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Title: At Home and Abroad; Or, Things and Thoughts in America and Europe

Author: Margaret Fuller

Editor: Arthur B. Fuller

Release date: July 18, 2005 [eBook #16327]
                Most recently updated: December 12, 2020

Language: English

Credits: Produced by Alison Hadwin and the Online Distributed
        Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net


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AT HOME AND ABROAD;
OR,
THINGS AND THOUGHTS
IN
AMERICA AND EUROPE.


BY
MARGARET FULLER OSSOLI,

Author of "Woman in the Nineteenth Century," "Art, Literature,
and the Drama," "Life without and Life Within," etc.

Edited by Her Brother,
ARTHUR B. FULLER.

NEW AND COMPLETE EDITION.

NEW YORK;
THE TRIBUNE ASSOCIATION.
134 Nassau Street
1869

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1856, by
ARTHUR B. FULLER,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of
Massachusetts.




PREFACE.


There are at least three classes of persons who travel in our own land
and abroad. The first and largest in number consists of those
who, "having eyes, see not, and ears, hear not," anything which is
profitable to be remembered. Crossing lake and ocean, passing over
the broad prairies of the New World or the classic fields of the Old,
though they look on the virgin soil sown thickly with flowers by
the hand of God, or on scenes memorable in man's history, they gaze
heedlessly, and when they return home can but tell us what they ate
and drank, and where slept,--no more; for this and matters of like
import are all for which they have cared in their wanderings.

Those composing the second class travel more intelligently. They
visit scrupulously all places which are noted either as the homes of
literature, the abodes of Art, or made classic by the pens of ancient
genius. Accurately do they mark the distance of one famed city from
another, the size and general appearance of each; they see as many as
possible of celebrated pictures and works of art, and mark carefully
dimensions, age, and all details concerning them. Men, too, whom the
world regards as great men, whether because of wisdom, poesy, warlike
achievements, or of wealth and station, they seek to take by the
hand and in some degree to know; at least to note their appearance,
demeanor, and mode of life. Writers belonging to this class of
travellers are not to be undervalued; returning home, they can give
much useful information, and tell much which all wish to hear and
know, though, as their narratives are chiefly circumstantial, and
every year circumstances change, such recitals lessen constantly in
value.

But there is a third class of those who journey, who see indeed the
outward, and observe it well. They, too, seek localities where Art and
Genius dwell, or have painted on canvas or sculptured in marble their
memorials; they become acquainted with the people, both famed and
obscure, of the lands which they visit and in which for a time they
abide; their hearts throb as they stand on places where great deeds
have been done, with whose dust perhaps is mingled the sacred ashes
of men who fell in the warfare for truth and freedom,--a warfare begun
early in the world's history, and not yet ended. But they do much
_more_ than this. There is, though in a different sense from what
ancient Pagans fancied, a genius or guardian spirit of each scene,
each stream and lake and country, and this spirit is ever speaking,
but in a tone which only the attent ear of the noble and gifted
can hear, and in a language which such minds and hearts only can
understand. With vision which needs no miracle to make it prophetic,
they see the destinies which nations are all-unconsciously shaping
for themselves, and note the deep meaning of passing events which only
make others wonder. Beneath the mask of mere externals, their eyes
discern the character of those whom they meet, and, refusing to accept
popular judgment in place of truth, they see often the real relation
which men bear to their race and age, and observe the facts by which
to determine whether such men are great only because of circumstances,
or by the irresistible power of their own minds. When such narrate
their journeyings, we have what is valuable not for a few years only,
but, because of its philosophic and suggestive spirit, what must
always be useful.

The reader of the following pages, it is believed, will decide that
Margaret Fuller deserves to rank with the latter class of travellers,
while not neglectful of those details which it is well to learn and
remember.

Twelve years ago she journeyed, in company with several friends, on
the Lakes, and through some of the Western States. Returning, she
published a volume describing this journey, which seems worthy of
republication. It seems so because it rather gives an idea of Western
scenery and character, than enters into guide-book statements which
would be all erroneous now.

Beside this, it is much a record of thoughts as well as things, and
those thoughts have lost none of their significance now. It gives us
also knowledge of Indian character, and impressions respecting that
much injured and fast vanishing race, which justice to them makes it
desirable should be remembered. The friends of Madame Ossoli will be
glad to make permanent this additional proof of her sympathy with all
the oppressed, no matter whether that oppression find embodiment in
the Indian or the African, the American or the European.

The second part of the present volume gives my sister's impressions
and observations during her European journey and residence in Italy.
This is done through letters, which originally appeared in the New
York Tribune but have never before been gathered into book form. There
may be a degree of incompleteness, sometimes perhaps inaccuracy, in
these letters, which are inseparable attendants upon letter-writing
during a journey or amid exciting and warlike scenes. None can lament
more than I that their writer lives not to revise them. Some errors,
too, were doubtless made in the original printing of these letters,
owing to her handwriting not being easily read by those who were not
familiar with it, and very probably some such errors may have escaped
my notice in the revision, especially as many emendations must be
conjectural, the original manuscript not now existing.

There is one fact, however, which gives this part of the volume a high
value. Madame Ossoli was in Rome during the most eventful period of
its modern history. She was almost the only American who remained
there during the Italian Revolution, and the siege of the city. Her
marriage with the Marquis Ossoli, who was Captain of the Civic Guard
and active in the republican councils and army, and her own ardent
love of freedom, and sacrifices for it, brought her into immediate
acquaintance with the leaders in the revolutionary army, and made
her cognizant of their plans, their motives, and their characters.
Unsuccessful for a time as has been that struggle for freedom, it was
yet a noble one, and its true history should be known in this country
and in all lands, that justice may be done to those who sacrificed
much, some even life, in behalf of liberty. Her peculiar fitness to
write the history of this struggle is well expressed by Mr. Greeley,
in his Introduction to one of her volumes recently published.[A] "Of
Italy's last struggle for liberty and light," he says, "she might
not merely say, with the Grattan of Ireland's kindred effort, half a
century earlier, 'I stood by its cradle; I followed its hearse.'
She might fairly claim to have been a portion of its incitement, its
animation, its informing soul. She bore more than a woman's part in
its conflicts and its perils; and the bombs of that ruthless army
which a false and traitorous government impelled against the ramparts
of Republican Rome, could have stilled no voice more eloquent in its
exposures, no heart more lofty in its defiance, of the villany which
so wantonly drowned in blood the hopes, while crushing the dearest
rights, of a people, than those of Margaret Fuller."

[Footnote A: Introduction to Papers on Literature and Art, p. 8.]

Inadequate, indeed, are these letters as a memorial and vindication of
that struggle, in comparison with the history which Madame Ossoli had
written, and which perished with her; but well do they deserve to be
preserved, as the record of a clear-minded and true-hearted eyewitness
of, and participator in, this effort to establish a new and better
Roman Republic. In one respect they have an interest higher than
would the history. They were written during the struggle, and show the
fluctuations of hope and despondency-which animated those most deeply
interested. I have thought it right to leave unchanged all expressions
of her opinion and feeling, even when it is evident from the letters
themselves that these were gradually somewhat modified by ensuing
events. Especially did this change occur in regard to the Pope, whom
she at first regarded, in common with all lovers of freedom in this
and other lands, with a hopefulness which was doomed to a cruel
disappointment. She was, however, never for a moment deceived as to
his character. His heart she believed kindly and good; his intellect,
of a low order; his views as to reform, narrow, intending only what is
partial, temporary, and alleviating, never a permanent, vital reform,
which should remove the cause of the ills on account of which his
people groaned. Really to elevate and free Italy, it was necessary to
remove the yoke of ecclesiastical and political thraldom; to do this
formed no part of his plans,--from his very nature he was incapable
of so great a purpose. The expression in her letters of this opinion,
when most people hoped better things, was at first censured, as doing
injustice to Pius IX.; but alas! events proved the impulses of his
heart to be in subjection to the prejudices of his mind, and that mind
to be weaker than even she had deemed it, with views as narrow as she
had feared.

The third part of this volume contains some letters to friends, which
were never written for the public eye, but are necessary to complete,
as far as can now be done, the narrative of her residence abroad. Some
few of these have already appeared in her "Memoirs," a work I cannot
too warmly recommend to those who would know my sister's character.
Many more of her letters may be there found, equally worthy of
perusal, but not so necessary to complete the history of events in
Italy.

The fourth part contains the details of that shipwreck which caused
mourning not only in the hearts of her kindred, but of the many
who knew and loved her. These, with some poems commemorative of her
character and eventful death, form a sad but fitting close to a book
which records her European journeyings, and her voyage to a home which
proved to be not in this land, where were waiting warm hearts to bid
her welcome, but one in a land yet freer, better than this, where she
can be no less loved by the angels, by our Saviour, and the Infinite
Father. After the copy for this volume had been sent to the press,
it was found necessary to omit some portions of the work in the
republication, as too much matter had been furnished for a volume of
reasonable size. The Editor made these omissions with much reluctance,
but the desire to bring a record of Madame Ossoli's journeyings within
the compass of one volume outweighed that reluctance. He believes the
omissions have been made in such a way as not materially to diminish
its value, especially as most which has been omitted will find place
in another volume he hopes soon to issue, containing a portion of the
miscellaneous writings of Madame Ossoli.

All of these omissions that are important occur in the Summer on the
Lakes, it being thought better to omit from a portion of the work
which had previously been before the public in book form. The
episodical nature of that work, too, enabled the Editor to make
omissions without in any way marring its unity. These omissions, when
other than mere verbal ones, consist of extracts from books which she
read in relation to the Indians; an account of and translation from
the Seeress of Prevorst, a German work which had not then, but has
since, been translated into English, and republished in this country;
a few extracts from letters and poems sent to her by friends while she
was in the West, one of which poems has been since published elsewhere
by its author; and the story of Marianna, (a great portion of which
may be found in my sister's "Memoirs,") and also Lines to Edith, a
short poem. Marianna and Lines to Edith will probably be republished
in another volume. From the letters of Madame Ossoli in Parts II. and
III. no omissions have been made other than verbal, or when pertaining
to trifling incidents, having only a temporary interest. Nothing in
any portion of the book recording my sister's own observations or
opinions has been omitted or changed. The reader, too, will notice
that nothing affecting the unity of the narrative is here wanting, the
volume even gaining in that respect by the omission of extracts from
other writers, and of a story and short poem not connected in any
regard with Western life.

In conclusion, the Editor would express the sincere hope that this
volume may not only be of general interest, but inspire its readers
with an increased love of republican institutions, and an earnest
purpose to seek the removal of every national wrong which hinders
our beloved country from being a perfect example and hearty helper
of other nations in their struggles for liberty. May it do something,
also, to remove misapprehension of the motives, character, and action
of those noble patriots of Italy, who strove, though for a time
vainly, to make their country free, and to deepen the sympathy which
every true American should feel with faithful men everywhere, who by
art are seeking to refine, by philanthropic exertion to elevate, by
the diffusion of truth to enlighten, or by self-sacrifice and earnest
effort to free, their fellow-men.

A.B.F.

Boston, March 1, 1856.




CONTENTS.


  PART  I.
  SUMMER ON THE LAKES 1


  PART  II.
  THINGS AND THOUGHTS IN EUROPE 117


  PART  III.
  LETTERS FROM ABROAD TO FRIENDS AT HOME 423


  PART IV.
  HOMEWARD VOYAGE, AND MEMORIALS 441




PART I

SUMMER ON THE LAKES.

  Summer days of busy leisure,
  Long summer days of dear-bought pleasure,
  You have done your teaching well;
  Had the scholar means to tell
  How grew the vine of bitter-sweet,
  What made the path for truant feet,
  Winter nights would quickly pass,
  Gazing on the magic glass
  O'er which the new-world shadows pass.
  But, in fault of wizard spell,
  Moderns their tale can only tell
  In dull words, with a poor reed
  Breaking at each time of need.
  Yet those to whom a hint suffices
  Mottoes find for all devices,
  See the knights behind their shields,
  Through dried grasses, blooming fields.

       *       *       *       *       *

  Some dried grass-tufts from the wide flowery field,
  A muscle-shell from the lone fairy shore,
  Some antlers from tall woods which never more
  To the wild deer a safe retreat can yield,
  An eagle's feather which adorned a Brave,
  Well-nigh the last of his despairing band,--
  For such slight gifts wilt thou extend thy hand
  When weary hours a brief refreshment crave?
  I give you what I can, not what I would
  If my small drinking-cup would hold a flood,
  As Scandinavia sung those must contain
  With which, the giants gods may entertain;
  In our dwarf day we drain few drops, and soon must thirst again.




CHAPTER I.

NIAGARA.


Niagara, June 10, 1843.

Since you are to share with me such foot-notes as may be made on the
pages of my life during this summer's wanderings, I should not be
quite silent as to this magnificent prologue to the, as yet, unknown
drama. Yet I, like others, have little to say, where the spectacle is,
for once, great enough to fill the whole life, and supersede thought,
giving us only its own presence. "It is good to be here," is the best,
as the simplest, expression that occurs to the mind.

We have been here eight days, and I am quite willing to go away. So
great a sight soon satisfies, making us content with itself, and with
what is less than itself. Our desires, once realized, haunt us again
less readily. Having "lived one day," we would depart, and become
worthy to live another.

We have not been fortunate in weather, for there cannot be too much,
or too warm sunlight for this scene, and the skies have been lowering,
with cold, unkind winds. My nerves, too much braced up by such an
atmosphere, do not well bear the continual stress of sight and sound.
For here there is no escape from the weight of a perpetual creation;
all other forms and motions come and go, the tide rises and recedes,
the wind, at its mightiest, moves in gales and gusts, but here is
really an incessant, an indefatigable motion. Awake or asleep, there
is no escape, still this rushing round you and through you. It is
in this way I have most felt the grandeur,--somewhat eternal, if not
infinite.

At times a secondary music rises; the cataract seems to seize its own
rhythm and sing it over again, so that the ear and soul are roused by
a double vibration. This is some effect of the wind, causing echoes
to the thundering anthem. It is very sublime, giving the effect of a
spiritual repetition through all the spheres.

When I first came, I felt nothing but a quiet satisfaction. I found
that drawings, the panorama, &c. had given me a clear notion of the
position and proportions of all objects here; I knew where to look for
everything, and everything looked as I thought it would.

Long ago, I was looking from a hill-side with a friend at one of
the finest sunsets that ever enriched, this world. A little cowboy,
trudging along, wondered what we could be gazing at. After spying
about some time, he found it could only be the sunset, and looking,
too, a moment, he said approvingly, "That sun looks well enough"; a
speech worthy of Shakespeare's Cloten, or the infant Mercury, up to
everything from the cradle, as you please to take it.

Even such a familiarity, worthy of Jonathan, our national hero, in
a prince's palace, or "stumping," as he boasts to have done, "up the
Vatican stairs, into the Pope's presence, in my old boots," I felt
here; it looks really _well enough_, I felt, and was inclined, as you
suggested, to give my approbation as to the one object in the world
that would not disappoint.

But all great expression, which, on a superficial survey, seems so
easy as well as so simple, furnishes, after a while, to the faithful
observer, its own standard by which to appreciate it. Daily these
proportions widened and towered more and more upon my sight, and I
got, at last, a proper foreground for these sublime distances. Before
coming away, I think I really saw the full wonder of the scene. After
a while it so drew me into itself as to inspire an undefined dread,
such as I never knew before, such as may be felt when death is about
to usher us into a new existence. The perpetual trampling of the
waters seized my senses. I felt that no other sound, however near,
could be heard, and would start and look behind me for a foe. I
realized the identity of that mood of nature in which these waters
were poured down with such absorbing force, with that in which the
Indian was shaped on the same soil. For continually upon my mind came,
unsought and unwelcome, images, such as never haunted it before, of
naked savages stealing behind me with uplifted tomahawks; again and
again this illusion recurred, and even after I had thought it over,
and tried to shake it off, I could not help starting and looking
behind me.

As picture, the falls can only be seen from the British side. There
they are seen in their veils, and at sufficient distance to appreciate
the magical effects of these, and the light and shade. From the boat,
as you cross, the effects and contrasts are more melodramatic. On the
road back from the whirlpool, we saw them as a reduced picture with
delight. But what I liked best was to sit on Table Rock, close to
the great fall. There all power of observing details, all separate
consciousness, was quite lost.

Once, just as I had seated myself there, a man came to take his first
look. He walked close up to the fall, and, after looking at it a
moment, with an air as if thinking how he could best appropriate it to
his own use, he spat into it.

This trait seemed wholly worthy of an age whose love of _utility_ is
such that the Prince Puckler Muskau suggests the probability of
men coming to put the bodies of their dead parents in the fields to
fertilize them, and of a country such as Dickens has described; but
these will not, I hope, be seen on the historic page to be truly the
age or truly the America. A little leaven is leavening the whole mass
for other bread.

The whirlpool I like very much. It is seen to advantage after the
great falls; it is so sternly solemn. The river cannot look more
imperturbable, almost sullen in its marble green, than it does just
below the great fall; but the slight circles that mark the hidden
vortex seem to whisper mysteries the thundering voice above could not
proclaim,--a meaning as untold as ever.

It is fearful, too, to know, as you look, that whatever has been
swallowed by the cataract is like to rise suddenly to light here,
whether uprooted tree, or body of man or bird.

The rapids enchanted me far beyond what I expected; they are so swift
that they cease to seem so; you can think only of their beauty. The
fountain beyond the Moss Islands I discovered for myself, and thought
it for some time an accidental beauty which it would not do to
leave, lest I might never see it again. After I found it permanent,
I returned many times to watch the play of its crest. In the little
waterfall beyond, Nature seems, as she often does, to have made a
study for some larger design. She delights in this,--a sketch within
a sketch, a dream within a dream. Wherever we see it, the lines of
the great buttress in the fragment of stone, the hues of the
waterfall copied in the flowers that star its bordering mosses, we
are delighted; for all the lineaments become fluent, and we mould the
scene in congenial thought with its genius.

People complain of the buildings at Niagara, and fear to see it
further deformed. I cannot sympathize with such an apprehension: the
spectacle is capable of swallowing up all such objects; they are not
seen in the great whole, more than an earthworm in a wide field.

The beautiful wood on Goat Island is full of flowers; many of the
fairest love to do homage here. The Wake-robin and May-apple are in
bloom now; the former, white, pink, green, purple, copying the rainbow
of the fall, and fit to make a garland for its presiding deity when he
walks the land, for they are of imperial size, and shaped like stones
for a diadem. Of the May-apple, I did not raise one green tent without
finding a flower beneath.

And now farewell. Niagara. I have seen thee, and I think all who come
here must in some sort see thee; thou art not to be got rid of as
easily as the stars. I will be here again beneath some flooding July
moon and sun. Owing to the absence of light, I have seen the rainbow
only two or three times by day; the lunar bow not at all. However, the
imperial presence needs not its crown, though illustrated by it.

General Porter and Jack Downing were not unsuitable figures here. The
former heroically planted the bridges by which we cross to Goat Island
and the Wake-robin-crowned genius has punished his temerity with
deafness, which must, I think, have come upon him when he sunk the
first stone in the rapids. Jack seemed an acute and entertaining
representative of Jonathan, come to look at his great water-privilege.
He told us all about the Americanisms of the spectacle; that is to
say, the battles that have been fought here. It seems strange that
men could fight in such a place; but no temple can still the personal
griefs and strifes in the breasts of its visitors.

No less strange is the fact that, in this neighborhood, an eagle
should be chained for a plaything. When a child, I used often to stand
at a window from which I could see an eagle chained in the balcony of
a museum. The people used to poke at it with sticks, and my childish
heart would swell with indignation as I saw their insults, and the
mien with which they were borne by the monarch-bird. Its eye was dull,
and its plumage soiled and shabby, yet, in its form and attitude,
all the king was visible, though sorrowful and dethroned. I never
saw another of the family till, when passing through the Notch of the
White Mountains, at that moment glowing before us in all the panoply
of sunset, the driver shouted, "Look there!" and following with our
eyes his upward-pointing finger, we saw, soaring slow in majestic
poise above the highest summit, the bird of Jove. It was a glorious
sight, yet I know not that I felt more on seeing the bird in all its
natural freedom and royalty, than when, imprisoned and insulted,
he had filled my early thoughts with the Byronic "silent rages" of
misanthropy.

Now, again, I saw him a captive, and addressed by the vulgar with the
language they seem to find most appropriate to such occasions,--that
of thrusts and blows. Silently, his head averted, he ignored their
existence, as Plotinus or Sophocles might that of a modern reviewer.
Probably he listened to the voice of the cataract, and felt that
congenial powers flowed free, and was consoled, though his own wing
was broken.

The story of the Recluse of Niagara interested me a little. It is
wonderful that men do not oftener attach their lives to localities
of great beauty,--that, when once deeply penetrated, they will let
themselves so easily be borne away by the general stream of things,
to live anywhere and anyhow. But there is something ludicrous in being
the hermit of a show-place, unlike St. Francis in his mountain-bed,
where none but the stars and rising sun ever saw him.

There is also a "guide to the falls," who wears his title labelled on
his hat; otherwise, indeed, one might as soon think of asking for a
gentleman usher to point out the moon. Yet why should we wonder at
such, when we have Commentaries on Shakespeare, and Harmonies of the
Gospels?

And now you have the little all I have to write. Can it interest you?
To one who has enjoyed the full life of any scene, of any hour, what
thoughts can be recorded about it seem like the commas and semicolons
in the paragraph,--mere stops. Yet I suppose it is not so to the
absent. At least, I have read things written about Niagara, music, and
the like, that interested _me_. Once I was moved by Mr. Greenwood's
remark, that he could not realize this marvel till, opening his eyes
the next morning after he had seen it, his doubt as to the possibility
of its being still there taught him what he had experienced. I
remember this now with pleasure, though, or because, it is exactly the
opposite to what I myself felt. For all greatness affects different
minds, each in "its own particular kind," and the variations of
testimony mark the truth of feeling.[A]

[Footnote A: "Somewhat avails, in one regard, the mere sight of beauty
without the union of feeling therewith. Carried away in memory, it
hangs there in the lonely hall as a picture, and may some time do its
message. I trust it may be so in my case, for I _saw_ every object far
more clearly than if I had been moved and filled with the presence,
and my recollections are equally distinct and vivid." Extracted from
Manuscript Notes of this Journey left by Margaret Fuller.--ED.]

I will here add a brief narrative of the experience of another, as
being much better than anything I could write, because more simple and
individual.

"Now that I have left this 'Earth-wonder,' and the emotions it
excited are past, it seems not so much like profanation to analyze
my feelings, to recall minutely and accurately the effect of this
manifestation of the Eternal. But one should go to such a scene
prepared to yield entirely to its influences, to forget one's little
self and one's little mind. To see a miserable worm creep to the brink
of this falling world of waters, and watch the trembling of its
own petty bosom, and fancy that this is made alone to act upon him
excites--derision? No,--pity."

As I rode up to the neighborhood of the falls, a solemn awe
imperceptibly stole over me, and the deep sound of the ever-hurrying
rapids prepared my mind for the lofty emotions to be experienced. When
I reached the hotel, I felt a strange indifference about seeing the
aspiration of my life's hopes. I lounged about the rooms, read the
stage-bills upon the walls, looked over the register, and, finding the
name of an acquaintance, sent to see if he was still there. What this
hesitation arose from, I know not; perhaps it was a feeling of my
unworthiness to enter this temple which nature has erected to its God.

At last, slowly and thoughtfully I walked down to the bridge leading
to Goat Island, and when I stood upon this frail support, and saw
a quarter of a mile of tumbling, rushing rapids, and heard their
everlasting roar, my emotions overpowered me, a choking sensation rose
to my throat, a thrill rushed through my veins, "my blood ran rippling
to my fingers' ends." This was the climax of the effect which the
falls produced upon me,--neither the American nor the British fall
moved me as did these rapids. For the magnificence, the sublimity of
the latter, I was prepared by descriptions and by paintings. When I
arrived in sight of them I merely felt, "Ah, yes! here is the fall,
just as I have seen it in a picture." When I arrived at the Terrapin
Bridge, I expected to be overwhelmed, to retire trembling from this
giddy eminence, and gaze with unlimited wonder and awe upon the
immense mass rolling on and on; but, somehow or other, I thought only
of comparing the effect on my mind with what I had read and heard.
I looked for a short time, and then, with almost a feeling of
disappointment, turned to go to the other points of view, to see if I
was not mistaken in not feeling any surpassing emotion at this sight.
But from the foot of Biddle's Stairs, and the middle of the river, and
from below the Table Rock, it was still "barren, barren all."

Provoked with my stupidity in feeling most moved in the wrong place,
I turned away to the hotel, determined to set off for Buffalo that
afternoon. But the stage did not go, and, after nightfall, as there
was a splendid moon, I went down to the bridge, and leaned over the
parapet, where the boiling rapids came down in their might. It was
grand, and it was also gorgeous; the yellow rays of the moon made
the broken waves appear like auburn tresses twining around the black
rocks. But they did not inspire me as before. I felt a foreboding of a
mightier emotion to rise up and swallow all others, and I passed on to
the Terrapin Bridge. Everything was changed, the misty apparition had
taken off its many-colored crown which it had worn by day, and a bow
of silvery white spanned its summit. The moonlight gave a poetical
indefiniteness to the distant parts of the waters, and while the
rapids were glancing in her beams, the river below the falls was black
as night, save where the reflection of the sky gave it the appearance
of a shield of blued steel. No gaping tourists loitered, eyeing with
their glasses, or sketching on cards the hoary locks of the ancient
river-god. All tended to harmonize with the natural grandeur of the
scene. I gazed long. I saw how here mutability and unchangeableness
were united. I surveyed the conspiring waters rushing against the
rocky ledge to overthrow it at one mad plunge, till, like toppling
ambition, o'er-leaping themselves, they fall on t' other side,
expanding into foam ere they reach the deep channel where they creep
submissively away.

Then arose in my breast a genuine admiration, and a humble adoration
of the Being who was the architect of this and of all. Happy were the
first discoverers of Niagara, those who could come unawares upon this
view and upon that, whose feelings were entirely their own. With what
gusto does Father Hennepin describe "this great downfall of water,"
"this vast and prodigious cadence of water, which falls down after a
surprising and astonishing manner, insomuch that the universe does not
afford its parallel. 'Tis true Italy and Swedeland boast of some such
things, but we may well say that they be sorry patterns when compared
with this of which we do now speak."




CHAPTER II.

THE LAKES.--CHICAGO.--GENEVA.--A THUNDER-STORM.--PAPAW GROVE.


SCENE, STEAMBOAT.--_About to leave Buffalo.--Baggage coming on
board.--Passengers bustling for their berths.--Little boys persecuting
everybody with their newspapers and pamphlets.--J., S., and M. huddled
up in a forlorn corner, behind a large trunk.--A heavy rain falling._

_M._ Water, water everywhere. After Niagara one would like a dry strip
of existence. And at any rate it is quite enough for me to have it
under foot without having it overhead in this way.

_J._ Ah, do not abuse the gentle element. It is hardly possible to
have too much of it, and indeed, if I were obliged to choose amid the
four, it would be the one in which I could bear confinement best.

_S._ You would make a pretty Undine, to be sure!

_J._ Nay. I only offered myself as a Triton, a boisterous Triton of
the sounding shell. You, M., I suppose, would be a salamander, rather.

_M._ No! that is too equivocal a position, whether in modern
mythology, or Hoffman's tales. I should choose to be a gnome.

_J._ That choice savors of the pride that apes humility.

_M._ By no means; the gnomes are the most important of all the
elemental tribes. Is it not they who make the money?

_J._ And are accordingly a dark, mean, scoffing ----

_M._ You talk as if you had always lived in that wild, unprofitable
element you are so fond of, where all things glitter, and nothing is
gold; all show and no substance. My people work in the secret, and
their works praise them in the open light; they remain in the dark
because only there such marvels could be bred. You call them mean.
They do not spend their energies on their own growth, or their own
play, but to feed the veins of Mother Earth with permanent splendors,
very different from what she shows on the surface.

Think of passing a life, not merely in heaping together, but _making_
gold. Of all dreams, that of the alchemist is the most poetical, for
he looked at the finest symbol. "Gold," says one of our friends, "is
the hidden light of the earth, it crowns the mineral, as wine the
vegetable order, being the last expression of vital energy."

_J._ Have you paid for your passage?

_J._ Yes! and in gold, not in shells or pebbles.

_J._ No really wise gnome would scoff at the water, the beautiful
water. "The spirit of man is like the water."

_S._ And like the air and fire, no less.

_J._ Yes, but not like the earth, this low-minded creature's chosen,
dwelling.

_M._ The earth is spirit made fruitful,--life. And its heartbeats are
told in gold and wine.

_J._ Oh! it is shocking to hear such sentiments in these times. I
thought that Bacchic energy of yours was long since repressed.

_M._ No! I have only learned to mix water with my wine, and stamp upon
my gold the heads of kings, or the hieroglyphics of worship. But since
I have learnt to mix with water, let's hear what you have to say in
praise of your favorite.

_J._ From water Venus was born, what more would you have? It is the
mother of Beauty, the girdle of earth, and the marriage of nations.

_S._ Without any of that high-flown poetry, it is enough, I think,
that it is the great artist, turning all objects that approach it to
picture.

_J._ True, no object that touches it, whether it be the cart that
ploughs the wave for sea-weed, or the boat or plank that rides upon
it, but is brought at once from the demesne of coarse utilities into
that of picture. All trades, all callings, become picturesque by the
water's side, or on the water. The soil, the slovenliness, is washed
out of every calling by its touch. All river-crafts, sea-crafts, are
picturesque, are poetical. Their very slang is poetry.

_M._ The reasons for that are complex.

_J._ The reason is, that there can be no plodding, groping words and
motions on my water as there are on your earth. There is no time,
no chance for them where all moves so rapidly, though so smoothly;
everything connected with water must be like itself, forcible, but
clear. That is why sea-slang is so poetical; there is a word for
everything and every act, and a thing and an act for every word.
Seamen must speak quick and bold, but also with utmost precision.
They cannot reef and brace other than in a Homeric dialect,--
therefore--(Steamboat bell rings.) But I must say a quick good-by.

_M._ What, going, going back to earth after all this talk upon the
other side. Well, that is nowise Homeric, but truly modern.

J. is borne off without time for any reply, but a laugh--at himself,
of course.

S. and M. retire to their state-rooms to forget the wet, the chill,
and steamboat smell, in their just-bought new world of novels.

Next day, when we stopped at Cleveland, the storm was just clearing
up; ascending the bluff, we had one of the finest views of the lake
that could have been wished. The varying depths of these lakes give to
their surface a great variety of coloring, and beneath this wild sky
and changeful light, the waters presented a kaleidoscopic variety
of hues, rich, but mournful. I admire these bluffs of red, crumbling
earth. Here land and water meet under very different auspices from
those of the rock-bound coast to which I have been accustomed. There
they meet tenderly to challenge, and proudly to refuse, though, not in
fact repel. But here they meet to mingle, are always rushing together,
and changing places; a new creation takes place beneath the eye.

The weather grew gradually clearer, but not bright; yet we could see
the shore and appreciate the extent of these noble waters.

Coming up the river St. Clair, we saw Indians for the first time.
They were camped out on the bank. It was twilight, and their blanketed
forms, in listless groups or stealing along the bank, with a lounge
and a stride so different in its wildness from the rudeness of the
white settler, gave me the first feeling that I really approached the
West.

The people on the boat were almost all New-Englanders, seeking their
fortunes. They had brought with them their habits of calculation,
their cautious manners, their love of polemics. It grieved me to hear
these immigrants, who were to be the fathers of a new race, all, from
the old man down to the little girl, talking, not of what they should
do, but of what they should get in the new scene. It was to them a
prospect, not of the unfolding nobler energies, but of more ease and
larger accumulation. It wearied me, too, to hear Trinity and Unity
discussed in the poor, narrow, doctrinal way on these free waters; but
that will soon cease; there is not time for this clash of opinions in
the West, where the clash of material interests is so noisy. They will
need the spirit of religion more than ever to guide them, but will
find less time than before for its doctrine. This change was to me,
who am tired of the war of words on these subjects, and believe it
only sows the wind to reap the whirlwind, refreshing, but I argue
nothing from it; there is nothing real in the freedom of thought at
the West,--it is from the position of men's lives, not the state
of their minds. So soon as they have time, unless they grow better
meanwhile, they will cavil and criticise, and judge other men by their
own standard, and outrage the law of love every way, just as they do
with us.

We reached Mackinaw the evening of the third day, but, to my great
disappointment, it was too late and too rainy to go ashore. The beauty
of the island, though seen under the most unfavorable circumstances,
did not disappoint my expectations.[A] But I shall see it to more
purpose on my return.

[Footnote A: "Mackinaw, that long desired, sight, was dimly discerned
under a thick fog, yet it soothed and cheered me. All looked mellow
there; man seemed to have worked in harmony with Nature instead of
rudely invading her, as in most Western towns. It seemed possible, on
that spot, to lead a life of serenity and cheerfulness. Some richly
dressed Indians came down to show themselves. Their dresses were of
blue broadcloth, with splendid leggings and knee-ties. On their heads
were crimson scarfs adorned with beads and falling on one shoulder,
their hair long and looking cleanly. Near were one or two wild figures
clad in the common white blankets." Manuscript Notes.--ED.]

As the day has passed dully, a cold rain preventing us from keeping
out in the air, my thoughts have been dwelling on a story told when we
were off Detroit, this morning, by a fellow-passenger, and whose moral
beauty touched me profoundly.

"Some years ago," said Mrs. L., "my father and mother stopped to
dine at Detroit. A short time before dinner my father met in the hall
Captain P., a friend of his youthful days. He had loved P. extremely,
as did many who knew him, and had not been surprised to hear of the
distinction and popular esteem which his wide knowledge, talents, and
noble temper commanded, as he went onward in the world. P. was every
way fitted to succeed; his aims were high, but not too high for his
powers, suggested by an instinct of his own capacities, not by an
ideal standard drawn from culture. Though steadfast in his course, it
was not to overrun others; his wise self-possession was no less for
them than himself. He was thoroughly the gentleman, gentle because
manly, and was a striking instance that, where there is strength
for sincere courtesy, there is no need of other adaptation to the
character of others, to make one's way freely and gracefully through
the crowd.

"My father was delighted to see him, and after a short parley in the
hall, 'We will dine together,' he cried, 'then we shall have time to
tell all our stories.'

"P. hesitated a moment, then said, 'My wife is with me.'

"'And mine with me,' said my father; 'that's well; they, too, will
have an opportunity of getting acquainted, and can entertain one
another, if they get tired of our college stories.'

"P. acquiesced, with a grave bow, and shortly after they all met in
the dining-room. My father was much surprised at the appearance of
Mrs. P. He had heard that his friend married abroad, but nothing
further, and he was not prepared to see the calm, dignified P. with
a woman on his arm, still handsome, indeed, but whose coarse and
imperious expression showed as low habits of mind as her exaggerated
dress and gesture did of education. Nor could there be a greater
contrast to my mother, who, though understanding her claims and place
with the certainty of a lady, was soft and retiring in an uncommon
degree.

"However, there was no time to wonder or fancy; they sat down, and
P. engaged in conversation, without much vivacity, but with his usual
ease. The first quarter of an hour passed well enough. But soon it was
observable that Mrs. P. was drinking glass after glass of wine, to an
extent few gentlemen did, even then, and soon that she was actually
excited by it. Before this, her manner had been brusque, if not
contemptuous, towards her new acquaintance; now it became, towards
my mother especially, quite rude. Presently she took up some slight
remark made by my mother, which, though, it did not naturally mean
anything of the sort, could be twisted into some reflection upon
England, and made it a handle, first of vulgar sarcasm, and then, upon
my mother's defending herself with some surprise and gentle dignity,
hurled upon her a volley of abuse, beyond Billingsgate.

"My mother, confounded by scenes and ideas presented to her mind
equally new and painful, sat trembling; she knew not what to do; tears
rushed into her eyes. My father, no less distressed, yet unwilling
to outrage the feelings of his friend by doing or saying what his
indignation prompted, turned an appealing look on P.

"Never, as he often said, was the painful expression of that sight
effaced from his mind. It haunted his dreams and disturbed his waking
thoughts. P. sat with his head bent forward, and his eyes cast down,
pale, but calm, with a fixed expression, not merely of patient woe,
but of patient shame, which it would not have been thought possible
for that noble countenance to wear. 'Yet,' said my father, 'it became
him. At other times he was handsome, but then beautiful, though of a
beauty saddened and abashed. For a spiritual light borrowed from the
worldly perfection of his mien that illustration by contrast, which
the penitence of the Magdalen does from the glowing earthliness of her
charms.'

"Seeing that he preserved silence, while Mrs. P. grew still more
exasperated, my father rose and led his wife to her own room. Half
an hour had passed, in painful and wondering surmises, when a gentle
knock was heard at the door, and P. entered equipped for a journey.
'We are just going,' he said, and holding out his hand, but without
looking at them, 'Forgive.'

"They each took his hand, and silently pressed it; then he went
without a word more.

"Some time passed, and they heard now and then of P., as he passed
from one army station to another, with his uncongenial companion,
who became, it was said, constantly more degraded. Whoever mentioned
having seen them wondered at the chance which had yoked him to such
a woman, but yet more at the silent fortitude with which he bore it.
Many blamed him for enduring it, apparently without efforts to check
her; others answered that he had probably made such at an earlier
period, and, finding them unavailing, had resigned himself to despair,
and was too delicate to meet the scandal that, with such resistance as
such a woman could offer, must attend a formal separation.

"But my father, who was not in such haste to come to conclusions, and
substitute some plausible explanation for the truth, found something
in the look of P. at that trying moment to which, none of these
explanations offered a key. There was in it, he felt, a fortitude,
but not the fortitude of the hero; a religious submission, above the
penitent, if not enkindled with the enthusiasm, of the martyr.

"I have said that my father was not one of those who are ready to
substitute specious explanations for truth, and those who are thus
abstinent rarely lay their hand, on a thread without making it a clew.
Such a man, like the dexterous weaver, lets not one color go till Ire
finds that which matches it in the pattern,--he keeps on weaving, but
chooses his shades; and my father found at last what he wanted to make
out the pattern for himself. He met a lady who had been intimate
with both himself and P. in early days, and, finding she had seen the
latter abroad, asked if she knew the circumstances of the marriage.

"'The circumstances of the act which sealed the misery of our friend,
I know,' she said, 'though as much in the dark as any one about the
motives that led to it.

"'We were quite intimate with P. in London, and he was our most
delightful companion. He was then in the full flower of the varied
accomplishments which set off his fine manners and dignified
character, joined, towards those he loved, with a certain soft
willingness which gives the desirable chivalry to a man. None was more
clear of choice where his personal affections were not touched,
but where they were, it cost him pain to say no, on the slightest
occasion. I have thought this must have had some connection with the
mystery of his misfortunes.

"'One day he called on me, and, without any preface, asked if I
would be present next day at his marriage. I was so surprised, and so
unpleasantly surprised, that I did not at first answer a word. We had
been on terms so familiar, that I thought I knew all about him, yet
had never dreamed of his having an attachment; and, though I had never
inquired on the subject, yet this reserve where perfect openness had
been supposed, and really, on my side, existed, seemed to me a kind of
treachery. Then it is never pleasant to know that a heart on which we
have some claim is to be given to another. We cannot tell how it will
affect our own relations with a person; it may strengthen or it may
swallow up other affections; the crisis is hazardous, and our first
thought, on such an occasion, is too often for ourselves,--at least
mine was. Seeing me silent, he repeated his question. "To whom," said
I, "are you to be married?" "That," he replied, "I cannot tell you."
He was a moment silent, then continued, with an impassive look of cold
self-possession, that affected me with strange sadness: "The name of
the person you will hear, of course, at the time, but more I cannot
tell you. I need, however, the presence, not only of legal, but of
respectable and friendly witnesses. I have hoped you and your husband
would, do me this kindness. Will you?" Something in his manner made it
impossible to refuse. I answered, before I knew I was going to speak,
"We will," and he left me.

"'I will not weary you with telling how I harassed myself and my
husband, who was, however, scarce less interested, with doubts and
conjectures. Suffice it that, next morning, P. came and took us in a
carriage to a distant church. We had just entered the porch, when a
cart, such as fruit and vegetables are brought to market in, drove
up, containing an elderly woman and a young girl. P. assisted them to
alight, and advanced with the girl to the altar.

"'The girl was neatly dressed and quite handsome, yet something in her
expression displeased me the moment I looked upon her. Meanwhile,
the ceremony was going on, and, at its close, P. introduced us to the
bride, and we all went to the door. "Good by, Fanny," said the elderly
woman. The new-made Mrs. P. replied without any token of affection or
emotion. The woman got into the cart and drove away.

"'From that time I saw but little of P. or his wife. I took our mutual
friends to see her, and they were civil to her for his sake. Curiosity
was very much excited, but entirely baffled; no one, of course, dared
speak to P. on the subject, and no other means could be found of
solving the riddle.

"'He treated his wife with grave and kind politeness, but it was
always obvious that they had nothing in common between them. Her
manners and tastes were not at that time gross, but her character
showed itself hard and material. She was fond of riding, and spent
much time so. Her style in this, and in dress, seemed the opposite of
P.'s; but he indulged all her wishes, while, for himself, he plunged
into his own pursuits.

"'For a time he seemed, if not happy, not positively unhappy; but,
after a few years, Mrs. P. fell into the habit of drinking, and then
such scenes as you witnessed grew frequent. I have often heard of
them, and always that P. sat, as you describe him, his head bowed down
and perfectly silent all through, whatever might be done or whoever
be present, and always his aspect has inspired such sympathy that no
person has questioned him or resented her insults, but merely got out
of the way as soon as possible.'

"'Hard and long penance,' said my father, after some minutes musing,
'for an hour of passion, probably for his only error.'

"'Is that your explanation?' said the lady. 'O, improbable! P. might
err, but not be led beyond himself.'

"I know that his cool, gray eye and calm complexion seemed to say
so, but a different story is told by the lip that could tremble, and
showed what flashes might pierce those deep blue heavens; and when
these over-intellectual beings do swerve aside, it is to fall down a
precipice, for their narrow path lies over such. But he was not one
to sin without making a brave atonement, and that it had become a holy
one, was written on that downcast brow."

The fourth day on these waters, the weather was milder and brighter,
so that we could now see them to some purpose. At night the moon was
clear, and, for the first time, from, the upper deck I saw one of the
great steamboats come majestically up. It was glowing with lights,
looking many-eyed and sagacious; in its heavy motion it seemed a
dowager queen, and this motion, with its solemn pulse, and determined
sweep, becomes these smooth waters, especially at night, as much as
the dip of the sail-ship the long billows of the ocean.

But it was not so soon that I learned to appreciate the lake scenery;
it was only after a daily and careless familiarity that I entered into
its beauty, for Nature always refuses to be seen by being stared at.
Like Bonaparte, she discharges her face of all expression when she
catches the eye of impertinent curiosity fixed on her. But he who has
gone to sleep in childish ease on her lap, or leaned an aching brow
upon her breast, seeking there comfort with full trust as from a
mother, will see all a mother's beauty in the look she bends upon him.
Later, I felt that I had really seen these regions, and shall speak of
them again.

In the afternoon we went on shore at the Manitou Islands, where the
boat stops to wood. No one lives here except wood-cutters for the
steamboats. I had thought of such a position, from its mixture of
profound solitude with service to the great world, as possessing an
ideal beauty. I think so still, even after seeing the wood-cutters and
their slovenly huts.

In times of slower growth, man did not enter a situation without a
certain preparation or adaptedness to it. He drew from it, if not to
the poetical extent, at least in some proportion, its moral and its
meaning. The wood-cutter did not cut down so many trees a day, that
the Hamadryads had not time to make their plaints heard; the shepherd
tended his sheep, and did no jobs or chores the while; the idyl had a
chance to grow up, and modulate his oaten pipe. But now the poet
must be at the whole expense of the poetry in describing one of these
positions; the worker is a true Midas to the gold he makes. The poet
must describe, as the painter sketches Irish peasant-girls and Danish
fishwives, adding the beauty, and leaving out the dirt.

I come to the West prepared for the distaste I must experience at its
mushroom growth. I know that, where "go ahead" is tire only motto, the
village cannot grow into the gentle proportions that successive
lives and the gradations of experience involuntarily give. In older
countries the house of the son grew from that of the father, as
naturally as new joints on a bough, and the cathedral crowned the
whole as naturally as the leafy summit the tree. This cannot be here.
The march of peaceful is scarce less wanton than that of warlike
invasion. The old landmarks are broken down, and the land, for a
season, bears none, except of the rudeness of conquest and the needs
of the day, whose bivouac-fires blacken the sweetest forest glades. I
have come prepared to see all this, to dislike it, but not with stupid
narrowness to distrust or defame. On the contrary, while I will not be
so obliging as to confound ugliness with beauty, discord with harmony,
and laud and be contented with all I meet, when it conflicts with my
best desires and tastes, I trust by reverent faith to woo the mighty
meaning of the scene, perhaps to foresee the law by which a new order,
a new poetry, is to be evoked from this chaos, and with a curiosity
as ardent, but not so selfish, as that of Macbeth, to call up the
apparitions of future kings from the strange ingredients of the
witch's caldron. Thus I will not grieve that all the noble trees are
gone already from this island to feed this caldron, but believe
it will have Medea's virtue, and reproduce them in the form of new
intellectual growths, since centuries cannot again adorn the land with
such as have been removed.

On this most beautiful beach of smooth white pebbles, interspersed
with agates and cornelians for those who know how to find them, we
stepped, not like the Indian, with some humble offering, which, if no
better than an arrow-head or a little parched corn, would, he judged,
please the Manitou, who looks only at the spirit in which it is
offered. Our visit was so far for a religious purpose that one of our
party went to inquire the fate of some Unitarian tracts left among
the wood-cutters a year or two before. But the old Manitou, though,
daunted like his children by the approach of the fire-ships, which he
probably considered demons of a new dynasty, he had suffered his
woods to be felled to feed their pride, had been less patient of an
encroachment which did not to him seem so authorized by the law of the
strongest, and had scattered those leaves as carelessly as the others
of that year.

But S. and I, like other emigrants, went, not to give, but to get,
to rifle the wood of flowers for the service of the fire-ship. We
returned with a rich booty, among which was the _Uva-ursi_, whose
leaves the Indians smoke, with the _Kinnikinnik_, and which had then
just put forth its highly finished little blossoms, as pretty as those
of the blueberry.

Passing along still further, I thought it would be well if the crowds
assembled to stare from the various landings were still confined to
the _Kinnikinnik_, for almost all had tobacco written on their faces,
their cheeks rounded with plugs, their eyes dull with its fumes. We
reached Chicago on the evening of the sixth day, having been out five
days and a half, a rather longer passage than usual at a favorable
season of the year.


Chicago, June 20.

There can be no two places in the world more completely thoroughfares
than this place and Buffalo. They are the two correspondent valves
that open and shut all the time, as the life-blood rushes from east to
west, and back again from west to east.

Since it is their office thus to be the doors, and let in and out, it
would be unfair to expect from them much character of their own. To
make the best provisions for the transmission of produce is their
office, and the people who live there are such as are suited for
this,--active, complaisant, inventive, business people. There are no
provisions for the student or idler; to know what the place can give,
you should be at work with the rest; the mere traveller will not find
it profitable to loiter there as I did.

Since circumstances made it necessary for me so to do, I read all the
books I could find about the new region, which now began, to become
real to me. Especially I read all the books about the Indians,--a
paltry collection truly, yet which furnished material for many
thoughts. The most narrow-minded and awkward recital still bears some
lineaments of the great features of this nature, and the races of men
that illustrated them.

Catlin's book is far the best. I was afterwards assured by those
acquainted with the regions he describes, that he is not to be
depended on for the accuracy of his facts, and indeed it is obvious,
without the aid of such assertions, that he sometimes yields to the
temptation of making out a story. They admitted, however, what from
my feelings I was sure of, that he is true to the spirit of the scene,
and that a far better view can be got from him than from any source
at present existing, of the Indian tribes of the Far West, and of the
country where their inheritance lay.

Murray's Travels I read, and was charmed by their accuracy and clear,
broad tone. He is the only Englishman that seems to have traversed
these regions as man simply, not as John Bull. He deserves to belong
to an aristocracy, for he showed his title to it more when left
without a guide in the wilderness, than he can at the court of
Victoria. He has; himself, no poetic force at description, but it is
easy to make images from his hints. Yet we believe the Indian cannot
be locked at truly except by a poetic eye. The Pawnees, no doubt, are
such as he describes them, filthy in their habits, and treacherous in
their character, but some would have seen, and seen truly, more beauty
and dignity than he does with all his manliness and fairness of mind.
However, his one fine old man is enough to redeem the rest, and is
perhaps tire relic of a better day, a Phocion among the Pawnees.

Schoolcraft's Algic Researches is a valuable book, though a worse
use could hardly have been made of such fine material. Had the
mythological or hunting stories of the Indians been written down
exactly as they were received from the lips of the narrators, the
collection could not have been surpassed in interest? both for
the wild charm they carry with them, and the light they throw on a
peculiar modification of life and mind. As it is, though the incidents
have an air of originality and pertinence to the occasion, that gives
us confidence that they have not been altered, the phraseology in
which they were expressed has been entirely set aside, and the flimsy
graces, common to the style of annuals and souvenirs, substituted for
the Spartan brevity and sinewy grasp of Indian speech. We can
just guess what might have been there, as we can detect the fine
proportions of the Brave whom the bad taste of some white patron has
arranged in frock-coat, hat, and pantaloons.

The few stories Mrs. Jameson wrote out, though to these also a
sentimental air has been given, offend much less in that way than is
common in this book. What would we not give for a completely faithful
version of some among them! Yet, with all these drawbacks, we cannot
doubt from internal evidence that they truly ascribe to the Indian
a delicacy of sentiment and of fancy that justifies Cooper in such
inventions as his Uncas. It is a white man's view of a savage hero,
who would be far finer in his natural proportions; still, through a
masquerade figure, it implies the truth.

Irving's books I also read, some for the first, some for the second
time, with increased interest, now that I was to meet such people as
he received his materials from. Though the books are pleasing from,
their grace and luminous arrangement, yet, with the exception of the
Tour to the Prairies, they have a stereotype, second-hand air. They
lack the breath, the glow, the charming minute traits of living
presence. His scenery is only fit to be glanced at from, dioramic
distance; his Indians are academic figures only. He would have made
the best of pictures, if he could have used his own eyes for studies
and sketches; as it is, his success is wonderful, but inadequate.

McKenney's Tour to the Lakes is the dullest of books, yet faithful and
quiet, and gives some facts not to be met with everywhere.

I also read a collection of Indian anecdotes and speeches, the worst
compiled and arranged book possible, yet not without clews of some
value. All these books I read in anticipation of a canoe-voyage
on Lake Superior as far as the Pictured Rocks, and, though I was
afterwards compelled to give up this project, they aided me in judging
of what I subsequently saw and heard of the Indians.

In Chicago I first saw the beautiful prairie-flowers. They were in
their glory the first ten days we were there,--

  "The golden and the flame-like flowers."

The flame-like flower I was taught afterwards, by an Indian girl, to
call "Wickapee"; and she told me, too, that its splendors had a useful
side, for it was used by the Indians as a remedy for an illness to
which they were subject.

Beside these brilliant flowers, which gemmed and gilt the grass in a
sunny afternoon's drive near the blue lake, between the low oak-wood
and the narrow beach, stimulated, whether sensuously by the optic
nerve, unused to so much gold and crimson with such tender green, or
symbolically through some meaning dimly seen in the flowers, I enjoyed
a sort of fairy-land exultation never felt before, and the first drive
amid the flowers gave me anticipation of the beauty of the prairies.

At first, the prairie seemed to speak of the very desolation of
dulness. After sweeping over the vast monotony of the lakes to come to
this monotony of land, with all around a limitless horizon,--to walk,
and walk, and run, but never climb, oh! it was too dreary for any but
a Hollander to bear. How the eye greeted the approach of a sail, or
the smoke of a steamboat; it seemed that anything so animated must
come from a better land, where mountains gave religion to the scene.

The only thing I liked at first to do was to trace with slow and
unexpecting step the narrow margin of the lake. Sometimes a heavy
swell gave it expression; at others, only its varied coloring, which
I found more admirable every day, and which gave it an air of mirage
instead of the vastness of ocean. Then there was a grandeur in the
feeling that I might continue that walk, if I had any seven-leagued
mode of conveyance to save fatigue, for hundreds of miles without an
obstacle and without a change.

But after I had ridden out, and seen the flowers, and observed the
sun set with that calmness seen only in the prairies, and tire cattle
winding slowly to their homes in the "island groves,"--most peaceful
of sights,--I began to love, because I began to know tire scene, and
shrank no longer from "the encircling vastness."

It is always thus with the new form of life; we must learn to look
at it by its own standard. At first, no doubt, my accustomed eye kept
saying, if the mind did not, What! no distant mountains? What! no
valleys? But after a while I would ascend the roof of the house where
we lived, and pass many hours, needing no sight but the moon reigning
in the heavens, or starlight falling upon the lake, till all the
lights were out in the island grove of men beneath my feet, and felt
nearer heaven that there was nothing but this lovely, still reception
on the earth; no towering mountains, no deep tree-shadows, nothing but
plain earth and water bathed in light.

Sunset, as seen from that place, presented most generally, low-lying,
flaky clouds, of the softest serenity.

One night a star "shot madly from, its sphere," and it had a fair
chance to be seen, but that serenity could not be astonished.

Yes! it was a peculiar beauty, that of those sunsets and moonlights on
the levels of Chicago, which Chamouny or the Trosachs could not make
me forget.[A]

[Footnote A: "From the prairie near Chicago had I seen, some days
before, the sun set with that calmness observed only on the prairies.
I know not what it says, but something quite different from sunset
at sea. There is no motion except of waving grasses,--the cattle move
slowly homeward in the distance. That _home!_ where is it? It seems as
If there was no home, and no need of one, and there is room enough to
wander on for ever."--Manuscript Notes.]

Notwithstanding all the attractions I thus found out by degrees on the
flat shores of the lake, I was delighted when I found myself really on
my way into the country for an excursion of two or three weeks. We set
forth in a strong wagon, almost as large, and with the look of those
used elsewhere for transporting caravans of wild beasts, loaded with
everything we might want, in case nobody would give it to us,--for
buying and selling were no longer to be counted on,--with, a pair of
strong horses, able and willing to force their way through mud-holes
and amid stumps, and a guide, equally admirable as marshal and
companion, who knew by heart the country and its history, both natural
and artificial, and whose clear hunter's eye needed, neither road nor
goal to guide it to all the spots where beauty best loves to dwell.

Add to this the finest weather, and such country as I had never seen,
even in my dreams, although these dreams had been haunted by wishes
for just such a one, and you may judge whether years of dulness might
not, by these bright days, be redeemed, and a sweetness be shed over
all thoughts of the West.

The first day brought us through woods rich in the moccason-flower
and lupine, and plains whose soft expanse was continually touched with
expression by the slow moving clouds which

  "Sweep over with their shadows, and beneath
  The surface rolls and fluctuates to the eye;
  Dark hollows seem to glide along and chase
          The sunny ridges,"

to the banks of the Fox River, a sweet and graceful stream. We
readied Geneva just in time to escape being drenched by a violent
thunder-shower, whose rise and disappearance threw expression into all
the features of the scene.

Geneva reminds me of a New England village, as indeed there, and
in the neighborhood, are many New-Englanders of an excellent stamp,
generous, intelligent, discreet, and seeking to win from life its true
values. Such are much wanted, and seem like points of light among the
swarms of settlers, whose aims are sordid, whose habits thoughtless
and slovenly.[A]

[Footnote A: "We passed a portion of one day with Mr. and Mrs. ----,
young, healthy, and, thank Heaven, _gay_ people. In the general
dulness that broods over this land where so little genius flows,
and care, business, and fashionable frivolity are equally dull,
unspeakable is the relief of some flashes of vivacity, some sparkles
of wit. Of course it is hard enough for those, most natively disposed
that way, to strike fire. I would willingly be the tinder to promote
the cheering blaze."--Manuscript Notes.]

With great pleasure we heard, with his attentive and affectionate
congregation, the Unitarian clergyman, Mr. Conant, and afterward
visited him in his house, where almost everything bore traces of his
own handiwork or that of his father. He is just such a teacher as is
wanted in this region, familiar enough, with the habits of those he
addresses to come home to their experience and their wants; earnest
and enlightened enough to draw the important inferences from the life
of every day.[B]

[Footnote B: "Let any who think men do not need or want the church,
hear these people talk about it as if it were the only indispensable
thing, and see what I saw in Chicago. An elderly lady from
Philadelphia, who had been visiting her sons in the West, arrived
there about one o'clock on a hot Sunday noon. She rang the bell and
requested a room immediately, as she wanted to get ready for afternoon
service. Some delay occurring, she expressed great regret, as she had
ridden all night for the sake of attending church. She went to
church, neither having dined nor taken any repose after her
journey."--Manuscript Notes.]

A day or two we remained here, and passed some happy hours in the
woods that fringe the stream, where the gentlemen found a rich booty
of fish.

Next day, travelling along the river's banks, was an uninterrupted
pleasure. We closed our drive in the afternoon at the house of an
English gentleman, who has gratified, as few men do, the common wish
to pass the evening of an active day amid the quiet influences of
country life. He showed us a bookcase filled with books about this
country; these he had collected for years, and become so familiar with
the localities, that, on coming here at last, he sought and found, at
once, the very spot he wanted, and where he is as content as he hoped
to be, thus realizing Wordsworth's description of the wise man, who
"sees what he foresaw."

A wood surrounds the house, through which paths are cut in every
direction. It is, for this new country, a large and handsome dwelling;
but round it are its barns and farm-yard, with cattle and poultry.
These, however, in the framework of wood, have a very picturesque and
pleasing effect. There is that mixture of culture and rudeness in the
aspect of things which gives a feeling of freedom, not of confusion.

I wish, it were possible to give some idea of this scene, as viewed
by the earliest freshness of dewy dawn. This habitation of man seemed
like a nest in the grass, so thoroughly were the buildings and all
the objects of human care harmonized with, what was natural. The tall
trees bent and whispered all around, as if to hail with, sheltering
love the men who had come to dwell among them.

The young ladies were musicians, and spoke French fluently, having
been educated in a convent. Here in the prairie, they had learned to
take care of the milk-room, and kill the rattlesnakes that assailed
their poultry-yard. Beneath the shade of heavy curtains you looked out
from the high and large windows to see Norwegian peasants at work in
their national dress. In the wood grew, not only the flowers I had
before seen, and wealth of tall, wild roses, but the splendid blue
spiderwort, that ornament of our gardens. Beautiful children strayed
there, who were soon to leave these civilized regions for some really
wild and western place, a post in the buffalo country. Their no less
beautiful mother was of Welsh descent, and the eldest child bore
the name of Gwynthleon. Perhaps there she will meet with some young
descendants of Madoc, to be her friends; at any rate, her looks may
retain that sweet, wild beauty, that is soon made to vanish from eyes
which look too much on shops and streets, and the vulgarities of city
"parties."

Next day we crossed the river. We ladies crossed on a little
foot-bridge, from which we could look down the stream, and see the
wagon pass over at the ford. A black thunder-cloud was coming up; the
sky and waters heavy with expectation. The motion of the wagon, with
its white cover, and the laboring horses, gave just the due interest
to the picture, because it seemed, as if they would not have time to
cross before the storm came on. However, they did get across, and we
were a mile or two on our way before the violent shower obliged us to
take refuge in a solitary house upon the prairie. In this country it
is as pleasant to stop as to go on, to lose your way as to find
it, for the variety in the population gives you a chance for fresh
entertainment in every hut, and the luxuriant beauty makes every path
attractive. In this house we found a family "quite above the common,"
but, I grieve to say, not above false pride, for the father, ashamed
of being caught barefoot, told us a story of a man, one of the richest
men, he said, in one of the Eastern cities, who went barefoot, from
choice and taste.

Near the door grew a Provence rose, then in blossom. Other families we
saw had brought with them and planted the locust. It was pleasant
to see their old home loves, brought into connection with their new
splendors. Wherever there were traces of this tenderness of feeling,
only too rare among Americans, other things bore signs also of
prosperity and intelligence, as if the ordering mind of man had some
idea of home beyond a mere shelter beneath which to eat and sleep.

No heaven need wear a lovelier aspect than earth did this afternoon,
after the clearing up of the shower. We traversed the blooming plain,
unmarked by any road, only the friendly track of wheels which bent,
not broke, the grass. Our stations were not from town to town, but
from grove to grove. These groves first floated like blue islands
in the distance. As we drew nearer, they seemed fair parks, and the
little log-houses on the edge, with their curling smokes, harmonized
beautifully with them.

One of these groves, Ross's Grove, we reached just at sunset, It was
of the noblest trees I saw during this journey, for generally the
trees were not large or lofty, but only of fair proportions. Here they
were large enough to form with their clear stems pillars for grand
cathedral aisles. There was space enough for crimson light to stream
through upon the floor of water which the shower had left. As we
slowly plashed through, I thought I was never in a better place for
vespers.

That night we rested, or rather tarried, at a grove some miles beyond,
and there partook of the miseries, so often jocosely portrayed, of
bedchambers for twelve, a milk dish for universal hand-basin, and
expectations that you would use and lend your "hankercher" for a
towel. But this was the only night, thanks to the hospitality of
private families, that we passed thus; and it was well that we had
this bit of experience, else might we have pronounced all Trollopian
records of the kind to be inventions of pure malice.

With us was a young lady who showed herself to have been bathed in
the Britannic fluid, wittily described by a late French writer, by
the impossibility she experienced of accommodating herself to the
indecorums of the scene. We ladies were to sleep in the bar-room, from
which its drinking visitors could be ejected only at a late hour. The
outer door had no fastening to prevent their return. However, our host
kindly requested we would call him, if they did, as he had "conquered
them for us," and would do so again. We had also rather hard couches
(mine was the supper-table); but we Yankees, born to rove, were
altogether too much fatigued to stand upon trifles, and slept as
sweetly as we would in the "bigly bower" of any baroness. But I think
England sat up all night, wrapped in her blanket-shawl, and with a
neat lace cap upon her head,--so that she would have looked perfectly
the lady, if any one had come in,--shuddering and listening. I know
that she was very ill next day, in requital. She watched, as her
parent country watches the seas, that nobody may do wrong in any case,
and deserved to have met some interruption, she was so well prepared.
However, there was none, other than from the nearness of some twenty
sets of powerful lungs, which would not leave the night to a deathly
stillness. In this house we had, if not good beds, yet good tea, good
bread, and wild strawberries, and were entertained with most free
communications of opinion and history from our hosts. Neither shall
any of us have a right to say again that we cannot find any who may
be willing to hear all we may have to say. "A's fish that comes to the
net," should be painted on the sign at Papaw Grove.




CHAPTER III.

ROCK RIVER.--OREGON.--ANCIENT INDIAN VILLAGE.--GANYMEDE TO
HIS EAGLE.--WESTERN FOURTH OF JULY CELEBRATION.--WOMEN IN THE
WEST.--KISHWAUKIE.--BELVIDERE.--FAREWELL.


In the afternoon of this day we reached the Rock River, in whose
neighborhood we proposed to make some stay, and crossed at Dixon's
Ferry.

This beautiful stream flows full and wide over a bed of rocks,
traversing a distance of near two hundred miles, to reach the
Mississippi. Great part of the country along its banks is the finest
region of Illinois, and the scene of some of the latest romance of
Indian warfare. To these beautiful regions Black Hawk returned with
his band "to pass the summer," when he drew upon himself the warfare
in which he was finally vanquished. No wonder he could not resist the
longing, unwise though its indulgence might be, to return in summer to
this home of beauty.

Of Illinois, in general, it has often been remarked, that it bears the
character of country which has been inhabited by a nation skilled
like the English in all the ornamental arts of life, especially in
landscape-gardening. The villas and castles seem to have been burnt,
the enclosures taken down, but the velvet lawns, the flower-gardens,
the stately parks, scattered at graceful intervals by the decorous
hand of art, the frequent deer, and the peaceful herd of cattle that
make picture of the plain, all suggest more of the masterly mind
of man, than the prodigal, but careless, motherly love of Nature.
Especially is this true of the Rock River country. The river flows
sometimes through these parks and lawns, then betwixt high bluffs,
whose grassy ridges are covered with fine trees, or broken with
crumbling stone, that easily assumes the forms of buttress, arch, and
clustered columns. Along the face of such crumbling rocks, swallows'
nests are clustered, thick as cities, and eagles and deer do not
disdain their summits. One morning, out in the boat along the base of
these rocks, it was amusing, and affecting too, to see these swallows
put their heads out to look at us. There was something very hospitable
about it, as if man had never shown himself a tyrant near them. What
a morning that was! Every sight is worth twice as much by the early
morning light. We borrow something of the spirit of the hour to look
upon them.

The first place where we stopped was one of singular beauty, a beauty
of soft, luxuriant wildness. It was on the bend of the river, a place
chosen by an Irish gentleman, whose absenteeship seems of the wisest
kind, since, for a sum which would have been but a drop of water to
the thirsty fever of his native land, he commands a residence
which has all that is desirable, in its independence, its beautiful
retirement, and means of benefit to others.

His park, his deer-chase, he found already prepared; he had only to
make an avenue through it. This brought us to the house by a drive,
which in the heat of noon seemed long, though afterwards, in the cool
of morning and evening, delightful. This is, for that part of the
world, a large and commodious dwelling. Near it stands the log-cabin
where its master lived while it was building, a very ornamental
accessory.

In front of the house was a lawn, adorned by the most graceful trees.
A few of these had been taken out to give a full view of the river,
gliding through banks such as I have described. On this bend the bank
is high and bold, so from, the house or the lawn the view was very
rich and commanding. But if you descended a ravine at the side to the
water's edge, you found there a long walk on the narrow shore, with
a wall above of the richest hanging wood, in which they said the deer
lay hid. I never saw one but often fancied that I heard them rustling,
at daybreak, by these bright, clear waters, stretching out in such
smiling promise where no sound broke the deep and blissful seclusion,
unless now and then this rustling, or the splash of some fish a little
gayer than the others; it seemed not necessary to have any better
heaven, or fuller expression of love and freedom, than in the mood of
Nature here.

Then, leaving the bank, you would walk far and yet farther through
long, grassy paths, full of the most brilliant, also the most delicate
flowers. The brilliant are more common on the prairie, but both kinds
loved this place.

Amid the grass of the lawn, with a profusion of wild strawberries, we
greeted also a familiar love, the Scottish harebell, the gentlest and
most touching form of the flower-world.

The master of the house was absent, but with a kindness beyond thanks
had offered us a resting-place there. Here we were taken care of by
a deputy, who would, for his youth, have been assigned the place of
a page in former times, but in the young West, it seems, he was old
enough for a steward. Whatever be called his function, he did the
honors of the place so much in harmony with it, as to leave the guests
free to imagine themselves in Elysium. And the three days passed here
were days of unalloyed, spotless happiness.

There was a peculiar charm in coming here, where the choice of
location, and the unobtrusive good taste of all the arrangements,
showed such intelligent appreciation of the spirit of the scene, after
seeing so many dwellings of the new settlers, which showed plainly
that they had no thought beyond satisfying the grossest material
wants. Sometimes they looked attractive, these little brown houses,
the natural architecture of the country, in the edge of the timber.
But almost always, when you came near the slovenliness of the
dwelling, and the rude way in which objects around it were treated,
when so little care would have presented a charming whole, were
very repulsive. Seeing the traces of the Indians, who chose the most
beautiful sites for their dwellings, and whose habits do not break
in on that aspect of Nature under which they were born, we feel as if
they were the rightful lords of a beauty they forbore to deform. But
most of these settlers do not see it at all; it breathes, it speaks
in vain to those who are rushing into its sphere. Their progress is
Gothic, not Roman, and their mode of cultivation will, in the course
of twenty, perhaps ten years, obliterate the natural expression of the
country.

This is inevitable, fatal; we must not complain, but look forward to
a good result. Still, in travelling through this country, I could not
but be struck with the force of a symbol. Wherever the hog comes,
the rattlesnake disappears; the omnivorous traveller, safe in its
stupidity, willingly and easily makes a meal of the most dangerous of
reptiles, and one which the Indian looks on with a mystic awe. Even so
the white settler pursues the Indian, and is victor in the chase. But
I shall say more upon the subject by and by.

While we were here, we had one grand thunder-storm, which added new
glory to the scene.

One beautiful feature was the return of the pigeons every afternoon
to their home. At this time they would come sweeping across the lawn,
positively in clouds, and with a swiftness and softness of winged
motion more beautiful than anything of the kind I ever knew. Had
I been a musician, such as Mendelssohn, I felt that I could have
improvised a music quite peculiar, from the sound they made, which
should have indicated all the beauty over which their wings bore them.
I will here insert a few lines left at this house on parting, which
feebly indicate some of the features.

  THE WESTERN EDEN.

  Familiar to the childish mind were tales
    Of rock-girt isles amid a desert sea,
  Where unexpected stretch the flowery vales
    To soothe the shipwrecked sailor's misery.
  Fainting, he lay upon a sandy shore,
  And fancied that all hope of life was o'er;
  But let him patient climb the frowning wall,
  Within, the orange glows beneath the palm-tree tall,
  And all that Eden boasted waits his call.

  Almost these tales seem realized to-day,
  When the long dulness of the sultry way,
  Where "independent" settlers' careless cheer
  Made us indeed feel we were "strangers" here,
  Is cheered by sudden sight of this fair spot,
  On which "improvement" yet has made no blot,
  But Nature all-astonished stands, to find
  Her plan protected by the human mind.

  Blest be the kindly genius of the scene;
    The river, bending in unbroken grace,
  The stately thickets, with their pathways green,
    Fair, lonely trees, each in its fittest place;
  Those thickets haunted by the deer and fawn;
  Those cloudlike flights of birds across the lawn!
  The gentlest breezes here delight to blow,
  And sun and shower and star are emulous to deck the show.

  Wondering, as Crusoe, we survey the land;
  Happier than Crusoe we, a friendly band.
  Blest be the hand that reared this friendly home,
  The heart and mind of him to whom we owe
  Hours of pure peace such as few mortals know;
  May he find such, should he be led to roam,--
  Be tended by such ministering sprites,--
  Enjoy such gayly childish days, such hopeful nights!
  And yet, amid the goods to mortals given,
  To give those goods again is most like heaven.

Hazelwood, Rock River, June 30, 1843.


The only really rustic feature was of the many coops of poultry near
the house, which I understood it to be one of the chief pleasures of
the master to feed.

Leaving this place, we proceeded a day's journey along the beautiful
stream, to a little town named Oregon. We called at a cabin, from
whose door looked out one of those faces which, once seen, are never
forgotten; young, yet touched with many traces of feeling, not only
possible, but endured; spirited, too, like the gleam of a finely
tempered blade. It was a face that suggested a history, and many
histories, but whose scene would have been in courts and camps. At
this moment their circles are dull for want of that life which, is
waning unexcited in this solitary recess.

The master of the house proposed to show us a "short cut," by which
we might, to especial advantage, pursue our journey. This proved to be
almost perpendicular down a hill, studded with young trees and stumps.
From these he proposed, with a hospitality of service worthy an
Oriental, to free our wheels whenever they should get entangled,
also to be himself the drag, to prevent our too rapid descent. Such
generosity deserved trust; however, we women could not be persuaded to
render it. We got out and admired, from afar, the process. Left by our
guide and prop, we found ourselves in a wide field, where, by playful
quips and turns, an endless "creek," seemed to divert itself with our
attempts to cross it. Failing in this, the next best was to whirl
down a steep bank, which feat our charioteer performed with an air
not unlike that of Rhesus, had he but been as suitably furnished with
chariot and steeds!

At last, after wasting some two or three hours on the "short cut,"
we got out by following an Indian trail,--Black Hawk's! How fair
the scene through which it led! How could they let themselves be
conquered, with such a country to fight for!

Afterwards, in the wide prairie, we saw a lively picture of
nonchalance (to speak in the fashion of clear Ireland). There, in the
wide sunny field, with neither tree nor umbrella above his head, sat
a pedler, with his pack, waiting apparently for customers. He was not
disappointed. We bought what hold, in regard to the human world,
as unmarked, as mysterious, and as important an existence, as the
infusoria to the natural, to wit, pins. This incident would have
delighted those modern sages, who, in imitation of the sitting
philosophers of ancient Ind, prefer silence to speech, waiting to
going, and scornfully smile, in answer to the motions of earnest life,

  "Of itself will nothing come,
  That ye must still be seeking?"

However, it seemed to me to-day, as formerly on these sublime
occasions, obvious that nothing would, come, unless something would
go; now, if we had been as sublimely still as the pedler, his pins
would have tarried in the pack, and his pockets sustained an aching
void of pence.

Passing through one of the fine, park-like woods, almost clear from
underbrush and carpeted with thick grasses and flowers, we met (for it
was Sunday) a little congregation just returning from their service,
which had been performed in a rude house in its midst. It had a sweet
and peaceful air, as if such words and thoughts were very dear to
them. The parents had with them, all their little children; but we saw
no old people; that charm was wanting which exists in such scenes in
older settlements, of seeing the silver bent in reverence beside the
flaxen head.

At Oregon, the beauty of the scene was of even a more sumptuous
character than at our former "stopping-place." Here swelled the river
in its boldest course, interspersed by halcyon isles on which Nature
had lavished all her prodigality in tree, vine, and flower, banked
by noble bluffs, three Hundred feet high, their sharp ridges as
exquisitely definite as the edge of a shell; their summits adorned
with those same beautiful trees, and with buttresses of rich rock,
crested with old hemlocks, which wore a touching and antique grace
amid, the softer and more luxuriant vegetation. Lofty natural mounds
rose amidst the rest, with the same lovely and sweeping outline,
showing everywhere the plastic power of water,--water, mother of
beauty,--which, by its sweet and eager flow, had left such lineaments
as human genius never dreamt of.

Not far from the river was a high crag, called the Pine Rock, which
looks out, as our guide observed, like a helmet above the brow of the
country. It seems as if the water left here and there a vestige of
forms and materials that preceded its course, just to set off its new
and richer designs.

The aspect of this country was to me enchanting, beyond any I have
ever seen, from its fulness of expression, its bold and impassioned
sweetness. Here the flood of emotion has passed over and marked
everywhere its course by a smile. The fragments of rock touch it with
a wildness and liberality which give just the needed relief. I should
never be tired here, though I have elsewhere seen country of more
secret and alluring charms, better calculated to stimulate and
suggest. Here the eye and heart are filled.

How happy the Indians must have been here! It is not long since they
were driven away, and the ground, above and below, is full of their
traces.

  "The earth is full of men."

You have only to turn up the sod to find arrowheads and Indian
pottery. On an island, belonging to our host, and nearly opposite his
house, they loved to stay, and, no doubt, enjoyed its lavish beauty
as much as the myriad wild pigeons that now haunt its flower-filled
shades. Here are still the marks of their tomahawks, the troughs in
which they prepared their corn, their caches.

A little way down the river is the site of an ancient Indian village,
with its regularly arranged mounds. As usual, they had chosen with the
finest taste. When we went there, it was one of those soft, shadowy
afternoons when Nature seems ready to weep, not from grief, but from
an overfull heart. Two prattling, lovely little girls, and an African
boy, with glittering eye and ready grin, made our party gay; but
all were still as we entered the little inlet and trod those flowery
paths. They may blacken Indian life as they will, talk of its dirt,
its brutality, I will ever believe that the men who chose that
dwelling-place were able to feel emotions of noble happiness as they
returned to it, and so were the women that received them. Neither were
the children sad or dull, who lived so familiarly with the deer
and the birds, and swam that clear wave in the shadow of the Seven
Sisters. The whole scene suggested to me a Greek splendor, a Greek
sweetness, and I can believe that an Indian brave, accustomed to
ramble in such paths, and be bathed by such sunbeams, might be
mistaken for Apollo, as Apollo was for him by West. Two of the boldest
bluffs are called the Deer's Walk, (not because deer do _not_ walk
there,) and the Eagle's Nest. The latter I visited one glorious
morning; it was that of the fourth of July, and certainly I think I
had never felt so happy that I was born in America. Woe to all country
folks that never saw this spot, never swept an enraptured gaze over
the prospect that stretched beneath. I do believe Rome and Florence
are suburbs compared to this capital of Nature's art.

The bluff was decked with great bunches of a scarlet variety of the
milkweed, like cut coral, and all starred with a mysterious-looking
dark flower, whose cup rose lonely on a tall stem. This had, for
two or three days, disputed the ground with the lupine and phlox. My
companions disliked, I liked it.

Here I thought of, or rather saw, what the Greek expresses under the
form of Jove's darling, Ganymede, and the following stanzas took form.

               GANYMEDE TO HIS EAGLE.

          SUGGESTED BY A WORK OF THORWALDSEN'S.

  Composed on the height called the Eagle's Nest, Oregon, Rock River,
                           July 4th, 1843.

  Upon the rocky mountain stood the boy,
    A goblet of pure water in his hand;
  His face and form spoke him one made for joy,
    A willing servant to sweet love's command,
  But a strange pain was written on his brow,
    And thrilled throughout his silver accents now.

  "My bird," he cries, "my destined brother friend,
    O whither fleets to-day thy wayward flight?
  Hast thou forgotten that I here attend,
    From the full noon until this sad twilight?
  A hundred times, at least, from the clear spring,
    Since the fall noon o'er hill and valley glowed,
  I've filled the vase which our Olympian king
    Upon my care for thy sole use bestowed;
  That, at the moment when thou shouldst descend,
  A pure refreshment might thy thirst attend.

  "Hast thou forgotten earth, forgotten me,
    Thy fellow-bondsman in a royal cause,
  Who, from the sadness of infinity,
    Only with thee can know that peaceful pause
  In which we catch the flowing strain of love,
    Which binds our dim fates to the throne of Jove?

  "Before I saw thee, I was like the May,
    Longing for summer that must mar its bloom,
  Or like the morning star that calls the day,
    Whose glories to its promise are the tomb;
  And as the eager fountain rises higher
    To throw itself more strongly back to earth,
  Still, as more sweet and full rose my desire,
    More fondly it reverted to its birth,
  For what the rosebud seeks tells not the rose,
  The meaning that the boy foretold the man cannot disclose.

  "I was all Spring, for in my being dwelt
    Eternal youth, where flowers are the fruit;
  Full feeling was the thought of what was felt,
    Its music was the meaning of the lute;
  But heaven and earth such life will still deny,
  For earth, divorced from heaven, still asks the question _Why?_

  "Upon the highest mountains my young feet
    Ached, that no pinions from their lightness grew,
  My starlike eyes the stars would fondly greet,
    Yet win no greeting from the circling blue;
  Fair, self-subsistent each in its own sphere,
    They had no care that there was none for me;
  Alike to them that I was far or near,
    Alike to them time and eternity.

  "But from the violet of lower air
    Sometimes an answer to my wishing came;
  Those lightning-births my nature seemed to share,
    They told the secrets of its fiery frame,
  The sudden messengers of hate and love,
  The thunderbolts that arm the hand of Jove,
  And strike sometimes the sacred spire, and strike the sacred grove.

  "Come in a moment, in a moment gone,
  They answered me, then left me still more lone;
  They told me that the thought which ruled the world
  As yet no sail upon its course had furled,
  That the creation was but just begun,
  New leaves still leaving from the primal one,
  But spoke not of the goal to which _my_ rapid wheels would run.

  "Still, still my eyes, though tearfully, I strained
  To the far future which my heart contained,
  And no dull doubt my proper hope profaned.

  "At last, O bliss! thy living form I spied,
    Then a mere speck upon a distant sky;
  Yet my keen glance discerned its noble pride,
    And the full answer of that sun-filled eye;
  I knew it was the wing that must upbear
    My earthlier form into the realms of air.

  "Thou knowest how we gained that beauteous height,
  Where dwells the monarch, of the sons of light;
  Thou knowest he declared us two to be
  The chosen servants of his ministry,
  Thou as his messenger, a sacred sign
  Of conquest, or, with omen more benign,
  To give its due weight to the righteous cause,
  To express the verdict of Olympian laws.

  "And I to wait upon the lonely spring,
    Which slakes the thirst of bards to whom 't is given
  The destined dues of hopes divine to sing,
    And weave the needed chain to bind to heaven.
  Only from such could be obtained a draught
  For him who in his early home from Jove's own cup has quaffed

  "To wait, to wait, but not to wait too long.
  Till heavy grows the burden of a song;
  O bird! too long hast thou been gone to-day,
  My feet are weary of their frequent way,
  The spell that opes the spring my tongue no more can say.

  "If soon thou com'st not, night will fall around,
  My head with a sad slumber will be bound,
  And the pure draught be spilt upon the ground.

  "Remember that I am not yet divine,
  Long years of service to the fatal Nine
  Are yet to make a Delphian vigor mine.

  "O, make them not too hard, thou bird of Jove!
  Answer the stripling's hope, confirm his love,
  Receive the service in which he delights,
  And bear him often to the serene heights,
  Where hands that were so prompt in serving thee
  Shall be allowed the highest ministry,
  And Rapture live with bright Fidelity."


The afternoon was spent in a very different manner. The family whose
guests we were possessed a gay and graceful hospitality that gave
zest to each moment. They possessed that rare politeness which, while
fertile in pleasant expedients to vary the enjoyment of a friend,
leaves him perfectly free the moment he wishes to be so. With such
hosts, pleasure may be combined with repose. They lived on the bank
opposite the town, and, as their house was full, we slept in the
town, and passed three days with them, passing to and fro morning and
evening in their boats. To one of these, called the Fairy, in which a
sweet little daughter of the house moved about lighter than any Scotch
Ellen ever sung, I should indite a poem, if I had not been guilty of
rhyme on this very page. At morning this boating was very pleasant; at
evening, I confess, I was generally too tired with the excitements of
the day to think it so.

The house--a double log-cabin--was, to my eye, the model of a Western
villa. Nature had laid out before it grounds which could not be
improved. Within, female taste had veiled every rudeness, availed
itself of every sylvan grace.

In this charming abode what laughter, what sweet thoughts, what
pleasing fancies, did we not enjoy! May such never desert those who
reared it, and made us so kindly welcome to all its pleasures!

Fragments of city life were dexterously crumbled into the dish
prepared for general entertainment. Ice-creams followed the dinner,
which was drawn by the gentlemen from the river, and music and
fireworks wound up the evening of days spent on the Eagle's Nest. Now
they had prepared a little fleet to pass over to the Fourth of July
celebration, which some queer drumming and fifing, from, the opposite
bank, had announced to be "on hand."

We found the free and independent citizens there collected beneath the
trees, among whom many a round Irish visage dimpled at the usual puffs
of "Ameriky."

The orator was a New-Englander, and the speech smacked loudly
of Boston, but was received with much applause and followed by a
plentiful dinner, provided by and for the Sovereign People, to which
Hail Columbia served as grace.

Returning, the gay flotilla cheered the little flag which the children
had raised from a log-cabin, prettier than any president ever saw,
and drank the health of our country and all mankind, with a clear
conscience.

Dance and song wound up the day. I know not when the mere local
habitation has seemed to me to afford so fair a chance of happiness as
this. To a person of unspoiled tastes, the beauty alone would afford
stimulus enough. But with it would be naturally associated all kinds
of wild sports, experiments, and the studies of natural history. In
these regards, the poet, the sportsman, the naturalist, would alike
rejoice in this wide range of untouched loveliness.

Then, with a very little money, a ducal estate may be purchased, and
by a very little more, and moderate labor, a family be maintained upon
it with raiment, food, and shelter. The luxurious and minute comforts
of a city life are not yet to be had without effort disproportionate
to their value. But, where there is so great a counterpoise, cannot
these be given up once for all? If the houses are imperfectly built,
they can afford immense fires and plenty of covering; if they are
small, who cares,--with, such fields to roam in? in winter, it may be
borne; in summer, is of no consequence. With plenty of fish, and game,
and wheat, can they not dispense with a baker to bring "muffins hot"
every morning to the door for their breakfast?

A man need not here take a small slice from the landscape, and fence
it in from the obtrusions of an uncongenial neighbor, and there cut
down his fancies to miniature improvements which a chicken could run
over in ten minutes. He may have water and wood and land enough, to
dread no incursions on his prospect from some chance Vandal that may
enter his neighborhood. He need not painfully economize and manage
how he may use it all; he can afford to leave some of it wild, and to
carry out his own plans without obliterating those of Nature.

Here, whole families might live together, if they would. The sons
might return from their pilgrimages to settle near the parent hearth;
the daughters might find room near their mother. Those painful
separations, which already desecrate and desolate the Atlantic coast,
are not enforced here by the stern need of seeking bread; and where
they are voluntary, it is no matter. To me, too, used to the feelings
which haunt a society of struggling men, it was delightful to look
upon a scene where Nature still wore her motherly smile, and seemed to
promise room, not only for those favored or cursed with the qualities
best adapting for the strifes of competition, but for the delicate,
the thoughtful, even the indolent or eccentric. She did not say, Fight
or starve; nor even, Work or cease to exist; but, merely showing that
the apple was a finer fruit than the wild crab, gave both room to grow
in the garden.

A pleasant society is formed of the families who live along the banks
of this stream upon farms. They are from various parts of the world,
and have much to communicate to one another. Many have cultivated
minds and refined manners, all a varied experience, while they have
in common the interests of a new country and a new life. They must
traverse some space to get at one another, but the journey is through
scenes that make it a separate pleasure. They must bear inconveniences
to stay in one another's houses; but these, to the well-disposed, are
only a source of amusement and adventure.

The great drawback upon the lives of these settlers, at present, is
the unfitness of the women for their new lot. It has generally been
the choice of the men, and the women follow, as women will, doing
their best for affection's sake, but too often in heartsickness and
weariness. Beside, it frequently not being a choice or conviction of
their own minds that it is best to be here, their part is the hardest,
and they are least fitted for it. The men can find assistance in
field labor, and recreation with the gun and fishing-rod. Their bodily
strength is greater, and enables them to bear and enjoy both these
forms of life.

The women can rarely find any aid in domestic labor. All its various
and careful tasks must often be performed, sick, or well, by the
mother and daughters, to whom a city education has imparted neither
the strength nor skill now demanded.

The wives of the poorer settlers, having more hard work to do than
before, very frequently become slatterns; but the ladies, accustomed
to a refined neatness, feel that they cannot degrade themselves by
its absence, and struggle under every disadvantage to keep up the
necessary routine of small arrangements.

With all these disadvantages for work, their resources for pleasure
are fewer. When they can leave the housework, they have not learnt to
ride, to drive, to row, alone. Their culture has too generally been
that given to women to make them "the ornaments of society." They can
dance, but not draw; talk French, but know nothing of the language
of flowers; neither in childhood were allowed to cultivate them,
lest they should tan their complexions. Accustomed to the pavement
of Broadway, they dare not tread the wild-wood paths for fear of
rattlesnakes!

Seeing much of this joylessness, and inaptitude, both of body and
mind, for a lot which would be full of blessings for those prepared
for it, we could not but look with deep interest on the little girls,
and hope they would grow up with the strength of body, dexterity,
simple tastes, and resources that would fit them to enjoy and refine
the Western farmer's life.

But they have a great deal to war with in the habits of thought
acquired by their mothers from their own early life. Everywhere
the fatal spirit of imitation, of reference to European standards,
penetrates, and threatens to blight whatever of original growth might
adorn the soil.

If the little girls grow up strong, resolute, able to exert their
faculties, their mothers mourn over their want of fashionable
delicacy. Are they gay, enterprising, ready to fly about in the
various ways that teach them so much, these ladies lament that "they
cannot go to school, where they might learn to be quiet." They lament
the want of "education" for their daughters, as if the thousand
needs which call out their young energies, and the language of nature
around, yielded no education.

Their grand ambition for their children is to send them to school in
some Eastern city, the measure most likely to make them useless and
unhappy at home. I earnestly hope that, erelong, the existence of good
schools near themselves, planned by persons of sufficient thought to
meet the wants of the place and time, instead of copying New York
or Boston, will correct this mania. Instruction the children want
to enable them to profit by the great natural advantages of their
position; but methods copied from the education of some English Lady
Augusta are as ill suited to the daughter of an Illinois farmer, as
satin shoes to climb the Indian mounds. An elegance she would diffuse
around her, if her mind were opened to appreciate elegance; it might
be of a kind new, original, enchanting, as different from that of
the city belle as that of the prairie torch-flower from the shop-worn
article that touches the cheek of that lady within her bonnet.

To a girl really skilled to make home beautiful and comfortable, with
bodily strength to enjoy plenty of exercise, the woods, the streams, a
few studies, music, and the sincere and familiar intercourse, far
more easily to be met with here than elsewhere, would afford happiness
enough. Her eyes would not grow dim, nor her cheeks sunken, in the
absence of parties, morning visits, and milliners' shops.

As to music, I wish I could see in such places the guitar rather than
the piano, and good vocal more than instrumental music.

The piano many carry with them, because it is the fashionable
instrument in the Eastern cities. Even there, it is so merely from
the habit of imitating Europe, for not one in a thousand is willing to
give the labor requisite to insure any valuable use of the instrument.

But out here, where the ladies have so much less leisure, it is still
less desirable. Add to this, they never know how to tune their own
instruments, and as persons seldom visit them who can do so, these
pianos are constantly out of tune, and would spoil the ear of one who
began by having any.

The guitar, or some portable instrument which requires less practice,
and could be kept in tune by themselves, would be far more desirable
for most of these ladies. It would give all they want as a household
companion to fill up the gaps of life with a pleasant stimulus
or solace, and be sufficient accompaniment to the voice in social
meetings.

Singing in parts is the most delightful family amusement, and those
who are constantly together can learn to sing in perfect accord. All
the practice it needs, after some good elementary instruction, is
such as meetings by summer twilight and evening firelight naturally
suggest. And as music is a universal language, we cannot but think a
fine Italian duet would be as much at home in the log cabin as one of
Mrs. Gore's novels.

The 6th of July we left this beautiful place. It was one of those
rich days of bright sunlight, varied by the purple shadows of large,
sweeping clouds. Many a backward look we cast, and left the heart
behind.

Our journey to-day was no less delightful than before, still all new,
boundless, limitless. Kinmont says, that limits are sacred; that the
Greeks were in the right to worship a god of limits. I say, that what
is limitless is alone divine, that there was neither wall nor road in
Eden, that those who walked, there lost and found their way just as
we did, and that all the gain from the Fall was that we had a wagon to
ride in. I do not think, either, that even the horses doubted whether
this last was any advantage.

Everywhere the rattlesnake-weed grows in profusion. The antidote
survives the bane. Soon the coarser plantain, the "white man's
footstep," shall take its place.

We saw also the compass-plant, and the Western tea-plant. Of some of
the brightest flowers an Indian girl afterwards told me the medicinal
virtues. I doubt not those students of the soil knew a use to every
fair emblem, on which we could only look to admire its hues and shape.

After noon we were ferried by a girl (unfortunately not of the most
picturesque appearance) across the Kishwaukie, the most graceful
of streams, and on whose bosom rested many full-blown
water-lilies,--twice as large as any of ours. I was told that, _en
revanche_, they were scentless, but I still regret that I could not
get at one of them to try. Query, did the lilied fragrance which,
in the miraculous times, accompanied visions of saints and angels,
proceed from water or garden lilies?

Kishwaukie is, according to tradition, the scene of a famous battle,
and its many grassy mounds contain the bones of the valiant. On these
waved thickly the mysterious purple flower, of which I have spoken
before. I think it springs from the blood of the Indians, as the
hyacinth did from that of Apollo's darling.

The ladies of our host's family at Oregon, when they first went,
there, after all the pains and plagues of building and settling, found
their first pastime in opening one of these mounds, in which they
found, I think, three of the departed, seated, in the Indian fashion.

One of these same ladies, as she was making bread one winter morning,
saw from the window a deer directly before the house. She ran out,
with her hands covered with dough, calling the others, and they caught
him bodily before he had time to escape.

Here (at Kiskwaukie) we received a visit from a ragged and barefooted,
but bright-eyed gentleman, who seemed to be the intellectual loafer,
the walking Will's coffee-house, of the place. He told us many
charming snake-stories; among others, of himself having seen seventeen
young ones re-enter the mother snake, on the approach of a visitor.

This night we reached Belvidere, a flourishing town in Boon County,
where was the tomb, now despoiled, of Big Thunder. In this later day
we felt happy to find a really good hotel.

From this place, by two days of very leisurely and devious journeying,
we reached Chicago, and thus ended a journey, which one at least of
the party might have wished unending.

I have not been particularly anxious to give the geography of the
scene, inasmuch as it seemed to me no route, nor series of stations,
but a garden interspersed with cottages, groves, and flowery lawns,
through which a stately river ran. I had no guide-book, kept no diary,
do not know how many miles we travelled each day, nor how many in all.
What I got from the journey was the poetic impression of the country
at large; it is all I have aimed to communicate.

The narrative might have been made much more interesting, as life was
at the time, by many piquant anecdotes and tales drawn from private
life. But here courtesy restrains the pen, for I know those who
received the stranger with such frank kindness would feel ill requited
by its becoming the means of fixing many spy-glasses, even though the
scrutiny might be one of admiring interest, upon their private homes.

For many of these anecdotes, too, I was indebted to a friend, whose
property they more lawfully are. This friend was one of those rare
beings who are equally at home in nature and with man. He knew a
tale of all that ran and swam and flew, or only grew, possessing
that extensive familiarity with things which shows equal sweetness
of sympathy and playful penetration. Most refreshing to me was his
unstudied lore, the unwritten poetry which common life presents to a
strong and gentle mind. It was a great contrast to the subtilties of
analysis, the philosophic strainings of which I had seen too much. But
I will not attempt to transplant it. May it profit others as it did me
in the region where it was born, where it belongs.

The evening of our return to Chicago, the sunset was of a splendor and
calmness beyond any we saw at the West. The twilight that succeeded
was equally beautiful; soft, pathetic, but just so calm. When
afterwards I learned this was the evening of Allston's death, it
seemed to me as if this glorious pageant was not without connection
with that event; at least, it inspired similar emotions,--a heavenly
gate closing a path adorned with shows well worthy Paradise.


FAREWELL TO ROCK RIVER VALLEY.

  Farewell, ye soft and sumptuous solitudes!
  Ye fairy distances, ye lordly woods,
  Haunted, by paths like those that Poussin knew,
  When after his all gazers' eyes he drew;
  I go,--and if I never more may steep
  An eager heart in your enchantments deep,
  Yet ever to itself that heart may say,
  Be not exacting; them hast lived one day,--
  Hast looked on that which matches with thy mood,
  Impassioned sweetness of full being's flood,
  Where nothing checked the bold yet gentle wave,
  Where naught repelled the lavish love that gave.
  A tender blessing lingers o'er the scene,
  Like some young mother's thought, fond, yet serene,
  And through its life new-born our lives have been.
  Once more farewell,--a sad, a sweet farewell;
  And, if I never must behold you more,
  In other worlds I will not cease to tell
  The rosary I here have numbered o'er;
  And bright-haired Hope will lend a gladdened ear,
  And Love will free him from the grasp of Fear,
  And Gorgon critics, while the tale they hear,
  Shall dew their stony glances with a tear,
  If I but catch one echo from your spell:--
  And so farewell,--a grateful, sad farewell!




CHAPTER IV.

A SHORT CHAPTER.--CHICAGO AGAIN.--MORRIS BIRKBECK.


Chicago had become interesting to me now, that I knew it as the
portal to so fair a scene. I had become interested in the land, in
the people, and looked sorrowfully on the lake on which I must soon
embark, to leave behind what I had just begun to enjoy.

Now was the time to see the lake. The July moon was near its full, and
night after night it rose in a cloudless sky above this majestic sea.
The heat was excessive, so that there was no enjoyment of life, except
in the night; but then the air was of that delicious temperature
worthy of orange-groves. However, they were not wanted;--nothing was,
as that full light fell on the faintly rippling waters, which then
seemed, boundless.

The most picturesque objects to be seen from Chicago on the inland
side were the lines of Hoosier wagons. These rude farmers, the large
first product of the soil, travel leisurely along, sleeping in their
wagons by night, eating only what they bring with them. In the town
they observe the same plan, and trouble no luxurious hotel for board
and lodging. Here they look like foreign peasantry, and contrast well
with the many Germans, Dutch, and Irish. In the country it is very
pretty to see them prepared to "camp out" at night, their horses
taken out of harness, and they lounging under the trees, enjoying the
evening meal.

On the lake-side it is fine to see the great boats come panting in
from their rapid and marvellous journey. Especially at night the
motion of their lights is very majestic.

When the favorite boats, the Great Western and Illinois, are going
out, the town is thronged with, people from the South and farther
West, to go in them. These moonlight nights I would hear the French
rippling and fluttering familiarly amid the rude ups and downs of the
Hoosier dialect.

At the hotel table were daily to be seen new faces, and new stories
to be learned. And any one who has a large acquaintance may be pretty
sure of meeting some of them here in the course of a few days.

At Chicago I read again Philip Van Artevelde, and certain passages
in it will always be in my mind associated with the deep sound of the
lake, as heard in the night. I used to read a short time at night, and
then open the blind to look out. The moon would be full upon the lake,
and the calm breath, pure light, and the deep voice harmonized well
with the thought of the Flemish hero. When will this country have such
a man? It is what she needs; no thin Idealist, no coarse Realist, but
a man whose eye reads the heavens, while his feet step firmly on the
ground, and his hands are strong and dexterous for the use of human
implements. A man religious, virtuous, and--sagacious; a man of
universal sympathies, but self-possessed; a man who knows the region
of emotion, though he is not its slave; a man to whom this world is
no mere spectacle, or fleeting shadow, not a great, solemn game, to be
played with, good heed, for its stakes are of eternal value, yet who,
if his own play be true, heeds not what he loses by the falsehood of
others;--a man who hives from the past, yet knows that its honey can
but moderately avail him; whose comprehensive eye scans the present,
neither infatuated by its golden lures, nor chilled by its many
ventures; who possesses prescience, as the wise man must, but not
so far as to be driven mad to-day by the gift which discerns
to-morrow;--when there is such a man for America, the thought which
urges her on will be expressed.

       *       *       *       *       *

Now that I am about to leave Illinois, feelings of regret and
admiration come over me, as in parting with a friend whom, we have
not had the good sense to prize and study, while hours of association,
never perhaps to return, were granted. I have fixed my attention
almost exclusively on the picturesque beauty of this region; it was
so new, so inspiring. But I ought to have been more interested in the
housekeeping of this magnificent State, in the education she is giving
her children, in their prospects.

Illinois is, at present, a by-word of reproach among the nations,
for the careless, prodigal course by which, in early youth, she has
endangered her honor. But you cannot look about you there, without
seeing that there are resources abundant to retrieve, and soon to
retrieve, far greater errors, if they are only directed with wisdom.

Would that the simple maxim, that honesty is the best policy, might be
laid to heart; that a sense of the true aim of life might elevate
the tone of politics and trade till public and private honor became
identical; that the Western man, in that crowded and exciting life
which, develops his faculties so fully for to-day, might not forget
that better part which could not be taken from him; that the Western
woman might take that interest and acquire that light for the
education of the children, for which she alone has leisure!

This is indeed the great problem of the place and time. If the next
generation be well prepared for their work, ambitious of good and
skilful to achieve it, the children of the present settlers may be
leaven enough for the mass constantly increasing by immigration. And
how much is this needed, where those rude foreigners can so little
understand the best interests of the land they seek for bread and
shelter! It would be a happiness to aid in this good work, and
interweave the white and golden threads into the fate of Illinois. It
would be a work worthy the devotion of any mind.

In the little that I saw was a large proportion of intelligence,
activity, and kind feeling; but, if there was much serious laying to
heart of the true purposes of life, it did not appear in the tone of
conversation.

Having before me the Illinois Guide-Book, I find there mentioned, as
a "visionary," one of the men I should think of as able to be a truly
valuable settler in a new and great country,--Morris Birkbeck, of
England. Since my return, I have read his journey to, and letters
from, Illinois. I see nothing promised there that will not surely
belong to the man who knows how to seek for it.

Mr. Birkbeck was an enlightened, philanthropist, the rather that he
did not wish to sacrifice himself to his fellow-men, but to benefit
them with all he had, and was, and wished. He thought all the
creatures of a divine love ought to be happy and ought to be good, and
that his own soul and his own life were not less precious than those
of others; indeed, that to keep these healthy was his only means of a
healthy influence.

But his aims were altogether generous. Freedom, the liberty of law,
not license; not indolence, work for himself and children and all
men, but under genial and poetic influences;--these were his aims. How
different from those of the new settlers in general! And into his
mind so long ago shone steadily the two thoughts, now so prevalent in
thinking and aspiring minds, of "Resist not evil," and "Every man his
own priest, and the heart the only true church."

He has lost credit for sagacity from accidental circumstances. It
does not appear that his position was ill chosen, or his means
disproportioned to his ends, had he been sustained by funds from
England, as he had a right to expect. But through the profligacy of a
near relative, commissioned to collect these dues, he was disappointed
of them, and his paper protested and credit destroyed in our cities,
before he became aware of his danger.

Still, though more slowly and with more difficulty, he might have
succeeded in his designs. The English farmer might have made the
English settlement a model for good methods and good aims to all that
region, had not death prematurely cut short his plans.

I have wished to say these few words, because the veneration with
which I have been inspired for his character by those who knew him
well, makes me impatient of this careless blame being passed from
mouth to mouth and book to book. Success is no test of a man's
endeavor, and Illinois will yet, I hope, regard this man, who knew so
well what _ought_ to be, as one of her true patriarchs, the Abraham of
a promised land.

He was one too much before his time to be soon valued; but the time
is growing up to him, and will understand his mild philanthropy, and
clear, large views.

I subjoin the account of his death, given me by a friend, as
expressing, in fair picture, the character of the man.

"Mr. Birkbeck was returning from the seat of government, whither he
had been on public business, and was accompanied by his son Bradford,
a youth of sixteen or eighteen. It was necessary to cross a ford,
which was rendered difficult by the swelling of the stream. Mr. B.'s
horse was unwilling to plunge into the water, so his son offered to
go first, and he followed. Bradford's horse had just gained footing on
the opposite shore, when he looked back and perceived his father was
dismounted, struggling in the water, and carried down by the current.

"Mr. Birkbeck could not swim; Bradford could; so he dismounted, and
plunged into the stream to save his father. He got to him before
he sunk, held him up above water, and told him to take hold of his
collar, and he would swim ashore with him. Mr. B. did so, and Bradford
exerted all his strength to stem the current and reach the shore at a
point where they could land; but, encumbered by his own clothing and
his father's weight, he made no progress; when Mr. B. perceived this,
he, with his characteristic calmness and resolution, gave up his hold
of his son, and, motioning to him to save himself, resigned himself to
his fate. His son reached the shore, but was too much overwhelmed
by his loss to leave it. He was found by some travellers, many hours
after, seated on the margin of the stream, with his face in his hands,
stupefied with grief.

"The body was found, and on the countenance was the sweetest smile;
and Bradford said, 'Just so he smiled, upon me when he let go and
pushed me away from him.'"

Many men can choose the right and best on a great occasion, but not
many can, with such ready and serene decision, lay aside even
life, when that is right and best. This little narrative touched my
imagination in very early youth, and often has come up, in lonely
vision, that face, serenely smiling above the current which bore him
away to another realm of being.




CHAPTER V.

THOUGHTS AND SCENES IN WISCONSIN.--SOCIETY IN MILWAUKIE.--INDIAN
ANECDOTE.--SEERESS OF PREVORST.--MILWAUKIE.


A territory, not yet a State;[A] still nearer the acorn than we were.

[Footnote A: Wisconsin was not admitted into the Union as a State till
1847, after this volume was written.--ED.]

It was very pleasant coming up. These large and elegant boats are so
well arranged that every excursion may be a party of pleasure. There
are many fair shows to see on the lake and its shores, almost always
new and agreeable persons on board, pretty children playing about,
ladies singing (and if not very well, there is room, to keep out of
the way). You may see a great deal here of Life, in the London sense,
if you know a few people; or if you do not, and have the tact to look
about you without seeming to stare.

We came to Milwaukie, where we were to pass a fortnight or more.

This place is most beautifully situated. A little river, with romantic
banks, passes up through the town. The bank of the lake is here a
bold bluff, eighty feet in height. From its summit is enjoyed a noble
outlook on the lake. A little narrow path winds along the edge of the
lake below. I liked this walk much,--above me this high wall of rich
earth, garlanded on its crest with trees, the long ripples of the lake
coming up to my feet. Here, standing in the shadow, I could appreciate
better its magnificent changes of color, which are the chief beauties
of the lake-waters; but these are indescribable.

It was fine to ascend into the lighthouse, above this bluff, and
thence watch the thunder-clouds which so frequently rose over the
lake, or the great boats coming in. Approaching the Milwaukie pier,
they made a bend, and seemed to do obeisance in the heavy style
of some dowager duchess entering a circle she wishes to treat with
especial respect.

These boats come in and out every day, and still afford a cause for
general excitement. The people swarm, down to greet them, to receive
and send away their packages and letters. To me they seemed such
mighty messengers, to give, by their noble motion, such an idea of the
power and fulness of life, that they were worthy to carry despatches
from king to king. It must be very pleasant for those who have an
active share in carrying on the affairs of this great and growing
world to see them approach, and pleasant to such as have dearly loved
friends at the next station. To those who have neither business nor
friends, it sometimes gives a desolating sense of insignificance.

The town promises to be, some time, a fine one, as it is so well
situated; and they have good building material,--a yellow brick, very
pleasing to the eye. It seems to grow before you, and has indeed but
just emerged from the thickets of oak and wild-roses. A few steps
will take you into the thickets, and certainly I never saw so many
wild-roses, or of so beautiful a red. Of such a color were the first
red ones the world ever saw, when, says the legend, Venus flying to
the assistance of Adonis, the rose-bushes kept catching her to make
her stay, and the drops of blood the thorns drew from her feet, as
she tore herself a way, fell on the white roses, and turned them this
beautiful red.

One day, walking along the river's bank in search of a waterfall to be
seen from one ravine, we heard tones from a band of music, and saw a
gay troop shooting at a mark, on the opposite bank. Between every shot
the band played; the effect was very pretty.

On this walk we found two of the oldest and most gnarled hemlocks that
ever afforded study for a painter. They were the only ones we saw;
they seemed the veterans of a former race.

At Milwaukie, as at Chicago, are many pleasant people, drawn together
from all parts of the world. A resident here would find great piquancy
in the associations,--those he met having such dissimilar histories
and topics. And several persons I saw, evidently transplanted from the
most refined circles to be met in this country. There are lures enough
in the West for people of all kinds;--the enthusiast and the cunning
man; the naturalist, and the lover who needs to be rich for the sake
of her he loves.

The torrent of immigration swells very strongly towards this place.
During the fine weather, the poor refugees arrive daily, in their
national dresses, all travel-soiled and worn. The night they pass in
rude shantees, in a particular quarter of the town, then walk off into
the country,--the mothers carrying their infants, the fathers leading
the little children by the hand, seeking a home where their hands may
maintain them.

One morning we set off in their track, and travelled a day's
journey into this country,--fair, yet not, in that part which I saw,
comparable, in my eyes, to the Rock River region. Rich fields, proper
for grain, alternate with oak openings, as they are called; bold,
various, and beautiful were the features of the scene, but I saw
not those majestic sweeps, those boundless distances, those heavenly
fields; it was not the same world.

Neither did we travel in the same delightful manner. We were now in a
nice carriage, which must not go off the road, for fear of breakage,
with a regular coachman, whose chief care was not to tire his horses,
and who had no taste for entering fields in pursuit of wild-flowers,
or tempting some strange wood-path, in search of whatever might
befall. It was pleasant, but almost as tame as New England.

But charming indeed was the place where we stopped. It was in the
vicinity of a chain of lakes, and on the bank of the loveliest
little stream, called, the Bark River, which, flowed in rapid amber
brightness, through fields, and dells, and stately knolls, of most
poetic beauty.

The little log-cabin where we slept, with its flower-garden in front,
disturbed the scene no more than a stray lock on the fair cheek.
The hospitality of that house I may well call princely; it was the
boundless hospitality of the heart, which, if it has no Aladdin's lamp
to create a palace for the guest, does him still higher service by the
freedom of its bounty to the very last drop of its powers.

Sweet were the sunsets seen in the valley of this stream, though,
here, and, I grieve to say, no less near the Rock River, the fiend,
who has every liberty to tempt the happy in this world, appeared in
the shape of mosquitos, and allowed us no bodily to enjoy our mental
peace.

One day we ladies gave, under the guidance of our host, to visiting
all the beauties of the adjacent lakes,--Nomabbin, Silver, and Pine
Lakes. On the shore of Nomabbin had formerly been one of the finest
Indian villages. Our host said, that once, as he was lying there
beneath the bank, he saw a tall Indian standing at gaze on the knoll.
He lay a long time, curious to see how long the figure would maintain
its statue-like absorption. But at last his patience yielded, and,
in moving, he made a slight noise. The Indian saw him, gave a wild,
snorting sound of indignation and pain, and strode away.

What feelings must consume their hearts at such moments! I scarcely
see how they can forbear to shoot the white man where he stands.

But the power of fate is with, the white man, and the Indian feels it.
This same gentleman told of his travelling through the wilderness with
an Indian guide. He had with him a bottle of spirit which he meant to
give him in small quantities, but the Indian, once excited, wanted
the whole at once. "I would not," said Mr. ----, "give it him, for I
thought, if he got really drunk, there was an end to his services as
a guide. But he persisted, and at last tried to take it from me. I
was not armed; he was, and twice as strong as I. But I knew an Indian
could not resist the look of a white man, and I fixed my eye steadily
on his. He bore it for a moment, then his eye fell; he let go the
bottle. I took his gun and threw it to a distance. After a few
moments' pause, I told him to go and fetch it, and left it in his
hands. From that moment he was quite obedient, even servile, all the
rest of the way."

This gentleman, though in other respects of most kindly and liberal
heart, showed the aversion that the white man soon learns to feel for
the Indian on whom he encroaches,--the aversion of the injurer for him
he has degraded. After telling the anecdote of his seeing the Indian
gazing at the seat of his former home,

  "A thing for human feelings the most trying,"

and which, one would think, would have awakened soft compassion--
almost remorse--in the present owner of that fair hill, which
contained for the exile the bones of his dead, the ashes of his
hopes, he observed: "They cannot be prevented from straggling back
here to their old haunts. I wish they could. They ought not to be
permitted to drive away _our_ game." OUR game,--just heavens!

The same gentleman showed, on a slight occasion, the true spirit of a
sportsman, or perhaps I might say of Man, when engaged in any kind
of chase. Showing us some antlers, he said: "This one belonged to a
majestic creature. But this other was the beauty. I had been lying a
long time at watch, when at last I heard them come crackling along. I
lifted my head cautiously, as they burst through the trees. The first
was a magnificent fellow; but then I saw coming one, the prettiest,
the most graceful I ever beheld,--there was something so soft and
beseeching in its look. I chose him at once, took aim, and shot him
dead. You see the antlers are not very large; it was young, but the
prettiest creature!"

In the course of this morning's drive, we visited the gentlemen on
their fishing party. They hailed us gayly, and rowed ashore to show us
what fine booty they had. No disappointment there, no dull work.

On the beautiful point of land from which we first saw them lived a
contented woman, the only one I heard of out there. She was English,
and said she had seen so much suffering in her own country, that the
hardships of this seemed as nothing to her. But the others--even our
sweet and gentle hostess--found their labors disproportioned to their
strength, if not to their patience; and, while their husbands and
brothers enjoyed the country in hunting or fishing, they found
themselves confined to a comfortless and laborious in-door life. But
it need not be so long.

This afternoon, driving about on the banks of these lakes, we found
the scene all of one kind of loveliness; wide, graceful woods, and
then these fine sheets of water, with, fine points of land jutting out
boldly into them. It was lovely, but not striking or peculiar.

All woods suggest pictures. The European forest, with its long glades
and green, sunny dells, naturally suggested the figures of armed
knight on his proud steed, or maiden, decked in gold and pearl,
pricking along them on a snow-white palfrey; the green dells, of weary
Palmer sleeping there beside the spring with his head upon his wallet.
Our minds, familiar with such, figures, people with them the New
England woods, wherever the sunlight falls down a longer than usual
cart-track, wherever a cleared spot has lain still enough for the
trees to look friendly, with their exposed sides cultivated by the
light, and the grass to look velvet warm, and be embroidered with
flowers. These Western woods suggest a different kind of ballad. The
Indian legends have often an air of the wildest solitude, as has the
one Mr. Lowell has put into verse in his late volume. But I did not
see those wild woods; only such as suggest to me little romances of
love and sorrow, like this:--

GUNHILDA.

  A maiden sat beneath the tree,
  Tear-bedewed her pale cheeks be,
  And she sigheth heavily.

  From forth the wood into the light
  A hunter strides, with carol light,
  And a glance so bold and bright.

  He careless stopped and eyed the maid;
  "Why weepest thou?" he gently said;
  "I love thee well; be not afraid."

  He takes her hand, and leads her on;
  She should have waited there alone,
  For he was not her chosen one.

  He leans her head upon his breast,
  She knew 't was not her home of rest,
  But ah! she had been sore distrest.

  The sacred stars looked sadly down;
  The parting moon appeared to frown,
  To see thus dimmed the diamond crown.

  Then from the thicket starts a deer,
  The huntsman, seizing on his spear,
  Cries, "Maiden, wait thou for me here."

  She sees him vanish into night,
  She starts from sleep in deep affright,
  For it was not her own true knight.

  Though but in dream Gunhilda failed.
  Though but a fancied ill assailed,
  Though she but fancied fault bewailed,--

  Yet thought of day makes dream of night:
  She is not worthy of the knight,
  The inmost altar burns not bright.

  If loneliness thou canst not bear,
  Cannot the dragon's venom dare,
  Of the pure meed thou shouldst despair.

  Now sadder that lone maiden sighs,
  Far bitterer tears profane her eyes,
  Crushed, in the dust her heart's flower lies.

On the bank of Silver Lake we saw an Indian encampment. A shower
threatened us, but we resolved to try if we could not visit it before
it came on. We crossed a wide field on foot, and found the Indians
amid the trees on a shelving bank; just as we reached them, the rain
began to fall in torrents, with frequent thunderclaps, and we had
to take refuge in their lodges. These were very small, being for
temporary use, and we crowded the occupants much, among whom were
several sick, on the damp ground, or with only a ragged mat between
them and it. But they showed all the gentle courtesy which, marks
their demeanor towards the stranger, who stands in any need; though it
was obvious that the visit, which inconvenienced them, could only
have been caused by the most impertinent curiosity, they made us as
comfortable as their extreme poverty permitted. They seemed to think
we would not like to touch them; a sick girl in the lodge where I was,
persisted in moving so as to give me the dry place; a woman, with the
sweet melancholy eye of the race, kept off the children and wet dogs
from even the hem of my garment.

Without, their fires smouldered, and black kettles, hung over them on
sticks, smoked, and seethed in the rain. An old, theatrical-looking
Indian stood with arms folded, looking up to the heavens, from
which the rain clashed and the thunder reverberated; his air was
French-Roman; that is, more Romanesque than Roman. The Indian ponies,
much excited, kept careering through the wood, around the encampment,
and now and then, halting suddenly, would thrust in their intelligent,
though amazed faces, as if to ask their masters when this awful pother
would cease, and then, after a moment, rush and trample off again.

At last we got away, well wetted, but with a picturesque scene for
memory. At a house where we stopped to get dry, they told us that
this wandering band (of Pottawattamies), who had returned, on a visit,
either from homesickness, or need of relief, were extremely destitute.
The women had been there to see if they could barter for food their
head-bands, with which they club their hair behind into a form not
unlike a Grecian knot. They seemed, indeed, to have neither food,
utensils, clothes, nor bedding; nothing but the ground, the sky, and
their own strength. Little wonder if they drove off the game!

Part of the same band I had seen in Milwaukee, on a begging dance.
The effect of this was wild and grotesque. They wore much paint and
feather head-dresses. "Indians without paint are poor coots," said a
gentleman who had been a great deal with, and really liked, them;
and I like the effect of the paint on them; it reminds of the gay
fantasies of nature. With them in Milwaukie was a chief, the finest
Indian figure I saw, more than six feet in height, erect, and of a
sullen, but grand gait and gesture. He wore a deep-red blanket, which
fell in large folds from his shoulders to his feet, did not join in
the dance, but slowly strode about through the streets, a fine
sight, not a French-Roman, but a real Roman. He looked unhappy,
but listlessly unhappy, as if he felt it was of no use to strive or
resist.

While in the neighborhood of these lakes, we visited also a foreign
settlement of great interest. Here were minds, it seemed, to
"comprehend the trust" of their new life; and, if they can only stand
true to them, will derive and bestow great benefits therefrom.

But sad and sickening to the enthusiast who comes to these shores,
hoping the tranquil enjoyment of intellectual blessings, and the
pure happiness of mutual love, must be a part of the scene that he
encounters at first. He has escaped from the heartlessness of courts,
to encounter the vulgarity of the mob; he has secured solitude, but
it is a lonely, a deserted solitude. Amid the abundance of nature,
he cannot, from petty, but insuperable obstacles, procure, for a long
time, comforts or a home.

But let him come sufficiently armed with patience to learn the new
spells which the new dragons require, (and this can only be done
on the spot,) he will not finally be disappointed of the promised
treasure; the mob will resolve itself into men, yet crude, but of good
dispositions, and capable of good character; the solitude will become
sufficiently enlivened, and home grow up at last from the rich sod.

In this transition state we found one of these homes. As we
approached, it seemed the very Eden which earth might still afford to
a pair willing to give up the hackneyed pleasures of the world for a
better and more intimate communion with one another and with beauty:
the wild road led through wide, beautiful woods, to the wilder and
more beautiful shores of the finest lake we saw. On its waters,
glittering in the morning sun, a few Indians were paddling to and fro
in their light canoes. On one of those fair knolls I have so often
mentioned stood the cottage, beneath trees which stooped as if
they yet felt brotherhood with its roof-tree. Flowers waved, birds
fluttered round, all had the sweetness of a happy seclusion; all
invited to cry to those who inhabited it, All hail, ye happy ones!

But on entrance to those evidently rich in personal beauty, talents,
love, and courage, the aspect of things was rather sad. Sickness had
been with them, death, care, and labor; these had not yet blighted
them, but had turned their gay smiles grave. It seemed that hope and
joy had given place to resolution. How much, too, was there in them,
worthless in this place, which would have been so valuable
elsewhere! Refined graces, cultivated powers, shine in vain before
field-laborers, as laborers are in this present world; you might as
well cultivate heliotropes to present to an ox. Oxen and heliotropes
are both good, but not for one another.

With them were some of the old means of enjoyment, the books,
the pencil, the guitar; but where the wash-tub and the axe are so
constantly in requisition, there is not much time and pliancy of hand
for these.

In the inner room, the master of the house was seated; he had been
sitting there long, for he had injured his foot on ship-board, and his
farming had to be done by proxy. His beautiful young wife was his
only attendant and nurse, as well as a farm, housekeeper. How well
she performed hard and unaccustomed duties, the objects of her care
showed; everything that belonged to the house was rude, but neatly
arranged. The invalid, confined to an uneasy wooden chair, (they had
not been able to induce any one to bring them an easy-chair from the
town,) looked as neat and elegant as if he had been dressed by the
valet of a duke. He was of Northern blood, with clear, full blue eyes,
calm features, a tempering of the soldier, scholar, and man of the
world, in his aspect. Either various intercourses had given him that
thoroughbred look never seen in Americans, or it was inherited from
a race who had known all these disciplines. He formed a great but
pleasing contrast to his wife, whose glowing complexion and dark
yellow eye bespoke an origin in some climate more familiar with the
sun. He looked as if he could sit there a great while patiently,
and live on his own mind, biding his time; she, as if she could bear
anything for affection's sake, but would feel the weight of each
moment as it passed.

Seeing the album full of drawings and verses, which bespoke the circle
of elegant and affectionate intercourse they had left behind, we could
not but see that the young wife sometimes must need a sister, the
husband a companion, and both must often miss that electricity which
sparkles from the chain of congenial minds.

For mankind, a position is desirable in some degree proportioned to
education. Mr. Birkbeck was bred a farmer, but these were nurslings
of the court and city; they may persevere, for an affectionate courage
shone in their eyes, and, if so, become true lords of the soil, and
informing geniuses to those around; then, perhaps, they will feel that
they have not paid too clear for the tormented independence of the new
settler's life. But, generally, damask roses will not thrive in the
wood, and a ruder growth, if healthy and pure, we wish rather to see
there.

I feel about these foreigners very differently from what I do about
Americans. American men and women are inexcusable if they do not bring
up children so as to be fit for vicissitudes; the meaning of our star
is, that here all men being free and equal, every man should be fitted
for freedom and an independence by his own resources wherever the
changeful wave of our mighty stream may take him. But the star of
Europe brought a different horoscope, and to mix destinies breaks the
thread of both. The Arabian horse will not plough well, nor can the
plough-horse be rode to play the jereed. Yet a man is a man wherever
he goes, and something precious cannot fail to be gained by one who
knows how to abide by a resolution of any kind, and pay the cost
without a murmur.

Returning, the fine carriage at last fulfilled its threat of breaking
down. We took refuge in a farm-house. Here was a pleasant scene,--a
rich and beautiful estate, several happy families, who had removed
together, and formed a natural community, ready to help and enliven
one another. They were farmers at home, in Western New York, and both
men and women knew how to work. Yet even here the women did not like
the change, but they were willing, "as it might be best for the young
folks." Their hospitality was great: the houseful of women and pretty
children seemed all of one mind.

Returning to Milwaukie much fatigued, I entertained myself: for a
day or two with reading. The book I had brought with me was in strong
contrast with, the life around, me. Very strange was this vision of
an exalted and sensitive existence, which seemed to invade the next
sphere, in contrast with the spontaneous, instinctive life, so healthy
and so near the ground I had been surveying. This was the German book
entitled:--

"The Seeress of Prevorst.--Revelations concerning the Inward Life of
Man, and the Projection of a World of Spirits into ours, communicated
by Justinus Kerner."

This book, published in Germany some twelve years since, and which
called forth there plenteous dews of admiration, as plenteous
hail-storms of jeers and scorns, I never saw mentioned in any English
publication till some year or two since. Then a playful, but not
sarcastic account of it, in the Dublin Magazine, so far excited my
curiosity, that I procured the book, intending to read it so soon as I
should have some leisure days, such as this journey has afforded.

Dr. Kerner, its author, is a man of distinction in his native land,
both as a physician and a thinker, though always on the side of
reverence, marvel, and mysticism. He was known to me only through two
or three little poems of his in Catholic legends, which I much admired
for the fine sense they showed of the beauty of symbols.

He here gives a biography, mental and physical, of one of the
most remarkable cases of high nervous excitement that the age,
so interested in such, yet affords, with all its phenomena of
clairvoyance and susceptibility of magnetic influences. As to my own
mental positron on these subjects, it may be briefly expressed by
a dialogue between several persons who honor me with a portion of
friendly confidence and criticism, and myself, personified as _Free
Hope_. The others may be styled _Old Church_, _Good Sense_, and
_Self-Poise_.


DIALOGUE.

_Good Sense._ I wonder you can take any interest in such observations
or experiments. Don't you see how almost impossible it is to make them
with any exactness, how entirely impossible to know anything about
them unless made by yourself, when the least leaven of credulity,
excited fancy, to say nothing of willing or careless imposture,
spoils the whole loaf? Beside, allowing the possibility of some clear
glimpses into a higher state of being, what do we want of it now? All
around us lies what we neither understand nor use. Our capacities, our
instincts for this our present sphere, are but half developed. Let
us confine ourselves to that till the lesson be learned; let us be
completely natural, before we trouble ourselves with the supernatural.
I never see any of these things but I long to get away and lie under
a green tree, and let the wind blow on me. There is marvel and charm
enough in that for me.

_Free Hope._ And for me also. Nothing is truer than the Wordsworthian
creed, on which Carlyle lays such stress, that we need only look
on the miracle of every day, to sate ourselves with thought and
admiration every day. But how are our faculties sharpened to do it?
Precisely by apprehending the infinite results of every day.

Who sees the meaning of the flower uprooted in the ploughed field? The
ploughman who does not look beyond its boundaries and does not raise
his eyes from the ground? No,--but the poet who sees that field in its
relations with the universe, and looks oftener to the sky than on the
ground. Only the dreamer shall understand realities, though, in truth,
his dreaming must be not out of proportion to his waking!

The mind, roused powerfully by this existence, stretches of itself
into what the French sage calls the "aromal state." From the hope thus
gleaned it forms the hypothesis, under whose banner it collects its
facts.

Long before these slight attempts were made to establish, as a science
what is at present called animal magnetism, always, in fact, men were
occupied more or less with this vital principle,--principle of
flux and influx,--dynamic of our mental mechanics,--human phase of
electricity. Poetic observation was pure, there was no quackery in its
free course, as there is so often in this wilful tampering with the
hidden springs of life, for it is tampering unless done in a patient
spirit and with severe truth; yet it may be, by the rude or greedy
miners, some good ore is unearthed. And some there are who work in
the true temper, patient and accurate in trial, not rushing to
conclusions, feeling there is a mystery, not eager to call it by name
till they can know it as a reality: such may learn, such may teach.

Subject to the sudden revelations, the breaks in habitual existence,
caused by the aspect of death, the touch of love, the flood of music,
I never lived, that I remember, what you call a common natural day.
All my days are touched by the supernatural, for I feel the pressure
of hidden causes, and the presence, sometimes the communion, of unseen
powers. It needs not that I should ask the clairvoyant whether "a
spirit-world projects into ours." As to the specific evidence, I would
not tarnish my mind by hasty reception. The mind is not, I know, a
highway, but a temple, and its doors should not be carelessly left
open. Yet it were sin, if indolence or coldness excluded what had a
claim to enter; and I doubt whether, in the eyes of pure intelligence,
an ill-grounded hasty rejection be not a greater sign of weakness than
an ill-grounded and hasty faith.

I will quote, as my best plea, the saying of a man old in years, but
not in heart, and whose long life has been distinguished by that
clear adaptation of means to ends which gives the credit of practical
wisdom. He wrote to his child, "I have lived too long, and seen too
much, to be _in_ credulous." Noble the thought, no less so its frank
expression, instead of saws of caution, mean advices, and other modern
instances. Such was the romance of Socrates when he bade his disciples
"sacrifice a cock to Æsculapius."

_Old Church._ You are always so quick-witted and voluble, Free Hope,
you don't get time to see how often you err, and even, perhaps, sin
and blaspheme. The Author of all has intended to confine our knowledge
within certain boundaries, has given us a short span of time for
a certain probation, for which our faculties are adapted. By wild
speculation and intemperate curiosity we violate His will, and incur
dangerous, perhaps fatal, consequences. We waste our powers, and,
becoming morbid and visionary, are unfitted to obey positive precepts,
and perform positive duties.

_Free Hope._ I do not see how it is possible to go further beyond the
results of a limited human experience than those do who pretend to
settle the origin and nature of sin, the final destiny of souls, and
the whole plan of the Causal Spirit with regard to them. I think those
who take your view have not examined themselves, and do not know the
ground on which they stand.

I acknowledge no limit, set up by man's opinion, as to the capacities
of man. "Care is taken," I see it, "that the trees grow not up into
heaven"; but, to me it seems, the more vigorously they aspire, the
better. Only let it be a vigorous, not a partial or sickly aspiration.
Let not the tree forget its root.

So long as the child insists on knowing where its dead parent is, so
long as bright eyes weep at mysterious pressures, too heavy for the
life, so long as that impulse is constantly arising which made the
Roman emperor address his soul in a strain of such touching softness,
vanishing from, the thought, as the column of smoke from the eye, I
know of no inquiry which the impulse of man suggests that is forbidden
to the resolution of man to pursue. In every inquiry, unless sustained
by a pure and reverent spirit, he gropes in the dark, or falls
headlong.

_Self-Poise._ All this may be very true, but what is the use of all
this straining? Far-sought is dear-bought. When we know that all is in
each, and that the ordinary contains the extraordinary, why should we
play the baby, and insist upon having the moon for a toy when a tin
dish will do as well? Our deep ignorance is a chasm that we can only
fill up by degrees, but the commonest rubbish will help us as well
as shred silk. The god Brahma, while on earth, was set to fill up a
valley, but he had only a basket given him in which to fetch earth for
this purpose; so is it with us all. No leaps, no starts, will avail
us; by patient crystallization alone, the equal temper of wisdom is
attainable. Sit at home, and the spirit-world will look in at your
window with moonlit eyes; run out to find it, and rainbow and golden
cup will have vanished, and left you the beggarly child you were. The
better part of wisdom is a sublime prudence, a pure and patient truth,
that will receive nothing it is not sure it can permanently lay to
heart. Of our study, there should be in proportion two thirds of
rejection to one of acceptance. And, amid the manifold infatuations
and illusions of this world of emotion, a being capable of clear
intelligence can do no better service than to hold himself upright,
avoid nonsense, and do what chores lie in his way, acknowledging every
moment that primal truth, which no fact exhibits, nor, if pressed by
too warm a hope, will even indicate. I think, indeed, it is part of
our lesson to give a formal consent to what is farcical, and to
pick up our living and our virtue amid what is so ridiculous, hardly
deigning a smile, and certainly not vexed. The work is done through
all, if not by every one.

_Free Hope._ Thou art greatly wise, my friend, and ever respected by
me, yet I find not in your theory or your scope room enough for the
lyric inspirations or the mysterious whispers of life. To me it
seems that it is madder never to abandon one's self, than often to be
infatuated; better to be wounded, a captive, and a slave, than always
to walk in armor. As to magnetism, that is only a matter of fancy. You
sometimes need just such a field in which to wander vagrant, and if it
bear a higher name, yet it may be that, in last result, the trance of
Pythagoras might be classed with the more infantine transports of the
Seeress of Prevorst.

What is done interests me more than what is thought and supposed.
Every fact is impure, but every fact contains in it the juices of
life. Every fact is a clod, from which may grow an amaranth or a palm.

Climb you the snowy peaks whence come the streams, where the
atmosphere is rare, where you can see the sky nearer, from which you
can get a commanding view of the landscape? I see great disadvantages
as well as advantages in this dignified position. I had rather walk
myself through all kinds of places, even at the risk of being robbed
in the forest, half drowned at the ford, and covered with dust in the
street.

I would beat with the living heart of the world, and understand all
the moods, even the fancies or fantasies, of nature. I dare to
trust to the interpreting spirit to bring me out all right at
last,--establish truth through error.

Whether this be the best way is of no consequence, if it be the one
individual character points out.

  For one, like me, it would be vain
  From glittering heights the eyes to strain;
  I the truth can only know,
  Tested by life's most fiery glow.
  Seeds of thought will never thrive,
  Till dews of love shall bid them live.

Let me stand in my age with all its waters flowing round me. If
they sometimes subdue, they must finally upbear me, for I seek the
universal,--and that must be the best.

The Spirit, no doubt, leads in every movement of my time: if I seek
the How, I shall find it, as well as if I busied myself more with the
Why.

Whatever is, is right, if only men are steadily bent to make it so, by
comprehending and fulfilling its design.

May not I have an office, too, in my hospitality and ready sympathy?
If I sometimes entertain guests who cannot pay with gold coin,
with "fair rose nobles," that is better than to lose the chance of
entertaining angels unawares.

You, my three friends, are held, in heart-honor, by me. You,
especially, Good Sense, because where you do not go yourself, you do
not object to another's going, if he will. You are really liberal.
You, Old Church, are of use, by keeping unforgot the effigies of old
religion, and reviving the tone of pure Spenserian sentiment, which
this time is apt to stifle in its childish haste. But you are very
faulty in censuring and wishing to limit others by your own
standard. You, Self-Poise, fill a priestly office. Could but a larger
intelligence of the vocations of others, and a tender sympathy with
their individual natures, be added, had you more of love, or more of
apprehensive genius, (for either would give you the needed expansion
and delicacy,) you would command my entire reverence. As it is, I must
at times deny and oppose you, and so must others, for you tend, by
your influence, to exclude us from our full, free life. We must
be content when you censure, and rejoiced when you approve; always
admonished to good by your whole being, and sometimes by your
judgment.

       *       *       *       *       *

Do not blame me that I have written so much suggested by the German
seeress, while you were looking for news of the West. Here on the
pier, I see disembarking the Germans, the Norwegians, the Swedes, the
Swiss. Who knows how much of old legendary lore, of modern wonder,
they have already planted amid the Wisconsin forests? Soon, their
tales of the origin of things, and the Providence which rules them,
will be so mingled with those of the Indian, that the very oak-tree
will not know them apart,--will not know whether itself be a Runic, a
Druid, or a Winnebago oak.

Some seeds of all growths that have ever been known in this world
might, no doubt, already be found in these Western wilds, if we had
the power to call them to life.

I saw, in the newspaper, that the American Tract Society boasted of
their agent's having exchanged, at a Western cabin door, tracts for
the "Devil on Two Sticks," and then burnt that more entertaining than
edifying volume. No wonder, though, they study it there. Could one
but have the gift of reading the dreams dreamed by men of such various
birth, various history, various mind, it would afford much, more
extensive amusement than did the chambers of one Spanish city!

Could I but have flown at night through such mental experiences,
instead of being shut up in my little bedroom at the Milwaukie
boarding-house, this chapter would have been worth reading. As it is,
let us hasten to a close.

Had I been rich in money, I might have built a house, or set up in
business, during my fortnight's stay at Milwaukie, matters move on
there at so rapid a rate. But being only rich in curiosity, I was
obliged to walk the streets and pick up what I could in casual
intercourse. When I left the street, indeed, and walked on the bluffs,
or sat beside the lake in their shadow, my mind was rich in dreams
congenial to the scene, some time to be realized, though not by me.

A boat was left, keel up, half on the sand, half in the water, swaying
with each swell of the lake. It gave a picturesque grace to that part
of the shore, as the only image of inaction,--only object of a pensive
character to be seen. Near this I sat, to dream my dreams and watch
the colors of the lake, changing hourly, till the sun sank. These
hours yielded impulses, wove webs, such as life will not again afford.

Returning to the boarding-house, which was also a boarding-school, we
were sure to be greeted by gay laughter.

This school was conducted by two girls of nineteen and seventeen
years; their pupils were nearly as old as themselves. The relation
seemed very pleasant between them; the only superiority--that of
superior knowledge--was sufficient to maintain authority,--all the
authority that was needed to keep daily life in good order.

In the West, people are not respected merely because they are old in
years; people there have not time to keep up appearances in that way;
when persons cease to have a real advantage in wisdom, knowledge,
or enterprise, they must stand back, and let those who are oldest in
character "go ahead," however few years they may count. There are no
banks of established respectability in which to bury the talent there;
no napkin of precedent in which to wrap it. What cannot be made to
pass current, is not esteemed coin of the realm.

To the windows of this house, where the daughter of a famous "Indian
fighter," i.e. fighter against the Indians, was learning French, and
the piano, came wild, tawny figures, offering for sale their baskets
of berries. The boys now, instead of brandishing the tomahawk, tame
their hands to pick raspberries.

Here the evenings were much lightened by the gay chat of one of the
party, who with the excellent practical sense of mature experience,
and the kindest heart, united a _naïveté_ and innocence such as I
never saw in any other who had walked so long life's tangled path.
Like a child, she was everywhere at home, and, like a child, received
and bestowed entertainment from all places, all persons. I thanked her
for making me laugh, as did the sick and poor, whom she was sure to
find out in her briefest sojourn in any place, for more substantial
aid. Happy are those who never grieve, and so often aid and enliven
their fellow-men!

This scene, however, I was not sorry to exchange for the much
celebrated beauties of the island of Mackinaw.




CHAPTER VI.

MACKINAW.--INDIANS.--INDIAN WOMEN.--EVERETT'S RECEPTION OF
CHIEFS.--UNFITNESS OF INDIAN MISSIONARIES.--OUR DUTIES TOWARD THIS
RACE.


Late at night we reached this island of Mackinaw, so famous for its
beauty, and to which I proposed a visit of some length. It was the
last week in August, at which, time a large representation from the
Chippewa and Ottawa tribes are here to receive their annual payments
from the American government. As their habits make travelling easy and
inexpensive to them, neither being obliged to wait for steamboats, or
write to see whether hotels are full, they come hither by thousands,
and those thousands in families, secure of accommodation on the beach,
and food from the lake, to make a long holiday out of the occasion.
There were near two thousand encamped on the island already, and more
arriving every day.

As our boat came in, the captain had some rockets let off. This
greatly excited the Indians, and their yells and wild cries resounded
along the shore. Except for the momentary flash of the rockets, it
was perfectly dark, and my sensations as I walked with a stranger to a
strange hotel, through the midst of these shrieking savages, and heard
the pants and snorts of the departing steamer, which carried, away
all my companions, were somewhat of the dismal sort; though it was
pleasant, too, in the way that everything strange is; everything that
breaks in upon the routine that so easily incrusts us.

I had reason to expect a room to myself at the hotel, but found
none, and was obliged to take up my rest in the common parlor and
eating-room, a circumstance which insured my being an early riser.

With the first rosy streak, I was out among my Indian neighbors, whose
lodges honeycombed the beautiful beach, that curved away in long, fair
outline on either side the house. They were already on the alert, the
children creeping out from beneath the blanket door of the lodge, the
women pounding corn in their rude mortars, the young men playing on
their pipes. I had been much amused, when the strain proper to the
Winnebago courting flute was played to me on another instrument, at
any one fancying it a melody; but now, when I heard the notes in
their true tone and time, I thought it not unworthy comparison, in
its graceful sequence, and the light flourish at the close, with the
sweetest bird-song; and this, like the bird-song, is only practised
to allure a mate. The Indian, become a citizen and a husband, no more
thinks of playing the flute, than one of the "settled-down" members of
our society would, of choosing the "purple light of love" as dye-stuff
for a surtout.

Mackinaw has been fully described by able pens, and I can only add my
tribute to the exceeding beauty of the spot and its position. It is
charming to be on an island so small that you can sail round it in an
afternoon, yet large enough to admit of long, secluded walks through
its gentle groves. You can go round it in your boat; or, on foot, you
can tread its narrow beach, resting, at times, beneath the lofty walls
of stone, richly wooded, which rise from it in various architectural
forms. In this stone, caves are continually forming, from the action
of the atmosphere; one of these is quite deep, and a rocky fragment
left at its mouth, wreathed with little creeping plants, looks, as you
sit within, like a ruined pillar.

The arched rock surprised me, much as I had heard of it, from, the
perfection of the arch. It is perfect, whether you look up through it
from the lake, or down through it to the transparent waters. We both
ascended and descended--no very easy matter--the steep and crumbling
path, and rested at the summit, beneath the trees, and at the foot,
upon the cool, mossy stones beside the lapsing wave. Nature has
carefully decorated all this architecture with shrubs that take root
within the crevices, and small creeping vines. These natural ruins may
vie for beautiful effect with the remains of European grandeur, and
have, beside, a charm as of a playful mood in Nature.

The sugar-loaf rock is a fragment in the same kind as the pine rock
we saw in Illinois. It has the same air of a helmet, as seen from an
eminence at the side, which you descend by a long and steep path. The
rock itself may be ascended by the bold and agile: half-way up is a
niche, to which those who are neither can climb by a ladder. A very
handsome young officer and lady who were with us did so, and then,
facing round, stood there side by side, looking in the niche, if
not like saints or angels wrought by pious hands in stone, as
romantically, if not as holily, worthy the gazer's eye.

The woods which adorn the central ridge of the island are very full
in foliage, and, in August, showed the tender green and pliant leaf
of June elsewhere. They are rich in beautiful mosses and the wild
raspberry.

From Fort Holmes, the old fort, we had the most commanding view of the
lake and straits, opposite shores, and fair islets. Mackinaw itself is
best seen from the water. Its peculiar shape is supposed to have been
the origin of its name, Michilimackinac, which means the Great Turtle.
One person whom I saw wished to establish another etymology, which he
fancied to be more refined; but, I doubt not, this is the true one,
both because the shape might suggest such a name, and the existence
of an island of such form in this commanding position would seem
a significant fact to the Indians. For Henry gives the details of
peculiar worship paid to the Great Turtle, and the oracles received
from this extraordinary Apollo of the Indian Delphos.

It is crowned, most picturesquely, by the white fort, with its gay
flag. From this, on one side, stretches the town. How pleasing a
sight, after the raw, crude, staring assemblage of houses everywhere
else to be met in this country, is an old French town, mellow in
its coloring, and with the harmonious effect of a slow growth, which
assimilates, naturally, with objects round it! The people in its
streets, Indian, French, half-breeds, and others, walked with a
leisure step, as of those who live a life of taste and inclination,
rather than of the hard press of business, as in American towns
elsewhere.

On the other side, along the fair, curving beach, below the white
houses scattered on the declivity, clustered the Indian lodges, with
their amber-brown matting, so soft and bright of hue, in the late
afternoon sun. The first afternoon I was there, looking down from
a near height, I felt that I never wished to see a more fascinating
picture. It was an hour of the deepest serenity; bright blue and gold,
with rich shadows. Every moment the sunlight fell more mellow.
The Indians were grouped and scattered among the lodges; the women
preparing food, in the kettle or frying-pan, over the many small
fires; the children, half naked, wild as little goblins, were playing
both in and out of the water. Here and there lounged a young girl,
with a baby at her back, whose bright eyes glanced, as if born into a
world of courage and of joy, instead of ignominious servitude and slow
decay. Some girls were cutting wood, a little way from me, talking and
laughing, in the low musical tone, so charming in the Indian women.
Many bark canoes were upturned upon the beach, and, by that light, of
almost the same amber as the lodges; others coming in, their square
sails set, and with almost arrowy speed, though heavily laden with
dusky forms, and all the apparatus of their household. Here and there
a sail-boat glided by, with a different but scarce less pleasing
motion.

It was a scene of ideal loveliness, and these wild forms adorned it,
as looking so at home in it. All seemed happy, and they were happy
that day, for they had no fire-water to madden them, as it was Sunday,
and the shops were shut.

From my window, at the boarding-house, my eye was constantly attracted
by these picturesque groups. I was never tired of seeing the canoes
come in, and the new arrivals set up their temporary dwellings. The
women ran to set up the tent-poles, and spread the mats on the ground.
The men brought the chests, kettles, &c.; the mats were then laid on
the outside, the cedar-boughs strewed on the ground, the blanket hung
up for a door, and all was completed in less than twenty minutes. Then
they began to prepare the night meal, and to learn of their neighbors
the news of the day.

The habit of preparing food out of doors gave all the gypsy charm and
variety to their conduct. Continually I wanted Sir Walter Scott to
have been there. If such romantic sketches were suggested to him, by
the sight of a few gypsies, not a group near one of these fires but
would have furnished him material for a separate canvas. I was so
taken up with the spirit of the scene, that I could not follow out
the stories suggested by these weather-beaten, sullen, but eloquent
figures.

They talked a great deal, and with much, variety of gesture, so that I
often had a good guess at the meaning of their discourse. I saw
that, whatever the Indian may be among the whites, he is anything but
taciturn with his own people; and he often would declaim, or narrate
at length. Indeed, it is obvious, if only from the fables taken from
their stores by Mr. Schoolcraft, that these tribes possess great power
that way.

I liked very much, to walk or sit among them. With, the women I held
much communication by signs. They are almost invariably coarse and
ugly, with the exception of their eyes, with a peculiarly awkward
gait, and forms bent by burdens. This gait, so different from the
steady and noble step of the men, marks the inferior position
they occupy. I had heard much eloquent contradiction of this. Mrs.
Schoolcraft had maintained to a friend, that they were in fact as
nearly on a par with their husbands as the white woman with hers.
"Although," said she, "on account of inevitable causes, the Indian
woman is subjected to many hardships of a peculiar nature, yet her
position, compared with that of the man, is higher and freer than that
of the white woman. Why will people look only on one side? They either
exalt the red man into a demigod, or degrade him into a beast. They
say that he compels his wife to do all the drudgery, while he does
nothing but hunt and amuse himself; forgetting that upon his activity
and power of endurance as a hunter depends the support of his
family; that this is labor of the most fatiguing kind, and that it is
absolutely necessary that he should keep his frame unbent by burdens
and unworn by toil, that he may be able to obtain the means of
subsistence. I have witnessed scenes of conjugal and parental love
in the Indian's wigwam, from, which I have often, often thought the
educated white man, proud of his superior civilization, might learn a
useful lesson. When he returns from hunting, worn out with, fatigue,
having tasted nothing since dawn, his wife, if she is a good wife,
will take off his moccasons and replace them with dry ones, and will
prepare his game for their repast, while his children will climb upon
him, and he will caress them, with all the tenderness of a woman; and
in the evening the Indian wigwam is the scene of the purest domestic
pleasures. The father will relate, for the amusement of the wife and
for the instruction of the children, all the events of the day's hunt,
while they will treasure up every word that falls, and thus learn
the theory of the art whose practice is to be the occupation of their
lives."

Mrs. Grant speaks thus of the position of woman amid the Mohawk
Indians:--

"Lady Mary Montague says, that the court of Vienna was the paradise of
old women, and that there is no other place in the world where a woman
past fifty excites the least interest. Had her travels extended to
the interior of North America, she would have seen another instance of
this inversion of the common mode of thinking. Here a woman never was
of consequence, till sire had a son old enough to fight the battles of
his country. From, that date she held a superior rank in society; was
allowed to live at ease, and even called to consultations on national
affairs. In savage and warlike countries, the reign of beauty is very
short, and its influence comparatively limited. The girls in childhood
had a very pleasing appearance; but excepting their fine hair,
eyes, and teeth, every external grace was soon banished by perpetual
drudgery, carrying burdens too heavy to be borne, and other slavish
employments, considered beneath the dignity of the men. These walked
before, erect and graceful, decked with ornaments which set off to
advantage the symmetry of their well-formed persons, while the poor
women followed, meanly attired, bent under the weight of the children
and the utensils, which they carried everywhere with, them, and
disfigured and degraded by ceaseless toils. They were very early
married, for a Mohawk had no other servant but his wife; and whenever
he commenced hunter, it was requisite he should have some one to carry
his load, cook his kettle, make his moccasons, and, above all, produce
the young warriors who were to succeed him in the honors of the chase
and of the tomahawk. Wherever man is a mere hunter, woman is a mere
slave. It is domestic intercourse that softens man, and elevates
woman; and of that there can be but little, where the employments
and amusements are not in common. The ancient Caledonians honored the
fair; but then it is to be observed, they were fair huntresses,
and moved in the light of their beauty to the hill of roes; and the
culinary toils were entirely left to the rougher sex. When the young
warrior made his appearance, it softened the cares of his mother, who
well knew that, when he grew up, every deficiency in tenderness to his
wife would be made up in superabundant duty and affection to her. If
it were possible to carry filial veneration to excess, it was done
here; for all other charities were absorbed in it. I wonder this
system of depressing the sex in their early years, to exalt them,
when all their juvenile attractions are flown, and when mind alone
can distinguish them, has not occurred to our modern reformers.
The Mohawks took good care not to admit their women to share their
prerogatives, till they approved themselves good wives and mothers."

The observations of women upon the position of woman are always more
valuable than those of men; but, of these two, Mrs. Grant's seem
much, nearer the truth than Mrs. Schoolcraft's, because, though her
opportunities for observation did not bring her so close, she looked
more at both sides to find the truth.

Carver, in his travels among the Winnebagoes, describes two queens,
one nominally so, like Queen Victoria; the other invested with a
genuine royalty, springing from her own conduct.

In the great town of the Winnebagoes, he found a queen presiding over
the tribe, instead of a sachem. He adds, that, in some tribes, the
descent is given to the female line in preference to the male, that
is, a sister's son will succeed to the authority, rather than a
brother's son. The position of this Winnebago queen reminded me
forcibly of Queen Victoria's.

"She sat in the council, but only asked a few questions, or gave some
trifling directions in matters relative to the state, for women are
never allowed to sit in their councils, except they happen to be
invested with the supreme authority, and then it is not customary for
them to make any formal speeches, as the chiefs do. She was a very
ancient woman, small in stature, and not much distinguished by
her dress from several young women that attended her. These, her
attendants, seemed greatly pleased whenever I showed any tokens
of respect to their queen, especially when I saluted her, which I
frequently did to acquire her favor."

The other was a woman, who, being taken captive, found means to kill
her captor, and make her escape; and the tribe were so struck with
admiration at the courage and calmness she displayed on the occasion,
as to make her chieftainess in her own light.

Notwithstanding the homage paid to women, and the consequence allowed
them in some cases, it is impossible to look upon the Indian women
without feeling that they _do_ occupy a lower place than women among
the nations of European civilization. The habits of drudgery expressed
in their form and gesture, the soft and wild but melancholy expression
of their eye, reminded me of the tribe mentioned by Mackenzie, where
the women destroy their female children, whenever they have a good
opportunity; and of the eloquent reproaches addressed by the Paraguay
woman to her mother, that she had not, in the same way, saved her from
the anguish and weariness of her lot.

More weariness than anguish, no doubt, falls to the lot of most of
these women. They inherit submission, and the minds of the generality
accommodate themselves more or less to any posture. Perhaps they
suffer less than their white sisters, who have more aspiration and
refinement, with little power of self-sustenance. But their place is
certainly lower, and their share of the human inheritance less.

Their decorum and delicacy are striking, and show that, when these are
native to the mind, no habits of life make any difference. Their whole
gesture is timid, yet self-possessed. They used to crowd round me, to
inspect little things I had to show them, but never press near; on the
contrary, would reprove and keep off the children. Anything they took
from my hand was held with care, then shut or folded, and returned
with an air of lady-like precision. They would not stare, however
curious they might be, but cast sidelong glances.

A locket that I wore was an object of untiring interest; they seemed
to regard it as a talisman. My little sun-shade was still more
fascinating to them; apparently they had never before seen one. For an
umbrella they entertained profound regard, probably looking upon it as
the most luxurious superfluity a person can possess, and therefore a
badge of great wealth. I used to see an old squaw, whose sullied
skin and coarse, tanned locks told that she had braved sun and storm,
without a doubt or care, for sixty years at least, sitting gravely at
the door of her lodge, with an old green umbrella over her head, happy
for hours together in the dignified shade. For her happiness pomp
came not, as it so often does, too late; she received it with grateful
enjoyment.

One day, as I was seated on one of the canoes, a woman came and sat
beside me, with her baby in its cradle set up at her feet. She asked
me by a gesture to let her take my sun-shade, and then to show her how
to open it. Then she put it into her baby's hand, and held it over
its head, looking at me the while with a sweet, mischievous laugh, as
much, as to say, "You carry a thing that is only fit for a baby." Her
pantomime was very pretty. She, like the other women, had a glance,
and shy, sweet expression in the eye; the men have a steady gaze.

That noblest and loveliest of modern Preux, Lord Edward Fitzgerald,
who came through Buffalo to Detroit and Mackinaw, with Brant, and was
adopted into the Bear tribe by the name of Eghnidal, was struck in
the same way by the delicacy of manners in women. He says:
"Notwithstanding the life they lead, which would make most women rough
and masculine, they are as soft, meek, and modest as the best brought
up girls in England. Somewhat coquettish too! Imagine the manners of
Mimi in a poor _squaw_, that has been carrying packs in the woods all
her life."

McKenney mentions that the young wife, during the short bloom of her
beauty, is an object of homage and tenderness to her husband. One
Indian woman, the Flying Pigeon, a beautiful and excellent person, of
whom he gives some particulars, is an instance of the power uncommon
characters will always exert of breaking down the barriers custom has
erected round them. She captivated by her charms, and inspired her
husband and son with, reverence for her character. The simple praise
with which the husband indicates the religion, the judgment, and the
generosity he saw in her, are as satisfying as Count Zinzendorf's more
labored eulogium on his "noble consort." The conduct of her son,
when, many years after her death, he saw her picture at Washington, is
unspeakably affecting. Catlin gives anecdotes of the grief of a
chief for the loss of a daughter, and the princely gifts he offers
in exchange for her portrait, worthy not merely of European, but of
Troubadour sentiment. It is also evident that, as Mrs. Schoolcraft
says, the women have great power at home. It can never be otherwise,
men being dependent upon them for the comfort of their lives. Just
so among ourselves, wives who are neither esteemed nor loved by their
husbands have great power over their conduct by the friction of
every day, and over the formation of their opinions by the daily
opportunities so close a relation affords of perverting testimony
and instilling doubts. But these sentiments should not come in brief
flashes, but burn as a steady flame; then there would be more women
worthy to inspire them. This power is good for nothing, unless the
woman be wise to use it aright. Has the Indian, has the white woman,
as noble a feeling of life and its uses, as religious a self-respect,
as worthy a field of thought and action, as man? If not, the white
woman, the Indian woman, occupies a position inferior to that of man.
It is not so much a question of power, as of privilege.

The men of these subjugated tribes, now accustomed to drunkenness and
every way degraded, bear but a faint impress of the lost grandeur of
the race. They are no longer strong, tall, or finely proportioned.
Yet, as you see them stealing along a height, or striding boldly
forward, they remind you of what _was_ majestic in the red man.

On the shores of Lake Superior, it is said, if you visit them at
home, you may still see a remnant of the noble blood. The Pillagers
(Pilleurs), a band celebrated by the old travellers, are still
existent there.

  "Still some, 'the eagles of their tribe,' may rush."

I have spoken of the hatred felt by the white man for the Indian: with
white women it seems to amount to disgust, to loathing. How I could
endure the dirt, the peculiar smell, of the Indians, and their
dwellings, was a great marvel in the eyes of my lady acquaintance;
indeed, I wonder why they did not quite give me up, as they certainly
looked on me with great distaste for it. "Get you gone, you Indian
dog," was the felt, if not the breathed, expression towards the
hapless owners of the soil;--all their claims, all their sorrows quite
forgot, in abhorrence of their dirt, their tawny skins, and the vices
the whites have taught them.

A person who had seen them during great part of a life expressed his
prejudices to me with such violence, that I was no longer surprised
that the Indian children threw sticks at him, as he passed. A lady
said: "Do what you will for them, they will be ungrateful. The savage
cannot be washed out of them. Bring up an Indian child, and see if you
can attach it to you." The next moment, she expressed, in the presence
of one of those children whom she was bringing up, loathing at the
odor left by one of her people, and one of the most respected, as
he passed through the room. When the child is grown, she will be
considered basely ungrateful not to love the lady, as she certainly
will not; and this will be cited as an instance of the impossibility
of attaching the Indian.

Whether the Indian could, by any efforts of love and intelligence
from, the white man, have been civilized and made a valuable
ingredient in the new state, I will not say; but this we are sure
of,--the French Catholics, at least, did not harm them, nor disturb
their minds merely to corrupt them. The French, they loved. But the
stern Presbyterian, with his dogmas and his task-work, the city circle
and the college, with their niggard concessions and unfeeling stare,
have never tried the experiment. It has not been tried. Our people and
our government have sinned alike against the first-born of the
soil, and if they are the fated agents of a new era, they have done
nothing,--have invoked no god to keep them sinless while they do the
hest of fate.

Worst of all is it, when they invoke the holy power only to mask their
iniquity; when the felon trader, who, all the week, has been besotting
and degrading the Indian with rum mixed with red pepper, and damaged
tobacco, kneels with him on Sunday before a common altar, to tell
the rosary which recalls the thought of Him crucified for love of
suffering men, and to listen to sermons in praise of "purity"!!

"My savage friends," cries the old, fat priest, "you must, above all
things, aim at _purity_."

Oh! my heart swelled when I saw them in a Christian church. Better
their own dog-feasts and bloody rites than such mockery of that other
faith.

"The dog," said an Indian, "was once a spirit; he has fallen for his
sin, and was given by the Great Spirit, in this shape, to man, as his
most intelligent companion. Therefore we sacrifice it in highest honor
to our friends in this world,--to our protecting geniuses in another."

There was religion in that thought. The white man sacrifices his own
brother, and to Mammon, yet he turns in loathing from, the dog-feast.

"You say," said the Indian of the South to the missionary, "that
Christianity is pleasing to God. How can that be?--Those men at
Savannah are Christians."

Yes! slave-drivers and Indian traders are called Christians, and the
Indian is to be deemed less like the Son of Mary than they! Wonderful
is the deceit of man's heart!

I have not, on seeing something of them in their own haunts, found
reason to change the sentiments expressed in the following lines, when
a deputation of the Sacs and Foxes visited Boston in 1837, and were,
by one person at least, received in a dignified and courteous manner.


GOVERNOR EVERETT RECEIVING THE INDIAN CHIEFS,

NOVEMBER, 1837.

  Who says that Poesy is on the wane,
  And that the Muses tune their lyres in vain?
  'Mid all the treasures of romantic story,
  When thought was fresh and fancy in her glory,
  Has ever Art found out a richer theme,
  More dark a shadow, or more soft a gleam,
  Than fall upon the scene, sketched carelessly,
  In the newspaper column of to-day?

  American romance is somewhat stale.
  Talk of the hatchet, and the faces pale,
  Wampum and calumets and forests dreary,
  Once so attractive, now begins to weary.
  Uncas and Magawisca please us still,
  Unreal, yet idealized with skill;
  But every poetaster, scribbling witling,
  From the majestic oak his stylus whittling,
  Has helped to tire us, and to make us fear
  The monotone in which so much we hear
  Of "stoics of the wood," and "men without a tear."

  Yet Nature, ever buoyant, ever young,
  If let alone, will sing as erst she sung;
  The course of circumstance gives back again
  The Picturesque, erewhile pursued in vain;
  Shows us the fount of Romance is not wasted,--
  The lights and shades of contrast not exhausted.

  Shorn of his strength, the Samson now must sue
    For fragments from the feast his fathers gave;
  The Indian dare not claim what is his due,
    But as a boon his heritage must crave;
  His stately form shall soon be seen no more
  Through all his father's land, the Atlantic shore;
  Beneath the sun, to _us_ so kind, _they_ melt,
  More heavily each day our rule is felt.
  The tale is old,--we do as mortals must:
  Might makes right here, but God and Time are just.

  Though, near the drama hastens to its close,
  On this last scene awhile your eyes repose;
  The polished Greek and Scythian meet again,
  The ancient life is lived by modern men;
  The savage through our busy cities walks,
  He in his untouched, grandeur silent stalks.
  Unmoved by all our gayeties and shows,
  Wonder nor shame can touch him as he goes;
  He gazes on the marvels we have wrought,
  But knows the models from whence all was brought;
  In God's first temples he has stood so oft,
  And listened to the natural organ-loft,
  Has watched the eagle's flight, the muttering thunder heard.
  Art cannot move him to a wondering word.
  Perhaps he sees that all this luxury
  Brings less food to the mind than to the eye;
  Perhaps a simple sentiment has brought
  More to him than your arts had ever taught.
  What are the petty triumphs _Art_ has given,
  To eyes familiar with the naked heaven?

  All has been seen,--dock, railroad, and canal,
  Fort, market, bridge, college, and arsenal,
  Asylum, hospital, and cotton-mill,
  The theatre, the lighthouse, and the jail.
  The Braves each novelty, reflecting, saw,
  And now and then growled out the earnest "_Yaw_."
  And now the time is come, 'tis understood,
  When, having seen and thought so much, a _talk_ may do some good.

  A well-dressed mob have thronged the sight to greet,
  And motley figures throng the spacious street;
  Majestical and calm through all they stride,
  Wearing the blanket with a monarch's pride;
  The gazers stare and shrug, but can't deny
  Their noble forms and blameless symmetry.
  If the Great Spirit their _morale_ has slighted,
  And wigwam smoke their mental culture blighted,
  Yet the _physique_, at least, perfection reaches,
  In wilds where neither Combe nor Spurzheim teaches;
  Where whispering trees invite man to the chase,
  And bounding deer allure him to the race.

  Would thou hadst seen it! That dark, stately band,
  Whose ancestors enjoyed all this fair land,
  Whence they, by force or fraud, were made to flee,
  Are brought, the white man's victory to see.
  Can kind emotions in their proud hearts glow,
  As through these realms, now decked by Art, they go?
  The church, the school, the railroad, and the mart,--
  Can these a pleasure to their minds impart?
  All once was theirs,--earth, ocean, forest, sky,--
  How can they joy in what now meets the eye?
  Not yet Religion has unlocked the soul,
  Nor Each has learned to glory in the Whole!

  Must they not think, so strange and sad their lot,
  That they by the Great Spirit are forgot?
  From the far border to which they are driven,
  They might look up in trust to the clear heaven;
  But _here_,--what tales doth every object tell
  Where Massasoit sleeps, where Philip fell!

  We take our turn, and the Philosopher
  Sees through the clouds a hand which cannot err
  An unimproving race, with all their graces
  And all their vices, must resign their places;
  And Human Culture rolls its onward flood
  Over the broad plains steeped in Indian blood
  Such thoughts steady our faith; yet there will rise
  Some natural tears into the calmest eyes,--
  Which gaze where forest princes haughty go,
  Made for a gaping crowd a raree-show.

  But _this_ a scene seems where, in courtesy,
  The pale face with the forest prince could vie,
  For one presided, who, for tact and grace,
  In any age had held an honored place,--
  In Beauty's own dear day had shone a polished Phidian vase!

  Oft have I listened to his accents bland,
    And owned the magic of his silvery voice,
  In all the graces which life's arts demand,
    Delighted by the justness of his choice.
  Not his the stream of lavish, fervid thought,--
  The rhetoric by passion's magic wrought;
  Not his the massive style, the lion port,
  Which with the granite class of mind assort;
  But, in a range of excellence his own,
  With all the charms to soft persuasion known,
  Amid our busy people we admire him,--"elegant and lone."

  He scarce needs words: so exquisite the skill
  Which modulates the tones to do his will,
  That the mere sound enough would charm the ear,
  And lap in its Elysium all who hear.
  The intellectual paleness of his cheek,
    The heavy eyelids and slow, tranquil smile,
  The well-cut lips from which the graces speak,
    Pit him alike to win or to beguile;
  Then those words so well chosen, fit, though few,
  Their linked sweetness as our thoughts pursue,
  We deem them spoken pearls, or radiant diamond dew.

  And never yet did I admire the power
    Which makes so lustrous every threadbare theme,--
  Which won for La Fayette one other hour,
    And e'en on July Fourth could cast a gleam,--
  As now, when I behold him play the host,
  With all the dignity which red men boast,--
  With all the courtesy the whites have lost;
  Assume the very hue of savage mind,
  Yet in rude accents show the thought refined;
  Assume the _naïveté_ of infant age,
  And in such prattle seem still more a sage;
  The golden mean with tact unerring seized,
  A courtly critic shone, a simple savage pleased.
  The stoic of the woods his skill confessed,
  As all the father answered in his breast;
  To the sure mark the silver arrow sped,
  The "man without a tear" a tear has shed;
  And them hadst wept, hadst thou been there, to see
  How true one sentiment must ever be,
  In court or camp, the city or the wild,--
  To rouse the father's heart, you need but name his child.

The speech of Governor Everett on that occasion was admirable; as I
think, the happiest attempt ever made to meet the Indian in his own
way, and catch the tone of his mind. It was said, in the newspapers,
that Keokuck did actually shed tears when addressed as a father. If he
did not with his eyes, he well might in his heart.

Not often have they been addressed with such intelligence and tact.
The few who have not approached them with sordid rapacity, but from
love to them, as men having souls to be redeemed, have most frequently
been persons intellectually too narrow, too straitly bound in sects
or opinions, to throw themselves into the character or position of
the Indians, or impart to them anything they can make available. The
Christ shown them by these missionaries is to them but a new and more
powerful Manito; the signs of the new religion, but the fetiches that
have aided the conquerors.

Here I will copy some remarks made by a discerning observer, on the
methods used by the missionaries, and their natural results.

"Mr. ---- and myself had a very interesting conversation, upon the
subject of the Indians, their character, capabilities, &c. After ten
years' experience among them, he was forced to acknowledge that the
results of the missionary efforts had produced nothing calculated to
encourage. He thought that there was an intrinsic disability in them
to rise above, or go beyond, the sphere in which they had so long
moved. He said, that even those Indians who had been converted, and
who had adopted the habits of civilization, were very little improved
in their real character; they were as selfish, as deceitful, and
as indolent, as those who were still heathens. They had repaid the
kindnesses of the missionaries with the basest ingratitude, killing
their cattle and swine, and robbing them of their harvests, which,
they wantonly destroyed. He had abandoned the idea of effecting any
general good to the Indians. He had conscientious scruples as to
promoting an enterprise so hopeless as that of missions among
the Indians, by sending accounts to the East that might induce
philanthropic individuals to contribute to their support. In fact, the
whole experience of his intercourse with them seemed to have convinced
him of the irremediable degradation of the race. Their fortitude
under suffering he considered the result of physical and mental
insensibility; their courage, a mere animal excitement, which they
found it necessary to inflame, before daring to meet a foe. They have
no constancy of purpose; and are, in fact, but little superior to the
brutes in point of moral development. It is not astonishing, that one
looking upon the Indian character from Mr. ----'s point of view should
entertain such sentiments. The object of his intercourse with them
was, to make them apprehend the mysteries of a theology, which, to the
most enlightened, is an abstruse, metaphysical study; and it is not
singular they should prefer their pagan superstitions, which address
themselves more directly to the senses. Failing in the attempt to
Christianize before civilizing them, he inferred that in the intrinsic
degradation of their faculties the obstacle was to be found."

Thus the missionary vainly attempts, by once or twice holding up the
cross, to turn deer and tigers into lambs; vainly attempts to convince
the red man that a heavenly mandate takes from him his broad lands. He
bows his head, but does not at heart acquiesce. He cannot. It is not
true; and if it were, the descent of blood through the same channels,
for centuries, has formed habits of thought not so easily to be
disturbed.

Amalgamation would afford the only true and profound means of
civilization. But nature seems, like all else, to declare that this
race is fated to perish. Those of mixed blood fade early, and are not
generally a fine race. They lose what is best in either type,
rather than enhance the value of each, by mingling. There are
exceptions,--one or two such I know of,--but this, it is said, is the
general rule.

A traveller observes, that the white settlers who live in the woods
soon become sallow, lanky, and dejected; the atmosphere of the trees
does not agree with Caucasian lungs; and it is, perhaps, in part an
instinct of this which causes the hatred of the new settlers towards
trees. The Indian breathed the atmosphere of the forests freely; he
loved their shade. As they are effaced from the land, he fleets too; a
part of the same manifestation, which cannot linger behind its proper
era.

The Chippewas have lately petitioned the State of Michigan, that they
may be admitted as citizens; but this would be vain, unless they could
be admitted, as brothers, to the heart of the white man. And while
the latter feels that conviction of superiority which enabled our
Wisconsin friend to throw away the gun, and send the Indian to
fetch it, he needs to be very good, and very wise, not to abuse his
position. But the white man, as yet, is a half-tamed pirate, and
avails himself as much as ever of the maxim, "Might makes right." All
that civilization does for the generality is to cover up this with a
veil of subtle evasions and chicane, and here and there to rouse the
individual mind to appeal to Heaven against it.

I have no hope of liberalizing the missionary, of humanizing the
sharks of trade, of infusing the conscientious drop into the flinty
bosom of policy, of saving the Indian from immediate degradation and
speedy death. The whole sermon may be preached from the text, "Needs
be that offences must come, yet woe onto them by whom they come."
Yet, ere they depart, I wish there might be some masterly attempt to
reproduce, in art or literature, what is proper to them,--a kind of
beauty and grandeur which few of the every-day crowd have hearts to
feel, yet which ought to leave in the world its monuments, to inspire
the thought of genius through all ages. Nothing in this kind has been
done masterly; since it was Clevengers's ambition, 't is pity he had
not opportunity to try fully his powers. We hope some other mind may
be bent upon it, ere too late. At present the only lively impress
of their passage through the world is to be found in such books as
Catlin's, and some stories told by the old travellers.

Let me here give another brief tale of the power exerted by the
white man over the savage in a trying case; but in this case it was
righteous, was moral power.

"We were looking over McKenney's Tour to the Lakes, and, on observing
the picture of Key-way-no-wut, or the Going Cloud, Mr. B. observed,
'Ah, that is the fellow I came near having a fight with'; and he
detailed at length the circumstances. This Indian was a very desperate
character, and of whom, all the Leech Lake band stood in fear. He
would shoot down any Indian who offended him, without the least
hesitation, and had become quite the bully of that part of the tribe.
The trader at Leech Lake warned Mr. B. to beware of him, and said that
he once, when he (the trader) refused to give up to him his stock of
wild-rice, went and got his gun and tomahawk, and shook the tomahawk
over his head, saying, '_Now_, give me your wild-rice.' The trader
complied with his exaction, but not so did Mr. B. in the adventure
which I am about to relate. Key-way-no-wut came frequently to him with
furs, wishing him to give for them, cotton-cloth, sugar, flour, &c.
Mr. B. explained to him that he could not trade for furs, as he was
sent there as a teacher, and that it would be like putting his hand
into the fire to do so, as the traders would inform against him, and
he would be sent out of the country. At the same time, he _gave_
him the articles which he wished. Key-way-no-wut found this a very
convenient way of getting what he wanted, and followed up this sort
of game, until, at last, it became insupportable. One day the Indian
brought a very large otter-skin, and said, 'I want to get for this
ten pounds of sugar, and some flour and cloth,' adding, 'I am not like
other Indians, _I_ want to pay for what I get.' Mr. B. found that he
must either be robbed of all he had by submitting to these exactions,
or take a stand at once. He thought, however, he would try to avoid a
scrape, and told his customer he had not so much sugar to spare. 'Give
me, then,' said he, 'what you can spare'; and Mr. B., thinking to make
him back out, told him he would, give him five pounds of sugar for his
skin. 'Take it,' said the Indian. He left the skin, telling Mr. B. to
take good care of it. Mr. B. took it at once to the trader's store,
and related the circumstance, congratulating himself that he had got
rid of the Indian's exactions. But in about a month Key-way-no-wut
appeared, bringing some dirty Indian sugar, and said, 'I have brought
back the sugar that I borrowed of you, and I want my otter-skin back.'
Mr. B. told him, 'I _bought_ an otter-skin of you, but if you will
return the other articles you have got for it, perhaps I can get it
for you.' 'Where is the skin?' said he very quickly; 'what have you
done with it?' Mr. B. replied it was in the trader's store, where he
(the Indian) could not get it. At this information he was furious,
laid his hands on his knife and tomahawk, and commanded Mr. B. to
bring it at once. Mr. B. found this was the crisis, where he must take
a stand or be 'rode over rough-shod' by this man. His wife, who was
present was much alarmed, and begged he would get the skin for the
Indian, but he told her that 'either he or the Indian would soon be
master of his house, and if she was afraid to see it decided which
was to be so, she had better retire,' He turned to Key-way-no-wut, and
addressed him in a stern voice as follows: 'I will _not_ give you the
skin. How often have you come to my house, and I have shared with you
what I had. I gave you tobacco when you were well, and medicine when
you were sick, and you never went away from my wigwam with your hands
empty. And this is the way you return my treatment to you. I had
thought you were a man and a chief, but you are not, you are nothing
but an old woman. Leave this house, and never enter it again.' Mr. B.
said he expected the Indian would attempt his life when he said this,
but that he had placed himself in a position so that he could defend
himself, and looked straight into the Indian's eye, and, like other
wild beasts, he quailed before the glance of mental and moral courage.
He calmed down at once, and soon began to make apologies. Mr. B. then
told him kindly, but firmly, that, if he wished to walk in the same
path with him, he must walk as straight as the crack on the floor
before them; adding, that he would not walk with anybody who would
jostle him by walking so crooked as he had done. He was perfectly
tamed, and Mr. B. said he never had any more trouble with him."

The conviction here livingly enforced of the superiority on the side
of the white man, was thus expressed by the Indian orator at Mackinaw
while we were there. After the customary compliments about sun, dew,
&c., "This," said he, "is the difference between the white and the
red man; the white man looks to the future and paves the way for
posterity. The red man never thought of this." This is a statement
uncommonly refined for an Indian; but one of the gentlemen present,
who understood the Chippewa, vouched for it as a literal rendering of
his phrases; and he did indeed touch the vital point of difference.
But the Indian, if he understands, cannot make use of his
intelligence. The fate of his people is against it, and Pontiac and
Philip have no more chance than Julian in the times of old.

The Indian is steady to that simple creed which forms the basis of all
his mythology; that there is a God and a life beyond this; a right and
wrong which each man can see, betwixt which each man should choose;
that good brings with it its reward, and vice its punishment. His
moral code, if not as refined as that of civilized nations, is
clear and noble in the stress laid upon truth and fidelity. And all
unprejudiced observers bear testimony, that the Indians, until broken
from their old anchorage by intercourse with the whites,--who offer
them, instead, a religion of which they furnish neither interpretation
nor example,--were singularly virtuous, if virtue be allowed to
consist in a man's acting up to his own ideas of right.

My friend, who joined me at Mackinaw, happened, on the homeward
journey, to see a little Chinese girl, who had been sent over by one
of the missionaries, and observed that, in features, complexion, and
gesture, she was a counterpart to the little Indian girls she had just
seen playing about on the lake shore.

The parentage of these tribes is still an interesting subject of
speculation, though, if they be not created for this region, they have
become so assimilated to it as to retain little trace of any other. To
me it seems most probable, that a peculiar race was bestowed on each
region,[A] as the lion on one latitude and the white bear on another.
As man has two natures,--one, like that of the plants and animals,
adapted to the uses and enjoyments of this planet, another which
presages and demands a higher sphere,--he is constantly breaking
bounds, in proportion as the mental gets the better of the mere
instinctive existence. As yet, he loses in harmony of being what he
gains in height and extension; the civilized man is a larger mind, but
a more imperfect nature, than the savage.

[Footnote A: Professor Agassiz has recently published some able
scientific papers tending to enforce this theory.--ED.]

We hope there will be a national institute, containing all the remains
of the Indians, all that has been preserved by official intercourse at
Washington, Catlin's collection, and a picture-gallery as complete
as can be made, with a collection of skulls from all parts of the
country. To this should be joined the scanty library that exists on
the subject.

A little pamphlet, giving an account of the massacre at Chicago, has
lately; been published, which I wish much I had seen while there, as
it would have imparted an interest to spots otherwise barren. It is
written with animation, and in an excellent style, telling just what
we want to hear, and no more. The traits given of Indian generosity
are as characteristic as those of Indian cruelty. A lady, who was
saved by a friendly chief holding her under the waters of the lake, at
the moment the balls endangered her, received also, in the heat of the
conflict, a reviving draught from a squaw, who saw she was exhausted;
and as she lay down, a mat was hung up between her and the scene of
butchery, so that she was protected from the sight, though she could
not be from sounds full of horror.

I have not wished to write sentimentally about the Indians, however
moved by the thought of their wrongs and speedy extinction. I know
that the Europeans who took possession of this country felt themselves
justified by their superior civilization and religious ideas. Had they
been truly civilized or Christianized, the conflicts which sprang
from the collision of the two races might have been avoided; but this
cannot be expected in movements made by masses of men. The mass has
never yet been humanized, though the age may develop a human thought.
Since those conflicts and differences did arise, the hatred which
sprang from terror and suffering, on the European side, has naturally
warped the whites still further from justice.

The Indian, brandishing the scalps of his wife and friends, drinking
their blood, and eating their hearts, is by him viewed as a fiend,
though, at a distant day, he will no doubt be considered as having
acted the Roman or Carthaginian part of heroic and patriotic
self-defence, according to the standard of right and motives
prescribed by his religious faith and education. Looked at by his
own standard, he is virtuous when he most injures his enemy, and the
white, if he be really the superior in enlargement of thought, ought
to cast aside his inherited prejudices enough to see this, to look on
him in pity and brotherly good-will, and do all he can to mitigate the
doom of those who survive his past injuries.

In McKenney's book is proposed a project for organizing the Indians
under a patriarchal government; but it does not look feasible, even
on paper. Could their own intelligent men be left to act unimpeded
in their behalf, they would do far better for them than the white
thinker, with all his general knowledge. But we dare not hope
the designs of such will not always be frustrated by barbarous
selfishness, as they were in Georgia. _There_ was a chance of seeing
what might have been done, now lost for ever.

Yet let every man look to himself how far this blood shall be required
at his hands. Let the missionary, instead of preaching to the Indian,
preach to the trader who ruins him, of the dreadful account which will
be demanded of the followers of Cain, in a sphere where the accents
of purity and love come on the ear more decisively than in ours. Let
every legislator take the subject to heart, and, if he cannot undo the
effects of past sin, try for that clear view and right sense that may
save us from sinning still more deeply. And let every man and every
woman, in their private dealings with the subjugated race, avoid all
share in embittering, by insult or unfeeling prejudice, the captivity
of Israel.




CHAPTER VII.

SAULT ST. MARIE.--ST. JOSEPH'S ISLAND.--THE LAND OF
MUSIC.--RAPIDS.--HOMEWARD.--GENERAL HULL.--THE BOOK TO THE READER.


Nine days I passed alone at Mackinaw, except for occasional visits
from kind and agreeable residents at the fort, and Mr. and Mrs. A. Mr.
A., long engaged in the fur-trade, is gratefully remembered by many
travellers. From Mrs. A., also, I received kind attentions, paid in
the vivacious and graceful manner of her nation.

The society at the boarding-house entertained, being of a kind
entirely new to me. There were many traders from the remote stations,
such as La Pointe, Arbre Croche,--men who had become half wild and
wholly rude by living in the wild; but good-humored, observing, and
with a store of knowledge to impart, of the kind proper to their
place.

There were two little girls here, that were pleasant companions for
me. One gay, frank, impetuous, but sweet and winning. She was an
American, fair, and with bright brown hair. The other, a little French
Canadian, used to join me in my walks, silently take my hand, and
sit at my feet when I stopped in beautiful places. She seemed to
understand without a word; and I never shall forget her little figure,
with its light, but pensive motion, and her delicate, grave features,
with the pale, clear complexion and soft eye. She was motherless, and
much left alone by her father and brothers, who were boatmen. The two
little girls were as pretty representatives of Allegro and Penseroso
as one would wish to see.

I had been wishing that a boat would come in to take me to the Sault
St. Marie, and several times started to the window at night in hopes
that the pant and dusky-red light crossing the waters belonged to such
an one; but they were always boats for Chicago or Buffalo, till, on
the 28th of August, Allegro, who shared my plans and wishes, rushed
in to tell me that the General Scott had come; and in this little
steamer, accordingly, I set off the next morning.

I was the only lady, and attended in the cabin by a Dutch girl and
an Indian woman. They both spoke English fluently, and entertained me
much by accounts of their different experiences.

The Dutch girl told me of a dance among the common people at
Amsterdam, called the shepherd's dance. The two leaders are dressed
as shepherd and shepherdess; they invent to the music all kinds of
movements, descriptive of things that may happen in the field, and the
rest are obliged to follow. I have never heard of any dance which gave
such free play to the fancy as this. French dances merely describe
the polite movements of society; Spanish and Neapolitan, love; the
beautiful Mazurkas, &c. are war-like or expressive of wild scenery.
But in this one is great room both for fun and fancy.

The Indian was married, when young, by her parents, to a man she did
not love. He became dissipated, and did not maintain her. She left
him, taking with her their child, for whom and herself she earns a
subsistence by going as chambermaid in these boats. Now and then, she
said, her husband called on her, and asked if he might live with her
again; but she always answered, No. Here she was far freer than she
would have been in civilized life. I was pleased by the nonchalance of
this woman, and the perfectly national manner she had preserved after
so many years of contact with all kinds of people.

The two women, when I left the boat, made me presents of Indian work,
such as travellers value, and the manner of the two was characteristic
of their different nations. The Indian brought me hers, when I was
alone, looked bashfully down when she gave it, and made an almost
sentimental little speech. The Dutch girl brought hers in public, and,
bridling her short chin with a self-complacent air, observed she had
_bought_ it for me. But the feeling of affectionate regard was the
same in the minds of both.

Island after island we passed, all fairly shaped and clustering in a
friendly way, but with little variety of vegetation. In the afternoon
the weather became foggy, and we could not proceed after dark. That
was as dull an evening as ever fell.

The next morning the fog still lay heavy, but the captain took me out
in his boat on an exploring expedition, and we found the remains of
the old English fort on Point St. Joseph's. All around was so wholly
unmarked by anything but stress of wind and weather, the shores of
these islands and their woods so like one another, wild and lonely,
but nowhere rich and majestic, that there was some charm, in the
remains of the garden, the remains even of chimneys and a pier. They
gave feature to the scene.

Here I gathered many flowers, but they were the same as at Mackinaw.

The captain, though he had been on this trip hundreds of times, had
never seen this spot, and never would but for this fog, and his desire
to entertain me. He presented a striking instance how men, for the
sake of getting a living, forget to live. It is just the same in the
most romantic as the most dull and vulgar places. Men get the harness
on so fast, that they can never shake it off, unless they guard
against this danger from the very first. In Chicago, how many men live
who never find time to see the prairies, or learn anything unconnected
with the business of the day, or about the country they are living in!

So this captain, a man of strong sense and good eyesight, rarely found
time to go off the track or look about him on it. He lamented, too,
that there had been no call which, induced him to develop his powers
of expression, so that he might communicate what he had seen for the
enjoyment or instruction of others.

This is a common fault among the active men, the truly living, who
could tell what life is. It should not be so. Literature should not be
left to the mere literati,--eloquence to the mere orator; every Cæsar
should be able to write his own commentary. We want a more equal, more
thorough, more harmonious development, and there is nothing to hinder
the men of this country from it, except their own supineness, or
sordid views.

When the weather did clear, our course up the river was delightful.
Long stretched before us the island of St. Joseph's, with its fair
woods of sugar-maple. A gentleman on board, who belongs to the Fort
at the Sault, said their pastime was to come in the season of making
sugar, and pass some time on this island,--the days at work, and the
evening in dancing and other amusements. Work of this kind done in the
open air, where everything is temporary, and every utensil prepared
on the spot, gives life a truly festive air. At such times, there is
labor and no care,--energy with gayety, gayety of the heart.

I think with the same pleasure of the Italian vintage, the Scotch
harvest-home, with its evening dance in the barn, the Russian
cabbage-feast even, and our huskings and hop-gatherings. The
hop-gatherings, where the groups of men and girls are pulling down and
filling baskets with the gay festoons, present as graceful pictures as
the Italian vintage.

How pleasant is the course along a new river, the sight of new shores!
like a life, would but life flow as fast, and upbear us with as full a
stream. I hoped we should come in sight of the rapids by daylight; but
the beautiful sunset was quite gone, and only a young moon trembling
over the scene, when we came within hearing of them.

I sat up long to hear them merely. It was a thoughtful hour. These
two days, the 29th and 30th of August, are memorable in my life;
the latter is the birthday of a near friend. I pass them alone,
approaching Lake Superior; but I shall not enter into that truly
wild and free region; shall not have the canoe voyage, whose daily
adventure, with the camping out at night beneath the stars, would have
given an interlude of such value to my existence. I shall not see the
Pictured Rocks, their chapels and urns. It did not depend on me; it
never has, whether such things shall be done or not.

My friends! may they see, and do, and be more; especially those who
have before them a greater number of birthdays, and a more healthy and
unfettered existence!

I should like to hear some notes of earthly music to-night. By the
faint moonshine I can hardly see the banks; how they look I have no
guess, except that there are trees, and, now and then, a light lets me
know there are homes, with their various interests. I should like to
hear some strains of the flute from beneath those trees, just to break
the sound of the rapids.

  THE LAND OF MUSIC.

  When no gentle eyebeam charms;
  No fond hope the bosom warms;
  Of thinking the lone mind is tired,--
  Naught seems bright to be desired.

  Music, be thy sails unfurled;
  Bear me to thy better world;
  O'er a cold and weltering sea,
  Blow thy breezes warm and free.

  By sad sighs they ne'er were chilled,
  By sceptic spell were never stilled.
  Take me to that far-off shore,
  Where lovers meet to part no more.
      There doubt and fear and sin are o'er;
      The star of love shall set no more.

With the first light of dawn I was up and out, and then was glad I had
not seen all the night before, it came upon me with such power in its
dewy freshness. O, they are beautiful indeed, these rapids! The grace
is so much more obvious than the power. I went up through the old
Chippewa burying-ground to their head, and sat down on a large stone
to look. A little way off was one of the home-lodges, unlike in shape
to the temporary ones at Mackinaw, but these have been described by
Mrs. Jameson. Women, too, I saw coming home from the woods, stooping
under great loads of cedar-boughs, that were strapped upon their
backs. But in many European countries women carry great loads, even of
wood, upon their backs. I used to hear the girls singing and laughing
as they were cutting down boughs at Mackinaw; this part of their
employment, though laborious, gives them the pleasure of being a great
deal in the free woods.

I had ordered a canoe to take me down the rapids, and presently I saw
it coming, with the two Indian canoe-men in pink calico shirts, moving
it about with their long poles, with a grace and dexterity worthy
fairy-land. Now and then they cast the scoop-net;--all looked just as
I had fancied, only far prettier.

When they came to me, they spread a mat in the middle of the canoe; I
sat down, and in less than four minutes we had descended the rapids,
a distance of more than three quarters of a mile. I was somewhat
disappointed in this being no more of an exploit than I found it.
Having heard such expressions used as of "darting," or "shooting
down," these rapids, I had fancied there was a wall of rock somewhere,
where descent would somehow be accomplished, and that there would come
some one gasp of terror and delight, some sensation entirely new to
me; but I found myself in smooth water, before I had time to feel
anything but the buoyant pleasure of being carried so lightly through
this surf amid the breakers. Now and then the Indians spoke to
one another in a vehement jabber, which, however, had no tone that
expressed other than pleasant excitement. It is, no doubt, an act of
wonderful dexterity to steer amid these jagged rocks, when one
rude touch would tear a hole in the birch canoe; but these men are
evidently so used to doing it, and so adroit, that the silliest person
could not feel afraid. I should like to have come down twenty times,
that I might have had leisure to realize the pleasure. But the fog
which had detained us on the way shortened the boat's stay at the
Sault, and I wanted my time to walk about.

While coming down the rapids, the Indians caught a white-fish for my
breakfast; and certainly it was the best of breakfasts. The
white-fish I found quite another thing caught on the spot, and cooked
immediately, from what I had found it at Chicago or Mackinaw. Before,
I had had the bad taste to prefer the trout, despite the solemn and
eloquent remonstrances of the _habitués_, to whom the superiority of
white-fish seemed a cardinal point of faith.

I am here reminded that I have omitted that indispensable part of a
travelling journal, the account of what we found to eat. I cannot hope
to make up, by one bold stroke, all my omissions of daily record;
but that I may show myself not destitute of the common feelings of
humanity, I will observe that he whose affections turn in summer
towards vegetables should not come to this region, till the subject
of diet be better understood; that of fruit, too, there is little yet,
even at the best hotel tables; that the prairie chickens require
no praise from me, and that the trout and white-fish are worthy the
transparency of the lake waters.

In this brief mention I by no means intend to give myself an air of
superiority to the subject. If a dinner in the Illinois woods, on dry
bread and drier meat, with water from the stream that flowed hard by,
pleased me best of all, yet, at one time, when living at a house where
nothing was prepared for the table fit to touch, and even the bread
could not be partaken of without a headache in consequence, I learnt
to understand and sympathize with the anxious tone in which fathers
of families, about to take their innocent children into some scene of
wild beauty, ask first of all, "Is there a good, table?" I shall ask
just so in future. Only those whom the Powers have furnished with
small travelling cases of ambrosia can take exercise all day, and be
happy without even bread morning or night.

Our voyage back was all pleasure. It was the fairest day. I saw the
river, the islands, the clouds, to the greatest advantage.

On board was an old man, an Illinois farmer, whom I found a most
agreeable companion. He had just been with his son, and eleven other
young men, on an exploring expedition to the shores of Lake Superior.
He was the only old man of the party, but he had enjoyed most of any
the journey. He had been the counsellor and playmate, too, of the
young ones. He was one of those parents--why so rare?--who understand
and live a new life in that of their children, instead of wasting time
and young happiness in trying to make them conform to an object and
standard of their own. The character and history of each child may
be a new and poetic experience to the parent, if he will let it.
Our farmer was domestic, judicious, solid; the son, inventive,
enterprising, superficial, full of follies, full of resources, always
liable to failure, sure to rise above it. The father conformed to, and
learnt from, a character he could not change, and won the sweet from
the bitter.

His account of his life at home, and of his late adventures among the
Indians, was very amusing, but I want talent to write it down, and I
have not heard the slang of these people intimately enough. There is a
good book about Indiana, called the New Purchase, written by a person
who knows the people of the country well enough to describe them in
their own way. It is not witty, but penetrating, valuable for its
practical wisdom and good-humored fun.

There were many sportsman-stories told, too, by those from Illinois
and Wisconsin. I do not retain any of these well enough, nor any that
I heard earlier, to write them down, though they always interested me
from bringing wild natural scenes before the mind. It is pleasant
for the sportsman to be in countries so alive with game; yet it is so
plenty that one would think shooting pigeons or grouse would seem
more like slaughter, than the excitement of skill to a good sportsman.
Hunting the deer is full of adventure, and needs only a Scrope to
describe it to invest the Western woods with _historic_ associations.

How pleasant it was to sit and hear rough men tell pieces out of their
own common lives, in place of the frippery talk of some fine circle
with its conventional sentiment, and timid, second-hand criticism.
Free blew the wind, and boldly flowed the stream, named for Mary
mother mild.

A fine thunder-shower came on in the afternoon. It cleared at sunset,
just as we came in sight of beautiful Mackinaw, over which, a rainbow
bent in promise of peace.

I have always wondered, in reading travels, at the childish joy
travellers felt at meeting people they knew, and their sense of
loneliness when they did not, in places where there was everything new
to occupy the attention. So childish, I thought, always to be longing
for the new in the old, and the old in the new. Yet just such sadness
I felt, when I looked on the island glittering in the sunset, canopied
by the rainbow, and thought no friend would welcome me there; just
such childish joy I felt to see unexpectedly on the landing the face
of one whom I called friend.

The remaining two or three days were delightfully spent, in walking or
boating, or sitting at the window to see the Indians go. This was not
quite so pleasant as their coming in, though accomplished with
the same rapidity; a family not taking half an hour to prepare for
departure, and the departing canoe a beautiful object. But they left
behind, on all the shore, the blemishes of their stay,--old rags,
dried boughs, fragments of food, the marks of their fires. Nature
likes to cover up and gloss over spots and scars, but it would take
her some time to restore that beach to the state it was in before they
came.

S. and I had a mind for a canoe excursion, and we asked one of the
traders to engage us two good Indians, that would not only take us
out, but be sure and bring us back, as we could not hold converse
with them. Two others offered their aid, beside the chief's son,
a fine-looking youth of about sixteen, richly dressed in blue
broadcloth, scarlet sash and leggins, with a scarf of brighter red
than the rest, tied around his head, its ends falling gracefully
on one shoulder. They thought it, apparently, fine amusement to
be attending two white women; they carried us into the path of
the steamboat, which was going out, and paddled with all their
force,--rather too fast, indeed, for there was something of a swell on
the lake, and they sometimes threw water into the canoe. However, it
flew over the waves, light as a seagull. They would say, "Pull away,"
and "Ver' warm," and, after these words, would laugh gayly. They
enjoyed the hour, I believe, as much as we.

The house where we lived belonged to the widow of a French trader, an
Indian by birth, and wearing the dress of her country She spoke
French fluently, and was very ladylike in her manners. She is a great
character among them. They were all the time coming to pay her homage,
or to get her aid and advice; for she is, I am told, a shrewd woman of
business. My companion carried about her sketch-book with her, and
the Indians were interested when they saw her using her pencil, though
less so than about the sun-shade. This lady of the tribe wanted to
borrow the sketches of the beach, with its lodges and wild groups, "to
show to the _savages_" she said.

Of the practical ability of the Indian women, a good specimen is given
by McKenney, in an amusing story of one who went to Washington, and
acted her part there in the "first circles," with a tact and sustained
dissimulation worthy of Cagliostro. She seemed to have a thorough
love of intrigue for its own sake, and much dramatic talent. Like the
chiefs of her nation, when on an expedition among the foe, whether for
revenge or profit, no impulses of vanity or way-side seductions
had power to turn her aside from carrying out her plan as she had
originally projected it.

Although I have little to tell, I feel that I have learnt a great deal
of the Indians, from observing them even in this broken and degraded
condition. There is a language of eye and motion which cannot be put
into words, and which teaches what words never can. I feel acquainted
with the soul of this race; I read its nobler thought in their defaced
figures. There _was_ a greatness, unique and precious, which he who
does not feel will never duly appreciate the majesty of nature in this
American continent.

I have mentioned that the Indian orator, who addressed the agents on
this occasion, said, the difference between the white man and the red
man is this: "The white man no sooner came here, than he thought of
preparing the way for his posterity; the red man never thought of
this." I was assured this was exactly his phrase; and it defines the
true difference. We get the better because we do

  "Look before and after."

But, from, the same cause, we

  "Pine for what is not."

The red man, when happy, was thoroughly happy; when good, was simply
good. He needed the medal, to let him know that he _was_ good.

These evenings we were happy, looking over the old-fashioned garden,
over the beach, over the waters and pretty island opposite, beneath
the growing moon. We did not stay to see it full at Mackinaw; at two
o'clock one night, or rather morning, the Great Western came snorting
in, and we must go; and Mackinaw, and all the Northwest summer, is now
to me no more than picture and dream:--

  "A dream within a dream."

These last days at Mackinaw have been pleasanter than the "lonesome"
nine, for I have recovered the companion with whom I set out from the
East,--one who sees all, prizes all, enjoys much, interrupts never.

At Detroit we stopped for half a day. This place is famous in our
history, and the unjust anger at its surrender is still expressed
by almost every one who passes there. I had always shared the common
feeling on this subject; for the indignation at a disgrace to our arms
that seemed so unnecessary has been handed down from father to child,
and few of us have taken the pains to ascertain where the blame
lay. But now, upon the spot, having read all the testimony, I felt
convinced that it should rest solely with the government, which, by
neglecting to sustain General Hull, as he had a right to expect they
would, compelled him to take this step, or sacrifice many lives, and
of the defenceless inhabitants, not of soldiers, to the cruelty of a
savage foe, for the sake of his reputation.

I am a woman, and unlearned in such affairs; but, to a person
with common sense and good eyesight, it is clear, when viewing
the location, that, under the circumstances, he had no prospect of
successful defence, and that to attempt it would have been an act of
vanity, not valor.

I feel that I am not biassed in this judgment by my personal
relations, for I have always heard both sides, and though my feelings
had been moved by the picture of the old man sitting in the midst
of his children, to a retired and despoiled old age, after a life
of honor and happy intercourse with the public, yet tranquil, always
secure that justice must be done at last, I supposed, like others,
that he deceived himself, and deserved to pay the penalty for failure
to the responsibility he had undertaken. Now, on the spot, I change,
and believe the country at large must, erelong, change from this
opinion. And I wish to add my testimony, however trifling its weight,
before it be drowned in the voice of general assent, that I may do
some justice to the feelings which possess me here and now.

A noble boat, the Wisconsin, was to be launched this afternoon; the
whole town was out in many-colored array, the band playing. Our boat
swept round to a good position, and all was ready but--the Wisconsin,
which could not be made to stir. This was quite a disappointment. It
would have been an imposing sight.

In the boat many signs admonished that we were floating eastward. A
shabbily-dressed phrenologist laid his hand on every head which would
bend, with half-conceited, half-sheepish expression, to the trial of
his skill. Knots of people gathered here and there to discuss points
of theology. A bereaved lover was seeking religious consolation
in--Butler's Analogy, which he had purchased for that purpose.
However, he did not turn over many pages before his attention was
drawn aside by the gay glances of certain damsels that came on board
at Detroit, and, though Butler might afterwards be seen sticking
from his pocket, it had not weight to impede him from many a feat of
lightness and liveliness. I doubt if it went with him from the boat.
Some there were, even, discussing the doctrines of Fourier. It seemed
pity they were not going to, rather than from, the rich and free
country where it would be so much easier than with us to try the great
experiment of voluntary association, and show beyond a doubt that "an
ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure," a maxim of the "wisdom
of nations" which has proved of little practical efficacy as yet.

Better to stop before landing at Buffalo, while I have yet the
advantage over some of my readers.




THE BOOK TO THE READER,

WHO OPENS, AS AMERICAN READERS OFTEN DO,--AT THE END.

  To see your cousin in her country home,
  If at the time of blackberries you come,
  "Welcome, my friends," she cries with ready glee,
  "The fruit is ripened, and the paths are free.
  But, madam, you will tear that handsome gown;
  The little boy be sure to tumble down;
  And, in the thickets where they ripen best,
  The matted ivy, too, its bower has drest.
  And then the thorns your hands are sure to rend,
  Unless with heavy gloves you will defend;
  Amid most thorns the sweetest roses blow,
  Amid most thorns the sweetest berries grow."

  If, undeterred, you to the fields must go,
    You tear your dresses and you scratch your hands;
  But, in the places where the berries grow,
    A sweeter fruit the ready sense commands,
  Of wild, gay feelings, fancies springing sweet,--
  Of bird-like pleasures, fluttering and fleet.

  Another year, you cannot go yourself,
    To win the berries from the thickets wild,
  And housewife skill, instead, has filled the shelf
    With blackberry jam, "by best receipts compiled,--
  Not made with country sugar, for too strong
  The flavors that to maple-juice belong;
  But foreign sugar, nicely mixed 'to suit
  The taste,' spoils not the fragrance of the fruit."

  "'Tis pretty good," half-tasting, you reply,
  "I scarce should know it from fresh blackberry.
  But the best pleasure such a fruit can yield
  Is to be gathered in the open field;
  If only as an article of food,
  Cherry or crab-apple is quite as good;
  And, for occasions of festivity,
  West India sweetmeats you had better buy."

  Thus, such a dish of homely sweets as these
  In neither way may chance the taste to please.

  Yet try a little with the evening-bread;
  Bring a good needle for the spool of thread;
  Take fact with fiction, silver with the lead,
  And, at the mint, you can get gold instead;
  In fine, read me, even as you would be read.




PART II.

THINGS AND THOUGHTS IN EUROPE.




LETTER I.

PASSAGE IN THE CAMBRIA.--LORD AND LADY FALKLAND.--CAPTAIN
JUDKINS.--LIVERPOOL.--MANCHESTER.--MECHANICS' INSTITUTE.--"THE
DIAL."--PEACE AND WAR.--THE WORKING-MEN OF ENGLAND.--THEIR TRIBUTE TO
SIR ROBERT PEEL.--THE ROYAL INSTITUTE.--STATUES.--CHESTER.--BATHING.


Ambleside, Westmoreland, 23d August, 1846.

I take the first interval of rest and stillness to be filled up by
some lines for the Tribune. Only three weeks have passed since leaving
New York, but I have already had nine days of wonder in England, and,
having learned a good deal, suppose I may have something to tell.

Long before receiving this, you know that we were fortunate in the
shortest voyage ever made across the Atlantic,[A]--only ten days
and sixteen hours from Boston to Liverpool. The weather and all
circumstances were propitious; and, if some of us were weak of head
enough to suffer from the smell and jar of the machinery, or other
ills by which the sea is wont to avenge itself on the arrogance of
its vanquishers, we found no pity. The stewardess observed that she
thought "any one tempted God Almighty who complained on a voyage where
they did not even have to put guards to the dishes"!

[Footnote A: True at the time these Letters were written.--ED.]

As many contradictory counsels were given us with regard to going in
one of the steamers in preference to a sailing vessel, I will mention
here, for the benefit of those who have not yet tried one, that he
must be fastidious indeed who could complain of the Cambria. The
advantage of a quick passage and certainty as to the time of arrival,
would, with us, have outweighed many ills; but, apart from this, we
found more space than we expected and as much as we needed for a
very tolerable degree of convenience in our sleeping-rooms, better
ventilation than Americans in general can be persuaded to accept,
general cleanliness, and good attendance. In the evening, when the
wind was favorable, and the sails set, so that the vessel looked like
a great winged creature darting across the apparently measureless
expanse, the effect was very grand, but ah! for such a spectacle one
pays too dear; I far prefer looking out upon "the blue and foaming
sea" from a firm green shore.

Our ship's company numbered several pleasant members, and that desire
prevailed in each to contribute to the satisfaction of all, which, if
carried out through the voyage of life, would make this earth as happy
as it is a lovely abode. At Halifax we took in the Governor of Nova
Scotia, returning from his very unpopular administration. His lady was
with, him, a daughter of William the Fourth and the celebrated Mrs.
Jordan. The English on board, and the Americans, following their lead,
as usual, seemed to attach much importance to her left-handed alliance
with one of the dullest families that ever sat upon a throne, (and
that is a bold word, too,) none to her descent from one whom Nature
had endowed with her most splendid regalia,--genius that fascinated
the attention of all kinds and classes of men, grace and winning
qualities that no heart could resist. Was the cestus buried with her,
that no sense of its pre-eminent value lingered, as far as I could
perceive, in the thoughts of any except myself?

We had a foretaste of the delights of living under an aristocratical
government at the Custom-House, where our baggage was detained, and
we waiting for it weary hours, because of the preference given to
the mass of household stuff carried back by this same Lord and Lady
Falkland.

Captain Judkins of the Cambria, an able and prompt commander, is the
man who insisted upon Douglass being admitted to equal rights upon his
deck with the insolent slave-holders, and assumed a tone toward their
assumptions, which, if the Northern States had had the firmness, good
sense, and honor to use, would have had the same effect, and put
our country in a very different position from that she occupies at
present. He mentioned with pride that he understood the New York
Herald called him "the Nigger Captain," and seemed as willing to
accept the distinction as Colonel McKenney is to wear as his last
title that of "the Indian's friend."

At the first sight of the famous Liverpool Docks, extending miles on
each side of our landing, we felt ourselves in a slower, solider, and
not on that account less truly active, state of things than at home.
That impression is confirmed. There is not as we travel that rushing,
tearing, and swearing, that snatching of baggage, that prodigality of
shoe-leather and lungs, which attend the course of the traveller in
the United States; but we do not lose our "goods," we do not miss our
car. The dinner, if ordered in time, is cooked properly, and served
punctually, and at the end of the day more that is permanent seems to
have come of it than on the full-drive system. But more of this, and
with a better grace, at a later day.

The day after our arrival we went to Manchester. There we went over
the magnificent warehouse of ---- Phillips, in itself a Bazaar ample
to furnish provision for all the wants and fancies of thousands. In
the evening we went to the Mechanics' Institute, and saw the boys
and young men in their classes. I have since visited the Mechanics'
Institute at Liverpool, where more than seventeen hundred pupils are
received, and with more thorough educational arrangements; but the
excellent spirit, the desire for growth in wisdom and enlightened
benevolence, is the same in both. For a very small fee, the mechanic,
clerk, or apprentice, and the women of their families, can receive
various good and well-arranged instruction, not only in common
branches of an English education, but in mathematics, composition,
the French and German, languages, the practice and theory of the Fine
Arts, and they are ardent in availing themselves of instruction in
the higher branches. I found large classes, not only in architectural
drawing, which may be supposed to be followed with a view to
professional objects, but landscape also, and as large in German as
in French. They can attend many good lectures and concerts without
additional charge, for a due place is here assigned to music as to its
influence on the whole mind. The large and well-furnished libraries
are in constant requisition, and the books in most constant demand
are not those of amusement, but of a solid and permanent interest and
value. Only for the last year in Manchester, and for two in Liverpool,
have these advantages been extended to girls; but now that part of
the subject is looked upon as it ought to be, and begins to be treated
more and more as it must and will be wherever true civilization is
making its way. One of the handsomest houses in Liverpool has been
purchased for the girls' school, and room and good arrangement been
afforded for their work and their play. Among other things they are
taught, as they ought to be in all American schools, to cut out and
make dresses.

I had the pleasure of seeing quotations made from our Boston "Dial,"
in the address in which the Director of the Liverpool Institute, a
very benevolent and intelligent man, explained to his disciples and
others its objects, and which concludes thus:--

"But this subject of self-improvement is inexhaustible. If traced to
its results in action, it is, in fact, 'The Whole Duty of Man.' What
of detail it involves and implies, I know that you will, each and all,
think out for yourselves. Beautifully has it been said: 'Is not the
difference between spiritual and material things just this,--that in
the one case we must watch details, in the other, keep alive the high
resolve, and the details will take care of themselves? Keep the sacred
central fire burning, and throughout the system, in each of its acts,
will be warmth and glow enough.'[A]

[Footnote A: The Dial, Vol. I. p. 188, October, 1840, "Musings of a
Recluse."]

"For myself, if I be asked what my purpose is in relation to you, I
would briefly reply, It is that I may help, be it ever so feebly, to
train up a race of young men, who shall escape vice by rising above
it; who shall love truth because it is truth, not because it brings
them wealth or honor; who shall regard life as a solemn thing,
involving too weighty responsibilities to be wasted in idle or
frivolous pursuits; who shall recognize in their daily labors, not
merely a tribute to the "hard necessity of daily bread," but a field
for the development of their better nature by the discharge of duty;
who shall judge in all things for themselves, bowing the knee to no
sectarian or party watchwords of any kind; and who, while they think
for themselves, shall feel for others, and regard their talents, their
attainments, their opportunities, their possessions, as blessings held
in trust for the good of their fellow-men."

I found that The Dial had been read with earnest interest by some of
the best minds in these especially practical regions, that it had been
welcomed as a representative of some sincere and honorable life in
America, and thought the fittest to be quoted under this motto:--

  "What are noble deeds but noble thoughts realized?"

Among other signs of the times we bought Bradshaw's Railway Guide,
and, opening it, found extracts from the writings of our countrymen,
Elihu Burritt and Charles Sumner, on the subject of Peace, occupying
a leading place in the "Collect," for the month, of this little
hand-book, more likely, in an era like ours, to influence the conduct
of the day than would an illuminated breviary. Now that peace is
secured for the present between our two countries, the spirit is
not forgotten that quelled the storm. Greeted on every side with
expressions of feeling about the blessings of peace, the madness and
wickedness of war, that would be deemed romantic in our darker land,
I have answered to the speakers, "But you are mightily pleased, and
illuminate for your victories in China and Ireland, do you not?" and
they, unprovoked by the taunt, would mildly reply, "_We_ do not, but
it is too true that a large part of the nation fail to bring home
the true nature and bearing of those events, and apply principle to
conduct with as much justice as they do in the case of a nation nearer
to them by kindred and position. But we are sure that feeling is
growing purer on the subject day by day, and that there will soon be a
large majority against war on any occasion or for any object."

I heard a most interesting letter read from a tradesman in one of the
country towns, whose daughters are self-elected instructors of the
people in the way of cutting out from books and pamphlets fragments on
the great subjects of the day, which they send about in packages, or
paste on walls and doors. He said that one such passage, pasted on a
door, he had seen read with eager interest by hundreds to whom such
thoughts were, probably, quite new, and with some of whom it could
scarcely fail to be as a little seed of a large harvest. Another good
omen I found in written tracts by Joseph Barker, a working-man of the
town of Wortley, published through his own printing-press.

How great, how imperious the need of such men, of such deeds, we felt
more than ever, while compelled to turn a deaf ear to the squalid and
shameless beggars of Liverpool, or talking by night in the streets of
Manchester to the girls from the Mills, who were strolling bareheaded,
with coarse, rude, and reckless air, through the streets, or seeing
through the windows of the gin-palaces the women seated drinking, too
dull to carouse. The homes of England! their sweetness is melting into
fable; only the new Spirit in its holiest power can restore to those
homes their boasted security of "each man's castle," for Woman, the
warder, is driven into the street, and has let fall the keys in her
sad plight. Yet darkest hour of night is nearest dawn, and there seems
reason to believe that

  "There's a good time coming."

Blest be those who aid, who doubt not that

  "Smallest helps, if rightly given,
  Make the impulse stronger;
  'Twill be strong enough one day."

Other things we saw in Liverpool,--the Royal Institute, with the
statue of Roscoe by Chantrey, and in its collection from the works
of the early Italian artists, and otherwise, bearing traces of that
liberality and culture by which the man, happy enough to possess them,
and at the same time engaged with his fellow-citizens in practical
life, can do so much more to enlighten and form them, than prince or
noble possibly can with far larger pecuniary means. We saw the statue
of Huskisson in the Cemetery. It is fine as a portrait statue, but
as a work of art wants firmness and grandeur. I say it is fine as a
portrait statue, though we were told it is not like the original; but
it is a good conception of an individuality which might exist, if it
does not yet. It is by Gibson, who received his early education in
Liverpool. I saw there, too, the body of an infant borne to the grave
by women; for it is a beautiful custom, here, that those who have
fulfilled all other tender offices to the little being should hold to
it the same relation to the very last.

From Liverpool we went to Chester, one of the oldest cities in
England, a Roman station once, and abode of the "Twentieth Legion,"
"the Victorious." Tiles bearing this inscription, heads of Jupiter,
and other marks of their occupation, have, not long ago, been detected
beneath the sod. The town also bears the marks of Welsh invasion and
domestic struggles. The shape of a cross in which it is laid out, its
walls and towers, its four arched gateways, its ramparts and ruined,
towers, mantled with ivy, its old houses with Biblical inscriptions,
its cathedral,--in which tall trees have grown up amid the arches, a
fresh garden-plot, with flowers, bright green and red, taken place
of the altar, and a crowd of revelling swallows supplanted the sallow
choirs of a former priesthood,--present a _tout-ensemble_ highly
romantic in itself, and charming, indeed, to Transatlantic eyes. Yet
not to all eyes would it have had charms, for one American traveller,
our companion on the voyage, gravely assured us that we should find
the "castles and that sort of thing all humbug," and that, if we
wished to enjoy them, it would "be best to sit at home and read some
_handsome_ work on the subject."

At the hotel in Liverpool and that in Manchester I had found no bath,
and asking for one at Chester, the chambermaid said, with earnest
good-will, that "they had none, but she thought she could get me
a note from her master to the Infirmary (!!) if I would go there."
Luckily I did not generalize quite as rapidly as travellers in America
usually do, and put in the note-book,--"_Mem._: None but the sick ever
bathe in England"; for in the next establishment we tried, I found
the plentiful provision for a clean and healthy day, which I had read
would be met _everywhere_ in this country.

All else I must defer to my next, as the mail is soon to close.




LETTER II.

CHESTER.--ITS MUSEUM.--TRAVELLING COMPANIONS.--A BENGALESE.--
WESTMORELAND.--AMBLESIDE.--COBDEN AND BRIGHT.--A SCOTCH
LADY.--WORDSWORTH.--HIS FLOWERS.--MISS MARTINEAU.


Ambleside. Westmoreland, 27th August, 1846.

I forgot to mention, in writing of Chester, an object which gave me
pleasure. I mentioned, that the wall which enclosed the old town was
two miles in circumference; far beyond this stretches the modern
part of Chester, and the old gateways now overarch the middle of long
streets. This wall is now a walk for the inhabitants, commanding a
wide prospect, and three persons could walk abreast on its smooth
flags. We passed one of its old picturesque towers, from whose top
Charles the First, poor, weak, unhappy king, looked down and saw his
troops defeated by the Parliamentary army on the adjacent plain. A
little farther on, one of these picturesque towers is turned to the
use of a Museum, whose stock, though scanty, I examined with singular
pleasure, for it had been made up by truly filial contributions
from, all who had derived benefit from Chester, from the Marquis
of Westminster--whose magnificent abode, Eton Hall, lies not far
off--down to the merchant's clerk, who had furnished it in his leisure
hours with a geological chart, the soldier and sailor, who sent back
shells, insects, and petrifactions from their distant wanderings, and
a boy of thirteen, who had made, in wood, a model of its cathedral,
and even furnished it with a bell to ring out the evening chimes. Many
women had been busy in filling these magazines for the instruction
and the pleasure of their fellow-townsmen. Lady ----, the wife of the
captain of the garrison, grateful for the gratuitous admission of the
soldiers once a month,--a privilege of which the keeper of the Museum
(a woman also, who took an intelligent pleasure in her task) assured
me that they were eager to avail themselves,--had given a fine
collection of butterflies, and a ship. An untiring diligence had
been shown in adding whatever might stimulate or gratify imperfectly
educated minds. I like to see women perceive that there are other
ways of doing good besides making clothes for the poor or teaching
Sunday-school; these are well, if well directed, but there are many
other ways, some as sure and surer, and which benefit the giver no
less than the receiver.

I was waked from sleep at the Chester Inn by a loud dispute between
the chambermaid and an unhappy elderly gentleman, who insisted that he
had engaged the room in which I was, had returned to sleep in it,
and consequently must do so. To her assurances that the lady was long
since in possession, he was deaf; but the lock, fortunately for me,
proved a stronger defence. With all a chambermaid's morality, the
maiden boasted to me, "He said he had engaged 44, and would not
believe me when I assured him it was 46; indeed, how could he? I did
not believe myself." To my assurance that, if I had known the room,
was his, I should not have wished for it, but preferred taking a
worse, I found her a polite but incredulous listener.

Passing from Liverpool to Lancaster by railroad, that convenient but
most unprofitable and stupid way of travelling, we there took the
canal-boat to Kendal, and passed pleasantly through a country of that
soft, that refined and cultivated loveliness, which, however much
we have heard of it, finds the American eye--accustomed to so much
wildness, so much rudeness, such a corrosive action of man upon
nature--wholly unprepared. I feel all the time as if in a sweet dream,
and dread to be presently awakened by some rude jar or glare; but none
comes, and here in Westmoreland--but wait a moment, before we speak of
that.

In the canal-boat we found two well-bred English gentlemen, and two
well-informed German gentlemen, with whom we had some agreeable talk.
With one of the former was a beautiful youth, about eighteen, whom I
supposed, at the first glance, to be a type of that pure East-Indian
race whose beauty I had never seen represented before except in
pictures; and he made a picture, from which I could scarcely take my
eyes a moment, and from it could as ill endure to part. He was dressed
in a broadcloth robe richly embroidered, leaving his throat and the
upper part of his neck bare, except that he wore a heavy gold chain.
A rich shawl was thrown gracefully around him; the sleeves of his robe
were loose, with white sleeves below. He wore a black satin cap. The
whole effect of this dress was very fine yet simple, setting off to
the utmost advantage the distinguished beauty of his features, in
which there was a mingling of national pride, voluptuous sweetness in
that unconscious state of reverie when it affects us as it does in the
flower, and intelligence in its newly awakened purity. As he turned
his head, his profile was like one I used to have of Love asleep,
while Psyche leans over him with the lamp; but his front face,
with the full, summery look of the eye, was unlike that. He was a
Bengalese, living in England for his education, as several others are
at present. He spoke English well, and conversed on several subjects,
literary and political, with grace, fluency, and delicacy of thought.

Passing from Kendal to Ambleside, we found a charming abode furnished
us by the care of a friend in one of the stone cottages of this
region, almost the only one _not_ ivy-wreathed, but commanding a
beautiful view of the mountains, and truly an English home in its
neatness, quiet, and delicate, noiseless attention to the wants of all
within its walls. Here we have passed eight happy days, varied by
many drives, boating excursions on Grasmere and Winandermere, and the
society of several agreeable persons. As the Lake district at this
season draws together all kinds of people, and a great variety beside
come from, all quarters to inhabit the charming dwellings that
adorn its hill-sides and shores, I met and saw a good deal of the
representatives of various classes, at once. I found here two landed
proprietors from other parts of England, both "travelled English,"
one owning a property in Greece, where he frequently resides,
both warmly engaged in Reform measures, anti-Corn-Law,
anti-Capital-Punishment,--one of them an earnest student of Emerson's
Essays. Both of them had wives, who kept pace with their projects and
their thoughts, active and intelligent women, true ladies, skilful in
drawing and music; all the better wives for the development of every
power. One of them told me, with a glow of pride, that it was not long
since her husband had been "cut" by all his neighbors among the gentry
for the part he took against the Corn Laws; but, she added, he was now
a favorite with them all. Verily, faith will remove mountains, if
only you do join with it any fair portion of the dove and serpent
attributes.

I found here, too, a wealthy manufacturer, who had written many
valuable pamphlets on popular subjects. He said: "Now that the
progress of public opinion was beginning to make the Church and the
Army narrower fields for the younger sons of 'noble' families, they
sometimes wish to enter into trade; but, beside the aversion which had
been instilled into them for many centuries, they had rarely patience
and energy for the apprenticeship requisite to give the needed
knowledge of the world and habits of labor." Of Cobden he said: "He
is inferior in acquirements to very many of his class, as he is
self-educated and had everything to learn after he was grown up;
but in clear insight there is none like him." A man of very little
education, whom I met a day or two after in the stage-coach, observed
to me: "Bright is far the more eloquent of the two, but Cobden is
more felt, just _because_ his speeches are so plain, so merely
matter-of-fact and to the point."

We became acquainted also with Dr. Gregory, Professor of Chemistry
at Edinburgh, a very enlightened and benevolent man, who in many ways
both instructed and benefited us. He is the friend of Liebig, and one
of his chief representatives here.

We also met a fine specimen of the noble, intelligent Scotchwoman,
such as Walter Scott and Burns knew how to prize. Seventy-six years
have passed over her head, only to prove in her the truth of my
theory, that we need never grow old. She was "brought up" in the
animated and intellectual circle of Edinburgh, in youth an apt
disciple, in her prime a bright ornament of that society. She had been
an only child, a cherished wife, an adored mother, unspoiled by love
in any of these relations, because that love was founded on knowledge.
In childhood she had warmly sympathized in the spirit that animated
the American Revolution, and Washington had been her hero; later, the
interest of her husband in every struggle for freedom had cherished
her own; she had known in the course of her long life many eminent
men, knew minutely the history of efforts in that direction, and
sympathized now in the triumph of the people over the Corn Laws, as
she had in the American victories, with as much ardor as when a girl,
though with a wiser mind. Her eye was full of light, her manner and
gesture of dignity; her voice rich, sonorous, and finely modulated;
her tide of talk marked by candor, justice, and showing in every
sentence her ripe experience and her noble, genial nature. Dear to
memory will be the sight of her in the beautiful seclusion of her home
among the mountains, a picturesque, flower-wreathed dwelling, where
affection, tranquillity, and wisdom were the gods of the hearth, to
whom was offered no vain oblation. Grant us more such women, Time!
Grant to men the power to reverence, to seek for such!

Our visit to Mr. Wordsworth was very pleasant. He also is seventy-six,
but his is a florid, fair old age. He walked with us to all his
haunts about the house. Its situation is beautiful, and the "Rydalian
Laurels" are magnificent. Still I saw abodes among the hills that
I should have preferred for Wordsworth, more wild and still, more
romantic; the fresh and lovely Rydal Mount seems merely the retirement
of a gentleman, rather than the haunt of a poet. He showed his
benignity of disposition in several little things, especially in
his attentions to a young boy we had with us. This boy had left the
Circus, exhibiting its feats of horsemanship in Ambleside "for that
day only," at his own desire to see Wordsworth, and I feared he would
be disappointed, as I know I should have been at his age, if, when
called to see a poet, I had found no Apollo, flaming with youthful
glory, laurel-crowned and lyre in hand, but, instead, a reverend old
man clothed in black, and walking with cautious step along the level
garden-path; however, he was not disappointed, but seemed in timid
reverence to recognize the spirit that had dictated "Laodamia" and
"Dion,"--and Wordsworth, in his turn, seemed to feel and prize a
congenial nature in this child.

Taking us into the house, he showed us the picture of his sister,
repeating with much expression some lines of hers, and those so famous
of his about her, beginning, "Five years," &c.; also his own picture,
by Inman, of whom he spoke with esteem.

Mr. Wordsworth is fond of the hollyhock, a partiality scarcely
deserved by the flower, but which marks the simplicity of his
tastes. He had made a long avenue of them of all colors, from the
crimson-brown to rose, straw-color, and white, and pleased himself
with having made proselytes to a liking for them among his neighbors.

I never have seen such magnificent fuchsias as at Ambleside, and there
was one to be seen in every cottage-yard. They are no longer here
under the shelter of the green-house, as with us, and as they used to
be in England. The plant, from its grace and finished elegance, being
a great favorite of mine, I should like to see it as frequently and of
as luxuriant a growth at home, and asked their mode of culture, which
I here mark down, for the benefit of all who may be interested. Make
a bed of bog-earth and sand, put down slips of the fuchsia, and give
them a great deal of water,--this is all they need. People have them
out here in winter, but perhaps they would not bear the cold of our
Januaries.

Mr. Wordsworth spoke with, more liberality than we expected of the
recent measures about the Corn Laws, saying that "the principle was
certainly right, though as to whether existing interests had been as
carefully attended to as was just, he was not prepared to say." His
neighbors were pleased to hear of his speaking thus mildly, and hailed
it as a sign that he was opening his mind to more light on these
subjects. They lament that his habits of seclusion keep him much
ignorant of the real wants of England and the world. Living in this
region, which is cultivated by small proprietors, where there is
little poverty, vice, or misery, he hears not the voice which cries so
loudly from other parts of England, and will not be stilled by sweet
poetic suasion or philosophy, for it is the cry of men in the jaws of
destruction.

It was pleasant to find the reverence inspired by this great and pure
mind warmest nearest home. Our landlady, in heaping praises upon him,
added, constantly, "And Mrs. Wordsworth, too." "Do the people here,"
said I, "value Mr. Wordsworth most because he is a celebrated writer?"
"Truly, madam," said she, "I think it is because he is so kind a
neighbor."

  "True to the kindred points of Heaven and Home."

Dr. Arnold, too,--who lived, as his family still live, here,--diffused
the same ennobling and animating spirit among those who knew him in
private, as through the sphere of his public labors.

Miss Martineau has here a charming residence; it has been finished
only a few months, but all about it is in unexpectedly fair order, and
promises much beauty after a year or two of growth. Here we found her
restored to full health and activity, looking, indeed, far better than
she did when in the United States. It was pleasant to see her in this
home, presented to her by the gratitude of England for her course of
energetic and benevolent effort, and adorned by tributes of affection
and esteem from many quarters. From the testimony of those who were
with her in and since her illness, her recovery would seem to be of
as magical quickness and sure progress as has been represented. At
the house of Miss Martineau I saw Milman, the author, I must not say
poet,--a specimen of the polished, scholarly man of the world.

We passed one most delightful day in a visit to Langdale,--the scene
of "The Excursion,"--and to Dungeon-Ghyll Force. I am finishing my
letter at Carlisle on my way to Scotland, and will give a slight
sketch of that excursion, and one which occupied another day, from
Keswick to Buttermere and Crummock Water, in my next.




LETTER III.

WESTMORELAND.--LANGDALE.--DUNGEON-GHYLL FORCE.--KESWICK.--CARLISLE.--
BRANXHOLM.--SCOTT.--BURNS.


Edinburgh, 20th September, 1846.

I have too long delayed writing up my journal.--Many interesting
observations slip from recollection if one waits so many days:
yet, while travelling, it is almost impossible to find an hour when
something of value to be seen will not be lost while writing.

I said, in closing my last, that I would write a little more about
Westmoreland; but so much, has happened since, that I must now dismiss
that region with all possible brevity.

The first day of which I wished to speak was passed in visiting
Langdale, the scene of Wordsworth's "Excursion." Our party of eight
went in two of the vehicles called cars or droskas,--open carriages,
each drawn by one horse. They are rather fatiguing to ride in, but
good to see from. In steep and stony places all alight, and the driver
leads the horse: so many of these there are, that we were four or
five hours in going ten miles, including the pauses when we wished to
_look_.

The scenes through which we passed are, indeed, of the most wild and
noble character. The wildness is not savage, but very calm. Without
recurring to details, I recognized the tone and atmosphere of that
noble poem, which was to me, at a feverish period in my life, as pure
waters, free breezes, and cold blue sky, bringing a sense of eternity
that gave an aspect of composure to the rudest volcanic wrecks of
time.

We dined at a farm-house of the vale, with its stone floors, old
carved cabinet (the pride of a house of this sort), and ready
provision of oaten cakes. We then ascended a near hill to the
waterfall called Dungeon-Ghyll Force, also a subject touched by
Wordsworth's Muse. You wind along a path for a long time, hearing the
sound of the falling water, but do not see it till, descending by a
ladder the side of the ravine, you come to its very foot. You find
yourself then in a deep chasm, bridged over by a narrow arch of rock;
the water falls at the farther end in a narrow column. Looking up, you
see the sky through a fissure so narrow as to make it look very pure
and distant. One of our party, passing in, stood some time at the foot
of the waterfall, and added much to its effect, as his height gave a
measure by which to appreciate that of surrounding objects, and his
look, by that light so pale and statuesque, seemed to inform the place
with the presence of its genius.

Our circuit homeward from this grand scene led us through some
lovely places, and to an outlook upon the most beautiful part of
Westmoreland. Passing over to Keswick we saw Derwentwater, and near it
the Fall of Lodore. It was from Keswick that we made the excursion
of a day through Borrowdale to Buttermere and Crummock Water, which
I meant to speak of, but find it impossible at this moment. The mind
does not now furnish congenial colors with which to represent the
vision of that day: it must still wait in the mind and bide its time,
again to emerge to outer air.

At Keswick we went to see a model of the Lake country which gives an
excellent idea of the relative positions of all objects. Its maker had
given six years to the necessary surveys and drawings. He said that
he had first become acquainted with the country from his taste for
fishing, but had learned to love its beauty, till the thought arose of
making this model; that while engaged in it, he visited almost every
spot amid the hills, and commonly saw both sunrise and sunset upon
them; that he was happy all the time, but almost too happy when he saw
one section of his model coming out quite right, and felt sure at last
that he should be quite successful in representing to others the home
of his thoughts. I looked upon him as indeed an enviable man, to have
a profession so congenial with his feelings, in which he had been so
naturally led to do what would be useful and pleasant for others.

Passing from Keswick through a pleasant and cultivated country, we
paused at "fair Carlisle," not voluntarily, but because we could not
get the means of proceeding farther that day. So, as it was one in
which

  "The sun shone fair on Carlisle wall,"

we visited its Cathedral and Castle, and trod, for the first time, in
some of the footsteps of the unfortunate Queen of Scots.

Passing next day the Border, we found the mosses all drained, and
the very existence of sometime moss-troopers would have seemed
problematical, but for the remains of Gilnockie,--the tower of Johnnie
Armstrong, so pathetically recalled in one of the finest of the
Scottish ballads. Its size, as well as that of other keeps, towers,
and castles, whose ruins are reverentially preserved in Scotland,
gives a lively sense of the time when population was so scanty, and
individual manhood grew to such force. Ten men in Gilnockie were
stronger then in proportion to the whole, and probably had in them
more of intelligence, resource, and genuine manly power, than ten
regiments now of red-coats drilled to act out manoeuvres they do not
understand, and use artillery which needs of them no more than the
match to go off and do its hideous message.

Farther on we saw Branxholm, and the water in crossing which the
Goblin Page was obliged to resume his proper shape and fly, crying,
"Lost, lost, lost!" Verily these things seem more like home than one's
own nursery, whose toys and furniture could not in actual presence
engage the thoughts like these pictures, made familiar as household
words by the most generous, kindly genius that ever blessed this
earth.

On the coach with us was a gentleman coming from London to make his
yearly visit to the neighborhood of Burns, in which he was born. "I
can now," said he, "go but once a year; when a boy, I never let a week
pass without visiting the house of Burns." He afterward observed, as
every step woke us to fresh recollections of Walter Scott, that Scott,
with all his vast range of talent, knowledge, and activity, was a poet
of the past only, and in his inmost heart wedded to the habits of a
feudal aristocracy, while Burns is the poet of the present and the
future, the man of the people, and throughout a genuine man. This is
true enough; but for my part I cannot endure a comparison which by a
breath of coolness depreciates either. Both were wanted; each
acted the important part assigned him by destiny with a wonderful
thoroughness and completeness. Scott breathed the breath just fleeting
from the forms of ancient Scottish heroism and poesy into new,--he
made for us the bridge by which we have gone into the old Ossianic
hall and caught the meaning just as it was about to pass from us for
ever. Burns is full of the noble, genuine democracy which seeks not
to destroy royalty, but to make all men kings, as he himself was, in
nature and in action. They belong to the same world; they are pillars
of the same church, though they uphold its starry roof from opposite
sides. Burns was much the rarer man; precisely because he had most of
common nature on a grand scale; his humor, his passion, his sweetness,
are all his own; they need no picturesque or romantic accessories to
give them due relief: looked at by all lights they are the same. Since
Adam, there has been none that approached nearer fitness to stand
up before God and angels in the naked majesty of manhood than Robert
Burns;--but there was a serpent in his field also! Yet but for his
fault we could never have seen brought out the brave and patriotic
modesty with which he owned it. Shame on him who could bear to think
of fault in this rich jewel, unless reminded by such confession.

We passed Abbotsford without stopping, intending to go there on our
return. Last year five hundred Americans inscribed their names in its
porter's book. A raw-boned Scotsman, who gathered his weary length
into our coach on his return from a pilgrimage thither, did us the
favor to inform us that "Sir Walter was a vara intelligent mon," and
the guide-book mentions "the American Washington" as "a worthy old
patriot." Lord safe us, cummers, what news be there!

This letter, meant to go by the Great Britain, many interruptions
force me to close, unflavored by one whiff from the smoke of Auld
Reekie. More and better matter shall my next contain, for here and
in the Highlands I have passed three not unproductive weeks, of which
more anon.




LETTER IV.

EDINBURGH, OLD AND NEW.--SCOTT AND BURNS.--DR. ANDREW COMBE.--AMERICAN
RE-PUBLISHING.--THE BOOKSELLING TRADE.--THE MESSRS. CHAMBERS.--DE
QUINCEY THE OPIUM-EATER.--DR. CHALMERS.


Edinburgh, September 22d, 1846.

The beautiful and stately aspect of this city has been the theme of
admiration so general that I can only echo it. We have seen it to the
greatest advantage both from Calton Hill and Arthur's Seat, and our
lodgings in Princess Street allow us a fine view of the Castle, always
impressive, but peculiarly so in the moonlit evenings of our first
week here, when a veil of mist added to its apparent size, and at the
same time gave it the air with which Martin, in his illustrations
of "Paradise Lost," has invested the palace which "rose like an
exhalation."

On this our second visit, after an absence of near a fortnight in the
Highlands, we are at a hotel nearly facing the new monument to Scott,
and the tallest buildings of the Old Town. From my windows I see
the famous Kirk, the spot where the old Tolbooth was, and can almost
distinguish that where Porteous was done to death, and other objects
described in the most dramatic part of "The Heart of Mid-Lothian." In
one of these tall houses Hume wrote part of his History of England,
and on this spot still nearer was the home of Allan Ramsay. A thousand
other interesting and pregnant associations present themselves every
time I look out of the window.

In the open square between us and the Old Town is to be the terminus
of the railroad, but as the building will be masked with trees, it
is thought it will not mar the beauty of the place; yet Scott could
hardly have looked without regret upon an object that marks so
distinctly the conquest of the New over the Old, and, appropriately
enough, his statue has its back turned that way. The effect of the
monument to Scott is pleasing, though without strict unity of thought
or original beauty of design. The statue is too much hid within the
monument, and wants that majesty of repose in the attitude and drapery
which a sitting figure should have, and which might well accompany the
massive head of Scott. Still the monument is an ornament and an honor
to the city. This is now the fourth that has been erected within two
years to commemorate the triumphs of genius. Monuments that have risen
from the same idea, and in such quick succession, to Schiller, to
Goethe, to Beethoven, and to Scott, signalize the character of the new
era still more happily than does the railroad coming up almost to the
foot of Edinburgh Castle.

The statue of Burns has been removed from the monument erected in his
honor, to one of the public libraries, as being there more accessible
to the public. It is, however, entirely unworthy its subject, giving
the idea of a smaller and younger person, while we think of Burns
as of a man in the prime of manhood, one who not only promised, but
_was_, and with a sunny glow and breadth, of character of which this
stone effigy presents no sign.

A Scottish gentleman told me the following story, which would afford
the finest subject for a painter capable of representing the glowing
eye and natural kingliness of Burns, in contrast to the poor, mean
puppets he reproved.

Burns, still only in the dawn of his celebrity, was invited to dine
with one of the neighboring so-called gentry (unhappily quite void
of true gentle blood). On arriving he found his plate set in the
servants' room!! After dinner he was invited into a room where guests
were assembled, and, a chair being placed for him at the lower end of
the board, a glass of wine was offered, and he was requested to sing
one of his songs for the entertainment of the company. He drank off
the wine, and thundered forth in reply his grand song, "For a' that
and a' that," with which it will do no harm to refresh the memories
of our readers, for we doubt there may be, even in Republican America,
those who need the reproof as much, and with far less excuse, than had
that Scottish company.

  "Is there, for honest poverty,
    That hangs his head, and a' that?
  The coward slave, we pass him by,
    We dare be poor for a' that!
    For a' that, and a' that,
    Our toils obscure, and a' that,
  The rank is but the guinea's stamp,
    The man's the gowd for a' that.

  "What tho' on hamely fare we dine,
    Wear hoddin gray, and a' that;
  Gie fools their silks, and knaves their wine,
    A man's a man for a' that!
    For a' that, and a' that,
    Their tinsel show, and a' that,
  The honest man, though, e'er sae poor
    Is king o' men for a' that.

  "Ye see yon birkie, ca'd a lord,
    Wha struts, and stares, and a' that;
  Tho' hundreds worship at his word,
    He's but a coof for a' that;
    For a' that, and a' that,
    His ribbon, star, and a' that,
  The man of independent mind,
    He looks and laughs at a' that.

  "A prince can make a belted knight,
    A marquis, duke, and a' that;
  But an honest man's aboon his might
    Guid faith, he maunna fa' that!
    For a' that, and a' that,
    Their dignities, and a' that,
  The pith o' sense and pride o' worth
    Are higher ranks than a' that.

  "Then let us pray that, come it may,
    As come it will for a' that,
  That sense and worth, o'er a' the earth,
    May bear the gree, and a' that;
    For a' that, and a' that,
    It's coming yet for a' that,
  That man to man, the wide warld o'er,
    Shall brothers be for a' that."

And, having finished this prophecy and prayer, Nature's nobleman left
his churlish entertainers to hide their diminished heads in the home
they had disgraced.

We have seen all the stock lions. The Regalia people still crowd
to see, though the old natural feelings from which they so long lay
hidden seem almost extinct. Scotland grows English day by day. The
libraries of the Advocates, Writers to the Signet, &c., are fine
establishments. The University and schools are now in vacation; we are
compelled by unwise postponement of our journey to see both Edinburgh
and London at the worst possible season. We should have been here in
April, there in June. There is always enough to see, but now we find
a majority of the most interesting persons absent, and a stagnation in
the intellectual movements of the place.

We had, however, the good fortune to find Dr. Andrew Combe, who,
though a great invalid, was able and disposed for conversation at
this time. I was impressed with great and affectionate respect by
the benign and even temper of his mind, his extensive and accurate
knowledge, accompanied, as such should naturally be, by a large
and intelligent liberality. Of our country he spoke very wisely and
hopefully, though among other stories with which we, as Americans, are
put to the blush here, there is none worse than that of the conduct of
some of our publishers toward him. One of these stories I had heard
in New York, but supposed it to be exaggerated till I had it from the
best authority. It is of one of our leading houses who were publishing
on their own account and had stereotyped one of his works from an
early edition. When this work had passed through other editions and
he had for years been busy in reforming and amending it, he applied
to this house to republish from the later and better edition. They
refused. In vain he urged that it was not only for his own reputation
as an author that he was anxious, but for the good of the great
country through which writings on such, important subjects were to be
circulated, that they might have the benefit of his labors and best
knowledge. Such arguments on the stupid and mercenary tempers of those
addressed fell harmless as on a buffalo's hide might a gold-tipped
arrow. The book, they thought, answered THEIR purpose sufficiently,
for IT SELLS. Other purpose for a book they knew none. And as to the
natural rights of an author over the fruits of his mind, the distilled
essence of a life consumed in the severities of mental labor, they had
never heard of such a thing. His work was in the market, and he had
no more to do with it, that they could see, than the silkworm with the
lining of one of their coats.

Mr. Greeley, the more I look at this subject, the more I must
maintain, in opposition to your views, that the publisher cannot, if
a mere tradesman, be a man of honor. It is impossible in the nature of
things. He _must_ have some idea of the nature and value of literary
labor, or he is wholly unfit to deal with its products. He cannot
get along by occasional recourse to paid critics or readers; he must
himself have some idea what he is about. One partner, at least, in
the firm, must be a man of culture. All must understand enough to
appreciate their position, and know that he who, for his sordid aims,
circulates poisonous trash amid a great and growing people, and
makes it almost impossible for those whom Heaven has appointed as its
instructors to do their office, are the worst of traitors, and to be
condemned at the bar of nations under a sentence no less severe than
false statesmen and false priests. This matter should and must be
looked to more conscientiously.

Dr. Combe, repelled by all this indifference to conscience and natural
equity in the firm who had taken possession of his work, applied to
others. But here he found himself at once opposed by the invisible
barrier that makes this sort of tyranny so strong and so pernicious.
"It was the understanding among the trade that they were not to
interfere with one another; indeed, they could have no chance," &c.,
&c. When at last he did get the work republished in another part of
the country less favorable for his purposes, the bargain made as to
the pecuniary part of the transaction was in various ways so evaded,
that, up to this time, he has received no compensation from that
widely-circulated work, except a lock of Spurzheim's hair!!

I was pleased to hear the true view expressed by one of the Messrs.
Chambers. These brothers have worked their way up to wealth and
influence by daily labor and many steps. One of them is more the
business man, the other the literary curator of their Journal. Of this
Journal they issue regularly eighty thousand copies, and it is
doing an excellent work, by awakening among the people a desire for
knowledge, and, to a considerable extent, furnishing them with good
materials. I went over their fine establishment, where I found more
than a hundred and fifty persons, in good part women, employed, all
in well-aired, well-lighted rooms, seemingly healthy and content.
Connected with the establishment is a Savings Bank, and evening
instruction in writing, singing, and arithmetic. There was also a
reading-room, and the same valuable and liberal provision we had
found attached to some of the Manchester warehouses. Such accessories
dignify and gladden all kinds of labor, and show somewhat of the true
spirit of human brotherhood in the employer. Mr. Chambers said he
trusted they should never look on publishing _chiefly_ as _business_,
or a lucrative and respectable employment, but as the means of mental
and moral benefit to their countrymen. To one so wearied and disgusted
as I have been by vulgar and base avowals on such subjects, it was
very refreshing to hear this from the lips of a successful publisher.

Dr. Combe spoke with high praise of Mr. Hurlbart's book, "Human Rights
and their Political Guaranties," which was published at the Tribune
office. He observed that it was the work of a real thinker, and
extremely well written. It is to be republished here. Dr. Combe said
that it must make its way slowly, as it could interest those only who
were willing to read thoughtfully; but its success was sure at last.

He also spoke with, great interest and respect of Mrs. Farnham,
of whose character and the influence she has exerted on the female
prisoners at Sing Sing he had heard some account.

A person of a quite different character and celebrity is De Quincey,
the English Opium-Eater, and who lately has delighted us again with
the papers in Blackwood headed "Suspiria de Profundis." I had the
satisfaction, not easily attainable now, of seeing him for some hours,
and in the mood of conversation. As one belonging to the Wordsworth,
and Coleridge constellation, (he too is now seventy-six years of age,)
the thoughts and knowledge of Mr. De Quincey lie in the past; and
oftentimes he spoke of matters now become trite to one of a later
culture. But to all that fell from his lips, his eloquence, subtile
and forcible as the wind, full and gently falling as the evening dew,
lent a peculiar charm. He is an admirable narrator, not rapid, but
gliding along like a rivulet through a green meadow, giving and taking
a thousand little beauties not absolutely required to give his story
due relief, but each, in itself, a separate boon.

I admired, too, his urbanity, so opposite to the rapid, slang,
Vivian-Greyish style current in the literary conversation of the
day. "Sixty years since," men had time to do things better and more
gracefully than now.

With Dr. Chalmers we passed a couple of hours. He is old now, but
still full of vigor and fire. We had an opportunity of hearing a
fine burst of indignant eloquence from him. "I shall blush to my very
bones," said he, "if the _Chaarrch_"--(sound these two _rr_'s with
as much burr as possible and you will get at an idea of his mode of
pronouncing that unweariable word)--"if the Chaarrch yields to the
storm." He alluded to the outcry now raised against the Free Church by
the Abolitionists, whose motto is, "Send back the money," i.e. money
taken from the American slaveholders. Dr. Chalmers felt that, if they
did not yield from conviction, they must not to assault. His manner
of speaking on this subject gave me an idea of the nature of his
eloquence. He seldom preaches now.

A fine picture was presented by the opposition of figure and
lineaments between a young Indian, son of the celebrated Dwarkanauth
Tagore, who happened to be there that morning, and Dr. Chalmers, as
they were conversing together. The swarthy, half-timid, yet elegant
face and form of the Indian made a fine contrast with the florid,
portly, yet intellectually luminous appearance of the Doctor; half
shepherd, half orator, he looked a Shepherd King opposed to some
Arabian story-teller.

I saw others in Edinburgh of a later date who haply gave more valuable
as well as fresher revelations of the spirit, and whose names may be
by and by more celebrated than those I have cited; but for the present
this must suffice. It would take a week, if I wrote half I saw or
thought in Edinburgh, and I must close for to-day.




LETTER V.

PERTH.--TRAVELLING BY COACH.--LOCH LEVEN.--QUEEN MARY.--LOCH
KATRINE.--THE TROSACHS.--ROWARDENNAN.--A NIGHT ON BEN LOMOND.--SCOTCH
PEASANTRY.


Birmingham, September 30th, 1846.

I was obliged to stop writing at Edinburgh before the better half
of my tale was told, and must now begin there again, to speak of an
excursion into the Highlands, which occupied about a fortnight.

We left Edinburgh, by coach for Perth, and arrived there about three
in the afternoon. I have reason to be very glad that I visit this
island before the reign of the stage-coach is quite over. I have been
constantly on the top of the coach, even one day of drenching rain,
and enjoy it highly. Nothing can be more inspiring than this swift,
steady progress over such smooth roads, and placed so high as to
overlook the country freely, with the lively flourish of the horn
preluding every pause. Travelling by railroad is, in my opinion, the
most stupid process on earth; it is sleep without the refreshment of
sleep, for the noise of the train makes it impossible either to read,
talk, or sleep to advantage. But here the advantages are immense; you
can fly through this dull trance from one beautiful place to another,
and stay at each during the time that would otherwise be spent on
the road. Already the artists, who are obliged to find their home
in London, rejoice that all England is thrown open to them for
sketching-ground, since they can now avail themselves of a day's
leisure at a great distance, and with choice of position, whereas
formerly they were obliged to confine themselves to a few "green, and
bowery" spots in the neighborhood of the metropolis. But while in the
car, it is to me that worst of purgatories, the purgatory of dulness.

Well, on the coach we went to Perth, and passed through Kinross, and
saw Loch Leven, and the island where Queen Mary passed those sorrowful
months, before her romantic escape under care of the Douglas. As this
unhappy, lovely woman stands for a type in history, death, time, and
distance do not destroy her attractive power. Like Cleopatra, she has
still her adorers; nay, some are born to her in each new generation of
men. Lately she has for her chevalier the Russian Prince Labanoff, who
has spent fourteen years in studying upon all that related to her,
and thinks now that he can make out a story and a picture about the
mysteries of her short reign, which shall satisfy the desire of her
lovers to find her as pure and just as she was charming. I have only
seen of his array of evidence so much, as may be found in the pages of
Chambers's Journal, but that much does not disturb the original view I
have taken of the case; which is, that from a princess educated
under the Medici and Guise influence, engaged in the meshes of secret
intrigue to favor the Roman Catholic faith, her tacit acquiescence,
at least, in the murder of Darnley, after all his injurious conduct
toward her, was just what was to be expected. From a poor, beautiful
young woman, longing to enjoy life, exposed both by her position
and her natural fascinations to the utmost bewilderment of flattery,
whether prompted by interest or passion, her other acts of folly are
most natural, and let all who feel inclined harshly to condemn her
remember to

  "Gently scan your brother man,
  Still gentler sister woman."

Surely, in all the stern pages of life's account-book there is none on
which a more terrible price is exacted for every precious endowment.
Her rank and reign only made her powerless to do good, and exposed her
to danger; her talents only served to irritate her foes and disappoint
her friends. This most charming of women was the destruction of her
lovers: married three times, she had never any happiness as a wife,
but in both the connections of her choice found that she had either
never possessed or could not retain, even for a few weeks, the love of
the men she had chosen, so that Darnley was willing to risk her life
and that of his unborn child to wreak his wrath upon Rizzio, and after
a few weeks with Bothwell she was heard "calling aloud for a knife to
kill herself with." A mother twice, and of a son and daughter,
both the children were brought forth in loneliness and sorrow, and
separated from her early, her son educated to hate her, her
daughter at once immured in a convent. Add the eighteen years of her
imprisonment, and the fact that this foolish, prodigal world, when
there was in it one woman fitted by her grace and loveliness to charm
all eyes and enliven all fancies, suffered her to be shut up to water
with her tears her dull embroidery during all the full rose-blossom of
her life, and you will hardly get beyond this story for a tragedy, not
noble, but pallid and forlorn.

Such were the bootless, best thoughts I had while looking at the dull
blood-stain and blocked-up secret stair of Holyrood, at the ruins of
Loch Leven castle, and afterward at Abbotsford, where the picture
of Queen Mary's head, as it lay on the pillow when severed from the
block, hung opposite to a fine caricature of "Queen Elizabeth dancing
high and disposedly." In this last the face is like a mask, so
frightful is the expression of cold craft, irritated, vanity, and the
malice of a lonely breast in contrast with the attitude and elaborate
frippery of the dress. The ambassador looks on dismayed; the little
page can scarcely control the laughter which swells his boyish cheeks.
Such can win the world which, better hearts (and such Mary's was, even
if it had a large black speck in it) are most like to lose.

That was a most lovely day on which we entered Perth, and saw in full
sunshine its beautiful meadows, among them the North-Inch, the famous
battle-ground commemorated in "The Fair Maid of Perth," adorned with
graceful trees like those of the New England country towns. In the
afternoon we visited the modern Kinfauns, the stately home of Lord
Grey. The drive to it is most beautiful, on the one side the Park,
with noble heights that skirt it, on the other through a belt of trees
was seen the river and the sweep of that fair and cultivated country.
The house is a fine one, and furnished with taste, the library large,
and some good works in marble. Among the family pictures one
arrested my attention,--the face of a girl full of the most pathetic
sensibility, and with no restraint of convention upon its ardent,
gentle expression. She died young.

Returning, we were saddened, as almost always on leaving any such
place, by seeing such swarms of dirty women and dirtier children at
the doors of the cottages almost close by the gate of the avenue. To
the horrors and sorrows of the streets in such places as Liverpool,
Glasgow, and, above all, London, one has to grow insensible or die
daily; but here in the sweet, fresh, green country, where there seems
to be room for everybody, it is impossible to forget the frightful
inequalities between the lot of man and man, or believe that God can
smile upon a state of things such as we find existent here. Can any
man who has seen these things dare blame the Associationists for their
attempt to find prevention against such misery and wickedness in our
land? Rather will not every man of tolerable intelligence and good
feeling commend, say rather revere, every earnest attempt in that
direction, nor dare interfere with any, unless he has a better to
offer in its place?

Next morning we passed on to Crieff, in whose neighborhood we visited
Drummond Castle, the abode, or rather one of the abodes, of Lord
Willoughby D'Eresby. It has a noble park, through which you pass by
an avenue of two miles long. The old keep is still ascended to get
the fine view of the surrounding country; and during Queen Victoria's
visit, her Guards were quartered there. But what took my fancy most
was the old-fashioned garden, full of old shrubs and new flowers, with
its formal parterres in the shape of the family arms, and its clipped
yew and box trees. It was fresh from a shower, and now glittering and
fragrant in bright sunshine.

This afternoon we pursued our way, passing through the plantations
of Ochtertyre, a far more charming place to my taste than Drummond
Castle, freer and more various in its features. Five or six of these
fine places lie in the neighborhood of Crieff, and the traveller may
give two or three days to visiting them with a rich reward of delight.
But we were pressing on to be with the lakes and mountains rather, and
that night brought us to St. Fillan's, where we saw the moon shining
on Loch Earn.

All this region, and that of Loch Katrine and the Trosachs, which
we reached next day, Scott has described exactly in "The Lady of
the Lake"; nor is it possible to appreciate that poem, without going
thither, neither to describe the scene better than he has done after
you have seen it. I was somewhat disappointed in the pass of the
Trosachs itself; it is very grand, but the grand part lasts so
little while. The opening view of Loch Katrine, however, surpassed,
expectation. It was late in the afternoon when we launched our little
boat there for Ellen's isle.

The boatmen recite, though not _con molto espressione_, the parts of
the poem which describe these localities. Observing that they spoke of
the personages, too, with the same air of confidence, we asked if they
were sure that all this really happened. They replied, "Certainly; it
had been told from father to son through so many generations." Such
is the power of genius to interpolate what it will into the regular
log-book of Time's voyage.

Leaving Loch Katrine the following day, we entered Rob Roy's country,
and saw on the way the house where Helen MacGregor was born, and Rob
Roy's sword, which is shown in a house by the way-side.

We came in a row-boat up Loch Katrine, though both on that and Loch
Lomond you _may_ go in a hateful little steamer with a squeaking
fiddle to play Rob Roy MacGregor O. I walked almost all the way
through the pass from Loch Katrine to Loch Lomond; it was a distance
of six miles; but you feel as if you could walk sixty in that pure,
exhilarating air. At Inversnaid we took boat again to go down Loch
Lomond to the little inn of Rowardennan, from which the ascent is made
of Ben Lomond, the greatest elevation in these parts. The boatmen
are fine, athletic men; one of those with us this evening, a handsome
young man of two or three and twenty, sang to us some Gaelic songs.
The first, a very wild and plaintive air, was the expostulation of a
girl whose lover has deserted her and married another. It seems he is
ashamed, and will not even look at her when they meet upon the road.
She implores him, if he has not forgotten all that scene of bygone
love, at least to lift up his eyes and give her one friendly glance.
The sad _crooning_ burden of the stanzas in which she repeats this
request was very touching. When the boatman had finished, he hung his
head and seemed ashamed of feeling the song too much; then, when we
asked for another, he said he would sing another about a girl that was
happy. This one was in three parts. First, a tuneful address from a
maiden to her absent lover; second, his reply, assuring her of his
fidelity and tenderness; third, a strain which expresses their joy
when reunited. I thought this boatman had sympathies which would
prevent his tormenting any poor women, and perhaps make some one
happy, and this was a pleasant thought, since probably in the
Highlands, as elsewhere,

  "Maidens lend an ear too oft
    To the careless wooer;
  Maidens' hearts are _always soft_;
    Would that men's were truer!"

I don't know that I quote the words correctly, but that is the sum and
substance of a masculine report on these matters.

The first day at Rowardennan not being propitious for ascending the
mountain, we went down the lake to sup, and got very tired in various
ways, so that we rose very late next morning. Their we found a day
of ten thousand for our purpose; but unhappily a large party had come
with the sun and engaged all the horses, so that, if we went, it must
be on foot. This was something of an enterprise for me, as the ascent
is four miles, and toward the summit quite fatiguing; however, in the
pride of newly gained health and strength, I was ready, and set forth
with Mr. S. alone. We took no guide,--and the people of the house did
not advise it, as they ought. They told us afterward they thought the
day was so clear that there was no probability of danger, and they
were afraid of seeming mercenary about it. It was, however, wrong, as
they knew what we did not, that even the shepherds, if a mist comes
on, can be lost in these hills; that a party of gentlemen were so a
few weeks before, and only by accident found their way to a house on
the other side; and that a child which had been lost was not found for
five days, long after its death. We, however, nothing doubting, set
forth, ascending slowly, and often stopping to enjoy the points of
view, which are many, for Ben Lomond consists of a congeries of hills,
above which towers the true Ben, or highest peak, as the head of a
many-limbed body.

On reaching the peak, the night was one of beauty and grandeur such as
imagination never painted. You see around you no plain ground, but on
every side constellations or groups of hills exquisitely dressed in
the soft purple of the heather, amid which gleam the lakes, like eyes
that tell the secrets of the earth and drink in those of the heavens.
Peak beyond peak caught from the shifting light all the colors of the
prism, and on the farthest, angel companies seemed hovering in their
glorious white robes.

Words are idle on such subjects; what can I say, but that it was a
noble vision, that satisfied the eye and stirred the imagination in
all its secret pulses? Had that been, as afterward seemed likely,
the last act of my life, there could not have been a finer decoration
painted on the curtain which was to drop upon it.

About four o'clock we began our descent. Near the summit the traces of
the path are not distinct, and I said to Mr. S., after a while, that
we had lost it. He said, he thought that was of no consequence, we
could find oar way down. I thought however it was, as the ground was
full of springs that were bridged over in the pathway. He accordingly
went to look for it, and I stood still because so tired that I did not
like to waste any labor. Soon he called to me that he had found it,
and I followed in the direction where he seemed to be. But I mistook,
overshot it, and saw him no more. In about ten minutes I became
alarmed, and called him many times. It seems he on his side did the
same, but the brow of some hill was between us, and we neither saw nor
heard one another.

I then thought I would make the best of my way down, and I should
find him upon my arrival. But in doing so I found the justice of my
apprehension about the springs, as, so soon as I got to the foot of
the hills, I would sink up to my knees in bog, and have to go up the
hills again, seeking better crossing-places. Thus I lost much time;
nevertheless, in the twilight I saw at last the lake and the inn of
Rowardennan on its shore.

Between me and it lay direct a high heathery hill, which I afterward
found is called "The Tongue," because hemmed in on three sides by a
watercourse. It looked as if, could I only get to the bottom of that,
I should be on comparatively level ground. I then attempted to descend
in the watercourse, but, finding that impracticable, climbed on the
hill again and let myself down by the heather, for it was very steep
and full of deep holes. With great fatigue I got to the bottom, but
when about to cross the watercourse there, it looked so deep in the
dim twilight that I felt afraid. I got down as far as I could by the
root of a tree, and threw down a stone; it sounded very hollow, and
made me afraid to jump. The shepherds told me afterward, if I had, I
should probably have killed myself, it was so deep and the bed of the
torrent full of sharp stones.

I then tried to ascend the hill again, for there was no other way to
get off it, but soon sunk down utterly exhausted. When able to get up
again and look about me, it was completely dark. I saw far below me
a light, that looked about as big as a pin's head, which I knew to be
from the inn at Rowardennan, but heard no sound except the rush of the
waterfall, and the sighing of the night-wind.

For the first few minutes after I perceived I had got to my night's
lodging, such as it was, the prospect seemed appalling. I was very
lightly clad,--my feet and dress were very wet,--I had only a little
shawl to throw round me, and a cold autumn wind had already come, and
the night-mist was to fall on me, all fevered and exhausted as I was.
I thought I should not live through the night, or, if I did, live
always a miserable invalid. There was no chance to keep myself warm by
walking, for, now it was dark, it would be too dangerous to stir.

My only chance, however, lay in motion, and my only help in myself,
and so convinced was I of this, that I did keep in motion the whole
of that long night, imprisoned as I was on such a little perch of that
great mountain. _How_ long it seemed under such circumstances only
those can guess who may have been similarly circumstanced. The mental
experience of the time, most precious and profound,--for it was indeed
a season lonely, dangerous, and helpless enough for the birth of
thoughts beyond what the common sunlight will ever call to being,--may
be told in another place and time.

For about two hours I saw the stars, and very cheery and companionable
they looked; but then the mist fell, and I saw nothing more, except
such apparitions as visited Ossian on the hill-side when he went out
by night and struck the bosky shield and called to him the spirits of
the heroes and the white-armed maids with their blue eyes of grief. To
me, too, came those visionary shapes; floating slowly and gracefully,
their white robes would unfurl from the great body of mist in which
they had been engaged, and come upon me with a kiss pervasively cold
as that of death. What they might have told me, who knows, if I
had but resigned myself more passively to that cold, spirit-like
breathing!

At last the moon rose. I could not see her, but the silver light
filled the mist. Then I knew it was two o'clock, and that, having
weathered out so much of the night, I might the rest; and the hours
hardly seemed long to me more.

It may give an idea of the extent of the mountain to say that, though
I called every now and then with all my force, in case by chance some
aid might be near, and though no less than twenty men with their dogs
were looking for me, I never heard a sound except the rush of the
waterfall and the sighing of the night-wind, and once or twice the
startling of the grouse in the heather. It was sublime indeed,--a
never-to-be-forgotten presentation of stern, serene realities.

At last came the signs of day, the gradual clearing and breaking up;
some faint sounds, from I know not what. The little flies, too, arose
from their bed amid the purple heather, and bit me; truly they were
very welcome to do so. But what was my disappointment to find the mist
so thick, that I could see neither lake nor inn, nor anything to guide
me. I had to go by guess, and, as it happened, my Yankee method served
me well. I ascended the hill, crossed the torrent in the waterfall,
first drinking some of the water, which was as good at that time as
ambrosia. I crossed in that place because the waterfall made steps,
as it were, to the next hill; to be sure they were covered with water,
but I was already entirely wet with the mist, so that it did not
matter. I then kept on scrambling, as it happened, in the right
direction, till, about seven, some of the shepherds found me. The
moment they came, all my feverish strength departed, though, if
unaided, I dare say it would have kept me up during the day; and they
carried me home, where my arrival relieved my friends of distress
far greater than I had undergone, for I had had my grand solitude, my
Ossianic visions, and the pleasure of sustaining myself while they
had only doubt amounting to anguish and a fruitless search through the
night.

Entirely contrary to my expectations, I only suffered for this a few
days, and was able to take a parting look at my prison, as I went
down the lake, with feelings of complacency. It was a majestic-looking
hill, that Tongue, with the deep ravines on either side, and the
richest robe of heather I have seen anywhere.

Mr. S. gave all the men who were looking for me a dinner in the barn,
and he and Mrs. S. ministered to them, and they talked of Burns,
really the national writer, and known by them, apparently, as none
other is, and of hair-breadth escapes by flood and fell. Afterwards
they were all brought up to see me, and it was pleasing indeed to
observe the good breeding and good, feeling with which they deported
themselves on the occasion. Indeed, this adventure created quite an
intimate feeling between us and the people there. I had been much
pleased, with them before, in attending one of their dances, on
account of the genuine independence and politeness of their conduct.
They were willing and pleased to dance their Highland flings and
strathspeys for our amusement, and did it as naturally and as freely
as they would have offered the stranger the best chair.

All the rest must wait a while. I cannot economize time to keep up
my record in any proportion with what happens, nor can I get out of
Scotland on this page, as I had intended, without utterly slighting
many gifts and graces.




LETTER VI.

INVERARY.--THE ARGYLE FAMILY.--DUMBARTON.--SUNSET ON THE
CLYDE.--GLASGOW.--DIRT AND INTELLECT.--STIRLING.--"THE SCOTTISH
CHIEFS."--STIRLING CASTLE.--THE TOURNAMENT GROUND.--EDINBURGH.--JAMES
SIMPSON.--INFANT SCHOOLS.--FREE BATHS.--MELROSE.--ABBOTSFORD.--WALTER
SCOTT.--DRYBURGH ABBEY.--SCOTT'S TOMB.


Paris, November, 1846.

I am very sorry to leave such a wide gap between my letters, but I was
inevitably prevented from finishing one that was begun for the steamer
of the 4th of November. I then hoped to prepare one after my arrival
here in time for the Hibernia, but a severe cold, caught on the way,
unfitted me for writing. It is now necessary to retrace my steps a
long way, or lose sight of several things it has seemed desirable to
mention to friends in America, though I shall make out my narrative
more briefly than if nearer the time of action.

If I mistake not, my last closed just as I was looking back on the
hill where I had passed the night in all the miserable chill and amid
the ghostly apparitions of a Scotch mist, but which looked in the
morning truly beautiful, and (had I not known it too well to be
deceived) alluring, in its mantle of rich pink heath, the tallest and
most full of blossoms we anywhere saw, and with, the waterfall making
music by its side, and sparkling in the morning sun.

Passing from Tarbet, we entered the grand and beautiful pass of
Glencoe,--sublime with purple shadows with bright lights between, and
in one place showing an exquisitely silent and lonely little lake.
The wildness of the scene was heightened by the black Highland cattle
feeding here and there. They looked much at home, too, in the park at
Inverary, where I saw them next day. In Inverary I was disappointed.
I found, indeed, the position of every object the same as indicated
in the "Legend of Montrose," but the expression of the whole seemed
unlike what I had fancied. The present abode of the Argyle family is
a modern structure, and boasts very few vestiges of the old romantic
history attached to the name. The park and look-out upon the lake are
beautiful, but except from the brief pleasure derived from these, the
old cross from Iona that stands in the market-place, and the drone of
the bagpipe which lulled me to sleep at night playing some melancholy
air, there was nothing to make me feel that it was "a far cry to
Lochawe," but, on the contrary, I seemed in the very midst of the
prosaic, the civilized world.

Leaving Inverary, we left that day the Highlands too, passing through.
Hell Glen, a very wild and grand defile. Taking boat then on Loch
Levy, we passed down the Clyde, stopping an hour or two on our way at
Dumbarton. Nature herself foresaw the era of picture when she made and
placed this rock: there is every preparation for the artist's stealing
a little piece from her treasures to hang on the walls of a room. Here
I saw the sword of "Wallace wight," shown by a son of the nineteenth
century, who said that this hero lived about fifty years ago, and who
did not know the height of this rock, in a cranny of which he lived,
or at least ate and slept and "donned his clothes." From the top of
the rock I saw sunset on the beautiful Clyde, animated that day by an
endless procession of steamers, little skiffs, and boats. In one of
the former, the Cardiff Castle, we embarked as the last light of day
was fading, and that evening found ourselves in Glasgow.

I understand there is an intellectual society of high merit in
Glasgow, but we were there only a few hours, and did not see any one.
Certainly the place, as it may be judged of merely from the general
aspect of the population and such objects as may be seen in the
streets, more resembles an _Inferno_ than any other we have yet
visited. The people are more crowded together, and the stamp of
squalid, stolid misery and degradation more obvious and appalling.
The English and Scotch do not take kindly to poverty, like those of
sunnier climes; it makes them fierce or stupid, and, life presenting
no other cheap pleasure, they take refuge in drinking.

I saw here in Glasgow persons, especially women, dressed in dirty,
wretched tatters, worse than none, and with an expression of listless,
unexpecting woe upon their faces, far more tragic than the inscription
over the gate of Dante's _Inferno_. To one species of misery suffered
here to the last extent, I shall advert in speaking of London.

But from all these sorrowful tokens I by no means inferred the
falsehood of the information, that here was to be found a circle
rich in intellect and in aspiration. The manufacturing and commercial
towns, burning focuses of grief and vice, are also the centres of
intellectual life, as in forcing-beds the rarest flowers and fruits
are developed by use of impure and repulsive materials. Where evil
comes to an extreme, Heaven seems busy in providing means for the
remedy. Glaring throughout Scotland and England is the necessity for
the devoutest application of intellect and love to the cure of ills
that cry aloud, and, without such application, erelong help _must_ be
sought by other means than words. Yet there is every reason to hope
that those who ought to help are seriously, though, slowly, becoming
alive to the imperative nature of this duty; so we must not cease
to hope, even in the streets of Glasgow, and the gin-palaces of
Manchester, and the dreariest recesses of London.

From Glasgow we passed to Stirling, like Dumbarton endeared to the
mind which cherishes the memory of its childhood more by association
with Miss Porter's Scottish Chiefs, than with "Snowdon's knight and
Scotland's king." We reached the town too late to see the castle
before the next morning, and I took up at the inn "The Scottish
Chiefs," in which I had not read a word since ten or twelve years old.
We are in the habit now of laughing when this book is named, as if it
were a representative of what is most absurdly stilted or bombastic,
but now, in reading, my maturer mind was differently impressed from
what I expected, and the infatuation with which childhood and early
youth regard this book and its companion, "Thaddeus of Warsaw," was
justified. The characters and dialogue are, indeed, out of nature, but
the sentiment that animates them is pure, true, and no less healthy
than noble. Here is bad drawing, bad drama, but good music, to which
the unspoiled heart will always echo, even when the intellect has
learned to demand a better organ for its communication.

The castle of Stirling is as rich as any place in romantic
associations. We were shown its dungeons and its Court of Lions,
where, says tradition, wild animals, kept in the grated cells
adjacent, were brought out on festival occasions to furnish
entertainment for the court. So, while lords and ladies gay danced and
sang above, prisoners pined and wild beasts starved below. This, at
first blush, looks like a very barbarous state of things, but, on
reflection, one does not find that we have outgrown it in our present
so-called state of refined civilization, only the present way of
expressing the same facts is a little different. Still lords and
ladies dance and sing, unknowing or uncaring that the laborers who
minister to their luxuries starve or are turned into wild beasts. Man
need not boast his condition, methinks, till he can weave his costly
tapestry without the side that is kept under looking thus sadly.

The tournament ground is still kept green and in beautiful order, near
Stirling castle, as a memento of the olden time, and as we passed
away down the beautiful Firth, a turn of the river gave us a very
advantageous view of it. So gay it looked, so festive in the bright
sunshine, one almost seemed to see the graceful forms of knight and
noble pricking their good steeds to the encounter, or the stalwart
Douglas, vindicating his claim to be indeed a chief by conquest in the
rougher sports of the yeomanry.

Passing along the Firth to Edinburgh, we again passed two or three
days in that beautiful city, which I could not be content to leave
so imperfectly seen, if I had not some hope of revisiting it when the
bright lights that adorn it are concentred there. In summer almost
every one is absent. I was very fortunate to see as many interesting
persons as I did. On this second visit I saw James Simpson, a
well-known philanthropist, and leader in the cause of popular
education. Infant schools have been an especial care of his, and
America as well as Scotland has received the benefit of his thoughts
on this subject. His last good work has been to induce the erection
of public baths in Edinburgh, and the working people of that place,
already deeply in his debt for the lectures he has been unwearied
in delivering for their benefit, have signified their gratitude by
presenting him with a beautiful model of a fountain in silver as an
ornament to his study. Never was there a place where such a measure
would be more important; if cleanliness be akin to godliness,
Edinburgh stands at great disadvantage in her devotions. The impure
air, the terrific dirt which surround the working people, must make
all progress in higher culture impossible; and I saw nothing which
seemed to me so likely to have results of incalculable good, as this
practical measure of the Simpsons in support of the precept,

  "Wash and be clean every whit."

We returned into England by the way of Melrose, not content to leave
Scotland without making our pilgrimage to Abbotsford. The universal
feeling, however, has made this pilgrimage so common that there
is nothing left for me to say; yet, though I had read a hundred
descriptions, everything seemed new as I went over this epitome of
the mind and life of Scott. As what constitutes the great man is more
commonly some extraordinary combination and balance of qualities, than
the highest development of any one, so you cannot but here be struck
anew by the singular combination in Scott's mind of love for the
picturesque and romantic with the plainest common sense,--a delight
in heroic excess with the prudential habit of order. Here the most
pleasing order pervades emblems of what men commonly esteem disorder
and excess.

Amid the exquisite beauty of the ruins of Dryburgh, I saw with regret
that Scott's body rests in almost the only spot that is not green, and
cannot well be made so, for the light does not reach it. That is not
a fit couch for him who dressed so many dim and time-worn relics with
living green.

Always cheerful and beneficent, Scott seemed to the common eye in like
measure prosperous and happy, up to the last years, and the chair in
which, under the pressure of the sorrows which led to his death, he
was propped up to write when brain and eye and hand refused their
aid, the product remaining only as a guide to the speculator as to the
workings of the mind in case of insanity or approaching imbecility,
would by most persons be viewed as the only saddening relic of his
career. Yet when I recall some passages in the Lady of the Lake, and
the Address to his Harp, I cannot doubt that Scott had the full share
of bitter in his cup, and feel the tender hope that we do about other
gentle and generous guardians and benefactors of our youth, that in a
nobler career they are now fulfilling still higher duties with serener
mind. Doubtless too they are trusting in us that we will try to fill
their places with kindly deeds, ardent thoughts, nor leave the world,
in their absence,

  "A dim, vast vale of tears,
    Vacant and desolate."




LETTER VII.

NEWCASTLE.--DESCENT INTO A COAL-MINE.--YORK WITH ITS MINSTER.--
SHEFFIELD.--CHATSWORTH.--WARWICK CASTLE.--LEAMINGTON AND
STRATFORD.--SHAKESPEARE.--BIRMINGHAM.--GEORGE DAWSON.--JAMES
MARTINEAU.--W.J. FOX.--W.H. CHARMING AND THEODORE PARKER.--LONDON
AND PARIS.


Paris, 1846.

We crossed the moorland in a heavy rain, and reached Newcastle late
at night. Next day we descended into a coal-mine; it was quite an odd
sensation to be taken off one's feet and dropped down into darkness
by the bucket. The stables under ground had a pleasant Gil-Blas air,
though the poor horses cannot like it much; generally they see the
light of day no more after they have once been let down into these
gloomy recesses, but pass their days in dragging cars along the rails
of the narrow passages, and their nights in eating hay and dreaming
of grass!! When we went down, we meant to go along the gallery to the
place where the miners were then at work, but found this was a walk
of a mile and a half, and, beside the weariness of picking one's steps
slowly along by the light of a tallow candle, too wet and dirty an
enterprise to be undertaken by way of amusement; so, after proceeding
half a mile or so, we begged to be restored to our accustomed level,
and reached it with minds slightly edified and face and hands much
blackened.

Passing thence we saw York with its Minster, that dream of beauty
realized. From, its roof I saw two rainbows, overarching that lovely
country. Through its aisles I heard grand music pealing. But how
sorrowfully bare is the interior of such a cathedral, despoiled of the
statues, the paintings, and the garlands that belong to the Catholic
religion! The eye aches for them. Such a church is ruined by
Protestantism; its admirable exterior seems that of a sepulchre; there
is no correspondent life within.

Within the citadel, a tower half ruined and ivy-clad, is life that
has been growing up while the exterior bulwarks of the old feudal time
crumbled to ruin. George Fox, while a prisoner at York for obedience
to the dictates of his conscience, planted here a walnut, and the tall
tree that grew from it still "bears testimony" to his living presence
on that spot. The tree is old, but still bears nuts; one of them was
taken away by my companions, and may perhaps be the parent of a tree
somewhere in America, that shall shade those who inherit the spirit,
if they do not attach importance to the etiquettes, of Quakerism.

In Sheffield I saw the sooty servitors tending their furnaces. I saw
them, also on Saturday night, after their work was done, going to
receive its poor wages, looking pallid and dull, as if they had spent
on tempering the steel that vital force that should have tempered
themselves to manhood.

We saw, also, Chatsworth, with its park and mock wilderness, and
immense conservatory, and really splendid fountains and wealth of
marbles. It is a fine expression of modern luxury and splendor, but
did not interest me; I found little there of true beauty or grandeur.

Warwick Castle is a place entirely to my mind, a real representative
of the English aristocracy in the day of its nobler life. The grandeur
of the pile itself, and its beauty of position, introduce you fitly
to the noble company with which the genius of Vandyke has peopled
its walls. But a short time was allowed to look upon these nobles,
warriors, statesmen, and ladies, who gaze upon us in turn with such a
majesty of historic association, yet was I very well satisfied. It
is not difficult to see men through the eyes of Vandyke. His way of
viewing character seems superficial, though commanding; he sees the
man in his action on the crowd, not in his hidden life; he does not,
like some painters, amaze and engross us by his revelations as to the
secret springs of conduct. I know not by what hallucination I forebore
to look at the picture I most desired to see,--that of Lucy, Countess
of Carlisle. I was looking at something else, and when the fat,
pompous butler announced her, I did not recognize her name from his
mouth. Afterward it flashed across me, that I had really been standing
before her and forgotten to look. But repentance was too late; I had
passed the castle gate to return no more.

Pretty Leamington and Stratford are hackneyed ground. Of the latter
I only observed what, if I knew, I had forgotten, that the room where
Shakespeare was born has been an object of devotion only for forty
years. England has learned much of her appreciation of Shakespeare
from the Germans. In the days of innocence, I fondly supposed that
every one who could understand English, and was not a cannibal, adored
Shakespeare and read him on Sundays always for an hour or more, and on
week days a considerable portion of the time. But I have lived to know
some hundreds of persons in my native land, without finding ten who
had any direct acquaintance with their greatest benefactor, and I dare
say in England as large an experience would not end more honorably
to its subjects. So vast a treasure is left untouched, while men are
complaining of being poor, because they have not toothpicks exactly to
their mind.

At Stratford I handled, too, the poker used to such good purpose by
Geoffrey Crayon. The muse had fled, the fire was out, and the poker
rusty, yet a pleasant influence lingered even in that cold little
room, and seemed to lend a transient glow to the poker under the
influence of sympathy.

In Birmingham I heard two discourses from one of the rising lights of
England, George Dawson, a young man of whom I had earlier heard much
in praise. He is a friend of the people, in the sense of brotherhood,
not of a social convenience or patronage; in literature catholic; in
matters of religion antisectarian, seeking truth in aspiration and
love. He is eloquent, with good method in his discourse, fire and
dignity when wanted, with a frequent homeliness in enforcement and
illustration which offends the etiquettes of England, but fits him the
better for the class he has to address. His powers are uncommon and
unfettered in their play; his aim is worthy. He is fulfilling and will
fulfil an important task as an educator of the people, if all be
not marred by a taint of self-love and arrogance now obvious in his
discourse. This taint is not surprising in one so young, who has
done so much, and in order to do it has been compelled to great
self-confidence and light heed of the authority of other minds, and
who is surrounded almost exclusively by admirers; neither is it,
at present, a large speck; it may be quite purged from him by the
influence of nobler motives and the rise of his ideal standard; but,
on the other hand, should it spread, all must be vitiated. Let us hope
the best, for he is one that could ill be spared from the band who
have taken up the cause of Progress in England.

In this connection I may as well speak of James Martineau, whom I
heard in Liverpool, and W.J. Fox, whom I heard in London.

Mr. Martineau looks like the over-intellectual, the partially
developed man, and his speech confirms this impression. He is
sometimes conservative, sometimes reformer, not in the sense of
eclecticism, but because his powers and views do not find a true
harmony. On the conservative side he is scholarly, acute,--on the
other, pathetic, pictorial, generous. He is no prophet and no sage,
yet a man full of fine affections and thoughts, always suggestive,
sometimes satisfactory; he is well adapted to the wants of that class,
a large one in the present day, who love the new wine, but do not feel
that they can afford to throw away _all_ their old bottles.

Mr. Fox is the reverse of all this: he is homogeneous in his materials
and harmonious in the results he produces. He has great persuasive
power; it is the persuasive power of a mind warmly engaged in seeking
truth for itself. He sometimes carries homeward convictions with great
energy, driving in the thought as with golden nails. A glow of kindly
human sympathy enlivens his argument, and the whole presents thought
in a well-proportioned, animated body. But I am told he is far
superior in speech on political or social problems, than on such as I
heard him discuss.

I was reminded, in hearing all three, of men similarly engaged in our
country, W.H. Charming and Theodore Parker. None of them compare
in the symmetrical arrangement of extempore discourse, or in pure
eloquence and communication of spiritual beauty, with Charming, nor in
fulness and sustained flow with Parker, but, in power of practical and
homely adaptation of their thought to common wants, they are superior
to the former, and all have more variety, finer perceptions, and are
more powerful in single passages, than Parker.

And now my pen has run to 1st October, and still I have such
notabilities as fell to my lot to observe while in London, and these
that are thronging upon me here in Paris to record for you. I am sadly
in arrears, but 't is comfort to think that such meats as I have to
serve up are as good cold as hot. At any rate, it is just impossible
to do any better, and I shall comfort myself, as often before, with
the triplet which I heard in childhood from a sage (if only sages wear
wigs!):--

  "As said the great Prince Fernando,
  What _can_ a man do,
  More than he can do?"




LETTER VIII.

RECOLLECTIONS OF LONDON.--THE ENGLISH GENTLEMAN.--LONDON CLIMATE.--OUT
OF SEASON.--LUXURY AND MISERY.--A DIFFICULT PROBLEM.--TERRORS
OF POVERTY.--JOANNA BAILLIE AND MADAME ROLAND.--HAMPSTEAD.--MISS
BERRY.--FEMALE ARTISTS.--MARGARET GILLIES.--THE PEOPLE'S
JOURNAL.--THE TIMES.--THE HOWITTS.--SOUTH WOOD SMITH.--HOUSES FOR THE
POOR.--SKELETON OF JEREMY BENTHAM.--COOPER THE POET.--THOM.


Paris, December, 1846.

I sit down here in Paris to narrate some recollections of London.
The distance in space and time is not great, yet I seem in wholly a
different world. Here in the region of wax-lights, mirrors, bright
wood fires, shrugs, vivacious ejaculations, wreathed smiles, and
adroit courtesies, it is hard to remember John Bull, with his
coal-smoke, hands in pockets, except when extended for ungracious
demand of the perpetual half-crown, or to pay for the all but
perpetual mug of beer. John, seen on that side, is certainly the most
churlish of clowns, and the most clownish of churls. But then
there are so many other sides! When a gentleman, he is so truly the
gentleman, when a man, so truly the man of honor! His graces, when he
has any, grow up from his inmost heart.

Not that he is free from humbug; on the contrary, he is prone to the
most solemn humbug, generally of the philanthrophic or otherwise moral
kind. But he is always awkward beneath the mask, and can never impose
upon anybody--but himself. Nature meant him to be noble, generous,
sincere, and has furnished him with no faculties to make himself
agreeable in any other way or mode of being. 'Tis not so with your
Frenchman, who can cheat you pleasantly, and move with grace in the
devious and slippery path. You would be almost sorry to see him quite
disinterested and straightforward, so much of agreeable talent and
naughty wit would thus lie hid for want of use. But John, O John, we
must admire, esteem, or be disgusted with thee.

As to climate, there is not much to choose at this time of year. In
London, for six weeks, we never saw the sun for coal-smoke and fog. In
Paris we have not been blessed with its cheering rays above three or
four days in the same length of time, and are, beside, tormented with
an oily and tenacious mud beneath the feet, which makes it almost
impossible to walk. This year, indeed, is an uncommonly severe one at
Paris; but then, if they have their share of dark, cold days, it must
be admitted that they do all they can to enliven them.

But to dwell first on London,--London, in itself a world. We arrived
at a time which the well-bred Englishman considers as no time at
all,--quite out of "the season," when Parliament is in session, and
London thronged with the equipages of her aristocracy, her titled
wealthy nobles. I was listened to with a smile of contempt when I
declared that the stock shows of London would yield me amusement and
employment more than sufficient for the time I had to stay. But
I found that, with my way of viewing things, it would be to me an
inexhaustible studio, and that, if life were only long enough, I would
live there for years obscure in some corner, from which I could issue
forth day by day to watch unobserved the vast stream of life, or to
decipher the hieroglyphics which ages have been inscribing on the
walls of this vast palace (I may not call it a temple), which human
effort has reared for means, not yet used efficaciously, of human
culture.

And though I wish to return to London in "the season," when that city
is an adequate representative of the state of things in England, I
am glad I did not at first see all that pomp and parade of wealth and
luxury in contrast with the misery, squalid, agonizing, ruffianly,
which stares one in the face in every street of London, and hoots at
the gates of her palaces more ominous a note than ever was that of owl
or raven in the portentous times when empires and races have crumbled
and fallen from inward decay.

It is impossible, however, to take a near view of the treasures
created by English genius, accumulated by English industry, without a
prayer, daily more fervent, that the needful changes in the condition
of this people may be effected by peaceful revolution, which shall
destroy nothing except the shocking inhumanity of exclusiveness,
which now prevents their being used, for the benefit of all. May their
present possessors look to it in time! A few already are earnest in
a good spirit. For myself, much as I pitied the poor, abandoned,
hopeless wretches that swarm in the roads and streets of England, I
pity far more the English noble, with this difficult problem before
him, and such need of a speedy solution. Sad is his life, if a
conscientious man; sadder still, if not. Poverty in England has
terrors of which I never dreamed at home. I felt that it would be
terrible to be poor there, but far more so to be the possessor of that
for which so many thousands are perishing. And the middle class, too,
cannot here enjoy that serenity which the sages have described as
naturally their peculiar blessing. Too close, too dark throng the
evils they cannot obviate, the sorrows they cannot relieve. To a man
of good heart, each day must bring purgatory which he knows not how to
bear, yet to which he fears to become insensible.

From these clouds of the Present, it is pleasant to turn the thoughts
to some objects which have cast a light upon the Past, and which, by
the virtue of their very nature, prescribe hope for the Future. I have
mentioned with satisfaction seeing some persons who illustrated
the past dynasty in the progress of thought here: Wordsworth, Dr.
Chalmers, De Quincey, Andrew Combe. With a still higher pleasure,
because to one of my own sex, whom I have honored almost above any,
I went to pay my court to Joanna Baillie. I found on her brow, not
indeed a coronal of gold, but a serenity and strength undimmed and
unbroken by the weight of more than fourscore years, or by the scanty
appreciation which her thoughts have received.

I prize Joanna Baillie and Madame Roland as the best specimens which
have been hitherto offered of women of a Roman strength and singleness
of mind, adorned by the various culture and capable of the various
action opened to them by the progress of the Christian Idea. They are
not sentimental; they do not sigh and write of withered flowers of
fond affection, and woman's heart born to be misunderstood by the
object or objects of her fond, inevitable choice. Love (the passion),
when spoken of at all by them, seems a thing noble, religious, worthy
to be felt. They do not write of it always; they did not think of it
always; they saw other things in this great, rich, suffering world. In
superior delicacy of touch, they show the woman, but the hand is firm;
nor was all their speech, one continued utterance of mere personal
experience. It contained things which are good, intellectually,
universally.

I regret that the writings of Joanna Baillie are not more known in
the United States. The Plays on the Passions are faulty in their
plan,--all attempts at comic, even at truly dramatic effect, fail; but
there are masterly sketches of character, vigorous expressions of wise
thought, deep, fervent ejaculations of an aspiring soul!

We found her in her little calm retreat at Hampstead, surrounded by
marks of love and reverence from distinguished and excellent friends.
Near her was the sister, older than herself, yet still sprightly and
full of active kindness, whose character and their mutual relation she
has, in one of her last poems, indicated with such a happy mixture of
sagacity, humor, and tender pathos, and with so absolute a truth of
outline. Although no autograph collector, I asked for theirs, and when
the elder gave hers as "sister to Joanna Baillie," it drew a tear from
my eye,--a good tear, a genuine pearl,--fit homage to that fairest
product of the soul of man, humble, disinterested tenderness.

Hampstead has still a good deal of romantic beauty. I was told it was
the favorite sketching-ground of London artists, till the railroads
gave them easy means of spending a few hours to advantage farther
off. But, indeed, there is a wonderful deal of natural beauty lying in
untouched sweetness near London. Near one of our cities it would all
have been grabbed up the first thing. But we, too, are beginning to
grow wiser.

At Richmond I went to see another lady of more than threescore years'
celebrity, more than fourscore in age, Miss Berry the friend of Horace
Walpole, and for her charms of manner and conversation long and still
a reigning power. She has still the vivacity, the careless nature, or
refined art, that made her please so much in earlier days,--still is
girlish, and gracefully so. Verily, with her was no sign of labor or
sorrow.

From the older turning to the young, I must speak with pleasure
of several girls I know in London, who are devoting themselves to
painting as a profession. They have really wise and worthy views of
the artist's avocation; if they remain true to them, they will enjoy
a free, serene existence, unprofaned by undue care or sentimental
sorrow. Among these, Margaret Gillies has attained some celebrity;
she may be known to some in America by engravings in the "People's
Journal" from her pictures; but, if I remember right, these are
coarse things, and give no just notion of her pictures, which are
distinguished for elegance and refinement; a little mannerized, but
she is improving in that respect.

The "People's Journal" comes nearer being a fair sign of the times
than any other publication of England, apparently, if we except Punch.
As for the Times, on which you all use your scissors so industriously,
it is managed with vast ability, no doubt, but the blood would tingle
many a time to the fingers' ends of the body politic, before that
solemn organ which claims to represent the heart would dare to beat in
unison. Still it would require all the wise management of the Times,
or wisdom enough to do without it, and a wide range and diversity of
talent, indeed, almost sweeping the circle, to make a People's Journal
for England. The present is only a bud of the future flower.

Mary and William Howitt are its main support. I saw them several times
at their cheerful and elegant home. In Mary Howitt I found the same
engaging traits of character we are led to expect from her books
for children. Her husband is full of the same agreeable information,
communicated in the same lively yet precise manner we find in his
books; it was like talking with old friends, except that now the
eloquence of the eye was added. At their house I became acquainted
with Dr. Southwood Smith, the well-known philanthropist. He is at
present engaged on the construction of good tenements calculated to
improve the condition of the working people. His plans look promising,
and should they succeed, you shall have a detailed account of them. On
visiting him, we saw an object which I had often heard celebrated,
and had thought would be revolting, but found, on the contrary, an
agreeable sight; this is the skeleton of Jeremy Bentham. It was at
Bentham's request that the skeleton, dressed in the same dress he
habitually wore, stuffed out to an exact resemblance of life, and with
a portrait mark in wax, the best I ever saw, sits there, as assistant
to Dr. Smith in the entertainment of his guests and companion of his
studies. The figure leans a little forward, resting the hands on a,
stout stick which Bentham always carried, and had named "Dapple";
the attitude is quite easy, the expression of the whole quite mild,
winning, yet highly individual. It is a pleasing mark of that unity
of aim and tendency to be expected throughout the life of such a mind,
that Bentham, while quite a young man, had made a will, in which, to
oppose in the most convincing manner the prejudice against dissection
of the human subject, he had given his body after death to be used in
service of the cause of science. "I have not yet been able," said the
will, "to do much service to my fellow-men by my life, but perhaps I
may in this manner by my death." Many years after, reading a pamphlet
by Dr. Smith on the same subject, he was much pleased with it,
became his friend, and bequeathed his body to his care and use, with
directions that the skeleton should finally be disposed of in the way
I have described.

The countenance of Dr. Smith has an expression of expansive, sweet,
almost childlike goodness. Miss Gillies has made a charming picture of
him, with a favorite little granddaughter nestling in his arms.

Another marked figure that I encountered on this great showboard was
Cooper, the author of "The Purgatory of Luicides," a very remarkable
poem, of which, had there been leisure before my departure, I should
have made a review, and given copious extracts in the Tribune. Cooper
is as strong a man, and probably a milder one, than when in the prison
where that poem was written. The earnestness in seeking freedom
and happiness for all men, which drew upon him that penalty, seems
unabated; he is a very significant type of the new era, and also an
agent in bringing it near. One of the poets of the people, also, I
saw,--the sweetest singer of them all,--Thom. "A Chieftain unknown
to the Queen" is again exacting a cruel tribute from him. I wish much
that some of those of New York who have taken an interest in him would
provide there a nook in which he might find refuge and solace for the
evening of his days, to sing or to work as likes him best, and where
he could bring up two fine boys to happier prospects than the parent
land will afford them. Could and would America but take from other
lands more of the talent, as well as the bone and sinew, she would be
rich.

But the stroke of the clock warns me to stop now, and begin to-morrow
with fresher eye and hand on some interesting topics. My sketches are
slight; still they cannot be made without time, and I find none to be
had in this Europe except late at night. I believe it is what all the
inhabitants use, but I am too sleepy a genius to carry the practice
far.




LETTER IX.

WRITING AT NIGHT.--LONDON.--NATIONAL GALLERY.--MURILLO.--THE FLOWER
GIRL.--NURSERY-MAIDS AND WORKING-MEN.--HAMPTON COURT.--ZOÖLOGICAL
GARDENS.--KING OF ANIMALS.--ENGLISH PIETY.--EAGLES.--SIR JOHN SOANE'S
MUSEUM.--KEW GARDENS.--THE GREAT CACTUS.--THE REFORM CLUB HOUSE.--MEN
COOKS.--ORDERLY KITCHEN.--A GILPIN EXCURSION.--THE BELL AT EDMONTON.--
OMNIBUS.--CHEAPSIDE.--ENGLISH SLOWNESS.--FREILIGRATH.--ARCADIA.--
ITALIAN SCHOOL.--MAZZINI.--ITALY.--ITALIAN REFUGEES.--CORREGGIO.--
HOPE OF ITALIANS.--ADDRESSES.--SUPPER.--CARLYLE, HIS APPEARANCE,
CONVERSATION, &C.


Again I must begin to write late in the evening. I am told it is the
custom of the literati in these large cities to work in the night. It
is easy to see that it must be almost impossible to do otherwise; yet
not only is the practice very bad for the health, and one that brings
on premature old age, but I cannot think this night-work will prove as
firm in texture and as fair of hue as what is done by sunlight. Give
me a lonely chamber, a window from which through the foliage you can
catch glimpses of a beautiful prospect, and the mind finds itself
tuned to action.

But London, London! I have yet some brief notes to make on London. We
had scarcely any sunlight by which to see pictures, and I postponed
all visits to private collections, except one, in the hope of being in
England next time in the long summer days. In the National Gallery I
saw little except the Murillos; they were so beautiful, that with me,
who had no true conception of his kind of genius before, they took
away the desire to look into anything else at the same time. They
did not affect me much either, except with a sense of content in this
genius, so rich and full and strong. It was a cup of sunny wine that
refreshed but brought no intoxicating visions. There is something
very noble in the genius of Spain, there is such an intensity and
singleness; it seems to me it has not half shown itself, and must have
an important part to play yet in the drama of this planet.

At the Dulwich Gallery I saw the Flower Girl of Murillo, an enchanting
picture, the memory of which must always

      "Cast a light upon the day,
  A light that will not pass away,
      A sweet forewarning."

Who can despair when he thinks of a form like that, so full of life
and bliss! Nature, that made such human forms to match the butterfly
and the bee on June mornings when the lime-trees are in blossom, has
surely enough of happiness in store to satisfy us all, somewhere, some
time.

It was pleasant, indeed, to see the treasures of those galleries, of
the British Museum, and of so charming a place as Hampton Court,
open to everybody. In the National Gallery one finds a throng of
nursery-maids, and men just come from their work; true, they make a
great deal of noise thronging to and fro on the uncarpeted floors
in their thick boots, and noise from which, when penetrated by
the atmosphere of Art, men in the thickest boots would know how to
refrain; still I felt that the sight of such objects must be gradually
doing them a great deal of good. The British Museum would, in itself,
be an education for a man who should go there once a week, and think
and read at his leisure moments about what he saw.

Hampton Court I saw in the gloom, and rain, and my chief recollections
are of the magnificent yew-trees beneath whose shelter--the work
of ages--I took refuge from the pelting shower. The expectations
cherished from childhood about the Cartoons were all baffled; there
was no light by which they could be seen. But I must hope to visit
Hampton Court again in the time of roses.

The Zoölogical Gardens are another pleasure of the million, since,
although something is paid there, it is so little that almost all can
afford it. To me, it is a vast pleasure to see animals where they can
show out their habits or instincts, and to see them assembled from,
all climates and countries, amid verdure and with room enough, as they
are here, is a true poem. They have a fine lion, the first I ever saw
that realized the idea we have of the king of the animal world; but
the groan and roar of this one were equally royal. The eagles were
fine, but rather disgraced themselves. It is a trait of English piety,
which would, no doubt, find its defenders among ourselves, not to feed
the animals on Sunday, that their keepers may have rest; at least
this was the explanation given us by one of these men of the state of
ravenous hunger in which we found them on the Monday. I half hope
he was jesting with us. Certain it is that the eagles were wild with
famine, and even the grandest of them, who had eyed us at first as if
we were not fit to live in the same zone with him, when the meat came
round, after a short struggle to maintain his dignity, joined in wild
shriek and scramble with the rest.

Sir John Soane's Museum I visited, containing the sarcophagus
described by Dr. Waagen, Hogarth's pictures, a fine Canaletto, and
a manuscript of Tasso. It fills the house once the residence of his
body, still of his mind. It is not a mind with which I have sympathy;
I found there no law of harmony, and it annoyed me to see things all
jumbled together as if in an old curiosity-shop. Nevertheless it was a
generous bequest, and much may perhaps be found there of value to him
who takes time to seek.

The Gardens at Kew delighted me, thereabouts all was so green, and
still one could indulge at leisure in the humorous and fantastic
associations that cluster around the name of Kew, like the curls of
a "big wig" round the serene and sleepy face of its wearer. Here are
fourteen green-houses: in one you find all the palms; in another,
the productions of the regions of snow; in another, those squibs and
humorsome utterances of Nature, the cactuses,--ay! there I saw the
great-grandfather of all the cactuses, a hoary, solemn plant, declared
to be a thousand years old, disdaining to say if it is not really
much, older; in yet another, the most exquisitely minute plants,
delicate as the tracery of frostwork, too delicate for the bowers of
fairies, such at least as visit the gross brains of earthly poets.

The Reform Club was the only one of those splendid establishments that
I visited. Certainly the force of comfort can no farther go, nor can
anything be better contrived to make dressing, eating, news-getting,
and even sleeping (for there are bedrooms as well as dressing-rooms
for those who will), as comfortable as can be imagined. Yet to me this
palace of so many "single gentlemen rolled into one" seemed _stupidly_
comfortable, in the absence of that elegant arrangement and vivacious
atmosphere which only women can inspire. In the kitchen, indeed, I
met them, and on that account it seemed the pleasantest part of the
building,--though even there they are but the servants of servants.
There reigned supreme a genius in his way, who has published a work
on Cookery, and around him his pupils,--young men who pay a handsome
yearly fee for novitiate under his instruction. I was not sorry,
however, to see men predominant in the cooking department, as I hope
to see that and washing transferred to their care in the progress of
things, since they are "the stronger sex."

The arrangements of this kitchen were very fine, combining great
convenience with neatness, and even elegance. Fourier himself might
have taken pleasure in them. Thence we passed into the private
apartments of the artist, and found them full of pictures by his wife,
an artist in another walk. One or two of them had been engraved. _She_
was an Englishwoman.

A whimsical little excursion we made on occasion of the anniversary of
the wedding-day of two of my friends. They had often enjoyed reading
the account of John Gilpin's in America, and now thought that, as they
were in England and near enough, they would celebrate theirs also at
"the Bell at Edmonton." I accompanied them with "a little foot-page,"
to eke out the train, pretty and graceful and playful enough for
the train of a princess. But our excursion turned out somewhat of a
failure, in an opposite way to Gilpin's. Whereas he went too fast, we
went too slow. First we took coach and went through Cheapside to take
omnibus at (strange misnomer!) the Flower-Pot. But Gilpin could never
have had his race through Cheapside as it is in its present crowded
state; we were obliged to proceed at a funeral pace. We missed the
omnibus, and when we took the next one it went with the slowness of a
"family horse" in the old chaise of a New England deacon, and, after
all, only took us half-way. At the half-way house a carriage was to
be sought. The lady who let it, and all her grooms, were to be allowed
time to recover from their consternation at so unusual a move as
strangers taking a carriage to dine at the little inn at Edmonton, now
a mere alehouse, before we could be allowed to proceed. The English
stand lost in amaze at "Yankee notions," with their quick come and
go, and it is impossible to make them "go ahead" in the zigzag
chain-lightning path, unless you push them. A rather old part of the
plan had been a pilgrimage to the grave of Lamb, with a collateral
view to the rural beauties of Edmonton, but night had fallen on all
such hopes two hours at least before we reached the Bell. _There_,
indeed, we found them somewhat more alert to comprehend our wishes;
they laughed when we spoke of Gilpin, showed us a print of the race
and the window where Mrs. Gilpin must have stood,--balcony, alas!
there was none; allowed us to make our own fire, and provided us a
wedding dinner of tough meat and stale bread. Nevertheless we danced,
dined, paid (I believe), and celebrated the wedding quite to our
satisfaction, though in the space of half an hour, as we knew
friends were even at that moment expecting us to _tea_ at some miles'
distance. But it is always pleasant in this world of routine to act
out a freak. "Such a one," said an English gentleman, "one of _us_
would rarely have dreamed of, much, less acted." "Why, was it not
pleasant?" "Oh, _very_! but _so_ out of the way!"

Returning, we passed the house where Freiligrath finds a temporary
home, earning the bread, of himself and his family in a commercial
house. England houses the exile, but not without house-tax,
window-tax, and head-tax. Where is the Arcadia that dares invite
all genius to her arms, and change her golden wheat for their green
laurels and immortal flowers? Arcadia?--would the name were America!

And now returns naturally to my mind one of the most interesting
things I have seen here or elsewhere,--the school for poor Italian
boys, sustained and taught by a few of their exiled compatriots, and
especially by the mind and efforts of Mazzini. The name of Joseph
Mazzini is well known to those among us who take an interest in the
cause of human freedom, who, not content with the peace and ease
bought for themselves by the devotion and sacrifices of their fathers,
look with anxious interest on the suffering nations who are preparing
for a similar struggle. Those who are not, like the brutes that
perish, content with the enjoyment of mere national advantages,
indifferent to the idea they represent, cannot forget that the human
family is one,

  "And beats with one great heart."

They know that there can be no genuine happiness, no salvation for
any, unless the same can be secured for all.

To this universal interest in all nations and places where man,
understanding his inheritance, strives to throw off an arbitrary rule
and establish a state of things where he shall be governed as becomes
a man, by his own conscience and intelligence,--where he may speak
the truth as it rises in his mind, and indulge his natural emotions
in purity,--is added an especial interest in Italy, the mother of
our language and our laws, our greatest benefactress in the gifts
of genius, the garden of the world, in which our best thoughts have
delighted to expatiate, but over whose bowers now hangs a perpetual
veil of sadness, and whose noblest plants are doomed to removal,--for,
if they cannot bear their ripe and perfect fruit in another climate,
they are not permitted to lift their heads to heaven in their own.

Some of these generous refugees our country has received kindly, if
not with a fervent kindness; and the word _Correggio_ is still in
my ears as I heard it spoken in New York by one whose heart long
oppression could not paralyze. _Speranza_ some of the Italian youth
now inscribe on their banners, encouraged by some traits of apparent
promise in the new Pope. However, their only true hope is in
themselves, in their own courage, and in that wisdom winch may only be
learned through many disappointments as to how to employ it so that it
may destroy tyranny, not themselves.

Mazzini, one of these noble refugees, is not only one of the heroic,
the courageous, and the faithful,--Italy boasts many such,--but he is
also one of the wise;--one of those who, disappointed in the outward
results of their undertakings, can yet "bate no jot of heart and
hope," but _must_ "steer right onward "; for it was no superficial
enthusiasm, no impatient energies, that impelled him, but an
understanding of what _must_ be the designs of Heaven with regard to
man, since God is Love, is Justice. He is one who can live fervently,
but steadily, gently, every day, every hour, as well as on great,
occasions, cheered by the light of hope; for, with Schiller, he is
sure that "those who live for their faith shall behold it living."
He is one of those same beings who, measuring all things by the ideal
standard, have yet no time to mourn over failure or imperfection;
there is too much to be done to obviate it.

Thus Mazzini, excluded from publication in his native language, has
acquired the mastery both of French and English, and through his
expressions in either shine the thoughts which animated his earlier
effort with mild and steady radiance. The misfortunes of his country
have only widened the sphere of his instructions, and made him an
exponent of the better era to Europe at large. Those who wish to form
an idea of his mind could not do better than to read his sketches of
the Italian Martyrs in the "People's Journal." They will find there,
on one of the most difficult occasions, an ardent friend speaking of
his martyred friends with, the purity of impulse, warmth of sympathy,
largeness and steadiness of view, and fineness of discrimination which
must belong to a legislator for a CHRISTIAN commonwealth.

But though I have read these expressions with great delight, this
school was one to me still more forcible of the same ideas. Here these
poor boys, picked up from the streets, are redeemed from bondage and
gross ignorance by the most patient and constant devotion of time and
effort. What love and sincerity this demands from minds capable of
great thoughts, large plans, and rapid progress, only their peers can
comprehend, yet exceeding great shall he the reward; and as among
the fishermen, and poor people of Judæa were picked up those who have
become to modern Europe a leaven that leavens the whole mass, so may
these poor Italian boys yet become more efficacious as missionaries
to their people than would an Orphic poet at this period. These youths
have very commonly good faces, and eyes from which that Italian
fire that has done so much to warm the world glows out. We saw the
distribution of prizes to the school, heard addresses from Mazzini,
Pistracci, Mariotti (once a resident in our country), and an English
gentleman who takes a great interest in the work, and then adjourned
to an adjacent room, where a supper was provided for the boys and
other guests, among whom we saw some of the exiled Poles. The whole
evening gave a true and deep pleasure, though tinged with sadness. We
saw a planting of the kingdom of Heaven, though now no larger than a
grain of mustard-seed, and though perhaps none of those who watch the
spot may live to see the birds singing in its branches.

I have not yet spoken of one of _our_ benefactors, Mr. Carlyle, whom I
saw several times. I approached him with more reverence after a little
experience of England and Scotland had taught me to appreciate the
strength and height of that wall of shams and conventions which he
more than any man, or thousand men,--indeed, he almost alone,--has
begun to throw down. Wherever there was fresh thought, generous hope,
the thought of Carlyle has begun the work. He has torn off the veils
from hideous facts; he has burnt away foolish illusions; he has
awakened thousands to know what it is to be a man,--that we must live,
and not merely pretend to others that we live. He has touched the
rocks and they have given forth musical answer; little more was
wanting to begin to construct the city.

But that little was wanting, and the work of construction is left to
those that come after him: nay, all attempts of the kind he is the
readiest to deride, fearing new shams worse than the old, unable to
trust the general action of a thought, and finding no heroic man, no
natural king, to represent it and challenge his confidence.

Accustomed to the infinite wit and exuberant richness of his writings,
his talk is still an amazement and a splendor scarcely to be faced
with steady eyes. He does not converse,--only harangues. It is the
usual misfortune of such marked men (happily not one invariable or
inevitable) that they cannot allow other minds room to breathe and
show themselves in their atmosphere, and thus miss the refreshment
and instruction, which the greatest never cease to need from the
experience of the humblest. Carlyle allows no one a chance, but
bears down all opposition, not only by his wit and onset of words,
resistless in their sharpness as so many bayonets, but by actual
physical superiority, raising his voice and rushing on his opponent
with a torrent of sound. This is not the least from unwillingness to
allow freedom to others; on the contrary, no man would more enjoy
a manly resistance to his thought; but it is the impulse of a mind
accustomed to follow out its own impulse as the hawk its prey, and
which knows not how to stop in the chase. Carlyle, indeed, is arrogant
and overbearing, but in his arrogance there is no littleness or
self-love: it is the heroic arrogance of some old Scandinavian
conqueror,--it is his nature and the untamable impulse that has given
him power to crush the dragons. You do not love him, perhaps, nor
revere, and perhaps, also, he would only laugh at you if you did; but
you like him heartily, and like to see him the powerful smith, the
Siegfried, melting all the old iron in his furnace till it glows to a
sunset red, and burns you if you senselessly go too near. He seemed to
me quite isolated, lonely as the desert; yet never was man more fitted
to prize a man, could he find one to match his mood. He finds such,
but only in the past. He sings rather than talks. He pours upon you a
kind of satirical, heroical, critical poem, with regular cadences, and
generally catching up near the beginning some singular epithet, which,
serves as a _refrain_ when his song is full, or with which as with a
knitting-needle he catches up the stitches if he has chanced now
and then to let fall a row. For the higher kinds of poetry he has no
sense, and his talk on that subject is delightfully and gorgeously
absurd; he sometimes stops a minute to laugh at it himself, then
begins anew with fresh vigor; for all the spirits he is driving before
him seem to him as Fata Morganas, ugly masks, in fact, if he can but
make them turn about, but he laughs that they seem to others such
dainty Ariels. He puts out his chin sometimes till it looks like the
beak of a bird, and his eyes flash bright instinctive meanings like
Jove's bird; yet he is not calm and grand enough for the eagle: he
is more like the falcon, and yet not of gentle blood enough for that
either. He is not exactly like anything but himself, and therefore you
cannot see him without the most hearty refreshment and good-will, for
he is original, rich, and strong enough to afford a thousand, faults;
one expects some wild land in a rich kingdom. His talk, like his
books, is full of pictures, his critical strokes masterly; allow for
his point of view, and his survey is admirable. He is a large subject;
I cannot speak more or wiselier of him now, nor needs it; his works
are true, to blame and praise him, the Siegfried of England, great and
powerful, if not quite invulnerable, and of a might rather to destroy
evil than legislate for good. At all events, he seems to be what
Destiny intended, and represents fully a certain side; so we make no
remonstrance as to his being and proceeding for himself, though we
sometimes must for us.

I had meant some remarks on some fine pictures, and the little I saw
of the theatre in England; but these topics must wait till my next,
where they may connect themselves naturally enough with what I have to
say of Paris.




LETTER X.

MORE OF LONDON.--THE MODEL PRISON AT PENTONVILLE.--BATHING
ESTABLISHMENT FOR THE POOR.--ALSO ONE FOR WASHING CLOTHES.--THE
CRÈCHES OF PARIS, FOR POOR PEOPLE'S CHILDREN.--OLD DRURY
IN LONDON.--SADLER'S WELLS.--ENGLISH AND FRENCH ACTING COMPARED.--
MADEMOISELLE RACHEL.--FRENCH TRAGEDY.--ROSE CHENY.--DUMAS.--GUIZOT.--
THE PRESENTATION AT COURT OF THE YOUNG DUCHESS.--BALL AT THE
TUILERIES.--AMERICAN AND FRENCH WOMEN.--LEVERRIER.--THE SORBONNE.--
ARAGO.--DISCUSSIONS ON SUICIDE AND THE CRUSADES.--RÉMUSAT.--THE
ACADEMY.--LA MENNAIS.--BÉRANGER.--REFLECTIONS.


Paris.

When I wrote last I could not finish with London, and there remain
yet two or three things I wish to speak of before passing to my
impressions of this wonder-full Paris.

I visited the model prison at Pentonville; but though in some
respects an improvement upon others I have seen,--though there was the
appearance of great neatness and order in the arrangements of life,
kindness and good judgment in the discipline of the prisoners,--yet
there was also an air of bleak forlornness about the place, and it
fell far short of what my mind demands of such abodes considered as
redemption schools. But as the subject of prisons is now engaging the
attention of many of the wisest and best, and the tendency is in what
seems to me the true direction, I need not trouble myself to make
prude and hasty suggestions; it is a subject to which persons who
would be of use should give the earnest devotion of calm and leisurely
thought.

The same day I went to see an establishment which gave me unmixed
pleasure; it is a bathing establishment put at a very low rate to
enable the poor to avoid one of thee worst miseries of their lot, and
which yet promises _to pay_. Joined with this is an establishment for
washing clothes, where the poor can go and hire, for almost nothing,
good tubs, water ready heated, the use of an apparatus for rinsing,
drying, and ironing, all so admirably arranged that a poor woman
can in three hours get through an amount of washing and ironing
that would, under ordinary circumstances, occupy three or four days.
Especially the drying closets I contemplated with great satisfaction,
and hope to see in our own country the same arrangements throughout
the cities, and even in the towns and villages. Hanging out the
clothes is a great exposure for women, even when they have a good
place for it; but when, as is so common in cities, they must dry them
in the house, how much they suffer! In New York, I know, those poor
women who take in washing endure a great deal of trouble and toil from
this cause; I have suffered myself from being obliged to send
back what had cost them so much toil, because it had been, perhaps
inevitably, soiled in the drying or ironing, or filled with the smell
of their miscellaneous cooking. In London it is much worse. An eminent
physician told me he knew of two children whom he considered to have
died because their mother, having but one room to live in, was obliged
to wash and dry clothes close to their bed when they were ill. The
poor people in London naturally do without washing all they can, and
beneath that perpetual fall of soot the result may be guessed. All but
the very poor in England put out their washing, and this custom ought
to be universal in civilized countries, as it can be done much better
and quicker by a few regular laundresses than by many families,
and "the washing day" is so malignant a foe to the peace and joy of
households that it ought to be effaced from the calendar. But as long
as we are so miserable as to have any very poor people in this world,
_they_ cannot put out their washing, because they cannot earn enough
money to pay for it, and, preliminary to something better, washing
establishments like this of London are desirable.

One arrangement that they have here in Paris will be a good one, even
when we cease to have any very poor people, and, please Heaven, also
to have any very rich. These are the _Crèches_,--houses where poor
women leave their children to be nursed during the day while they are
at work.

I must mention that the superintendent of the washing establishment
observed, with a legitimate triumph, that it had been built without
giving a single dinner or printing a single puff,--an extraordinary
thing, indeed, for England!

To turn to something a little gayer,--the embroidery on this tattered
coat of civilized life,--I went into only two theatres; one the Old
Drury, once the scene of great glories, now of execrable music and
more execrable acting. If anything can be invented more excruciating
than an English opera, such as was the fashion at the time I was in
London, I am sure no sin of mine deserves the punishment of bearing
it.

At the Sadler's Wells theatre I saw a play which I had much admired in
reading it, but found still better in actual representation; indeed,
it seems to me there can be no better acting play: this is "The
Patrician's Daughter," by J.W. Marston. The movement is rapid, yet
clear and free; the dialogue natural, dignified, and flowing; the
characters marked with few, but distinct strokes. Where the tone
of discourse rises with manly sentiment or passion, the audience
applauded with bursts of generous feeling that gave me great pleasure,
for this play is one that, in its scope and meaning, marks the new era
in England; it is full of an experience which is inevitable to a man
of talent there, and is harbinger of the day when the noblest commoner
shall be the only noble possible in England.

But how different all this acting to what I find in France! Here the
theatre is living; you see something really good, and good throughout.
Not one touch of that stage strut and vulgar bombast of tone, which
the English actor fancies indispensable to scenic illusion, is
tolerated here. For the first time in my life I saw something
represented in a style uniformly good, and should have found
sufficient proof, if I had needed any, that all men will prefer what
is good to what is bad, if only a fair opportunity for choice
be allowed. When I came here, my first thought was to go and see
Mademoiselle Rachel. I was sure that in her I should find a true
genius, absolutely the diamond, and so it proved. I went to see her
seven or eight times, always in parts that required great force of
soul and purity of taste even to conceive them, and only once had
reason to find fault with her. On one single occasion I saw her
violate the harmony of the character to produce effect at a particular
moment; but almost invariably I found her a true artist, worthy
Greece, and worthy at many moments to have her conceptions
immortalized in marble.

Her range even in high tragedy is limited. She can only express the
darker passions, and grief in its most desolate aspects. Nature has
not gifted her with those softer and more flowery attributes that lend
to pathos its utmost tenderness. She does not melt to tears, or calm
or elevate the heart by the presence of that tragic beauty that needs
all the assaults of Fate to make it show its immortal sweetness. Her
noblest aspect is when sometimes she expresses truth in some severe
shape, and rises, simple and austere, above the mixed elements around
her. On the dark side, she is very great in hatred and revenge. I
admired her more in Phedre than in any other part in which I saw her.
The guilty love inspired by the hatred of a goddess was expressed in
all its symptoms with a force and terrible naturalness that almost
suffocated the beholder. After she had taken the poison, the
exhaustion and paralysis of the system, the sad, cold, calm submission
to Fate, were still more grand.

I had heard so much about the power of her eye in one fixed look, and
the expression she could concentrate in a single word, that the utmost
results could only satisfy my expectations. It is, indeed, something
magnificent to see the dark cloud give out such sparks, each one fit
to deal a separate death; but it was not that I admired most in her:
it was the grandeur, truth, and depth of her conception of each part,
and the sustained purity with which she represented it.

For the rest, I shall write somewhere a detailed _critique_ upon the
parts in which I saw her. It is she who has made me acquainted with
the true way of viewing French tragedy. I had no idea of its powers
and symmetry till now, and have received from the revelation high
pleasure and a crowd of thoughts.

The French language from her lips is a divine dialect; it is stripped
of its national and personal peculiarities, and becomes what any
language must, moulded by such a genius, the pure music of the heart
and soul. I never could remember her tone in speaking any word; it
was too perfect; you had received the thought quite direct. Yet, had
I never heard her speak a word, my mind would, be filled by her
attitudes. Nothing more graceful can be conceived, nor could the
genius of sculpture surpass her management of the antique drapery.

She has no beauty except in the intellectual severity of her outline,
and bears marks of age which will grow stronger every year, and make
her ugly before long. Still it will be a _grandiose_, gypsy, or rather
Sibylline ugliness, well adapted to the expression of some tragic
parts. Only it seems as if she could not live long; she expends force
enough upon a part to furnish out a dozen common lives.

Though the French tragedy is well acted throughout, yet unhappily
there is no male actor now with a spark of fire, and these men seem
the meanest pigmies by the side of Rachel;--so on the scene, beside
the tragedy intended by the author, you see also that common tragedy,
a woman of genius who throws away her precious heart, lives and dies
for one unworthy of her. In parts this effect is productive of too
much pain. I saw Rachel one night with her brother and sister. The
sister imitated her so closely that you could not help seeing she
had a manner, and an imitable manner. Her brother was in the play her
lover,--a wretched automaton, and presenting the most unhappy family
likeness to herself. Since then I have hardly cared to go and see her.
We could wish with geniuses, as with the Phoenix, to see only one of
the family at a time.

In the pathetic or sentimental drama Paris boasts another young
actress, nearly as distinguished in that walk as Rachel in hers.
This is Rose Cheny, whom we saw in her ninety-eighth personation of
Clarissa Harlowe, and afterward in Genevieve and the _Protégé sans
le Savoir_,--a little piece written expressly for her by Scribe.
The "Miss Clarisse" of the French drama is a feeble and partial
reproduction of the heroine of Richardson; indeed, the original in all
its force of intellect and character would have been too much for
the charming Rose Cheny, but to the purity and lovely tenderness of
Clarissa she does full justice. In the other characters she was
the true French girl, full of grace and a mixture of _naïveté_ and
cunning, sentiment and frivolity, that is winning and _piquant_, if
not satisfying. Only grief seems very strange to those bright eyes; we
do not find that they can weep much and bear the light of day, and the
inhaling of charcoal seems near at hand to their brightest pleasures.

At the other little theatres you see excellent acting, and a sparkle
of wit unknown to the world out of France. The little pieces in which
all the leading topics of the day are reviewed are full of drolleries
that make you laugh at each instant. _Poudre-Colon_ is the only one of
these I have seen; in this, among other jokes, Dumas, in the character
of Monte-Christo and in a costume half Oriental, half juggler, is made
to pass the other theatres in review while seeking candidates for his
new one.

Dumas appeared in court yesterday, and defended his own cause against
the editors who sue him for evading some of his engagements. I was
very desirous to hear him speak, and went there in what I was assured
would be very good season; but a French audience, who knew the ground
better, had slipped in before me, and I returned, as has been too
often the case with me in Paris, having seen nothing but endless
staircases, dreary vestibules, and _gens d'armes_. The hospitality of
_le grande nation_ to the stranger is, in many respects, admirable.
Galleries, libraries, cabinets of coins, museums, are opened in the
most liberal manner to the stranger, warmed, lighted, ay, and guarded,
for him almost all days in the week; treasures of the past are at his
service; but when anything is happening in the present, the French run
quicker, glide in more adroitly, and get possession of the ground. I
find it not the most easy matter to get to places even where there is
nothing going on, there is so much tiresome fuss of getting _billets_
from one and another to be gone through; but when something is
happening it is still worse. I missed hearing M. Guizot in his speech
on the Montpensier marriage, which would have given a very good idea
of his manner, and which, like this defence of M. Dumas, was a skilful
piece of work as regards evasion of the truth. The good feeling toward
England which had been fostered with so much care and toil seems to
have been entirely dissipated by the mutual recriminations about this
marriage, and the old dislike flames up more fiercely for having been
hid awhile beneath the ashes. I saw the little Duchess, the innocent
or ignorant cause of all this disturbance, when presented at court.
She went round the circle on the arm of the Queen. Though only
fourteen, she looks twenty, but has something fresh, engaging, and
girlish about her. I fancy it will soon be rubbed out under the drill
of the royal household.

I attended not only at the presentation, but at the ball given at
the Tuileries directly after. These are fine shows, as the suite
of apartments is very handsome, brilliantly lighted, and the French
ladies surpass all others in the art of dress; indeed, it gave me
much, pleasure to see them. Certainly there are many ugly ones, but
they are so well dressed, and have such an air of graceful vivacity,
that the general effect was that of a flower-garden. As often happens,
several American women were among the most distinguished for positive
beauty; one from Philadelphia, who is by many persons considered
the prettiest ornament of the dress circle at the Italian Opera, was
especially marked by the attention of the king. However, these ladies,
even if here a long time, do not attain the air and manner of French
women; the magnetic atmosphere that envelops them is less brilliant
and exhilarating in its attractions.

It was pleasant to my eye, which has always been so wearied in
our country by the sombre masses of men that overcloud our public
assemblies, to see them now in so great variety of costume, color, and
decoration.

Among the crowd wandered Leverrier, in the costume of Academician,
looking as if he had lost, not found, his planet. French _savants_ are
more generally men of the world, and even men of fashion, than those
of other climates; but, in his case, he seemed not to find it easy to
exchange the music of the spheres for the music of fiddles.

Speaking of Leverrier leads to another of my disappointments. I went
to the Sorbonne to hear him lecture, nothing dreaming that the old
pedantic and theological character of those halls was strictly kept up
in these days of light. An old guardian of the inner temple, seeing
me approach, had his speech all ready, and, manning the entrance, said
with a disdainful air, before we had time to utter a word, "Monsieur
may enter if he pleases, but Madame must remain here" (i.e. in
the court-yard). After some exclamations of surprise, I found an
alternative in the Hotel de Clugny, where I passed an hour very
delightfully while waiting for my companion. The rich remains of other
centuries are there so arranged that they can be seen to the best
advantage; many of the works in ivory, china, and carved wood are
truly splendid or exquisite. I saw a dagger with jewelled hilt which
talked whole poems to my mind. In the various "Adorations of the
Magi," I found constantly one of the wise men black, and with the
marked African lineaments. Before I had half finished, my companion
came and wished me at least to visit the lecture-rooms of the
Sorbonne, now that the talk, too good for female ears, was over.
But the guardian again interfered to deny me entrance. "You can go,
Madame," said he, "to the College of France; you can go to this and
t'other place, but you cannot enter here." "What, sir," said I, "is
it your institution alone that remains in a state of barbarism?" "Que
voulez vous, Madame?" he replied, and, as he spoke, his little
dog began to bark at me,--"Que voulez vous, Madame? c'est la
regle,"--"What would you have, Madam? IT IS THE RULE,"--a reply which
makes me laugh even now, as I think how the satirical wits of former
days might have used it against the bulwarks of learned dulness.

I was more fortunate in hearing Arago, and he justified all my
expectations. Clear, rapid, full and equal, his discourse is worthy
its celebrity, and I felt repaid for the four hours one is obliged to
spend in going, in waiting, and in hearing; for the lecture begins at
half past one, and you must be there before twelve to get a seat, so
constant and animated is his popularity.

I have attended, with some interest, two discussions at the
Athenée,--one on Suicide, the other on the Crusades. They are amateur
affairs, where, as always at such times, one hears much, nonsense and
vanity, much making of phrases and sentimental grimace; but there was
one excellent speaker, adroit and rapid as only a Frenchman could be.
With admirable readiness, skill, and rhetorical polish, he examined
the arguments of all the others, and built upon their failures
a triumph for himself. His management of the language, too,
was masterly, and French is the best of languages for such a
purpose,--clear, flexible, full of sparkling points and quick,
picturesque turns, with a subtile blandness that makes the dart tickle
while it wounds. Truly he pleased the fancy, filled the ear, and
carried us pleasantly along over the smooth, swift waters; but then
came from the crowd a gentleman, not one of the appointed orators
of the evening, but who had really something in his heart to say,--a
grave, dark man, with Spanish eyes, and the simple dignity of honor
and earnestness in all his gesture and manner. He said in few and
unadorned words his say, and the sense of a real presence filled the
room, and those charms of rhetoric faded, as vanish the beauties of
soap-bubbles from the eyes of astonished childhood.

I was present on one good occasion at the Academy the day that M.
Rémusat was received there in the place of Royer-Collard. I looked
down from one of the tribunes upon the flower of the celebrities of
France, that is to say, of the celebrities which are authentic, _comme
il faut_. Among them were many marked faces, many fine heads; but
in reading the works of poets we always fancy them about the age of
Apollo himself, and I found with pain some of my favorites quite old,
and very unlike the company on Parnassus as represented by Raphael.
Some, however, were venerable, even noble, to behold. Indeed, the
literary dynasty of France is growing old, and here, as in England
and Germany, there seems likely to occur a serious gap before the
inauguration of another, if indeed another is coming.

However, it was an imposing sight; there are men of real distinction
now in the Academy, and Molière would have a fair chance if he
were proposed to-day. Among the audience I saw many ladies of fine
expression and manner, as well as one or two _precieuses ridicules_, a
race which is never quite extinct.

M. Rémusat, as is the custom on these occasions, painted the portrait
of his predecessor; the discourse was brilliant and discriminating
in the details, but the orator seemed to me to neglect drawing some
obvious inferences which would have given a better point of view for
his subject.

A _séance_ to me much more impressive find interesting was one which
borrowed nothing from dress, decorations, or the presence of titled
pomp. I went to call on La Mennais, to whom I had a letter, I found
him in a little study; his secretary was writing in a larger room
through which I passed. With him was a somewhat citizen-looking,
but vivacious, elderly man, whom I was at first sorry to see,
having wished for half an hour's undisturbed visit to the apostle of
Democracy. But how quickly were those feelings displaced by joy when
he named to me the great national lyrist of France, the unequalled
Béranger. I had not expected to see him at all, for he is not one to
be seen in any show place; he lives in the hearts of the people, and
needs no homage from their eyes. I was very happy in that little study
in presence of these two men, whose influence has been so great, so
real. To me Béranger has been much; his wit, his pathos, his exquisite
lyric grace, have made the most delicate strings vibrate, and I can
feel, as well as see, what he is in his nation and his place. I have
not personally received anything from La Mennais, as, born under other
circumstances, mental facts which he, once the pupil of Rome, has
learned by passing through severe ordeals, are at the basis of all
my thoughts. But I see well what he has been and is to Europe, and of
what great force of nature and spirit. He seems suffering and pale,
but in his eyes is the light of the future.

These are men who need no flourish of trumpets to announce their
coming,--no band of martial music upon their steps,--no obsequious
nobles in their train. They are the true kings, the theocratic kings,
the judges in Israel. The hearts of men make music at their approach;
the mind of the age is the historian of their passage; and only men of
destiny like themselves shall be permitted to write their eulogies, or
fill their vacant seats.

Wherever there is a genius like his own, a germ of the finest fruit
still hidden beneath the soil, the "_Chante pauvre petit_" of Béranger
shall strike, like a sunbeam, and give it force to emerge, and
wherever there is the true Crusade,--for the spirit, not the tomb of
Christ,--shall be felt an echo of the "_Que tes armes soient benis
jeune soldat_" of La Mennais.




LETTER XI.

FRANCE AND HER ARTISTIC EXCELLENCE.--THE PICTURES OF HORACE
VERNET.--DE LA ROCHE.--LEOPOLD ROBERT.--CONTRAST BETWEEN THE FRENCH
AND ENGLISH SCHOOLS OF ART.--THE GENERAL APPRECIATION OF TURNER'S
PICTURES.--BOTANICAL MODELS IN WAX.--MUSIC.--THE OPERA.--DUPREZ.--
LABLACHE.--RONCONI.--GRISI.--PERSIANA.--"SEMIRAMIDE" AS PERFORMED BY
THE NEW YORK AND PARIS OPERAS.--MARIO.--COLETTI.--GARDINI.--
"DON GIOVANNI."--THE WRITER'S TRIAL OF THE "LETHEON."--ITS EFFECTS.


It needs not to speak in this cursory manner of the treasures of Art,
pictures, sculptures, engravings, and the other riches which France
lays open so freely to the stranger in her Musées. Any examination
worth writing of such objects, or account of the thoughts they
inspire, demands a place by itself, and an ample field in which to
expatiate. The American, first introduced to some good pictures by the
truly great geniuses of the religious period in Art, must, if capable
at all of mental approximation to the life therein embodied, be too
deeply affected, too full of thoughts, to be in haste to say anything,
and for me, I bide my time.

No such great crisis, however, is to be apprehended from acquaintance
with the productions of the modern French school. They are, indeed,
full of talent and of vigor, but also melodramatic and exaggerated to
a degree that seems to give the nightmare passage through the fresh
and cheerful day. They sound no depth of soul, and are marked with the
signet of a degenerate age.

Thus speak I generally. To the pictures of Horace Vernet one cannot
but turn a gracious eye, they are so faithful a transcript of the life
which circulates around us in the present state of things, and we
are willing to see his nobles and generals mounted on such excellent
horses. De la Roche gives me pleasure; there is in his pictures a
simple and natural poesy; he is a man who has in his own heart a well
of good water, whence he draws for himself when the streams are mixed
with strange soil and bear offensive marks of the bloody battles of
life.

The pictures of Leopold Robert I find charming. They are full of vigor
and nobleness; they express a nature where all is rich, young, and on
a large scale. Those that I have seen are so happily expressive of the
thoughts and perceptions of early manhood, I can hardly regret he
did not live to enter on another stage of life, the impression now
received is so single.

The effort of the French school in Art, as also its main tendency in
literature, seems to be to turn the mind inside out, in the coarsest
acceptation of such a phrase. Art can only be truly Art by presenting
an adequate outward symbol of some fact in the interior life. But then
it _is_ a symbol that Art seeks to present, and not the fact itself.
These French painters seem to have no idea of this; they have not
studied the method of Nature. With the true artist, as with Nature
herself, the more full the representation, the more profound and
enchanting is the sense of mystery. We look and look, as on a flower
of which we cannot scrutinize the secret life, yet b; looking seem
constantly drawn nearer to the soul that causes and governs that life.
But in the French pictures suffering is represented by streams of
blood,--wickedness by the most ghastly contortions.

I saw a movement in the opposite direction in England; it was in
Turner's pictures of the later period. It is well known that Turner,
so long an idol of the English public, paints now in a manner which
has caused the liveliest dissensions in the world of connoisseurs.
There are two parties, one of which maintains, not only that the
pictures of the late period are not good, but that they are not
pictures at all,--that it is impossible to make out the design, or
find what Turner is aiming at by those strange blotches of color.
The other party declare that these pictures are not only good, but
divine,--that whoever looks upon them in the true manner will not fail
to find there somewhat ineffably and transcendently admirable,--the
soul of Art. Books have been written to defend this side of the
question.

I had become much interested about this matter, as the fervor of
feeling on either side seemed to denote that there was something real
and vital going on, and, while time would not permit my visiting other
private collections in London and its neighborhood, I insisted on
taking it for one of Turner's pictures. It was at the house of one of
his devoutest disciples, who has arranged everything in the rooms to
harmonize with them. There were a great many of the earlier period;
these seemed to me charming, but superficial, views of Nature. They
were of a character that he who runs may read,--obvious, simple,
graceful. The later pictures were quite a different matter;
mysterious-looking things,--hieroglyphics of picture, rather than
picture itself. Sometimes you saw a range of red dots, which, after
long looking, dawned on you as the roofs of houses,--shining streaks
turned out to be most alluring rivulets, if traced with patience and
a devout eye. Above all, they charmed the eye and the thought. Still,
these pictures, it seems to me, cannot be considered fine works of
Art, more than the mystical writing common to a certain class of minds
in the United States can be called good writing. A great work of Art
demands a great thought, or a thought of beauty adequately expressed.
Neither in Art nor literature more than in life can an ordinary
thought be made interesting because well dressed. But in a transition
state, whether of Art or literature, deeper thoughts are imperfectly
expressed, because they cannot yet be held and treated masterly.
This seems to be the case with Turner. He has got beyond the English
gentleman's conventional view of Nature, which implies a _little_
sentiment and a _very_ cultivated taste; he has become awake to what
is elemental, normal, in Nature,--such, for instance, as one sees in
the working of water on the sea-shore. He tries to represent these
primitive forms. In the drawings of Piranesi, in the pictures of
Rembrandt, one sees this grand language exhibited more truly. It is
not picture, but certain primitive and leading effects of light and
shadow, or lines and contours, that captivate the attention. I saw a
picture of Rembrandt's at the Louvre, whose subject I do not know
and have never cared to inquire. I cannot analyze the group, but I
understand and feel the thought it embodies. At something similar
Turner seems aiming; an aim so opposed to the practical and outward
tendency of the English mind, that, as a matter of course, the
majority find themselves mystified, and thereby angered, but for the
same reason answering to so deep and seldom satisfied a want in the
minds of the minority, as to secure the most ardent sympathy where any
at all can be elicited.

Upon this topic of the primitive forms and operations of nature, I am
reminded of something interesting I was looking at yesterday. These
are botanical models in wax, with microscopic dissections, by an
artist from Florence, a pupil of Calamajo, the Director of the
Wax-Model Museum there. I saw collections of ten different genera,
embracing from fifty to sixty species, of Fungi, Mosses, and Lichens,
detected and displayed in all the beautiful secrets of their lives;
many of them, as observed by Dr. Leveillé of Paris. The artist told me
that a fisherman, introduced to such acquaintance with the marvels
of love and beauty which we trample under foot or burn in the chimney
each careless day, exclaimed, "'Tis the good God who protects us
on the sea that made all these"; and a similar recognition, a
correspondent feeling, will not be easily evaded by the most callous
observer. This artist has supplied many of these models to the
magnificent collection of the _Jardin des Plantes_, to Edinburgh, and
to Bologna, and would furnish them, to our museums at a much cheaper
rate than they can elsewhere be obtained. I wish the Universities of
Cambridge, New York, and other leading institutions of our country,
might avail themselves of the opportunity.

In Paris I have not been very fortunate in hearing the best music.
At the different Opera-Houses, the orchestra is always good, but the
vocalization, though far superior to what I have heard at home,
falls so far short of my ideas and hopes that--except to the Italian
Opera--I have not been often. The _Opera Comique_ I visited only
once; it was tolerably well, and no more, and, for myself, I find the
tolerable intolerable in music. At the Grand Opera I heard _Robert le
Diable_ and _Guillaume Tell_ almost with ennui; the decorations and
dresses are magnificent, the instrumental performance good, but not
one fine singer to fill these fine parts. Duprez has had a great
reputation, and probably has sung better In former days; still he
has a vulgar mind, and can never have had any merit as an artist. At
present I find him unbearable. He forces his voice, sings in the most
coarse, showy style, and aims at producing effects without regard to
the harmony of his part; fat and vulgar, he still takes the part of
the lover and young chevalier; to my sorrow I saw him in Ravenswood,
and he has well-nigh disenchanted for me the Bride of Lammermoor.

The Italian Opera is here as well sustained, I believe, as anywhere in
the world at present; all about it is certainly quite good, but alas!
nothing excellent, nothing admirable. Yet no! I must not say nothing:
Lablache is excellent,--voice, intonation, manner of song, action.
Ronconi I found good in the Doctor of "_L'Elisire d'Amore_". For the
higher parts Grisi, though now much too large for some of her parts,
and without a particle of poetic grace or dignity, has certainly
beauty of feature, and from nature a fine voice. But I find her
conception of her parts equally coarse and shallow. Her love is the
love of a peasant; her anger, though having the Italian picturesque
richness and vigor, is the anger of an Italian fishwife, entirely
unlike anything in the same rank elsewhere; her despair is that of a
person with the toothache, or who has drawn a blank in the lottery.
The first time I saw her was in _Norma_; then the beauty of her
outline, which becomes really enchanting as she recalls the first
emotions of love, the force and gush of her song, filled my ear, and
charmed the senses, so that I was pleased, and did not perceive her
great defects; but with each time of seeing her I liked her less, and
now I do not like her at all.

Persiani is more generally a favorite here; she is indeed skilful
both as an actress and in the management of her voice, but I find
her expression meretricious, her singing mechanical. Neither of these
women is equal to Pico in natural force, if she had but the same
advantages of culture and environment. In hearing _Semiramide_ here,
I first learned to appreciate the degree of talent with which it
was cast in New York. Grisi indeed is a far better Semiramis than
Borghese, but the best parts of the opera lost all their charm from
the inferiority of Brambilla, who took Pico's place. Mario has a
charming voice, grace and tenderness; he fills very well the part of
the young, chivalric lover, but he has no range of power. Coletti is
a very good singer; he has not from Nature a fine voice or personal
beauty; but he has talent, good taste, and often surpasses the
expectation he has inspired. Gardini, the new singer, I have only
heard once, and that was in a lovesick-shepherd part; he showed
delicacy, tenderness, and tact. In fine, among all these male singers
there is much to please, but little to charm; and for the women, they
never fail absolutely to fill their parts, but no ray of the Muse has
fallen on them.

_Don Giovanni_ conferred on me a benefit, of which certainly its great
author never dreamed. I shall relate it,--first begging pardon of
Mozart, and assuring him I had no thought of turning his music to
the account of a "vulgar utility." It was quite by accident. After
suffering several days very much with the toothache, I resolved to get
rid of the cause of sorrow by the aid of ether; not sorry, either, to
try its efficacy, after all the marvellous stories I had heard.
The first time I inhaled it, I did not for several seconds feel the
effect, and was just thinking, "Alas! this has not power to soothe
nerves so irritable as mine," when suddenly I wandered off, I
don't know where, but it was a sensation like wandering in long
garden-walks, and through many alleys of trees,--many impressions, but
all pleasant and serene. The moment the tube was removed, I started
into consciousness, and put my hand to my cheek; but, sad! the
throbbing tooth was still there. The dentist said I had not seemed to
him insensible. He then gave me the ether in a stronger dose, and this
time I quitted the body instantly, and cannot remember any detail of
what I saw and did; but the impression was as in the Oriental tale,
where the man has his head in the water an instant only, but in his
vision a thousand years seem to have passed. I experienced that same
sense of an immense length of time and succession of impressions;
even, now, the moment my mind was in that state seems to me a far
longer period in time than my life on earth does as I look back upon
it. Suddenly I seemed to see the old dentist, as I had for the
moment before I inhaled the gas, amid his plants, in his nightcap
and dressing-gown; in the twilight the figure had somewhat of a
Faust-like, magical air, and he seemed to say, "_C'est inutile._"
Again I started up, fancying that once more he had not dared to
extract the tooth, but it was gone. What is worth, noticing is the
mental translation I made of his words, which, my ear must have
caught, for my companion tells me he said, "_C'est le moment_," a
phrase of just as many syllables, but conveying just the opposite
sense.

Ah! I how I wished then, that you had settled, there in the United
States, who really brought this means of evading a portion of the
misery of life into use. But as it was, I remained at a loss whom to
apostrophize with my benedictions, whether Dr. Jackson, Morton, or
Wells, and somebody thus was robbed of his clue;--neither does Europe
know to whom to address her medals.

However, there is no evading the heavier part of these miseries. You
avoid the moment of suffering, and escape the effort of screwing up
your courage for one of these moments, but not the jar to the whole
system. I found the effect of having taken the ether bad for me. I
seemed to taste it all the time, and neuralgic pain continued; this
lasted three days. For the evening of the third, I had taken a ticket
to _Don Giovanni_, and could not bear to give up this opera, which I
had always been longing to hear; still I was in much suffering, and,
as it was the sixth day I had been so, much weakened. However, I went,
expecting to be obliged to come out; but the music soothed the
nerves at once. I hardly suffered at all during the opera; however, I
supposed the pain would return as soon as I came out; but no! it left
me from that time. Ah! if physicians only understood the influence
of the mind over the body, instead of treating, as they so often do,
their patients like machines, and according to precedent! But I must
pause here for to-day.




LETTER XII.

ADIEU TO PARIS.--ITS SCENES.--THE PROCESSION OF THE FAT
OX.--DESTITUTION OF THE POORER CLASSES.--NEED OF A REFORM.--THE
DOCTRINES OF FOURIER MAKING PROGRESS.--REVIEW OF FOURIER'S LIFE AND
CHARACTER.--THE PARISIAN PRESS ON THE SPANISH MARRIAGE.--GUIZOT'S
POLICY.--NAPOLEON.--THE MANUSCRIPTS OF ROUSSEAU IN THE CHAMBER
OF DEPUTIES.--HIS CHARACTER.--SPEECH OF M. BERRYER IN THE
CHAMBER.--AMERICAN AND FRENCH ORATORY.--THE AFFAIR OF CRACOW.--DULL
SPEAKERS IN THE CHAMBER.--FRENCH VIVACITY.--AMUSING SCENE.--GUIZOT
SPEAKING.--INTERNATIONAL EXCHANGE OF BOOKS.--THE EVENING SCHOOL OF THE
_FRÈRES CHRETIENS_.--THE GREAT GOOD ACCOMPLISHED BY THEM.--SUGGESTIONS
FOR THE LIKE IN AMERICA.--THE INSTITUTION OF THE DEACONESSES.--THE
NEW YORK "HOME."--SCHOOL FOR IDIOTS NEAR PARIS.--THE RECLAMATION OF
IDIOTS.


I bade adieu to Paris on the 25th of February, just as we had had
one fine day. It was the only one of really delightful weather, from
morning till night, that I had to enjoy all the while I was at Paris,
from the 13th of November till the 25th of February. Let no one abuse
our climate; even in winter it is delightful, compared to the Parisian
winter of mud and mist.

This one day brought out the Parisian world in its gayest colors. I
never saw anything more animated or prettier, of the kind, than
the promenade that day in the _Champs Elysées_. Such crowds of gay
equipages, with _cavaliers_ and their _amazons_ flying through their
midst on handsome and swift horses! On the promenade, what groups of
passably pretty ladies, with excessively pretty bonnets, announcing in
their hues of light green, peach-blossom, and primrose the approach
of spring, and charming children, for French children are charming! I
cannot speak with equal approbation of the files of men sauntering
arm in arm. One sees few fine-looking men in Paris: the air,
half-military, half-dandy, of self-esteem and _savoir-faire_, is not
particularly interesting; nor are the glassy stare and fumes of bad
cigars exactly what one most desires to encounter, when the heart
is opened by the breath of spring zephyrs and the hope of buds and
blossoms.

But a French crowd is always gay, full of quick turns and drolleries;
most amusing when most petulant, it represents what is so agreeable
in the character of the nation. We have now seen it on two good
occasions, the festivities of the new year, and just after we came was
the procession of the _Fat Ox_, described, if I mistake not, by Eugene
Sue. An immense crowd thronged the streets this year to see it,
but few figures and little invention followed the emblem of plenty;
indeed, few among the people could have had the heart for such a sham,
knowing how the poorer classes have suffered from hunger this winter.
All signs of this are kept out of sight in Paris. A pamphlet, called
"The Voice of Famine," stating facts, though in the tone of vulgar
and exaggerated declamation, unhappily common to productions on the
radical side, was suppressed almost as soon as published; but the fact
cannot be suppressed, that the people in the provinces have suffered
most terribly amid the vaunted prosperity of France.

While Louis Philippe lives, the gases, compressed by his strong grasp,
may not burst up to light; but the need of some radical measures of
reform is not less strongly felt in France than elsewhere, and the
time will come before long when such will be imperatively demanded.
The doctrines of Fourier are making considerable progress, and
wherever they spread, the necessity of some practical application of
the precepts of Christ, in lieu of the mummeries of a worn-out ritual,
cannot fail to be felt. The more I see of the terrible ills which
infest the body politic of Europe, the more indignation I feel at
the selfishness or stupidity of those in my own country who oppose
an examination of these subjects,--such as is animated by the hope of
prevention. The mind of Fourier was, in many respects, uncongenial to
mine. Educated in an age of gross materialism, he was tainted by its
faults. In attempts to reorganize society, he commits the error of
making soul the result of health of body, instead of body the clothing
of soul; but his heart was that of a genuine lover of his kind, of a
philanthropist in the sense of Jesus,--his views were large and noble.
His life was one of devout study on these subjects, and I should
pity the person who, after the briefest sojourn in Manchester and
Lyons,--the most superficial acquaintance with the population of
London and Paris,--could seek to hinder a study of his thoughts, or
be wanting in reverence for his purposes. But always, always, the
unthinking mob has found stones on the highway to throw at the
prophets.

Amid so many great causes for thought and anxiety, how childish has
seemed the endless gossip of the Parisian press on the subject of
the Spanish marriage,--how melancholy the flimsy falsehoods of M.
Guizot,--more melancholy the avowal so naïvely made, amid those
falsehoods, that to his mind expediency is the best policy! This is
the policy, said he, that has made France so prosperous. Indeed, the
success is correspondent with the means, though in quite another sense
than that he meant.

I went to the _Hotel des Invalides_, supposing I should be admitted
to the spot where repose the ashes of Napoleon, for though I love not
pilgrimages to sepulchres, and prefer paying my homage to the living
spirit rather than to the dust it once animated, I should have
liked to muse a moment beside his urn; but as yet the visitor is
not admitted there. In the library, however, one sees the picture of
Napoleon crossing the Alps, opposite to that of the present King of
the French. Just as they are, these should serve as frontispieces to
two chapters of history. In the first, the seed was sown in a field of
blood indeed, yet was it the seed of all that is vital in the present
period. By Napoleon the career was really laid open to talent, and all
that is really great in France now consists in the possibility that
talent finds of struggling to the light.

Paris is a great intellectual centre, and there is a Chamber of
Deputies to represent the people, very different from the poor,
limited Assembly politically so called. Their tribune is that of
literature, and one needs not to beg tickets to mingle with the
audience. To the actually so-called Chamber of Deputies I was indebted
for two pleasures. First and greatest, a sight of the manuscripts
of Rousseau treasured in their Library. I saw them and touched
them,--those manuscripts just as he has celebrated them, written on
the fine white paper, tied with ribbon. Yellow and faded age has
made them, yet at their touch I seemed to feel the fire of youth,
immortally glowing, more and more expansive, with which his soul has
pervaded this century. He was the precursor of all we most prize.
True, his blood was mixed with madness, and the course of his actual
life made some detours through villanous places, but his spirit was
intimate with the fundamental truths of human nature, and fraught with
prophecy. There is none who has given birth to more life for this age;
his gifts are yet untold; they are too present with us; but he who
thinks really must often think with Rousseau, and learn of him even
more and more: such is the method of genius, to ripen fruit for the
crowd of those rays of whose heat they complain.

The second pleasure was in the speech of M. Berryer, when the Chamber
was discussing the Address to the King. Those of Thiers and Guizot
had been, so far, more interesting, as they stood for more that was
important; but M. Berryer is the most eloquent speaker of the House.
His oratory is, indeed, very good; not logical, but plausible, full
and rapid, with occasional bursts of flame and showers of sparks,
though indeed no stone of size and weight enough to crush any man was
thrown out of the crater. Although the oratory of our country is
very inferior to what might be expected from the perfect freedom
and powerful motive for development of genius in this province, it
presents several examples of persons superior in both force and scope,
and equal in polish, to M. Berryer.

Nothing can be more pitiful than the manner in which the infamous
affair of Cracow is treated on all hands. There is not even the
affectation of noble feeling about it. La Mennais and his coadjutors
published in _La Reforme_ an honorable and manly protest, which the
public rushed to devour the moment it was out of the press;--and no
wonder! for it was the only crumb of comfort offered to those who have
the nobleness to hope that the confederation of nations may yet be
conducted on the basis of divine justice and human right. Most men who
touched the subject apparently weary of feigning, appeared in their
genuine colors of the calmest, most complacent selfishness. As
described by Körner in the prayer of such a man:--

  "O God, save me,
  My wife, child, and hearth,
  Then my harvest also;
  Then will I bless thee,
  Though thy lightning scorch to blackness
  All the rest of human kind."

A sentiment which finds its paraphrase in the following vulgate of our
land:--

  "O Lord, save me,
  My wife, child, and brother Sammy,
  Us four, _and no more_."

The latter clause, indeed, is not quite frankly avowed as yet by
politicians.

It is very amusing to be in the Chamber of Deputies when some dull
person is speaking. The French have a truly Greek vivacity; they
cannot endure to be bored. Though their conduct is not very dignified,
I should like a corps of the same kind of sharp-shooters in our
legislative assemblies when honorable gentlemen are addressing their
constituents and not the assembly, repeating in lengthy, windy, clumsy
paragraphs what has been the truism of the newspaper press for
months previous, wickedly wasting the time that was given us to learn
something for ourselves, and help our fellow-creatures. In the French
Chamber, if a man who has nothing to say ascends the tribune, the
audience-room is filled with the noise as of myriad beehives; the
President rises on his feet, and passes the whole time of the speech
in taking the most violent exercise, stretching himself to look
imposing, ringing his bell every two minutes, shouting to the
representatives of the nation to be decorous and attentive. In vain:
the more he rings, the more they won't be still. I saw an orator in
this situation, fighting against the desires of the audience, as only
a Frenchman could,--certainly a man of any other nation would have
died of embarrassment rather,--screaming out his sentences, stretching
out both arms with an air of injured dignity, panting, growing red in
the face; but the hubbub of voices never stopped an instant. At last
he pretended to be exhausted, stopped, and took out his snuff-box.
Instantly there was a calm. He seized the occasion, and shouted out a
sentence; but it was the only one he was able to make heard. They
were not to be trapped so a second time. When any one is speaking that
commands interest, as Berryer did, the effect of this vivacity is very
pleasing, the murmur of feeling that rushes over the assembly is so
quick and electric,--light, too, as the ripple on the lake. I heard
Guizot speak one day for a short time. His manner is very deficient
in dignity,--has not even the dignity of station; you see the man of
cultivated intellect, but without inward strength; nor is even his
panoply of proof.

I saw in the Library of the Deputies some books intended to be sent
to our country through M. Vattemare. The French have shown great
readiness and generosity with regard to his project, and I earnestly
hope that our country, if it accept these tokens of good-will, will
show both energy and judgment in making a return. I do not speak from
myself alone, but from others whose opinion is entitled to the highest
respect, when I say it is not by sending a great quantity of documents
of merely local interest, that would be esteemed lumber in our garrets
at home, that you pay respect to a nation able to look beyond, the
binding of a book. If anything is to be sent, let persons of ability
be deputed to make a selection honorable to us and of value to
the French. They would like documents from our Congress,--what is
important as to commerce and manufactures; they would also like much
what can throw light on the history and character of our aborigines.
This project of international exchange could not be carried on to any
permanent advantage without accredited agents on either side, but in
its present shape it wears an aspect of good feeling that is valuable,
and may give a very desirable impulse to thought and knowledge.
M. Vattemare has given himself to the plan with indefatigable
perseverance, and I hope our country will not be backward to accord
him that furtherance he has known how to conquer from his countrymen.

To his complaisance I was indebted for opportunity of a leisurely
survey of the _Imprimeri Royale_, which gave me several suggestions
I shall impart at a more favorable time, and of the operations of the
Mint also. It was at his request that the Librarian of the Chamber
showed me the manuscripts of Rousseau, which are not always seen by
the traveller. He also introduced me to one of the evening schools of
the _Frères Chretiens_, where I saw, with pleasure, how much can be
done for the working classes only by evening lessons. In reading and
writing, adults had made surprising progress, and still more so in
drawing. I saw with the highest pleasure, excellent copies of good
models, made by hard-handed porters and errand-boys with their brass
badges on their breasts. The benefits of such an accomplishment are,
in my eyes, of the highest value, giving them, by insensible degrees,
their part in the glories of art and science, and in the tranquil
refinements of home. Visions rose in my mind of all that might be done
in our country by associations of men and women who have received the
benefits of literary culture, giving such evening lessons throughout
our cities and villages. Should I ever return, I shall propose to
some of the like-minded an association for such a purpose, and try the
experiment of one of these schools of Christian brothers, with the vow
of disinterestedness, but without the robe and the subdued priestly
manner, which even in these men, some of whom seemed to me truly good,
I could not away with.

I visited also a Protestant institution, called that of the
Deaconesses, which pleased me in some respects. Beside the regular
_Crèche_, they take the sick children of the poor, and nurse them till
they are well. They have also a refuge like that of the Home which,
the ladies of New York have provided, through which members of
the most unjustly treated class of society may return to peace and
usefulness. There are institutions of the kind in Paris, but too
formal,--and the treatment shows ignorance of human nature. I see
nothing that shows so enlightened a spirit as the Home, a little germ
of good which I hope flourishes and finds active aid in the community.
I have collected many facts with regard to this suffering class of
women, both in England and in France. I have seen them under the thin
veil of gayety, and in the horrible tatters of utter degradation. I
have seen the feelings of men with regard to their condition, and the
general heartlessness in women of more favored and protected lives,
which I can only ascribe to utter ignorance of the facts. If a
proclamation of some of these can remove it, I hope to make such a one
in the hour of riper judgment, and after a more extensive survey.

Sad as are many features of the time, we have at least the
satisfaction of feeling that if something true can be revealed, if
something wise and kind shall be perseveringly tried, it stands a
chance of nearer success than ever before; for much light has been let
in at the windows of the world, and many dark nooks have been touched
by a consoling ray. The influence of such a ray I felt in visiting
the School for Idiots, near Paris,--idiots, so called long time by
the impatience of the crowd; yet there are really none such, but only
beings so below the average standard, so partially organized, that it
is difficult for them to learn or to sustain themselves. I wept the
whole time I was in this place a shower of sweet and bitter tears; of
joy at what had been done, of grief for all that I and others possess
and cannot impart to these little ones. But patience, and the Father
of All will give them all yet. A good angel these of Paris have in
their master. I have seen no man that seemed to me more worthy of
envy, if one could envy happiness so pure and tender. He is a man
of seven or eight and twenty, who formerly came there only to give
lessons in writing, but became so interested in his charge that he
came at last to live among them and to serve them. They sing the hymns
he writes for them, and as I saw his fine countenance looking in
love on those distorted and opaque vases of humanity, where he had
succeeded in waking up a faint flame, I thought his heart could never
fail to be well warmed and buoyant. They sang well, both in parts and
in chorus, went through gymnastic exercises with order and pleasure,
then stood in a circle and kept time, while several danced extremely
well. One little fellow, with whom the difficulty seemed to be that
an excess of nervous sensibility paralyzed instead of exciting the
powers, recited poems with a touching, childish grace and perfect
memory. They write well, draw well, make shoes, and do carpenter's
work. One of the cases most interesting to the metaphysician is that
of a boy, brought there about two years and a half ago, at the age of
thirteen, in a state of brutality, and of ferocious brutality. I read
the physician's report of him at that period. He discovered no ray of
decency or reason; entirely beneath the animals in the exercise of the
senses, he discovered a restless fury beyond that of beasts of prey,
breaking and throwing down whatever came in his way; was a voracious
glutton, and every way grossly sensual. Many trials and vast patience
were necessary before an inlet could be obtained to his mind; then it
was through the means of mathematics. He delights in the figures, can
draw and name them all, detects them by the touch when blindfolded.
Each, mental effort of the kind he still follows up with an imbecile
chuckle, as indeed his face and whole manner are still that of an
idiot; but he has been raised from his sensual state, and can now
discriminate and name colors and perfumes which before were all alike
to him. He is partially redeemed; earlier, no doubt, far more might
have been done for him, but the degree of success is an earnest which
must encourage to perseverance in the most seemingly hopeless cases. I
thought sorrowfully of the persons of this class whom I have known
in our country, who might have been so raised and solaced by similar
care. I hope ample provision may erelong be made for these Pariahs of
the human race; every case of the kind brings its blessings with it,
and observation on these subjects would be as rich in suggestion for
the thought, as such acts of love are balmy for the heart.




LETTER XIII.

MUSIC IN PARIS.--CHOPIN AND THE CHEVALIER NEUKOMM.--ADIEU TO PARIS.--A
MIDNIGHT DRIVE IN A DILIGENCE.--LYONS AND ITS WEAVERS.--THEIR MANNER
OF LIFE.--A YOUNG WIFE.--THE WEAVERS' CHILDREN.--THE BANKS OF
THE RHONE.--DREARY WEATHER FOR SOUTHERN FRANCE.--THE OLD ROMAN
AMPHITHEATRE AT ARLES.--THE WOMEN OF ARLES.--MARSEILLES.--PASSAGE
TO GENOA.--ITALY.--GENOA AND NAPLES.--BAIÆ.--VESUVIUS.--THE ITALIAN
CHARACTER AT HOME.--PASSAGE FROM LEGHORN IN A SMALL STEAMER.--NARROW
ESCAPE.--A CONFUSION OF LANGUAGES.--DEGRADATION OF THE NEAPOLITANS.


Naples.

In my last days at Paris I was fortunate in hearing some delightful
music. A friend of Chopin's took me to see him, and I had the
pleasure, which the delicacy of Iris health makes a rare one for the
public, of hearing him play. All the impressions I had received from
hearing his music imperfectly performed were justified, for it has
marked traits, which can be veiled, but not travestied; but to feel
it as it merits, one must hear himself; only a person as exquisitely
organized as he can adequately express these subtile secrets of the
creative spirit.

It was with, a very different sort of pleasure that I listened to the
Chevalier Neukomm, the celebrated composer of "David," which has
been so popular in our country. I heard him improvise on the _orgue
expressif_, and afterward on a great organ which has just been built
here by Cavaille for the cathedral of Ajaccio. Full, sustained,
ardent, yet exact, the stream, of his thought bears with it the
attention of hearers of all characters, as his character, full of
_bonhommie_, open, friendly, animated, and sagacious, would seem to
have something to present for the affection and esteem of all kinds of
men.

Chopin is the minstrel, Neukomm the orator of music: we want them
both,--the mysterious whispers and the resolute pleadings from the
better world, which calls us not to slumber here, but press daily
onward to claim our heritage.

Paris! I was sad to leave thee, thou wonderful focus, where ignorance
ceases to be a pain, because there we find such means daily to lessen
it. It is the only school where I ever found abundance of teachers who
could bear being examined by the pupil in their special branches. I
must go to this school more before I again cross the Atlantic, where
often for years I have carried about some trifling question without
finding the person who could answer it. Really deep questions we must
all answer for ourselves; the more the pity, then, that we get not
quickly through with a crowd of details, where the experience of
others might accelerate our progress.

Leaving by _diligence_, we pursued our way from twelve o'clock on
Thursday till twelve at night on Friday, thus having a large share of
magnificent moonlight upon the unknown fields we were traversing. At
Chalons we took boat and reached Lyons betimes that afternoon. So
soon as refreshed, we sallied out to visit some of the garrets of the
weavers. As we were making inquiries about these, a sweet little girl
who heard us offered to be our guide. She led us by a weary, winding
way, whose pavement was much easier for her feet in their wooden
_sabots_ than for ours in Paris shoes, to the top of a hill, from
which we saw for the first time "the blue and arrowy Rhone." Entering
the light buildings on this high hill, I found each chamber
tenanted by a family of weavers,--all weavers; wife, husband, sons,
daughters,--from nine years old upward,--each was helping. On one side
were the looms; nearer the door the cooking apparatus; the beds were
shelves near the ceiling: they climbed up to them on ladders. My sweet
little girl turned out to be a wife of six or seven years' standing,
with two rather sickly-looking children; she seemed to have the
greatest comfort that is possible amid the perplexities of a hard and
anxious lot, to judge by the proud and affectionate manner in which
she always said "_mon mari_," and by the courteous gentleness of his
manner toward her. She seemed, indeed, to be one of those persons on
whom "the Graces have smiled in their cradle," and to whom a natural
loveliness of character makes the world as easy as it can be made
while the evil spirit is still so busy choking the wheat with tares.
I admired her graceful manner of introducing us into those dark little
rooms, and she was affectionately received by all her acquaintance.
But alas! that voice, by nature of such bird-like vivacity, repeated
again and again, "Ah! we are all very unhappy now." "Do you sing
together, or go to evening schools?" "We have not the heart. When we
have a piece of work, we do not stir till it is finished, and then we
run to try and get another; but often we have to wait idle for weeks.
It grows worse and worse, and they say it is not likely to be any
better. We can think of nothing, but whether we shall be able to pay
our rent. Ah! the workpeople are very unhappy now." This poor, lovely
little girl, at an age when the merchant's daughters of Boston and New
York are just gaining their first experiences of "society," knew to
a farthing the price of every article of food and clothing that is
wanted by such a household. Her thought by day and her dream by night
was, whether she should long be able to procure a scanty supply of
these, and Nature had gifted her with precisely those qualities,
which, unembarrassed by care, would have made her and all she loved
really happy; and she was fortunate now, compared with many of her sex
in Lyons,--of whom a gentleman who knows the class well said: "When
their work fails, they have no resource except in the sale of their
persons. There are but these two ways open to them, weaving or
prostitution, to gain their bread." And there are those who dare to
say that such a state of things is _well enough_, and what Providence
intended for man,--who call those who have hearts to suffer at the
sight, energy and zeal to seek its remedy, visionaries and fanatics!
To themselves be woe, who have eyes and see not, ears and hear not,
the convulsions and sobs of injured Humanity!

My little friend told me she had nursed both her children,--though
almost all of her class are obliged to put their children out
to nurse; "but," said she, "they are brought back so little, so
miserable, that I resolved, if possible, to keep mine with me." Next
day in the steamboat I read a pamphlet by a physician of Lyons in
which he recommends the establishment of _Crèches_, not merely like
those of Paris, to keep the children by day, but to provide wet-nurses
for them. Thus, by the infants receiving nourishment from more healthy
persons, and who under the supervision of directors would treat them
well, he hopes to counteract the tendency to degenerate in this race
of sedentary workers, and to save the mothers from too heavy a burden
of care and labor, without breaking the bond between them and their
children, whom, under such circumstances, they could visit often, and
see them taken care of as they, brought up to know nothing except how
to weave, cannot take care of them. Here, again, how is one reminded
of Fourier's observations and plans, still more enforced by the recent
developments at Manchester as to the habit of feeding children on
opium, which has grown out of the position of things there.

Descending next day to Avignon, I had the mortification of finding the
banks of the Rhone still sheeted with white, and there waded through
melting snow to Laura's tomb. We did not see Mr. Dickens's Tower and
Goblin,--it was too late in the day,--but we saw a snowball fight
between two bands of the military in the castle yard that was gay
enough to make a goblin laugh. And next day on to Arles, still
snow,--snow and cutting blasts in the South of France, where everybody
had promised us bird-songs and blossoms to console us for the
dreary winter of Paris. At Arles, indeed, I saw the little saxifrage
blossoming on the steps of the Amphitheatre, and fruit-trees in flower
amid the tombs. Here for the first time I saw the great handwriting of
the Romans in its proper medium of stone, and I was content. It looked
us grand and solid as I expected, as if life in those days was thought
worth the having, the enjoying, and the using. The sunlight was warm
this day; it lay deliciously still and calm upon the ruins. One old
woman sat knitting where twenty-five thousand persons once gazed down
in fierce excitement on the fights of men and lions. Coming back, we
were refreshed all through the streets by the sight of the women of
Arles. They answered to their reputation for beauty; tall, erect, and
noble, with high and dignified features, and a full, earnest gaze of
the eye, they looked as if the Eagle still waved its wings over their
city. Even the very old women still have a degree of beauty, because
when the colors are all faded, and the skin wrinkled, the face
retains this dignity of outline. The men do not share in these
characteristics; some priestess, well beloved of the powers of old
religion, must have called down an especial blessing on her sex in
this town.

Hence to Marseilles,--where is little for the traveller to see, except
the mixture of Oriental blood in the crowd of the streets. Thence
by steamer to Genoa. Of this transit, he who has been on the
Mediterranean in a stiff breeze well understands I can have nothing to
say, except "I suffered." It was all one dull, tormented dream to me,
and, I believe, to most of the ship's company,--a dream too of thirty
hours' duration, instead of the promised sixteen.

The excessive beauty of Genoa is well known, and the impression upon
the eye alone was correspondent with what I expected; but, alas! the
weather was still so cold I could not realize that I had actually
touched those shores to which I had looked forward all my life, where
it seemed that the heart would expand, and the whole nature be turned
to delight. Seen by a cutting wind, the marble palaces, the gardens,
the magnificent water-view of Genoa, failed to charm,--"I _saw, not
felt_, how beautiful they were." Only at Naples have I found _my_
Italy, and here not till after a week's waiting,--not till I began
to believe that all I had heard in praise of the climate of Italy
was fable, and that there is really no spring anywhere except in the
imagination of poets. For the first week was an exact copy of the
miseries of a New England spring; a bright sun came for an hour or two
in the morning, just to coax you forth without your cloak, and then
came up a villanous, horrible wind, exactly like the worst east wind
of Boston, breaking the heart, racking the brain, and turning hope and
fancy to an irrevocable green and yellow hue, in lieu of their native
rose.

However, here at Naples I _have_ at last found _my_ Italy; I have
passed through the Grotto of Pausilippo, visited Cuma, Baiæ, and
Capri, ascended Vesuvius, and found all familiar, except the sense of
enchantment, of sweet exhilaration, this scene conveys.

  "Behold how brightly breaks the morning!"

and yet all new, as if never yet described, for Nature here, most
prolific and exuberant in her gifts, has touched them all with a charm
unhackneyed, unhackneyable, which the boots of English dandies cannot
trample out, nor the raptures of sentimental tourists daub or fade.
Baiæ had still a hid divinity for me, Vesuvius a fresh baptism of
fire, and Sorrento--O Sorrento was beyond picture, beyond poesy, for
the greatest Artist had been at work there in a temper beyond the
reach of human art.

Beyond this, reader, my old friend and valued acquaintance on other
themes, I shall tell you nothing of Naples, for it is a thing apart
in the journey of life, and, if represented at all, should be so in a
fairer form than offers itself at present. Now the actual life here is
over, I am going to Rome, and expect to see that fane of thought the
last day of this week.

At Genoa and Leghorn, I saw for the first time Italians in their
homes. Very attractive I found them, charming women, refined men,
eloquent and courteous. If the cold wind hid Italy, it could not the
Italians. A little group of faces, each so full of character, dignity,
and, what is so rare in an American face, the capacity for pure,
exalting passion, will live ever in my memory,--the fulfilment of a
hope!

We started from Leghorn in an English boat, highly recommended, and as
little deserving of such praise as many another bepuffed article.
In the middle of a fine, clear night, she was run into by the mail
steamer, which all on deck clearly saw coming upon her, for no reason
that could be ascertained, except that the man at the wheel said _he_
had turned the right way, and it never seemed to occur to him that
he could change when he found the other steamer had taken the same
direction. To be sure, the other steamer was equally careless, but as
a change on our part would have prevented an accident that narrowly
missed sending us all to the bottom, it hardly seemed worth while to
persist, for the sake of convicting them of error.

Neither the Captain nor any of his people spoke French, and we had
been much amused before by the chambermaid acting out the old story of
"Will you lend me the loan of a gridiron?" A Polish lady was on board,
with a French waiting-maid, who understood no word of English. The
daughter of John Bull would speak to the lady in English, and, when
she found it of no use, would say imperiously to the _suivante_, "Go
and ask your mistress what she will have for breakfast." And now when
I went on deck there was a parley between the two steamers, which the
Captain was obliged to manage by such interpreters as he could
find; it was a long and confused business. It ended at last in the
Neapolitan steamer taking us in tow for an inglorious return to
Leghorn. When she had decided upon this she swept round, her lights
glancing like sagacious eyes, to take us. The sea was calm as a lake,
the sky full of stars; she made a long detour, with her black hull,
her smoke and lights, which look so pretty at night, then came round
to us like the bend of an arm embracing. It was a pretty picture,
worth the stop and the fright,--perhaps the loss of twenty-four hours,
though I did not think so at the time.

At Leghorn we changed the boat, and, retracing our steps, came now at
last to Naples,--to this priest-ridden, misgoverned, full of dirty,
degraded men and women, yet still most lovely Naples,--of which the
most I can say is that the divine aspect of nature _can_ make you
forget the situation of man in this region, which was surely intended
for him as a princely child, angelic in virtue, genius, and beauty,
and not as a begging, vermin-haunted, image kissing Lazzarone.




LETTER XIV.

ITALY.--MISFORTUNE OF TRAVELLERS.--ENGLISH TRAVELLERS.--
COCKNEYISM.--MACDONALD THE SCULPTOR.--BRITISH ARISTOCRACY.--
TENERANI.--WOLFF'S DIANA AND SEASONS.--GOTT.--CRAWFORD.--OVERBECK
THE PAINTER.--AMERICAN PAINTERS IN ROME.--TERRY.--GRANCH.--HICKS.--
REMAINS OF THE ANTIQUE.--ITALIAN PAINTERS.--DOMENICHIMO AND
TITIAN.--FRESCOS OF RAPHAEL.--MICHEL ANGELO.--THE COLOSSEUM.--HOLY
WEEK.--ST. PETER'S.--PIUS IX. AND HIS MEASURES.--POPULAR
ENTHUSIASM.--PUBLIC DINNER AT THE BATHS OF TITUS.--AUSTRIAN
JEALOUSY.--THE "CONTEMPORANEO."


Rome, May, 1847.

There is very little that I can like to write about Italy. Italy is
beautiful, worthy to be loved and embraced, not talked about. Yet I
remember well that, when afar, I liked to read what was written about
her; now, all thought of it is very tedious.

The traveller passing along the beaten track, vetturinoed from inn
to inn, ciceroned from gallery to gallery, thrown, through indolence,
want of tact, or ignorance of the language, too much into the
society of his compatriots, sees the least possible of the country;
fortunately, it is impossible to avoid seeing a great deal. The great
features of the part pursue and fill the eye.

Yet I find that it is quite out of the question to know Italy; to say
anything of her that is full and sweet, so as to convey any idea of
her spirit, without long residence, and residence in the districts
untouched by the scorch and dust of foreign invasion (the invasion
of the _dilettanti_ I mean), and without an intimacy of feeling, an
abandonment to the spirit of the place, impossible to most Americans.
They retain too much, of their English blood; and the travelling
English, as a class, seem to me the most unseeing of all possible
animals. There are exceptions; for instance, the perceptions and
pictures of Browning seem as delicate and just here on the spot as
they did at a distance; but, take them as a class, they have the
vulgar familiarity of Mrs. Trollope without her vivacity, the
cockneyism of Dickens without his graphic power and love of the
odd corners of human nature. I admired the English at home in
their island; I admired their honor, truth, practical intelligence,
persistent power. But they do not look well in Italy; they are not the
figures for this landscape. I am indignant at the contempt they have
presumed to express for the faults of our semi-barbarous state. What
is the vulgarity expressed in our tobacco-chewing, and way of eating
eggs, compared to that which elbows the Greek marbles, guide-book in
hand,--chatters and sneers through the Miserere of the Sistine Chapel,
beneath the very glance of Michel Angelo's Sibyls,--praises
St. Peter's as "_nice_"--talks of "_managing_" the Colosseum by
moonlight,--and snatches "_bits_" for a "_sketch_" from the sublime
silence of the Campagna.

Yet I was again reconciled with them, the other day, in visiting
the studio of Macdonald. There I found a complete gallery of the
aristocracy of England; for each lord and lady who visits Rome
considers it a part of the ceremony to sit to him for a bust. And what
a fine race! how worthy the marble! what heads of orators,
statesmen, gentlemen! of women chaste, grave, resolute, and tender!
Unfortunately, they do not look as well in flesh and blood; then
they show the habitual coldness of their temperament, the habitual
subservience to frivolous conventionalities. They need some great
occasion, some exciting crisis, in order to make them look as free and
dignified as these busts; yet is the beauty there, though, imprisoned,
and clouded, and such a crisis would show us more then one Boadicea,
more than one Alfred. Tenerani has just completed a statue which is
highly-spoken of; it is called the Angel of the Resurrection. I was
not so fortunate as to find it in his studio. In that of Wolff I saw a
Diana, ordered by the Emperor of Russia. It is modern and sentimental;
as different from, the antique Diana as the trance of a novel-read
young lady of our day from the thrill with which the ancient shepherds
deprecated the magic pervasions of Hecate, but very beautiful and
exquisitely wrought. He has also lately finished the Four Seasons,
represented as children. Of these, Winter is graceful and charming.

Among the sculptors I delayed longest in the work-rooms of Gott.
I found his groups of young figures connected with animals very
refreshing after the grander attempts of the present time. They seem
real growths of his habitual mind,--fruits of Nature, full of joy and
freedom. His spaniels and other frisky poppets would please Apollo far
better than most of the marble nymphs and muses of the present day.

Our Crawford has just finished a bust of Mrs. Crawford, which is
extremely beautiful, full of grace and innocent sweetness. All its
accessaries are charming,--the wreaths, the arrangement of drapery,
the stuff of which the robe is made. I hope it will be much seen on
its arrival in New York. He has also an Herodias in the clay, which is
individual in expression, and the figure of distinguished elegance.
I liked the designs of Crawford better than those of Gibson, who is
estimated as highest in the profession now.

Among the studios of the European painters I have visited only that of
Overbeck. It is well known in the United States what his pictures are.
I have much to say at a more favorable time of what they represented
to me. He himself looks as if he had just stepped out of one of
them,--a lay monk, with a pious eye and habitual morality of thought
which limits every gesture.

Painting is not largely represented here by American artists at
present. Terry has two pleasing pictures on the easel: one is a
costume picture of Italian life, such as I saw it myself, enchanted
beyond my hopes, on coming to Naples on a day of grand festival in
honor of Santa Agatha. Cranch sends soon to America a picture of the
Campagna, such as I saw it on my first entrance into Rome, all light
and calmness; Hicks, a charming half-length of an Italian girl,
holding a mandolin: it will be sure to please. His pictures are full
of life, and give the promise of some real achievement in Art.

Of the fragments of the great time, I have now seen nearly all that
are treasured up here: I have, however, as yet nothing of consequence
to say of them. I find that others have often given good hints as to
how they _look_; and as to what they _are_, it can only be known by
approximating to the state of soul out of which they grew. They should
not be described, but reproduced. They are many and precious, yet is
there not so much of high excellence as I had expected: they will not
float the heart on a boundless sea of feeling, like the starry night
on our Western prairies. Yet I love much to see the galleries of
marbles, even when there are not many separately admirable, amid the
cypresses and ilexes of Roman villas; and a picture that is good at
all looks very good in one of these old palaces.

The Italian painters whom I have learned most to appreciate, since
I came abroad, are Domenichino and Titian. Of others one may learn
something by copies and engravings: but not of these. The portraits
of Titian look upon me from the walls things new and strange. They are
portraits of men such as I have not known. In his picture, absurdly
called _Sacred and Profane Love_, in the Borghese Palace, one of the
figures has developed my powers of gazing to an extent unknown before.

Domenichino seems very unequal in his pictures; but when he is grand
and free, the energy of his genius perfectly satisfies. The frescos
of Caracci and his scholars in the Farnese Palace have been to me a
source of the purest pleasure, and I do not remember to have heard of
them. I loved Guercino much before I came here, but I have looked
too much at his pictures and begin to grow sick of them; he is a very
limited genius. Leonardo I cannot yet like at all, but I suppose the
pictures are good for some people to look at; they show a wonderful
deal of study and thought. That is not what I can best appreciate in
a work of art. I hate to see the marks of them. I want a simple
and direct expression of soul. For the rest, the ordinary cant of
connoisseur-ship on these matters seems in Italy even more detestable
than elsewhere.

I have not yet so sufficiently recovered from my pain at finding the
frescos of Raphael in such a state, as to be able to look at them,
happily. I had heard of their condition, but could not realize it.
However, I have gained nothing by seeing his pictures in oil, which
are well preserved. I find I had before the full impression of his
genius. Michel Angelo's frescos, in like manner, I seem to have
seen as far as I can. But it is not the same with the sculptures: my
thought had not risen to the height of the Moses. It is the only thing
in Europe, so far, which has entirely outgone my hopes. Michel Angelo
was my demigod before; but I find no offering worthy to cast at the
feet of his Moses. I like much, too, his Christ. It is a refreshing
contrast with all the other representations of the same subject.
I like it even as contrasted with Raphael's Christ of the
Transfiguration, or that of the cartoon of _Feed my Lambs_.

I have heard owls hoot in the Colosseum by moonlight, and they spoke
more to the purpose than I ever heard any other voice upon that
subject. I have seen all the pomps and shows of Holy Week in the
church of St. Peter, and found them less imposing than an habitual
acquaintance with the place, with processions of monks and nuns
stealing in now and then, or the swell of vespers from some side
chapel. I have ascended the dome, and seen thence Rome and its
Campagna, its villas with, their cypresses and pines serenely sad as
is nothing else in the world, and the fountains of the Vatican garden
gushing hard by. I have been in the Subterranean to see a poor little
boy introduced, much to his surprise, to the bosom of the Church;
and then I have seen by torch-light the stone popes where they lie on
their tombs, and the old mosaics, and virgins with gilt caps. It is
all rich, and full,--very impressive in its way. St. Peter's must be
to each one a separate poem.

The ceremonies of the Church, have been numerous and splendid during
our stay here; and they borrow unusual interest from the love and
expectation inspired by the present Pontiff. He is a man of noble
and good aspect, who, it is easy to see, has set his heart upon doing
something solid for the benefit of man. But pensively, too, must
one feel how hampered and inadequate are the means at his command
to accomplish these ends. The Italians do not feel it, but deliver
themselves, with all the vivacity of their temperament, to perpetual
hurras, vivas, rockets, and torch-light processions. I often think how
grave and sad must the Pope feel, as he sits alone and hears all this
noise of expectation.

A week or two ago the Cardinal Secretary published a circular inviting
the departments to measures which would give the people a sort of
representative council. Nothing could seem more limited than this
improvement, but it was a great measure for Rome. At night the Corso
in which, we live was illuminated, and many thousands passed through
it in a torch-bearing procession. I saw them first assembled in the
Piazza del Popolo, forming around its fountain a great circle of fire.
Then, as a river of fire, they streamed slowly through the Corso, on
their way to the Quirinal to thank the Pope, upbearing a banner on
which the edict was printed. The stream, of fire advanced slowly, with
a perpetual surge-like sound of voices; the torches flashed on the
animated Italian faces. I have never seen anything finer. Ascending
the Quirinal they made it a mount of light. Bengal fires were thrown
up, which cast their red and white light on the noble Greek figures of
men and horses that reign over it. The Pope appeared on his balcony;
the crowd shouted three vivas; he extended his arms; the crowd fell on
their knees and received his benediction; he retired, and the torches
were extinguished, and the multitude dispersed in an instant.

The same week came the natal day of Rome. A great dinner was given at
the Baths of Titus, in the open air. The company was on the grass in
the area; the music at one end; boxes filled with the handsome Roman
women occupied the other sides. It was a new thing here, this popular
dinner, and the Romans greeted it in an intoxication of hope and
pleasure. Sterbini, author of "The Vestal," presided: many others,
like him, long time exiled and restored to their country by the
present Pope, were at the tables. The Colosseum, and triumphal arches
were in sight; an effigy of the Roman wolf with her royal nursling
was erected on high; the guests, with shouts and music, congratulated
themselves on the possession, in Pius IX., of a new and nobler founder
for another state. Among the speeches that of the Marquis d'Azeglio,
a man of literary note in Italy, and son-in-law of Manzoni, contained
this passage (he was sketching the past history of Italy):--

"The crown passed to the head of a German monarch; but he wore it not
to the benefit, but the injury, of Christianity,--of the world. The
Emperor Henry was a tyrant who wearied out the patience of God. God
said to Rome, 'I give you the Emperor Henry'; and from these hills
that surround us, Hildebrand, Pope Gregory VII., raised his austere
and potent voice to say to the Emperor, 'God did not give you Italy
that you might destroy her,' and Italy, Germany, Europe, saw her
butcher prostrated at the feet of Gregory in penitence. Italy,
Germany, Europe, had then kindled in the heart the first spark of
liberty."

The narrative of the dinner passed the censor, and was published: the
Ambassador of Austria read it, and found, with a modesty and candor
truly admirable, that this passage was meant to allude to his Emperor.
He must take his passports, if such home thrusts are to be made. And
so the paper was seized, and the account of the dinner only told from,
mouth to mouth, from those who had already read it. Also the idea of a
dinner for the Pope's fête-day is abandoned, lest something too frank
should again be said; and they tell me here, with a laugh, "I fancy
you have assisted at the first and last popular dinner." Thus we may
see that the liberty of Rome does not yet advance with seven-leagued
boots; and the new Romulus will need to be prepared for deeds at least
as bold as his predecessor, if he is to open a new order of things.

I cannot well wind up my gossip on this subject better than by
translating a passage from the programme of the _Contemporaneo_, which
represents the hope of Rome at this moment. It is conducted by men of
well-known talent.

"The _Contemporaneo_ (Contemporary) is a journal of progress, but
tempered, as the good and wise think best, in conformity with the
will of our best of princes, and the wants and expectations of the
public....

"Through discussion it desires to prepare minds to receive reforms so
soon and far as they are favored by the law of _opportunity_.

"Every attempt which is made contrary to this social law must fail. It
is vain to hope fruits from a tree out of season, and equally in vain
to introduce the best measures into a country not prepared to receive
them."

And so on. I intended to have translated in full the programme,
but time fails, and the law of opportunity does not favor, as my
"opportunity" leaves for London this afternoon. I have given enough to
mark the purport of the whole. It will easily be seen that it was
not from the platform assumed by the _Contemporaneo_ that Lycurgus
legislated, or Socrates taught,--that the Christian religion was
propagated, or the Church, was reformed by Luther. The opportunity
that the martyrs found here in the Colosseum, from whose blood grew
up this great tree of Papacy, was not of the kind waited for by these
moderate progressists. Nevertheless, they may be good schoolmasters
for Italy, and are not to be disdained in these piping times of peace.

More anon, of old and new, from Tuscany.




LETTER XV.

ITALY.--FRUITS AND FLOWERS ON THE ROUTE FROM FLORENCE TO ROME.--THE
PLAIN OF UMBRIA.--ASSISI.--THE SAINTS.--TUITION IN SCHOOLS.--PIUS
IX.--THE ETRURIAN TOMB.--PERUGIA AND ITS STORES OF EARLY
ART.--PORTRAITS OF RAPHAEL.--FLORENCE.--THE GRAND DUKE AND HIS
POLICY.--THE LIBERTY OF THE PRESS AND ITS INFLUENCE.--THE AMERICAN
SCULPTORS.--GREENOUGH AND HIS NEW WORKS.--POWERS.--HIS STATUE OF
CALHOUN.--REVIEW OF HIS ENDEAVORS.--THE FESTIVALS OF ST. JOHN AT
FLORENCE.--BOLOGNA.--FEMALE PROFESSORS IN ITS UNIVERSITY.--MATILDA
TAMBRONI AND OTHERS.--MILAN AND HER FEMALE MATHEMATICIAN.--THE STATE
OF WOMAN IN ITALY.--RAVENNA AND BYRON.--VENICE.--THE ADDA.--MILAN AND
ITS NEIGHBORHOOD, AND MANZONI.--EXCITEMENTS.--NATIONAL AFFAIRS.


Milan, August 9, 1847.

Since leaving Rome, I have not been able to steal a moment from
the rich and varied objects before me to write about them. I will,
therefore, take a brief retrospect of the ground.

I passed from Florence to Rome by the Perugia route, and saw for the
first time the Italian vineyards. The grapes hung in little clusters.
When I return, they will be full of light and life, but the fields
will not be so enchantingly fresh, nor so enamelled with flowers.

The profusion of red poppies, which dance on every wall and glitter
throughout the grass, is a great ornament to the landscape. In full
sunlight their vermilion is most beautiful. Well might Ceres gather
_such_ poppies to mingle with her wheat.

We climbed the hill to Assisi, and my ears thrilled as with many old
remembered melodies, when an old peasant, in sonorous phrase, bade
me look out and see the plain of Umbria. I looked back and saw
the carriage toiling up the steep path, drawn by a pair of those
light-colored oxen Shelley so much admired. I stood near the spot
where Goethe met with a little adventure, which he has described with
even more than his usual delicate humor. Who can ever be alone for a
moment in Italy? Every stone has a voice, every grain of dust seems
instinct with spirit from the Past, every step recalls some line, some
legend of long-neglected lore.

Assisi was exceedingly charming to me. So still!--all temporal noise
and bustle seem hushed down yet by the presence of the saint. So
clean!--the rains of heaven wash down all impurities into the valley.
I must confess that, elsewhere, I have shared the feelings of Dickens
toward St. Francis and St. Sebastian, as the "Mounseer Tonsons" of
Catholic art. St. Sebastian I have not been so tired of, for the
beauty and youth of the figure make the monotony with which the
subject of his martyrdom is treated somewhat less wearisome. But St.
Francis is so sad, and so ecstatic, and so brown, so entirely the
monk,--and St. Clara so entirely the nun! I have been very sorry for
her that he was able to draw her from the human to the heavenly life;
she seems so sad and so worn out by the effort. But here at Assisi,
one cannot help being penetrated by the spirit that flowed from that
life. Here is the room where his father shut up the boy to punish his
early severity of devotion. Here is the picture which represents him
despoiled of all outward things, even his garments,--devoting himself,
body and soul, to the service of God in the way he believed most
acceptable. Here is the underground chapel, where rest those weary
bones, saluted by the tears of so many weary pilgrims who have come
hither to seek strength from his example. Here are the churches above,
full of the works of earlier art, animated by the contagion of a great
example. It is impossible not to bow the head, and feel how mighty an
influence flows from a single soul, sincere in its service of truth,
in whatever form that truth comes to it.

A troop of neat, pretty school-girls attended us about, going with
us into the little chapels adorned with pictures which open at every
corner of the streets, smiling on us at a respectful distance. Some of
them were fourteen or fifteen years old. I found reading, writing, and
sewing were all they learned at their school; the first, indeed, they
knew well enough, if they could ever get books to use it on. Tranquil
as Assisi was, on every wall was read _Viva Pio IX.!_ and we found the
guides and workmen in the shop full of a vague hope from him. The old
love which has made so rich this aerial cradle of St. Francis glows
warm as ever in the breasts of men; still, as ever, they long for
hero-worship, and shout aloud at the least appearance of an object.

The church at the foot of the hill, Santa Maria degli Angeli, seems
tawdry after Assisi. It also is full of records of St. Francis, his
pains and his triumphs. Here, too, on a little chapel, is the famous
picture by Overbeck; too exact a copy, but how different in effect
from the early art we had just seen above! Harmonious but frigid,
grave but dull; childhood is beautiful, but not when continued, or
rather transplanted, into the period where we look for passion, varied
means, and manly force.

Before reaching Perugia, I visited an Etrurian tomb, which is a little
way off the road; it is said to be one of the finest in Etruria. The
hill-side is full of them, but excavations are expensive, and not
frequent. The effect of this one was beyond my expectations; in it
were several female figures, very dignified and calm, as the dim
lamp-light fell on them by turns. The expression of these figures
shows that the position of woman in these states was noble. Their
eagles' nests cherished well the female eagle who kept watch in the
eyrie.

Perugia too is on a noble hill. What a daily excitement such a view,
taken at every step! life is worth ten times as much in a city so
situated. Perugia is full, overflowing, with the treasures of early
art. I saw them so rapidly it seems now as if in a trance, yet
certainly with a profit, a manifold gain, such as Mahomet thought he
gained from his five minutes' visits to other spheres. Here are two
portraits of Raphael as a youth: it is touching to see what effect
this angel had upon all that surrounded him from the very first.

Florence! I was there a month, and in a sense saw Florence: that is to
say, I took an inventory of what is to be seen there, and not without
great intellectual profit. There is too much that is really admirable
in art,--the nature of its growth lies before you too clearly to be
evaded. Of such things more elsewhere.

I do not like Florence as I do cities more purely Italian. The natural
character is ironed out here, and done up in a French pattern; yet
there is no French vivacity, nor Italian either. The Grand Duke--more
and more agitated by the position in which he finds himself between
the influence of the Pope and that of Austria--keeps imploring and
commanding his people to keep still, and they _are_ still and glum
as death. This is all on the outside; within, Tuscany burns. Private
culture has not been in vain, and there is, in a large circle, mental
preparation for a very different state of things from the present,
with an ardent desire to diffuse the same amid the people at large.
The sovereign has been obliged for the present to give more liberty to
the press, and there is an immediate rush of thought to the new vent;
if it is kept open a few months, the effect on the body of the people
cannot fail to be great. I intended to have translated some passages
from the programme of the _Patria_, one of the papers newly started
at Florence, but time fails. One of the articles in the same number by
Lambruschini, on the duties of the clergy at this juncture, contains
views as liberal as can be found in print anywhere in the world. More
of these things when I return to Rome in the autumn, when I hope to
find a little leisure to think over what I have seen, and, if found
worthy, to put the result in writing.

I visited the studios of our sculptors; Greenough has in clay a David
which promises high beauty and nobleness, a bass-relief, full of grace
and tender expression; he is also modelling a head of Napoleon, and
justly enthusiastic in the study. His great group I did not see in
such a state as to be secure of my impression. The face of the Pioneer
is very fine, the form of the woman graceful and expressive; but I was
not satisfied with the Indian. I shall see it more as a whole on my
return to Florence.

As to the Eve and the Greek Slave, I could only join with the rest of
the world in admiration of their beauty and the fine feeling of nature
which they exhibit. The statue of Calhoun is full of power, simple,
and majestic in attitude and expression. In busts Powers seems to
me unrivalled; still, he ought not to spend his best years on an
employment which cannot satisfy his ambition nor develop his powers.
If our country loves herself, she will order from him some great work
before the prime of his genius has been frittered away, and his best
years spent on lesser things.

I saw at Florence the festivals of St. John, but they are poor affairs
to one who has seen the Neapolitan and Roman people on such occasions.

Passing from Florence, I came to Bologna,--learned Bologna; indeed an
Italian city, full of expression, of physiognomy, so to speak. A woman
should love Bologna, for there has the spark of intellect in woman
been cherished with reverent care. Not in former ages only, but in
this, Bologna raised a woman who was worthy to the dignities of its
University, and in their Certosa they proudly show the monument to
Matilda Tambroni, late Greek Professor there. Her letters, preserved
by her friends, are said to form a very valuable collection. In their
anatomical hall is the bust of a woman, Professor of Anatomy. In Art
they have had Properzia di Rossi, Elizabetta Sirani, Lavinia Fontana,
and delight to give their works a conspicuous place.

In other cities the men alone have their _Casino dei Nobili_, where
they give balls, _conversazioni_, and similar entertainments. Here
women have one, and are the soul of society.

In Milan, also, I see in the Ambrosian Library the bust of a female
mathematician. These things make me feel that, if the state of woman
in Italy is so depressed, yet a good-will toward a better is not
wholly wanting. Still more significant is the reverence to the Madonna
and innumerable female saints, who, if, like St. Teresa, they had
intellect as well as piety, became counsellors no less than comforters
to the spirit of men.

Ravenna, too, I saw, and its old Christian art, the Pineta, where
Byron loved to ride, and the paltry apartments where, cheered by a new
affection, in which was more of tender friendship than of passion, he
found himself less wretched than at beautiful Venice or stately Genoa.

All the details of this visit to Ravenna are pretty. I shall write
them out some time. Of Padua, too, the little to be said should be
said in detail.

Of Venice and its enchanted life I could not speak; it should only
be echoed back in music. There only I began to feel in its fulness
Venetian Art. It can only be seen in its own atmosphere. Never had I
the least idea of what is to be seen at Venice. It seems to me as if
no one ever yet had seen it,--so entirely wanting is any expression
of what I felt myself. Venice! on this subject I shall not write much
till time, place, and mode agree to make it fit.

Venice, where all is past, is a fit asylum for the dynasties of the
Past. The Duchesse de Berri owns one of the finest palaces on the
Grand Canal; the Duc de Bordeaux rents another; Mademoiselle Taglioni
has bought the famous Casa d'Oro, and it is under repair. Thanks to
the fashion which has made Venice a refuge of this kind, the palaces,
rarely inhabited by the representatives of their ancient names, are
valuable property, and the noble structures will not be suffered
to lapse into the sea, above which they rose so proudly.
The restorations, too, are made with excellent taste and
judgment,--nothing is spoiled. Three of these fine palaces are now
hotels, so that the transient visitor can enjoy from their balconies
all the wondrous shows of the Venetian night and day as much as any
of their former possessors did. I was at the Europa, formerly the
Giustiniani Palace, with better air than those on the Grand Canal, and
a more unobstructed view than Danieli's.

Madame de Berri gave an entertainment on the birthnight of her son,
and the old Duchesse d'Angoulême came from Vienna to attend it. 'T
was a scene of fairy-land, the palace full of light, so that from the
canal could be seen even the pictures on the walls. Landing from the
gondolas, the elegantly dressed ladies and gentlemen seemed to rise
from the water; we also saw them glide up the great stair, rustling
their plumes, and in the reception-rooms make and receive the
customary grimaces. A fine band stationed on the opposite side of the
canal played the while, and a flotilla of gondolas lingered there to
listen. I, too, amid, the mob, a pleasant position in Venice alone,
thought of the Stuarts, Bourbons, Bonapartes, here in Italy, and
offered up a prayer that other names, when the possessors have power
without the heart to use it for the emancipation of mankind, might he
added to the list, and other princes, more rich in blood than brain,
might come to enjoy a perpetual _villeggiatura_ in Italy. It did not
seem to me a cruel wish. The show of greatness will satisfy every
legitimate desire of such minds. A gentle punishment for the
distributors of _letters de cachet_ and Spielberg dungeons to their
fellow-men.

Having passed more than a fortnight at Venice, I have come here,
stopping at Vicenza, Verona, Mantua, Lago di Garda, Brescia.
Certainly I have learned more than ever in any previous ten days of my
existence, and have formed an idea what is needed for the study of Art
and its history in these regions. To be sure, I shall never have time
to follow it up, but it is a delight to look up those glorious vistas,
even when there is no hope of entering them.

A violent shower obliged me to stop on the way. It was late at night,
and I was nearly asleep, when, roused by the sound of bubbling waters,
I started up and asked, "Is that the Adda?" and it was. So deep is
the impression made by a simple natural recital, like that of Renzo's
wanderings in the _Promessi Sposi_, that the memory of his hearing the
Adda in this way occurred to me at once, and the Adda seemed familiar
as if I had been a native of this region.

As the Scottish lakes seem the domain of Walter Scott, so does Milan
and its neighborhood in the mind of a foreigner belong to Manzoni. I
have seen him since, the gentle lord of this wide domain; his hair is
white, but his eyes still beam as when he first saw the apparitions of
truth, simple tenderness, and piety which he has so admirably recorded
for our benefit. Those around lament that the fastidiousness of his
taste prevents his completing and publishing more, and that thus
a treasury of rare knowledge and refined thought will pass from
us without our reaping the benefit. We, indeed, have no title to
complain, what we do possess from his hand is so excellent.

At this moment there is great excitement in Italy. A supposed spy
of Austria has been assassinated at Ferrara, and Austrian troops are
marched there. It is pretended that a conspiracy has been discovered
in Rome; the consequent disturbances have been put down. The National
Guard is forming. All things seem to announce that some important
change is inevitable here, but what? Neither Radicals nor Moderates
dare predict with confidence, and I am yet too much a stranger
to speak with assurance of impressions I have received. But it is
impossible not to hope.




LETTER XVI.

REVIEW OF PAST AND PRESENT.--THE MERITS OF ITALIAN
LITERATURE.--MANZONI.--ITALIAN DIALECTS.--MILAN, THE MILANESE, AND
THE SIMPLICITY OF THEIR LANGUAGE.--THE NORTH OF ITALY, AND A TOUR TO
SWITZERLAND.--ITALIAN LAKES.--MAGGIORE, COMO, AND LUGANO.--LAGO DI
GARDA.--THE BOATMEN OF THE LAKES AND THE GONDOLIERS.--LADY FRANKLIN,
WIDOW OF THE NAVIGATOR.--RETURN TO AND FESTIVALS AT MILAN.--THE
ARCHBISHOP.--AUSTRIAN RULE AND AUSTRIAN POLICY.--THE FUTURE HOPES OF
ITALY.--A GLANCE AT PAVIA, FLORENCE, PARMA, AND BOLOGNA, AND THE WORKS
OF THE MASTERS.


Rome, October, 1847.

I think my last letter was from Milan, and written after I had seen
Manzoni. This was to me a great pleasure. I have now seen the most
important representatives who survive of the last epoch in thought.
Our age has still its demonstrations to make, its heroes and poets to
crown.

Although the modern Italian literature is not poor, as many persons at
a distance suppose, but, on the contrary, surprisingly rich in tokens
of talent, if we consider the circumstances under which it struggles
to exist, yet very few writers have or deserve a European or American
reputation. Where a whole country is so kept down, her best minds
cannot take the lead in the progress of the age; they have too much to
suffer, too much to explain. But among the few who, through depth of
spiritual experience and the beauty of form in which it is expressed,
belong not only to Italy, but to the world, Manzoni takes a high
rank. The passive virtues he teaches are no longer what is wanted; the
manners he paints with so delicate a fidelity are beginning to change;
but the spirit of his works,--the tender piety, the sensibility to the
meaning of every humblest form of life, the delicate humor and satire
so free from disdain,--these are immortal.

Young Italy rejects Manzoni, though not irreverently; Young Italy
prizes his works, but feels that the doctrine of "Pray and wait" is
not for her at this moment,--that she needs a more fervent hope, a
more active faith. She is right.

It is well known that the traveller, if he knows the Italian language
as written in books, the standard Tuscan, still finds himself a
stranger in many parts of Italy, unable to comprehend the dialects,
with their lively abbreviations and witty slang. That of Venice I had
understood somewhat, and could enter into the drollery and _naïveté_
of the gondoliers, who, as a class, have an unusual share of
character. But the Milanese I could not at first understand at all.
Their language seemed to me detestably harsh, and their gestures
unmeaning. But after a friend, who possesses that large and ready
sympathy easier found in Italy than anywhere else, had translated for
me verbatim into French some of the poems written in the Milanese,
and then read them aloud in the original, I comprehended the peculiar
inflection of voice and idiom in the people, and was charmed with it,
as one is with the instinctive wit and wisdom of children.

There is very little to see at Milan, compared with any other Italian
city; and this was very fortunate for me, allowing an interval
of repose in the house, which I cannot take when there is so much
without, tempting me to incessant observation and study. I went
through, the North of Italy with a constantly increasing fervor of
interest. When I had thought of Italy, it was always of the South, of
the Roman States, of Tuscany. But now I became deeply interested in
the history, the institutions, the art of the North. The fragments
of the past mark the progress of its waves so clearly, I learned to
understand, to prize them every day more, to know how to make use of
the books about them. I shall have much to say on these subjects some
day.

Leaving Milan, I went on the Lago Maggiore, and afterward into
Switzerland. Of this tour I shall not speak here; it was a beautiful
little romance by itself, and infinitely refreshing to be so near
nature in these grand and simple forms, after so much exciting thought
of Art and Man. The day passed in the St. Bernardin, with its lofty
peaks and changing lights upon the distant snows,--its holy, exquisite
valleys and waterfalls, its stories of eagles and chamois, was the
greatest refreshment I ever experienced: it was bracing as a cold bath
after the heat of a crowd amid which one has listened to some most
eloquent oration.

Returning from Switzerland, I passed a fortnight on the Lake of
Como, and afterward visited Lugano. There is no exaggeration in the
enthusiastic feeling with which artists and poets have viewed these
Italian lakes. Their beauties are peculiar, enchanting, innumerable.
The Titan of Richter, the Wanderjahre of Goethe, the Elena of Taylor,
the pictures of Turner, had not prepared me for the visions of beauty
that daily entranced the eyes and heart in those regions. To our
country Nature has been most bounteous; but we have nothing in the
same kind that can compare with these lakes, as seen under the Italian
heaven. As to those persons who have pretended to discover that the
effects of light and atmosphere were no finer than they found in our
own lake scenery, I can only say that they must be exceedingly obtuse
in organization,--a defect not uncommon among Americans.

Nature seems to have labored to express her full heart in as many
ways as possible, when she made these lakes, moulded and planted their
shores. Lago Maggiore is grand, resplendent in Its beauty; the view of
the Alps gives a sort of lyric exaltation to the scene. Lago di Garda
is so soft and fair,--so glittering sweet on one side, the ruins of
ancient palaces rise so softly with the beauties of that shore; but
at the other end, amid the Tyrol, it is sublime, calm, concentrated
in its meaning. Como cannot be better described in general than in the
words of Taylor:

  "Softly sublime, profusely fair."

Lugano is more savage, more free in its beauty. I was on it in a
high gale; there was a little clanger, just enough to exhilarate; its
waters were wild, and clouds blowing across the neighboring peaks. I
like very much the boatmen on these lakes; they have strong and prompt
character. Of simple features, they are more honest and manly than
Italian men are found in the thoroughfares; their talk is not so witty
as that of the Venetian gondoliers, but picturesque, and what the
French call _incisive_. Very touching were some of their histories, as
they told them to me while pausing sometimes on the lake.

On this lake, also, I met Lady Franklin, wife of the celebrated
navigator. She has been in the United States, and showed equal
penetration and candor in remarks on what she had seen there. She gave
me interesting particulars as to the state of things in Van Diemen's
Land, where she passed seven years when her husband was in authority
there.

I returned to Milan for the great feast of the Madonna, 8th September,
and those made for the Archbishop's entry, which took place the same
week. These excited as much feeling as the Milanese can have a chance
to display, this Archbishop being much nearer tire public heart than
his predecessor, who was a poor servant of Austria.

The Austrian rule is always equally hated, and time, instead of
melting away differences, only makes them more glaring. The Austrian
race have no faculties that can ever enable them to understand the
Italian character; their policy, so well contrived to palsy and
repress for a time, cannot kill, and there is always a force at work
underneath which shall yet, and I think now before long, shake off
the incubus. The Italian nobility have always kept the invader at a
distance; they have not been at all seduced or corrupted by the lures
of pleasure or power, but have shown a passive patriotism highly
honorable to them. In the middle class ferments much thought, and
there is a capacity for effort; in the present system it cannot show
itself, but it is there; thought ferments, and will yet produce a
wine that shall set the Lombard veins on fire when the time for action
shall arrive. The lower classes of the population are in a dull state
indeed. The censorship of the press prevents all easy, natural ways of
instructing them; there are no public meetings, no free access to them
by more instructed and aspiring minds. The Austrian policy is to allow
them a degree of material well-being, and though so much wealth is
drained from, the country for the service of the foreigners, jet
enough must remain on these rich plains comfortably to feed and clothe
the inhabitants. Yet the great moral influence of the Pope's action,
though obstructed in their case, does reach and rouse them, and they,
too, felt the thrill of indignation at the occupation of Ferrara. The
base conduct of the police toward the people, when, at Milan, some
youths were resolute to sing tire hymn in honor of Pius IX., when the
feasts for the Archbishop afforded so legitimate an occasion, roused
all the people to unwonted feeling. The nobles protested, and Austria
had not courage to persist as usual. She could not sustain her police,
who rushed upon a defenceless crowd, that had no share in what excited
their displeasure, except by sympathy, and, driving them like sheep,
wounded them _in the backs_. Austria feels that there is now no
sympathy for her in these matters; that it is not the interest of the
world to sustain her. Her policy is, indeed, too thoroughly organized
to change except by revolution; its scope is to serve, first, a
reigning family instead of the people; second, with the people to
seek a physical in preference to an intellectual good; and, third,
to prefer a seeming outward peace to an inward life. This policy may
change its opposition from the tyrannical to the insidious; it can
know no other change. Yet do I meet persons who call themselves
Americans,--miserable, thoughtless Esaus, unworthy their high
birthright,--who think that a mess of pottage can satisfy the wants of
man, and that the Viennese listening to Strauss's waltzes, the Lombard
peasant supping full of his polenta, is _happy enough_. Alas: I have
the more reason to be ashamed of my countrymen that it is not among
the poor, who have so much, toil that there is little time to think,
but those who are rich, who travel,--in body that is, they do not
travel in mind. Absorbed at home by the lust of gain, the love of
show, abroad they see only the equipages, the fine clothes, the
food,--they have no heart for the idea, for the destiny of our own
great nation: how can they feel the spirit that is struggling now in
this and others of Europe?

But of the hopes of Italy I will write more fully in another letter,
and state what I have seen, what felt, what thought. I went from
Milan, to Pavia, and saw its magnificent Certosa, I passed several
hours in examining its riches, especially the sculptures of its
façade, full of force and spirit. I then went to Florence by Parma
and Bologna. In Parma, though ill, I went to see all the works of the
masters. A wonderful beauty it is that informs them,--not that which
is the chosen food of my soul, yet a noble beauty, and which did its
message to me also. Those works are failing; it will not be useless to
describe them in a book. Beside these pictures, I saw nothing in Parma
and Modena; these states are obliged to hold their breath while their
poor, ignorant sovereigns skulk in corners, hoping to hide from the
coming storm. Of all this more in my next.




LETTER XVII.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF ROME IN THE SPRING.--THE POPE.--ROME AS
A CAPITAL.--TUSCANY.--THE LIBERTY OF THE PRESS THERE JUST
ESTABLISHED.--THE ENLIGHTENED MINDS AND AVAILABLE INSTRUCTORS OF
TUSCANY.--ITALIAN ESTIMATION OF PIUS IX., AND THE INFLUENCE,
PRESENT AND FUTURE, OF HIS LABORS.--FOREIGN INTRUSION THE CURSE OF
ITALY.--IRRUPTION OF THE AUSTRIANS INTO ITALY, AND ITS EFFECTS.--LOUIS
PHILIPPE'S APOSTASY TURNED TO THE ADVANTAGE OF FREEDOM.--THE GREAT
FÊTE AT FLORENCE IN HONOR OF THE GRANT OF A NATIONAL GUARD.--THE
AMERICAN SCULPTORS, GREENOUGH, CRAWFORD, AND THEIR PARTICIPATION IN
THE FÊTE.--AMERICANS GENERALLY IN ITALY.--HYMNS IN FLORENCE IN HONOR
OF PIUS IX.--HAPPY AUGURY TO BE DRAWN FROM THE WISE DOCILITY OF THE
PEOPLE.--AN EXPRESSION OF SYMPATHY FROM AMERICA TOWARD ITALY EARNESTLY
HOPED FOR.


Rome, October 18, 1847.

In the spring, when I came to Rome, the people were in the
intoxication of joy at the first serious measures of reform taken
by the Pope. I saw with pleasure their childlike joy and trust. With
equal pleasure I saw the Pope, who has not in his expression the signs
of intellectual greatness so much as of nobleness and tenderness of
heart, of large and liberal sympathies. Heart had spoken to heart
between the prince and the people; it was beautiful to see the
immediate good influence exerted by human feeling and generous
designs, on the part of a ruler. He had wished to be a father, and
the Italians, with that readiness of genius that characterizes them,
entered at once into the relation; they, the Roman people, stigmatized
by prejudice as so crafty and ferocious, showed themselves children,
eager to learn, quick to obey, happy to confide.

Still doubts were always present whether all this joy was not
premature. The task undertaken by the Pope seemed to present
insuperable difficulties. It is never easy to put new wine into old
bottles, and our age is one where all things tend to a great crisis;
not merely to revolution, but to radical reform. From the people
themselves the help must come, and not from princes; in the new state
of things, there will be none but natural princes, great men. From the
aspirations of the general heart, from the teachings of conscience
in individuals, and not from an old ivy-covered church long since
undermined, corroded by time and gnawed by vermin, the help must come.
Rome, to resume her glory, must cease to be an ecclesiastical capital;
must renounce all this gorgeous mummery, whose poetry, whose picture,
charms no one more than myself, but whose meaning is all of the past,
and finds no echo in the future. Although I sympathized warmly with
the warm love of the people, the adulation of leading writers, who
were so willing to take all from the hand of the prince, of the
Church, as a gift and a bounty, instead of implying steadily that it
was the right of the people, was very repulsive to me. The moderate
party, like all who, in a transition state, manage affairs with a
constant eye to prudence, lacks dignity always in its expositions; it
is disagreeable and depressing to read them.

Passing into Tuscany, I found the liberty of the press just
established, and a superior preparation to make use of it. The _Alba_,
the _Patria_, were begun, and have been continued with equal judgment
and spirit. Their aim is to educate the youth, to educate the
lower people; they see that this is to be done by promoting thought
fearlessly, yet urge temperance in action, while the time is yet so
difficult, and many of its signs dubious. They aim at breaking down
those barriers between the different states of Italy, relics of a
barbarous state of polity, artificially kept up by the craft of her
foes. While anxious not to break down what is really native to the
Italian character,--defences and differences that give individual
genius a chance to grow and the fruits of each region to ripen in
their natural way,--they aim at a harmony of spirit as to measures
of education and for the affairs of business, without which Italy can
never, as one nation, present a front strong enough to resist foreign
robbery, and for want of which so much time and talent are wasted
here, and internal development almost wholly checked.

There is in Tuscany a large corps of enlightened minds, well prepared
to be the instructors, the elder brothers and guardians, of the lower
people, and whose hearts burn to fulfil that noble office. Before, it
had been almost impossible to them, for the reasons I have named in
speaking of Lombardy; but during these last four months that the way
has been opened by the freedom of the press, and establishment of the
National Guard,--so valuable, first of all, as giving occasion for
public meetings and free interchange of thought between the different
classes,--it is surprising how much light they have been able to
diffuse.

A Bolognese, to whom I observed, "How can you be so full of trust when
all your hopes depend, not on the recognition of principles and wants
throughout the people, but on the life of one mortal man?" replied:
"Ah! but you don't consider that his life gives us a chance to effect
that recognition. If Pius IX. be spared to us five years, it will
be impossible for his successors ever to take a backward course. Our
nation is of a genius so vivacious,--we are unhappy, but not stupid,
we Italians,--we can learn as much in two months as other nations in
twenty years." This seemed to me no brag when I returned to Tuscany
and saw the great development and diffusion of thought that had taken
place during my brief absence. The Grand Duke, a well-intentioned,
though dull man, had dared, to declare himself "_an_ ITALIAN _prince_"
and the heart of Tuscany had bounded with hope. It is now deeply as
justly felt that _the_ curse of Italy is foreign intrusion; that
if she could dispense with foreign aid, and be free from foreign
aggression, she would find the elements of salvation within herself.
All her efforts tend that way, to re-establish the natural position of
things; may Heaven grant them success! For myself, I believe they will
attain it. I see more reason for hope, as I know more of the people.
Their rash and baffled struggles have taught them prudence; they are
wanted in the civilized world as a peculiar influence; their leaders
are thinking men, their cause is righteous. I believe that Italy will
revive to new life, and probably a greater, one more truly rich and
glorious, than at either epoch of her former greatness.

During the period of my absence, the Austrians had entered Ferrara.
It is well that they hazarded this step, for it showed them the
difficulties in acting against a prince of the Church who is at the
same time a friend to the people. The position was new, and they were
probably surprised at the result,--surprised at the firmness of the
Pope, surprised at the indignation, tempered by calm resolve, on the
part of the Italians. Louis Philippe's mean apostasy has this
time turned to the advantage of freedom. He renounced the good
understanding with England which it had been one of the leading
features of his policy to maintain, in the hope of aggrandizing and
enriching his family (not France, he did not care for France); he did
not know that he was paving the way for Italian freedom. England now
is led to play a part a little nearer her pretensions as the guardian
of progress than she often comes, and the ghost of La Fayette looks
down, not unappeased, to see the "Constitutional King" decried by the
subjects he has cheated and lulled so craftily. The king of Sardinia
is a worthless man, in whom nobody puts any trust so far as regards
his heart or honor; but the stress of things seems likely to keep him
on the right side. The little sovereigns blustered at first, then ran
away affrighted when they found there was really a spirit risen
at last within the charmed circle,--a spirit likely to defy, to
transcend, the spells of haggard premiers and imbecile monarchs.

I arrived in Florence, unhappily, too late for the great fête of the
12th of September, in honor of the grant of a National Guard. But
I wept at the mere recital of the events of that day, which, if it
should lead to no important results, must still be hallowed for ever
in the memory of Italy, for the great and beautiful emotions that
flooded the hearts of her children. The National Guard is hailed with
no undue joy by Italians, as the earnest of progress, the first step
toward truly national institutions and a representation of the people.
Gratitude has done its natural work in their hearts; it has made
them better. Some days before the fête were passed in reconciling
all strifes, composing all differences between cities, districts, and
individuals. They wished to drop all petty, all local differences, to
wash away all stains, to bathe and prepare for a new great covenant of
brotherly love, where each should act for the good of all. On that day
they all embraced in sign of this,--strangers, foes, all exchanged the
kiss of faith and love; they exchanged banners, as a token that they
would fight for, would animate, one another. All was done in that
beautiful poetic manner peculiar to this artist people; but it was the
spirit, so great and tender, that melts my heart to think of. It was
the spirit of true religion,--such, my Country! as, welling freshly
from some great hearts in thy early hours, won for thee all of value
that thou canst call thy own, whose groundwork is the assertion, still
sublime though thou hast not been true to it, that all men have equal
rights, and that these are _birth_-rights, derived from God alone.

I rejoice to say that the Americans took their share on this occasion,
and that Greenough--one of the few Americans who, living in Italy,
takes the pains to know whether it is alive or dead, who penetrates
beyond the cheats of tradesmen and the cunning of a mob corrupted
by centuries of slavery, to know the real mind, the vital blood, of
Italy--took a leading part. I am sorry to say that a large portion of
my countrymen here take the same slothful and prejudiced view as the
English, and, after many years' sojourn, betray entire ignorance of
Italian literature and Italian life, beyond what is attainable in a
month's passage through the thoroughfares. However, they did show,
this time, a becoming spirit, and erected the American eagle where
its cry ought to be heard from afar,--where a nation is striving
for independent existence, and a government representing the people.
Crawford here in Rome has had the just feeling to join the Guard, and
it is a real sacrifice for an artist to spend time on the exercises;
but it well becomes the sculptor of Orpheus,--of him who had such
faith, such music of divine thought, that he made the stones move,
turned the beasts from their accustomed haunts, and shamed hell itself
into sympathy with the grief of love. I do not deny that such a spirit
is wanted here in Italy; it is everywhere, if anything great, anything
permanent, is to be done. In reference to what I have said of many
Americans in Italy, I will only add, that they talk about the corrupt
and degenerate state of Italy as they do about that of our slaves at
home. They come ready trained to that mode of reasoning which affirms
that, because men are degraded by bad institutions, they are not fit
for better.

As to the English, some of them are full of generous, intelligent
sympathy;--indeed what is more solidly, more wisely good than the
right sort of Englishmen!--but others are like a gentleman I travelled
with the other day, a man of intelligence and refinement too as to the
details of life and outside culture, who observed, that he did not
see what the Italians wanted of a National Guard, unless to wear these
little caps. He was a man who had passed five years in Italy, but
always covered with that non-conductor called by a witty French writer
"the Britannic fluid."

Very sweet to my ear was the continual hymn in the streets of
Florence, in honor of Pius IX. It is the Roman hymn, and none of the
new ones written in Tuscany have been able to take its place. The
people thank the Grand Duke when he does them good, but they know well
from whose mind that good originates, and all their love is for the
Pope. Time presses, or I would fain describe in detail the troupe of
laborers of the lower class, marching home at night, keeping step as
if they were in the National Guard, filling the air, and cheering the
melancholy moon, by the patriotic hymns sung with the mellow tone and
in the perfect time which belong to Italians. I would describe the
extempore concerts in the streets, the rejoicings at the theatres,
where the addresses of liberal souls to the people, through that best
vehicle, the drama, may now be heard. But I am tired; what I have to
write would fill volumes, and my letter must go. I will only add
some words upon the happy augury I draw from the wise docility of the
people. With what readiness they listened to wise counsel, and the
hopes of the Pope that they would give no advantage to his enemies, at
a time when they were so fevered by the knowledge that conspiracy
was at work in their midst! That was a time of trial. On all these
occasions of popular excitement their conduct is like music, in such
order, and with such union of the melody of feeling with discretion
where to stop; but what is wonderful is that they acted in the same
manner on that difficult occasion. The influence of the Pope here is
without bounds; he can always calm the crowd at once. But in Tuscany,
where they have no such idol, they listened in the same way on a very
trying occasion. The first announcement of the regulation for the
Tuscan National Guard terribly disappointed the people; they felt that
the Grand Duke, after suffering them to demonstrate such trust and joy
on the feast of the 12th, did not really trust, on his side; that he
meant to limit them all he could. They felt baffled, cheated; hence
young men in anger tore down at once the symbols of satisfaction and
respect; but the leading men went among the people, begged them to be
calm, and wait till a deputation had seen the Grand Duke. The people,
listening at once to men who, they were sure, had at heart their best
good, waited; the Grand Duke became convinced, and all ended without
disturbance. If they continue to act thus, their hopes cannot be
baffled. Certainly I, for one, do not think that the present road will
suffice to lead Italy to her goal. But it _is_ an onward, upward road,
and the people learn as they advance. Now they can seek and think
fearless of prisons and bayonets, a healthy circulation of blood
begins, and the heart frees itself from disease.

I earnestly hope for some expression of sympathy from my country
toward Italy. Take a good chance and do something; you have shown much
good feeling toward the Old World in its physical difficulties,--you
ought to do still more in its spiritual endeavor. This cause is
OURS, above all others; we ought to show that we feel it to be so. At
present there is no likelihood of war, but in case of it I trust the
United States would not fail in some noble token of sympathy toward
this country. The soul of our nation need not wait for its government;
these things are better done by individuals. I believe some in the
United States will pay attention to these words of mine, will feel
that I am not a person to be kindled by a childish, sentimental
enthusiasm, but that I must be sure I have seen something of Italy
before speaking as I do. I have been here only seven months, but my
means of observation have been uncommon. I have been ardently desirous
to judge fairly, and had no prejudices to prevent; beside, I was not
ignorant of the history and literature of Italy, and had some common
ground on which to stand with, its inhabitants, and hear what they
have to say. In many ways Italy is of kin to us; she is the country
of Columbus, of Amerigo, of Cabot. It would please me much to see a
cannon here bought by the contributions of Americans, at whose head
should stand the name of Cabot, to be used by the Guard for salutes
on festive occasions, if they should be so happy as to have no
more serious need. In Tuscany they are casting one to be called the
"Gioberti," from a writer who has given a great impulse to the present
movement. I should like the gift of America to be called the AMERIGO,
the COLUMBO, or the WASHINGTON. Please think of this, some of my
friends, who still care for the eagle, the Fourth of July, and the old
cries of hope and honor. See if there are any objections that I do not
think of, and do something if it is well and brotherly. Ah! America,
with all thy rich boons, thou hast a heavy account to render for the
talent given; see in every way that thou be not found wanting.




LETTER XVIII.

REFLECTIONS FOR THE NEW YEAR.--AMERICANS IN EUROPE.--FRANCE, ENGLAND,
POLAND, ITALY, RUSSIA, AUSTRIA,--THEIR POLICY.--EUROPE TOILS AND
STRUGGLES.--ALL THINGS BODE A NEW OUTBREAK.--THE EAGLE OF
AMERICA STOOPS TO EARTH, AND SHARES THE CHARACTER OF THE
VULTURE.--ABOLITION.--THE YOUTH OF THE LAND.--ANTICIPATIONS OF THEIR
USEFULNESS.


This letter will reach the United States about the 1st of January; and
it may not be impertinent to offer a few New-Year's reflections. Every
new year, indeed, confirms the old thoughts, but also presents them
under some new aspects.

The American in Europe, if a thinking mind, can only become more
American. In some respects it is a great pleasure to be here. Although
we have an independent political existence, bur position toward
Europe, as to literature and the arts, is still that of a colony, and
one feels the same joy here that is experienced by the colonist in
returning to the parent home. What was but picture to us becomes
reality; remote allusions and derivations trouble no more: we see the
pattern of the stuff, and understand the whole tapestry. There is
a gradual clearing up on many points, and many baseless notions and
crude fancies are dropped. Even the post-haste passage of the business
American through the great cities, escorted by cheating couriers
and ignorant _valets de place_, unable to hold intercourse with the
natives of the country, and passing all his leisure hours with his
countrymen, who know no more than himself, clears his mind of some
mistakes,--lifts some mists from his horizon.

There are three species. First, the servile American,--a being utterly
shallow, thoughtless, worthless. He comes abroad to spend his money
and indulge his tastes. His object in Europe is to have fashionable
clothes, good foreign cookery, to know some titled persons, and
furnish himself with coffee-house gossip, by retailing which
among those less travelled and as uninformed as himself he can win
importance at home. I look with unspeakable contempt on this class,--a
class which has all the thoughtlessness and partiality of the
exclusive classes in Europe, without any of their refinement, or the
chivalric feeling which still sparkles among them here and there.
However, though these willing serfs in a free age do some little hurt,
and cause some annoyance at present, they cannot continue long; our
country is fated to a grand, independent existence, and, as its laws
develop, these parasites of a bygone period must wither and drop away.

Then there is the conceited American, instinctively bristling and
proud of--he knows not what. He does not see, not he, that the history
of Humanity for many centuries is likely to have produced results it
requires some training, some devotion, to appreciate and profit by.
With his great clumsy hands, only fitted to work on a steam-engine,
he seizes the old Cremona violin, makes it shriek with anguish, in his
grasp, and then declares he thought it was all humbug before he came,
and now he knows it; that there is not really any music in these old
things; that the frogs in one of our swamps make much finer, for they
are young and alive. To him the etiquettes of courts and camps, the
ritual of the Church, seem simply silly,--and no wonder, profoundly
ignorant as he is of their origin and meaning. Just so the legends
which are the subjects of pictures, the profound myths which are
represented in the antique marbles, amaze and revolt him; as, indeed,
such things need to be judged of by another standard than that of the
Connecticut Blue-Laws. He criticises severely pictures, feeling quite
sure that his natural senses are better means of judgment than the
rules of connoisseurs,--not feeling that, to see such objects, mental
vision as well as fleshly eyes are needed and that something is aimed
at in Art beyond the imitation of the commonest forms of Nature. This
is Jonathan in the sprawling state, the booby truant, not yet aspiring
enough to be a good school-boy. Yet in his folly there is meaning;
add thought and culture to his independence, and he will be a man of
might: he is not a creature without hope, like the thick-skinned dandy
of the class first specified.

The artistes form a class by themselves. Yet among them, though
seeking special aims by special means, may also be found the
lineaments of these two classes, as well as of the third, of which I
am now to speak.

This is that of the thinking American,--a man who, recognizing the
immense advantage of being born to a new world and on a virgin soil,
yet does not wish one seed from the past to be lost. He is anxious
to gather and carry back with him every plant that will bear a new
climate and new culture. Some will dwindle; others will attain a bloom
and stature unknown before. He wishes to gather them clean, free from
noxious insects, and to give them a fair trial in his new world. And
that he may know the conditions under which he may best place them in
that new world, he does not neglect to study their history in this.

The history of our planet in some moments seems so painfully mean
and little,--such terrible bafflings and failures to compensate some
brilliant successes,--such a crushing of the mass of men beneath, the
feet of a few, and these, too, often the least worthy,--such a small
drop of honey to each cup of gall, and, in many cases, so mingled that
it is never one moment in life purely tasted,--above all, so little
achieved for Humanity as a whole, such tides of war and pestilence
intervening to blot out the traces of each triumph,--that no wonder
if the strongest soul sometimes pauses aghast; no wonder if the many
indolently console themselves with gross joys and frivolous prizes.
Yes! those men _are_ worthy of admiration who can carry this cross
faithfully through fifty years; it is a great while for all the
agonies that beset a lover of good, a lover of men; it makes a soul
worthy of a speedier ascent, a more productive ministry in the next
sphere. Blessed are they who ever keep that portion of pure, generous
love with which they began life! How blessed those who have deepened
the fountains, and have enough to spare for the thirst of others! Some
such there are; and, feeling that, with all the excuses for failure,
still only the sight of those who triumph, gives a meaning to life or
makes its pangs endurable, we must arise and follow.

Eighteen hundred years of this Christian culture in these European
kingdoms, a great theme never lost sight of, a mighty idea, an
adorable history to which the hearts of men invariably cling, yet are
genuine results rare as grains of gold in the river's sandy bed! Where
is the genuine democracy to which the rights of all men are holy?
where the child-like wisdom learning all through life more and more
of the will of God? where the aversion to falsehood, in all its myriad
disguises of cant, vanity, covetousness, so clear to be read in all
the history of Jesus of Nazareth? Modern Europe is the sequel to that
history, and see this hollow England, with its monstrous wealth and
cruel poverty, its conventional life, and low, practical aims! see
this poor France, so full of talent, so adroit, yet so shallow and
glossy still, which could not escape from a false position with all
its baptism of blood! see that lost Poland, and this Italy bound down
by treacherous hands in all the force of genius! see Russia with its
brutal Czar and innumerable slaves! see Austria and its royalty that
represents nothing, and its people, who, as people, are and have
nothing! If we consider the amount of truth that has really been
spoken out in the world, and the love that has beat in private
hearts,--how genius has decked each spring-time with such splendid
flowers, conveying each one enough of instruction in its life of
harmonious energy, and how continually, unquenchably, the spark of
faith has striven to burst into flame and light up the universe,--the
public failure seems amazing, seems monstrous.

Still Europe toils and struggles with her idea, and, at this moment,
all things bode and declare a new outbreak of the fire, to destroy old
palaces of crime! May it fertilize also many vineyards! Here at this
moment a successor of St. Peter, after the lapse of near two thousand
years, is called "Utopian" by a part of this Europe, because he
strives to get some food to the mouths of the _leaner_ of his flock.
A wonderful state of things, and which leaves as the best argument
against despair, that men do not, _cannot_ despair amid such dark
experiences. And thou, my Country! wilt thou not be more true? does no
greater success await thee? All things have so conspired to teach, to
aid! A new world, a new chance, with oceans to wall in the new thought
against interference from the old!--treasures of all kinds, gold,
silver, corn, marble, to provide for every physical need! A noble,
constant, starlike soul, an Italian, led the way to thy shores, and,
in the first days, the strong, the pure, those too brave, too sincere,
for the life of the Old World, hastened to people them. A generous
struggle then shook off what was foreign, and gave the nation a
glorious start for a worthy goal. Men rocked the cradle of its hopes,
great, firm, disinterested, men, who saw, who wrote, as the basis
of all that was to be done, a statement of the rights, the _inborn_
rights of men, which, if fully interpreted and acted upon, leaves
nothing to be desired.

Yet, O Eagle! whose early flight showed this clear sight of the sun,
how often dost thou near the ground, how show the vulture in these
later days! Thou wert to be the advance-guard of humanity, the herald
of all progress; how often hast thou betrayed this high commission!
Fain would the tongue in clear, triumphant accents draw example from
thy story, to encourage the hearts of those who almost faint and die
beneath the old oppressions. But we must stammer and blush when we
speak of many things. I take pride here, that I can really say the
liberty of the press works well, and that checks and balances are
found naturally which suffice to its government. I can say that the
minds of our people are alert, and that talent has a free chance to
rise. This is much. But dare I further say that political ambition is
not as darkly sullied as in other countries? Dare I say that men of
most influence in political life are those who represent most virtue,
or even intellectual power? Is it easy to find names in that career of
which I can speak with enthusiasm? Must I not confess to a boundless
lust of gain in my country? Must I not concede the weakest vanity,
which bristles and blusters at each foolish taunt of the foreign
press, and admit that the men who make these undignified rejoinders
seek and find popularity so? Can I help admitting that there is as yet
no antidote cordially adopted, which will defend even that great, rich
country against the evils that have grown out of the commercial system
in the Old World? Can I say our social laws are generally better, or
show a nobler insight into the wants of man and woman? I do, indeed,
say what I believe, that voluntary association for improvement in
these particulars will be the grand means for my nation to grow, and
give a nobler harmony to the coming age. But it is only of a small
minority that I can say they as yet seriously take to heart these
things; that they earnestly meditate on what is wanted for their
country, for mankind,--for our cause is indeed, the cause of all
mankind at present. Could we succeed, really succeed, combine a deep
religious love with practical development, the achievements of genius
with the happiness of the multitude, we might believe man had now
reached a commanding point in his ascent, and would stumble and faint
no more. Then there is this horrible cancer of slavery, and the wicked
war that has grown out of it. How dare I speak of these things here?
I listen to the same arguments against the emancipation of Italy, that
are used against the emancipation of our blacks; the same arguments
in favor of the spoliation of Poland, as for the conquest of Mexico.
I find the cause of tyranny and wrong everywhere the same,--and lo! my
country! the darkest offender, because with the least excuse; forsworn
to the high calling with which she was called; no champion of the
rights of men, but a robber and a jailer; the scourge hid behind her
banner; her eyes fixed, not on the stars, but on the possessions of
other men.

How it pleases me here to think of the Abolitionists! I could never
endure to be with them at home, they were so tedious, often so narrow,
always so rabid and exaggerated in their tone. But, after all, they
had a high motive, something eternal in their desire and life; and if
it was not the only thing worth thinking of, it was really something
worth living and dying for, to free a great nation from such a
terrible blot, such a threatening plague. God strengthen them, and
make them wise to achieve their purpose!

I please myself, too, with remembering some ardent souls among the
American youth, who I trust will yet expand, and help to give soul to
the huge, over-fed, too hastily grown-up body. May they be constant!
"Were man but constant, he were perfect," it has been said; and it is
true that he who could be constant to those moments in which he has
been truly human, not brutal, not mechanical, is on the sure path to
his perfection, and to effectual service of the universe.

It is to the youth that hope addresses itself; to those who yet burn
with aspiration, who are not hardened in their sins. But I dare not
expect too much of them. I am not very old; yet of those who, in
life's morning, I saw touched by the light of a high hope, many have
seceded. Some have become voluptuaries; some, mere family men, who
think it quite life enough to win bread for half a dozen people,
and treat them, decently; others are lost through indolence and
vacillation. Yet some remain constant;

  "I have witnessed many a shipwreck,
  Yet still beat noble hearts."

I have found many among the youth of England, of France, of Italy,
also, full of high desire; but will they have courage and purity to
fight the battle through in the sacred, the immortal band? Of some
of them I believe it, and await the proof. If a few succeed amid the
trial, we have not lived and loved in vain.

To these, the heart and hope of my country, a happy new year! I do
not know what I have written; I have merely yielded to my feelings
in thinking of America; but something of true love must be in these
lines. Receive them kindly, my friends; it is, of itself, some merit
for printed words to be sincere.




LETTER XIX.

THE CLIMATE OF ITALY.--REVIEW OF FIRST IMPRESSIONS.--ROME IN ITS
VARIOUS ASPECTS.--THE POPE.--CEMETERY OF SANTO SPIRITO.--CEREMONIES AT
THE CHAPELS.--THE WOMEN OF ITALY.--FESTIVAL OF ST. CARLO BORROMEO.--AN
INCIDENT IN THE CHAPEL.--ENGLISH RESIDENTS IN THE SEVEN-HILLED
CITY.--MRS. TROLLOPE A RESIDENT OF FLORENCE.--THE POPE AS HE
COMMUNICATES WITH HIS PEOPLE.--THE POSITION OF AFFAIRS.--LESSER
POTENTATES.--THE INAUGURATION OF THE NEW COUNCIL.--THE CEREMONIES
THERETO APPERTAINING.--THE AMERICAN FLAG IN ROME.--A BALL.--A FEAST,
AND ITS REVERSE.--THE FUNERAL OF A COUNCILLOR.


Rome, December 17, 1847.

This 17th day of December I rise to see the floods of sunlight
blessing us, as they have almost every day since I returned to
Rome,--two months and more,--with scarce three or four days of rainy
weather. I still see the fresh roses and grapes each morning on my
table, though both these I expect to give up at Christmas.

This autumn is _something like_, as my countrymen say at home. Like
_what_, they do not say; so I always supposed they meant like their
ideal standard. Certainly this weather corresponds with mine; and
I begin to believe the climate of Italy is really what it has been
represented. Shivering here last spring in an air no better than the
cruel cast wind of Puritan Boston, I thought all the praises lavished
on

  "Italia, O Italia!"

would turn out to be figments of the brain; and that even Byron,
usually accurate beyond the conception of plodding pedants, had
deceived us when he says, you have the happiness in Italy to

  "See the sun set, sure he'll rise to-morrow,"

and not, according to a view which exercises a withering influence on
the enthusiasm of youth in my native land, be forced to regard each
pleasant day as a _weather-breeder_.

How delightful, too, is the contrast between this time and the spring
in another respect! Then I was here, like travellers in general,
expecting to be driven away in a short time. Like others, I went
through the painful process of sight-seeing, so unnatural everywhere,
so counter to the healthful methods and true life of the mind. You
rise in the morning knowing there are a great number of objects worth
knowing, which you may never have the chance to see again. You go
every day, in all moods, under all circumstances; feeling, probably,
in seeing them, the inadequacy of your preparation for understanding
or duly receiving them. This consciousness would be most valuable if
one had time to think and study, being the natural way in which the
mind is lured to cure its defects; but you have no time; you are
always wearied, body and mind, confused, dissipated, sad. The objects
are of commanding beauty or full of suggestion, but there is no quiet
to let that beauty breathe its life into the soul; no time to follow
up these suggestions, and plant for the proper harvest. Many persons
run about Rome for nine days, and then go away; they might as well
expect to appreciate the Venus by throwing a stone at it, as hope
really to see Rome in this time. I stayed in Rome nine weeks, and came
away unhappy as he who, having been taken in the visions of the night
through some wondrous realm, wakes unable to recall anything but the
hues and outlines of the pageant; the real knowledge, the recreative
power induced by familiar love, the assimilation of its soul and
substance,--all the true value of such a revelation,--is wanting; and
he remains a poor Tantalus, hungrier than before he had tasted this
spiritual food.

No; Rome is not a nine-days wonder; and those who try to make it such
lose the ideal Rome (if they ever had it), without gaining any notion
of the real. To those who travel, as they do everything else, only
because others do, I do not speak; they are nothing. Nobody counts in
the estimate of the human race who has not a character.

For one, I now really live in Rome, and I begin to see and feel the
real Rome. She reveals herself day by day; she tells me some of her
life. Now I never go out to see a sight, but I walk every day; and
here I cannot miss of some object of consummate interest to end a
walk. In the evenings, which are long now, I am at leisure to follow
up the inquiries suggested by the day.

As one becomes familiar, Ancient and Modern Rome, at first so
painfully and discordantly jumbled together, are drawn apart to the
mental vision. One sees where objects and limits anciently wore; the
superstructures vanish, and you recognize the local habitation of so
many thoughts. When this begins to happen, one feels first truly
at ease in Rome. Then the old kings, the consuls and tribunes, the
emperors, drunk with blood and gold, the warriors of eagle sight and
remorseless beak, return for us, and the togated procession finds
room to sweep across the scene; the seven hills tower, the innumerable
temples glitter, and the Via Sacra swarms with triumphal life once
more.

Ah! how joyful to see once more _this_ Rome, instead of the pitiful,
peddling, Anglicized Rome, first viewed in unutterable dismay from the
_coupé_ of the vettura,--a Rome all full of taverns, lodging-houses,
cheating chambermaids, vilest _valets de place_, and fleas! A Niobe
of nations indeed! Ah! why, secretly the heart blasphemed, did the sun
omit to kill her too, when all the glorious race which wore her crown
fell beneath his ray? Thank Heaven, it is possible to wash away all
this dirt, and come at the marble yet.

Their the later Papal Rome: it requires much acquaintance, much
thought, much reference to books, for the child of Protestant
Republican America to see where belong the legends illustrated by rite
and picture, the sense of all the rich tapestry, where it has a united
and poetic meaning, where it is broken by some accident of history.
For all these things--a senseless mass of juggleries to the uninformed
eye--are really growths of the human spirit struggling to develop its
life, and full of instruction for those who learn to understand them.

Then Modern Rome,--still ecclesiastical, still darkened and damp in
the shadow of the Vatican, but where bright hopes gleam now amid the
ashes! Never was a people who have had more to corrupt them,--bloody
tyranny, and incubus of priestcraft, the invasions, first of
Goths, then of trampling emperors and kings, then of sight-seeing
foreigners,--everything to turn them from a sincere, hopeful, fruitful
life; and they are much corrupted, but still a fine race. I cannot
look merely with a pictorial eye on the lounge of the Roman dandy, the
bold, Juno gait of the Roman Contadina. I love them,--dandies and all?
I believe the natural expression of these fine forms will animate them
yet. Certainly there never was a people that showed a better heart
than they do in this day of love, of purely moral influence. It makes
me very happy to be for once in a place ruled by a father's love, and
where the pervasive glow of one good, generous heart is felt in every
pulse of every day.

I have seen the Pope several times since my return, and it is a real
pleasure to see him in the thoroughfares, where his passage is always
greeted as that of _the_ living soul.

The first week of November there is much praying for the dead here in
the chapels of the cemeteries. I went to Santo Spirito. This cemetery
stands high, and all the way up the slope was lined with beggars
petitioning for alms, in every attitude find tone, (I mean tone that
belongs to the professional beggar's gamut, for that is peculiar,)
and under every pretext imaginable, from the quite legless elderly
gentleman to the ragged ruffian with the roguish twinkle in his eye,
who has merely a slight stiffness in one arm and one leg. I could
not help laughing, it was such a show,--greatly to the alarm of my
attendant, who declared they would kill me, if ever they caught me
alone; but I was not afraid. I am sure the endless falsehood in which
such creatures live must make them very cowardly. We entered the
cemetery; it was a sweet, tranquil place, lined with cypresses, and
soft sunshine lying on the stone coverings where repose the houses of
clay in which once dwelt joyous Roman hearts,--for the hearts here do
take pleasure in life. There were several chapels; in one boys were
chanting, in others people on their knees silently praying for the
dead. In another was one of the groups in wax exhibited in such
chapels through the first week of November. It represented St. Carlo
Borromeo as a beautiful young man in a long scarlet robe, pure and
brilliant as was the blood of the martyrs, relieving the poor who were
grouped around him,--old people and children, the halt, the maimed,
the blind; he had called them all into the feast of love. The chapel
was lighted and draped so as to give very good effect to this group;
the spectators were mainly children and young girls, listening with
ardent eyes, while their parents or the nuns explained to them the
group, or told some story of the saint. It was a pretty scene, only
marred by the presence of a villanous-looking man, who ever and anon
shook the poor's box. I cannot understand the bad taste of choosing
him, when there were _frati_ and priests enough of expression less
unprepossessing.

I next entered a court-yard, where the stations, or different periods
in the Passion of Jesus, are painted on the wall. Kneeling before
these were many persons: here a Franciscan, in his brown robe and
cord; there a pregnant woman, uttering, doubtless, some tender
aspiration for the welfare of the yet unborn dear one; there some
boys, with gay yet reverent air; while all the while these fresh young
voices were heard chanting. It was a beautiful moment, and despite the
wax saint, the ill-favored friar, the professional mendicants, and
my own removal, wide as pole from pole, from the positron of mind
indicated by these forms, their spirit touched me, and. I prayed too;
prayed for the distant, every way distant,--for those who seem to have
forgotten me, and with me all we had in common; prayed for the dead in
spirit, if not in body; prayed for myself, that I might never walk the
earth

  "The tomb of my dead self";

and prayed in general for all unspoiled and loving hearts,--no less
for all who suffer and find yet no helper.

Going out, I took my road by the cross which marks the brow of the
hill. Up the ascent still wound the crowd of devotees, and still the
beggars beset them. Amid that crowd, how many lovely, warm-hearted
women! The women of Italy are intellectually in a low place,
_but_--they are unaffected; you can see what Heaven meant them to be,
and I believe they will be yet the mothers of a great and generous
race. Before me lay Rome,--how exquisitely tranquil in the sunset!
Never was an aspect that for serene grandeur could vie with that of
Rome at sunset.

Next day was the feast of the Milanese saint, whose life has been made
known to some Americans by Manzoni, when speaking in his popular novel
of the cousin of St. Carlo, Federigo Borromeo. The Pope came in state
to the church of St. Carlo, in the Corso. The show was magnificent;
the church is not very large, and was almost filled with Papal court
and guards, in all their splendid harmonies of color. An Italian child
was next me, a little girl of four or five years, whom her mother
had brought to see the Pope. As in the intervals of gazing the child
smiled and made signs to me, I nodded in return, and asked her name.
"Virginia," said she; "and how is the Signora named?" "Margherita,"
"My name," she rejoined, "is Virginia Gentili." I laughed, but did not
follow up the cunning, graceful lead,--still I chatted and played with
her now and then. At last, she said to her mother, "La Signora e molto
cara," ("The Signora is very dear," or, to use the English equivalent,
_a darling_,) "show her my two sisters." So the mother, herself a
fine-looking woman, introduced two handsome young ladies, and with the
family I was in a moment pleasantly intimate for the hour.

Before me sat three young English ladies, the pretty daughters of
a noble Earl; their manners were a strange contrast to this Italian
graciousness, best expressed by their constant use of the pronoun
_that_. "_See that man!_" (i.e. some high dignitary of the Church,)
"Look at that dress!" dropped constantly from their lips. Ah! without
being a Catholic, one may well wish Rome was not dependent on English
sight-seers, who violate her ceremonies with acts that bespeak their
thoughts full of wooden shoes and warming-pans. Can anything be
more sadly expressive of times out of joint than the fact that Mrs.
Trollope is a resident in Italy? Yes! she is fixed permanently in
Florence, as I am told, pensioned at the rate of two thousand pounds
a year to trail her slime over the fruit of Italy. She is here in Rome
this winter, and, after having violated the virgin beauty of America,
will have for many a year her chance to sully the imperial matron of
the civilized world. What must the English public be, if it wishes to
pay two thousand pounds a year to get Italy Trollopified?

But to turn to a pleasanter subject. When the Pope entered, borne in
his chair of state amid the pomp of his tiara and his white and gold
robes, he looked to me thin, or, as the Italians murmur anxiously
at times, _consumato_, or wasted. But during the ceremony he seemed
absorbed in his devotions, and at the end I think he had become
exhilarated by thinking of St. Carlo, who was such another over the
human race as himself, and his face wore a bright glow of faith. As he
blessed the people, he raised his eyes to Heaven, with a gesture quite
natural: it was the spontaneous act of a soul which felt that moment
more than usual its relation with things above it, and sure of support
from a higher Power. I saw him to still greater advantage a little
while after, when, riding on the Campagna with a young gentleman who
had been ill, we met the Pope on foot, taking exercise. He often quits
his carriage at the gates and walks in this way. He walked rapidly,
robed in a simple white drapery, two young priests in spotless purple
on either side; they gave silver to the poor who knelt beside the way,
while the beloved Father gave his benediction. My companion knelt;
he is not a Catholic, but he felt that "this blessing would do him
no harm." The Pope saw at once he was ill, and gave him a mark of
interest, with that expression of melting love, the true, the only
charity, which assures all who look on him that, were his power equal
to his will, no living thing would ever suffer more. This expression
the artists try in vain to catch; all busts and engravings of him are
caricatures; it is a magnetic sweetness, a lambent light that plays
over his features, and of which only great genius or a soul tender as
his own would form an adequate image.

The Italians have one term of praise peculiarly characteristic of
their highly endowed nature. They say of such and such, _Ha una
phisonomia simpatica_,--"He has a sympathetic expression"; and this is
praise enough. This may be pre-eminently said of that of Pius IX. _He_
looks, indeed, as if nothing human could be foreign to him. Such alone
are the genuine kings of men.

He has shown undoubted wisdom, clear-sightedness, bravery, and
firmness; but it is, above all, his generous human heart that gives
him his power over this people. His is a face to shame the selfish,
redeem the sceptic, alarm the wicked, and cheer to new effort the
weary and heavy-laden. What form the issues of his life may take is
yet uncertain; in my belief, they are such as he does not think of;
but they cannot fail to be for good. For my part, I shall always
rejoice to have been here in his time. The working of his influence
confirms my theories, and it is a positive treasure to me to have seen
him. I have never been presented, not wishing to approach, so real a
presence in the path of mere etiquette; I am quite content to see
him standing amid the crowd, while the band plays the music he has
inspired.

  "Sons of Rome, awake!"

Yes, awake, and let no police-officer put you again to sleep in
prison, as has happened to those who were called by the Marseillaise.

Affairs look well. The king of Sardinia has at last, though with
evident distrust and heartlessness, entered the upward path in a
way that makes it difficult to return. The Duke of Modena, the
most senseless of all these ancient gentlemen, after publishing a
declaration, which made him more ridiculous than would the bitterest
pasquinade penned by another, that he would fight to the death against
reform, finds himself obliged to lend an ear as to the league for
the customs; and if he joins that, other measures follow of course.
Austria trembles; and, in fine, cannot sustain the point of Ferrara.
The king of Naples, after having shed much blood, for which he has a
terrible account to render, (ah! how many sad, fair romances are to
tell already about the Calabrian difficulties!) still finds the spirit
fomenting in his people; he cannot put it down. The dragon's teeth are
sown, and the Lazzaroni may be men yet! The Swiss affairs have taken
the right direction, and good will ensue, if other powers act with
decent honesty, and think of healing the wounds of Switzerland, rather
than merely of tying her down, so that she cannot annoy them.

In Rome, here, the new Council is inaugurated, and elections have
given tolerable satisfaction. Already, struggles ended in other places
begin to be renewed here, as to gas-lights, introduction of machinery,
&c. We shall see at the end of the winter how they have gone on. At
any rate, the wants of the people are in some measure represented; and
already the conduct of those who have taken to themselves so large a
portion of the loaves and fishes on the very platform supposed to be
selected by Jesus for a general feeding of his sheep, begins to be
the subject of spoken as well as whispered animadversion. Torlonia is
assailed in his bank, Campana amid his urns or his Monte di Picti; but
these assaults have yet to be verified.

On the day when the Council was to be inaugurated, great preparations
were made by representatives of other parts of Italy, and also of
foreign nations friendly to the cause of progress. It was considered
to represent the same fact as the feast of the 12th of September in
Tuscany,--the dawn of an epoch when the people shall find their wants
and aspirations represented and guarded. The Americans showed a warm
interest; the gentlemen subscribing to buy a flag, the United States
having none before in Rome, and the ladies meeting to make it. The
same distinguished individual, indeed, who at Florence made a speech
to prevent "the American eagle being taken out on so trifling an
occasion," with similar perspicuity and superiority of view, on the
present occasion, was anxious to prevent "rash demonstrations, which
might embroil the United States with Austria"; but the rash youth
here present rushed on, ignorant how to value his Nestorian
prudence,--fancying, hot-headed simpletons, that the cause of Freedom
was the cause of America, and her eagle at home wherever the sun shed
a warmer ray, and there was reason to hope a happier life for man. So
they hurried to buy their silk, red, white, and blue, and inquired of
recent arrivals how many States there are this winter in the Union, in
order to making the proper number of stars. A magnificent spread-eagle
was procured, not without difficulty, as this, once the eyrie of the
king of birds, is now a rookery rather, full of black, ominous fowl,
ready to eat the harvest sown by industrious hands. This eagle, having
previously spread its wings over a piece of furniture where its back
was sustained by the wall, was somewhat deficient in a part of its
anatomy. But we flattered ourselves he should be held so high that no
Roman eye, if disposed, could carp and criticise. When lo! just as the
banner was ready to unfold its young glories in the home of Horace,
Virgil, and Tacitus, an ordinance appeared prohibiting the display of
any but the Roman ensign.

This ordinance was, it is said, caused by representations made to the
Pope that the Oscurantists, ever on the watch to do mischief, meant to
make this the occasion of disturbance,--as it is their policy to seek
to create irritation here; that the Neapolitan and Lombardo-Venetian
flags would appear draped with black, and thus the signal be given for
tumult. I cannot help thinking these fears were groundless; that the
people, on their guard, would have indignantly crushed at once any
of these malignant efforts. However that may be, no one can ever be
really displeased with any measure of the Pope, knowing his excellent
intentions. But the limitation of the festival deprived it of the
noble character of the brotherhood of nations and an ideal aim, worn
by that of Tuscany. The Romans, drilled and disappointed, greeted
their Councillors with but little enthusiasm. The procession, too, was
but a poor affair for Rome. Twenty-four carriages had been lent by
the princes and nobles, at the request of the city, to convey the
Councillors. I found something symbolical in this. Thus will they be
obliged to furnish from their old grandeur the vehicles of the new
ideas. Each deputy was followed by his target and banner. When
the deputy for Ferrara passed, many garlands were thrown upon his
carriage. There has been deep respect and sympathy felt for the
citizens of Ferrara, they have conducted so well under their late
trying circumstances. They contained themselves, knowing that the
least indiscretion would give a handle for aggression to the enemies
of the good cause. But the daily occasions of irritation must have
been innumerable, and they have shown much power of wise and dignified
self-government.

After the procession passed, I attempted to go on foot from the Café
Novo, in the Corso, to St. Peter's, to see the decorations of the
streets, but it was impossible. In that dense, but most vivacious,
various, and good-humored crowd, with all best will on their part
to aid the foreigner, it was impossible to advance. So I saw
only themselves; but that was a great pleasure. There is so much
individuality of character here, that it is a great entertainment to
be in a crowd.

In the evening, there was a ball given at the Argentina. Lord Minto
was there; Prince Corsini, now Senator; the Torlonias, in uniform of
the Civic Guard,--Princess Torlonia in a sash of their colors, given
her by the Civic Guard, which she waved often in answer to their
greetings. But the beautiful show of the evening was the Trasteverini
dancing the Saltarello in their most brilliant costume. I saw them
thus to much greater advantage than ever before. Several were nobly
handsome, and danced admirably; it was really like Pinelli.

The Saltarello enchants me; in this is really the Italian wine,
the Italian sun. The first time, I saw it danced one night very
unexpectedly near the Colosseum; it carried me quite beyond myself,
so that I most unamiably insisted on staying, while the friends in my
company, not heated by enthusiasm like me, were shivering and perhaps
catching cold from the damp night-air. I fear they remember it against
me; nevertheless I cherish the memory of the moments wickedly stolen
at their expense, for it is only the first time seeing such a thing
that you enjoy a peculiar delight. But since, I love to see and study
it much.

The Pope, in receiving the Councillors, made a speech,--such as the
king of Prussia intrenched himself in on a similar occasion, only much
better and shorter,--implying that he meant only to improve, not to
_reform_, and should keep things _in statu quo_, safe locked with
the keys of St. Peter. This little speech was made, no doubt, more to
reassure czars, emperors, and kings, than from the promptings of the
spirit. But the fact of its necessity, as well as the inferior freedom
and spirit of the Roman journals to those of Tuscany, seems to say
that the pontifical government, though from the accident of this one
man's accession it has taken the initiative to better times, yet
may not, after a while, from its very nature, be able to keep in the
vanguard.

A sad contrast to the feast of this day was presented by the same
persons, a fortnight after, following the body of Silvani, one of
the Councillors, who died suddenly. The Councillors, the different
societies of Rome, a corps _frati_ bearing tapers, the Civic Guard
with drums slowly beating, the same state carriages with their
liveried attendants all slowly, sadly moving, with torches and
banners, drooped along the Corso in the dark night. A single horseman,
with his long white plume and torch reversed, governed the procession;
it was the Prince Aldobrandini. The whole had that grand effect so
easily given by this artist people, who seize instantly the natural
poetry of an occasion, and with unanimous tact hasten to represent it.
More and much anon.




LETTER XX.

ROME.--BAD WEATHER.--ST. CECILIA.--THE PEOPLE'S PROCESSIONS.--TAKING
THE VEIL.--FESTIVITIES.--POLITICAL AGITATION.--NOBLES.--MARIA
LOUISA.--GUICCIOLI.--PARMA.--ADDRESS TO THE NEW SOVEREIGN.--THE NEW
YORK MEETING FOR ITALY.--ADDRESS TO THE POPE.


Rome, December 30, 1847.

I could not, in my last, content myself with praising the glorious
weather. I wrote in the last day of it. Since, we have had a fortnight
of rain falling incessantly, and whole days and nights of torrents
such as are peculiar to the "clearing-up" shower in our country.

Under these circumstances, I have found my lodging in the Corso not
only has its dark side, but is all dark, and that one in the Piazza di
Spagne would have been better for me in this respect; there on these
days, the only ones when I wish to stay at home and write and study, I
should have had the light. Now, if I consulted the good of my eyes, I
should have the lamp lit on first rising in the morning.

"Every sweet must have its bitter," and the exchange from the
brilliance of the Italian heaven to weeks and months of rain, and such
black cloud, is unspeakably dejecting. For myself, at the end of this
fortnight without exercise or light, and in such a damp atmosphere,
I find myself without strength, without appetite, almost without
spirits. The life of the German scholar who studies fifteen hours out
of the twenty-four, or that of the Spielberg prisoner who could live
through ten, fifteen, twenty years of dark prison with, only half an
hour's exercise in the day, is to me a mystery. How can the brain, the
nerves, ever support it? We are made to keep in motion, to drink the
air and light; to me these are needed to make life supportable, the
physical state is so difficult and full of pains at any rate.

I am sorry for those who have arrived just at this time hoping
to enjoy the Christmas festivities. Everything was spoiled by the
weather. I went at half past ten to San Luigi Francese, a church
adorned with some of Domenichino's finest frescos on the life and
death of St. Cecilia.

This name leads me to a little digression. In a letter to Mr.
Phillips, the dear friend of our revered Dr. Charming, I asked him if
he remembered what recumbent statue it was of which Dr. Charming was
wont to speak as of a sight that impressed him more than anything else
in Rome. He said, indeed, his mood, and the unexpectedness in seeing
this gentle, saintly figure lying there as if death had just struck
her down, had no doubt much influence upon him; but still he believed
the work had a peculiar holiness in its expression. I recognized at
once the theme of his description (the name he himself had forgotten)
as I entered the other evening the lonely church of St. Cecilia in
Trastevere. As in his case, it was twilight: one or two nuns were at
their devotions, and there lay the figure in its grave-clothes, with
an air so gentle, so holy, as if she had only ceased to pray as the
hand of the murderer struck her down. Her gentle limbs seemed instinct
still with soft, sweet life; the expression was not of the heroine,
the martyr, so much as of the tender, angelic woman. I could well
understand the deep impression made upon his mind. The expression of
the frescos of Domenichino is not inharmonious with the suggestions of
this statue.

Finding the Mass was not to begin for some time, I set out for the
Quirinal to see the Pope return from that noble church, Santa Maria
Maggiore, where he officiated this night. I reached the mount just
as he was returning. A few torches gleamed before his door; perhaps a
hundred people were gathered together round the fountain. Last year an
immense multitude waited for him there to express their affection in
one grand good-night; the change was occasioned partly by the weather,
partly by other causes, of which I shall speak by and by. Just as he
returned, the moon looked palely out from amid the wet clouds, and
shone upon the fountain, and the noble figures above it, and the
long white cloaks of the Guardia Nobile who followed his carriage
on horseback; darker objects could scarcely be seen, except by the
flickering light of the torches, much blown by the wind. I then
returned to San Luigi. The effect of the night service there was very
fine; those details which often have such a glaring, mean look by day
are lost sight of in the night, and the unity of impression from the
service is much more undisturbed. The music, too, descriptive of that
era which promised peace on earth, good-will to men, was very sweet,
and the _pastorale_ particularly soothed the heart amid the crowd, and
pompous ceremonial. But here, too, the sweet had its bitter, in the
vulgar vanity of the leader of the orchestra, a trait too common in
such, who, not content with marking the time for the musicians, made
his stick heard in the remotest nook of the church; so that what would
have been sweet music, and flowed in upon the soul, was vulgarized to
make you remember the performers and their machines.

On Monday the leaders of the Guardia Civica paid their respects to
the Pope, who, in receiving them, expressed his constantly increasing
satisfaction in having given this institution to his people. The same
evening there was a procession with torches to the Quirinal, to pay
the homage due to the day (Feast of St. John, and name-day of the
Pope, _Giovanni Maria Mastai_); but all the way the rain continually
threatened to extinguish the torches, and the Pope could give but a
hasty salute under an umbrella, when the heavens were again opened,
and such a cataract of water descended, as drove both man and beast to
seek the nearest shelter.

On Sunday, I went to see a nun take the veil. She was a person of high
family; a princess gave her away, and the Cardinal Ferreti, Secretary
of State, officiated. It was a much less effective ceremony than I
expected from the descriptions of travellers and romance-writers.
There was no moment of throwing on the black veil; no peal of music;
no salute of cannon. The nun, an elegantly dressed woman of five or
six and twenty,--pretty enough, but whose quite worldly air gave the
idea that it was one of those arrangements made because no suitable
establishment could otherwise be given her,--came forward, knelt, and
prayed; her confessor, in that strained, unnatural whine too common
among preachers of all churches and all countries, praised himself for
having induced her to enter on a path which would lead her fettered
steps "from palm to palm, from triumph to triumph," Poor thing! she
looked as if the domestic olives and poppies were all she wanted; and
lacking these, tares and wormwood must be her portion. She was then
taken behind a grating, her hair cut, and her clothes exchanged for
the nun's vestments; the black-robed sisters who worked upon her
looking like crows or ravens at their ominous feasts. All the while,
the music played, first sweet and thoughtful, then triumphant strains.
The effect on my mind was revolting and painful to the last degree.
Were monastic seclusion always voluntary, and could it be ended
whenever the mind required a change back from seclusion to common
life, I should have nothing to say against it; there are positions of
the mind which it suits exactly, and even characters that might choose
it all through life; certainly, to the broken-hearted it presents a
shelter that Protestant communities do not provide. But where it
is enforced or repented of, no hell could be worse; nor can a more
terrible responsibility be incurred than by him who has persuaded a
novice that the snares of the world are less dangerous than the demons
of solitude.

Festivities in Italy have been of great importance, since, for a
century or two back, the thought, the feeling, the genius of the
people have had more chance to expand, to express themselves, there
than anywhere else. Now, if the march of reform goes forward, this
will not be so; there will be also speeches made freely on public
occasions, without having the life pressed out of them by the
censorship. Now we hover betwixt the old and the new; when the many
reasons for the new prevail, I hope what is poetical in the old will
not be lost. The ceremonies of New Year are before me; but as I shall
have to send this letter on New-Year's day, I cannot describe them.
The Romans begin now to talk of the mad gayeties of Carnival, and the
Opera is open. They have begun with "Attila," as, indeed, there
is little hope of hearing in Italy other music than Verdi's. Great
applause waited on the following words:--

"EZIO (THE ROMAN LEADER).

  "E gittata la mia sorte,
    Pronto sono ad ogni guerra,
  S' io cardò, cadrè da forte,
    E il mio nome resterà.

  "Non vedrò l'amata terra
    Svener lenta e farri a brano,
  Sopra l'ultimo Romano
    Tutta Italia piangerà."

    "My lot is fixed, and I stand ready for every conflict. If
    I must fall, I shall fall as a brave man, and my fame will
    survive. I shall not see my beloved country fall to pieces and
    slowly perish, and over the last Roman all Italy will weep."

And at lines of which the following is a translation:--

    "O brave man, whose mighty power can raise thy country from
    such dire distress; from the immortal hills, radiant with
    glory, let the shades of our ancestors arise; oh! only one
    day, one instant, arise to look upon us!"

It was an Italian who sung this strain, though, singularly enough,
here in the heart of Italy, so long reputed the home of music, three
principal parts were filled by persons bearing the foreign names of
Ivanoff, Mitrovich, and Nissren.

Naples continues in a state of great excitement, which now pervades
the upper classes, as several young men of noble families have been
arrested; among them, one young man much beloved, son of Prince
Terella, and who, it is said, was certainly not present on the
occasion for which he was arrested, and that the measure was taken
because he was known to sympathize strongly with the liberal movement.
The nobility very generally have not feared to go to the house of his
father to express their displeasure at the arrest and interest in
the young man. The ministry, it is said, are now persuaded of the
necessity of a change of measures. The king alone remains inflexible
in his stupidity.

The stars of Bonaparte and Byron show again a conjunction, by the
almost simultaneous announcement of changes in the lot of women with
whom they were so intimately connected;--the Archduchess of Parma,
Maria Louisa, is dead; the Countess Guiccioli is married. The Countess
I have seen several times; she still looks young, and retains the
charms which by the contemporaries of Byron she is reputed to have
had; they never were of a very high order; her best expression is that
of a good heart. I always supposed that Byron, weary and sick of the
world such as he had known it, became attached to her for her good
disposition, and sincere, warm tenderness for him; the sight of her,
and the testimony of a near relative, confirmed this impression. This
friend of hers added, that she had tried very hard to remain devoted
to the memory of Byron, but was quite unequal to the part, being one
of those affectionate natures that must have some one near with whom
to be occupied; and now, it seems, she has resigned herself publicly
to abandon her romance. However, I fancy the manes of Byron remain
undisturbed.

We all know the worthless character of Maria Louisa, the indifference
she showed to a husband who, if he was not her own choice, yet would
have been endeared to almost any woman, as one fallen from an immense
height into immense misfortune, and as the father of her child. No
voice from her penetrated to cheer his exile: the unhappiness
of Josephine was well avenged. And that child, the poor Duke of
Reichstadt, of a character so interesting, and with obvious elements
of greatness, withering beneath the mean, cold influence of his
grandfather,--what did Maria Louisa do for him,--she, appointed by
Nature to be his inspiring genius, his protecting angel? I felt for
her a most sad and profound contempt last summer, as I passed through
her oppressed dominion, a little sphere, in which, if she could not
save it from the usual effects of the Austrian rule, she might have
done so much private, womanly good,--might have been a genial heart
to warm it,--and where she had let so much ill be done. A journal
announces her death in these words: "The Archduchess is dead; a woman
who _might_ have occupied one of the noblest positions in the history
of the age";--and there makes expressive pause.

Parma, passing from bad to worse, falls into the hands of the Duke of
Modena; and the people and magistracy have made an address to their
new ruler. The address has received many thousand signatures, and
seems quite sincere, except in the assumption of good-will in the Duke
of Modena; and this is merely an insincerity of etiquette.




LETTER XXI.

THE POPE'S RECEPTION OF THE NEW OFFICERS.--THEY KISS HIS
FOOT.--VESPERS AT THE GESÙ.--A POOR YOUTH IN ROME SEEKING A
PATRON.--RUMORS OF DISTURBANCES.--THEIR CAUSE.--REPRESENTATIONS TO THE
POPE.--HIS CONDUCT IN THE AFFAIR.--AN ITALIAN CONSUL FOR THE UNITED
STATES.--CATHOLICISM.--THE POPULARITY OF THE POPE.--HIS DEPOSITION OF
A CENSOR.--THE POLICY OF THE POPE IN HIS DOMESTIC NOT EQUAL TO THAT
OF HIS PUBLIC LIFE.--HIS OPPOSITION TO PROTESTANT REFORM.--LETTER FROM
JOSEPH MAZZINI TO THE PONTIFF.--REFLECTIONS ON IT.


Rome, January 10, 1848.

In the first morning of this New Year I sent off a letter which must
then be mailed, in order to reach the steamer of the 16th. So far am
I from home, that even steam does not come nigh to annihilate the
distance.

This afternoon I went to the Quirinal Palace to see the Pope receive
the new municipal officers. He was to-day in his robes of white and
gold, with his usual corps of attendants in pure red and white, or
violet and white. The new officers were in black velvet dresses, with
broad white collars. They took the oaths of office, and then actually
kissed his foot. I had supposed this was never really done, but only
a very low obeisance made; the act seemed to me disgustingly abject.
A Heavenly Father does not want his children at his feet, but in his
arms, on a level with his heart.

After this was over the Pope went to the Gesù, a very rich church,
belonging to the Jesuits, to officiate at Vespers, and we followed.
The music was beautiful, and the effect of the church, with its
richly-painted dome and altar-piece in a blaze of light, while the
assembly were in a sort of brown darkness, was very fine.

A number of Americans there, new arrivals, kept requesting in the
midst of the music to know when _it_ would begin. "Why, this is _it_,"
some one at last had the patience to answer; "you are hearing Vespers
now." "What," they replied, "is there no oration, no speech!" So
deeply rooted in the American mind is the idea that a sermon is the
only real worship!

This church, is indelibly stamped on my mind. Coming to Rome this
time, I saw in the diligence a young man, whom his uncle, a priest of
the convent that owns this church, had sent for, intending to provide
him employment here. Some slight circumstances tested the character
of this young man, and showed it what I have ever found it, singularly
honorable and conscientious. He was led to show me his papers, among
which was a letter from a youth whom, with that true benevolence only
possible to the poor, because only they _can_ make great sacrifices,
he had so benefited as to make an entire change in his prospects for
life. Himself a poor orphan, with nothing but a tolerable education
at an orphan asylum, and a friend of his dead parents to find him
employment on leaving it, he had felt for this young man, poorer and
more uninstructed than himself, had taught him at his leisure to read
and write, had then collected from, friends, and given himself,
till he had gathered together sixty francs, procuring also for
his _protégé_ a letter from monks, who were friends of his, to the
convents on the road, so that wherever there was one, the poor youth
had lodging and food gratis. Thus armed, he set forth on foot for
Rome; Piacenza, their native place, affording little hope even of
gaining bread, in the present distressed state of that dominion. The
letter was to say that he had arrived, and been so fortunate as to
find employment immediately in the studio of Benzoni, the sculptor.

The poor patron's eyes sparkled as I read the letter. "How happy he
is!" said he. "And does he not spell and write well? I was his only
master."

But the good do not inherit the earth, and, less fortunate than his
_protégé_, Germano on his arrival found his uncle ill of the Roman
fever. He came to see me, much agitated. "Can it be, Signorina," says
he, "that God, who has taken my father and mother, will also take
from me the only protector I have left, and just as I arrive in this
strange place, too?" After a few days he seemed more tranquil, and
told me that, though he had felt as if it would console him and divert
his mind to go to some places of entertainment, he had forborne and
applied the money to have masses said for his uncle. "I feel," he
said, "as if God would help me." Alas! at that moment the uncle was
dying. Poor Germano came next day with a receipt for masses said for
the soul of the departed, (his simple faith in these being apparently
indestructible,) and amid his tears he said: "The Fathers were so
unkind, they were hardly willing to hear me speak a word; they were so
afraid I should be a burden to them, I shall never go there again. But
the most cruel thing was, I offered them a scudo (dollar) to say six
masses for the soul of my poor uncle; they said they would only say
five, and must have seven baiocchi (cents) more for that."

A few days after, I happened to go into their church, and found it
thronged, while a preacher, panting, sweating, leaning half out of
the pulpit, was exhorting his hearers to "imitate Christ." With
unspeakable disgust I gazed on this false shepherd of those who had
just so failed in their duty to a poor stray lamb, Their church is so
rich in ornaments, the seven baiocchi were hardly needed to burnish
it. Their altar-piece is a very imposing composition, by an artist
of Rome, still in the prime of his powers. Capalti. It represents the
Circumcision, with the cross and six waiting angels in the background;
Joseph, who holds the child, the priest, and all the figures in the
foreground, seem intent upon the barbarous rite, except Mary the
mother; her mind seems to rush forward into the future, and understand
the destiny of her child; she sees the cross,--she sees the angels,
too.

Now I have mentioned a picture, let me say a word or two about Art and
artists, by way of parenthesis in this letter so much occupied, with
political affairs. We laugh a little here at some words that come from
your city on the subject of Art.

We hear that the landscapes painted here show a want of familiarity
with Nature; artists need to return to America and see her again. But,
friends, Nature wears a different face in Italy from what she does in
America. Do you not want to see her Italian face? it is very glorious!
We thought it was the aim of Art to reproduce all forms of Nature, and
that you would not be sorry to have transcripts of what you have not
always round you. American Art is not necessarily a reproduction of
American Nature.

Hicks has made a charming picture of familiar life, which those who
cannot believe in Italian daylight would not tolerate. I am not sure
that all eyes are made in the same manner, for I have known those who
declare they see nothing remarkable in these skies, these hues; and
always complain when they are reproduced in picture. I have yet seen
no picture by Cropsey on an Italian subject, but his sketches from
Scotch scenes are most poetical and just presentations of those lakes,
those mountains, with their mourning veils. He is an artist of great
promise. Cranch has made a picture for Mr. Ogden Haggerty of a fine
mountain-hold of old Colonna story. I wish he would write a ballad
about it too; there is plenty of material.

But to return to the Jesuits. One swallow does not make a summer, nor
am I--who have seen so much hard-heartedness and barbarous greed of
gain in all classes of men--so foolish as to attach undue importance
to the demand, by those who have dared to appropriate peculiarly to
themselves the sacred name of Jesus, from a poor orphan, and for the
soul of one of their own order, of "seven baiocchi more." But I have
always been satisfied, from the very nature of their institutions,
that the current prejudice against them must be correct. These
institutions are calculated to harden the heart, and destroy entirely
that truth which is the conservative principle in character. Their
influence is and must be always against the free progress of humanity.
The more I see of its working, the more I feel how pernicious it is,
and were I a European, to no object should I lend myself with more
ardor, than to the extirpation of this cancer. True, disband the
Jesuits, there would still remain Jesuitical men, but singly they
would have infinitely less power to work mischief.

The influence of the Oscurantist foe has shown itself more and more
plainly in Rome, during the last four or five weeks. A false miracle
is devised: the Madonna del Popolo, (who has her handsome house very
near me,) has cured, a paralytic youth, (who, in fact, was never
diseased,) and, appearing to him in a vision, takes occasion to
criticise severely the measures of the Pope. Rumors of tumult in
one quarter are circulated, to excite it in another. Inflammatory
handbills are put up in the night. But the Romans thus far resist all
intrigues of the foe to excite them to bad conduct.

On New-Year's day, however, success was near. The people, as usual,
asked permission of the Governor to go to the Quirinal and receive the
benediction of the Pope. This was denied, and not, as it might truly
have been, because the Pope was unwell, but in the most ungracious,
irritating manner possible, by saying, "He is tired of these things:
he is afraid of disturbance." Then, the people being naturally
excited and angry, the Governor sent word to the Pope that there was
excitement, without letting him know why, and had the guards doubled
on the posts. The most absurd rumors were circulated among the people
that the cannon of St. Angelo were to be pointed on them, &c. But
they, with that singular discretion which they show now, instead
of rising, as their enemies had hoped, went to ask counsel of their
lately appointed Senator, Corsini. He went to the Pope, found him ill,
entirely ignorant of what was going on, and much distressed when he
heard it. He declared that the people should be satisfied, and,
since they had not been allowed to come to him, he would go to them.
Accordingly, the next day, though rainy and of a searching cold like
that of a Scotch mist, we had all our windows thrown open, and the red
and yellow tapestries hung out. He passed through the principal parts
of the city, the people throwing themselves on their knees and crying
out, "O Holy Father, don't desert us! don't forget us! don't listen
to our enemies!" The Pope wept often, and replied, "Fear nothing,
my people, my heart is yours." At last, seeing how ill he was, they
begged him to go in, and he returned to the Quirinal; the present
Tribune of the People, as far as rule in the heart is concerned,
Ciceronacchio, following his carriage. I shall give some account of
this man in another letter.

For the moment, the difficulties are healed, as they will be whenever
the Pope directly shows himself to the people. Then his generous,
affectionate heart will always act, and act on them, dissipating the
clouds which others have been toiling to darken.

In speaking of the intrigues of these emissaries of the power of
darkness, I will mention that there is a report here that they are
trying to get an Italian Consul for the United States, and one in the
employment of the Jesuits. This rumor seems ridiculous; yet it is true
that Dr. Beecher's panic about Catholic influence in the United
States is not quite unfounded, and that there is considerable hope
of establishing a new dominion there. I hope the United States will
appoint no Italian, no Catholic, to a consulship. The representative
of the United States should be American; our national character
and interests are peculiar, and cannot be fitly represented by a
foreigner, unless, like Mr. Ombrossi of Florence, he has passed part
of his youth in the United States. It would, indeed, be well if our
government paid attention to qualification for the office in the
candidate, and not to pretensions founded on partisan service;
appointing only men of probity, who would not stain the national
honor in the sight of Europe. It would be wise also not to select men
entirely ignorant of foreign manners, customs, ways of thinking, or
even of any language in which to communicate with foreign society,
making the country ridiculous by all sorts of blunders; but 't were
pity if a sufficient number of Americans could not be found, who are
honest, have some knowledge of Europe and gentlemanly tact, and are
able at least to speak French.

To return to the Pope, although the shadow that has fallen on his
popularity is in a great measure the work of his enemies, yet there is
real cause for it too. His conduct in deposing for a time one of the
Censors, about the banners of the 15th of December, his speech to the
Council the same day, his extreme displeasure at the sympathy of a
few persons with the triumph of the Swiss Diet, because it was a
Protestant triumph, and, above all, his speech to the Consistory, so
deplorably weak in thought and absolute in manner, show a man less
strong against domestic than foreign foes, instigated by a generous,
humane heart to advance, but fettered by the prejudices of education,
and terribly afraid to be or seem to be less the Pope of Rome, in
becoming a reform prince, and father to the fatherless. I insert a
passage of this speech, which seems to say that, whenever there shall
be collision between the priest and the reformer, the priest shall
triumph:--

"Another subject there is which profoundly afflicts and harasses our
mind. It is not certainly unknown to you, Venerable Brethren, that
many enemies of Catholic truth have, in our times especially, directed
their efforts by the desire to place certain monstrous offsprings
of opinion on a par with the doctrine of Christ, or to blend them
therewith, seeking to propagate more and more that impious system of
_indifference_ toward all religion whatever.

"And lately some have been found, dreadful to narrate! who have
offered such an insult to our name and Apostolic dignity, as
slanderously to represent us participators in their folly, and
favorers of that most iniquitous system above named. These have been
pleased to infer from, the counsels (certainly not foreign to
the sanctity of the Catholic religion) which, in certain affairs
pertaining to the civil exercise of the Pontific sway, we had benignly
embraced for the increase of public prosperity and good, and also from
the pardon bestowed in clemency upon certain persons subject to that
sway, in the very beginning of our Pontificate, that we had such
benevolent sentiments toward every description of persons as to
believe that not only the sons of the Church, but others also,
remaining aliens from Catholic unity, are alike in the way of
salvation, and may attain eternal life. Words are wanting to us, from
horror, to repel this new and atrocious calumny against us. It is true
that with intimate affection of heart we love all mankind, but not
otherwise than in the charity of God and of our Lord Jesus Christ, who
came to seek and to save that which had perished, who wisheth that all
men should be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth, and who sent
his disciples through the whole world to preach the Gospel to every
creature, declaring that those who should believe and be baptized
should be saved, but those who should not believe, should be
condemned. Let those therefore who seek salvation come to the pillar
and support of the Truth, which is the Church,--let them come, that
is, to the true Church of Christ, which possesses in its bishops
and the supreme head of all, the Roman Pontiff, a never-interrupted
succession of Apostolic authority, and which for nothing has ever been
more zealous than to preach, and with all care preserve and defend,
the doctrine announced as the mandate of Christ by his Apostles; which
Church afterward increased, from the time of the Apostles, in the
midst of every species of difficulties, and flourished throughout the
whole world, radiant in the splendor of miracles, amplified by the
blood of martyrs, ennobled by the virtues of confessors and virgins,
corroborated by the testimony and most sapient writings of the
fathers,--as it still flourishes throughout all lands, refulgent in
perfect unity of the sacraments, of faith, and of holy discipline.
We who, though unworthy, preside in this supreme chair of the Apostle
Peter, in which Christ our Lord placed the foundation of his Church,
have at no time abstained, from any cares or toils to bring, through
the grace of Christ himself, those who are in ignorance and error to
this sole way of truth and salvation. Let those, whoever they be,
that are adverse, remember that heaven and earth shall pass away, but
nothing can ever perish of the words of Christ, nor be changed in the
doctrine which the Catholic Church received, to guard, defend, and
publish, from him.

"Next to this we cannot but speak to you, Venerable Brethren, of the
bitterness of sorrow by which we were affected, on seeing that a few
days since, in this our fair city, the fortress and centre of the
Catholic religion, it proved possible to find some--very few indeed
and well-nigh frantic men--who, laying aside the very sense of
humanity, and to the extreme disgust and indignation of other citizens
of this town, were not withheld, by horror from triumphing openly and
publicly over the most lamentable intestine war lately excited among
the Helvetic people; which truly fatal war we sorrow over from the
depths of our heart, as well considering the blood shed by that
nation, the slaughter of brothers, the atrocious, daily recurring, and
fatal discords, hatreds, and dissensions (which usually redound among
nations in consequence especially of civil wars), as the detriment
which we learn the Catholic religion has suffered, and fear it may yet
suffer, in consequence of this, and, finally, the deplorable acts of
sacrilege committed in the first conflict, which our soul shrinks from
narrating."

It is probably on account of these fears of Pius IX. lest he should
be a called a Protestant Pope, that the Roman journals thus far, in
translating the American Address to the Pope, have not dared to add
any comment.

But if the heart, the instincts, of this good man have been beyond his
thinking powers, that only shows him the providential agent to work
out aims beyond his ken. A wave has been set in motion, which cannot
stop till it casts up its freight upon the shore, and if Pius IX. does
not suffer himself to be surrounded by dignitaries, and see the signs
of the times through the eyes of others,--if he does not suffer the
knowledge he had of general society as a simple prelate to become
incrusted by the ignorance habitual to princes,--he cannot fail long
to be a most important agent in fashioning a new and better era for
this beautiful injured land.

I will now give another document, which may be considered as
representing the view of what is now passing taken by the democratic
party called "Young Italy." Should it in any other way have reached
the United States, yet it will not come amiss to have it translated
for the Tribune, as many of your readers may not otherwise have a
chance of seeing this noble document, one of the milestones in the
march of thought. It is a letter to the Most High Pontiff, Pius IX.,
from Joseph Mazzini.


"London, 8th September, 1847.

"MOST HOLY FATHER,--Permit an Italian, who has studied your every step
for some months back with much hopefulness, to address to you, in the
midst of the applauses, often far too servile and unworthy of you,
which, resound near you, some free and profoundly sincere words. Take
to read them some moments from your infinite cares. From a simple
individual animated by holy intentions may come, sometimes, a great
counsel; and I write to you with so much love, with so much emotion of
my whole soul, with so much faith in the destiny of my country, which
may be revived by your means, that my thoughts ought to speak truth.

"And first, it is needful, Most Holy Father, that I should say to
you somewhat of myself. My name has probably reached your ears,
but accompanied by all the calumnies, by all the errors, by all the
foolish conjectures, which the police, by system, and many men of my
party through want of knowledge or poverty of intellect, have heaped
upon it. I am not a subverter, nor a communist, nor a man of blood,
nor a hater, nor intolerant, nor exclusive adorer of a system, or of
a form imagined by my mind. I adore God, and an idea which seems to me
of God,--Italy an angel of moral unity and of progressive civilization
for the nations of Europe. Here and everywhere I have written the best
I know how against the vices of materialism, of egotism, of reaction,
and against the destructive tendencies which contaminate many of
our party. If the people should rise in violent attack against the
selfishness and bad government of their rulers, I, while rendering
homage to the right of the people, shall be among the first to prevent
the excesses and the vengeance which long slavery has prepared. I
believe profoundly in a religious principle, supreme above all social
ordinances; in a divine order, which we ought to seek to realize here
on earth; in a law, in a providential design, which we all ought,
according to our powers, to study and to promote. I believe in the
inspiration of my immortal soul, in the teaching of Humanity, which
shouts to me, through the deeds and words of all its saints, incessant
progress for all through, the work of all my brothers toward a common
moral amelioration, toward the fulfilment of the Divine Law. And in
the great history of Humanity I have studied the history of Italy, and
have found there Rome twice directress of the world,--first through
the Emperors, later through the Popes. I have found there, that
every manifestation of Italian life has also been a manifestation of
European life; and that always when Italy fell, the moral unity
of Europe began to fall apart in analysis, in doubt, in anarchy.
I believe in yet another manifestation of the Italian idea; and I
believe that another European world ought to be revealed from the
Eternal City, that had the Capitol, and has the Vatican. And this
faith has not abandoned me ever, through years, poverty, and griefs
which God alone knows. In these few words lies all my being, all
the secret of my life. I may err in the intellect, but the heart has
always remained pure. I have never lied through fear or hope, and I
speak to you as I should speak to God beyond the sepulchre.

"I believe you good. There is no man this day, I will not say in
Italy, but in all Europe, more powerful than you; you then have, most
Holy Father, vast duties. God measures these according to the means
which he has granted to his creatures.

"Europe is in a tremendous crisis of doubts and desires. Through the
work of time, accelerated by your predecessors of the hierarchy of the
Church, faith is dead, Catholicism is lost in despotism; Protestantism
is lost in anarchy. Look around you; you will find superstitious and
hypocrites, but not believers. The intellect travels in a void. The
bad adore calculation, physical good; the good pray and hope; nobody
_believes_. Kings, governments, the ruling classes, combat for a power
usurped, illegitimate, since it does not represent the worship of
truth, nor disposition to sacrifice one's self for the good of all;
the people combat because they suffer, because they would fain take
their turn to enjoy; nobody fights for duty, nobody because the war
against evil and falsehood is a holy war, the crusade of God. We have
no more a heaven; hence we have no more a society.

"Do not deceive yourself, Most Holy Father; this is the present state
of Europe.

"But humanity cannot exist without a heaven. The idea of society is
only a consequence of the idea of religion. We shall have then, sooner
or later, religion and heaven. We shall have these not in the kings
and the privileged classes,--their very condition excludes love,
the soul of all religions,--but in the people. The spirit from God
descends on many gathered together in his name. The people have
suffered for ages on the cross, and God will bless them with a faith.

"You can, Most Holy Father, hasten that moment. I will not tell you
my individual opinions on the religious development which is to come;
these are of little importance. But I will say to you, that, whatever
be the destiny of the creeds now existing, you can put yourself at the
head of this development. If God wills that such creeds should
revive, you can make them revive; if God wills that they should be
transformed, that, leaving the foot of the cross, dogma and worship
should be purified by rising a step nearer God, the Father and
Educator of the world, you can put yourself between the two epochs,
and guide the world to the conquest and the practice of religious
truth, extirpating a hateful egotism, a barren negation.

"God preserve me from tempting you with ambition; that would be
profanation. I call you, in the name of the power which God has
granted you, and has not granted without a reason, to fulfil the good,
the regenerating European work. I call you, after so many ages of
doubt and corruption, to be apostle of Eternal Truth. I call you to
make yourself the 'servant of all,' to sacrifice yourself, if needful,
so that 'the will of God may be done on the earth as it is in heaven';
to hold yourself ready to glorify God in victory, or to repeat with
resignation, if you must fail, the words of Gregory VII.: 'I die in
exile, because I have loved justice and hated iniquity.'

"But for this, to fulfil the mission which God confides to you, two
things are needful,--to be a believer, and to unify Italy. Without the
first, you will fall in the middle of the way, abandoned by God and by
men; without the second, you will not have the lever with which only
you can effect great, holy, and durable things.

"Be a believer; abhor to be king, politician, statesman. Make no
compromise with error; do not contaminate yourself with diplomacy,
make no compact with fear, with expediency, with the false doctrines
of a _legality_, which is merely a falsehood invented when faith
failed. Take no counsel except from God, from the inspirations of your
own heart, and from the imperious necessity of rebuilding a temple to
truth, to justice, to faith. Self-collected, in enthusiasm of love for
humanity, and apart from every human regard, ask of God that he will
teach you the way; then enter upon it, with the faith of a conqueror
on your brow, with the irrevocable decision of the martyr in your
heart; look neither to the right hand nor the left, but straight
before you, and up to heaven. Of every object that meets you on the
way, ask of yourself: 'Is this just or unjust, true or false, law of
man or law of God?' Proclaim aloud the result of your examination, and
act accordingly. Do not say to yourself: 'If I speak and work in such
a way, the princes of the earth will disagree; the ambassadors will
present notes and protests!' What are the quarrels of selfishness in
princes, or their notes, before a syllable of the eternal Evangelists
of God? They have had importance till now, because, though phantoms,
they had nothing to oppose them but phantoms; oppose to them the
reality of a man who sees the Divine view, unknown to them, of human
affairs, of an immortal soul conscious of a high mission, and these
will vanish before you as vapors accumulated in darkness before the
sun which rises in the east. Do not let yourself be affrighted by
intrigues; the creature who fulfils a duty belongs not to men, but to
God. God will protect you; God will spread around you such a halo
of love, that neither the perfidy of men irreparably lost, nor
the suggestions of hell, can break through it. Give to the world a
spectacle new, unique: you will have results new, not to be foreseen
by human calculation. Announce an era; declare that Humanity is
sacred, and a daughter of God; that all who violate her rights to
progress, to association, are on the way of error; that in God is the
source of every government; that those who are best by intellect and
heart, by genius and virtue, must be the guides of the people.
Bless those who suffer and combat; blame, reprove, those who cause
suffering, without regard to the name they bear, the rank that invests
them. The people will adore in you the best interpreter of the
Divine design, and your conscience will give you rest, strength, and
ineffable comfort.

"Unify Italy, your country. For this you have no need to work, but
to bless Him who works through you and in your name. Gather round you
those who best represent the national party. Do not beg alliances with
princes. Continue to seek the alliance of our own people; say, 'The
unity of Italy ought to be a fact of the nineteenth century,' and it
will suffice; we shall work for you. Leave our pens free; leave free
the circulation of ideas in what regards this point, vital for us,
of the national unity. Treat the Austrian government, even when it no
longer menaces your territory, with the reserve of one who knows that
it governs by usurpation in Italy and elsewhere; combat it with words
of a just man, wherever it contrives oppressions and violations of
the rights of others out of Italy. Require, in the name of the God of
Peace, the Jesuits allied with Austria in Switzerland to withdraw from
that country, where their presence prepares an inevitable and speedy
effusion of the blood of the citizens. Give a word of sympathy which
shall become public to the first Pole of Galicia who comes into your
presence. Show us, in fine, by some fact, that you intend not only to
improve the physical condition of your own few subjects, but that
you embrace in your love the twenty-four millions of Italians, your
brothers; that you believe them called by God to unite in family unity
under one and the same compact; that you would bless the national
banner, wherever it should be raised by pure and incontaminate hands;
and leave the rest to us. We will cause to rise around you a nation
over whose free and popular development you, living, shall preside.
We will found a government unique in Europe, which shall destroy the
absurd divorce between spiritual and temporal power, and in which you
shall be chosen to represent the principle of which the men chosen by
the nation will make the application. We shall know how to translate
into a potent fact the instinct which palpitates through all Italy.
We will excite for you active support among the nations of Europe; we
will find you friends even in the ranks of Austria; we alone, because
we alone have unity of design, believe in the truth of our principle,
and have never betrayed it. Do not fear excesses from the people once
entered upon this way; the people only commit excesses when left to
their own impulses without any guide whom they respect. Do not pause
before the idea of becoming a cause of war. War exists, everywhere,
open or latent, but near breaking out, inevitable; nor can human
power prevent it. Nor do I, it must be said frankly, Most Holy
Father, address to you these words because I doubt in the least of our
destiny, or because I believe you the sole, the indispensable means
of the enterprise. The unity of Italy is a work of God,--a part of
the design of Providence and of all, even of those who show themselves
most satisfied with local improvements, and who, less sincere than
I, wish to make them means of attaining their own aims. It will be
fulfilled, with you or without you. But I address you, because I
believe you worthy to take the initiative in a work so vast; because
your putting yourself at the head of it would much abridge the road
and diminish the dangers, the injury, the blood; because with you
the conflict would assume a religious aspect, and be freed from many
dangers of reaction and civil errors; because might be attained at
once under your banner a political result and a vast moral result;
because the revival of Italy under the ægis of a religious idea, of
a standard, not of rights, but of duties, would leave behind all the
revolutions of other countries, and place her immediately at the head
of European progress; because it is in your power to cause that God
and the people, terms too often fatally disjoined, should meet at once
in beautiful and holy harmony, to direct the fate of nations.

"If I could be near you, I would invoke from God power to convince
you, by gesture, by accent, by tears; now I can only confide to the
paper the cold corpse, as it were, of my thought; nor can I ever have
the certainty that you have read, and meditated a moment what I write.
But I feel an imperious necessity of fulfilling this duty toward Italy
and you, and, whatsoever you may think of it, I shall find myself more
in peace with my conscience for having thus addressed you.

"Believe, Most Holy Father, in the feelings of veneration and of high
hope which professes for you your most devoted

"JOSEPH MAZZINI."


Whatever may be the impression of the reader as to the ideas and
propositions contained in this document,[A] I think he cannot fail to
be struck with its simple nobleness, its fervent truth.

[Footnote A: This letter was printed in Paris to be circulated in
Italy. A prefatory note signed by a friend of Mazzini's, states that
the original was known to have reached the hands of the Pope. The hope
is expressed that the publication of this letter, though without the
authority of its writer, will yet not displease him, as those who are
deceived as to his plans and motives will thus learn his true purposes
and feelings, and the letter will one day aid the historian who seeks
to know what were the opinions and hopes of the entire people of
Italy.--ED.]

A thousand petty interruptions have prevented my completing this
letter, till, now the hour of closing the mail for the steamer is so
near, I shall not have time to look over it, either to see what I have
written or make slight corrections. However, I suppose it represents
the feelings of the last few days, and shows that, without having lost
any of my confidence in the Italian movement, the office of the Pope
in promoting it has shown narrower limits, and sooner than I had
expected.

This does not at all weaken my personal feeling toward this excellent
man, whose heart I have seen in his face, and can never doubt. It was
necessary to be a great thinker, a great genius, to compete with the
difficulties of his position. I never supposed he was that; I am
only disappointed that his good heart has not carried him on a little
farther. With regard to the reception of the American address, it
is only the Roman press that is so timid; the private expressions of
pleasure have been very warm; the Italians say, "The Americans are
indeed our brothers." It remains to be seen, when Pius IX. receives
it, whether the man, the reforming prince, or the Pope is uppermost at
that moment.




LETTER XXII.

THE CEREMONIES SUCCEEDING EPIPHANY.--THE DEATH OF TORLONIA, AND ITS
PREDISPOSING CAUSES.--FUNERAL HONORS.--A STRIKING CONTRAST IN THE
DECEASE OF THE CARDINAL PRINCE MASSIMO.--THE POPE AND HIS OFFICERS
OF STATE.--THE CARDINAL BOFONDI.--SYMPATHETIC EXCITEMENTS THROUGH
ITALY.--SICILY IN FULL INSURRECTION.--THE KING OF SICILY, PRINCE
METTERNICH, AND LOUIS PHILIPPE.--A RUMOR AS TO THE PARENTAGE OF THE
KING OF THE FRENCH.--ROME: AVE MARIA.--LIFE IN THE ETERNAL CITY.--THE
BAMBINO.--CATHOLICISM: ITS GIFTS AND ITS WORKINGS.--THE CHURCH OF ARA
COELI.--EXHIBITION OF THE BAMBINO.--BYGONE SUPERSTITION AND LIVING
REALITY.--THE SOUL OF CATHOLICISM HAS FLED.--REFLECTIONS.--EXHIBITION
BY THE COLLEGE OF THE PROPAGANDA.--EXERCISES IN ALL LANGUAGES.--
DISTURBANCES AND THEIR CAUSES.--THOUGHTS.--BLESSING ANIMALS.--ACCOUNTS
FROM PAVIA.--AUSTRIA.--THE KING OF NAPLES.--RUMORS FROM OTHER PARTS OF
EUROPE.--FRANCE.--GUIZOT.--APPEARANCES AND APPREHENSIONS.


Rome, January, 1848.

I think I closed my last letter, without having had time to speak of
the ceremonies that precede and follow Epiphany. This month, no day,
scarcely an hour, has passed unmarked by some showy spectacle or some
exciting piece of news.

On the last day of the year died Don Carlo Torlonia, brother of the
banker, a man greatly beloved and regretted. The public felt this
event the more that its proximate cause was an attack made upon his
brother's house by Paradisi, now imprisoned in the Castle of St.
Angelo, pending a law process for proof of his accusations. Don
Carlo had been ill before, and the painful agitation caused by these
circumstances decided his fate. The public had been by no means
displeased at this inquiry into the conduct of Don Alessandro
Torlonia, believing that his assumed munificence is, in this case,
literally a robbery of Peter to pay Paul, and that all he gives
to Rome is taken from Rome. But I sympathized no less with the
affectionate indignation of his brother, too good a man to be made the
confidant of wrong, or have eyes for it, if such exist.

Thus, in the poetical justice which does not fail to be done in the
prose narrative of life, while men hastened, the moment a cry was
raised against Don Alessandro, to echo it back with all kinds of
imputations both on himself and his employees, every man held his
breath, and many wept, when the mortal remains of Don Carlo passed;
feeling that in him was lost a benefactor, a brother, a simple, just
man.

Don Carlo was a Knight of Malta; yet with him the celibate life had
not hardened the heart, but only left it free on all sides to general
love. Not less than half a dozen pompous funerals were given in his
honor, by his relatives, the brotherhoods to which he belonged, and
the battalion of the Civic Guard of which he was commander-in-chief.
But in his own house the body lay in no other state than that of a
simple Franciscan, the order to which he first belonged, and whose vow
he had kept through half a century, by giving all he had for the good
of others. He lay on the ground in the plain dark robe and cowl, no
unfit subject for a modern picture of little angels descending to
shower lilies on a good man's corpse. The long files of armed men,
the rich coaches, and liveried retinues of the princes, were little
observed, in comparison with more than a hundred orphan girls whom his
liberality had sustained, and who followed the bier in mourning robes
and long white veils, spirit-like, in the dark night. The trumpet's
wail, and soft, melancholy music from the bands, broke at times the
roll of the muffled drum; the hymns of the Church were chanted, and
volleys of musketry discharged, in honor of the departed; but much
more musical was the whisper in which the crowd, as passed his mortal
frame, told anecdotes of his good deeds.

I do not know when I have passed more consolatory moments than in the
streets one evening during this pomp and picturesque show,--for once
not empty of all meaning as to the present time, recognizing that
good which remains in the human being, ineradicable by all ill, and
promises that our poor, injured nature shall rise, and bloom again,
from present corruption to immortal purity. If Don Carlo had been a
thinker,--a man of strong intellect,--he might have devised means of
using his money to more radical advantage than simply to give it in
alms; he had only a kind human heart, but from that heart distilled a
balm which made all men bless it, happy in finding cause to bless.

As in the moral little books with which our nurseries are entertained,
followed another death in violent contrast. One of those whom the new
arrangements deprived of power and the means of unjust gain was the
Cardinal Prince Massimo, a man a little younger than Don Carlo,
but who had passed his forty years in a very different manner.
He remonstrated; the Pope was firm, and, at last, is said to have
answered with sharp reproof for the past. The Cardinal contained
himself in the audience, but, going out, literally suffocated with the
rage he had suppressed. The bad blood his bad heart had been so
long making rushed to his head, and he died on his return home.
Men laughed, and proposed that all the widows he had deprived of a
maintenance should combine to follow _his_ bier. It was said boys
hissed as that bier passed. Now, a splendid suit of lace being for
sale in a shop of the Corso, everybody says: "Have you been to look
at the lace of Cardinal Massimo, who died of rage, because he could
no longer devour the public goods?" And this is the last echo of _his_
requiem.

The Pope is anxious to have at least well-intentioned men in places of
power. Men of much ability, it would seem, are not to be had. His last
prime minister was a man said to have energy, good dispositions, but
no thinking power. The Cardinal Bofondi, whom he has taken now, is
said to be a man of scarce any ability; there being few among the
new Councillors the public can name as fitted for important trust.
In consolation, we must remember that the Chancellor Oxenstiern found
nothing more worthy of remark to show his son, than by how little
wisdom the world could be governed. We must hope these men of straw
will serve as thatch to keep out the rain, and not be exposed to the
assaults of a devouring flame.

Yet that hour may not be distant. The disturbances of the 1st of
January here were answered by similar excitements in Leghorn and
Genoa, produced by the same hidden and malignant foe. At the same
time, the Austrian government in Milan organized an attempt to rouse
the people to revolt, with a view to arrests, and other measures
calculated to stifle the spirit of independence they know to be latent
there. In this iniquitous attempt they murdered eighty persons; yet
the citizens, on their guard, refused them the desired means of
ruin, and they were forced to retractions as impudently vile as their
attempts had been. The Viceroy proclaimed that "he hoped the people
would confide in him as he did in them"; and no doubt they will. At
Leghorn and Genoa, the wiles of the foe were baffled by the wisdom of
the popular leaders, as I trust they always will be; but it is needful
daily to expect these nets laid in the path of the unwary.

Sicily is in full insurrection; and it is reported Naples, but this
is not sure. There was a report, day before yesterday, that the poor,
stupid king was already here, and had taken cheap chambers at the
Hotel d'Allemagne, as, indeed, it is said he has always a turn for
economy, when he cannot live at the expense of his suffering people.
Day before yesterday, every carriage that the people saw with a
stupid-looking man in it they did not know, they looked to see if it
was not the royal runaway. But it was their wish was father to that
thought, and it has not as yet taken body as fact. In like manner they
report this week the death of Prince Metternich; but I believe it
is not sure he is dead yet, only dying. With him passes one great
embodiment of ill to Europe. As for Louis Philippe, he seems reserved
to give the world daily more signal proofs of his base apostasy to the
cause that placed him on the throne, and that heartless selfishness,
of which his face alone bears witness to any one that has a mind to
read it. How the French nation could look upon that face, while yet
flushed with the hopes of the Three Days, and put him on the throne
as representative of those hopes, I cannot conceive. There is a story
current in Italy, that he is really the child of a man first a barber,
afterwards a police-officer, and was substituted at nurse for the true
heir of Orleans; and the vulgarity of form in his body of limbs, power
of endurance, greed of gain, and hard, cunning intellect, so unlike
all traits of the weak, but more "genteel" Bourbon race, might well
lend plausibility to such a fable.

But to return to Rome, where I hear the Ave Maria just ringing. By the
way, nobody pauses, nobody thinks, nobody prays.

  "Ave Maria! 't is the hour of prayer,
  Ave Maria! 't is the hour of love," &c.,

is but a figment of the poet's fancy.

To return to Rome: what a Rome! the fortieth day of rain, and damp,
and abominable reeking odors, such as blessed cities swept by the
sea-breeze--bitter sometimes, yet indeed a friend--never know. It has
been dark all day, though the lamp has only been lit half an hour. The
music of the day has been, first the atrocious _arias_, which last in
the Corso till near noon, though certainly less in virulence on rainy
days. Then came the wicked organ-grinder, who, apart from the horror
of the noise, grinds exactly the same obsolete abominations as at
home or in England,--the Copenhagen Waltz, "Home, sweet home," and all
that! The cruel chance that both an English my-lady and a Councillor
from one of the provinces live opposite, keeps him constantly before
my window, hoping baiocchi. Within, the three pet dogs of my landlady,
bereft of their walk, unable to employ their miserable legs and eyes,
exercise themselves by a continual barking, which is answered by all
the dogs in the neighborhood. An urchin returning from the laundress,
delighted with the symphony, lays down his white bundle in the gutter,
seats himself on the curb-stone, and attempts an imitation of the
music of cats as a tribute to the concert. The door-bell rings. _Chi
è?_ "Who is it?" cries the handmaid, with unweariable senselessness,
as if any one would answer, _Rogue_, or _Enemy_, instead of the
traditionary _Amico_, _Friend_. Can it be, perchance, a letter, news
of home, or some of the many friends who have neglected so long
to write, or some ray of hope to break the clouds of the difficult
Future? Far from it. Enter a man poisoning me at once with the smell
of the worst possible cigars, not to be driven out, insisting I shall
look upon frightful, ill-cut cameos, and worse-designed mosaics,
made by some friend of his, who works in a chamber and will sell _so_
cheap. Man of ill-odors and meanest smile! I am no Countess to be
fooled by you. For dogs they were not even--dog-cheap.

A faint and misty gleam of sun greeted the day on which there was the
feast to the Bambino, the most venerated doll of Rome. This is the
famous image of the infant Jesus, reputed to be made of wood from
a tree of Palestine, and which, being taken away from its present
abode,--the church of Ara Coeli,--returned by itself, making the bells
ring as it sought admittance at the door. It is this which is carried
in extreme cases to the bedside of the sick. It has received more
splendid gifts than any other idol. An orphan by my side, now
struggling with difficulties, showed me on its breast a splendid
jewel, which a doting grandmother thought more likely to benefit her
soul if given to the Bambino, than if turned into money to give her
grandchildren education and prospects in life. The same old lady
left her vineyard, not to these children, but to her confessor, a
well-endowed Monsignor, who occasionally asks this youth, his
godson, to dinner! Children so placed are not quite such devotees to
Catholicism as the new proselytes of America;--they are not so much
patted on the head, and things do not show to them under quite the
same silver veil.

The church of Ara Coeli is on or near the site of the temple of
Capitoline Jove, which certainly saw nothing more idolatrous than
these ceremonies. For about a week the Bambino is exhibited in an
illuminated chapel, in the arms of a splendidly dressed Madonna doll.
Behind, a transparency represents the shepherds, by moonlight, at the
time the birth was announced, and, above, God the Father, with many
angels hailing the event. A pretty part of this exhibition, which I
was not so fortunate as to hit upon, though I went twice on purpose,
is the children making little speeches in honor of the occasion.
Many readers will remember some account of this in Andersen's
"Improvvisatore."

The last time I went was the grand feast in honor of the Bambino. The
church was entirely full, mostly with Contadini and the poorer people,
absorbed in their devotions: one man near me never raised his head
or stirred from his knees to see anything; he seemed in an anguish of
prayer, either from repentance or anxiety. I wished I could have
hoped the ugly little doll could do Mm any good. The noble stair
which descends from the great door of this church to the foot of the
Capitol,--a stair made from fragments of the old imperial time,--was
flooded with people; the street below was a rapid river also, whose
waves were men. The ceremonies began with splendid music from the
organ, pealing sweetly long and repeated invocations. As if answering
to this call, the world came in, many dignitaries, the Conservatori,
(I think conservatives are the same everywhere, official or no,) and
did homage to the image; then men in white and gold, with the candles
they are so fond here of burning by daylight, as if the poorest
artificial were better than the greatest natural light, uplifted high
above themselves the baby, with its gilded robes and crown, and made
twice the tour of the church, passing twice the column labelled "From
the Home of Augustus," while the band played--what?--the Hymn to Pius
IX. and "Sons of Rome, awake!" Never was a crueller comment upon the
irreconcilableness of these two things. Rome seeks to reconcile reform
and priestcraft.

But her eyes are shut, that they see not. O awake indeed, Romans! and
you will see that the Christ who is to save men is no wooden dingy
effigy of bygone superstitions, but such as Art has seen him in your
better mood,--a Child, living, full of love, prophetic of a boundless
future,--a Man acquainted with all sorrows that rend the heart of
all, and ever loving man with sympathy and faith death could not
quench,--_that_ Christ lives and may be sought; burn your doll of
wood.

How any one can remain a Catholic--I mean who has ever been aroused to
think, and is not biassed by the partialities of childish years--after
seeing Catholicism here in Italy, I cannot conceive. There was once a
soul in the religion while the blood of its martyrs was yet fresh
upon the ground, but that soul was always too much encumbered with
the remains of pagan habits and customs: that soul is now quite fled
elsewhere, and in the splendid catafalco, watched by so many white
and red-robed snuff-taking, sly-eyed men, would they let it be opened,
nothing would be found but bones!

Then the College for propagating all this, the most venerable
Propaganda, has given its exhibition in honor of the Magi, wise men of
the East who came to Christ. I was there one day. In conformity with
the general spirit of Rome,--strangely inconsistent in a country where
the Madonna is far more frequently and devoutly worshipped than God or
Christ, in a city where at least as many female saints and martyrs are
venerated as male,--there was no good place for women to sit. All
the good seats were for the men in the area below, but in the gallery
windows, and from the organ-loft, a few women were allowed to peep
at what was going on. I was one of these exceptional characters. The
exercises were in all the different languages under the sun. It would
have been exceedingly interesting to hear them, one after the
other, each in its peculiar cadence and inflection, but much of the
individual expression was taken away by that general false academic
tone which is sure to pervade such exhibitions where young men speak
who have as yet nothing to say. It would have been different, indeed,
if we could have heard natives of all those countries, who were
animated by real feelings, real wants. Still it was interesting,
particularly the language and music of Kurdistan, and the full-grown
beauty of the Greek after the ruder dialects. Among those who appeared
to the best advantage were several blacks, and the majesty of the
Latin hexameters was confided to a full-blooded Guinea negro, who
acquitted himself better than any other I heard. I observed, too, the
perfectly gentlemanly appearance of these young men, and that they
had nothing of that Cuffy swagger by which those freed from a servile
state try to cover a painful consciousness of their position in our
country. Their air was self-possessed, quiet and free beyond that of
most of the whites.


January 22, 2 o'clock, P.M.

Pour, pour, pour again, dark as night,--many people coming in to see
me because they don't know what to do with themselves. I am very glad
to see them for the same reason; this atmosphere is so heavy, I seem
to carry the weight of the world on my head and feel unfitted for
every exertion. As to eating, that is a bygone thing; wine, coffee,
meat, I have resigned; vegetables are few and hard to have, except
horrible cabbage, in which the Romans delight. A little rice still
remains, which I take with pleasure, remembering it growing in the
rich fields of Lombardy, so green and full of glorious light. That
light fell still more beautiful on the tall plantations of hemp, but
it is dangerous just at present to think of what is made from hemp.

This week all the animals are being blessed,[A] and they get a
gratuitous baptism, too, the while. The lambs one morning were taken
out to the church of St. Agnes for this purpose. The little companion
of my travels, if he sees this letter, will remember how often we saw
her with her lamb in pictures. The horses are being blessed by St.
Antonio, and under his harmonizing influence are afterward driven
through the city, twelve and even twenty in hand. They are harnessed
into light wagons, and men run beside them to guard against accident,
in case the good influence of the Saint should fail.

[Footnote A: One of Rome's singular customs.--ED.]

This morning came the details of infamous attempts by the Austrian
police to exasperate the students of Pavia. The way is to send persons
to smoke cigars in forbidden places, who insult those who are obliged
to tell them to desist. These traps seem particularly shocking when
laid for fiery and sensitive young men. They succeeded: the students
were lured, into combat, and a number left dead and wounded on both
sides. The University is shut up; the inhabitants of Pavia and Milan
have put on mourning; even at the theatre they wear it. The Milanese
will not walk in that quarter where the blood of their fellow-citizens
has been so wantonly shed. They have demanded a legal investigation of
the conduct of the officials.

At Piacenza similar attempts have been made to excite the Italians, by
smoking in their faces, and crying, "Long live the Emperor!" It is a
worthy homage to pay to the Austrian crown,--this offering of cigars
and blood.

  "O this offence is rank; it smells to Heaven."

This morning authentic news is received from Naples. The king, when
assured by his own brother that Sicily was in a state of irresistible
revolt, and that even the women quelled the troops,--showering on them
stones, furniture, boiling oil, such means of warfare as the household
may easily furnish to a thoughtful matron,--had, first, a stroke of
apoplexy, from, which the loss of a good deal of bad blood relieved
him. His mind apparently having become clearer thereby, he has offered
his subjects an amnesty and terms of reform, which, it is hoped, will
arrive before his troops have begun to bombard the cities in obedience
to earlier orders.

Comes also to-day the news that the French Chamber of Peers propose
an Address to the King, echoing back all the falsehoods of his speech,
including those upon reform, and the enormous one that "the peace of
Europe is now assured"; but that some members have worthily opposed
this address, and spoken truth in an honorable manner.

Also, that the infamous sacrifice of the poor little queen of Spain
puts on more tragic colors; that it is pretended she has epilepsy, and
she is to be made to renounce the throne, which, indeed, has been a
terrific curse to her. And Heaven and Earth have looked calmly on,
while the king of France has managed all this with the most unnatural
of mothers.


January 27.

This morning comes the plan of the Address of the Chamber of Deputies
to the King: it contains some passages that are keenest satire upon
him, as also some remarks which have been made, some words of truth
spoken in the Chamber of Peers, that must have given him some twinges
of nervous shame as he read. M. Guizot's speech on the affairs of
Switzerland shows his usual shabbiness and falsehood. Surely never
prime minister stood in so mean a position as he: one like Metternich
seems noble and manly in comparison; for if there is a cruel,
atheistical, treacherous policy, there needs not at least continual
evasion to avoid declaring in words what is so glaringly manifest in
fact.

There is news that the revolution has now broken out in Naples; that
neither Sicilians nor Neapolitans will trust the king, but demand
his abdication; and that his bad demon, Coclo, has fled, carrying two
hundred thousand ducats of gold. But in particulars this news is not
yet sure, though, no doubt, there is truth, at the bottom.

Aggressions on the part of the Austrians continue in the North. The
advocates Tommaso and Manin (a light thus reflected on the name of the
last Doge), having dared to declare formally the necessity of reform,
are thrown into prison. Every day the cloud swells, and the next
fortnight is likely to bring important tidings.




LETTER XXIII.

UNPLEASANTNESS OF A ROMAN WINTER.--PROGRESS OF EVENTS IN EUROPE,
AND THEIR EFFECT UPON ITALY.--THE CARNIVAL.--RAIN INTERRUPTS
THE GAYETY.--REJOICINGS FOR THE REVOLUTIONS OF FRANCE AND
AUSTRIA.--TRANSPORTS OF THE PEOPLE.--OBLATIONS TO THE CAUSE OF
LIBERTY.--CASTLE FUSANO.--THE WEATHER, GLADSOMENESS OF NATURE, AND THE
PLEASURE OF THOUGHT.


Rome, March 29, 1848.

It is long since I have written. My health entirely gave way beneath
the Roman winter. The rain was constant, commonly falling in torrents
from the 16th of December to the 19th of March. Nothing could surpass
the dirt, the gloom, the desolation, of Rome. Let no one fancy he has
seen her who comes here only in the winter. It is an immense mistake
to do so. I cannot sufficiently rejoice that I did not first see Italy
in the winter.

The climate of Rome at this time of extreme damp I have found equally
exasperating and weakening. I have had constant nervous headache
without strength to bear it, nightly fever, want of appetite. Some
constitutions bear it better, but the complaint of weakness and
extreme dejection of spirits is general among foreigners in the wet
season. The English say they become acclimated in two or three years,
and cease to suffer, though never so strong as at home.

Now this long dark dream--to me the most idle and most suffering
season of my life--seems past. The Italian heavens wear again their
deep blue; the sun shines gloriously; the melancholy lustres are
stealing again over the Campagna, and hundreds of larks sing unwearied
above its ruins.

Nature seems in sympathy with the great events that are
transpiring,--with the emotions which are swelling the hearts of
men. The morning sun is greeted by the trumpets of the Roman legions
marching out once more, now not to oppress but to defend. The stars
look down on their jubilees over the good news which nightly reaches
them from their brothers of Lombardy. This week has been one of
nobler, sweeter feeling, of a better hope and faith, than Rome in her
greatest days ever knew. How much has happened since I wrote! First,
the victorious resistance of Sicily and the revolution of Naples.
This has led us yet only to half-measures, but even these have been of
great use to the progress of Italy. The Neapolitans will probably have
to get rid at last of the stupid crowned head who is at present their
puppet; but their bearing with him has led to the wiser sovereigns
granting these constitutions, which, if eventually inadequate to the
wants of Italy, will be so useful, are so needed, to educate her to
seek better, completer forms of administration.

In the midst of all this serious work came the play of Carnival, in
which there was much less interest felt than usual, but enough to
dazzle and captivate a stranger. One thing, however, has been omitted
in the description of the Roman Carnival; i.e. that it rains every
day. Almost every day came on violent rain, just as the tide of gay
masks was fairly engaged in the Corso. This would have been well worth
bearing once or twice, for the sake of seeing the admirable good
humor of this people. Those who had laid out all their savings in the
gayest, thinnest dresses, on carriages and chairs for the Corso, found
themselves suddenly drenched, their finery spoiled, and obliged to
ride and sit shivering all the afternoon. But they never murmured,
never scolded, never stopped throwing their flowers. Their strength of
constitution is wonderful. While I, in my shawl and boa, was coughing
at the open window from the moment I inhaled the wet sepulchral air,
the servant-girls of the house had taken off their woollen gowns, and,
arrayed in white muslins and roses, sat in the drenched street
beneath the drenching rain, quite happy, and have suffered nothing in
consequence.

The Romans renounced the _Moccoletti_, ostensibly as an expression of
sympathy for the sufferings of the Milanese, but really because, at
that time, there was great disturbance about the Jesuits, and the
government feared that difficulties would arise in the excitement of
the evening. But, since, we have had this entertainment in honor
of the revolutions of France and Austria, and nothing could be more
beautiful. The fun usually consists in all the people blowing one
another's lights out. We had not this; all the little tapers were
left to blaze, and the long Corso swarmed with tall fire-flies. Lights
crept out over the surface of all the houses, and such merry little
twinkling lights, laughing and flickering with each slightest movement
of those who held them! Up and down the Corso they twinkled, they
swarmed, they streamed, while a surge of gay triumphant sound ebbed
and flowed beneath that glittering surface. Here and there danced men
carrying aloft _moccoli_, and clanking chains, emblem of the tyrannic
power now vanquished by the people;--the people, sweet and noble, who,
in the intoxication of their joy, were guilty of no rude or unkindly
word or act, and who, no signal being given as usual for the
termination of their diversion, closed, of their own accord and with
one consent, singing the hymns for Pio, by nine o'clock, and
retired peacefully to their homes, to dream of hopes they yet scarce
understand.

This happened last week. The news of the dethronement of Louis
Philippe reached us just after the close of the Carnival. It was just
a year from my leaving Paris. I did not think, as I looked with such
disgust on the empire of sham he had established in France, and saw
the soul of the people imprisoned and held fast as in an iron vice,
that it would burst its chains so soon. Whatever be the result, France
has done gloriously; she has declared that she will not be satisfied
with pretexts while there are facts in the world,--that to stop her
march is a vain attempt, though the onward path be dangerous and
difficult. It is vain to cry, Peace! peace! when there is no peace.
The news from France, in these days, sounds ominous, though still
vague. It would appear that the political is being merged in the
social struggle: it is well. Whatever blood is to be shed, whatever
altars cast down, those tremendous problems MUST be solved, whatever
be the cost! That cost cannot fail to break many a bank, many a heart,
in Europe, before the good can bud again out of a mighty corruption.
To you, people of America, it may perhaps be given to look on and
learn in time for a preventive wisdom. You may learn the real meaning
of the words FRATERNITY, EQUALITY: you may, despite the apes of the
past who strive to tutor you, learn the needs of a true democracy. You
may in time learn to reverence, learn to guard, the true aristocracy
of a nation, the only really nobles,--the LABORING CLASSES.

And Metternich, too, is crushed; the seed of the woman has had his
foot on the serpent. I have seen the Austrian arms dragged through
the streets of Rome and burned in the Piazza del Popolo. The Italians
embraced one another, and cried, _Miracolo! Providenza!_ the modern
Tribune Ciceronacchio fed the flame with faggots; Adam Mickiewicz, the
great poet of Poland, long exiled from his country or the hopes of a
country, looked on, while Polish women, exiled too, or who perhaps,
like one nun who is here, had been daily scourged by the orders of a
tyrant, brought little pieces that had been scattered in the street
and threw them into the flames,--an offering received by the Italians
with loud plaudits. It was a transport of the people, who found no way
to vent their joy, but the symbol, the poesy, natural to the Italian
mind. The ever-too-wise "upper classes" regret it, and the Germans
choose to resent it as an insult to Germany; but it was nothing of
the kind; the insult was to the prisons of Spielberg, to those who
commanded the massacres of Milan,--a base tyranny little congenial to
the native German heart, as the true Germans of Germany are at this
moment showing by their resolves, by their struggles.

When the double-headed eagle was pulled down from above the lofty
portal of the Palazzo di Venezia, the people placed there in its stead
one of white and gold, inscribed with the name ALTA ITALIA, and quick
upon the emblem followed the news that Milan was fighting against her
tyrants,--that Venice had driven them out and freed from their prisons
the courageous Protestants in favor of truth, Tommaso and Manin,--that
Manin, descendant of the last Doge, had raised the republican banner
on the Place St. Mark,--and that Modena, that Parma, were driving out
the unfeeling and imbecile creatures who had mocked Heaven and man by
the pretence of government there.

With indescribable rapture these tidings were received in Rome. Men
were seen dancing, women weeping with joy along the street. The youth
rushed to enroll themselves in regiments to go to the frontier. In the
Colosseum their names were received. Father Gavazzi, a truly patriotic
monk, gave them the cross to carry on a new, a better, because
defensive, crusade. Sterbini, long exiled, addressed them. He said:
"Romans, do you wish to go; do you wish to go with all your hearts?
If so, you _may_, and those who do not wish to go themselves may give
money. To those who will go, the government gives bread and fifteen
baiocchi a day." The people cried: "We wish to go, but we do not wish
so much; the government is very poor; we can live on a paul a day."
The princes answered by giving, one sixty thousand, others twenty,
fifteen, ten thousand dollars. The people responded by giving at
the benches which are opened in the piazzas literally everything;
street-pedlers gave the gains of each day; women gave every
ornament,--from the splendid necklace and bracelet down to the poorest
bit of coral; servant-girls gave five pauls, two pauls, even half a
paul, if they had no more. A man all in rags gave two pauls. "It
is," said he, "all I have." "Then," said Torlonia, "take from me this
dollar." The man of rags thanked him warmly, and handed that also to
the bench, which refused to receive it. "No! _that_ must stay with
you," shouted all present. These are the people whom the traveller
accuses of being unable to rise above selfish considerations;--a
nation rich and glorious by nature, capable, like all nations, all
men, of being degraded by slavery, capable, as are few nations, few
men, of kindling into pure flame at the touch of a ray from the Sun of
Truth, of Life.

The two or three days that followed, the troops were marching about by
detachments, followed always by the people, to the Ponte Molle, often
farther. The women wept; for the habits of the Romans are so domestic,
that it seemed a great thing to have their sons and lovers gone even
for a few months. The English--or at least those of the illiberal,
bristling nature too often met here, which casts out its porcupine
quills against everything like enthusiasm (of the more generous Saxon
blood I know some noble examples)--laughed at all this. They have said
that this people would not fight; when the Sicilians, men and women,
did so nobly, they said: "O, the Sicilians are quite unlike the
Italians; you will see, when the struggle comes on in Lombardy, they
cannot resist the Austrian force a moment." I said: "That force is
only physical; do not you think a sentiment can sustain them?" They
replied: "All stuff and poetry; it will fade the moment their blood
flows." When the news came that the Milanese, men and women, fight as
the Sicilians did, they said: "Well, the Lombards are a better race,
but these Romans are good for nothing. It is a farce for a Roman to
try to walk even; they never walk a mile; they will not be able to
support the first day's march of thirty miles, and not have their
usual _minéstra_ to eat either." Now the troops were not willing to
wait for the government to make the necessary arrangements for their
march, so at the first night's station--Monterosi--they did _not_ find
food or bedding; yet the second night, at Civita Castellana, they were
so well alive as to remain dancing and vivaing Pio Nono in the piazza
till after midnight. No, Gentlemen, soul is not quite nothing, if
matter be a clog upon its transports.

The Americans show a better, warmer feeling than they did; the meeting
in New York was of use in instructing the Americans abroad! The dinner
given here on Washington's birthday was marked by fine expressions of
sentiment, and a display of talent unusual on such occasions. There
was a poem from Mr. Story of Boston, which gave great pleasure; a
speech by Mr. Hillard, said to be very good, and one by Rev. Mr. Hedge
of Bangor, exceedingly admired for the felicity of thought and image,
and the finished beauty of style.

Next week we shall have more news, and I shall try to write and
mention also some interesting things want of time obliges me to omit
in this letter.


April 1.

Yesterday I passed at Ostia and Castle Fusano. A million birds sang;
the woods teemed with blossoms; the sod grew green hourly over the
graves of the mighty Past; the surf rushed in on a fair shore; the
Tiber majestically retreated to carry inland her share from the
treasures of the deep; the sea-breezes burnt my face, but revived my
heart. I felt the calm of thought, the sublime hopes of the future,
nature, man,--so great, though so little,--so dear, though incomplete.
Returning to Rome, I find the news pronounced official, that the
viceroy Ranieri has capitulated at Verona; that Italy is free,
independent, and one. I trust this will prove no April-foolery, no
premature news; it seems too good, too speedy a realization of hope,
to have come on earth, and can only be answered in the words of the
proclamation made yesterday by Pius IX.:--

"The events which these two months past have seen rush after one
another in rapid succession, are no human work. Woe to him who, in
this wind, which shakes and tears up alike the lofty cedars and humble
shrubs, hears not the voice of God! Woe to human pride, if to the
fault or merit of any man whatsoever it refer these wonderful changes,
instead of adoring the mysterious designs of Providence."




LETTER XXIV.

AFFAIRS IN ITALY.--THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT OF MILAN.--ADDRESS TO
THE GERMAN NATION.--BROTHERHOOD, AND THE INDEPENDENCE OF ITALY.--THE
PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT TO THE NATIONS SUBJECT TO THE RULE OF THE
HOUSE OF AUSTRIA.--REFLECTIONS ON THESE MOVEMENTS.--LAMARTINE.--
BERANGER.--MICKIEWICZ IN FLORENCE: ENTHUSIASTIC RECEPTION: STYLED
THE DANTE OF POLAND: HIS ADDRESS BEFORE THE FLORENTINES.--EXILES
RETURNING.--MAZZINI.--THE POSITION OF PIUS IX.--HIS DERELICTION FROM
THE CAUSE OF FREEDOM AND OF PROGRESS.--THE AFFAIR OF THE JESUITS.--
HIS COURSE IN VARIOUS MATTERS.--LANGUAGE OF THE PEOPLE.--THE WORK
BEGUN BY NAPOLEON VIRTUALLY FINISHED.--THE LOSS OF PIUS IX. FOR THE
MOMENT A GREAT ONE.--THE RESPONSIBILITY OF EVENTS LYING WHOLLY WITH
THE PEOPLE.--HOPES AND PROSPECTS OF THE FUTURE.


Rome, April 19, 1848.

In closing my last, I hoped to have some decisive intelligence
to impart by this time, as to the fortunes of Italy. But though
everything, so far, turns in her favor, there has been no decisive
battle, no final stroke. It pleases me much, as the news comes from
day to day, that I passed so leisurely last summer over that part of
Lombardy now occupied by the opposing forces, that I have in my mind
the faces both of the Lombard and Austrian leaders. A number of the
present members of the Provisional Government of Milan I knew while
there; they are men of twenty-eight and thirty, much more advanced in
thought than the Moderates of Rome, Naples, Tuscany, who are too much
fettered with a bygone state of things, and not on a par in thought,
knowledge, preparation for the great future, with the rest of the
civilized world at this moment. The papers that emanate from the
Milanese government are far superior in tone to any that have been
uttered by the other states. Their protest in favor of their rights,
their addresses to the Germans at large and the countries under the
dominion of Austria, are full of nobleness and thoughts sufficiently
great for the use of the coming age. These addresses I translate,
thinking they may not in other form reach America.


"THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT OF MILAN TO THE GERMAN NATION.

"We hail you as brothers, valiant, learned, generous Germans!

"This salutation from a people just risen after a terrible struggle to
self-consciousness and to the exercise of its rights, ought deeply to
move your magnanimous hearts.

"We deem ourselves worthy to utter that great word Brotherhood, which
effaces among nations the traditions of all ancient hate, and we
proffer it over the new-made graves of our fellow-citizens, who have
fought and died to give us the right to proffer it without fear or
shame.

"We call brothers men of all nations who believe and hope in the
improvement of the human family, and seek the occasion to further it;
but you, especially, we call brothers, you Germans, with whom, we have
in common so many noble sympathies,--the love of the arts and higher
studies, the delight of noble contemplation,--with whom also we have
much correspondence in our civil destinies.

"With you are of first importance the interests of the great country,
Germany,--with us, those of the great country, Italy.

"We were induced to rise in arms against Austria, (we mean, not
the people, but the government of Austria,) not only by the need of
redeeming ourselves from the shame and grief of thirty-one years of
the most abject despotism, but by a deliberate resolve to take our
place upon the plane of nations, to unite with our brothers of the
Peninsula, and take rank with them under the great banner raised by
Pius IX., on which is written, THE INDEPENDENCE OF ITALY.

"Can you blame us, independent Germans? In blaming us, you would
sink beneath your history, beneath your most honored and recent
declarations.

"We have chased the Austrian from our soil; we shall give ourselves
no repose till we have chased him from all parts of Italy. No this
enterprise we are all sworn; for this fights our army enrolled in
every part of the Peninsula,--an array of brothers led by the king of
Sardinia, who prides himself on being the sword of Italy.

"And the Austrian is not more our enemy than yours.

"The Austrian--we speak still of the government, and not of the
people--has always denied and contradicted the interests of the whole
German nation, at the head of an assemblage of races differing in
language, in customs, in institutions. When it was in his power to
have corrected the errors of time and a dynastic policy, by assuming
the high mission of uniting them by great moral interests, he
preferred to arm one against the other, and to corrupt them all.

"Fearing every noble instinct, hostile to every grand idea, devoted
to the material interests of an oligarchy of princes spoiled by a
senseless education, of ministers who had sold their consciences, of
speculators who subjected and sacrificed everything to gold, the only
aim of such a government was to sow division everywhere. What wonder
if everywhere in Italy, as in Germany, it reaps harvests of hate and
ignominy. Yes, of hate! To this the Austrian has condemned us, to know
hate and its deep sorrows. But we are absolved in the sight of God,
and by the insults which have been heaped upon us for so many years,
the unwearied efforts to debase us, the destruction of our villages,
the cold-blooded slaughter of our aged people, our priests, our women,
our children. And you,--you shall be the first to absolve us, you,
virtuous among the Germans, who certainly have shared our indignation
when a venal and lying press accused us of being enemies to your great
and generous nation, and we could not answer, and were constrained to
devour in silence the shame of an accusation which wounded us to the
heart.

"We honor you, Germans! we pant to give you glorious evidence of this.
And, as a prelude to the friendly relations we hope to form with your
governments, we seek to alleviate as much as possible the pains of
captivity to some officers and soldiers belonging to various states of
the Germanic Confederation, who fought in the Austrian army. These
we wish to send back to you, and are occupied by seeking the means to
effect this purpose. We honor you so much, that we believe you capable
of preferring to the bonds of race and language the sacred titles of
misfortune and of right.

"Ah! answer to our appeal, valiant, wise, and generous Germans! Clasp
the hand, which we offer you with the heart of a brother and friend;
hasten to disavow every appearance of complicity with a government
which the massacres of Galicia and Lombardy have blotted from the list
of civilized and Christian governments. It would be a beautiful thing
for you to give this example, which will be new in history and worthy
of these miraculous times,--the example of a strong and generous
people casting aside other sympathies, other interests, to answer
the invitation of a regenerate people, to cheer it in its new career,
obedient to the great principles of justice, of humanity, of civil and
Christian brotherhood."


"THE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT OF MILAN TO THE NATIONS SUBJECT TO THE
RULE OF THE HOUSE OF AUSTRIA.

"From your lands have come three armies which have brought war into
ours; your speech is spoken by those hostile bands who come to us with
fire and sword; nevertheless we come to you as to brothers.

"The war which calls for our resistance is not your war; you are not
our enemies: you are only instruments in the hand of our foe, and this
foe, brothers, is common to us all.

"Before God, before men, solemnly we declare it,--our only enemy is
the government of Austria.

"And that government which for so many years has labored to cancel, in
the races it has subdued, every vestige of nationality, which takes
no heed of their wants or prayers, bent only on serving miserable
interests and more miserable pride, fomenting always antipathies
conformably with the ancient maxim of tyrants, _Divide and
govern_,--this government has constituted itself the adversary of
every generous thought, the ally and patron of all ignoble causes,
the government declared by the whole civilized world paymaster of the
executioners of Galicia.

"This government, after having pertinaciously resisted the legal
expression of moderate desires,--after having defied with ludicrous
hauteur the opinion of Europe, has found itself in its metropolis
too weak to resist an insurrection of students, and has yielded,--has
yielded, making an assignment on time, and throwing to you, brothers,
as an alms-gift to the importunate beggar, the promise of institutions
which, in these days, are held essential conditions of life for a
civilized nation.

"But you have not confided in this promise; for the youth of Vienna,
which feels the inspiring breath of this miraculous time, is impelled
on the path of progress; and therefore the Austrian government,
uncertain of itself and of your dispositions, took its old part of
standing still to wait for events, in the hope of turning them to its
own profit.

"In the midst of this it received the news of our glorious revolution,
and it thought to have found in this the best way to escape from
its embarrassment. First it concealed that news; then made it known
piecemeal, and disfigured by hypocrisy and hatred. We were a handful
of rebels thirsting for German blood. We make a war of stilettos, we
wish the destruction of all Germany. But for us answers the admiration
of all Italy, of all Europe, even the evidence of your own people whom
we are constrained to hold prisoners or hostages, who will unanimously
avow that we have shown heroic courage in the fight, heroic moderation
in victory.

"Yes! we have risen as one man against the Austrian government, to
become again a nation, to make common cause with our Italian brothers,
and the arms which we have assumed for so great an object we shall not
lay down till we have attained it. Assailed by a brutal executor of
brutal orders, we have combated in a just war; betrayed, a price
set on our heads, wounded in the most vital parts, we have not
transgressed the bounds of legitimate defence. The murders, the
depredations of the hostile band, irritated against us by most wicked
arts, have excited our horror, but never a reprisal. The soldier, his
arms once laid down, was for us only an unfortunate.

"But behold how the Austrian government provokes you against us, and
bids you come against us as a crusade! A crusade! The parody would be
ludicrous if it were not so cruel. A crusade against a people which,
in the name of Christ, under a banner blessed by the Vicar of Christ,
and revered by all the nations, fights to secure its indefeasible
rights.

"Oh! if you form against us this crusade,--we have already shown
the world what a people can do to reconquer its liberty, its
independence,--we will show, also, what it can do to preserve
them. If, almost unarmed, we have put to flight an army inured to
war,--surely, brothers, that army wanted faith in the cause for which
it fought,--can we fear that our courage will grow faint after our
triumph, and when aided by all our brothers of Italy? Let the Austrian
government send against us its threatened battalions, they will find
in our breasts a barrier more insuperable than the Alps. Everything
will be a weapon to us; from every villa, from every field, from every
hedge, will issue defenders of the national cause; women and children
will fight like men; men will centuple their strength, their courage;
and we will all perish amid the ruins of our city, before receiving
foreign rule into this land which at last we call ours.

"But this must not be. You, our brothers, must not permit it to be;
your honor, your interests, do not permit it. Will you fight in a
cause which you must feel to be absurd and wicked? You sink to the
condition of hirelings, and do you not believe that the Austrian
government, should it conquer us and Italy, would turn against you the
arms you had furnished for the conquest? Do you not believe it would
act as after the struggle with Napoleon? And are you not terrified by
the idea of finding yourself in conflict with all civilized Europe,
and constrained to receive, to feast as your ally, the Autocrat of
Russia, that perpetual terror to the improvement and independence of
Europe? It is not possible for the house of Lorraine to forget its
traditions; it is not possible that it should resign itself to live
tranquil in the atmosphere of Liberty. You can only constrain it by
sustaining yourself, with the Germanic and Slavonian nationalities,
and with this Italy, which longs only to see the nations harmonize
with that resolve which she has finally taken, that she may never more
be torn in pieces.

"Think of us, brothers. This is for you and for us a question of life
and of death; it is a question on which depends, perhaps, the peace of
Europe.

"For ourselves, we have already weighed the chances of the struggle,
and subordinated them all to this final resolution, that we will be
free and independent, with our brothers of Italy.

"We hope that our words will induce you to calm counsels; if not, you
will find us on the field of battle generous and loyal enemies, as now
we profess ourselves your generous and loyal brothers.

  (Signed,)

    "CASATI, _President_,
    DURINI,
    STRIGELLI,
    BERETTA,
    GRAPPI,
    TURRONI,
    REZZONICO,
    CARBONERA,
    BORROMEO,
    P. LITTA,
    GIULINI,
    GUERRIERI,
    PORRO,
    MORRONI,
    AB. ANELLI,
    CORRENTI, _Sec.-Gen._"

These are the names of men whose hearts glow with that generous ardor,
the noble product of difficult times. Into their hearts flows wisdom
from on high,--thoughts great, magnanimous, brotherly. They may not
all remain true to this high vocation, but, at any rate, they will
have lived a period of true life. I knew some of these men when in
Lombardy; of old aristocratic families, with all the refinement of
inheritance and education, they are thoroughly pervaded by principles
of a genuine democracy of brotherhood and justice. In the flower
of their age, they have before them a long career of the noblest
usefulness, if this era follows up its present promise, and they are
faithful to their present creed, and ready to improve and extend it.

Every day produces these remarkable documents. So many years as we
have been suffocated and poisoned by the atmosphere of falsehood in
official papers, how refreshing is the tone of noble sentiment in
Lamartine! What a real wisdom and pure dignity in the letter
of Béranger! _He_ was always absolutely true,--an oasis in the
pestilential desert of Humbug; but the present time allowed him a fine
occasion.

The Poles have also made noble manifestations. Their great poet, Adam
Mickiewicz, has been here to enroll the Italian Poles, publish the
declaration of faith in which they hope to re-enter and re-establish
their country, and receive the Pope's benediction on their banner. In
their declaration of faith are found these three articles:--

"Every one of the nation a citizen,--every citizen equal in rights and
before authorities.

"To the Jew, our elder brother, respect, brotherhood, aid on the way
to his eternal and terrestrial good, entire equality in political and
civil rights.

"To the companion of life, woman, citizenship, entire equality of
rights."

This last expression of just thought the Poles ought to initiate, for
what other nation has had such truly heroic women? Women indeed,--not
children, servants, or playthings.

Mickiewicz, with the squadron that accompanied him from Rome, was
received with the greatest enthusiasm at Florence. Deputations from
the clubs and journals went to his hotel and escorted him to the
Piazza del Gran Dúca, where, amid an immense concourse of people, some
good speeches were made. A Florentine, with a generous forgetfulness
of national vanity, addressed him as the Dante of Poland, who, more
fortunate than the great bard and seer of Italy, was likely to return
to his country to reap the harvest of the seed he had sown.

"O Dante of Poland! who, like our Alighieri, hast received from
Heaven sovereign genius, divine song, but from earth sufferings and
exile,--more happy than our Alighieri, thou hast reacquired a country;
already thou art meditating on the sacred harp the patriotic hymn of
restoration and of victory. The pilgrims of Poland have become the
warriors of their nation. Long live Poland, and the brotherhood of
nations!"

When this address was finished, the great poet appeared on the balcony
to answer. The people received him with a tumult of applause, followed
by a profound silence, as they anxiously awaited his voice. Those
who are acquainted with the powerful eloquence, the magnetism, of
Mickiewicz as an orator, will not be surprised at the effect produced
by this speech, though delivered in a foreign language. It is the
force of truth, the great vitality of his presence, that loads his
words with such electric power. He spoke as follows:--

"People of Tuscany! Friends! Brothers! We receive your shouts of
sympathy in the name of Poland; not for us, but for our country. Our
country, though distant, claims from you this sympathy by its long
martyrdom. The glory of Poland, its only glory, truly Christian, is
to have suffered more than all the nations. In other countries the
goodness, the generosity of heart, of some sovereigns protected the
people; as yours has enjoyed the dawn of the era now coming, under the
protection of your excellent prince. [Viva Leopold II.!] But conquered
Poland, slave and victim, of sovereigns who were her sworn enemies and
executioners,--Poland, abandoned by the governments and the nations,
lay in agony on her solitary Golgotha. She was believed slain, dead,
burred. 'We have slain her,' shouted the despots; 'she is dead!'
[No, no! long live Poland!] 'The dead cannot rise again,' replied
the diplomatists; 'we may now be tranquil.' [A universal shudder of
feeling in the crowd.] There came a moment in which the world doubted
of the mercy and justice of the Omnipotent. There was a moment in
which the nations thought that the earth might be for ever abandoned
by God, and condemned to the rule of the demon, its ancient lord. The
nations forgot that Jesus Christ came down from heaven to give liberty
and peace to the earth. The nations had forgotten all this. But God
is just. The voice of Pius IX. roused Italy. [Long live Pius IX.!] The
people of Paris have driven out the great traitor against the cause
of the nations. [Bravo! Viva the people of Paris!] Very soon will be
heard the voice of Poland. Poland will rise again! [Yes, yes!
Poland will rise again!] Poland will call to life all the Slavonic
races,--the Croats, the Dalmatians, the Bohemians, the Moravians,
the Illyrians. These will form the bulwark against the tyrant of the
North. [Great applause.] They will close for ever the way against the
barbarians of the North,--destroyers of liberty and of civilization.
Poland is called to do more yet: Poland, as crucified nation, is risen
again, and called to serve her sister nations. The will of God
is, that Christianity should become in Poland, and through Poland
elsewhere, no more a dead letter of the law, but the living law of
states and civil associations;--[Great applause;]--that Christianity
should be manifested by acts, the sacrifices of generosity and
liberality. This Christianity is not new to you, Florentines; your
ancient republic knew and has acted upon it: it is time that the same
spirit should make to itself a larger sphere. The will of God is that
the nations should act towards one another as neighbors,--as brothers.
[A tumult of applause.] And you, Tuscans, have to-day done an act of
Christian brotherhood. Receiving thus foreign, unknown pilgrims, who
go to defy the greatest powers of the earth, you have in us saluted
only what is in us of spiritual and immortal,--our faith and our
patriotism. [Applause.] We thank you; and we will now go into the
church to thank God."

"All the people then followed the Poles to the church of Santa Cróce,
where was sung the _Benedictus Dominus_, and amid the memorials of the
greatness of Italy collected in that temple was forged more strongly
the chain of sympathy and of union between two nations, sisters in
misfortune and in glory."

This speech and its reception, literally translated from the journal
of the day, show how pleasant it is on great occasions to be brought
in contact with this people, so full of natural eloquence and of
lively sensibility to what is great and beautiful.

It is a glorious time too for the exiles who return, and reap even a
momentary fruit of their long sorrows. Mazzini has been able to return
from his seventeen years' exile, during which there was no hour, night
or day, that the thought of Italy was banished from his heart,--no
possible effort that he did not make to achieve the emancipation of
his people, and with it the progress of mankind. He returns, like
Wordsworth's great man, "to see what he foresaw." He will see his
predictions accomplishing yet for a long time, for Mazzini has a
mind far in advance of his times in general, and his nation in
particular,--a mind that will be best revered and understood when
the "illustrious Gioberti" shall be remembered as a pompous verbose
charlatan, with just talent enough to catch the echo from the
advancing wave of his day, but without any true sight of the wants of
man at this epoch. And yet Mazzini sees not all: he aims at political
emancipation; but he sees not, perhaps would deny, the bearing of some
events, which even now begin to work their way. Of this, more anon;
but not to-day, nor in the small print of the Tribune. Suffice it to
say, I allude to that of which the cry of Communism, the systems of
Fourier, &c., are but forerunners. Mazzini sees much already,--at
Milan, where he is, he has probably this day received the intelligence
of the accomplishment of his foresight, implied in his letter to the
Pope, which angered Italy by what was thought its tone of irreverence
and doubt, some six months since.

To-day is the 7th of May, for I had thrown aside this letter, begun
the 19th of April, from a sense that there was something coming that
would supersede what was then to say. This something has appeared in a
form that will cause deep sadness to good hearts everywhere. Good and
loving hearts, that long for a human form which they can revere,
will be unprepared and for a time must suffer much from the final
dereliction of Pius IX. to the cause of freedom, progress, and of the
war. He was a fair image, and men went nigh to idolize it; this
they can do no more, though they may be able to find excuse for
his feebleness, love his good heart no less than before, and draw
instruction from the causes that have produced his failure, more
valuable than his success would have been.

Pius IX., no one can doubt who has looked on him, has a good and pure
heart; but it needed also, not only a strong, but a great mind,

  "To _comprehend his trust_, and to the same
  Keep faithful, with a singleness of aim."

A highly esteemed friend in the United States wrote to express
distaste to some observations in a letter of mine to the Tribune on
first seeing the Pontiff a year ago, observing, "To say that he had
not the expression of great intellect was _uncalled for_" Alas!
far from it; it was an observation that rose inevitably on knowing
something of the task before Pius IX., and the hopes he had excited.
The problem he had to solve was one of such difficulty, that only
one of those minds, the rare product of ages for the redemption of
mankind, could be equal to its solution. The question that inevitably
rose on seeing him was, "Is he such a one?" The answer was immediately
negative. But at the same time, he had such an aspect of true
benevolence and piety, that a hope arose that Heaven would act through
him, and impel him to measures wise beyond his knowledge.

This hope was confirmed by the calmness he showed at the time of the
conspiracy of July, and the occupation of Ferrara by the Austrians.
Tales were told of simple wisdom, of instinct, which he obeyed in
opposition to the counsels of all his Cardinals. Everything went on
well for a time.

But tokens of indubitable weakness were shown by the Pope in early
acts of the winter, in the removal of a censor at the suggestion of
others, in his speech, to the Consistory, in his answer to the first
address of the Council. In these he declared that, when there was
conflict between the priest and the man, he always meant to be the
priest; and that he preferred the wisdom of the past to that of the
future.

Still, times went on bending his predeterminations to the call of the
moment. He _acted_ wiselier than he intended; as, for instance, three
weeks after declaring he would not give a constitution to his people,
he gave it,--a sop to Cerberus, indeed,--a poor vamped-up thing that
will by and by have to give place to something more legitimate, but
which served its purpose at the time as declaration of rights for the
people. When the news of the revolution of Vienna arrived, the Pope
himself cried _Viva Pio Nono!_ and this ebullition of truth in one so
humble, though opposed to his formal declarations, was received by his
people with that immediate assent which truth commands.

The revolution of Lombardy followed. The troops of the line were sent
thither; the volunteers rushed to accompany them. In the streets of
Rome was read the proclamation of Charles Albert, in which he styles
himself the servant of Italy and of Pius IX. The priests preached the
war, and justly, as a crusade; the Pope blessed their banners. Nobody
dreamed, or had cause to dream, that these movements had not his
full sympathy; and his name was in every form invoked as the chosen
instrument of God to inspire Italy to throw off the oppressive yoke of
the foreigner, and recover her rights in the civilized world.

At the same time, however, the Pope was seen to act with great
blindness in the affair of the Jesuits. The other states of Italy
drove them out by main force, resolved not to have in the midst of
the war a foe and spy in the camp. Rome wished to do the same, but the
Pope rose in their defence. He talked as if they were assailed as a
_religious_ body, when he could not fail, like everybody else, to be
aware that they were dreaded and hated solely as agents of despotism.
He demanded that they should be assailed only by legal means, when
none such were available. The end was in half-measures, always the
worst possible. He would not entirely yield, and the people would
not at all. The Order was ostensibly dissolved; but great part of
the Jesuits really remain here in disguise, a constant source of
irritation and mischief, which, if still greater difficulties had
not arisen, would of itself have created enough. Meanwhile, in the
earnestness of the clergy about the pretended loss of the head of St.
Andrew, in the ceremonies of the holy week, which at this juncture
excited no real interest, was much matter for thought to the calm
observer as to the restlessness of the new wine, the old bottles being
heard to crack on every side, and hour by hour.

Thus affairs went on from day to day,--the Pope kissing the foot of
the brazen Jupiter and blessing palms of straw at St. Peter's;
the _Circolo Romano_ erecting itself into a kind of Jacobin Club,
dictating programmes for an Italian Diet-General, and choosing
committees to provide for the expenses of the war; the Civic Guard
arresting people who tried to make mobs as if famishing, and, being
searched, were found well provided both with arms and money; the
ministry at their wits' end, with their trunks packed up ready to
be off at a moment's warning,--when the report, it is not yet known
whether true or false, that one of the Roman Civic Guard, a well-known
artist engaged in the war of Lombardy, had been taken and hung by the
Austrians as a brigand, roused the people to a sense of the position
of their friends, and they went to the Pope to demand that he should
take a decisive stand, and declare war against the Austrians.

The Pope summoned, a consistory; the people waited anxiously, for
expressions of his were reported, as if the troops ought not to have
thought of leaving the frontier, while every man, woman, and child
in Rome knew, and every letter and bulletin declared, that all their
thought was to render active aid to the cause of Italian independence.
This anxious doubt, however, had not prepared at all for the excess to
which they were to be disappointed.

The speech of the Pope declared, that he had never any thought of
the great results which had followed his actions; that he had only
intended local reforms, such as had previously been suggested by the
potentates of Europe; that he regretted the _mis_use which had been
made of his name; and wound up by lamenting over the war,--dear to
every Italian heart as the best and holiest cause in which for ages
they had been called to embark their hopes,--as if it was something
offensive to the spirit of religion, and which he would fain see
hushed up, and its motives smoothed out and ironed over.

A momentary stupefaction followed this astounding performance,
succeeded by a passion of indignation, in which the words _traitor_
and _imbecile_ were associated with the name that had been so dear to
his people. This again yielded to a settled grief: they felt that he
was betrayed, but no traitor; timid and weak, but still a sovereign
whom they had adored, and a man who had brought them much good, which
could not be quite destroyed by his wishing to disown it. Even of
this fact they had no time to stop and think; the necessity was too
imminent of obviating the worst consequences of this ill; and the
first thought was to prevent the news leaving Rome, to dishearten the
provinces and army, before they had tried to persuade the Pontiff to
wiser resolves, or, if this could not be, to supersede his power.

I cannot repress my admiration at the gentleness, clearness, and good
sense with which the Roman people acted under these most difficult
circumstances. It was astonishing to see the clear understanding which
animated the crowd, as one man, and the decision with which they acted
to effect their purpose. Wonderfully has this people been developed
within a year!

The Pope, besieged by deputations, who mildly but firmly showed him
that, if he persisted, the temporal power must be placed in other
hands, his ears filled with reports of Cardinals, "such venerable
persons," as he pathetically styles them, would not yield in spirit,
though compelled to in act. After two days' struggle, he was obliged
to place the power in the hands of the persons most opposed to him,
and nominally acquiesce in their proceedings, while in his second
proclamation, very touching from the sweetness of its tone, he shows a
fixed misunderstanding of the cause at issue, which leaves no hope of
his ever again being more than a name or an effigy in their affairs.

His people were much affected, and entirely laid aside their anger,
but they would not be blinded as to the truth. While gladly returning
to their accustomed habits of affectionate homage toward the Pontiff,
their unanimous sense and resolve is thus expressed in an able
pamphlet of the day, such as in every respect would have been deemed
impossible to the Rome of 1847:--

"From the last allocution of Pius result two facts of extreme
gravity;--the entire separation between the spiritual and temporal
power, and the express refusal of the Pontiff to be chief of an
Italian Republic. But far from drawing hence reason for discouragement
and grief, who looks well at the destiny of Italy may bless
Providence, which breaks or changes the instrument when the work
is completed, and by secret and inscrutable ways conducts us to the
fulfilment of our desires and of our hopes.

"If Pius IX. refuses, the Italian people does not therefore draw back.
Nothing remains to the free people of Italy, except to unite in one
constitutional kingdom, founded on the largest basis; and if the chief
who, by our assemblies, shall be called to the highest honor, either
declines or does not answer worthily, the people will take care of
itself.

"Italians! down with all emblems of private and partial interests.
Let us unite under one single banner, the tricolor, and if he who has
carried it bravely thus far lets it fall from his hand, we will take
it one from the other, twenty-four millions of us, and, till the last
of us shall have perished under the banner of our redemption, the
stranger shall not return into Italy.

"Viva Italy! viva the Italian people!"[A]

[Footnote A: Close of "A Comment by Pio Angelo Fierortino on the
Allocution of Pius IX. spoken in the Secret Consistory of 29th April,
1848," dated Italy, 30th April, 1st year of the Redemption of Italy.]

These events make indeed a crisis. The work begun by Napoleon is
finished. There will never more be really a Pope, but only the effigy
or simulacrum of one.

The loss of Pius IX. is for the moment a great one. His name had real
moral weight,--was a trumpet appeal to sentiment. It is not the same
with any man that is left. There is not one that can be truly a leader
in the Roman dominion, not one who has even great intellectual weight.

The responsibility of events now lies wholly with the people, and
that wave of thought which has begun to pervade them. Sovereigns and
statesmen will go where they are carried; it is probable power will be
changed continually from, hand to hand, and government become, to all
intents and purposes, representative. Italy needs now quite to throw
aside her stupid king of Naples, who hangs like a dead weight on her
movements. The king of Sardinia and the Grand Duke of Tuscany will be
trusted while they keep their present course; but who can feel sure
of any sovereign, now that Louis Philippe has shown himself so mad
and Pius IX. so blind? It seems as if fate was at work to bewilder
and cast down the dignities of the world and democratize society at a
blow.

In Rome there is now no anchor except the good sense of the people.
It seems impossible that collision should not arise between him who
retains the name but not the place of sovereign, and the provisional
government which calls itself a ministry. The Count Mamiani, its new
head, is a man of reputation as a writer, but untried as yet as a
leader or a statesman. Should agitations arise, the Pope can no longer
calm them by one of his fatherly looks.

All lies in the future; and our best hope must be that the Power which
has begun so great a work will find due means to end it, and make the
year 1850 a year of true jubilee to Italy; a year not merely of pomps
and tributes, but of recognized rights and intelligent joys; a year of
real peace,--peace, founded not on compromise and the lying etiquettes
of diplomacy, but on truth and justice.

Then this sad disappointment in Pius IX. may be forgotten, or, while
all that was lovely and generous in his life is prized and reverenced,
deep instruction may be drawn from his errors as to the inevitable
dangers of a priestly or a princely environment, and a higher
knowledge may elevate a nobler commonwealth than the world has yet
known.

Hoping this era, I remain at present here. Should my hopes be dashed
to the ground, it will not change my faith, but the struggle for its
manifestation is to me of vital interest. My friends write to urge my
return; they talk of our country as the land of the future. It is so,
but that spirit which made it all it is of value in my eyes, which
gave all of hope with which I can sympathize for that future, is
more alive here at present than in America. My country is at present
spoiled by prosperity, stupid with the lust of gain, soiled by crime
in its willing perpetuation of slavery, shamed by an unjust war, noble
sentiment much forgotten even by individuals, the aims of politicians
selfish or petty, the literature frivolous and venal. In Europe, amid
the teachings of adversity, a nobler spirit is struggling,--a spirit
which cheers and animates mine. I hear earnest words of pure faith and
love. I see deeds of brotherhood. This is what makes _my_ America. I
do not deeply distrust my country. She is not dead, but in my time she
sleepeth, and the spirit of our fathers flames no more, but lies hid
beneath the ashes. It will not be so long; bodies cannot live when the
soul gets too overgrown with gluttony and falsehood. But it is not the
making a President out of the Mexican war that would make me wish to
come back. Here things are before my eyes worth recording, and, if I
cannot help this work, I would gladly be its historian.


May 13.

Returning from a little tour in the Alban Mount, where everything
looks so glorious this glorious spring, I find a temporary quiet. The
Pope's brothers have come to sympathize with him; the crowd sighs over
what he has done, presents him with great bouquets of flowers, and
reads anxiously the news from the north and the proclamations of the
new ministry. Meanwhile the nightingales sing; every tree and plant
is in flower, and the sun and moon shine as if paradise were already
re-established on earth. I go to one of the villas to dream it is so,
beneath the pale light of the stars.




LETTER XXV.

REVIEW OF THE COURSE OF PIUS IX.--MAMIANI.--THE PEOPLE'S DISAPPOINTED
HOPES.--THE MONUMENTS IN MILAN, NAPLES, ETC.--THE KING OF NAPLES AND
HIS TROOPS.--CALAMITIES OF THE WAR.--THE ITALIAN PEOPLE.--CHARLES
ALBERT.--DEDUCTIONS.--SUMMER AMONG THE MOUNTAINS OF ITALY.


Rome, December 2, 1848.

I have not written for six months, and within that time what changes
have taken place on this side "the great water,"--changes of how
great dramatic interest historically,--of bearing infinitely important
ideally! Easy is the descent in ill.

I wrote last when Pius IX. had taken the first stride on the downward
road. He had proclaimed himself the foe of further reform measures,
when he implied that Italian independence was not important in his
eyes, when he abandoned the crowd of heroic youth who had gone to the
field with his benediction, to some of whom his own hand had given
crosses. All the Popes, his predecessors, had meddled with, most
frequently instigated, war; now came one who must carry out,
literally, the doctrines of the Prince of Peace, when the war was
not for wrong, or the aggrandizement of individuals, but to
redeem national, to redeem human, rights from the grasp of foreign
oppression.

I said some cried "traitor," some "imbecile," some wept, but In the
minds of all, I believe, at that time, grief was predominant. They
could no longer depend on him they had thought their best friend. They
had lost their father.

Meanwhile his people would not submit to the inaction he urged. They
saw it was not only ruinous to themselves, but base and treacherous
to the rest of Italy. They said to the Pope, "This cannot be; you
must follow up the pledges you have given, or, if you will not act to
redeem them, you must have a ministry that will." The Pope, after he
had once declared to the contrary, ought to have persisted. He should
have said, "I cannot thus belie myself, I cannot put my name to acts I
have just declared to be against my conscience."

The ministers of the people ought to have seen that the position they
assumed was utterly untenable; that they could not advance with an
enemy in the background cutting off all supplies. But some patriotism
and some vanity exhilarated them, and, the Pope having weakly yielded,
they unwisely began their impossible task. Mamiani, their chief, I
esteem a man, under all circumstances, unequal to such a position,--a
man of rhetoric merely. But no man could have acted, unless the
Pope had resigned his temporal power, the Cardinals been put under
sufficient check, and the Jesuits and emissaries of Austria driven
from their lurking-places.

A sad scene began. The Pope,--shut up more and more in his palace, the
crowd of selfish and insidious advisers darkening round, enslaved by
a confessor,--he who might have been the liberator of suffering Europe
permitted the most infamous treacheries to be practised in his name.
Private letters were written to the foreign powers, denying the
acts he outwardly sanctioned; the hopes of the people were evaded
or dallied with; the Chamber of Deputies permitted to talk and pass
measures which they never could get funds to put into execution;
legions to form and manoeuvre, but never to have the arms and
clothing they needed. Again and again the people went to the Pope for
satisfaction. They got only--benediction.

Thus plotted and thus worked the scarlet men of sin, playing the hopes
of Italy off and on, while _their_ hope was of the miserable defeat
consummated by a still worse traitor at Milan on the 6th of August.
But, indeed, what could be expected from the "Sword of Pius IX.," when
Pius IX. himself had thus failed in his high vocation. The king of
Naples bombarded his city, and set on the Lazzaroni to rob and murder
the subjects he had deluded by his pretended gift of the Constitution.
Pius proclaimed that he longed to embrace _all_ the princes of Italy.
He talked of peace, when all knew for a great part of the Italians
there was no longer hope of peace, except in the sepulchre, or
freedom.

The taunting manifestos of Welden are a sufficient comment on the
conduct of the Pope. "As the government of his Holiness is too weak
to control his subjects,"--"As, singularly enough, a great number of
Romans are found, fighting against us, contrary to the _expressed_
will of their prince,"--such were the excuses for invasions of the
Pontifical dominions, and the robbery and insult by which they were
accompanied. Such invasions, it was said, made his Holiness very
indignant; he remonstrated against these; but we find no word of
remonstrance against the tyranny of the king of Naples,--no word
of sympathy for the victims of Lombardy, the sufferings of Verona,
Vicenza, Padua, Mantua, Venice.

In the affairs of Europe there are continued signs of the plan of the
retrograde party to effect similar demonstrations in different places
at the same hour. The 15th of May was one of these marked days.
On that day the king of Naples made use of the insurrection he had
contrived to excite, to massacre his people, and find an excuse for
recalling his troops from Lombardy. The same day a similar crisis was
hoped in Rome from the declarations of the Pope, but that did not work
at the moment exactly as the foes of enfranchisement hoped.

However, the wounds were cruel enough. The Roman volunteers received
the astounding news that they were not to expect protection or
countenance from their prince; all the army stood aghast, that they
were no longer to fight in the name of Pio. It had been so dear,
so sweet, to love and really reverence the head of their Church,
so inspiring to find their religion for once in accordance with the
aspirations of the soul! They were to be deprived, too, of the aid of
the disciplined Neapolitan troops and their artillery, on which they
had counted. How cunningly all this was contrived to cause dissension
and dismay may easily be seen.

The Neapolitan General Pepe nobly refused to obey, and called on the
troops to remain with him. They wavered; but they are a pampered army,
personally much attached to the king, who pays them well and indulges
them at the expense of his people, that they may be his support
against that people when in a throe of nature it rises and striven
for its rights. For the same reason, the sentiment of patriotism was
little diffused among them in comparison with the other troops. And
the alternative presented was one in which it required a very clear
sense of higher duty to act against habit. Generally, after wavering
awhile, they obeyed and returned. The Roman States, which had received
them with so many testimonials of affection and honor, on their
retreat were not slack to show a correspondent aversion and contempt.
The towns would not suffer their passage; the hamlets were unwilling
to serve them even with fire and water. They were filled at once with
shame and rage; one officer killed himself, unable to bear it; in the
unreflecting minds of the soldiers, hate sprung up for the rest of
Italy, and especially Rome, which will make them admirable tools of
tyranny in case of civil war.

This was the first great calamity of the war. But apart from the
treachery of the king of Naples and the dereliction of the Pope,
it was impossible it should end thoroughly well. The people were
in earnest, and have shown themselves so; brave, and able to bear
privation. No one should dare, after the proofs of the summer, to
reiterate the taunt, so unfriendly frequent on foreign lips at the
beginning of the contest, that the Italian can boast, shout, and fling
garlands, but not _act_. The Italian always showed himself noble and
brave, even in foreign service, and is doubly so in the cause of his
country. But efficient heads were wanting. The princes were not in
earnest; they were looking at expediency. The Grand Duke, timid and
prudent, wanted to do what was safest for Tuscany; his ministry,
"_Moderate_" and prudent, would have liked to win a great prize at
small risk. They went no farther than the people pulled them. The king
of Sardinia had taken the first bold step, and the idea that treachery
on his part was premeditated cannot be sustained; it arises from the
extraordinary aspect of his measures, and the knowledge that he is not
incapable of treachery, as he proved in early youth. But now it was
only his selfishness that worked to the same results. He fought and
planned, not for Italy, but the house of Savoy, which his Balbis and
Giobertis had so long been prophesying was to reign supreme in the
new great era of Italy. These prophecies he more than half believed,
because they chimed with his ambitious wishes; but he had not soul
enough to realize them; he trusted only in his disciplined troops;
he had not nobleness enough to believe he might rely at all on
the sentiment of the people. For his troops he dared not have good
generals; conscious of meanness and timidity, he shrank from the
approach of able and earnest men; he was inly afraid they would,
in helping Italy, take her and themselves out of his guardianship.
Antonini was insulted, Garibaldi rejected; other experienced leaders,
who had rushed to Italy at the first trumpet-sound, could never
get employment from him. As to his generalship, it was entirely
inadequate, even if he had made use of the first favorable moments.
But his first thought was not to strike a blow at the Austrians before
they recovered from the discomfiture of Milan, but to use the panic
and need of his assistance to induce Lombardy and Venice to annex
themselves to his kingdom. He did not even wish seriously to get the
better till this was done, and when this was done, it was too late.
The Austrian army was recruited, the generals had recovered their
spirits, and were burning to retrieve and avenge their past defeat.
The conduct of Charles Albert had been shamefully evasive in the first
months. The account given by Franzini, when challenged in the Chamber
of Deputies at Turin, might be summed up thus: "Why, gentlemen,
what would you have? Every one knows that the army is in excellent
condition, and eager for action. They are often reviewed, hear
speeches, and sometimes get medals. We take places always, if it is
not difficult. I myself was present once when the troops advanced; our
men behaved gallantly, and had the advantage in the first skirmish;
but afterward the enemy pointed on us artillery from the heights, and,
naturally, we retired. But as to supposing that his Majesty Charles
Albert is indifferent to the success of Italy in the war, that is
absurd. He is 'the Sword of Italy'; he is the most magnanimous of
princes; he is seriously occupied about the war; many a day I have
been called into his tent to talk it over, before he was up in the
morning!"

Sad was it that the heroic Milan, the heroic Venice, the heroic
Sicily, should lean on such a reed as this, and by hurried acts,
equally unworthy as unwise, sully the glory of their shields. Some
names, indeed, stand, out quite free from this blame. Mazzini, who
kept up a combat against folly and cowardice, day by day and hour by
hour, with almost supernatural strength, warned the people constantly
of the evils which their advisers were drawing upon them. He was heard
then only by a few, but in this "Italia del Popolo" may be found many
prophecies exactly fulfilled, as those of "the golden-haired love of
Phoebus" during the struggles of Ilium. He himself, in the last sad
days of Milan, compared his lot to that of Cassandra. At all events,
his hands are pure from that ill. What could be done to arouse
Lombardy he did, but the "Moderate" party unable to wean themselves
from old habits, the pupils of the wordy Gioberti thought there could
be no safety unless under the mantle of a prince. They did not foresee
that he would run away, and throw that mantle on the ground.

Tommaso and Manin also were clear in their aversion to these measures;
and with them, as with all who were resolute in principle at that
time, a great influence has followed.

It is said Charles Albert feels bitterly the imputations on his
courage, and says they are most ungrateful, since he has exposed the
lives of himself and his sons in the combat. Indeed, there ought to
be made a distinction between personal and mental courage. The former
Charles Albert may possess, may have too much of what this still
aristocratic world calls "the feelings of a gentleman" to shun
exposing himself to a chance shot now and then. An entire want of
mental courage he has shown. The battle, decisive against him, was
made so by his giving up the moment fortune turned against him. It is
shameful to hear so many say this result was inevitable, just because
the material advantages were in favor of the Austrians. Pray, was
never a battle won against material odds? It is precisely such that a
good leader, a noble man, may expect to win. Were the Austrians driven
out of Milan because the Milanese had that advantage? The Austrians
would again, have suffered repulse from them, but for the baseness of
this man, on whom they had been cajoled into relying,--a baseness that
deserves the pillory; and on a pillory will the "Magnanimous," as he
was meanly called in face of the crimes of his youth and the timid
selfishness of his middle age, stand in the sight of posterity. He
made use of his power only to betray Milan; he took from the citizens
all means of defence, and then gave them up to the spoiler; he
promised to defend them "to the last drop of his blood," and sold
them the next minute; even the paltry terms he made, he has not seen
maintained. Had the people slain him in their rage, he well deserved
it at their hands; and all his conduct since show how righteous would
have been that sudden verdict of passion.

Of all this great drama I have much to write, but elsewhere, in a more
full form, and where I can duly sketch the portraits of actors little
known in America. The materials are over-rich. I have bought my right
in them by much sympathetic suffering; yet, amid the blood and tears
of Italy, 'tis joy to see some glorious new births. The Italians are
getting cured of mean adulation and hasty boasts; they are learning
to prize and seek realities; the effigies of straw are getting knocked
down, and living, growing men take their places. Italy is being
educated for the future, her leaders are learning that the time is
past for trust in princes and precedents,--that there is no hope
except in truth and God; her lower people are learning to shout less
and think more.

Though my thoughts have been much with the public in this struggle for
life, I have been away from it during the summer months, in the quiet
valleys, on the lonely mountains. There, personally undisturbed, I
have seen the glorious Italian summer wax and wane,--the summer of
Southern Italy, which I did not see last year. On the mountains it was
not too hot for me, and I enjoyed the great luxuriance of vegetation.
I had the advantage of having visited the scene of the war minutely
last summer, so that, in mind, I could follow every step of the
campaign, while around me were the glorious relics of old times,--the
crumbling theatre or temple of the Roman day, the bird's-nest village
of the Middle Ages, on whose purple height shone the sun and moon of
Italy in changeless lustre. It was great pleasure to me to watch the
gradual growth and change of the seasons, so different from ours.
Last year I had not leisure for this quiet acquaintance. Now I saw the
fields first dressed in their carpets of green, enamelled richly with
the red poppy and blue corn-flower,--in that sunshine how resplendent!
Then swelled the fig, the grape, the olive, the almond; and my food
was of these products of this rich clime. For near three months I had
grapes every day; the last four weeks, enough daily for two persons
for a cent! Exquisite salad for two persons' dinner and supper cost
but a cent, and all other products of the region were in the same
proportion. One who keeps still in Italy, and lives as the people do,
may really have much simple luxury for very little money; though both
travel, and, to the inexperienced foreigner, life in the cities, are
expensive.




LETTER XXVI.

THOUGHTS OF THE ITALIAN RACE, THE SEASONS, AND ROME.--CHANGES.--THE
DEATH OF THE MINISTER ROSSI.--THE CHURCH OF SAN LUIGI DEL
FRANCESI.--ST. CECILIA AND THE DOMENICHINO CHAPEL.--THE PIAZZA DEL
POPOLO.--THE TROOPS: PREPARATORY MOVEMENTS TOWARD THE QUIRINAL.--THE
DEMONSTRATION ON THE PALACE.--THE CHURCH: ITS POSITION AND AIMS.--THE
POPE'S FLIGHT, &C.--SOCIAL LIFE.--DON TIRLONE.--THE NEW YEAR.


Rome, December 2, 1848.

Not till I saw the snow on the mountains grow rosy in the autumn
sunset did I turn my steps again toward Rome. I was very ready to
return. After three or four years of constant excitement, this six
months of seclusion had been welcome; but now I felt the need of
meeting other eyes beside those, so bright and so shallow, of the
Italian peasant. Indeed, I left what was most precious, but which
I could not take with me;[A] still it was a compensation that I was
again to see Rome,--Rome, that almost killed me with her cold breath
of last winter, yet still with that cold breath whispered a tale of
import so divine. Rome so beautiful, so great! her presence stupefies,
and one has to withdraw to prize the treasures she has given. City
of the soul! yes, it is _that_; the very dust magnetizes you, and
thousand spells have been chaining you in every careless, every
murmuring moment. Yes! Rome, however seen, thou must be still adored;
and every hour of absence or presence must deepen love with one who
has known what it is to repose in thy arms.

[Footnote A: Her child, who was born in Rieti, September 5, 1848, and
was necessarily left in that town during the difficulties and siege of
Rome.--ED.]

Repose! for whatever be the revolutions, tumults, panics, hopes, of
the present day, still the temper of life here is repose. The great
past enfolds us, and the emotions of the moment cannot here greatly
disturb that impression. From the wild shout and throng of the
streets the setting sun recalls us as it rests on a hundred domes and
temples,--rests on the Campagna, whose grass is rooted in departed
human greatness. Burial-place so full of spirit that death itself
seems no longer cold! O let me rest here, too! Hest here seems
possible; meseems myriad lives still linger here, awaiting some one
great summons.

The rivers had burst their bounds, and beneath the moon the fields
round Rome lay one sheet of silver. Entering the gate while the
baggage was under examination, I walked to the entrance of a villa.
Far stretched its overarching shrubberies, its deep green bowers; two
statues, with foot advanced and uplifted finger, seemed to greet me;
it was near the scene of great revels, great splendors in the old
time; there lay the gardens of Sallust, where were combined palace,
theatre, library, bath, and villa. Strange things have happened since,
the most attractive part of which--the secret heart--lies buried or
has fled to animate other forms; for of that part historians have
rarely given a hint more than they do now of the truest life of our
day, which refuses to be embodied, by the pen, craving forms more
mutable, more eloquent than the pen can give.

I found Rome empty of foreigners. Most of the English have fled in
affright,--the Germans and French are wanted at home,--the Czar has
recalled many of his younger subjects; he does not like the schooling
they get here. That large part of the population, which lives by the
visits of foreigners was suffering very much,--trade, industry, for
every reason, stagnant. The people were every moment becoming more
exasperated by the impudent measures of the Minister Rossi, and their
mortification at seeing Rome represented and betrayed by a foreigner.
And what foreigner? A pupil of Guizot and Louis Philippe. The news of
the bombardment and storm of Vienna had just reached Rome. Zucchi,
the Minister of War, at once left the city to put down over-free
manifestations in the provinces, and impede the entrance of the troops
of the patriot chief, Garibaldi, into Bologna. From the provinces came
soldiery, called by Rossi to keep order at the opening of the Chamber
of Deputies. He reviewed them in the face of the Civic Guard; the
press began to be restrained; men were arbitrarily seized and sent
out of the kingdom. The public indignation rose to its height; the cup
overflowed.

The 15th was a beautiful day, and I had gone out for a long walk.
Returning at night, the old Padrona met me with her usual smile a
little clouded. "Do you know," said she, "that the Minister Rossi has
been killed?" No Roman said _murdered_.

"Killed?"

"Yes,--with a thrust in the back. A wicked man, surely; but is that
the way to punish even the wicked?"

"I cannot," observed a philosopher, "sympathize under any
circumstances with so immoral a deed; but surely the manner of doing
it was great."

The people at large were not so refined in their comments as either
the Padrona or the philosopher; but soldiers and populace alike ran up
and down, singing, "Blessed the hand that rids the earth of a tyrant."

Certainly, the manner _was_ "great."

The Chamber was awaiting the entrance of Rossi. Had he lived to enter,
he would have found the Assembly, without a single exception, ranged
upon the Opposition benches. His carriage approached, attended by a
howling, hissing multitude. He smiled, affected unconcern, but must
have felt relieved when his horses entered the courtyard gate of
the _Cancelleria_. He did not know he was entering the place of his
execution. The horses stopped; he alighted in the midst of a crowd; it
jostled him, as if for the purpose of insult; he turned abruptly,
and received as he did so the fatal blow. It was dealt by a resolute,
perhaps experienced, hand; he fell and spoke no word more.

The crowd, as if all previously acquainted with the plan, as no doubt
most of them were, issued quietly from the gate, and passed through
the outside crowd,--its members, among whom was he who dealt the blow,
dispersing in all directions. For two or three minutes this outside
crowd did not know that anything special had happened. When they did,
the news was at the moment received in silence. The soldiers in whom
Rossi had trusted, whom he had hoped to flatter and bribe, stood at
their posts and said not a word. Neither they nor any one asked, "Who
did this? Where is he gone?" The sense of the people certainly was
that it was an act of summary justice on an offender whom the laws
could not reach, but they felt it to be indecent to shout or exult on
the spot where he was breathing his last. Rome, so long supposed the
capital of Christendom, certainly took a very pagan view of this act,
and the piece represented on the occasion at the theatres was "The
Death of Nero."

The next morning I went to the Church of St. Andrea della Valle, where
was to be performed a funeral service, with fine music, in honor of
the victims of Vienna; for this they do here for the victims of every
place,--"victims of Milan," "victims of Paris," "victims of Naples,"
and now "victims of Vienna." But to-day I found the church closed, the
service put off,--Rome was thinking about her own victims.

I passed into the Ripetta, and entered the Church of San Luigi dei
Francesi. The Republican flag was flying at the door; the young
sacristan said the fine musical service, which this church gave
formerly on St. Philip's day in honor of Louis Philippe, would now
be transferred to the Republican anniversary, the 25th of February. I
looked at the monument Chateaubriand erected when here, to a poor girl
who died, last of her family, having seen all the others perish
round her. I entered the Domenichino Chapel, and gazed anew on the
magnificent representations of the Life and Death of St. Cecilia. She
and St. Agnes are my favorite saints. I love to think of those angel
visits which her husband knew by the fragrance of roses and lilies
left behind in the apartment. I love to think of his visit to the
Catacombs, and all that followed. In one of the pictures St. Cecilia,
as she stretches out her arms toward the suffering multitude, seems
as if an immortal fount of purest love sprung from her heart. It gives
very strongly the idea of an inexhaustible love,--the only love that
is much worth thinking about.

Leaving the church, I passed along toward the Piazza del Popolo.
"Yellow Tiber rose," but not high enough to cause "distress," as he
does when in a swelling mood. I heard the drums beating, and, entering
the Piazza, I found the troops of the line already assembled, and
the Civic Guard marching in by platoons, each battalion saluted as it
entered by trumpets and a fine strain from the band of the Carbineers.

I climbed the Pincian to see better. There is no place so fine for
anything of this kind as the Piazza del Popolo, it is so full of
light, so fair and grand, the obelisk and fountain make so fine a
centre to all kinds of groups.

The object of the present meeting was for the Civic Guard and troops
of the line to give pledges of sympathy preparatory to going to the
Quirinal to demand a change of ministry and of measures. The flag of
the Union was placed in front of the obelisk; all present saluted it;
some officials made addresses; the trumpets sounded, and all moved
toward the Quirinal.

Nothing could be gentler than the disposition of those composing the
crowd. They were resolved to be played with no longer, but no
threat was uttered or thought. They believed that the court would be
convinced by the fate of Rossi that the retrograde movement it had
attempted was impracticable. They knew the retrograde party were
panic-struck, and hoped to use the occasion to free the Pope from its
meshes. All felt that Pius IX. had fallen irrevocably from his high
place as the friend of progress and father of Italy; but still he was
personally beloved, and still his name, so often shouted in hope and
joy, had not quite lost its _prestige_.

I returned to the house, which is very near the Quirinal. On one
side I could see the palace and gardens of the Pope, on the other the
Piazza Barberini and street of the Four Fountains. Presently I saw the
carriage of Prince Barberini drive hurriedly into his court-yard gate,
the footman signing to close it, a discharge of fire-arms was heard,
and the drums of the Civic Guard beat to arms.

The Padrona ran up and down, crying with every round of shot, "Jesu
Maria, they are killing the Pope! O poor Holy Father!--Tito, Tito,"
(out of the window to her husband,) "what _is_ the matter?"

The lord of creation disdained to reply.

"O Signora! pray, pray, ask Tito what is the matter?"

I did so.

"I don't know, Signora; nobody knows."

"Why don't you go on the Mount and see?"

"It would be an imprudence, Signora; nobody will go."

I was just thinking to go myself, when I saw a poor man borne by,
badly wounded, and heard that the Swiss were firing on the people.
Their doing so was the cause of whatever violence there was, and it
was not much.

The people had assembled, as usual, at the Quirinal, only with more
form and solemnity than usual. They had taken with them several of the
Chamber of Deputies, and they sent an embassy, headed by Galetti, who
had been in the late ministry, to state their wishes. They received
a peremptory negative. They then insisted on seeing the Pope, and
pressed on the palace. The Swiss became alarmed, and fired from the
windows and from the roof. They did this, it is said, without orders;
but who could, at the time, suppose that? If it had been planned to
exasperate the people to blood, what more could have been done? As it
was, very little was shed; but the Pope, no doubt, felt great panic.
He heard the report of fire-arms,--heard that they tried to burn
a door of the palace. I would lay my life that he could have shown
himself without the slightest danger; nay, that the habitual respect
for his presence would have prevailed, and hushed all tumult. He did
not think so, and, to still it, once more degraded himself and injured
his people, by making promises he did not mean to keep.

He protests now against those promises as extorted by violence,--a
strange plea indeed for the representative of St. Peter!

Rome is all full of the effigies of those over whom violence had no
power. There was an early Pope about to be thrown into the Tiber;
violence had no power to make him say what he did not mean. Delicate
girls, men in the prime of hope and pride of power,--they were all
alike about that. They could die in boiling oil, roasted on coals, or
cut to pieces; but they could not say what they did not mean. These
formed the true Church; it was these who had power to disseminate
the religion of him, the Prince of Peace, who died a bloody death of
torture between sinners, because he never could say what he did not
mean.

A little church, outside the gate of St. Sebastian commemorates the
following affecting tradition of the Church. Peter, alarmed at the
persecution of the Christians, had gone forth to fly, when in this
spot he saw a bright figure in his path, and recognized his Master
travelling toward Rome. "Lord," he said, "whither goest thou?" "I
go," replied Jesus, "to die with my people." Peter comprehended the
reproof. He felt that he must not a fourth time deny his Master,
yet hope for salvation. He returned to Rome to offer his life in
attestation of his faith.

The Roman Catholic Church has risen a monument to the memory of
such facts. And has the present head of that Church quite failed to
understand their monition?

Not all the Popes have so failed, though the majority have been
intriguing, ambitious men of the world. But even the mob of Rome--and
in Rome there _is_ a true mob of unheeding cabbage-sellers, who never
had a thought before beyond contriving how to satisfy their animal
instincts for the day--said, on hearing the protest, "There was
another Pius, not long since, who talked in a very different style.
When the French threatened him, he said, 'You may do with me as you
see fit, but I cannot consent to act against my convictions.'"

In fact, the only dignified course for the Pope to pursue was to
resign his temporal power. He could no longer hold it on his own
terms; but to it he clung; and the counsellors around him were men to
wish him to regard _that_ as the first of duties. When the question
was of waging war for the independence of Italy, they regarded him
solely as the head of the Church; but when the demand was to satisfy
the wants of his people, and ecclesiastical goods were threatened with
taxes, then he was the prince of the state, bound to maintain all the
selfish prerogatives of bygone days for the benefit of his successors.
Poor Pope! how has his mind been torn to pieces in these later days!
It moves compassion. There can be no doubt that all his natural
impulses are generous and kind, and in a more private station he would
have died beloved and honored; but to this he was unequal; he has
suffered bad men to surround him, and by their misrepresentations and
insidious suggestions at last entirely to cloud his mind. I believe he
really thinks now the Progress movement tends to anarchy, blood, and
all that looked worst in the first French revolution. However that may
be, I cannot forgive him some of the circumstances of this flight. To
fly to Naples; to throw himself in the arms of the bombarding monarch,
blessing him and thanking his soldiery for preserving that part of
Italy from anarchy; to protest that all his promises at Rome were null
and void, when he thought himself in safety to choose a commission for
governing in his absence, composed of men of princely blood, but as to
character so null that everybody laughed, and said he chose those
who could best be spared if they were killed; (but they all ran away
directly;) when Rome was thus left without any government, to refuse
to see any deputation, even the Senator of Rome, whom he had so gladly
sanctioned,--these are the acts either of a fool or a foe. They are
not his acts, to be sure, but he is responsible; he lets them stand as
such in the face of the world, and weeps and prays for their success.

No more of him! His day is over. He has been made, it seems
unconsciously, an instrument of good his regrets cannot destroy. Nor
can he be made so important an instrument of ill. These acts have not
had the effect the foes of freedom hoped. Rome remained quite cool and
composed; all felt that they had not demanded more than was their duty
to demand, and were willing to accept what might follow. In a few
days all began to say: "Well, who would have thought it? The Pope, the
Cardinals, the Princes are gone, and Rome is perfectly tranquil, and
one does not miss anything, except that there are not so many rich
carriages and liveries."

The Pope may regret too late that he ever gave the people a chance
to make this reflection. Yet the best fruits of the movement may
not ripen for a long time. It is a movement which requires radical
measures, clear-sighted, resolute men: these last, as yet, do not show
themselves in Rome. The new Tuscan ministry has three men of superior
force in various ways,--Montanelli, Guerazzi, D'Aguila; such are not
as yet to be found in Rome.

But should she fall this time,--and she must either advance with
decision and force, or fall, since to stand still is impossible,--the
people have learned much; ignorance and servility of thought are
lessened,--the way is paving for final triumph.

And my country, what does she? You have chosen a new President from
a Slave State, representative of the Mexican war. But he seems to be
honest, a man that can be esteemed, and is one really known to
the people, which is a step upward, after having sunk last time to
choosing a mere tool of party.

Pray send here a good Ambassador,--one that has experience of foreign
life, that he may act with good judgment, and, if possible, a man
that has knowledge and views which extend beyond the cause of party
politics in the United States,--a man of unity in principles, but
capable of understanding variety in forms. And send a man capable
of prizing the luxury of living in, or knowing Rome; the office of
Ambassador is one that should not be thrown away on a person who
cannot prize or use it. Another century, and I might ask to be made
Ambassador myself, ('tis true, like other Ambassadors, I would employ
clerks to do the most of the duty,) but woman's day has not come yet.
They hold their clubs in Paris, but even George Sand will not act
with women as they are. They say she pleads they are too mean, too
treacherous. She should not abandon them for that, which is not
nature, but misfortune. How much I shall have to say on that subject
if I live, which I desire not, for I am very tired of the battle with
giant wrongs, and would like to have some one younger and stronger
arise to say what ought to be said, still more to do what ought to be
done. Enough! if I felt these things in privileged America, the cries
of mothers and wives beaten at night by sons and husbands for their
diversion after drinking, as I have repeatedly heard them these past
months,--the excuse for falsehood, "I _dare not_ tell my husband, he
would be ready to kill me,"--have sharpened my perception as to the
ills of woman's condition and the remedies that must be applied. Had
I but genius, had I but energy, to tell what I know as it ought to be
told! God grant them me, or some other more worthy woman, I pray.

_Don Tirlone_, the _Punch_ of Rome, has just come in. This number
represents the fortress of Gaëta. Outside hangs a cage containing
a parrot (_pappagallo_), the plump body of the bird surmounted by a
noble large head with benign face and Papal head-dress. He sits on
the perch now with folded wings, but the cage door, in likeness of a
portico, shows there is convenience to come forth for the purposes
of benediction, when wanted. Outside, the king of Naples, dressed
as Harlequin, plays the organ for instruction of the bird (unhappy
penitent, doomed to penance), and, grinning with sharp teeth,
observes: "He speaks in my way now." In the background a young
Republican holds ready the match for a barrel of gunpowder, but looks
at his watch, waiting the moment to ignite it.

A happy New Year to my country! may she be worthy of the privileges
she possesses, while others are lavishing their blood to win
them,--that is all that need be wished for her at present.




LETTER XXVII.

ROME.--THE CARNIVAL: THE MOCCOLETTI.--THE ROMAN CHARACTER.--THE
POPE'S FLIGHT.--THE ASSEMBLY.--THE PEOPLE.--THE POPE'S MISTAKE.--HIS
MANIFESTO: ITS TONE AND EFFECT.--DESTRUCTION OF THE TEMPORAL DOMINION
OF THE CHURCH.


Rome, Evening of Feb. 20, 1849.

It is said you cannot thoroughly know any place till you have both
summered and wintered in it; but more than one summer and winter of
experience seems to be needed for Rome. How I fretted last winter,
during the three months' rain, and sepulchral chill, and far worse
than sepulchral odors, which accompanied it! I thought it was the
invariable Roman winter, and that I should never be able to stay here
during another; so took my room only by the month, thinking to fly so
soon as the rain set in. And lo! it has never rained at all; but there
has been glorious sun and moon, unstained by cloud, always; and these
last days have been as warm as May,--the days of the Carnival, for I
have just come in from seeing the _Moccoletti_.

The Republican Carnival has not been as splendid as the Papal, the
absence of dukes and princes being felt in the way of coaches and
rich dresses; there are also fewer foreigners than usual, many having
feared to assist at this most peaceful of revolutions. But if
less splendid, it was not less gay; the costumes were many and
fanciful,--flowers, smiles, and fun abundant.

This is the first time of my seeing the true _Moccoletti_; last year,
in one of the first triumphs of democracy, they did not blow oat the
lights, thus turning it into an illumination. The effect of the swarms
of lights, little and large, thus in motion all over the fronts of
the houses, and up and down the Corso, was exceedingly pretty and
fairy-like; but that did not make up for the loss of that wild,
innocent gayety of which this people alone is capable after childhood,
and which never shines out so much as on this occasion. It is
astonishing the variety of tones, the lively satire and taunt of which
the words _Senza moccolo_, _senza mo_, are susceptible from
their tongues. The scene is the best burlesque on the life of the
"respectable" world that can be imagined. A ragamuffin with a little
piece of candle, not even lighted, thrusts it in your face with an air
of far greater superiority than he can wear who, dressed in gold and
velvet, erect in his carriage, holds aloft his light on a tall pole.
In vain his security; while he looks down on the crowd to taunt the
wretches _senza mo_, a weak female hand from a chamber window blots
out his pretensions by one flirt of an old handkerchief.

Many handsome women, otherwise dressed in white, wore the red liberty
cap, and the noble though somewhat coarse Roman outline beneath this
brilliant red, by the changeful glow of million lights, made a fine
effect. Men looked too vulgar in the liberty cap.

How I mourn that my little companion E. never saw these things, that
would have given him such store of enchanting reminiscences for all
his after years! I miss him always on such occasions; formerly it was
through him that I enjoyed them. He had the child's heart, had
the susceptible fancy, and, naturally, a fine discerning sense for
whatever is individual or peculiar.

I missed him much at the Fair of St. Eustachio. This, like the
Carnival, was last year entirely spoiled by constant rain. I never
saw it at all before. It comes in the first days, or rather nights, of
January. All the quarter of St. Eustachio is turned into one toy-shop;
the stalls are set out in the street and brightly lighted, up. These
are full of cheap toys,--prices varying from half a cent up to twenty
cents. The dolls, which are dressed as husband and wife, or sometimes
grouped in families, are the most grotesque rag-babies that can
be imagined. Among the toys are great quantities of whistles, tin
trumpets, and little tambourines; of these every man, woman, and
child has bought one, and is using it to make a noise. This extempore
concert begins about ten o'clock, and lasts till midnight; the
delight of the numerous children that form part of the orchestra, the
good-humored familiarity without the least touch of rudeness in the
crowd, the lively effect of the light upon the toys, and the jumping,
shouting figures that, exhibit them, make this the pleasantest
Saturnalia. Had you only been there, E., to guide me by the hand,
blowing the trumpet for both, and spying out a hundred queer things in
nooks that entirely escape me!

The Roman still plays amid his serious affairs, and very serious have
they been this past winter. The Roman legions went out singing and
dancing to fight in Lombardy, and they fought no less bravely for
that.

When I wrote last, the Pope had fled, guided, he says, "by the hand
of Providence,"--Italy deems by the hand of Austria,--to Gaëta. He
had already soiled his white robes, and defamed himself for ever,
by heaping benedictions on the king of Naples and the bands of
mercenaries whom he employs to murder his subjects on the least sign
of restlessness in their most painful position. Most cowardly had been
the conduct of his making promises he never meant to keep, stealing
away by night in the coach of a foreign diplomatist, protesting that
what he had done was null because he had acted under fear,--as if
such a protest could avail to one who boasts himself representative
of Christ and his Apostles, guardian of the legacy of the martyrs! He
selected a band of most incapable men to face the danger he had feared
for himself; most of these followed his example and fled. Rome sought
an interview with him, to see if reconciliation were possible; he
refused to receive her messengers. His wicked advisers calculated upon
great confusion and distress as inevitable on the occasion; but,
for once, the hope of the bad heart was doomed to immediate
disappointment. Rome coolly said, "If you desert me,--if you will not
hear me,--I must act for myself." She threw herself into the arms of
a few men who had courage and calmness for this crisis; they bade her
think upon what was to be done, meanwhile avoiding every excess that
could give a color to calumny and revenge. The people, with admirable
good sense, comprehended and followed up this advice. Never was Rome
so truly tranquil, so nearly free from gross ill, as this winter. A
few words of brotherly admonition have been more powerful than all the
spies, dungeons, and scaffolds of Gregory.

"The hand of the Omnipotent works for us," observed an old man whom I
saw in the street selling cigars the evening before the opening of the
Constitutional Assembly. He was struck by the radiant beauty of the
night. The old people observe that there never has been such a winter
as this which follows the establishment by the French of a republic.

May the omens speed well! A host of enemies without are ready to levy
war against this long-suffering people, to rivet anew their chains.
Still there is now an obvious tide throughout Europe toward a better
order of things, and a wave of it may bear Italy onward to the shore.

The revolution, like all genuine ones, has been instinctive, its
results unexpected and surprising to the greater part of those who
achieved them. The waters, which had flowed so secretly beneath the
crust of habit that many never heard their murmur, unless in dreams,
have suddenly burst to light in full and beautiful jets; all rush to
drink the pure and living draught.

As in the time of Jesus, the multitude had been long enslaved beneath
a cumbrous ritual, their minds designedly darkened by those who
should have enlightened them, brutified, corrupted, amid monstrous
contradictions and abuses; yet the moment they hear a word
correspondent to the original nature, "Yes, it is true," they cry. "It
is spoken with, authority. Yes, it ought to be so. Priests ought to
be better and wiser than other men; if they were, they would not need
pomp and temporal power to command respect. Yes, it is true; we ought
not to lie; we should not try to impose upon one another. We ought
rather to prefer that our children should work honestly for their
bread, than get it by cheating, begging, or the prostitution of their
mothers. It would be better to act worthily and kindly, probably would
please God more than the kissing of relics. We have long darkly felt
that these things were so; _now_ we know it."

The unreality of relation between the people and the hierarchy was
obvious instantly upon the flight of Pius. He made an immense mistake
then, and he made it because neither he nor his Cardinals were aware
of the unreality. They did not know that, great as is the force of
habit, truth _only_ is imperishable. The people had abhorred Gregory,
had adored Pius, upon whom they looked as a saviour, as a liberator;
finding themselves deceived, a mourning-veil had overshadowed their
love. Still, had Pius remained here, and had courage to show himself
on agitating occasions, his position as the Pope, before whom they had
been bred to bow, his aspect, which had once seemed to them full of
blessing and promise, like that of an angel, would have still retained
power. Probably the temporal dominion of the Papacy would not have
been broken up. He fled; the people felt contempt for his want of
force and truth. He wrote to reproach them with ingratitude; they were
indignant. What had they to be grateful for? A constitution to which
he had not kept true an instant; the institution of the National
Guard, which he had begun to neutralize; benedictions, followed by
such actions as the desertion of the poor volunteers in the war for
Italian independence? Still, the people were not quite alienated
from Pius. They felt sure that his heart was, in substance, good
and kindly, though the habits of the priest and the arts of his
counsellors had led him so egregiously to falsify its dictates and
forget the vocation with which he had been called. Many hoped he would
see his mistake, and return to be at one with the people. Among the
more ignorant, there was a superstitious notion that he would return
in the night of the 5th of January. There were many bets that he would
be found in the palace of the Quirinal the morning of the 6th. All
these lingering feelings were finally extinguished by the advice of
excommunication. As this may not have readied America, I subjoin a
translation. Here I was obliged to make use of a manuscript copy;
all the printed ones were at once destroyed. It is probably the last
document of the kind the world will see.


MANIFESTO OF PIUS IX.

"To OUR MOST BELOVED SUBJECTS:--

"From this pacific abode to which it has pleased Divine Providence to
conduct us, and whence we can freely manifest our sentiments and our
will, we have waited for testimonies of remorse from our misguided
children for the sacrileges and misdeeds committed against persons
attached to our service,--among whom some have been slain, others
outraged in the most barbarous manner,--as well as for those against
our residence and our person. But we have seen nothing except a
sterile invitation to return to our capital, unaccompanied by a
word of condemnation for those crimes or the least guaranty for our
security against the frauds and violences of that same company of
furious men which still tyrannizes with a barbarous despotism over
Rome and the States of the Church. We also waited, expecting that
the protests and orders we have uttered would recall to the duties of
fidelity and subjection those who have despised and trampled upon them
in the very capital of our States. But, instead of this, a new and
more monstrous act of undisguised felony and of actual rebellion by
them audaciously committed, has filled the measure of our affliction,
and excited at the same time our just indignation, as it will
afflict the Church Universal. We speak of that act, in every
respect detestable, by which, it has been pretended to initiate the
convocation of a so-called General National Assembly of the Roman
States, by a decree of the 29th of last December, in order to
establish new political forms for the Pontifical dominion. Adding
thus iniquity to iniquity, the authors and favorers of the demagogical
anarchy strive to destroy the temporal authority of the Roman Pontiff
over the dominions of Holy Church,--however irrefragably established
through the most ancient and solid rights, and venerated, recognized,
and sustained by all the nations,--pretending and making others
believe that his sovereign power can be subject to controversy or
depend on the caprices of the factious. We shall spare our dignity
the humiliation of dwelling on all that is monstrous contained in that
act, abominable through the absurdity of its origin no less than the
illegality of its form and the impiety of its scope; but it appertains
to the apostolic authority, with which, however unworthy, we are
invested, and to the responsibility which binds us by the most sacred
oaths in the sight of the Omnipotent, not only to protest in the most
energetic and efficacious manner against that same act, but to condemn
it in the face of the universe as an enormous and sacrilegious crime
against our independence and sovereignty, meriting the chastisements
threatened by divine and human laws. We are persuaded that, on
receiving the impudent invitation, you were full of holy indignation,
and will have rejected far from you this guilty and shameful
provocation. Notwithstanding, that none of you may say he has been
deluded by fallacious seductions, and by the preachers of subversive
doctrines, or ignorant of what is contriving by the foes of all order,
all law, all right, true liberty, and your happiness, we to-day again
raise and utter abroad our voice, so that you may be more certain of
the absoluteness with which we prohibit men, of whatever class and
condition, from taking any part in the meetings which those persons
may dare to call, for the nomination of individuals to be sent to
the condemned Assembly. At the same time we recall to you how this
absolute prohibition is sanctioned by the decrees of our predecessors
and of the Councils, especially of the Sacred Council-General of
Trent, Sect. XXII. Chap. 11, in which the Church has fulminated many
times her censures, and especially the greater excommunication, as
incurred without fail by any declaration of whomsoever daring to
become guilty of whatsoever attempt against the temporal sovereignty
of the Supreme Pontiff, this we declare to have been already unhappily
incurred by all those who have given aid to the above-named act, and
others preceding, intended to prejudice the same sovereignty, and in
other modes and under false pretexts have, perturbed, violated,
and usurped our authority. Yet, though we feel ourselves obliged by
conscience to guard the sacred deposit of the patrimony of the Spouse
of Jesus Christ, confided to our care, by using the sword of severity
given to us for that purpose, we cannot therefore forget that we are
on earth the representative of Him who in exercise of his justice does
not forget mercy. Raising, therefore, our hands to Heaven, while we
to it recommend a cause which is indeed more Heaven's than ours, and
while anew we declare ourselves ready, with the aid of its powerful
grace, to drink even to the dregs, for the defence and glory of the
Catholic Church, the cup of persecution which He first wished to drink
for the salvation of the same, we shall not desist from supplicating
Him benignly to hear the fervent prayers which day and night we
unceasingly offer for the salvation of the misguided. No day certainly
could be more joyful for us, than that in which it shall be granted to
see return into the fold of the Lord our sons from whom now we derive
so much bitterness and so great tribulations. The hope of enjoying
soon the happiness of such a day is strengthened in us by the
reflection, that universal are the prayers which, united to ours,
ascend to the throne of Divine Mercy from the lips and the heart of
the faithful throughout the Catholic world, urging it continually to
change the hearts of sinners, and reconduct them into the paths of
truth and of justice.

"Gaëta, January 6, 1849."


The silliness, bigotry, and ungenerous tone of this manifesto excited
a simultaneous movement in the population. The procession which
carried it, mumbling chants, for deposit in places provided for lowest
uses, and then, taking from, the doors of the hatters' shops the
cardinals' hats, threw them into the Tiber, was a real and general
expression of popular disgust. From that hour the power of the scarlet
hierarchy fell to rise no more. No authority can survive a universal
movement of derision. From that hour tongues and pens were loosed, the
leaven of Machiavellism, which still polluted the productions of the
more liberal, disappeared, and people talked as they felt, just as
those of us who do not choose to be slaves are accustomed to do in
America.

"Jesus," cried an orator, "bade them feed his lambs. If they have done
so, it has been to rob their fleece and drink their blood."

"Why," said another, "have we been so long deaf to the saying, that
the temporal dominion of the Church was like a thorn in the wound of
Italy, which shall never be healed till that thorn is extracted?"

And then, without passion, all felt that the temporal dominion was in
fact finished of itself, and that it only remained to organize another
form of government.




LETTER XXVIII.

GIOBERTI, MAMIANI, AND MAZZINI.--FORMATION OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL
ASSEMBLY.--THE RIGHT OF SUFFRAGE.--A PROCESSION.--PROCLAMATION OF
THE REPUBLIC.--RESULTS.--DECREE OF THE ASSEMBLY.--AMERICANS IN
ROME: DIFFERENCE OF IMPRESSIONS.--FLIGHT OF THE GRAND DUKE OF
TUSCANY.--CHARLES ALBERT.--PRESENT STATE OF ROME.--REFLECTIONS AND
CONCLUSIONS.--LATEST INTELLIGENCE.


Rome, Evening of Feb. 20, 1849.

The League between the Italian States, and the Diet which was to
establish it, had been the thought of Gioberti, but had found the
instrument at Rome in Mamiani. The deputies were to be named by
princes or parliaments, their mandate to be limited by the existing
institutions of the several states; measures of mutual security and
some modifications in the way of reform would be the utmost that could
be hoped from this Diet. The scope of this party did not go beyond
more vigorous prosecution of the war for independence, and the
establishment of good, institutions for the several principalities on
a basis of assimilation.

Mazzini, the great radical thinker of Italy, was, on the contrary,
persuaded that unity, not union, was necessary to this country. He
had taken for his motto, GOD AND THE PEOPLE, and believed in no
other powers. He wished an Italian Constitutional Assembly, selected
directly by the people, and furnished with an unlimited mandate to
decide what form was now required by the needs of the Peninsula. His
own wishes, certainly, aimed at a republic; but the decision remained
with the representatives of the people.

The thought of Gioberti had been at first the popular one, as he,
in fact, was the seer of the so-called Moderate party. For myself, I
always looked upon him as entirely a charlatan, who covered his want
of all real force by the thickest embroidered mantle of words. Still,
for a time, he corresponded with the wants of the Italian mind. He
assailed the Jesuits, and was of real use by embodying the distrust
and aversion that brooded in the minds of men against these most
insidious and inveterate foes of liberty and progress. This triumph,
at least, he may boast: that sect has been obliged to yield; its
extinction seems impossible, of such life-giving power was the fiery
will of Loyola. In the Primate he had embodied the lingering hope of
the Catholic Church; Pius IX. had answered to the appeal, had answered
only to show its futility. He had run through Italy as courier for
Charles Albert, when the so falsely styled Magnanimous entered,
pretending to save her from the stranger, really hoping to take her
for himself. His own cowardice and treachery neutralized the hope, and
Charles Albert, abject in his disgrace, took a retrograde ministry.
This the country would not suffer, and obliged him after a while
to reassume at least the position of the previous year, by taking
Gioberti for his premier. But it soon became evident that the ministry
of Charles Albert was in the same position as had been that of Pius
IX. The hand was powerless when the head was indisposed. Meantime the
name of Mazzini had echoed through Tuscany from the revered lips
of Montanelli; it reached the Roman States, and though at first
propagated by foreign impulse, yet, as soon as understood, was
welcomed as congenial. Montanelli had nobly said, addressing Florence:
"We could not regret that the realization of this project should take
place in a sister city, still more illustrious than ours." The Romans
took him at his word; the Constitutional Assembly for the Roman States
was elected with a double mandate, that the deputies might sit in the
Constitutional Assembly for all Italy whenever the other provinces
could send theirs. They were elected by universal suffrage. Those who
listened to Jesuits and Moderates predicted that the project would
fail of itself. The people were too ignorant to make use of the
liberty of suffrage.

But ravens now-a-days are not the true prophetic birds. The Roman
eagle recommences her flight, and it is from its direction only that
the high-priest may draw his augury. The people are certainly as
ignorant as centuries of the worst government, the neglect of popular
education, the enslavement of speech and the press, could make them;
yet they have an instinct to recognize measures that are good for
them. A few weeks' schooling at some popular meetings, the clubs, the
conversations of the National Guards in their quarters or on patrol,
were sufficient to concert measures so well, that the people voted in
larger proportion than at contested elections in our country, and made
a very good choice.

The opening of the Constitutional Assembly gave occasion for a fine
procession. All the troops in Rome defiled from the Campidoglio;
among them many bear the marks of suffering from the Lombard war. The
banners of Sicily, Venice, and Bologna waved proudly; that of Naples
was veiled with crape. I was in a balcony in the Piazza di Venezia;
the Palazzo di Venezia, that sternest feudal pile, so long the
head-quarters of Austrian machinations, seemed to frown, as the bands
each in passing struck up the _Marseillaise_. The nephew of Napoleon
and Garibaldi, the hero of Montevideo, walked together, as deputies.
The deputies, a grave band, mostly advocates or other professional
men, walked without other badge of distinction than the tricolored
scarf. I remembered the entrance of the deputies to the Council only
fourteen months ago, in the magnificent carriages lent by the princes
for the occasion; they too were mostly nobles, and their liveried
attendants followed, carrying their scutcheons. Princes and
councillors have both fled or sunk into nothingness; in those
councillors was no counsel. Will it be found in the present? Let us
hope so! What we see to-day has much more the air of reality than all
that parade of scutcheons, or the pomp of dress and retinue with which
the Ecclesiastical Court was wont to amuse the people.

A few days after followed the proclamation of a Republic. An immense
crowd of people surrounded the Palazzo della Cancelleria, within whose
court-yard Rossi fell, while the debate was going on within. At one
o'clock in the morning of the 9th of February, a Republic was resolved
upon, and the crowd rushed away to ring all the bells.

Early next morning I rose and went forth to observe the Republic.
Over the Quirinal I went, through the Forum, to the Capitol. There was
nothing to be seen except the magnificent calm emperor, the tamers
of horses, the fountain, the trophies, the lions, as usual; among the
marbles, for living figures, a few dirty, bold women, and Murillo boys
in the sun just as usual. I passed into the Corso; there were men in
the liberty cap,--of course the lowest and vilest had been the first
to assume it; all the horrible beggars persecuting as impudently as
usual. I met some English; all their comfort was, "It would not last
a month." "They hoped to see all these fellows shot yet." The English
clergyman, more mild and legal, only hopes to see them (i.e. the
ministry, deputies, &c.) _hung_.

Mr. Carlyle would be delighted with his countrymen. They are entirely
ready and anxious to see a Cromwell for Italy. They, too, think, when
the people starve, "It is no matter what happens in the back parlor."
What signifies that, if there is "order" in the front? How dare the
people make a noise to disturb us yawning at billiards!

I met an American. He "had no confidence in the Republic." Why?
Because he "had no confidence in the people." Why? Because "they were
not like _our_ people." Ah! Jonathan and John,--excuse me, but I
must say the Italian has a decided advantage over you in the power of
quickly feeling generous sympathy, as well as some other things which
I have not time now to particularize. I have memoranda from you both
in my note-book.

At last the procession mounts the Campidoglio. It is all dressed with
banners. The tricolor surmounts the palace of the senator; the senator
himself has fled. The deputies mount the steps, and one of them reads,
in a clear, friendly voice, the following words:--


"FUNDAMENTAL DECREE OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL ASSEMBLY OF ROME.

"ART. I.--The Papacy has fallen in fact and in right from the temporal
government of the Roman State.

"ART. II.--The Roman Pontiff shall have all the necessary guaranties
for independence in the exercise of his spiritual power.

"ART. III.--The form of government of the Roman State shall be a pure
democracy, and will take the glorious name of Roman Republic.

"ART. IV.--The Roman Republic shall have with the rest of Italy the
relations exacted by a common nationality."

Between each of these expressive sentences the speaker paused; the
great bell of the Capitol gave forth its solemn melodies; the cannon
answered; while the crowd shouted, _Viva la Republica! Viva Italia!_


The imposing grandeur of the spectacle to me gave new force to the
emotion that already swelled my heart; my nerves thrilled, and I
longed to see in some answering glance a spark of Rienzi, a little of
that soul which made my country what she is. The American at my side
remained impassive. Receiving all his birthright from a triumph of
democracy, he was quite indifferent to this manifestation on this
consecrated spot. Passing the winter in Rome to study art, he was
insensible to the artistic beauty of the scene,--insensible to this
new life of that spirit from which all the forms he gazes at
in galleries emanated. He "did not see the use of these popular
demonstrations."

Again I must mention a remark of his, as a specimen of the ignorance
in which Americans usually remain during their flighty visits to these
scenes, where they associate only with one another. And I do it the
rather as this seemed a really thoughtful, intelligent man; no vain,
vulgar trifler. He said, "The people seem only to be looking on; they
take no part."

What people? said I.

"Why, these around us; there is no other people."

There are a few beggars, errand-boys, and nurse-maids.

"The others are only soldiers."

Soldiers! The Civic Guard! all the decent men in Rome.

Thus it is that the American, on many points, becomes more ignorant
for coming abroad, because he attaches some value to his crude
impressions and frequent blunders. It is not thus that any seed-corn
can be gathered from foreign gardens. Without modest scrutiny, patient
study, and observation, he spends his money and goes home, with a
new coat perhaps, but a mind befooled rather than instructed. It
is necessary to speak the languages of these countries, and know
personally some of their inhabitants, in order to form any accurate
impressions.

The flight of the Grand Duke of Tuscany followed. In imitation of
his great exemplar, he promised and smiled to the last, deceiving
Montanelli, the pure and sincere, at the very moment he was about to
enter his carriage, into the belief that he persevered in his assent
to the liberal movement. His position was certainly very difficult,
but he might have left it like a gentleman, like a man of honor. 'T
was pity to destroy so lightly the good opinion the Tuscans had of
him. Now Tuscany meditates union with Rome.

Meanwhile, Charles Albert is filled with alarm. He is indeed betwixt
two fires. Gioberti has published one of his prolix, weak addresses,
in which, he says, that in the beginning of every revolution one must
fix a limit beyond which he will not go; that, for himself, he has
done it,--others are passing beyond his mark, and he will not go any
farther. Of the want of thought, of insight into historic and all
other truths, which distinguishes the "illustrious Gioberti," this
assumption is a specimen. But it makes no difference; he and his
prince must go, sooner or later, if the movement continues, nor is
there any prospect of its being stayed unless by foreign intervention.
This the Pope has not yet, it is believed, solicited, but there is
little reason to hope he will be spared that crowning disgrace. He
has already consented to the incitement of civil war. Should an
intervention be solicited, all depends on France. Will she basely
forfeit every pledge and every duty, to say nothing of her true
interest? It seems that her President stands doubtful, intending to
do what is for _his_ particular interest; but if his interest proves
opposed to the republican principle, will France suffer herself again
to be hoodwinked and enslaved? It is impossible to know, she has
already shown such devotion to the mere prestige of a name.

On England no dependence can be placed. She is guided by no great
idea; her Parliamentary leaders sneer at sentimental policy, and the
"jargon" of ideas. She will act, as always, for her own interest; and
the interest of her present government is becoming more and more the
crushing of the democratic tendency. They are obliged to do it at
home, both in the back and the front parlor; it would not be decent
as yet to have a Spielberg just at home for obstreperous patriots, but
England has so many ships, it is just as easy to transport them to
a safe distance. Then the Church of England, so long an enemy to the
Church of Rome, feels a decided interest with it on the subject of
temporal possessions. The rich English traveller, fearing to see the
Prince Borghese stripped of one of his palaces for a hospital or
some such low use, thinks of his own twenty-mile park and the crowded
village of beggars at its gate, and muses: "I hope to see them all
shot yet, these rascally republicans."

How I wish my country would show some noble sympathy when an
experience so like her own is going on. Politically she cannot
interfere; but formerly, when Greece and Poland were struggling, they
were at least aided by private contributions. Italy, naturally so
rich, but long racked and impoverished by her oppressors, greatly
needs money to arm and clothe her troops. Some token of sympathy, too,
from America would be so welcome to her now. If there were a circle of
persons inclined to trust such to me, I might venture to promise the
trust should be used to the advantage of Italy. It would make me proud
to have my country show a religious faith in the progress of ideas,
and make some small sacrifice of its own great resources in aid of a
sister cause, now.

But I must close this letter, which it would be easy to swell to a
volume from the materials in my mind. One or two traits of the hour I
must note. Mazzarelli, chief of the present ministry, was a prelate,
and named spontaneously by the Pope before his flight. He has
shown entire and frank intrepidity. He has laid aside the title of
Monsignor, and appears before the world as a layman.

Nothing can be more tranquil than has been the state of Rome all
winter. Every wile has been used by the Oscurantists to excite the
people, but their confidence in their leaders could not be broken.
A little mutiny in the troops, stimulated by letters from their old
leaders, was quelled in a moment. The day after the proclamation of
the Republic, some zealous ignoramuses insulted the carriages that
appeared with servants in livery. The ministry published a grave
admonition, that democracy meant liberty, not license, and that he
who infringed upon an innocent freedom of action in others must
be declared traitor to his country. Every act of the kind ceased
instantly. An intimation that it was better not to throw large comfits
or oranges during the Carnival, as injuries have thus been sometimes
caused, was obeyed with equal docility.

On Sunday last, placards affixed in the high places summoned the city
to invest Giuseppe Mazzini with the rights of a Roman citizen. I have
not yet heard the result. The Pope made Rossi a Roman citizen; he was
suffered to retain that title only one day. It was given him on the
14th of November, he died the 15th. Mazzini enters Rome at any rate,
for the first time in his life, as deputy to the Constitutional
Assembly; it would be a noble poetic justice, if he could enter also
as a Roman citizen.


February 24.

The Austrians have invaded Ferrara, taken $200,000 and six hostages,
and retired. This step is, no doubt, intended to determine whether
France will resent the insult, or whether she will betray Italy. It
shows also the assurance of the Austrian that the Pope will approve
of an armed intervention. Probably before I write again these matters
will reach some decided crisis.




LETTER XXIX.

THE ROMAN REPUBLIC.--CHARLES ALBERT A TRAITOR.--FALL OF
GIOBERTI.--MAZZINI.--HIS CHARACTER.--HIS ADDRESS TO THE PEOPLE.--HIS
ORATORY.--AMERICAN ARTISTS.--BROWN, TERRY, AND FREEMAN.--HICKS AND
HIS PICTURES.--CROPSEY AND CRANCH CONTRASTED.--AMERICAN
LANDSCAPE PAINTINGS.--SCULPTORS.--STORY'S "FISHER BOY."--MOZIER'S
"POCAHONTAS."--GREENOUGH'S GROUP.--POWERS'S "SLAVE."--THE
EQUESTRIAN STATUE OF WASHINGTON.--CRAWFORD'S DESIGN.--TRIALS OF THE
ARTIST.--AMERICAN PATRONS OF ART.--EXPENSES OF ARTIST LIFE.--A GERMAN
SCULPTOR.--OVERBECK AND HIS PAINTINGS.--FESTIVAL OF FRIED RICE.--AN
AVE MARIA.


Rome, March 20, 1849.

The Roman Republic moves on better than could have been expected.
There are great difficulties about money, necessarily, as the
government, so beset with trials and dangers, cannot command
confidence in that respect. The solid coin has crept out of
the country or lies hid, and in the use of paper there are the
corresponding inconveniences. But the poor, always the chief sufferers
from such a state of things, are wonderfully patient, and I doubt not
that the new form, if Italy could be left to itself, would be settled
for the advantage of all. Tuscany would soon be united with Rome, and
to the Republic of Central Italy, no longer broken asunder by petty
restrictions and sacrificed to the interests of a few persons, would
come that prosperity natural to a region so favored by nature.

Could Italy be left alone! But treacherous, selfish men at home strive
to betray, and foes threaten her from without on every side. Even
France, her natural ally, promises to prove foolishly and basely
faithless. The dereliction from principle of her government seems
certain, and thus far the nation, despite the remonstrance of a few
worthy men, gives no sign of effective protest. There would be little
hope for Italy, were not the thrones of her foes in a tottering state,
their action liable at every moment to be distracted by domestic
difficulties. The Austrian government seems as destitute of support
from the nation as is possible for a government to be, and the army is
no longer what it was, being made up so largely of new recruits. The
Croats are uncertain in their adhesion, the war in Hungary likely to
give them much to do; and if the Russian is called in, the rest of
Europe becomes hostile. All these circumstances give Italy a chance
she otherwise could not have; she is in great measure unfurnished with
arms and money; her king in the South is a bloody, angry, well-armed
foe; her king in the North, a proved traitor. Charles Albert has now
declared, war because he could not do otherwise; but his sympathies
are in fact all against liberty; the splendid lure that he might
become king of Italy glitters no more; the Republicans are in the
ascendant, and he may well doubt, should the stranger be driven out,
whether Piedmont could escape the contagion. Now, his people insisting
on war, he has the air of making it with a good grace; but should he
be worsted, probably he will know some loophole by which to steal out.
The rat will get out and leave the lion in the trap.

The "illustrious Gioberti" has fallen,--fallen for ever from his high
scaffold of words. His demerits were too unmistakable for rhetoric to
hide. That he sympathized with the Pope rather than the Roman people,
and could not endure to see him stripped of his temporal power, no
one could blame in the author of the _Primato_. That he refused the
Italian General Assembly, if it was to be based on the so-called
Montanelli system instead of his own, might be conviction, or it might
be littleness and vanity. But that he privily planned, without even
adherence of the council of ministers, an armed intervention of the
Piedmontese troops in Tuscany, thus willing to cause civil war, and,
at this great moment, to see Italian blood shed by Italian hands, was
treachery. I think, indeed, he has been probably made the scape-goat
in that affair; that Charles Albert planned the measure, and, finding
himself unable to carry it out, in consequence of the vigilance and
indignant opposition of the Chamber of Deputies, was somewhat consoled
by making it an occasion to victimize the "Illustrious," whom four
weeks before the people had forced him to accept as his minister.

Now the name of Gioberti is erased from the corners of the streets to
which it was affixed a year ago; he is stripped of all his honorary
degrees, and proclaimed an unworthy son of the country. Mazzini is
the idol of the people. "Soon to be hunted out," sneered the sceptical
American. Possibly yes; for no man is secure of his palm till the
fight is over. The civic wreath may be knocked from his head a hundred
times in the ardor of the contest. No matter, if he can always keep
the forehead pure and lofty, as will Mazzini.

In thinking of Mazzini, I always remember Petrarch's invocation to
Rienzi. Mazzini comes at a riper period in the world's history, with
the same energy of soul, but of purer temper and more enlarged views
to answer them.

I do not know whether I mentioned a kind of poetical correspondence
about Mazzini and Rossi. Rossi was also an exile for liberal
principles, but he did not value his birthright; he alienated it, and
as a French citizen became peer of France and representative of Louis
Philippe in Italy. When, with the fatuity of those whom the gods
have doomed to perish, Pius IX. took the representative of the fallen
Guizot policy for his minister, he made him a Roman citizen. He was
proclaimed such on the 14th of November. On the 15th he perished,
before he could enter the parliament he had called. He fell at the
door of the Cancelleria when it was sitting.

Mazzini, in his exile, remained absolutely devoted to his native
country. Because, though feeling as few can that the interests of
humanity in all nations are identical, he felt also that, born of a
race so suffering, so much needing devotion and energy, his first
duty was to that. The only powers he acknowledged were _God and the
People_, the special scope of his acts the unity and independence of
Italy. Rome was the theme of his thoughts, but, very early exiled,
he had never seen that home to which all the orphans of the soul
so naturally turn. Now he entered it as a Roman citizen, elected
representative of the people by universal suffrage. His motto, _Dio
e Popolo_, is put upon the coin with the Roman eagle; unhappily this
first-issued coin is of brass, or else of silver, with much alloy.
_Dii, avertite omen_, and may peaceful days turn it all to pure gold!

On his first entrance to the house, Mazzini, received with fervent
applause and summoned, to take his place beside the President, spoke
as follows:--

"It is from me, colleagues, that should come these tokens of applause,
these tokens of affection, because the little good I have not done,
but tried to do, has come to me from Rome. Rome was always a sort of
talisman for me; a youth, I studied the history of Italy, and found,
while all the other nations were born, grew up, played their part in
the world, then fell to reappear no more in the same power, a single
city was privileged by God to die only to rise again greater than
before, to fulfil a mission greater than the first. I saw the Rome
of the Empire extend her conquests from the confines of Africa to the
confines of Asia. I saw Rome perish, crushed by the barbarians, by
those whom even yet the world, calls barbarians. I saw her rise
again, after having chased away these same barbarians, reviving in
its sepulchre the germ of Civilization. I saw her rise more great
for conquest, not with arms, but with words,--rise in the name of the
Popes to repeat her grand mission. I said in my heart, the city which
alone in the world has had two grand lives, one greater than the
other, will have a third. After the Rome which wrought by conquest of
arms, the Rome which wrought by conquest of words, must come a third
which shall work by virtue of example. After the Rome of the Emperors,
after the Rome of the Popes, will come the Rome of the People. The
Rome of the People is arisen; do not salute with applauses, but let
us rejoice together! I cannot promise anything for myself, except
concurrence in all you shall do for the good of Rome, of Italy, of
mankind. Perhaps we shall have to pass through great crises; perhaps
we shall have to fight a sacred battle against the only enemy that
threatens us,--Austria. We will fight it, and we will conquer. I hope,
please God, that foreigners may not be able to say any more that which
so many of them repeat to-day, speaking of our affairs,--that the
light which, comes from Rome is only an _ignis fatuus_ wandering among
the tombs. The world shall see that it is a starry light, eternal,
pure, and resplendent as those we look up to in the heavens!"

On a later day he spoke more fully of the difficulties that threaten
at home the young republic, and said:--

"Let us not hear of Right, of Left, of Centre; these terms express
the three powers in a constitutional monarchy; for us they have
no meaning; the only divisions for us are of Republicans or
non-Republicans,--or of sincere men and temporizing men. Let us not
hear so much of the Republicans of to-day and of yesterday; I am a
Republican of twenty years' standing. Entertaining such hopes for
Italy, when many excellent, many sincere men held them as Utopian,
shall I denounce these men because they are now convinced of their
practicability?"

This last I quote from memory. In hearing the gentle tone of
remonstrance with those of more petty mind, or influenced by the
passions of the partisan, I was forcibly reminded of the parable by
Jesus, of the vineyard and the discontent of the laborers that those
who came at the eleventh hour "received also a penny." Mazzini also is
content that all should fare alike as brethren, if only they will come
into the vineyard. He is not an orator, but the simple conversational
tone of his address is in refreshing contrast with the boyish rhetoric
and academic swell common to Italian speakers in the present unfledged
state. As they have freer use of the power of debate, they will
become more simple and manly. The speech of Mazzini is laden with
thought,--it goes straight to the mark by the shortest path, and moves
without effort, from the irresistible impression of deep conviction
and fidelity in the speaker. Mazzini is a man of genius, an elevated
thinker; but the most powerful and first impression from his presence
must always be of the religion of his soul, of his _virtue_, both in
the modern and antique sense of that word.

If clearness of right, if energy, if indefatigable perseverance, can
steer the ship through this dangerous pass, it will be done. He said,
"We will conquer"; whether Rome will, this time, is not to me certain,
but such men as Mazzini conquer always,--conquer in defeat. Yet Heaven
grant that no more blood, no more corruption of priestly government,
be for Italy. It could only be for once more, for the strength, of her
present impulse would not fail to triumph at last; but even one more
trial seems too intolerably much, when I think of the holocaust of the
broken hearts, baffled lives, that must attend it.

But enough of politics for the present; this letter goes by private
hand, and, as news, will be superseded before it can arrive.

Let me rather take the opportunity to say some things that I have let
lie by, while writing of political events. Especially of our artists I
wish to say something. I know many of thorn, if not all, and see with
pleasure our young country so fairly represented.

Among the painters I saw of Brown only two or three pictures at the
exhibition in Florence; they were coarse, flashy things. I was told
he could do better; but a man who indulges himself with such, coarse
sale-work cannot surely do well at any time.

The merits of Terry and Freeman are not my merits; they are beside
both favorites in our country, and have a sufficient number of
pictures there for every one to judge. I am no connoisseur as regards
the technical merits of paintings; it is only poetic invention, or a
tender feeling of nature, which captivates me.

Terry loves grace, and consciously works from the model. The result is
a pleasing transposition of the hues of this clime. But the design of
the picture is never original, nor is it laden with any message from,
the heart. Of Freeman I know less; as the two or three pictures of his
that I have seen never interested me. I have not visited his studio.

Of Hicks I think very highly. He is a man of ideas, an original
observer, and with a poetic heart. His system of coloring is derived
from a thoughtful study, not a mere imitation of nature, and shows
the fineness of his organization. Struggling unaided to pursue the
expensive studies of his art, he has had only a small studio, and
received only orders for little cabinet pictures. Could, he carry out
adequately his ideas, in him would be found the treasure of genius. He
has made the drawings for a large picture of many figures; the design
is original and noble, the grouping highly effective. Could he paint
this picture, I believe it would be a real boon to the lovers of art,
the lovers of truth. I hope very much that, when he returns to the
United States, some competent patron of art--one of the few who have
mind as well as purse--will see the drawings and order the picture.
Otherwise he cannot paint it, as the expenses attendant on models
for so many figures, &c. are great, and the time demanded could not
otherwise be taken from the claims of the day.

Among landscape painters Cropsey and Cranch have the true artist
spirit. In faculties, each has what the other wants. Cropsey is a
reverent and careful student of nature in detail; it is no pedantry,
but a true love he has, and his pictures are full of little, gentle
signs of intimacy. They please and touch; but yet in poetic feeling
of the heart of nature he is not equal to Cranch, who produces
fine effects by means more superficial, and, on examination, less
satisfactory. Each might take somewhat from the other to advantage,
could he do it without diminishing his own original dower. Both are
artists of high promise, and deserve to be loved and cherished by
a country which may, without presumption, hope to carry landscape
painting to a pitch of excellence unreached before. For the historical
painter, the position with us is, for many reasons, not favorable;
but there is no bar in the way of the landscape painter, and fate,
bestowing such a prodigality of subject, seems to give us a hint not
to be mistaken. I think the love of landscape painting is genuine in
our nation, and as it is a branch of art where achievement has been
comparatively low, we may not unreasonably suppose it has been left
for us. I trust it will be undertaken in the highest spirit. Nature,
it seems to me, reveals herself more freely in our land; she is true,
virgin, and confiding,--she smiles upon the vision of a true Endymion.
I hope to see, not only copies upon canvas of our magnificent scenes,
but a transfusion of the spirit which is their divinity.

Then why should the American landscape painter come to Italy? cry
many. I think, myself, he ought not to stay here very long. Yet a few
years' study is precious, for here Nature herself has worked with man,
as if she wanted to help him in the composition of pictures. The ruins
of Italy, in their varied relations with vegetation and the heavens,
make speeches from every stone for instruction of the artist; the
greatest variety here is found with the greatest harmony. To know how
this union may be accomplished is a main secret of art, and though the
coloring is not the same, yet he who has the key to its mysteries of
beauty is the more initiated to the same in other climates, and
will easily attune afresh his more instructed eye and mind to the
contemplation of that which moulded his childhood.

I may observe of the two artists I have named, that Cranch has entered
more into the spirit of Italian landscape, while Cropsey is still more
distinguished on subjects such as he first loved. He seemed to find
the Scotch lake and mountain scenery very congenial; his sketches and
pictures taken from a short residence there are impressive. Perhaps a
melancholy or tender subject suits him best; something rich, bold, and
mellow is more adapted to call out the genius of Cranch.

Among the sculptors new names rise up, to show that this is decidedly
a province for hope in America. I look upon this as the natural talent
of an American, and have no doubt that glories will be displayed by
our sculptors unknown to classic art. The facts of our history, ideal
and social, will be grand and of new import; it is perfectly natural
to the American to mould in clay and carve in stone. The permanence of
material and solid, relief in the forms correspond to the positiveness
of his nature better than the mere ephemeral and even tricky methods
of the painter,--to his need of motion and action, better than
the chambered scribbling of the poet. He will thus record his best
experiences, and these records will adorn the noble structures that
must naturally arise for the public uses of our society.

It is particularly gratifying to see men that might amass far more
money and attain more temporary power in other things, despise those
lower lures, too powerful in our country, and aim only at excellence
in the expression of thought. Among these I may mention Story and
Mozier. Story has made in Florence the model for a statue of his
father. This I have not seen, but two statuettes that he modelled
here from the "Fisher" of Goethe pleased me extremely. The languid,
meditative reverie of the boy, the morbid tenderness of his nature, is
most happily expressed in the first, as is the fascinated surrender to
the siren murmur of tire flood in the second. He has taken the moment

  "Half drew she him; half sank he in," &c.

I hope some one will give him an order to make them in marble. Mozier
seemed to have an immediate success. The fidelity and spirit of his
portrait-busts could be appreciated by every one; for an ideal head of
Pocahontas, too, he had at once orders for many copies. It was not
an Indian head, but, in the union of sweetness and strength with a
princelike, childlike dignity, very happily expressive of his idea of
her character. I think he has modelled a Rebecca at the Well, but this
I did not see.

These have already a firm hold on the affections of our people; every
American who comes to Italy visits their studios, and speaks of them
with pride, as indeed they well may, in comparing them with artists of
other nations. It will not be long before you see Greenough's group;
it is in spirit a pendant to Cooper's novels. I confess I wish he
had availed himself of the opportunity to immortalize the real noble
Indian in marble. This is only the man of the woods,--no Metamora, no
Uncas. But the group should be very instructive to our people.

You seem as crazy about Powers's Greek Slave as the Florentines were
about Cimabue's Madonnas, in which we still see the spark of genius,
but not fanned to its full flame. If your enthusiasm be as genuine as
that of the lively Florentines, we will not quarrel with it; but I
am afraid a great part is drawing-room rapture and newspaper echo.
Genuine enthusiasm, however crude the state of mind from which it
springs, always elevates, always educates; but in the same proportion
talking and writing for effect stultifies and debases. I shall not
judge the adorers of the Greek Slave, but only observe, that they have
not kept in reserve any higher admiration for works even now extant,
which are, in comparison with that statue, what that statue is
compared with any weeping marble on a common monument.

I consider the Slave as a form of simple and sweet beauty, but that
neither as an ideal expression nor a specimen of plastic power is it
transcendent. Powers stands far higher in his busts than in any ideal
statue. His conception of what is individual in character is clear
and just, his power of execution almost unrivalled; but he has had a
lifetime of discipline for the bust, while his studies on the human
body are comparatively limited; nor is his treatment of it free and
masterly. To me, his conception of subject is not striking: I do not
consider him rich in artistic thought.

He, no less than Greenough and Crawford, would feel it a rich reward
for many labors, and a happy climax to their honors, to make an
equestrian statue of Washington for our country. I wish they might all
do it, as each would show a different kind of excellence. To present
the man on horseback, the wise centaur, the tamer of horses, may well
be deemed a high achievement of modern, as it was of ancient art. The
study of the anatomy and action of the horse, so rich in suggestions,
is naturally most desirable to the artist; happy he who, obliged
by the brevity of life and the limitations of fortune, to make his
studies conform to his "orders," finds himself justified by a national
behest in entering on this department.

At home one gets callous about the character of Washington, from a
long experience of Fourth of July bombast in his praise. But seeing
the struggles of other nations, and the deficiencies of the leaders
who try to sustain them, the heart is again stimulated, and puts forth
buds of praise. One appreciates the wonderful combination of events
and influences that gave our independence so healthy a birth, and the
almost miraculous merits of the men who tended its first motions. In
the combination of excellences needed at such a period with the purity
and modesty which dignify the private man in the humblest station,
Washington as yet stands alone. No country has ever had such a good
future; no other is so happy as to have a pattern of spotless worth
which will remain in her latest day venerable as now.

Surely, then, that form should be immortalized in material solid as
its fame; and, happily for the artist, that form was of natural beauty
and dignity, and he who places him on horseback simply represents his
habitual existence. Everything concurs to make an equestrian statue of
Washington desirable.

The dignified way to manage that affair would be to have a committee
chosen of impartial judges, men who would look only to the merits of
the work and the interests of the country, unbiassed by any personal
interest in favor of some one artist. It is said it is impossible to
find such a committee, but I cannot believe it. Let there be put aside
the mean squabbles and jealousies, the vulgar pushing of unworthy
friends, with which, unhappily, the artist's career seems more rife
than any other, and a fair concurrence established; let each artist
offer his design for an equestrian statue of Washington, and let the
best have the preference.

Mr. Crawford has made a design which he takes with him to America, and
which, I hope, will be generally seen. He has represented Washington
in his actual dress; a figure of Fame, winged, presents the laurel and
civic wreath; his gesture declines them; he seems to say, "For me the
deed is enough,--I need no badge, no outward, token in reward."

This group has no insipid, allegorical air, as might be supposed; and
its composition is very graceful, simple, and harmonious. The costume
is very happily managed. The angel figure is draped, and with, the
liberty-cap, which, as a badge both of ancient and modern times, seems
to connect the two figures, and in an artistic point of view balances
well the cocked hat; there is a similar harmony between the angel's
wings and the extremities of the horse. The action of the winged
figure induces a natural and spirited action of the horse and rider. I
thought of Goethe's remark, that a fine work of art will always have,
at a distance, where its details cannot be discerned, a beautiful
effect, as of architectural ornament, and that this excellence the
groups of Raphael share with the antique. He would have been pleased
with the beautiful balance of forms in this group, with the freedom
with which light and air play in and out, the management of the whole
being clear and satisfactory at the first glance. But one should go
into a great number of studies, as you can in Rome or Florence, and
see the abundance of heavy and inharmonious designs to appreciate the
merits of this; anything really good seems so simple and so a matter
of course to the unpractised observer.

Some say the Americans will not want a group, but just the fact; the
portrait of Washington riding straight onward, like Marcus Aurelius,
or making an address, or lifting his sword. I do not know about
that,--it is a matter of feeling. This winged figure not only gives
a poetic sense to the group, but a natural support and occasion for
action to the horse and rider. Uncle Sam must send Major Downing to
look at it, and then, if he wants other designs, let him establish
a concurrence, as I have said, and choose what is best. I am not
particularly attached to Mr. Greenough, Mr. Powers, or Mr. Crawford. I
admire various excellences in the works of each, and should be glad
if each received an order for an equestrian statue. Nor is there any
reason why they should not. There is money enough in the country, and
the more good things there are for the people to see freely in open
daylight, the better. That makes artists germinate.

I love the artists, though I cannot speak of their works in a way to
content their friends, or even themselves, often. Who can, that has a
standard of excellence in the mind, and a delicate conscience in
the use of words? My highest tribute is meagre of superlatives in
comparison with the hackneyed puffs with which artists submit to
be besmeared. Submit? alas! often they court them, rather. I do not
expect any kindness from my contemporaries. I know that what is to
me justice and honor is to them only a hateful coldness. Still I
love them, I wish for their good, I feel deeply for their sufferings,
annoyances, privations, and would lessen them if I could. I have
thought it might perhaps be of use to publish some account of the
expenses of the artist. There is a general impression, that the artist
lives very cheaply in Italy. This is a mistake. Italy, compared
with America, is not so very cheap, except for those who have iron
constitutions to endure bad food, eaten in bad air, damp and dirty
lodgings. The expenses, even in Florence, of a simple but clean and
wholesome life, are little less than in New York. The great difference
is for people that are rich. An Englishman of rank and fortune does
not need the same amount of luxury as at home, to be on a footing with
the nobles of Italy. The Broadway merchant would find his display of
mahogany and carpets thrown away in a country where a higher kind of
ornament is the only one available. But poor people, who can, at any
rate, buy only the necessaries of life, will find them in the Italian
cities, where all sellers live by cheating foreigners, very little
cheaper than in America.

The patrons of Art in America, ignorant of these facts, and not
knowing the great expenses which attend the study of Art and the
production of its wonders, are often guilty of most undesigned
cruelty, and do things which it would grieve their hearts to have
done, if they only knew the facts. They have read essays on the uses
of adversity in developing genius, and they are not sufficiently
afraid to administer a dose of adversity beyond what the forces of
the patient can bear. Laudanum in drops is useful as a medicine, but a
cupful kills downright.

Beside this romantic idea about letting artists suffer to develop
their genius, the American Mæcenas is not sufficiently aware of
the expenses attendant on producing the work he wants. He does not
consider that the painter, the sculptor, must be paid for the time
he spends in designing and moulding, no less than in painting and
carving; that he must have his bread and sleeping-house, his workhouse
or studio, his marbles and colors,--the sculptor his workmen; so that
if the price be paid he asks, a modest and delicate man very commonly
receives _no_ guerdon for his thought,--the real essence of the
work,--except the luxury of seeing it embodied, which he could not
otherwise have afforded, The American Mæcenas often pushes the price
down, not from want of generosity, but from a habit of making what are
called good bargains,--i.e. bargains for one's own advantage at the
expense of a poorer brother. Those who call these good do not believe
that

                  "Mankind is one,
  And beats with one great heart."

They have not read the life of Jesus Christ.

Then the American Mæcenas sometimes, after ordering a work, has been
known to change his mind when the statue is already modelled. It is
the American who does these things, because an American, who either
from taste or vanity buys a picture, is often quite uneducated as to
the arts, and cannot understand why a little picture or figure costs
so much money. The Englishman or Frenchman, of a suitable position to
seek these adornments for his house, usually understands better than
the visitor of Powers who, on hearing the price of the Proserpine,
wonderingly asked, "Isn't statuary riz lately?" Queen Victoria of
England, and her Albert, it is said, use their royal privilege to get
works of art at a price below their value; but their subjects would be
ashamed to do so.

To supply means of judging to the American merchant (full of kindness
and honorable sympathy as beneath the crust he so often is) who wants
pictures and statues, not merely from ostentation, but as means of
delight and improvement to himself and his friends, who has a soul to
respect the genius and desire the happiness of the artist, and who,
if he errs, does so from ignorance of the circumstances, I give the
following memorandum, made at my desire by an artist, my neighbor:--

"The rent of a suitable studio for modelling in clay and executing
statues in marble may be estimated at $200 a year.

"The best journeyman carver in marble at Rome receives $60 a month.
Models are paid $1 a day.

"The cost of marble varies according to the size of the block, being
generally sold by the cubic palm, a square of nine inches English.
As a general guide regarding the prices established among the higher
sculptors of Rome, I may mention that for a statue of life-size the
demand is from $1,000 to $5,000, varying according to the composition
of the figure and the number of accessories.

"It is a common belief in the United States, that a student of Art can
live in Italy and pursue his studies on an income of $300 or $400 a
year. This is a lamentable error; the Russian government allows its
pensioners $700, which is scarcely sufficient. $1,000 per annum should
be placed at the disposal of every young artist leaving our country
for Europe."

Let it be remembered, in addition to considerations inevitable
from this memorandum, that an artist may after years and months of
uncheered and difficult toil, after he has gone through the earlier
stages of an education, find it too largely based, and of aim too
high, to finish in this world.

The Prussian artist here on my left hand learned not only his art,
but reading and writing, after he was thirty. A farmer's son, he was
allowed no freedom to learn anything till the death of the head of
the house left him a beggar, but set him free; he walked to Berlin,
distant several hundred miles, attracted by his first works some
attention, and received some assistance in money, earned more by
invention of a ploughshare, walked to Rome, struggled through every
privation, and has now a reputation which has secured him the means of
putting his thoughts into marble. True, at forty-nine years of age he
is still severely poor; he cannot marry, because he cannot maintain a
family; but he is cheerful, because he can work in his own way, trusts
with childlike reliance in God, and is still sustained by the vigorous
health he won laboring in his father's fields. Not every man
could continue to work, circumstanced as he is, at the end of the
half-century. For him the only sad thing in my mind is that his works
are not worth working, though of merit in composition and execution,
yet ideally a product of the galvanized piety of the German school,
more mutton-like than lamb-like to my unchurched eyes.

You are likely to have a work to look at in the United States by the
great master of that school, Overbeck; Mr. Perkins of Boston, who
knows how to spend his money with equal generosity and discretion,
having bought his "Wise and Foolish Virgins." It will be precious to
the country from great artistic merits. As to the spirit, "blessed are
the poor in spirit." That kind of severity is, perhaps has become, the
nature of Overbeck. He seems like a monk, but a really pious and pure
one. This spirit is not what I seek; I deem it too narrow for our
day, but being deeply sincere in him, its expression is at times also
deeply touching. Barabbas borne in triumph, and the child Jesus,
who, playing with his father's tools, has made himself a cross, are
subjects best adapted for expression of this spirit.

I have written too carelessly,--much writing hath made me mad of late.
Forgive if the "style be not neat, terse, and sparkling," if there be
naught of the "thrilling," if the sentences seem not "written with a
diamond pen," like all else that is published in America. Some time I
must try to do better. For this time

  "Forgive my faults; forgive my virtues too."


March 21.

Day before yesterday was the Feast of St. Joseph. He is supposed to
have acquired a fondness for fried rice-cakes during his residence
in Egypt. Many are eaten in the open street, in arbors made for the
occasion. One was made beneath my window, on Piazza Barberini. All the
day and evening men, cleanly dressed in white aprons and liberty
caps, quite new, of fine, red cloth, were frying cakes for crowds of
laughing, gesticulating customers. It rained a little, and they held
an umbrella over the frying-pan, but not over themselves. The arbor
is still there, and little children are playing in and out of it; one
still lesser runs in its leading-strings, followed by the bold, gay
nurse, to the brink of the fountain, after its orange which has
rolled before it. Tenerani's workmen are coming out of his studio,
the priests are coming home from Ponte Pio, the Contadini beginning
to play at _moro_, for the setting sun has just lit up the magnificent
range of windows in the Palazzo Barberini, and then faded tenderly,
sadly away, and the mellow bells have chimed the Ave Maria. Rome looks
as Roman, that is to say as tranquil, as ever, despite the trouble
that tugs at her heart-strings. There is a report that Mazzini is to
be made Dictator, as Manin is in Venice, for a short time, so as to
provide hastily and energetically for the war. Ave Maria Sanissima!
when thou didst gaze on thy babe with such infinite hope, thou didst
not dream that, so many ages after, blood would be shed and curses
uttered in his name. Madonna Addolorata! hadst thou not hoped peace
and good-will would spring from his bloody woes, couldst thou have
borne those hours at the foot of the cross. O Stella! woman's heart of
love, send yet a ray of pure light on this troubled deep?




LETTER XXX.

THE STRUGGLE IN ROME.--POSITION OF THE FRENCH.--THE
AUSTRIANS.--FEELING OF THE ROMAN PEOPLE.--THE FRENCH TROOPS.--EFFECTS
OF WAR.--HOSPITALS.--THE PRINCESS BELGIOIOSO.--POSITION OF MR. CASS AS
ENVOY.--DIFFICULTIES AND SUGGESTIONS.--AMERICA AND ROME.--REFLECTIONS
ON THE ETERNAL CITY.--THE FRENCH: THE PEOPLE.


Rome, May 27, 1849.

I have suspended writing in the expectation of some decisive event;
but none such comes yet. The French, entangled in a web of falsehood,
abashed by a defeat that Oudinot has vainly tried to gloss over, the
expedition disowned by all honorable men at home, disappointed at
Gaëta, not daring to go the length Papal infatuation demands, know not
what to do. The Neapolitans have been decidedly driven back into their
own borders, the last time in a most shameful rout, their king flying
in front. We have heard for several days that the Austrians were
advancing, but they come not. They also, it is probable, meet with
unexpected embarrassments. They find that the sincere movement of the
Italian people is very unlike that of troops commanded by princes
and generals who never wished to conquer and were always waiting to
betray. Then their troubles at home are constantly increasing, and,
should the Russian intervention quell these to-day, it is only to
raise a storm far more terrible to-morrow.

The struggle is now fairly, thoroughly commenced between the principle
of democracy and the old powers, no longer legitimate. That struggle
may last fifty years, and the earth be watered with the blood and
tears of more than one generation, but the result is sure. All Europe,
including Great Britain, where the most bitter resistance of all will
be made, is to be under republican government in the next century.

  "God moves in a mysterious way."

Every struggle made by the old tyrannies, all their Jesuitical
deceptions, their rapacity, their imprisonments and executions of the
most generous men, only sow more dragon's teeth; the crop shoots up
daily more and more plenteous.

When I first arrived in Italy, the vast majority of this people had no
wish beyond limited monarchies, constitutional governments. They still
respected the famous names of the nobility; they despised the priests,
but were still fondly attached to the dogmas and ritual of the Roman
Catholic Church. It required King Bomba, the triple treachery
of Charles Albert, Pius IX., and the "illustrious Gioberti," the
naturally kind-hearted, but, from the necessity of his position,
cowardly and false Leopold of Tuscany, the vagabond "serene"
meannesses of Parma and Modena, the "fatherly" Radetzsky, and,
finally, the imbecile Louis Bonaparte, "would-be Emperor of France,"
to convince this people that no transition is possible between the
old and the new. _The work is done_; the revolution in Italy is now
radical, nor can it stop till Italy becomes independent and united as
a republic. Protestant she already is, and though the memory of saints
and martyrs may continue to be revered, the ideal of woman to be
adored under the name of Mary, yet Christ will now begin to be a
little thought of; _his_ idea has always been kept carefully out of
sight under the old _régime_; all the worship being for the Madonna
and saints, who were to be well paid for interceding for sinners;--an
example which might make men cease to be such, was no way coveted. Now
the New Testament has been translated into Italian; copies are already
dispersed far and wide; men calling themselves Christians will no
longer be left entirely ignorant of the precepts and life of Jesus.

The people of Rome have burnt the Cardinals' carriages. They took the
confessionals out of the churches, and made mock confessions in the
piazzas, the scope of which was, "I have sinned, father, so and so."
"Well, my son, how much will you _pay_ to the Church for absolution?"
Afterward the people thought of burning the confessionals, or using
them for barricades; but at the request of the Triumvirate they
desisted, and even put them back into the churches. But it was from no
reaction of feeling that they stopped short, only from respect for
the government. The "Tartuffe" of Molière has been translated into
Italian, and was last night performed with great applause at the
Valle. Can all this be forgotten? Never! Should guns and bayonets
replace the Pope on the throne, he will find its foundations, once
deep as modern civilization, now so undermined that it falls with the
least awkward movement.

But I cannot believe he will be replaced there. France alone could
consummate that crime,--that, for her, most cruel, most infamous
treason. The elections in France will decide. In three or four days
we shall know whether the French nation at large be guilty or
no,--whether it be the will of the nation to aid or strive to ruin a
government founded on precisely the same basis as their own.

I do not dare to trust that people. The peasant is yet very ignorant.
The suffering workman is frightened as he thinks of the punishments
that ensued on the insurrections of May and June. The man of property
is full of horror at the brotherly scope of Socialism. The aristocrat
dreams of the guillotine always when he hears men speak of the people.
The influence of the Jesuits is still immense in France. Both in
France and England the grossest falsehoods have been circulated with
unwearied diligence about the state of things in Italy. An amusing
specimen of what is still done in this line I find just now in a
foreign journal, where it says there are red flags on all the houses
of Rome; meaning to imply that the Romans are athirst for blood. Now,
the fact is, that these flags are put up at the entrance of those
streets where there is no barricade, as a signal to coachmen and
horsemen that they can pass freely. There is one on the house where
I am, in which is no person but myself, who thirst for peace, and the
Padrone, who thirsts for money.

Meanwhile the French troops are encamped at a little distance from
Rome. Some attempts at fair and equal treaty when their desire to
occupy Rome was firmly resisted, Oudinot describes in his despatches
as a readiness for _submission_. Having tried in vain to gain this
point, he has sent to France for fresh orders. These will be decided
by the turn the election takes. Meanwhile the French troops are much
exposed to the Roman force where they are. Should the Austrians come
up, what will they do? Will they shamelessly fraternize with the
French, after pretending and proclaiming that they came here as a
check upon their aggressions? Will they oppose them in defence of
Rome, with which they are at war?

Ah! the way of falsehood, the way of treachery,--how dark, how full of
pitfalls and traps! Heaven defend from it all who are not yet engaged
therein!

War near at hand seems to me even more dreadful than I had fancied
it. True, it tries men's souls, lays bare selfishness in undeniable
deformity. Here it has produced much fruit of noble sentiment, noble
act; but still it breeds vice too, drunkenness, mental dissipation,
tears asunder the tenderest ties, lavishes the productions of Earth,
for which her starving poor stretch out their hands in vain, in the
most unprofitable manner. And the ruin that ensues, how terrible! Let
those who have ever passed happy days in Rome grieve to hear that
the beautiful plantations of Villa Borghese--that chief delight and
refreshment of citizens, foreigners, and little children--are laid
low, as far as the obelisk. The fountain, singing alone amid the
fallen groves, cannot be seen and heard without tears; it seems like
some innocent infant calling and crowing amid dead bodies on a field
which battle has strewn with the bodies of those who once cherished
it. The plantations of Villa Salvage on the Tiber, also, the beautiful
trees on the way from St. John Lateran to La Maria Maggiore, the trees
of the Forum, are fallen. Rome is shorn of the locks which lent grace
to her venerable brow. She looks desolate, profaned. I feel what I
never expected to,--as if I might by and by be willing to leave Rome.

Then I have, for the first time, seen what wounded men suffer. The
night of the 30th of April I passed in the hospital, and saw the
terrible agonies of those dying or who needed amputation, felt their
mental pains and longing for the loved ones who were away; for many of
these were Lombards, who had come from the field of Novarra to fight
with a fairer chance,--many were students of the University, who had
enlisted and thrown themselves into the front of the engagement. The
impudent falsehoods of the French general's despatches are incredible.
The French were never decoyed on in any way. They were received with
every possible mark of hostility. They were defeated in open field,
the Garibaldi legion rushing out to meet them; and though they
suffered much from the walls, they sustained themselves nowhere. They
never put up a white flag till they wished to surrender. The vanity
that strives to cover over these facts is unworthy of men. The only
excuse for the imprudent conduct of the expedition is that they were
deceived, not by the Romans here, but by the priests of Gaëta, leading
them to expect action in their favor within the walls. These priests
themselves were deluded by their hopes and old habits of mind. The
troops did not fight well, and General Oudinot abandoned his wounded
without proper care. All this says nothing against French valor,
proved by ages of glory, beyond the doubt of their worst foes. They
were demoralized because they fought in so bad a cause, and there was
no sincere ardor or clear hope in any breast.

But to return to the hospitals: these were put in order, and have been
kept so, by the Princess Belgioioso. The princess was born of one
of the noblest families of the Milanese, a descendant of the great
Trivalzio, and inherited a large fortune. Very early she compromised
it in liberal movements, and, on their failure, was obliged to fly to
Paris, where for a time she maintained herself by writing, and I
think by painting also. A princess so placed naturally excited great
interest, and she drew around her a little court of celebrated men.
After recovering her fortune, she still lived in Paris, distinguished
for her talents and munificence, both toward literary men and her
exiled countrymen. Later, on her estate, called Locate, between Pavia
and Milan, she had made experiments in the Socialist direction with
fine judgment and success. Association for education, for labor, for
transaction of household affairs, had been carried on for several
years; she had spared no devotion of time and money to this object,
loved, and was much beloved by, those objects of her care, and said
she hoped to die there. All is now despoiled and broken up, though it
may be hoped that some seeds of peaceful reform have been sown which
will spring to light when least expected. The princess returned to
Italy in 1847-8, full of hope in Pius IX and Charles Albert. She
showed her usual energy and truly princely heart, sustaining, at her
own expense, a company of soldiers and a journal up to the last sad
betrayal of Milan, August 6th. These days undeceived all the people,
but few of the noblesse; she was one of the few with mind strong
enough to understand the lesson, and is now warmly interested in the
republican movement. From Milan she went to France, but, finding
it impossible to effect anything serious there in behalf of Italy,
returned, and has been in Rome about two months. Since leaving
Milan she receives no income, her possessions being in the grasp of
Radetzky, and cannot know when, if ever, she will again. But as
she worked so largely and well with money, so can she without. She
published an invitation to the Roman women to make lint and bandages,
and offer their services to the wounded; she put the hospitals in
order; in the central one, Trinita de Pellegrini, once the abode where
the pilgrims were received during holy week, and where foreigners
were entertained by seeing their feet washed by the noble dames and
dignitaries of Rome, she has remained day and night since the 30th of
April, when the wounded were first there. Some money she procured at
first by going through Rome, accompanied by two other ladies veiled,
to beg it. Afterward the voluntary contributions were generous; among
the rest, I am proud to say, the Americans in Rome gave $250, of which
a handsome portion came from Mr. Brown, the Consul.

I value this mark of sympathy more because of the irritation and
surprise occasioned here by the position of Mr. Cass, the Envoy. It is
most unfortunate that we should have an envoy here for the first
time, just to offend and disappoint the Romans. When all the other
ambassadors are at Gaëta, ours is in Rome, as if by his presence to
discountenance the republican government, which he does not recognize.
Mr. Cass, it seems, is required by his instructions not to recognize
the government till sure it can be sustained. Now it seems to me that
the only dignified ground for our government, the only legitimate
ground for any republican government, is to recognize for any nation
the government chosen by itself. The suffrage had been correct here,
and the proportion of votes to the whole population was much larger,
it was said by Americans here, than it is in our own country at the
time of contested elections. It had elected an Assembly; that Assembly
had appointed, to meet the exigencies of this time, the Triumvirate.
If any misrepresentations have induced America to believe, as France
affects to have believed, that so large a vote could have been
obtained by moral intimidation, the present unanimity of the
population in resisting such immense odds, and the enthusiasm of their
every expression in favor of the present government, puts the matter
beyond a doubt. The Roman people claims once more to have a national
existence. It declines further serfdom to an ecclesiastical court.
It claims liberty of conscience, of action, and of thought. Should it
fall from its present position, it will not be from, internal dissent,
but from foreign oppression.

Since this is the case, surely our country, if no other, is bound to
recognize the present government _so long as it can sustain itself_.
This position is that to which we have a right: being such, it is no
matter how it is viewed by others. But I dare assert it is the only
respectable one for our country, in the eyes of the Emperor of Russia
himself.

The first, best occasion is past, when Mr. Cass might, had he been
empowered to act as Mr. Rush did in France, have morally strengthened
the staggering republic, which would have found sympathy where alone
it is of permanent value, on the basis of principle. Had it been in
vain, what then? America would have acted honorably; as to our being
compromised thereby with the Papal government, that fear is idle. Pope
and Cardinals have great hopes from America; the giant influence there
is kept up with the greatest care; the number of Catholic writers
in the United States, too, carefully counted. Had our republican
government acknowledged this republican government, the Papal
Camarilla would have respected us more, but not loved us less; for
have we not the loaves and fishes to give, as well as the precious
souls to be saved? Ah! here, indeed, America might go straightforward
with all needful impunity. Bishop Hughes himself need not be
anxious. That first, best occasion has passed, and the unrecognized,
unrecognizing Envoy has given offence, and not comfort, by a presence
that seemed constantly to say, I do not think you can sustain
yourselves. It has wounded both the heart and the pride of Rome. Some
of the lowest people have asked me, "Is it not true that your country
had a war to become free?" "Yes." "Then why do they not feel for us?"

Yet even now it is not too late. If America would only hail
triumphant, though she could not sustain injured Rome, that would
be something. "Can you suppose Rome will triumph," you say, "without
money, and against so potent a league of foes?" I am not sure, but
I hope, for I believe something in the heart of a people when fairly
awakened. I have also a lurking confidence in what our fathers spoke
of so constantly, a providential order of things, by which brute force
and selfish enterprise are sometimes set at naught by aid which seems
to descend from a higher sphere. Even old pagans believed in that,
you know; and I was born in America, Christianized by the
Puritans,--America, freed by eight years' patient suffering, poverty,
and struggle,--America, so cheered in dark days by one spark of
sympathy from a foreign shore,--America, first "recognized" by
Lafayette. I saw him when traversing our country, then great, rich,
and free. Millions of men who owed in part their happiness to what, no
doubt, was once sneered at as romantic sympathy, threw garlands in his
path. It is natural that I should have some faith.

Send, dear America! to thy ambassadors a talisman precious beyond all
that boasted gold of California. Let it loose his tongue to cry, "Long
live the Republic, and may God bless the cause of the people, the
brotherhood of nations and of men,--equality of rights for all." _Viva
America!_

Hail to my country! May she live a free, a glorious, a loving
life, and not perish, like the old dominions, from, the leprosy of
selfishness.


Evening.

I am alone in the ghostly silence of a great house, not long since
full of gay faces and echoing with gay voices, now deserted by every
one but me,--for almost all foreigners are gone now, driven by force
either of the summer heats or the foe. I hear all the Spaniards are
going now,--that twenty-one have taken passports to-day; why that is,
I do not know.

I shall not go till the last moment; my only fear is of France. I
cannot think in any case there would be found men willing to damn
themselves to latest posterity by bombarding Rome. Other cities they
may treat thus, careless of destroying the innocent and helpless, the
babe and old grandsire who cannot war against them. But Rome, precious
inheritance of mankind,--will they run the risk of marring her shrined
treasures? Would they dare do it?

Two of the balls that struck St. Peter's have been sent to Pius IX. by
his children, who find themselves so much less "beloved" than were the
Austrians.

These two days, days of solemn festivity in the calends of the Church,
have been duly kept, and the population looks cheerful as it swarms
through the streets. The order of Rome, thronged as it is with troops,
is amazing. I go from one end to the other, and amid the poorest and
most barbarous of the population, (barbarously ignorant, I mean,)
alone and on foot. My friends send out their little children alone
with their nurses. The amount of crime is almost nothing to what it
was. The Roman, no longer pent in ignorance and crouching beneath
espionage, no longer stabs in the dark. His energies have true vent;
his better feelings are roused; he has thrown aside the stiletto. The
power here is indeed miraculous, since no doubt still lurk within the
walls many who are eager to incite brawls, if only to give an excuse
for slander.

To-day I suppose twelve thousand Austrians marched into Florence.
The Florentines have humbled and disgraced themselves in vain. They
recalled the Grand Duke to ward off the entrance of the Austrians, but
in vain went the deputation to Gaëta--in an American steamer! Leopold
was afraid to come till his dear cousins of Austria had put everything
in perfect order; then the Austrians entered to take Leghorn, but the
Florentines still kept on imploring them not to come there; Florence
was as subdued, as good as possible, already:--they have had the
answer they deserved. Now they crown their work by giving over
Guerazzi and Petracci to be tried by an Austrian court-martial. Truly
the cup of shame brims over.

I have been out on the balcony to look over the city. All sleeps with
that peculiar air of serene majesty known to this city only;--this
city that has grown, not out of the necessities of commerce nor the
luxuries of wealth, but first out of heroism, then out of faith.
Swelling domes, roofs softly tinted with yellow moss! what deep
meaning, what deep repose, in your faintly seen outline!

The young moon climbs among clouds,--the clouds of a departing
thunderstorm. Tender, smiling moon! can it be that thy full orb may
look down on a smoking, smouldering Rome, and see her best blood run
along the stones, without one nation in the world to defend, one to
aid,--scarce one to cry out a tardy "Shame"? We will wait, whisper the
nations, and see if they can bear it. Rack them well to see if they
are brave. _If they can do without us_, we will help them. Is it thus
ye would be served in your turn? Beware!




LETTER XXXI.

THE FRENCH TREASON AT ROME.--OUDINOT.--LESSEPS.--LETTER OF THE
TRIUMVIRATE.--REPLY OF LESSEPS.--COURSE OF OUDINOT.--THE WOUNDED
ITALIANS.--GARIBALDI.--ITALIAN YOUNG MEN.--MILITARY FUNERAL.--HAVOC OF
THE SIEGE.--COURAGE OF MAZZINI.--FALSENESS OF THE LONDON TIMES.


Rome, June 10, 1849.

What shall I write of Rome in these sad but glorious days? Plain facts
are the best; for my feelings I could not find fit words.

When I last wrote, the French were playing the second act of their
farce.

In the first, the French government affected to consult the Assembly.
The Assembly, or a majority of the Assembly, affected to believe the
pretext it gave, and voted funds for twelve thousand men to go to
Civita Vecchia. Arriving there, Oudinot proclaimed that he had come
as a friend and brother. He was received as such. Immediately he took
possession of the town, disarmed the Roman troops, and published a
manifesto in direct opposition to his first declaration.

He sends to Rome that he is coming there as a friend; receives the
answer that he is not wanted and cannot be trusted. This answer he
chooses to consider as coming from a minority, and advances on Rome.
The pretended majority on which he counts never shows itself by
a single movement within the walls. He makes an assault, and is
defeated. On this subject his despatches to his government are full
of falsehoods that would disgrace the lowest pickpocket,--falsehoods
which it is impossible he should not know to be such.

The Assembly passed a vote of blame. M. Louis Bonaparte writes a
letter of compliment and assurance that this course of violence shall
be sustained. In conformity with this promise twelve thousand more
troops are sent. This time it is not thought necessary to consult the
Assembly. Let us view the

SECOND ACT.

Now appears in Rome M. Ferdinand Lesseps, Envoy, &c. of the French
government. He declares himself clothed with full powers to treat
with Rome. He cannot conceal his surprise at all he sees there, at
the ability with which preparations have been made for defence, at the
patriotic enthusiasm which pervades the population. Nevertheless, in
beginning his game of treaty-making, he is not ashamed to insist on
the French occupying the city. Again and again repulsed, he again and
again returns to the charge on this point. And here I shall translate
the letter addressed to him by the Triumvirate, both because of its
perfect candor of statement, and to give an idea of the sweet and
noble temper in which these treacherous aggressions have been met.


LETTER OF THE TRIUMVIRS TO MONSIEUR LESSEPS.

"May 25, 1849.

"We have had the honor, Monsieur, to furnish you, in our note of the
16th, with some information as to the unanimous consent which was
given to the formation of the government of the Roman Republic.
We to-day would speak to you of the actual question, such as it is
debated in fact, if not by right, between the French government and
ours. You will allow us to do it with the frankness demanded by the
urgency of the situation, as well as the sympathy which ought to
govern all relations between France and Italy. Our diplomacy is the
truth, and the character given to your mission is a guaranty that the
best possible interpretation will be given to what we shall say to
you.

"With your permission, we return for an instant to the cause of the
present situation of affairs.

"In consequence of conferences and arrangements which took place
without the government of the Roman Republic ever being called on
to take part, it was some time since decided by the Catholic
Powers,--1st. That a modification should take place in the government
and institutions of the Roman States; 2d. That this modification
should have for basis the return of Pius IX., not as Pope, for to that
no obstacle is interposed by us, but as temporal sovereign; 3d.
That if, to attain that aim, a continuous intervention was judged
necessary, that intervention should take place.

"We are willing to admit, that while for some of the contracting
governments the only motive was the hope of a general restoration and
absolute return to the treaties of 1815, the French government
was drawn into this agreement only in consequence of erroneous
information, tending systematically to depict the Roman States as
given up to anarchy and governed by terror exercised in the name of an
audacious minority. We know also, that, in the modification proposed,
the French government intended to represent an influence more or less
liberal, opposed to the absolutist programme of Austria and of
Naples. It does none the less remain true, that under the Apostolic or
constitutional form, with or without liberal guaranties to the Roman
people, the dominant thought in all the negotiations to which we
allude has been some sort of return toward the past, a compromise
between the Roman people and Pius IX. considered as temporal prince.

"We cannot dissemble to ourselves, Monsieur, that the French
expedition has been planned and executed under the inspiration of this
thought. Its object was, on one side, to throw the sword of France
into the balance of negotiations which were to be opened at Rome;
on the other, to guarantee the Roman people from the excess of
retrograde, but always on condition that it should submit to
constitutional monarchy in favor of the Holy Father. This is assured
to us partly from information which we believe we possess as to the
concert with Austria; from the proclamations of General Oudinot; from
the formal declarations made by successive envoys to the Triumvirate;
from the silence obstinately maintained whenever we have sought to
approach the political question and obtain a formal declaration of the
fact proved in our note of the 16th, that the institutions by
which the Roman people are governed at this time are the free and
spontaneous expression of the wish of the people inviolable when
legally ascertained. For the rest, the vote of the French Assembly
sustains implicitly the fact that we affirm.

"In such a situation, under the menace of an inadmissible compromise,
and of negotiations which the state of our people no way provoked, our
part, Monsieur, could not be doubtful. To resist,--we owed this to
our country, to France, to all Europe. We ought, in fulfilment of a
mandate loyally given, loyally accepted, maintain to our country the
inviolability, so far as that was possible to us, of its territory,
and of the institutions decreed by all the powers, by all the
elements, of the state. We ought to conquer the time needed for appeal
from France ill informed to France better informed, to save the sister
republic the disgrace and the remorse which must be hers if, rashly
led on by bad suggestions from without, she became, before she was
aware, accomplice in an act of violence to which we can find no
parallel without going back to the partition of Poland in 1772. We
owed it to Europe to maintain, as far as we could, the fundamental
principles of all international life, the independence of each people
in all that concerns its internal administration. We say it without
pride,--for if it is with enthusiasm that we resist the attempts of
the Neapolitan monarchy and of Austria, our eternal enemy, it is with
profound grief that we are ourselves constrained to contend with the
arms of France,--we believe in following this line of conduct we
have deserved well, not only of our country, but of all the people of
Europe, even of France herself.

"We come to the actual question. You know, Monsieur, the events which
have followed the French intervention. Our territory has been invaded
by the king of Naples.

"Four thousand Spaniards were to embark on the 17th for invasion of
this country. The Austrians, having surmounted the heroic resistance
of Bologna, have advanced into Romagna, and are now marching on
Ancona.

"We have beaten and driven out of our territory the forces of the king
of Naples. We believe we should do the same by the Austrian forces, if
the attitude of the French here did not fetter our action.

"We are sorry to say it, but France must be informed that the
expedition of Civita Vecchia, said to be planned for our protection,
costs us very dear. Of all the interventions with which it is hoped to
overwhelm us, that of the French has been the most perilous. Against
the soldiers of Austria and the king of Naples we can fight, for
God protects a good cause. But we _do not wish to fight_ against
the French. We are toward them in a state, not of war, but of simple
defence. But this position, the only one we wish to take wherever
we meet France, has for us all the inconveniences without any of the
favorable chances of war.

"The French expedition has, from the first, forced us to concentrate
our troops, thus leaving our frontier open to Austrian invasion, and
Bologna and the cities of Romagna unsustained. The Austrians have
profited by this. After eight days of heroic resistance by the
population, Bologna was forced to yield. We had bought in France arms
for our defence. Of these ten thousand muskets have been detained
between Marseilles and Civita Vecchia. These are in your hands. Thus
with a single blow you deprive us of ten thousand soldiers. In every
armed man is a soldier against the Austrians.

"Your forces are disposed around our walls as if for a siege. They
remain there without avowed aim or programme. They have forced us to
keep the city in a state of defence which weighs upon our finances.
They force us to keep here a body of troops who might be saving our
cities from the occupation and ravages of the Austrians. They hinder
our going from place to place, our provisioning the city, our sending
couriers. They keep minds in a state of excitement and distrust which
might, if our population were less good and devoted, lead to sinister
results. They do _not_ engender anarchy nor reaction, for both are
impossible at Rome; but they sow the seed of irritation against
France, and it is a misfortune for us who were accustomed to love and
hope in her.

"We are besieged, Monsieur, besieged by France, in the name of a
protective mission, while some leagues off the king of Naples, flying,
carries off our hostages, and the Austrian slays our brothers.

"You have presented propositions. Those propositions have been
declared inadmissible by the Assembly. To-day you add a fourth to
the three already rejected. This says that France will protect from
foreign invasion all that part of our territory that may be occupied
by her troops. You must yourself feel that this changes nothing in our
position.

"The parts of the territory occupied by your troops are in fact
protected; but if only for the present, to what are they reduced? and
if it is for the future, have we no other way to protect our territory
than by giving it up entirely to you?

"The real intent of your demands is not stated. It is the occupation
of Rome. This demand has constantly stood first in your list of
propositions. Now we have had the honor to say to you, Monsieur, that
is impossible. The people will never consent to it. If the occupation
of Rome has for its aim only to protect it, the people thank you,
but tell you at the same time, that, able to defend Rome by their
own forces, they would be dishonored even in your eyes by declaring
themselves insufficient, and needing the aid of some regiments of
French soldiers. If the occupation has otherwise a political object,
which God forbid, the people, who have given themselves freely
these institutions, cannot suffer it. Rome is their capital, their
palladium, their sacred city. They know very well, that, apart from
their principles, apart from their honor, there is civil war at the
end of such an occupation. They are filled with distrust by your
persistence. They foresee, the troops being once admitted, changes in
men and in actions which would be fatal to their liberty. They know
that, in presence of foreign bayonets, the independence of their
Assembly, of their government, would be a vain word. They have always
Civita Vecchia before their eyes.

"On this point be sure their will is irrevocable. They will be
massacred from barricade to barricade, before they will surrender.
Can the soldiers of France wish to massacre a brother people whom they
came to protect, because they do not wish to surrender to them their
capital?

"There are for France only three parts to take in the Roman States.
She ought to declare herself for us, against us, or neutral. To
declare herself for us would be to recognize our republic, and fight
side by side with us against the Austrians. To declare against us is
to crush without motive the liberty, the national life, of a friendly
people, and fight side by side with the Austrians. France _cannot_ do
that. She _will not_ risk a European war to depress us, her ally. Let
her, then, rest neutral in this conflict between us and our enemies.
Only yesterday we hoped more from her, but to-day we demand but this.

"The occupation of Civita Vecchia is a fact accomplished; let it go.
France thinks that, in the present state of things, she ought not to
remain distant from the field of battle. She thinks that, vanquishers
or vanquished, we may have need of her moderative action and of her
protection. We do not think so; but we will not react against her. Let
her keep Civita Vecchia. Let her even extend her encampments, if the
numbers of her troops require it, in the healthy regions of Civita
Vecchia and Viterbo. Let her then wait the issue of the combats about
to take place. All facilities will be offered her, every proof of
frank and cordial sympathy given; her officers can visit Rome, her
soldiers have all the solace possible. But let her neutrality be
sincere and without concealed plans. Let her declare herself in
explicit terms. Let her leave us free to use all our forces. Let her
restore our arms. Let her not by her cruisers drive back from our
ports the men who come to our aid from other parts of Italy. Let
her, above all, withdraw from before our walls, and cause even the
appearance of hostility to cease between two nations who, later,
undoubtedly are destined to unite in the same international faith, as
now they have adopted the same form of government."


In his answer, Lesseps appears moved by this statement, and
particularly expresses himself thus:--

"One point appears above all to occupy you; it is the thought that
we wish forcibly to impose upon you the obligation of receiving us as
friends. _Friendship and violence are incompatible._ Thus it would
be _inconsistent_ on our part to begin by firing our cannon upon you,
since we are your natural protectors. _Such a contradiction enters
neither into my intentions, nor those of the government of the French
republic, nor of our army and its honorable chief._"

These words were written at the head-quarters of Oudinot, and
of course seen and approved by him. At the same time, in private
conversation, "the honorable chief" could swear he would occupy Rome
by "one means or another." A few days after, Lesseps consented to
conditions such as the Romans would tolerate. He no longer insisted on
occupying Rome, but would content himself with good positions in the
country. Oudinot protested that the Plenipotentiary had "exceeded his
powers,"--that he should not obey,--that the armistice was at an end,
and he should attack Rome on Monday. It was then Friday. He proposed
to leave these two days for the few foreigners that remained to
get out of town. M. Lesseps went off to Paris, in great seeming
indignation, to get _his_ treaty ratified. Of course we could not
hear from him for eight or ten days. Meanwhile, the _honorable_ chief,
alike in all his conduct, attacked on Sunday instead of Monday. The
attack began before sunrise, and lasted all day. I saw it from my
window, which, though distant, commands the gate of St. Pancrazio. Why
the whole force was bent on that part, I do not know. If they could
take it, the town would be cannonaded, and the barricades useless; but
it is the same with the Pincian Gate. Small-parties made feints in two
other directions, but they were at once repelled. The French fought
with great bravery, and this time it is said with beautiful skill and
order, sheltering themselves in their advance by movable barricades.
The Italians fought like lions, and no inch of ground was gained by
the assailants. The loss of the French is said to be very great: it
could not be otherwise. Six or seven hundred Italians are dead or
wounded. Among them are many officers, those of Garibaldi especially,
who are much exposed by their daring bravery, and whose red tunic
makes them the natural mark of the enemy. It seems to me great folly
to wear such a dress amid the dark uniforms; but Garibaldi has always
done it. He has now been wounded twice here and seventeen times in
Ancona.

All this week I have been much at the hospitals where are these noble
sufferers. They are full of enthusiasm; this time was no treason, no
Vicenza, no Novara, no Milan. They had not been given up by wicked
chiefs at the moment they were shedding their blood, and they had
conquered. All were only anxious to get out again and be at their
posts. They seemed to feel that those who died so gloriously were
fortunate; perhaps they were, for if Rome is obliged to yield,--and
how can she stand always unaided against the four powers?--where shall
these noble youths fly? They are the flower of the Italian youth;
especially among the Lombards are some of the finest young men I have
ever seen. If Rome falls, if Venice falls, there is no spot of Italian
earth where they can abide more, and certainly no Italian will wish
to take refuge in France. Truly you said, M. Lesseps, "Violence and
friendship are incompatible."

A military funeral of the officer Ramerino was sadly picturesque and
affecting. The white-robed priests went before the body singing, while
his brothers in arms bore the lighted tapers. His horse followed,
saddled and bridled. The horse hung his head and stepped dejectedly;
he felt there was something strange and gloomy going on,--felt that
his master was laid low. Ramerino left a wife and children. A great
proportion of those who run those risks are, happily, alone. Parents
weep, but will not suffer long; their grief is not like that of widows
and children.

Since the 3d we have only cannonade and skirmishes. The French are at
their trenches, but cannot advance much; they are too much molested
from the walls. The Romans have made one very successful sortie. The
French availed themselves of a violent thunderstorm, when the
walls were left more thinly guarded, to try to scale them, but were
immediately driven back. It was thought by many that they never would
be willing to throw bombs and shells into Rome, but they do whenever
they can. That generous hope and faith in them as republicans and
brothers, which put the best construction on their actions, and
believed in their truth as far as possible, is now destroyed. The
government is false, and the people do not resist; the general is
false, and the soldiers obey.

Meanwhile, frightful sacrifices are being made by Rome. All her
glorious oaks, all her gardens of delight, her casinos, full of the
monuments of genius and taste, are perishing in the defence. The
houses, the trees which had been spared at the gate of St. Pancrazio,
all afforded shelter to the foe, and caused so much loss of life,
that the Romans have now fully acquiesced in destruction agonizing to
witness. Villa Borghese is finally laid waste, the villa of Raphael
has perished, the trees are all cut down at Villa Albani, and the
house, that most beautiful ornament of Rome, must, I suppose, go too.
The stately marble forms are already driven from their place in that
portico where Winckelmann sat and talked with such delight. Villa
Salvage is burnt, with all its fine frescos, and that bank of the
Tiber shorn of its lovely plantations.

Rome will never recover the cruel ravage of these days, perhaps
only just begun. I had often thought of living a few months near St.
Peter's, that I might go as much as I liked to the church and the
museum, have Villa Pamfili and Monte Mario within the compass of
a walk. It is not easy to find lodgings there, as it is a quarter
foreigners never inhabit; but, walking about to see what pleasant
places there were, I had fixed my eye on a clean, simple house near
Ponte St. Angelo. It bore on a tablet that it was the property of
Angela ----; its little balconies with their old wooden rails, full
of flowers in humble earthen vases, the many bird-cages, the air of
domestic quiet and comfort, marked it as the home of some vestal or
widow, some lone woman whose heart was centred in the ordinary and
simplest pleasures of a home. I saw also she was one having the most
limited income, and I thought, "She will not refuse to let me a room
for a few months, as I shall be as quiet as herself, and sympathize
about the flowers and birds." Now the Villa Pamfili is all laid waste.
The French encamp on Monte Mario; what they have done there is not
known yet. The cannonade reverberates all day under the dome of St.
Peter's, and the house of poor Angela is levelled with the ground. I
hope her birds and the white peacocks of the Vatican gardens are in
safety;--but who cares for gentle, harmless creatures now?

I have been often interrupted while writing this letter, and suppose
it is confused as well as incomplete. I hope my next may tell of
something decisive one way or the other. News is not yet come from
Lesseps, but the conduct of Oudinot and the formation of the new
French ministry give reason to hope no good. Many seem resolved to
force back Pius IX. among his bleeding flock, into the city ruined
by him, where he cannot remain, and if he come, all this struggle and
sorrow is to be borne over again. Mazzini stands firm as a rock. I
know not whether he hopes for a successful issue, but he _believes_ in
a God bound to protect men who do what they deem their duty. Yet how
long, O Lord, shall the few trample on the many?

I am surprised to see the air of perfect good faith with which
articles from the London Times, upon the revolutionary movements,
are copied into our papers. There exists not in Europe a paper more
violently opposed to the cause of freedom than the Times, and neither
its leaders nor its foreign correspondence are to be depended upon.
It is said to receive money from Austria. I know not whether this
be true, or whether it be merely subservient to the aristocratical
feeling of England, which is far more opposed to republican movements
than is that of Russia; for in England fear embitters hate. It is
droll to remember our reading in the class-book.

    "Ay, down to the dust with them, slaves as they are";--

to think how bitter the English were on the Italians who succumbed,
and see how they hate those who resist. And their cowardice here in
Italy is ludicrous. It is they who run away at the least intimation
of danger,--it is they who invent all the "fe, fo, fum" stories about
Italy,--it is they who write to the Times and elsewhere that they dare
not for their lives stay in Rome, where I, a woman, walk everywhere
alone, and all the little children do the same, with their nurses.
More of this anon.




LETTER XXXII.

PROGRESS OF THE TRAGEDY.--PIUS IX. DISAVOWS LIBERALISM.--OUDINOT,
AND THE ROMAN AUTHORITIES.--SHAME OF FRANCE.--DEVASTATION OF
THE CITY.--COURAGE OF THE PEOPLE.--BOMBS EXTINGUISHED.--A CRISIS
APPROACHING.


Rome, June 21, 1849.

It is now two weeks since the first attack of Oudinot, and as yet we
hear nothing decisive from Paris. I know not yet what news may have
come last night, but by the morning's mail we did not even receive
notice that Lesseps had arrived in Paris.

Whether Lesseps was consciously the servant of all these base
intrigues, time will show. His conduct was boyish and foolish, if it
was not treacherous. The only object seemed to be to create panic, to
agitate, to take possession of Rome somehow, though what to do with
it, if they could get it, the French government would hardly know.

Pius IX., in his allocution of the 29th of April last, has explained
himself fully. He has disavowed every liberal act which ever seemed
to emanate from him, with the exception of the amnesty. He has
shamelessly recalled his refusal to let Austrian blood be shed, while
Roman flows daily at his request. He has implicitly declared that his
future government, could he return, would be absolute despotism,--has
dispelled the last lingering illusion of those still anxious to
apologize for him as only a prisoner now in the hands of the Cardinals
and the king of Naples. The last frail link is broken that bound to
him the people of Rome, and could the French restore him, they must
frankly avow themselves, abandon entirely and fully the position they
took in February, 1848, and declare themselves the allies of Austria
and of Russia.

Meanwhile they persevere in the Jesuitical policy that has already
disgraced and is to ruin them. After a week of vain assaults, Oudinot
sent to Rome the following letter, which I translate, as well as the
answers it elicited.


LETTER OF GENERAL OUDINOT,

_Intended for the Roman Constituent Assembly, the Triumvirate, the
Generalissimo, and the Commander-in-Chief of the National Guard._

"General,--The events of war have, as you know, conducted the French
army to the gates of Rome.

"Should the entrance into the city remain closed against us, I should
see myself constrained to employ immediately all the means of action
that France has placed in my hands.

"Before having recourse to such terrible necessity, I think it my
duty to make a last appeal to a people who cannot have toward France
sentiments of hostility.

"The Roman army wishes, no doubt, equally with myself, to spare bloody
ruin to the capital of the Christian world.

"With this conviction, I pray you, Signore General, to give the
enclosed proclamation the most speedy publicity. If, twelve hours
after this despatch shall have been delivered to you, an answer
corresponding to the honor and the intentions of France shall not have
reached me, I shall be constrained to give the forcible attack.

"Accept, &c.

"Villa Pamfili, 12 June, 1849, 5 P.M."


He was in fact at Villa Santucci, much farther out, but could not be
content without falsifying his date as well as all his statements.


"PROCLAMATION.

"Inhabitants of Rome,--We did not come to bring you war. We came
to sustain among you order, with liberty. The intentions of our
government have been misunderstood. The labors of the siege
have conducted us under your walls. Till now we have wished only
occasionally to answer the fire of your batteries. We approach these
last moments, when the necessities of war burst out in terrible
calamities. Spare them to a city fall of so many glorious memories.

"If you persist in repelling us, on you alone will fall the
responsibility of irreparable disasters."


The following are the answers of the various functionaries to whom
this letter was sent:--


ANSWER OF THE ASSEMBLY.

"General,--The Roman Constitutional Assembly informs you, in reply to
your despatch of yesterday, that, having concluded a convention from
the 31st of May, 1849, with M. de Lesseps, Minister Plenipotentiary of
the French Republic, a convention which we confirmed soon after your
protest, it must consider that convention obligatory for both parties,
and indeed a safeguard of the rights of nations, until it has been
ratified or declined by the government of France. Therefore the
Assembly must regard as a violation of that convention every hostile
act of the French army since the above-named 31st of May, and all
others that shall take place before the resolution of your government
can be made known, and before the expiration of the time agreed upon
for the armistice. You demand, General, an answer correspondent to the
intentions and power of France. Nothing could be more conformable with
the intentions and power of France than to cease a flagrant violation
of the rights of nations.

"Whatever may be the results of such violation, the people of Rome are
not responsible for them. Rome is strong in its right, and decided
to maintain tire conventions which attach it to your nation; only it
finds itself constrained by the necessity of self-defence to repel
unjust aggressions.

"Accept, &c., for the Assembly,

"The President, GALLETTI.

"Secretaries, FABRETTI, PANNACCHI, COCCHI."


"ANSWER OF THE COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF OF THE NATIONAL GUARD.

"General,--The treaty, of which we await the ratification, assures
this tranquil city from every disaster.

"The National Guard, destined to maintain order, has the duty of
seconding the resolutions of the government; willingly and zealously
it fulfils this duty, not caring for annoyance and fatigue.

"The National Guard showed very lately, when it escorted the prisoners
sent back to you, its sympathy for France, but it shows also on every
occasion a supreme regard for its own dignity, for the honor of Rome.

"Any misfortune to the capital of the Catholic world, to the
monumental city, must be attributed not to the pacific citizens
constrained to defend themselves, but solely to its aggressors.

"Accept, &c.

"STURBINETTI,

_General of the National Guard, Representative of the People_".


ANSWER OF THE GENERALISSIMO.

"Citizen General,--A fatality leads to conflict between the armies
of two republics, whom a better destiny would have invited to combat
against their common enemy; for the enemies of the one cannot fail to
be also enemies of the other.

"We are not deceived, and shall combat by every means in our power
whoever assails our institutions, for only the brave are worthy to
stand before the French soldiers.

"Reflecting that there is a state of life worse than death, if the war
you wage should put us in that state, it will be better to close our
eyes for ever than to see the interminable oppressions of oar country.

"I wish you well, and desire fraternity.

"ROSSELLI."


ANSWER OF THE TRIUMVIRATE.

"We have the honor to transmit to you the answer of the Assembly.

"We never break our promises. We have promised to defend, in execution
of orders from the Assembly and people of Rome, the banner of the
Republic, the honor of the country, and the sanctity of the capital of
the Christian world; this promise we shall maintain.

"Accept, &c.

"The Triumvirs,

  ARMELLINI.
  MAZZINI.
  SAFFI."


Observe the miserable evasion of this missive of Oudinot: "The fortune
of war has conducted us." What war? He pretended to come as a friend,
a protector; is enraged only because, after his deceits at Civita
Vecchia, Rome will not trust him within her walls. For this he daily
sacrifices hundreds of lives. "The Roman people cannot be hostile to
the French?" No, indeed; they were not disposed to be so. They had
been stirred to emulation by the example of France. They had warmly
hoped in her as their true ally. It required all that Oudinot has done
to turn their faith to contempt and aversion.

Cowardly man! He knows now that he comes upon a city which wished to
receive him only as a friend, and he cries, "With my cannon, with my
bombs, I will compel you to let me betray you."

The conduct of France--infamous enough before--looks tenfold blacker
now that, while the so-called Plenipotentiary is absent with the
treaty to be ratified, her army daily assails Rome,--assails in vain.
After receiving these answers to his letter and proclamation, Oudinot
turned all the force of his cannonade to make a breach, and
began, what no one, even in these days, has believed possible, the
bombardment of Rome.

Yes! the French, who pretend to be the advanced guard of civilization,
are bombarding Rome. They dare take the risk of destroying the richest
bequests made to man by the great Past. Nay, they seem to do it in an
especially barbarous manner. It was thought they would avoid, as much
as possible, the hospitals for the wounded, marked to their view
by the black banner, and the places where are the most precious
monuments; but several bombs have fallen on the chief hospital, and
the Capitol evidently is especially aimed at. They made a breach in
the wall, but it was immediately filled up with a barricade, and all
the week they have been repulsed in every attempt they made to gain
ground, though with considerable loss of life on our side; on theirs
it must be great, but how great we cannot know.

Ponte Molle, the scene of Raphael's fresco of a battle, in the
Vatican, saw again a fierce struggle last Friday. More than fifty were
brought wounded into Rome.

But wounds and assaults only fire more and more the courage of her
defenders. They feel the justice of their cause, and the peculiar
iniquity of this aggression. In proportion as there seems little aid
to be hoped from man, they seem to claim it from God. The noblest
sentiments are heard from every lip, and, thus far, their acts amply
correspond.

On the eve of the bombardment one or two officers went round with
a fine band. It played on the piazzas the Marseillaise and Roman
marches; and when the people were thus assembled, they were told
of the proclamation, and asked how they felt. Many shouted loudly,
_Guerra! Viva la Republica Romana!_ Afterward, bands of young men went
round singing the chorus,

  "Vogliamo sempre quella,
  Vogliamo Liberta."

("We want always one thing; we want liberty.") Guitars played, and
some danced. When the bombs began to come, one of the Trasteverini,
those noble images of the old Roman race, redeemed her claim to that
descent by seizing a bomb and extinguishing the match. She received a
medal and a reward in money. A soldier did the same thing at Palazza
Spada, where is the statue of Pompey, at whose base great Cæsar fell.
He was promoted. Immediately the people were seized with emulation;
armed with pans of wet clay, they ran wherever the bombs fell, to
extinguish them. Women collect the balls from the hostile cannon, and
carry them to ours. As thus very little injury has been done to life,
the people cry, "Madonna protects us against the bombs; she wills not
that Rome should be destroyed."

Meanwhile many poor people are driven from their homes, and provisions
are growing very dear. The heats are now terrible for us, and must be
far more so for the French. It is said a vast number are ill of fever;
indeed, it cannot be otherwise. Oudinot himself has it, and perhaps
this is one explanation of the mixture of violence and weakness in his
actions.

He must be deeply ashamed at the poor result of his bad acts,--that at
the end of two weeks and so much bravado, he has done nothing to Rome,
unless intercept provisions, kill some of her brave youth, and
injure churches, which should be sacred to him as to us. St. Maria
Trastevere, that ancient church, so full of precious remains, and
which had an air of mild repose more beautiful than almost any other,
is said to have suffered particularly.

As to the men who die, I share the impassioned sorrow of the
Triumvirs. "O Frenchmen!" they wrote, "could you know what men you
destroy! _They_ are no mercenaries, like those who fill your ranks,
but the flower of the Italian youth, and the noblest among the aged.
When you shall know of what minds you have robbed the world, how ought
you to repent and mourn!"

This is especially true of the Emigrant and Garibaldi legions. The
misfortunes of Northern and Southern Italy, the conscription which
compels to the service of tyranny those who remain, has driven from
the kingdom of Naples and from Lombardy all the brave and noble youth.
Many are in Venice or Rome, the forlorn hope of Italy. Radetzky,
every day more cruel, now impresses aged men and the fathers of large
families. He carries them with him in chains, determined, if he cannot
have good troops to send into Hungary, at least to revenge himself on
the unhappy Lombards.

Many of these young men, students from Pisa, Pavia, Padua, and the
Roman University, lie wounded in the hospitals, for naturally they
rushed first to the combat. One kissed an arm which was cut off;
another preserves pieces of bone which were painfully extracted from
his wound, as relics of the best days of his life. The older men, many
of whom have been saddened by exile and disappointment, less glowing,
are not less resolved. A spirit burns noble as ever animated the most
precious deeds we treasure from the heroic age. I suffer to see these
temples of the soul thus broken, to see the fever-weary days and
painful operations undergone by these noble men, these true priests of
a higher hope; but I would not, for much, have missed seeing it
all. The memory of it will console amid the spectacles of meanness,
selfishness, and faithlessness which life may yet have in store for
the pilgrim.


June 23.

Matters verge to a crisis. The French government sustains Oudinot and
disclaims Lesseps. Harmonious throughout, shameless in falsehood, it
seems Oudinot knew that tire mission of Lesseps was at an end, when
he availed himself of his pacific promises to occupy Monte Mario.
When the Romans were anxious at seeing French troops move in that
direction, Lesseps said it was only done to occupy them, and conjured
the Romans to avoid all collision which might prevent his success
with the treaty. The sham treaty was concluded on the 30th of May, a
detachment of French having occupied Monte Mario on the night of the
29th. Oudinot flies into a rage and refuses to sign; M. Lesseps goes
off to Paris; meanwhile, the brave Oudinot attacks on the 3d of June,
after writing to the French Consul that Ire should not till the 4th,
to leave time for the foreigners remaining to retire. He attacked in
the night, possessing himself of Villa Pamfili, as he had of Monte
Mario, by treachery and surprise.

Meanwhile, M. Lesseps arrives in Paris, to find himself seemingly or
really in great disgrace with the would-be Emperor and his cabinet. To
give reason for this, M. Drouyn de Lhuys, who had publicly declared
to the Assembly that M. Lesseps had no instructions except from the
report of the sitting of the 7th of May, shamefully publishes a
letter of special instructions, hemming him in on every side, which M.
Lesseps, the "Plenipotentiary," dares not disown.

What are we to think of a great nation, whose leading men are such
barefaced liars? M. Guizot finds his creed faithfully followed up.

The liberal party in France does what it can to wash its hands of this
offence, but it seems weak, and unlikely to render effectual service
at this crisis. Venice, Rome, Ancona, are the last strong-holds of
hope, and they cannot stand for ever thus unsustained. Night before
last, a tremendous cannonade left no moment to sleep, even had the
anxious hearts of mothers and wives been able to crave it. At morning
a little detachment of French had entered by the breach of St.
Pancrazio, and intrenched itself in a vineyard. Another has possession
of Villa Poniatowski, close to the Porta del Popolo, and attacks
and alarms are hourly to be expected. I long to see the final one,
dreadful as that hour may be, since now there seems no hope from
delay. Men are daily slain, and this state of suspense is agonizing.

In the evening 'tis pretty, though terrible, to see the bombs, fiery
meteors, springing from the horizon line upon their bright path, to do
their wicked message. 'T would not be so bad, methinks, to die by one
of these, as wait to have every drop of pure blood, every childlike
radiant hope, drained and driven from the heart by the betrayals of
nations and of individuals, till at last the sickened eyes refuse more
to open to that light which shines daily on such pits of iniquity.




LETTER XXXIII.

SIEGE OF ROME.--HEAT.--NIGHT ATTACKS.--THE BOMBARDMENT.--THE
NIGHT BREACH.--DEFECTION.--ENTRY OF THE FRENCH.--SLAUGHTER OF
THE ROMANS.--THE HOSPITALS.--DESTRUCTION BY BOMBS.--CESSATION OF
RESISTANCE.--OUDINOT'S STUBBORNNESS.--GARIBALDI'S TROOPS.--THEIR
MUSTER ON THE SCENE OF RIENZI'S TRIUMPH.--GARIBALDI.--HIS
DEPARTURE.--"RESPECTABLE" OPINION.--THE PROTECTORS UNMASKED.--COLD
RECEPTION.--A PRIEST ASSASSINATED.--MARTIAL LAW DECLARED.--REPUBLICAN
EDUCATION.--DISAPPEARANCE OF FRENCH SOLDIERS.--CLEARING THE
HOSPITALS.--PRIESTLY BASENESS.--INSULT TO THE AMERICAN CONSUL.--HIS
PROTEST AND DEPARTURE.--DISARMING THE NATIONAL GUARD.--POSITION OF MR.
CASS.--PETTY OPPRESSION.--EXPULSION OF FOREIGNERS.--EFFECT OF
FRENCH PRESENCE.--ADDRESS TO THE PEOPLE.--VISIT TO THE SCENE OF
STRIFE.--AMERICAN SYMPATHY FOR LIBERTY IN EUROPE.


Rome, July 6, 1849.

If I mistake not, I closed my last letter just as the news arrived
here that the attempt of the democratic party in France to resist the
infamous proceedings of the government had failed, and thus Rome, as
far as human calculation went, had not a hope for her liberties left.
An inland city cannot long sustain a siege when there is no hope of
aid. Then followed the news of the surrender of Ancona, and Rome
found herself alone; for, though Venice continued to hold out, all
communication was cut off.

The Republican troops, almost to a man, left Ancona, but a long march
separated them from Rome.

The extreme heat of these days was far more fatal to the Romans than
to their assailants, for as fast as the French troops sickened, their
place was taken by fresh arrivals. Ours also not only sustained the
exhausting service by day, but were harassed at night by attacks,
feigned or real. These commonly began about eleven or twelve o'clock
at night, just when all who meant to rest were fairly asleep. I can
imagine the harassing effect upon the troops, from what I feel in
my sheltered pavilion, in consequence of not knowing a quiet night's
sleep for a month.

The bombardment became constantly more serious. The house where I live
was filled as early as the 20th with persons obliged to fly from the
Piazza di Gesu, where the fiery rain fell thickest. The night of the
21st-22d, we were all alarmed about two o'clock, A.M. by a tremendous
cannonade. It was the moment when the breach was finally made by which
the French entered. They rushed in, and I grieve to say, that, by the
only instance of defection known in the course of the siege, those
companies of the regiment Union which had in charge a position on
that point yielded to panic and abandoned it. The French immediately
entered and intrenched themselves. That was the fatal hour for the
city. Every day afterward, though obstinately resisted, the enemy
gained, till at last, their cannon being well placed, the city was
entirely commanded from the Janiculum, and all thought of further
resistance was idle.

It was true policy to avoid a street-fight, in which the Italian,
an unpractised soldier, but full of feeling and sustained from the
houses, would have been a match even for their disciplined troops.
After the 22d of June, the slaughter of the Romans became every day
more fearful. Their defences were knocked down by the heavy cannon
of the French, and, entirely exposed in their valorous onsets,
great numbers perished on the spot. Those who were brought into the
hospitals were generally grievously wounded, very commonly subjects
for amputation. My heart bled daily more and more at these sights, and
I could not feel much for myself, though now the balls and bombs began
to fall round me also. The night of the 28th the effect was truly
fearful, as they whizzed and burst near me. As many as thirty fell
upon or near the Hotel de Russie, where Mr. Cass has his temporary
abode. The roof of the studio in the pavilion, tenanted by Mr.
Stermer, well known to the visitors of Rome for his highly-finished
cabinet pictures, was torn to pieces. I sat alone in my much exposed
apartment, thinking, "If one strikes me, I only hope it will kill
me at once, and that God will transport my soul to some sphere where
virtue and love are not tyrannized over by egotism and brute force,
as in this." However, that night passed; the next, we had reason to
expect a still more fiery salute toward the Pincian, as here alone
remained three or four pieces of cannon which could be used. But on
the morning of the 30th, in a contest at the foot of the Janiculum,
the line, old Papal troops, naturally not in earnest like the free
corps, refused to fight against odds so terrible. The heroic Marina
fell, with hundreds of his devoted Lombards. Garibaldi saw his best
officers perish, and himself went in the afternoon to say to the
Assembly that further resistance was unavailing.

The Assembly sent to Oudinot, but he refused any conditions,--refused
even to guarantee a safe departure to Garibaldi, his brave foe.
Notwithstanding, a great number of men left the other regiments
to follow the leader whose courage had captivated them, and whose
superiority over difficulties commanded their entire confidence.
Toward the evening of Monday, the 2d of July, it was known that the
French were preparing to cross the river and take possession of all
the city. I went into the Corso with some friends; it was filled with
citizens and military. The carriage was stopped by the crowd near the
Doria palace; the lancers of Garibaldi galloped along in full career.
I longed for Sir Walter Scott to be on earth again, and see them; all
are light, athletic, resolute figures, many of the forms of the finest
manly beauty of the South, all sparkling with its genius and ennobled
by the resolute spirit, ready to dare, to do, to die. We followed
them to the piazza of St. John Lateran. Never have I seen a sight
so beautiful, so romantic, and so sad. Whoever knows Rome knows the
peculiar solemn grandeur of that piazza, scene of the first triumph of
Rienzi, and whence may be seen the magnificence of the "mother of all
churches," the baptistery with its porphyry columns, the Santa Scala
with its glittering mosaics of the early ages, the obelisk standing
fairest of any of those most imposing monuments of Rome, the view
through the gates of the Campagna, on that side so richly strewn with
ruins. The sun was setting, the crescent moon rising, the flower of
the Italian youth were marshalling in that solemn place. They had been
driven from every other spot where they had offered their hearts as
bulwarks of Italian independence; in this last strong-hold they had
sacrificed hecatombs of their best and bravest in that cause; they
must now go or remain prisoners and slaves. _Where_ go, they knew not;
for except distant Hungary there is not now a spot which would receive
them, or where they can act as honor commands. They had all put on
the beautiful dress of the Garibaldi legion, the tunic of bright red
cloth, the Greek cap, or else round hat with Puritan plume. Their long
hair was blown back from resolute faces; all looked full of courage.
They had counted the cost before they entered on this perilous
struggle; they had weighed life and all its material advantages
against liberty, and made their election; they turned not back, nor
flinched, at this bitter crisis. I saw the wounded, all that could go,
laden upon their baggage cars; some were already pale and fainting,
still they wished to go. I saw many youths, born to rich inheritance,
carrying in a handkerchief all their worldly goods. The women were
ready; their eyes too were resolved, if sad. The wife of Garibaldi
followed him on horseback. He himself was distinguished by the white
tunic; his look was entirely that of a hero of the Middle Ages,--his
face still young, for the excitements of his life, though so many,
have all been youthful, and there is no fatigue upon his brow or
cheek. Fall or stand, one sees in him a man engaged in the career for
which he is adapted by nature. He went upon the parapet, and looked
upon the road with a spy-glass, and, no obstruction being in sight, he
turned his face for a moment back upon Rome, then led the way through
the gate. Hard was the heart, stony and seared the eye, that had no
tear for that moment. Go, fated, gallant band! and if God care not
indeed for men as for the sparrows, most of ye go forth to perish. And
Rome, anew the Niobe! Must she lose also these beautiful and brave,
that promised her regeneration, and would have given it, but for the
perfidy, the overpowering force, of the foreign intervention?

I know that many "respectable" gentlemen would be surprised to hear me
speak in this way. Gentlemen who perform their "duties to society" by
buying for themselves handsome clothes and furniture with the interest
of their money, speak of Garibaldi and his men as "brigands" and
"vagabonds." Such are they, doubtless, in the same sense as Jesus,
Moses, and Eneas were. To me, men who can throw so lightly aside the
ease of wealth, the joys of affection, for the sake of what they deem
honor, in whatsoever form, are the "respectable." No doubt there are
in these bands a number of men of lawless minds, and who follow this
banner only because there is for them no other path. But the
greater part are the noble youths who have fled from the Austrian
conscription, or fly now from the renewal of the Papal suffocation,
darkened by French protection.

As for the protectors, they entirely threw aside the mask, as it was
always supposed they would, the moment they had possession of Rome. I
do not know whether they were really so bewildered by their priestly
counsellors as to imagine they would be well received in a city which
they had bombarded, and where twelve hundred men were lying wounded
by their assault. To say nothing of the justice or injustice of the
matter, it could not be supposed that the Roman people, if it had any
sense of dignity, would welcome them. I did not appear in the street,
as I would not give any countenance to such a wrong; but an English
lady, my friend, told me they seemed to look expectingly for the
strong party of friends they had always pretended to have within the
walls. The French officers looked up to the windows for ladies, and,
she being the only one they saw, saluted her. She made no reply. They
then passed into the Corso. Many were assembled, the softer
Romans being unable to control a curiosity the Milanese would have
disclaimed, but preserving an icy silence. In an evil hour, a foolish
priest dared to break it by the cry of _Viva Pio Nono!_ The populace,
roused to fury, rushed on him with their knives. He was much wounded;
one or two others were killed in the rush. The people howled then, and
hissed at the French, who, advancing their bayonets, and clearing the
way before them, fortified themselves in the piazzas. Next day the
French troops were marched to and fro through Rome, to inspire awe in
the people; but it has only created a disgust amounting to loathing,
to see that, with such an imposing force, and in great part fresh, the
French were not ashamed to use bombs also, and kill women and children
in their beds. Oudinot then, seeing the feeling of the people, and
finding they pursued as a spy any man who so much as showed the way
to his soldiers,--that the Italians went out of the cafés if Frenchmen
entered,--in short, that the people regarded him and his followers in
the same light as the Austrians,--has declared martial law in Rome;
the press is stifled; everybody is to be in the house at half past
nine o'clock in the evening, and whoever in any way insults his men,
or puts any obstacle in their way, is to be shot.

The fruits of all this will be the same as elsewhere; temporary
repression will sow the seeds of perpetual resistance; and never
was Rome in so fair a way to be educated for a republican form of
government as now.

Especially could nothing be more irritating to an Italian population,
in the month of July, than to drive them to their homes at half past
nine. After the insupportable heat of the day, their only enjoyment
and refreshment are found in evening walks, and chats together as they
sit before their cafés, or in groups outside some friendly door. Now
they must hurry home when the drum beats at nine o'clock. They are
forbidden to stand or sit in groups, and this by their bombarding
_protector!_ Comment is unnecessary.

French soldiers are daily missing; of some it is known that they have
been killed by the Trasteverini for daring to make court to their
women. Of more than a hundred and fifty, it is only known that they
cannot he found; and in two days of French "order" more acts
of violence have been committed, than in two months under the
Triumvirate.

The French have taken up their quarters in the court-yards of the
Quirinal and Venetian palaces, which are full of the wounded, many
of whom have been driven well-nigh mad, and their burning wounds
exasperated, by the sound of the drums and trumpets,--the constant
sense of an insulting presence. The wounded have been warned to leave
the Quirinal at the end of eight days, though there are many who
cannot be moved from bed to bed without causing them great anguish
and peril; nor is it known that any other place has been provided as a
hospital for them. At the Palazzo di Venezia the French have searched
for three emigrants whom they wished to imprison, even in the
apartments where the wounded were lying, running their bayonets into
the mattresses. They have taken for themselves beds given by the
Romans to the hospital,--not public property, but private gift. The
hospital of Santo Spirito was a governmental establishment, and, in
using a part of it for the wounded, its director had been retained,
because he had the reputation of being honest and not illiberal. But
as soon as the French entered, he, with true priestly baseness, sent
away the women nurses, saying he had no longer money to pay them,
transported the wounded into a miserable, airless basement, that had
before been used as a granary, and appropriated the good apartments to
the use of the French!


July 8.

The report of this morning is that the French yesterday violated the
domicile of our Consul, Mr. Brown, pretending to search for persons
hidden there; that Mr. Brown, banner in one hand and sword in the
other, repelled the assault, and fairly drove them down stairs; that
then he made them an appropriate speech, though in a mixed language of
English, French, and Italian; that the crowd vehemently applauded Mr.
Brown, who already was much liked for the warm sympathy he had shown
the Romans in their aspirations and their distresses; and that he then
donned his uniform, and went to Oudinot to make his protest. How this
was received I know not, but understand Mr. Brown departed with his
family yesterday evening. Will America look as coldly on the insult to
herself, as she has on the struggle of this injured people?

To-day an edict is out to disarm the National Guard. The generous
"protectors" wish to take all the trouble upon themselves. Rome is
full of them; at every step are met groups in the uniform of France,
with faces bronzed in the African war, and so stultified by a life
without enthusiasm and without thought, that I do not believe
Napoleon would recognize them as French soldiers. The effect of their
appearance compared with that of the Italian free corps is that of
body as compared with spirit. It is easy to see how they could be used
to purposes so contrary to the legitimate policy of France, for they
do not look more intellectual, more fitted to have opinions of their
own, than the Austrian soldiery.


July 10.

The plot thickens. The exact facts with regard to the invasion of Mr.
Brown's house I have not been able to ascertain. I suppose they will
be published, as Oudinot has promised to satisfy Mr. Cass. I must
add, in reference to what I wrote some time ago of the position of our
Envoy here, that the kind and sympathetic course of Mr. Cass toward
the Republicans in these troubles, his very gentlemanly and courteous
bearing, have from the minds of most removed all unpleasant feelings.
They see that his position was very peculiar,--sent to the Papal
government, finding here the Republican, and just at that moment
violently assailed. Unless he had extraordinary powers, he naturally
felt obliged to communicate further with our government before
acknowledging this. I shall always regret, however, that he did
not stand free to occupy the high position that belonged to the
representative of the United States at that moment, and peculiarly
because it was by a republic that the Roman Republic was betrayed.

But, as I say, the plot thickens. Yesterday three families were
carried to prison because a boy crowed like a cock at the French
soldiery from the windows of the house they occupied. Another, because
a man pursued took refuge in their court-yard. At the same time, the
city being mostly disarmed, came the edict to take down the insignia
of the Republic, "emblems of anarchy." But worst of all they have done
is an edict commanding all foreigners who had been in the service of
the Republican government to leave Rome within twenty-four hours. This
is the most infamous thing done yet, as it drives to desperation those
who stayed because they had so many to go with and no place to go
to, or because their relatives lie wounded here: no others wished to
remain in Rome under present circumstances.

I am sick of breathing the same air with men capable of a part so
utterly cruel and false. As soon as I can, I shall take refuge in the
mountains, if it be possible to find an obscure nook unpervaded by
these convulsions. Let not my friends be surprised if they do not hear
from me for some time. I may not feel like writing. I have seen too
much sorrow, and, alas! without power to aid. It makes me sick to see
the palaces and streets of Rome full of these infamous foreigners, and
to note the already changed aspect of her population. The men of Rome
had begun, filled with new hopes, to develop unknown energy,--they
walked quick, their eyes sparkled, they delighted in duty, in
responsibility; in a year of such life their effeminacy would have
been vanquished. Now, dejectedly, unemployed, they lounge along the
streets, feeling that all the implements of labor, all the ensigns of
hope, have been snatched from them. Their hands fall slack, their eyes
rove aimless, the beggars begin to swarm again, and the black ravens
who delight in the night of ignorance, the slumber of sloth, as the
only sureties for their rule, emerge daily more and more frequent from
their hiding-places.

The following Address has been circulated from hand to hand.


"TO THE PEOPLE OF ROME.

"Misfortune, brothers, has fallen upon us anew. But it is trial of
brief duration,--it is the stone of the sepulchre which we shall throw
away after three days, rising victorious and renewed, an immortal
nation. For with us are God and Justice,--God and Justice, who cannot
die, but always triumph, while kings and popes, once dead, revive no
more.

"As you have been great in the combat, be so in the days of
sorrow,--great in your conduct as citizens, by generous disdain, by
sublime silence. Silence is the weapon we have now to use against the
Cossacks of France and the priests, their masters.

"In the streets do not look at them; do not answer if they address
you.

"In the cafés, in the eating-houses, if they enter, rise and go out.

"Let your windows remain closed as they pass.

"Never attend their feasts, their parades.

"Regard the harmony of their musical bands as tones of slavery, and,
when you hear them, fly.

"Let the liberticide soldier be condemned to isolation; let him atone
in solitude and contempt for having served priests and kings.

"And you, Roman women, masterpiece of God's work! deign no look, no
smile, to those satellites of an abhorred Pope! Cursed be she who,
before the odious satellites of Austria, forgets that she is Italian!
Her name shall be published for the execration of all her people! And
even the courtesans! let them show love for their country, and thus
regain the dignity of citizens!

"And our word of order, our cry of reunion and emancipation, be now
and ever, VIVA LA REPUBLICA!

"This incessant cry, which not even French slaves can dispute,
shall prepare us to administer the bequest of our martyrs, shall be
consoling dew to the immaculate and holy bones that repose, sublime
holocaust of faith and of love, near our walls, and make doubly divine
the Eternal City. In this cry we shall find ourselves always brothers,
and we shall conquer. Viva Rome, the capital of Italy! Viva the Italy
of the people! Viva the Roman Republic!

"A ROMAN.

"Rome, July 4, 1849."


Yes; July 4th, the day so joyously celebrated in our land, is that of
the entrance of the French into Rome!

I know not whether the Romans will follow out this programme with
constancy, as the sterner Milanese have done. If they can, it will
draw upon them endless persecutions, countless exactions, but at once
educate and prove them worthy of a nobler life.

Yesterday I went over the scene of conflict. It was fearful even to
_see_ the Casinos Quattro Venti and Vascello, where the French and
Romans had been several days so near one another, all shattered to
pieces, with fragments of rich stucco and painting still sticking to
rafters between the great holes made by the cannonade, and think
that men had stayed and fought in them when only a mass of ruins.
The French, indeed, were entirely sheltered the last days; to my
unpractised eyes, the extent and thoroughness of their works seemed
miraculous, and gave me the first clear idea of the incompetency of
the Italians to resist organized armies. I saw their commanders had
not even known enough of the art of war to understand how the French
were conducting the siege. It is true, their resources were at any
rate inadequate to resistance; only continual sorties would have
arrested the progress of the foe, and to make them and man the wall
their forces were inadequate. I was struck more than ever by the
heroic valor of _our_ people,--let me so call them now as ever; for
go where I may, a large part of my heart will ever remain in Italy.
I hope her children will always acknowledge me as a sister, though
I drew not my first breath here. A Contadini showed me where
thirty-seven braves are buried beneath a heap of wall that fell upon
them in the shock of one cannonade. A marble nymph, with broken arm,
looked sadly that way from her sun-dried fountain; some roses were
blooming still, some red oleanders, amid the ruin. The sun was casting
its last light on the mountains on the tranquil, sad Campagna,
that sees one leaf more turned in the book of woe. This was in the
Vascello. I then entered the French ground, all mapped and hollowed
like a honeycomb. A pair of skeleton legs protruded from a bank of one
barricade; lower, a dog had scratched away its light covering of
earth from the body of a man, and discovered it lying face upward all
dressed; the dog stood gazing on it with an air of stupid amazement.
I thought at that moment, recalling some letters received: "O men and
women of America, spared these frightful sights, these sudden wrecks
of every hope, what angel of heaven do you suppose has time to listen
to your tales of morbid woe? If any find leisure to work for men
to-day, think you not they have enough to do to care for the victims
here?"

I see you have meetings, where you speak of the Italians, the
Hungarians. I pray you _do something_; let it not end in a mere cry of
sentiment. That is better than to sneer at all that is liberal,
like the English,--than to talk of the holy victims of patriotism as
"anarchists" and "brigands"; but it is not enough. It ought not
to content your consciences. Do you owe no tithe to Heaven for the
privileges it has showered on you, for whose achievement so many
here suffer and perish daily? Deserve to retain them, by helping
your fellow-men to acquire them. Our government must abstain from
interference, but private action is practicable, is due. For Italy,
it is in this moment too late; but all that helps Hungary helps her
also,--helps all who wish the freedom of men from an hereditary yoke
now become intolerable. Send money, send cheer,--acknowledge as the
legitimate leaders and rulers those men who represent the people,
who understand their wants, who are ready to die or to live for their
good. Kossuth I know not, but his people recognize him; Manin I know
not, but with what firm nobleness, what perserving virtue, he has
acted for Venice! Mazzini I know, the man and his acts, great, pure,
and constant,--a man to whom only the next age can do justice, as
it reaps the harvest of the seed he has sown in this. Friends,
countrymen, and lovers of virtue, lovers of freedom, lovers of truth!
be on the alert; rest not supine in your easier lives, but remember

  "Mankind is one,
  And beats with one great heart."




PART III.

LETTERS FROM ABROAD TO FRIENDS AT HOME.




LETTERS.

FROM A LETTER TO ---- ----.


Bellagio, Lake of Como, August, 1847.

You do not deceive yourself surely about religion, in so far as that
there is a deep meaning in those pangs of our fate which, if we live
by faith, will become our most precious possession. "Live for thy
faith and thou shalt yet behold it living," is with me, as it hath
been, a maxim.

Wherever I turn, I see still the same dark clouds, with occasional
gleams of light. In this Europe how much suffocated life!--a sort of
woe much less seen with us. I know many of the noble exiles, pining
for their natural sphere; many of them seek in Jesus the guide and
friend, as you do. For me, it is my nature to wish to go straight to
the Creative Spirit, and I can fully appreciate what you say of the
need of our happiness depending on no human being. Can you really have
attained such wisdom? Your letter seemed to me very modest and pure,
and I trust in Heaven all may be solid.

I am everywhere well received, and high and low take pleasure in
smoothing my path. I love much the Italians. The lower classes have
the vices induced by long subjection to tyranny; but also a winning
sweetness, a ready and discriminating love for the beautiful, and a
delicacy in the sympathies, the absence of which always made me
sick in our own country. Here, at least, one does not suffer from
obtuseness or indifference. They take pleasure, too, in acts of
kindness; they are bountiful, but it is useless to hope the least
honor in affairs of business. I cannot persuade those who serve me,
however attached, that they should not deceive me, and plunder me.
They think that is part of their duty towards a foreigner. This is
troublesome no less than disagreeable; it is absolutely necessary to
be always on the watch against being cheated.

       *       *       *       *       *

EXTRACT FROM A LETTER.

One loses sight of all dabbling and pretension when seated at the feet
of dead Rome,--Rome so grand and beautiful upon her bier. Art is dead
here; the few sparkles that sometimes break through the embers cannot
make a flame; but the relics of the past are great enough, over-great;
we should do nothing but sit, and weep, and worship.

In Rome, one has all the free feeling of the country; the city is so
interwoven with vineyards and gardens, such delightful walks in the
villas, such ceaseless music of the fountains, and from every high
point the Campagna and Tiber seem so near.

Full of enchantment has been my summer, passed wholly among Italians,
in places where no foreigner goes, amid the snowy peaks, in the
exquisite valleys of the Abruzzi. I have seen a thousand landscapes,
any one of which might employ the thoughts of the painter for years.
Not without reason the people dream that, at the death of a saint,
columns of light are seen to hover on those mountains. They take, at
sunset, the same rose-hues as the Alps. The torrents are magnificent.
I knew some noblemen, with baronial castles nestled in the hills and
slopes, rich in the artistic treasures of centuries. They liked me,
and showed me the hidden beauties of Roman remains.

       *       *       *       *       *

Rome, April, 1848.

The gods themselves walk on earth, here in the Italian spring. Day
after day of sunny weather lights up the flowery woods and Arcadian
glades. The fountains, hateful during the endless rains, charm again.
At Castle Turano I found heaths, as large as our pear-trees, in full
flower. Such wealth of beauty is irresistible, but ah! the drama of my
life is very strange: the ship plunges deeper as it rises higher. You
would be amazed, could you know how different is my present phase of
life from that in which you knew me; but you would love me no less; it
is tire same planet that shows such different climes.

       *       *       *       *       *

TO HER MOTHER.

Rome, November 16, 1848.

I am again in Rome, situated for the first time entirely to my mind.
I have only one room, but large; and everything about the bed
so gracefully and adroitly disposed that it makes a beautiful
parlor,--and of course I pay much less. I have the sun all day, and
an excellent chimney. It is very high, and has pure air and the most
beautiful view all around imaginable. Add, that I am with the dearest,
delightful old couple one can imagine,--quick, prompt, and kind,
sensible and contented. Having no children, they like to regard me and
the Prussian sculptor, my neighbor, as such; yet are too delicate and
too busy ever to intrude. In the attic dwells a priest, who insists on
making my fire when Antonia is away. To be sure, he pays himself for
his trouble by asking a great many questions....

You cannot conceive the enchantment of this place. So much I suffered
here last January and February, I thought myself a little weaned; but
returning, my heart swelled even to tears with the cry of the poet,

  "O Rome, _my_ country, city of the soul!"

Those have not lived who have not seen Rome. Warned, however, by the
last winter, I dared not rent my lodgings for the year. I hope I am
acclimated. I have been through what is called the grape-cure, much
more charming, certainly, than the water-cure. At present I am very
well, but, alas! because I have gone to bed early, and done very
little. I do not know if I can maintain any labor. As to my life, I
think it is not the will of Heaven it should terminate very soon. I
have had another strange escape.

I had taken passage in the diligence to come to Rome; two rivers were
to be passed, the Turano and the Tiber, but passed by good bridges,
and a road excellent when not broken unexpectedly by torrents from
the mountains. The diligence sets out between three and four in
the morning, long before light. The director sent me word that
the Marchioness Crispoldi had taken for herself and family a coach
extraordinary, which would start two hours later, and that I could
have a place in that if I liked; so I accepted. The weather had been
beautiful, but on the eve of the day fixed for my departure, the wind
rose, and the rain fell in torrents. I observed that the river, which
passed my window, was much swollen, and rushed with great violence. In
the night I heard its voice still stronger, and felt glad I had not to
set out in the dark. I rose at twilight and was expecting my carriage,
and wondering at its delay, when I heard that the great diligence,
several miles below, had been seized by a torrent; the horses were
up to their necks in water, before any one dreamed of danger. The
postilion called on all the saints, and threw himself into the water.
Tire door of the diligence could not be opened, and tire passengers
forced themselves, one after another, into the cold water; it was dark
too. Had I been there, I had fared ill. A pair of strong men were ill
after it, though all escaped with life.

For several days there was no going to Rome; but at last we set forth
in two great diligences, with all the horses of the route. For many
miles the mountains and ravines were covered with snow; I seemed to
have returned to my own country and climate. Few miles were passed
before the conductor injured his leg under the wheel, and I had the
pain of seeing him suffer all the way, while "Blood of Jesus!" and
"Souls in Purgatory!" was the mildest beginning of an answer to the
jeers of the postilions upon his paleness. We stopped at a miserable
osteria, in whose cellar we found a magnificent relic of Cyclopean
architecture,--as indeed in Italy one is paid at every step for
discomfort and danger, by some precious subject of thought. We
proceeded very slowly, and reached just at night a solitary little
inn which marks the site of the ancient home of the Sabine virgins,
snatched away to become the mothers of Rome. We were there saluted
with, the news that the Tiber also had overflowed its banks, and it
was very doubtful if we could pass. But what else to do? There were no
accommodations in the house for thirty people, or even for three; and
to sleep in the carriages, in that wet air of the marshes, was a more
certain danger than to attempt the passage. So we set forth; the moon,
almost at the full, smiling sadly on the ancient grandeurs half draped
in mist, and anon drawing over her face a thin white veil. As we
approached the Tiber, the towers and domes of Rome could be seen,
like a cloud lying low on the horizon. The road and the meadows, alike
under water, Jay between us and it, one sheet of silver. The horses
entered; they behaved nobly. We proceeded, every moment uncertain if
the water would not become deep; but the scene was beautiful, and I
enjoyed it highly. I have never yet felt afraid, when really in the
presence of danger, though sometimes in its apprehension.

At last we entered the gate; the diligence stopping to be examined, I
walked to the gate of Villa Ludovisi, and saw its rich shrubberies of
myrtle, so pale and eloquent in the moonlight....

My dear friend, Madame Arconati, has shown me generous love; a
Contadina, whom I have known this summer, hardly less. Every Sunday
she came in her holiday dress, a beautiful corset of red silk, richly
embroidered, rich petticoat, nice shoes and stockings, and handsome
coral necklace, on one arm an immense basket of grapes, on the other
a pair of live chickens to be eaten by me for her sake ("_per amore
mio_"), and wanted no present, no reward: it was, as she said, "for
the honor and pleasure of her acquaintance." The old father of the
family never met me but he took off his hat, and said, "Madame, it
is to me a consolation to see you." Are there not sweet flowers of
affection in life, glorious moments, great thoughts? Why must they be
so dearly paid for?

Many Americans have shown me great and thoughtful kindness and none
more so than William Story and his wife. They are now in Florence, but
may return. I do not know whether I shall stay here or not: I shall be
guided much by the state of my health.

All is quieted now in Rome. Late at night the Pope had to yield, but
not till the door of his palace was half burned, and his confessor
killed. This man, Parma, provoked his fate by firing on the people
from a window. It seems the Pope never gave order to fire; his guard
acted from a sudden impulse of their own. The new ministry chosen are
little inclined to accept. It is almost impossible for any one to act,
unless the Pope is stripped of his temporal power, and the hour
for that is not yet quite ripe; though they talk more and more of
proclaiming the Republic, and even of calling to Rome my friend
Mazzini.

If I came home at this moment, I should feel as if forced to leave my
own house, my own people, and the hour which I had always longed for.
If I do come in this way, all I can promise is to plague other people
as little as possible. My own plans and desires will be postponed to
another world.

Do not feel anxious about me. Some higher Power leads me through
strange, dark, thorny paths, broken at times by glades opening down
into prospects of sunny beauty, into which I am not permitted to
enter. If God disposes for us, it is not for nothing. This I can say:
my heart is in some respects better, it is kinder, and more humble.
Also, my mental acquisitions have certainly been great, however
inadequate to my desires.

       *       *       *       *       *

TO HER BROTHER, K.F. FULLER.

Rome, January 19, 1849.

MY DEAR RICHARD,--With my window open, looking out upon St. Peter's,
and the glorious Italian sun pouring in, I was just thinking of you; I
was just thinking how I wished you were here, that we might walk forth
and talk together under the influence of these magnificent objects. I
was thinking of the proclamation of the Constitutional Assembly here,
a measure carried by courageous youth in the face of age, sustained by
the prejudices of many years, the ignorance of the people, and all the
wealth of the country; yet courageous youth faces not only these, but
the most threatening aspect of foreign powers, and dares a future of
blood and exile to achieve privileges which are our American common
birthright. I thought of the great interests which may in our country
be sustained without obstacle by every able man,--interests of
humanity, interests of God.

I thought of the new prospects of wealth opened to our countrymen by
the acquisition of New Mexico and California,--the vast prospects of
our country every way, so that it is itself a vast blessing to be born
an American; and I thought how impossible it is that one like you,
of so strong and generous a nature, should, if he can but patiently
persevere, be defrauded of a rich, manifold, powerful life.


Thursday eve, January 25.

This has been a most beautiful day, and I have taken a long walk out
of town. How much I should like sometimes to walk with you again! I
went to the church of St. Lorenzo, one of the most ancient in Rome,
rich in early mosaics, also with spoils from the temples, marbles,
ancient sarcophagi with fine bassirilievi, and magnificent columns.
There is a little of everything, but the medley is harmonized by the
action of time, and the sensation induced is that of repose. It has
the public cemetery, and there lie the bones of many poor; the rich
and noble lie in lead coffins in the church vaults of Rome, but St.
Lorenzo loved the poor. When his tormentors insisted on knowing where
he had hid his riches,--"There," he said, pointing to the crowd of
wretches who hovered near his bed, compelled to see the tyrants of the
earth hew down the tree that had nourished and sheltered them.

Amid the crowd of inexpressive epitaphs, one touched me, erected by
a son to his father. "He was," says the son, "an angel of prosperity,
seeking our good in distant countries with unremitting toll and pain.
We owe him all. For his death it is my only consolation that in life I
never left his side."

Returning, I passed the Pretorian Camp, the Campus Salisetus, where
vestals that had broken their vows were buried alive in the city
whose founder was born from a similar event. Such are the usual, the
frightful inconsistencies of mankind.

From my windows I see the Barberini palace; in its chambers are the
pictures of the Cenci, and the Galatea, so beautifully described by
Goethe; in the gardens are the remains of the tomb of Servius Tullius.

Yesterday as I went forth I saw the house where Keats lived in Rome,
and where he died; I saw the Casino of Raphael. Returning, I passed
the villa where Goethe lived when in Rome: afterwards, the houses of
Claude and Poussin.

Ah what human companionship here! how everything speaks! I live myself
in the apartment described in Andersen's "Improvvisatore," which get
you, and read a scene of the childhood of Antonio. I have the room, I
suppose, indicated as being occupied by the Danish sculptor.

       *       *       *       *       *

TO THE SAME.

Rome, March 17, 1849.

I take occasion to enclose this seal, as a little birthday present,
for I think you will be twenty-five in May. I have used it a great
deal; the design is graceful and expressive,--the stone of some little
value.

I live with the severest economy consistent with my health. I could
not live for less anywhere. I have renounced much, have suffered more.
I trust I shall not find it impossible to accomplish, at least one
of my designs. This is, to see the end of the political struggle
in Italy, and write its history. I think it will come to its crisis
within, this year. But to complete my work as I have begun, I must
watch it to the end.

This work, if I can accomplish it, will be a worthy chapter in the
history of the world; and if written with the spirit which breathes
through me, and with sufficient energy and calmness to execute well
the details, would be what the motto on my ring indicates,--"_a
possession for ever, for man_."

It ought to be profitable to me pecuniarily; but in these respects
Fate runs so uniformly counter to me, that I dare not expect ever to
be free from perplexity and uncongenial labor. Still, these will never
more be so hard to me, if I shall have done something good, which may
survive my troubled existence. Yet it would be like the rest, if by
ill health, want of means, or being driven prematurely from the field
of observation, this hope also should be blighted. I am prepared to
have it so. Only my efforts tend to the accomplishment of my object;
and should they not be baffled, you will not see me before the summer
of 1850.

Meantime, let the future be what it may, I live as well as I can in
the present.

Farewell, my dear Richard; that you may lead a peaceful, aspiring, and
generous life was ever, and must ever be, the prayer from the soul of
your sister

MARGARET.

       *       *       *       *       *

UNDAUNTED ROME.

Rome, May 6, 1849.

I write you from barricaded Rome. The "Mother of Nations" is now at
bay against them all. Rome was suffering before. The misfortunes of
other regions of Italy, the defeat at Novara, preconcerted in hope
to strike the last blow at Italian independence, the surrender and
painful condition of Genoa, the money-difficulties,--insuperable
unless the government could secure confidence abroad as well as at
home,--prevented her people from finding that foothold for which they
were ready.

The vacillations of France agitated them; still they could not
seriously believe she would ever act the part she has. We must say
France, because, though many honorable men have washed their hands
of all share in the perfidy, the Assembly voted funds to sustain the
expedition to Civita Vecchia; and the nation, the army, have remained
quiescent. No one was, no one could be, deceived as to the scope of
this expedition. It was intended to restore the Pope to the temporal
sovereignty, from which the people, by the use of suffrage, had
deposed him. No doubt the French, in case of success, proposed to
temper the triumph of Austria and Naples, and stipulate for conditions
that might soothe the Romans and make their act less odious. They were
probably deceived, also, by the representations of Gaëta, and believed
that a large party, which had been intimidated by the republicans,
would declare in favor of the Pope when they found themselves likely
to be sustained. But this last pretext can in noway avail them. They
landed at Civita Vecchia, and no one declared for the Pope. They
marched on Rome. Placards were affixed within the walls by hands
unknown, calling upon the Papal party to rise within the town. Not a
soul stirred. The French had no excuse left for pretending to believe
that the present government was not entirely acceptable to the people.
Notwithstanding, they assail the gates; they fire upon St. Peter's,
and their balls pierce the Vatican. They were repulsed, as they
deserved, retired in quick and shameful defeat, as surely the brave
French soldiery could not, if they had not been demoralized by the
sense of what an infamous course they were pursuing.

France, eager to destroy the last hope of Italian
emancipation,--France, the alguazil of Austria, the soldiers of
republican France, firing upon republican Rome! If there be angel
as well as demon powers that interfere in the affairs of men, those
bullets could scarcely fail to be turned back against their own
breasts. Yet Roman blood has flowed also; I saw how it stained
the walls of the Vatican Gardens on the 30th of April--the first
anniversary of the appearance of Pius IX.'s too famous encyclic
letter. Shall he, shall any Pope, ever again walk peacefully in these
gardens? It seems impossible! The temporal sovereignty of the Popes
is virtually destroyed by their shameless, merciless measures taken
to restore it. The spiritual dominion ultimately falls, too, into
irrevocable ruin. What may be the issue at this moment, we cannot
guess. The French have retired to Civita Vecchia, but whether to
reëmbark or to await reinforcements, we know not. The Neapolitan force
has halted within a few miles of the walls; it is not large, and they
are undoubtedly surprised at the discomfiture of the French. Perhaps
they wait for the Austrians, but we do not yet hear that these have
entered the Romagna. Meanwhile, Rome is strongly barricaded, and,
though she cannot stand always against a world in arms, she means at
least to do so as long as possible. Mazzini is at her head; she has
now a guide "who understands his faith," and all there is of a noble
spirit will show itself. We all feel very sad, because the idea of
bombs, barbarously thrown in, and street-fights in Rome, is peculiarly
dreadful. Apart from all the blood and anguish inevitable at such
times, the glories of Art may perish, and mankind be forever despoiled
of the most beautiful inheritance. Yet I would defend Rome to the last
moment. She must not be false to the higher hope that has dawned upon
her. She must not fall back again into servility and corruption.

And no one is willing. The interference of the French has roused the
weakest to resistance. "From the Austrians, from the Neapolitans,"
they cried, "we expected this; but from the French--it is too
infamous; it cannot be borne;" and they all ran to arms and fought
nobly.

The Americans here are not in a pleasant situation. Mr. Cass, the
Chargé of the United States, stays here without recognizing the
government. Of course, he holds no position at the present moment
that can enable him to act for us. Beside, it gives us pain that our
country, whose policy it justly is to avoid armed interference with
the affairs of Europe, should not use a moral influence. Rome has, as
we did, thrown off a government no longer tolerable; she has made
use of the suffrage to form another; she stands on the same basis as
ourselves. Mr. Rush did us great honor by his ready recognition of a
principle as represented by the French Provisional Government; had
Mr. Cass been empowered to do the same, our country would have acted
nobly, and all that is most truly American in America would have
spoken to sustain the sickened hopes of European democracy. But of
this more when I write next. Who knows what I may have to tell another
week?

       *       *       *       *       *

TO HER BROTHER, R.B. FULLER.

Rome, May 22, 1849.

I do not write to Eugene yet, because around me is such excitement I
cannot settle my mind enough to write a letter good for anything. The
Neapolitans have been driven back; but the French, seem to be amusing
us with a pretence of treaties, while waiting for the Austrians to
come up. The Austrians cannot, I suppose, be more than three days'
march from us. I feel but little about myself. Such thoughts are
merged in indignation, and in the fears I have that Rome may be
bombarded. It seems incredible that any nation should be willing to
incur the infamy of such an act,--an act that may rob posterity of a
most precious part of its inheritance;--only so many incredible things
have happened of late. I am with William Story, his wife and uncle.
Very kind friends they have been in this strait. They are going away,
so soon as they can find horses,--going into Germany. I remain alone
in the house, under our flag, almost the only American except the
Consul and Ambassador. But Mr. Cass, the Envoy, has offered to do
anything for me, and I feel at liberty to call on him if I please.

But enough of this. Let us implore of fate another good meeting,
full and free, whether long or short. Love to dearest mother, Arthur,
Ellen, Lloyd. Say to all, that, should any accident possible to these
troubled times transfer me to another scene of existence, they need
not regret it. There must be better worlds than this, where innocent
blood is not ruthlessly shed, where treason does not so easily
triumph, where the greatest and best are not crucified. I do not say
this in apprehension, but in case of accident, you might be glad to
keep this last word from your sister

MARGARET.

       *       *       *       *       *

TO R.W. EMERSON.

Rome, June 10, 1849.

I received your letter amid the round of cannonade and musketry. It
was a terrible battle fought here from the first to the last light of
day. I could see all its progress from my balcony. The Italians fought
like lions. It is a truly heroic spirit that animates them. They make
a stand here for honor and their rights, with little ground for hope
that they can resist, now they are betrayed by France.

Since the 30th of April, I go almost daily to the hospitals, and
though I have suffered, for I had no idea before how terrible gun-shot
wounds and wound-fevers are, yet I have taken pleasure, and great
pleasure, in being with the men. There is scarcely one who is not
moved by a noble spirit. Many, especially among the Lombards, are the
flower of the Italian youth. When they begin to get better, I carry
them books and flowers; they read, and we talk.

The palace of the Pope, on the Quirinal, is now used for
convalescents. In those beautiful gardens I walk with them, one with
his sling, another with his crutch. The gardener plays off all his
water-works for the defenders of the country, and gathers flowers for
me, their friend.

A day or two since, we sat in the Pope's little pavilion, where he
used to give private audience. The sun was going gloriously down over
Monte Mario, where gleamed the white tents of the French light-horse
among the trees. The cannonade was heard at intervals. Two bright-eyed
boys sat at our feet, and gathered up eagerly every word said by the
heroes of the day. It was a beautiful hour, stolen from the midst of
ruin and sorrow, and tales were told as full of grace and pathos as in
the gardens of Boccaccio, only in a very different spirit,--with noble
hope for man, and reverence for woman.

The young ladies of the family, very young girls, were filled with
enthusiasm for the suffering, wounded patriots, and they wished to
go to the hospital, to give their services. Excepting the three
superintendents, none but married ladies were permitted to serve
there, but their services were accepted. Their governess then wished
to go too, and, as she could speak several languages, she was admitted
to the rooms of the wounded soldiers, to interpret for them, as the
nurses knew nothing but Italian, and many of these poor men were
suffering because they could not make their wishes known. Some are
French, some Germans, many Poles. Indeed, I am afraid it is too true
that there were comparatively few Romans among them. This young lady
passed several nights there.

Should I never return, and sometimes I despair of doing so, it seems
so far off,--so difficult, I am caught in such a net of ties here,--if
ever you know of my life here, I think you will only wonder at the
constancy with which I have sustained myself,--the degree of profit to
which, amid great difficulties, I have put the time,--at least in the
way of observation. Meanwhile, love me all you can. Let me feel that,
amid the fearful agitations of the world, there are pure hands, with
healthful, even pulse, stretched out toward me, if I claim their
grasp.

I feel profoundly for Mazzini. At moments I am tempted to say, "Cursed
with every granted prayer,"--so cunning is the demon. Mazzini has
become the inspiring soul of his people. He saw Rome, to which all his
hopes through life tended, for the first time as a Roman citizen, and
to become in a few days its ruler. He has animated, he sustains her to
a glorious effort, which, if it fails this time, will not in the age.
His country will be free. Yet to me it would be so dreadful to cause
all this bloodshed,--to dig the graves of such martyrs!

Then, Rome is being destroyed; her glorious oaks,--her villas,
haunts of sacred beauty, that seemed the possession of the world for
ever,--the villa of Raphael, the villa of Albani, home of Winckelmann
and the best expression of the ideal of modern Rome, and so many other
sanctuaries of beauty,--all must perish, lest a foe should level his
musket from their shelter. I could not, could not!

I know not, dear friend, whether I shall ever get home across that
great ocean, but here in Rome I shall no longer wish to live.

O Rome, _my_ country! could I imagine that the triumph of what I held
dear was to heap such desolation on thy head!

Speaking of the republic, you say, "Do you not wish Italy had a great
man?" Mazzini is a great man. In mind, a great, poetic statesman; in
heart, a lover; in action, decisive and full of resource as Cæsar.
Dearly I love Mazzini. He came in, just as I had finished the first
letter to you. His soft, radiant look makes melancholy music in my
soul; it consecrates my present life, that, like the Magdalen, I may,
at the important hour, shed all the consecrated ointment on his head.
There is one, Mazzini, who understands thee well,--who knew thee no
less when an object of popular fear than now of idolatry,--and who, if
the pen be not held too feebly, will help posterity to know thee too!

       *       *       *       *       *

TO HER SISTER, MRS. E.K. CHANNING.

Rome, June 19, 1849.

As was Eve, at first, I suppose every mother is delighted by the birth
of a man-child. There is a hope that he will conquer more ill, and
effect more good, than is expected from girls. This prejudice in favor
of man does not seem to be destroyed by his shortcomings for ages.
Still, each mother hopes to find in hers an Emanuel. I should like
very much to see your children, but hardly realize I ever shall.
The journey home seems so long, so difficult, so expensive. I should
really like to lie down here, and sleep my way into another sphere of
existence, if I could take with me one or two that love and need me,
and was sure of a good haven for them on that other side.

The world seems to go so strangely wrong! The bad side triumphs; the
blood and tears of the generous flow in vain. I assist at many saddest
scenes, and suffer for those whom I knew not before. Those whom I knew
and loved,--who, if they had triumphed, would have opened for me an
easier, broader, higher-mounting road,--are everyday more and more
involved in earthly ruin. Eternity is with us, but there is much
darkness and bitterness in this portion of it. A baleful star rose on
my birth, and its hostility, I fear, will never be disarmed while I
walk below.

       *       *       *       *       *

TO W.H. CHANNING.

July, 1849.

I cannot tell you what I endured in leaving Rome, abandoning the
wounded soldiers,--knowing that there is no provision made for them,
when they rise from the beds where they have been thrown by a noble
courage, and have suffered with a noble patience. Some of the poorer
men, who rise bereft even of the right arm,--one having lost both the
right arm and the right leg,--I could have provided for with a small
sum. Could I have sold my hair, or blood from my arm, I would have
done it. Had any of the rich Americans remained in Rome, they would
have given it to me; they helped nobly at first, in the service of the
hospitals, when there was far less need; but they had all gone. What
would I have given could I but have spoken to one of the Lawrences,
or the Phillipses! They could and would have saved this misery. These
poor men are left helpless in the power of a mean and vindictive foe.
You felt so oppressed in the Slave States; imagine what I felt at
seeing all the noblest youth, all the genius of this dear land, again
enslaved!

       *       *       *       *       *

TO HER MOTHER.

Florence, February 6, 1850.

Dearest Mother,--After receiving your letter of October, I answered
immediately; but as Richard mentions, in one dated December 4th, that
you have not heard, I am afraid, by some post-office mistake, it went
into the mail-bag of some sail-ship, instead of steamer, so you were
very long without hearing. I regret it the more, as I wanted so much
to respond fully to your letter,--so lovely, so generous, and which,
of all your acts of love, was perhaps the one most needed by me, and
which has touched me the most deeply.

I gave you in that a flattering picture of our life. And those
pleasant days lasted till the middle of December; but then came on
a cold unknown to Italy, and which has lasted ever since. As the
apartments were not prepared for such weather, we suffered a good
deal. Besides, both Ossoli and myself were taken ill at New-Year's
time, and were not quite well again, all January: now we are quite
well. The weather begins to soften, though still cloudy, damp, and
chilly, so that poor baby can go out very little; on that account he
does not grow so fast, and gets troublesome by evening, as he tires
of being shut up in two or three little rooms, where he has examined
every object hundreds of times. He is always pointing to the door. He
suffers much with chilblains, as do other children here; however, he
is, with that exception, in the best health, and is a great part of
the time very gay, laughing and dancing in the nurse-maid's arms, and
trying to sing and drum, in imitation of the bands, which play a great
deal in the Piazza.

Nothing special has happened to me. The uninhabitableness of the
rooms where I had expected to write, and the need of using our little
dining-room, the only one in which is a stove, for dressing baby,
taking care of him, eating, and receiving visits and messages, have
prevented my writing for six or seven weeks past. In the evening, when
baby went to bed, about eight, I began to have time, but was generally
too tired to do anything but read. The four hours, however, from nine
till one, beside the bright little fire, have been very pleasant. I
have thought of you a great deal, remembering how you suffer from cold
in the winter, and hope you are in a warm, comfortable house, have
pleasant books to read, and some pleasant friends to see. One does not
want many; only a few bright faces to look in now and then, and help
thaw the ice with little rills of genial conversation. I have fewer of
these than at Rome,--but still several.
       *       *       *       *       *
Horace Sumner, youngest son of father's friend, Mr. Charles P. Sumner,
lives near us, and comes every evening to read a little while with
Ossoli. He has solid good in his heart and mind. We have a true regard
for him, and he has shown true and steadfast sympathy for us; when I
am ill or in a hurry, he helps me like a brother. Ossoli and Sumner
exchange some instruction in English and Italian.

       *       *       *       *       *

My sister's last letter from Europe is full of solemnity, and
evidences her clear conviction of the perils of the voyage across the
treacherous ocean. It is a leave-taking, dearly cherished now by the
mother to whom it was addressed, the kindred of whom she speaks, and
by those other kindred,--those who in spirit felt near to and loved
her. It is as follows:--

Florence, May 14, 1850.

"Dear Mother,--I will believe I shall be welcome with my
treasures,--my husband and child. For me, I long so much to see you!
Should anything hinder our meeting upon earth, think of your daughter,
as one who always wished, at least, to do her duty, and who always
cherished you, according as her mind opened to discover excellence.

"Give dear love, too, to my brothers; and first to my eldest, faithful
friend, Eugene; a sister's love to Ellen; love to my kind good aunts,
and to my dear cousin E. God bless them!

"I hope we shall be able to pass some time together yet, in this
world. But if God decrees otherwise,--here and HEREAFTER, my dearest
mother,

"Your loving child,

"MARGARET."




PART IV.

HOMEWARD VOYAGE, AND MEMORIALS.


It seems proper that some account of the sad close of Madame Ossoli's
earthly journeyings should be embodied in this volume recording her
travels. But a brother's hand trembles even now and _cannot_ write it.
Noble, heroic, unselfish, _Christian_ was that death, even as had been
her life; but its outward circumstances were too painful for my pen
to describe. Nor needs it,--for a scene like that must have impressed
itself indelibly on those who witnessed it, and accurate and vivid
have been their narratives. The Memoirs of my sister contain a most
faithful description; but as they are accessible to all, and I trust
will be read by all who have read this volume, I have chosen rather
to give the accounts somewhat condensed which appeared in the New
York Tribune at the time of the calamity. The first is from the pen of
Bayard Taylor, who visited the scene on the day succeeding the wreck,
and describes the appearance of the shore and the remains of the
vessel. This is followed by the narrative of Mrs. Hasty, wife of the
captain, herself a participant in the scene, and so overwhelmed by
grief at her husband's loss, and that of friends she had learned so
much to value, that she has since faded from this life. A true and
noble woman, her account deserves to be remembered. The third article
is from the pen of Horace Greeley, my sister's ever-valued friend.
Several poems, suggested by this scene, written by those in the Old
World and New who loved and honored Madame Ossoli, are also inserted
here. The respect they testify for the departed is soothing to the
hearts of kindred, and to the many who love and cherish the memory of
Margaret Fuller.--ED.




LETTER OF BAYARD TAYLOR


Fire Island, Tuesday, July 23.

To the Editors of the Tribune:--

I reached the house of Mr. Smith Oakes, about one mile from the spot
where the Elizabeth was wrecked, at three o'clock this morning. The
boat in which I set out last night from Babylon, to cross the bay, was
seven hours making the passage. On landing among the sand-hills, Mr.
Oakes admitted me into his house, and gave me a place of rest for the
remaining two or three hours of the night.

This morning I visited the wreck, traversed the beach for some extent
on both sides, and collected all the particulars that are now likely
to be obtained, relative to the closing scenes of this terrible
disaster. The sand is strewn for a distance of three or four miles
with fragments of planks, spars, boxes, and the merchandise with which
the vessel was laden. With the exception of a piece of her broadside,
which floated to the shore intact, all the timbers have been so
chopped and broken by the sea, that scarcely a stick of ten feet in
length can be found. In front of the wreck these fragments are piled
up along high-water mark to the height of several feet, while farther
in among the sand-hills are scattered casks of almonds stove in,
and their contents mixed with the sand, sacks of juniper-berries,
oil-flasks, &c. About half the hull remains under water, not more than
fifty yards from the shore. The spars and rigging belonging to the
foremast, with part of the mast itself, are still attached to the
ruins, surging over them at every swell. Mr. Jonathan Smith, the agent
of the underwriters, intended to have the surf-boat launched this
morning, for the purpose of cutting away the rigging and ascertaining
how the wreck lies; but the sea is still too high.

From what I can learn, the loss of the Elizabeth is mainly to be
attributed to the inexperience of the mate, Mr. H.P. Bangs, who acted
as captain after leaving Gibraltar. By his own statement, he supposed
he was somewhere between Cape May and Barnegat, on Thursday evening.
The vessel was consequently running northward, and struck head on.
At the second thump, a hole was broken in her side, the seas poured
through and over her, and she began going to pieces. This happened at
ten minutes before four o'clock. The passengers were roused from
their sleep by the shock, and hurried out of the cabin in their
night-clothes, to take refuge on the forecastle, which was the least
exposed part of the vessel. They succeeded with great difficulty; Mrs.
Hasty, the widow of the late captain, fell into a hatchway, from which
she was dragged by a sailor who seized her by the hair.

The swells increased continually, and the danger of the vessel giving
way induced several of the sailors to commit themselves to the waves.
Previous to this they divested themselves of their clothes, which they
tied to pieces of plank and sent ashore. These were immediately
seized upon by the beach pirates, and never afterward recovered.
The carpenter cut loose some planks and spars, and upon one of these
Madame Ossoli was advised to trust herself, the captain promising to
go in advance, with her boy. She refused, saying that she had no wish
to live without the child, and would not, at that hour, give the care
of it to another. Mrs. Hasty then took hold of a plank, in company
with the second mate, Mr. Davis, through whose assistance she landed
safely, though terribly bruised by the floating timber. The captain
clung to a hatch, and was washed ashore insensible, where he was
resuscitated by the efforts of Mr. Oakes and several others, who were
by this time collected on the beach. Most of the men were entirely
destitute of clothing, and some, who were exhausted and ready to let
go their hold, were saved by the islanders, who went into the surf
with lines about their waists, and caught them.

The young Italian girl, Celesta Pardena, who was bound for New York,
where she had already lived in the family of Henry Peters Gray, the
artist, was at first greatly alarmed, and uttered the most piercing
screams. By the exertions of the Ossolis she was quieted, and
apparently resigned to her fate. The passengers reconciled themselves
to the idea of death. At the proposal of the Marquis Ossoli some time
was spent in prayer, after which all sat down calmly to await the
parting of the vessel. The Marchioness Ossoli was entreated by the
sailors to leave the vessel, or at least to trust her child to them,
but she steadily refused.

Early in the morning some men had been sent to the lighthouse for the
life-boat which is kept there. Although this is but two miles distant,
the boat did not arrive till about one o'clock, by which time the gale
had so increased, and the swells were so high and terrific, that it
was impossible to make any use of it. A mortar was also brought for
the purpose of firing a line over the vessel, to stretch a hawser
between it and the shore. The mortar was stationed on the lee of
a hillock, about a hundred and fifty rods from the wreck, that the
powder might be kept dry. It was fired five times, but failed to
carry a line more than half the necessary distance. Just before the
forecastle sunk, the remaining sailors determined to leave.

The steward, with whom the child had always been a great favorite,
took it, almost by main force, and plunged with it into the sea;
neither reached the shore alive. The Marquis Ossoli was soon
afterwards washed away, but his wife remained in ignorance of his
fate. The cook, who was the last person that reached the shore alive,
said that the last words he heard her speak were: "I see nothing but
death before me,--I shall never reach the shore." It was between two
and three o'clock in the afternoon, and after lingering for about ten
hours, exposed to the mountainous surf that swept over the vessel,
with the contemplation of death constantly forced upon her mind, she
was finally overwhelmed as the foremast fell. It is supposed that her
body and that of her husband are still buried under the ruins of the
vessel. Mr. Horace Sumner, who jumped overboard early in the morning,
was never seen afterwards.

The dead bodies that were washed on shore were terribly bruised and
mangled. That of the young Italian girl was enclosed in a rough box,
and buried in the sand, together with those of the sailors. Mrs. Hasty
had by this time found a place of shelter at Mr. Oakes's house, and
at her request the body of the boy, Angelo Eugene Ossoli, was carried
thither, and kept for a day previous to interment. The sailors, who
had all formed a strong attachment to him during the voyage, wept like
children when they saw him. There was some difficulty in finding a
coffin when the time of burial came, whereupon they took one of their
chests, knocked out the tills, laid the body carefully inside, locked
and nailed down the lid. He was buried in a little nook between two of
the sand-hills, some distance from the sea.

The same afternoon a trunk belonging to the Marchioness Ossoli came
to shore, and was fortunately secured before the pirates had an
opportunity of purloining it. Mrs. Hasty informs me that it contained
several large packages of manuscripts, which she dried carefully by
the fire. I have therefore a strong hope that the work on Italy will
be entirely recovered. In a pile of soaked papers near the door,
I found files of the _Democratie Pacifique_ and _Il Nazionale_ of
Florence, as well as several of Mazzini's pamphlets, which I have
preserved.

An attempt will probably be made to-morrow to reach the wreck with the
surf-boat. Judging from its position and the known depth of the water,
I should think the recovery, not only of the bodies, if they are still
remaining there, but also of Powers's statue and the blocks of rough
Carrara, quite practicable, if there should be a sufficiency of still
weather. There are about a hundred and fifty tons of marble under the
ruins. The paintings, belonging to Mr. Aspinwall, which were washed
ashore in boxes, and might have been saved had any one been on the
spot to care for them, are for the most part utterly destroyed. Those
which were least injured by the sea-water were cut from the frames
and carried off by the pirates; the frames were broken in pieces,
and scattered along the beach. This morning I found several shreds of
canvas, evidently more than a century old, half buried in the sand.
All the silk, Leghorn braid, hats, wool, oil, almonds, and other
articles contained in the vessel, were carried off as soon as they
came to land. On Sunday there were nearly a thousand persons here,
from all parts of the coast between Rockaway and Montauk, and
more than half of them were engaged in secreting and carrying off
everything that seemed to be of value.

The two bodies found yesterday were those of sailors. All have now
come to land but those of the Ossolis and Horace Sumner. If not found
in the wreck, they will be cast ashore to the westward of this, as the
current has set in that direction since the gale.

Yours, &c.

       *       *       *       *       *




THE WRECK OF THE ELIZABETH.


From a conversation with Mrs. Hasty, widow of the captain of the
ill-fated Elizabeth, we gather the following particulars of her voyage
and its melancholy termination.

We have already stated that Captain Hasty was prostrated, eight days
after leaving Leghorn, by a disease which was regarded and treated as
fever, but which ultimately exhibited itself as small-pox of the most
malignant type. He died of it just as the vessel reached Gibraltar,
and his remains were committed to the deep. After a short detention
in quarantine, the Elizabeth resumed her voyage on the 8th ultimo,
and was long baffled by adverse winds. Two days from Gibraltar, the
terrible disease which had proved fatal to the captain attacked the
child of the Ossolis, a beautiful boy of two years, and for many days
his recovery was regarded as hopeless. His eyes were completely closed
for five days, his head deprived of all shape, and his whole person
covered with pustules; yet, through the devoted attention of his
parents and their friends, he survived, and at length gradually
recovered. Only a few scars and red spots remained on his face and
body, and these were disappearing, to the great joy of his mother, who
felt solicitous that his rare beauty should not be marred at his first
meeting with those she loved, and especially her mother.

At length, after a month of slow progress, the wind shifted, and blew
strongly from the southwest for several days, sweeping them rapidly
on their course, until, on Thursday evening last, they knew that they
were near the end of their voyage. Their trunks were brought up and
repacked, in anticipation of a speedy arrival in port. Meantime, the
breeze gradually swelled to a gale, which became decided about nine
o'clock on that evening. But their ship was new and strong, and
all retired to rest as usual. They were running west, and supposed
themselves about sixty miles farther south than they actually were.
By their reckoning, they would be just off the harbor of New York next
morning. About half past two o'clock, Mr. Bangs, the mate in command,
took soundings, and reported twenty-one fathoms. He said that depth
insured their safety till daylight, and turned in again. Of course,
all was thick around the vessel, and the storm howling fiercely. One
hour afterward, the ship struck with great violence, and in a moment
was fast aground. She was a stout brig of 531 tons, five years old,
heavily laden with marble, &c., and drawing seventeen feet water. Had
she been light, she might have floated over the bar into twenty feet
water, and all on board could have been saved. She struck rather
sidewise than bows on, canted on her side and stuck fast, the mad
waves making a clear sweep over her, pouring down into the cabin
through the skylight, which was destroyed. One side of the cabin
was immediately and permanently under water, the other frequently
drenched. The passengers, who were all up in a moment, chose the most
sheltered positions, and there remained, calm, earnest, and resigned
to any fate, for a long three hours. No land was yet visible; they
knew not where they were, but they knew that their chance of surviving
was small indeed. When the coast was first visible through the driving
storm in the gray light of morning, the sand-hills were mistaken for
rocks, which made the prospect still more dismal. The young Ossoli
cried a little with discomfort and fright, but was soon hushed to
sleep. Our friend Margaret had two life-preservers, but one of them
proved unfit for use. All the boats had been smashed in pieces or torn
away soon after the vessel struck; and it would have been madness to
launch them in the dark, if it had been possible to launch them at
all, with the waves charging over the wreck every moment. A sailor,
soon after light, took Madame Ossoli's serviceable life-preserver
and swam ashore with it, in quest of aid for those left on board, and
arrived safe, but of course could not return his means of deliverance.

By 7 A.M. it became evident that the cabin must soon go to pieces, and
indeed it was scarcely tenantable then. The crew were collected in
the forecastle, which was stronger and less exposed, the vessel having
settled by the stem, and the sailors had been repeatedly ordered to go
aft and help the passengers forward, but the peril was so great that
none obeyed. At length the second mate, Davis, went himself,
and accompanied the Italian girl, Celesta Pardena, safely to the
forecastle, though with great difficulty. Madame Ossoli went next, and
had a narrow escape from being washed away, but got over. Her child
was placed in a bag tied around a sailor's neck, and thus carried
safely. Marquis Ossoli and the rest followed, each convoyed by the
mate or one of the sailors.

All being collected in the forecastle, it was evident that their
position was still most perilous, and that the ship could not much
longer hold together. The women were urged to try first the experiment
of taking each a plank and committing themselves to the waves. Madame
Ossoli refused thus to be separated from her husband and child. She
had from the first expressed a willingness to live or die with them,
but not to live without them. Mrs. Hasty was the first to try the
plank, and, though the struggle was for some time a doubtful one, did
finally reach the shore, utterly exhausted. There was a strong current
setting to the westward, so that, though the wreck lay but a quarter
of a mile from the shore, she landed three fourths of a mile distant.
No other woman, and no passenger, survives, though several of the
crew came ashore after she did, in a similar manner. The last who came
reports that the child had been washed away from the man who held it
before the ship broke up, that Ossoli had in like manner been washed
from the foremast, to which he was clinging; but, in the horror of the
moment, Margaret never learned that those she so clung to had preceded
her to the spirit land. Those who remained of the crew had just
persuaded her to trust herself to a plank, in the belief that Ossoli
and their child had already started for the shore, when just as she
was stepping down, a great wave broke over the vessel and swept her
into the boiling deep. She never rose again. The ship broke up soon
after (about 10 A.M. Mrs. Hasty says, instead of the later hour
previously reported); but both mates and most of the crew got on
one fragment or another. It was supposed that those of them who were
drowned were struck by floating spars or planks, and thus stunned or
disabled so as to preclude all chance of their rescue.

We do not know at the time of this writing whether the manuscript of
our friend's work on Italy and her late struggles has been saved. We
fear it has not been. One of her trunks is known to have been saved;
but, though it contained a good many papers, Mrs. Hasty believes that
this was not among them. The author had thrown her whole soul into
this work, had enjoyed the fullest opportunities for observation, was
herself a partaker in the gallant though unsuccessful struggle which
has redeemed the name of Rome from the long rust of sloth, servility,
and cowardice, was the intimate friend and compatriot of the
Republican leaders, and better fitted than any one else to refute the
calumnies and falsehoods with which their names have been blackened by
the champions of aristocratic "order" throughout the civilized world.
We cannot forego the hope that her work on Italy has been saved, or
will yet be recovered.

       *       *       *       *       *

The following is a complete list of the persons lost by the wreck of
the ship Elizabeth:--

  Giovanni, Marquis Ossoli.
  Margaret Fuller Ossoli.
  Their child, Eugene Angelo Ossoli.
  Celesta Pardena, of Rome.
  Horace Sumner, of Boston.
  George Sanford, seaman (Swede).
  Henry Westervelt, seaman (Swede).
  George Bates, steward.

       *       *       *       *       *




DEATH OF MARGARET FULLER.


A great soul has passed from this mortal stage of being by the death
of MARGARET FULLER, by marriage Marchioness Ossoli, who, with her
husband and child, Mr. Horace Sumner of Boston,[A] and others, was
drowned in the wreck of the brig Elizabeth from Leghorn for this
port, on the south shore of Long Island, near Fire Island, on Friday
afternoon last. No passenger survives to tell the story of that night
of horrors, whose fury appalled many of our snugly sheltered citizens
reposing securely in their beds. We can adequately realize what it
must have been to voyagers approaching our coast from the Old World,
on vessels helplessly exposed to the rage of that wild southwestern
gale, and seeing in the long and anxiously expected land of their
youth and their love only an aggravation of their perils, a death-blow
to their hopes, an assurance of their temporal doom!

[Footnote A: Horace Sumner, one of the victims of the lamentable wreck
of the Elizabeth, was the youngest son of the late Hon. Charles P.
Sumner, of Boston, for many years Sheriff of Suffolk County, and the
brother of George Sumner, Esq., the distinguished American writer, now
resident at Paris, and of Hon. Charles Sumner of Boston, who is well
known for his legal and literary eminence throughout the country. He
was about twenty-four years of age, and had been abroad for nearly a
year, travelling in the South of Europe for the benefit of his health.
The past winter was spent by him chiefly in Florence, where he was on
terms of familiar intimacy with the Marquis and Marchioness Ossoli,
and was induced to take passage in the same vessel with them for his
return to his native land. He was a young man of singular modesty of
deportment, of an original turn of mind, and greatly endeared to his
friends by the sweetness of his disposition and the purity of his
character.]

Margaret Fuller was the daughter of Hon. Timothy Fuller, a lawyer
of Boston, but nearly all his life a resident of Cambridge, and a
Representative of the Middlessex District in Congress from 1817 to
1825. Mr. Fuller, upon his retirement from Congress, purchased a farm
at some distance from Boston, and abandoned law for agriculture, soon
after which he died. His widow and six children still survive.

Margaret, if we mistake not, was the first-born, and from a very early
age evinced the possession of remarkable intellectual powers. Her
father regarded her with a proud admiration, and was from childhood
her chief instructor, guide, companion, and friend. He committed the
too common error of stimulating her intellect to an assiduity and
persistency of effort which severely taxed and ultimately injured her
physical powers.[A] At eight years of age he was accustomed to require
of her the composition of a number of Latin verses per day, while
her studies in philosophy, history, general science, and current
literature were in after years extensive and profound. After her
father's death, she applied herself to teaching as a vocation, first
in Boston, then in Providence, and afterward in Boston again, where
her "Conversations" were for several seasons attended by classes of
women, some of them married, and including many from the best families
of the "American Athens."

[Footnote A: I think this opinion somewhat erroneous, for reasons
which I have already given in the edition recently published of Woman
in the Nineteenth Century. The reader is referred to page 352 of
that work, and also to page 38, where I believe my sister personified
herself under the name of Miranda, and stated clearly and justly the
relation which, existed between her father and herself.--ED.]

In the autumn of 1844, she accepted an invitation to take part in the
conduct of the Tribune, with especial reference to the department
of Reviews and Criticism on current Literature, Art, Music, &c.; a
position which she filled for nearly two years,--how eminently,
our readers well know. Her reviews of Longfellow's Poems, Wesley's
Memoirs, Poe's Poems, Bailey's "Festus," Douglas's Life, &c. must yet
be remembered by many. She had previously found "fit audience, though
few," for a series of remarkable papers on "The Great Musicians,"
"Lord Herbert of Cherbury," "Woman," &c., &c., in "The Dial," a
quarterly of remarkable breadth and vigor, of which she was at first
co-editor with Ralph Waldo Emerson, but which was afterward edited by
him only, though she continued a contributor to its pages. In 1843,
she accompanied some friends on a tour via Niagara, Detroit, and
Mackinac to Chicago, and across the prairies of Illinois, and her
resulting volume, entitled "Summer on the Lakes," is one of the best
works in this department ever issued from the American press. It
was too good to be widely and instantly popular. Her "Woman in the
Nineteenth Century"--an extension of her essay in the Dial--was
published by us early in 1845, and a moderate edition sold. The next
year, a selection from her "Papers on Literature and Art" was issued
by Wiley and Putnam, in two fair volumes of their "Library of American
Books." We believe the original edition was nearly or quite exhausted,
but a second has not been called for, while books nowise comparable
to it for strength or worth have run through half a dozen editions.[A]
These "Papers" embody some of her best contributions to the Dial, the
Tribune, and perhaps one or two which had not appeared in either.

[Footnote A: A second edition has since been published.--ED.]

In the summer of 1845, Miss Fuller accompanied the family of a devoted
friend to Europe, visiting England, Scotland, France, and passing
through Italy to Rome, where they spent the ensuing winter. She
accompanied her friends next spring to the North of Italy, and there
stopped, spending most of the summer at Florence, and returning at
the approach of winter to Rome, where she was soon after married to
Giovanni, Marquis Ossoli, who had made her acquaintance during her
first winter in the Eternal City. They have since resided in the
Roman States until the last summer, after the surrender of Rome to the
French army of assassins of liberty, when they deemed it expedient
to migrate to Florence, both having taken an active part in the
Republican movement which resulted so disastrously,--nay, of which the
ultimate result is yet to be witnessed. Thence in June they departed
and set sail at Leghorn for this port, in the Philadelphia brig
Elizabeth, which was doomed to encounter a succession of disasters.
They had not been many days at sea when the captain was prostrated by
a disease which ultimately exhibited itself as confluent small-pox
of the most malignant type, and terminated his life soon after they
touched at Gibraltar, after a sickness of intense agony and loathsome
horror. The vessel was detained some days in quarantine by reason of
this affliction, but finally set sail again on the 8th ultimo, just in
season to bring her on our coast on the fearful night between Thursday
and Friday last, when darkness, rain, and a terrific gale from the
southwest (the most dangerous quarter possible), conspired to hurl
her into the very jaws of destruction. It is said, but we know not how
truly, that the mate in command since the captain's death mistook
the Fire Island light for that on the Highlands of Neversink, and so
fatally miscalculated his course; but it is hardly probable that any
other than a first-class, fully manned ship could have worked off
that coast under such a gale, blowing him directly toward the roaring
breakers. She struck during the night, and before the next evening
the Elizabeth was a mass of drifting sticks and planks, while her
passengers and part of her crew were buried in the boiling surges.
Alas that our gifted friend, and those nearest to and most loved by
her, should have been among them!

We trust a new, compact, and cheap edition or selection, of Margaret
Fuller's writings will soon be given to the public, prefaced by a
Memoir. It were a shame to us if one so radiantly lofty in intellect,
so devoted to human liberty and well-being, so ready to dare and to
endure for the upraising of her sex and her race, should perish from
among us, and leave no memento less imperfect and casual than those we
now have. We trust the more immediate relatives of our departed friend
will lose no time in selecting the fittest person to prepare a Memoir,
with a selection from her writings, for the press.[A] America has
produced no woman who in mental endowments and acquirements has
surpassed Margaret Fuller, and it will be a public misfortune if her
thoughts are not promptly and acceptably embodied.

[Footnote A: The reader is aware that such a Memoir has since been
published, and that several of her works have been republished
likewise. I trust soon to publish a volume of Madame Ossoli's
Miscellaneous Writings.--ED.]

       *       *       *       *       *




MARGARET FULLER OSSOLI

BY C.P. CRANCH.


  O still, sweet summer days! O moonlight nights!
  After so drear a storm how can ye shine?
  O smiling world of many-hued delights,
  How canst thou 'round our sad hearts still entwine
  The accustomed wreaths of pleasure? How, O Day,
  Wakest thou so full of beauty? Twilight deep,
  How diest thou so tranquilly away?
  And how, O Night, bring'st thou the sphere of sleep?
  For she is gone from us,--gone, lost for ever,--
  In the wild billows swallowed up and lost,--
  Gone, full of love, life, hope, and high endeavor,
  Just when we would have welcomed her the most.

  Was it for this, O woman, true and pure!
  That life through shade and light had formed thy mind
  To feel, imagine, reason, and endure,--
  To soar for truth, to labor for mankind?
  Was it for this sad end thou didst bear thy part
  In deeds and words for struggling Italy,--
  Devoting thy large mind and larger heart
  That Rome in later days might yet be free?
  And, from that home driven out by tyranny,
  Didst turn to see thy fatherland once more,
  Bearing affection's dearest ties with thee;
  And as the vessel bore thee to our shore,
  And hope rose to fulfilment,--on the deck,
  When friends seemed almost beckoning unto thee:
  O God! the fearful storm,--the splitting wreck,--
  The drowning billows of the dreary sea!

  O, many a heart was stricken dumb with grief!
  We who had known thee here,--had met thee there
  Where Rome threw golden light on every leaf
  Life's volume turned in that enchanted air,--
  O friend! how we recall the Italian days
  Amid the Cæsar's ruined palace halls,--
  The Coliseum, and the frescoed blaze
  Of proud St. Peter's dome,--the Sistine walls,--
  The lone Campagna and the village green,--
  The Vatican,--the music and dim light
  Of gorgeous temples,--statues, pictures, seen
  With thee: those sunny days return so bright,
  Now thou art gone! Thou hast a fairer world
  Than that bright clime. The dreams that filled thee here
  Now find divine completion, and, unfurled
  Thy spirit-wings, find out their own high sphere.

  Farewell! thought-gifted, noble-hearted one!
  We, who have known thee, know thou art not lost;
  The star that set in storms still shines upon
  The o'ershadowing cloud, and, when we sorrow most,
  In the blue spaces of God's firmament
  Beams out with purer light than we have known.
  Above the tempest and the wild lament
  Of those who weep the radiance that is flown.

       *       *       *       *       *




THE DEATH OF MARGARET FULLER OSSOLI.

BY MARY C. AMES.


  O Italy! amid thy scenes of blood,
    She acted long a woman's noble part!
  Soothing the dying of thy sons, proud Rome!
    Till thou wert bowed, O city of her heart!
  When thou hadst fallen, joy no longer flowed
    In the rich sunlight of thy heaven;
  And from thy glorious domes and shrines of art,
    No quickening impulse to her life was given.

  From the deep shadow of thy cypress hills,
    From the soft beauty of thy classic plains,
  The noble-hearted, with, her treasures, turned
    To the far land where Freedom proudly reigns.
  After the rocking of long years of storms,
    Her weary spirit looked and longed for rest;
  Pictures of home, of loved and kindred forms,
    Rose warm and life-like in her aching breast.

  But the wild ocean rolled before her home;
    And, listening long unto its fearful moan,
  She thought of myriads who had found their rest
    Down in its caverns, silent, deep, and lone.
  Then rose the prayer within her heart of hearts,
    With the dark phantoms of a coming grief,
  That "_Nino_, Ossoli, and I may go
    _Together_;--that the anguish may be brief."

  The bark spread out her pennons proud and free,
    The sunbeams frolicked with the wanton waves;
  Smiled through the long, long days the summer sea,
    And sung sweet requiems o'er her sunken graves.
  E'en then the shadow of the fearful King
    Hung deep and darkening o'er the fated bark;
  Suffering and death and anguish reigned, ere came
    Hope's weary dove back to the longing ark.

  This was the morning to the night of woe;
    When the grim Ocean, in his fiercest wrath,
  Held fearful contest with the god of storms,
    Who lashed the waves with death upon his path.
  O night of agony! O awful morn,
    That oped on such a scene thy sullen eyes!
  The shattered ship,--those wrecked and broken hearts,
    Who only prayed, "_Together let us die_."

  Was this thy greeting longed for, Margaret,
    In the high, noontide of thy lofty pride?
  The welcome sighed for, in thine hours of grief,
    When pride had fled and hope in thee had died?
  Twelve hours' communion with the Terror-King!
    No wandering hope to give the heart relief!
  And yet thy prayer was heard,--the cold waves wrapt
    Those forms "together," and the woe was "brief."

  Thus closed thy day in darkness and in tears;
    Thus waned a life, alas! too full of pain;
  But O thou noble woman! thy brief life,
    Though full of sorrows, was not lived in vain.
  No more a pilgrim o'er a weary waste,
    With light ineffable thy mind is crowned;
  Heaven's richest lore is thine own heritage;
    All height is gained, thy "kingdom" now is found.

       *       *       *       *       *




TO THE MEMORY OF MARGARET FULLER.

BY E. OAKES SMITH.


  We hailed thee, Margaret, from the sea,
    We hailed thee o'er the wave,
  And little thought, in greeting thee,
    Thy home would be a grave.

  We blest thee in thy laurel crown,
    And in the myrtle's sheen,--
  Rejoiced thy noble worth to own,
    Still joy, our tears between.

  We hoped that many a happy year
    Would bless thy coming feet;
  And thy bright fame grow brighter here,
    By Fatherland made sweet.

  Gone, gone! with all thy glorious thought,--
    Gone with thy waking life,--
  With the green chaplet Fame had wrought,--
    The joy of Mother, Wife.

  Oh! who shall dare thy harp to take,
    And pour upon the air
  The clear, calm music, that should wake
    The heart to love and prayer!

  The lip, all eloquent, is stilled
    And silent with its trust,--
  The heart, with Woman's greatness filled,
    Must crumble to the dust:

  But from thy _great heart_ we will take
    New courage for the strife;
  From petty ills our bondage break,
    And labor with new life.

  Wake up, in darkness though it be,
    To better truth and light;
  Patient in toil, as we saw thee,
    In searching for the light;

  And mindless of the scorn it brings,
    For 't is in desert land
  That angels come with sheltering wings
    To lead us by the hand.

  Courageous one! thou art not lost,
    Though sleeping in the wave;
  Upon its chainless billows tost,
    For thee is fitting grave.

       *       *       *       *       *




SLEEP SWEETLY, GENTLE CHILD.[A]


    [The only child of the Marchioness Ossoli, well known
    as Margaret Fuller, is buried in the Valley Cemetery, at
    Manchester, N.H. There is always a vase of flowers placed near
    the grave, and a marble slab, with a cross and lily sculptured
    upon it, bears this inscription: "In Memory of Angelo Eugene
    Philip Ossoli, who was born at Rieti, in Italy, 5th September,
    1848, and perished by shipwreck off Fire Island, with both his
    parents, Giovanni Angelo and Margaret Fuller Ossoli, on the
    19th of July, 1850."]

  Sleep sweetly, gentle child! though to this sleep
    The cold winds rocked thee, on the ocean's breast,
  And strange, wild murmurs o'er the dark, blue deep
    Were the last sounds that lulled thee to thy rest,
  And while the moaning waves above thee rolled,
  The hearts that loved thee best grew still and cold.

  Sleep sweetly, gentle child! though the loved tone
    That twice twelve months had hushed thee to repose
  Could give no answer to the tearful moan
    That faintly from thy sea-moss pillow rose.
  That night the arms that closely folded thee
  Were the wet weeds that floated in the sea.

  Sleep sweetly, gentle child! the cold, blue wave
    Hath pitied the sad sighs the wild winds bore,
  And from the wreck it held _one_ treasure gave
    To the fond watchers weeping on the shore;--
  Now the sweet vale shall guard its precious trust,
  While mourning hearts weep o'er thy silent dust.

  Sleep sweetly, gentle child! love's tears are shed
    Upon the garlands of fair Northern flowers
  That fond hearts strew above thy lowly bed,
    Through all our summer's glad and pleasant hours:
  For thy sake, and for hers who sleeps beneath the wave,
  Kind hands bring flowers to fade upon thy grave.

  Sleep sweetly, gentle child! the warm wind sighs
    Amid the dark pines through this quiet dell,
  And waves the light flower-shade that lies
    Upon the white-leaved lily's sculptured bell;--
  The "Valley's" flowers are fair, the turf is green;--
  Sleep sweetly here, wept-for Eugene!

  Sleep sweetly, gentle child! this peaceful rest
    Hath early given thee to a home above,
  Safe from all sin and tears, for, ever blest
    To sing sweet praises of redeeming love.--
  The love that took thee to that world of bliss
  Ere thou hadst learned the sighs and griefs of this.

JULIET.

Laurel Brook, N.H., September, 1851.

[Footnote A: These lines are beautiful and full of sweet sympathy. The
home of the mother and brother of Margaret Fuller being now removed
from Manchester to Boston, the remains of the little child, too dear
to remain distant from us, have been removed to Mount Auburn. The
same marble slab is there with, its inscription, and the lines deserve
insertion here.--ED.]

       *       *       *       *       *




ON THE DEATH OF MARGARET FULLER.

BY G.P.R. JAMES.


  High hopes and bright thine early path bedecked,
    And aspirations beautiful though wild,--
  A heart too strong, a powerful will unchecked,
    A dream that earth-things could be undefiled.

  But soon, around thee, grew a golden chain,
    That bound the woman to more human things,
  And taught with joy--and, it may be, with pain--
    That there are limits e'en to Spirit's wings.

  Husband and child,--the loving and beloved,--
    Won, from the vast of thought, a mortal part,
  The impassioned wife and mother, yielding, proved
    Mind has itself a master--in the heart.

  In distant lands enhaloed by, old fame
    Thou found'st the only chain thy spirit knew,
  But captive ledst thy captors, from the shame
    Of ancient freedom, to the pride of new.

  And loved hearts clung around thee on the deck,
    Welling with sunny hopes 'neath sunny skies:
  The wide horizon round thee had no speck,--
    E'en Doubt herself could see no cloud arise.

  Thy loved ones clung around thee, when the sail
    O'er wide Atlantic billows onward bore
  Thy freight of joys, and the expanding gale
    Pressed the glad bark toward thy native shore.

  The loved ones clung around thee still, when all
    Was darkness, tempest, terror, and dismay,--
  More closely clung around thee, when the pall
    Of Fate was falling o'er the mortal clay.

  With them to live,--with them, with them to die,
    Sublime of human love intense and fine!--
  Was thy last prayer unto the Deity;
    And it was granted thee by Love Divine.

  In the same billow,--in the same dark grave,--
    Mother, and child, and husband, find their rest.
  The dream is ended; and the solemn wave
    Gives back the gifted to her country's breast.

       *       *       *       *       *




ON THE DEATH OF MARQUIS OSSOLI AND HIS WIFE, MARGARET FULLER.

BY WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR.


  Over his millions Death has lawful power,
  But over thee, brave Ossoli! none, none!
  After a long struggle, in a fight
  Worthy of Italy to youth restored,
  Thou, far from home, art sunk beneath the surge
  Of the Atlantic; on its shore; in reach
  Of help; in trust of refuge; sunk with all
  Precious on earth to thee,--a child, a wife!
  Proud as thou wert of her, America
  Is prouder, showing to her sons how high
  Swells woman's courage in a virtuous breast.

  She would not leave behind her those she loved:
  Such solitary safety might become
  Others,--not her; not her who stood beside
  The pallet of the wounded, when the worst
  Of France and Perfidy assailed the walls
  Of unsuspicious Rome. Rest, glorious soul,
  Renowned for strength of genius, Margaret!
  Rest with the twain too dear! My words are few,
  And shortly none will hear my failing voice,
  But the same language with more full appeal
  Shall hail thee. Many are the sons of song
  Whom thou hast heard upon thy native plains,
  Worthy to sing of thee; the hour is come;
  Take we our seats and let the dirge begin.

       *       *       *       *       *




MONUMENT TO THE OSSOLI FAMILY.

[FROM THE NEW YORK TRIBUNE.]


The family of Margaret Fuller Ossoli have just erected to her memory,
and that of her husband and child, a marble monument in Mount Auburn
cemetery, in Massachusetts. It is located on Pyrola Path, in a
beautiful part of the grounds, and has near it some noble oaks, while
the hand of affection has planted many a flower. The body of Margaret
Fuller rests in the ocean, but her memory abides in many hearts. She
needs no monumental stone, but human affection loves thus to do honor
to the departed.

The following is the inscription on the monument:--

                                   Erected
                                In Memory of

                          MARGARET FULLER OSSOLI,
                   Born in Cambridge, Mass., May 23, 1810.

  By birth, a Citizen of New England; by adoption, a Citizen of Rome; by genius,
      belonging to the World. In youth, an insatiate Student, seeking the
          highest culture; in riper years, Teacher, Writer, Critic of
            Literature and Art; in maturer age, Companion and Helper
                      of many earnest Reformers in America
                                  and Europe.

                                     And

                         In Memory of her Husband,
                      GIOVANNI ANGELO, MARQUIS OSSOLI.

            He gave up rank, station, and home for the Roman Republic,
                           and for his Wife and Child.

                                     And

                           In Memory of that Child,
                         ANGELO EUGENE PHILIP OSSOLI,

                     Born in Rieti, Italy, Sept. 5, 1848,
                 Whose dust reposes at the foot of this stone.
                  They passed from life together by shipwreck,
                                 July 19, 1850.

        United in life by mutual love, labors, and trials, the merciful Father
                             took them together, and
                         In death they were not divided.



THE END.





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