_The Rogues' Gallery_
"My terrible experiences during these months," continued Marie, "had at
least the advantage of bringing me nearer to him who was and is the
inspirer of whatever is worthy or good in me. It helped me to appreciate
him, and surely everything I suffered, everything I may still suffer, is
not too much to pay for that. He has made for me an ideal, and, without
that, life is but a sorry, sorry thing. During those wild months I, of
course, thought little of those things, those wonderful new things which
I had heard of from him, but now, when we were living quietly with our
anarchist friends, and the surroundings were in harmony with the mood
for thought, my interest awakened. I read a great deal and listened
attentively to the talk of the people around me, and slowly my ideas
became more and more clear.
"It took a long time for me to learn, to really understand what the
others were interested in. I did not dare to ask Terry too many
questions, especially there, where everybody admired him and looked up
to him so. A new shyness came over me when I began to see him in the
light of a philosopher and a poet. He seemed so far above me and I felt
myself so small and unworthy. But it was not long before I really began
to feel a strong interest in all that was said, in all these social
theories, in these ideas about the proletaire, about art and literature;
and I began to read books in a far different spirit from what I used--I
began to see in them truth about life, and to love this truth, whatever
it was. And I loved the freedom of the talk, and, above all, I loved the
feeling that from the highest point of view I was not an outcast, and
that the people who seemed to me the best did not so regard me. It
helped to give me the self-respect which every human being needs, I
think.
"I thought for a long time that I was very lucky indeed to get admitted
into this atmosphere. And, indeed, I know I _was_ lucky, but there came
a time when, for a while, I was very unhappy, not in the society of the
radicals--I always loved that--but among these particular people,
because they could not, after all, rid themselves of some conservative
prejudices. After a while I began to see that even those enlightened
people really had contempt for what I had been, or for my ignorance,
perhaps for both.
"This family, with whom we were staying, was supposed to have broad and
liberal ideas, and its members prided themselves on the fact that they
really put their theories into practice. Their home was run on a sort of
communistic basis, and the men and women who lived there were not tied
to each other by any legal bonds, for they believed in freedom of love.
They never made much noise about their ideas, or rather their practice,
and were what you might call refined or cultured anarchists.
"Terry and I had nothing in a worldly way, and we lived there on
'charity,' so to speak, though that word was, of course, never used. We
did, however, what work there was to be done in the household, trying in
this way to give some compensation in return for a bed to sleep on and
the simple food necessary to keep our bodies alive.
"Now, after a while, I began to feel crushed, oppressed in this home,
among these cold, cold, refined people, although they were anarchists.
They could not help showing me their contempt: they made me feel
inferior. They never said one word that indicated such a feeling, but I
could feel it by their attitude, by the attitude even of the little
child in the house. They looked upon me much in the same way as my
former mistress used, when I was the servant in the house, except that
they were bound by their theories to give me a nominal respect and to
try charitably to improve my mind and make of me a philosophical
anarchist.
"It was painful to me to see these people, who were so humane, who could
not bear to see the lowly oppressed, who could not bear to have
injustice done, to see these people pass me by in insulting silence,
look at me with cold, unsympathetic eyes! How it hurt me, not to receive
the word of encouragement from the kind look of people I looked up to!
So I crawled into my shell and did not go about much with the others. I
think I was forgotten by nearly everybody for days at a time. Terry
shared the room with me, and brought me food, as I grew more and more
unable to eat with the cold superior ones. He brought me tobacco, too,
and here it was, sitting all day alone, that I began the cigarette
habit: if it had not been for that, I think I should have gone mad.
"I never ceased to love Terry, but I had a bitter feeling against him,
too. He was always kind and good to me, but he spent most of his time
with his intellectual friends, and I began to feel that even he was
being 'charitable' to me. So after much misery and despair, I accepted a
proposal of marriage from a friend of my wild days and fled with him to
St. Louis. He took me to the home of his sisters and parents, where I
lived in peace and quiet for three weeks, recovered some of my health
and strength, and was able to review my past and think of my future; and
reflect on my coming marriage.
"The people I was with now were kind and sympathetic. They did not know
about my past life--only my prospective husband knew--he, of course,
knew all. The others thought I was a poor shop-girl, tired and
overworked. They were refined people, fairly well-to-do, rather
bourgeois, but with good hearts, and so innocent that they believed
everything their son told them, and received me as a daughter and
sister.
"Perhaps my nature is perverse, I don't know; but as soon as I got a
little rest and peace, I began to think of what I had left and
especially of Terry. It was not only my love for him that called, but
what my life with him had been and would be if I returned--a life that
was not a commonplace life, a life of intelligence and freedom. Already
I was bored by the quiet goodness of the people I was with, and I wanted
'something doing'!
"I saw Terry again as I had seen him first, with the glamour of ardent
love, the love that overleaps all barriers and, if only for an instant,
stands face to face with love, unhesitating, tumultuous, and triumphant.
The memory of even one perfect moment can never leave us, even if life
be ever so dark and harsh and bitter, there will always be that single
ray of light to illumine the darkness, and keep our steps from utter and
complete stumbling.
"I thought of Terry day and night, and grew so melancholy that my new
found friends were alarmed and suggested hastening the marriage, in
order to let me go South with my husband. This alarmed me terribly and
I begged that no such step should be taken. With much inward trembling,
I proposed that the marriage should be postponed and that I return to
Chicago. They would not listen to this, and I could see in their honest
faces the deepest amazement and a kind of suspicion. So I took refuge in
tears, pleading ill-health and offering no more suggestions.
"That same day I wrote Terry a long letter, in which I told him that I
still loved him, could not forget him, but had taken this step in
desperation because I could no longer endure living among these people
in Chicago, his friends, but not mine; that here in St. Louis I had
found a certain measure of peace and quiet which had lately been
disturbed by the realisation that soon I must decide to take a step
which would perhaps separate us two irrevocably, that I longed more than
words could tell to see him, to look into his face. I could never go
back, I wrote, to that life I had been living, because what I had
learned from him of what life is and what makes it worth living, had
made that thing impossible for me. So, I wrote, I could not go back,
and how, without him, could I go forward? So here I was, weak,
perplexed, and I begged him to write me, to advise me what to do.
"Very soon his reply came--the truest, kindest reply that I could have
received. He too had suffered since I left him, and comprehended only
too well why I had done as I did. Our suffering would help us to gain a
more comprehensive knowledge of life and of each other. And if I still
loved him, I should follow the inclination of my heart and return to
him. We two might start out again, wiser and surer for what had passed.
He assured me of his love, but warned me not to expect too much from
him, that our material comforts would be few, for he was as poor as I,
and however much he might wish to provide better, he knew that, for one
reason or another, he could not. But if I would be content to share his
crust and his love, much happiness and joy might be in store for us. He
finished his letter with a quotation from Browning's 'Lost Leader':
'Just for a handful of silver he left us,
Just for a ribbon to tie in his coat.'
"My hesitation disappeared at once, although it hurt me greatly to
carry out my resolution to return to Chicago. It cost me many a pang to
shock and hurt the dear good people, to seem so ungrateful for all their
love and kindness. But it had to be. I could not do otherwise. I
returned to Chicago two days after receiving the letter, and my lover
and I met and clasped hands and gazed into one another's eyes. We were
reunited, or rather united truly, for the first time, with better
understanding on both sides.
"Since that day, now six years ago, we have travelled the rough road
together, assisting one another as best we could, often stumbling and
misunderstanding and hurting one another, for we continually tried to
get deeper and deeper into real knowledge, real life, and it is hard to
reconcile all things. Generally to gain much, one must compromise, but
Terry and I did not wish to compromise. His and mine has been a
difficult and dangerous relation, but an interesting one. Very soon
after my return to Chicago, I felt much more at ease, no longer a
stumbling-block in his way; and I gained confidence, strength, and
knowledge. I met many people of the true communistic spirit, and by
social intercourse with them developed in every way. I continued to read
good books and attended lectures on the social problems of the day. So
after a time I became what is called an anarchist, just as Terry was.
"The reasons my books and companions brought forward for the
justification of anarchism were like meat and drink to me. I was filled
with enthusiasm for the ideas of a freedom which I now think is perhaps
impossible in our society. But I thought that the 'downtrodden,' the
'working classes,' held the fate of the world in their hands, if they
could but realise it. As time passed, my enthusiasm waned, for I began
to see many difficulties in the way of this beautiful idealism. At
times, I even doubted if the 'mob' were worthy of liberty at all. Such
thoughts, however, passed away whenever I saw the crowds of workers
streaming from the factories and stores, and looked upon their loutish,
brutal faces, wherein there was never a gleam of pride, of the joy of
creation, of intelligent effort. Then I would think, surely, surely,
humankind is not meant to be thus. Why, even the little birds, the tiny
little ants, what intelligence they display in their work; little
kittens and dogs playing in the streets, what unrestrained joy is
theirs! Work ought to be a pleasure and a blessing: and it would be so
if we could only choose our labour, if we could create, do those things
for which we are fitted, voluntarily, because of the need within us, for
the outward expression of our life, our hope and joy. So, work would
cease to be the curse it is to-day.
"And surely if we were free men and women, we would find our place in
the scheme of things, surely each one of us would seek the place suited
to his individual nature, and so perhaps at last everything would be a
part of the harmonious whole.
"When I think of things as they are and as they might be, I grow dizzy
and sick at heart, that mankind can be so blind, so hopelessly ignorant,
so unspeakably cruel, so weak and cowardly. I am only a novice, I know,
and there is so much for me to know, to learn, to strive for--much that
I, and hundreds and thousands of others, will never reach, for we are
burdened with heavy chains which we cannot break. Yet, there must be
somewhere on this big earth, some little place fitted for me, some
small corner where I must be of some value to myself.
"To you, no doubt, my sufferings and struggles will seem petty and my
ideas crude and commonplace; but, if so, the pity is all the greater.
After the agony I went through, freedom seemed to me the noblest thing
in the world, and I thought it the solution of everything. Since then my
ideas, perhaps, have become somewhat less 'crude,' but I have never for
a moment lost faith in the thought that freedom is the most essential,
the most necessary condition for us, if we are to endure life."
It is certainly what Marie calls "crude" to talk of liberty without
careful definition. Absolute freedom is inconceivable. But I am not
interested in presenting an argument: I am interested in the description
of a state of mind, of a section of society, of a certain emotional view
of things. The value, however, of these general ideas is undoubted, in
the spiritual improvement and moral comfort of thousands of people. I
think that Marie and Terry and the other characters that will appear in
this book are decidedly better off for the ideas they hold: that about
these ideas, or rather ideals, perhaps, they have grouped a society in
which they are not outcasts, in which their lives seem from some points
of view justified. And even in my opinion, though I live in different
circumstances, and see greater difficulties in the way of the
realisation of any social ideal than they do, yet I feel that their way
of looking at things is useful to the larger society of men, ultimately.
And, I, like other people, have deep respect for a consistent and
courageous life, based upon a principle or principles which I may not
hold myself.
The next scene in the life of Marie and Terry took place in what they
called "The Rogues' Gallery." This was during the time that Terry held a
position in the Prudential Insurance Company, whose employ he left, as
we have seen, in order to go to Pittsburg, to find the flaw in the
tannery process, at his brother Jim's request. He hired three little
rooms, and up to the time he went to Pittsburg, he welcomed to his home
everybody who was "against" things. Later on, he became more particular
in his associates--that is to say, he demanded of them something more
than mere disreputability, to use the conventional word. But at that
time he loved everything that the world hated or cast out. That was his
principle of action, his norm of judgment. Seeking the truth with
undivided passion, he rid himself at a later time, at least partially,
of this prejudice, and became quite able to "pass up," as he calls it,
that is reject, a human being even though he might be a thief, a
practical anarchist, a prostitute, or a souteneur. But at the time of
the existence of the Rogues' Gallery he loved everything rejected by
society, without making too nice a use of his natural taste.
There, in those three little slum rooms, gathered a strange society--a
society held together on the basis of its utter rejection of the larger
society of men. To be an acceptable member of this society, the
individual must in some way be a social rebel--either practically or
theoretically, or both. When Terry saw in some being rejected by society
a spark of thought or of feeling, he was excited and happy. It was
obvious to him, as to all persons who think and have practical contact
with many different kinds of people, that there are in life no heroes
and no villains; it was obvious that in the lowest thief or prostitute
there was that possibility of light and spiritual grace which all true
souls desire. Terry's function was to make them conscious of this; to
organise, so to speak, the outcasts upon a philosophic and aesthetic
basis and so save them to themselves, at least.
This was his great experiment with Marie, about which a large part of
this book is to be concerned. But this interest, this effort, extended
itself to many other individuals, and whenever Terry could feel himself
in contact with what he felt was essentially human, and, at the same
time, to his sense beautiful, he was filled, as I have said, with that
deep excitement of pleasure, which was both intellectual and moral. I
remember, one day, he said to me: "How often, during the lifetime of the
Rogues' Gallery, did I saunter down State Street with the pleasing
knowledge that I would find some 'low' person, girl or man, whom I knew
I could get at, who would strip himself or herself bare to me in a
spiritual sense, and would be revealed disinterestedly, would have no
axe to grind and no contemptible small ends to gain, and no tradesman's
commercial morality and no grafting conventionality, no moral cant based
on self-interest--some being so near the 'limit' that he was
intellectually and morally fearless and did not need to pose, from whom
some truth could be derived, whose sincerity and power of
straight-seeing was not warped and concealed by any bourgeois ambitions,
by any respectability."
From time to time Terry would take one of these beings home with him--to
his Rogues' Gallery and to Marie and to the other intimates, mainly more
or less self-conscious anarchists, all or nearly all derelicts of the
labouring class. There they could stay as long as they aesthetically
fitted, could share the communal cigarette, beds, beer, and food. And
Terry and Marie and their friends would talk and read aloud--Terry the
teacher, giving transcendental light into the nature of the good, the
beautiful, and the true. Many an outcast here came first to a pleasing
sense that from some points of view he was not altogether bad, nay, that
he had unexpectedly good points. Many of them to some philosophic
intensity; conversation became a joy, strangely unknown hitherto. The
educational character of this meeting place was marked, but, as I have
said, Terry's indiscriminating passion for the outcasts of the
proletaire limited the intellectual development of his little society.
At a later time, a much more developed society grew around Terry and
Marie, as we shall see, when we get to the Anarchist salon, or the
intellectual drawing room of the Anarchist Proletaire.
Terry's main effort was, at this time, and for years afterwards,
naturally directed toward Marie's spiritual education. Hitherto Marie
has revealed herself to the reader as a rather commonplace, very
physical, rather lazy, and quite egoistic person, one of many, with no
distinguished characteristics. But she was unusually endowed in some
ways. Eminently plastic, up to a certain point she rapidly assumed forms
suggested by Terry's spiritual touch. She derived from him her interest
in all high things, in philosophy, art and literature, but there always
remained an interesting distinction in the way she reacted to her
education. Terry remained always the rather transcendental philosopher,
with a predominant ethical sense. Marie, as she developed, showed a
deeper and subtler feeling for expression and a surer sensing of human
character, a juster psychology. Her nature is essentially less
beautiful, by far, than that of Terry, but more real, in a way, more
robust, and so constituted that in a long spiritual conflict she would
wear out the finer qualities of her lover. But this is anticipating,
except in so far as it is true that from the start Marie's psychological
vividness showed itself, often, of course, with base and physical
concomitants. In this connection I will quote a letter which well
illustrates this side of her character, and which also shows a contrast
to some of her loftier but more conventional and less true qualities.
She had been attending an anarchists' ball and she wrote:
"I danced a great deal and felt very happy, without the aid of any
stimulant either. I did not have any feeling of irritation or even
indifference toward anybody, not even toward Rose. I am fascinated by
Rose, and I sometimes think I hate her. I always like to be near her
when there is no one else around. She reveals herself to me then; in
fact quite throws off the mask which all women wear. In order to
encourage her to do this, I apparently throw down my own mask. Oh, how I
gloat over her then, when she shows me a side of her life and betrays
secret thoughts and feelings to me half unconsciously! Sometimes I
succeed in having her do this when there is a third person present, and
the look of hatred which passes across her face when she perceives she
has made a mistake, is a most interesting thing to see. But she
immediately comes to my side and we kiss each other and call each other
'angel girls' and 'darlings.' Thus we play with each other, and it is a
stand-off which is cleverest. She is quite puzzled sometimes by my
frankness about some things, for instance, about her looks. I notice she
compliments me on my looks whenever I am decidedly off colour, when I
wear a green ribbon, or a dowdy dress, or big shoes. But I am honest
with her in these things, and I like to see her look well. The game is
more interesting then.
"Well, at this ball, I wanted to dance with a certain man, but I did not
wish to ask him myself. So I requested Rose to do so, and she consented,
and I was soon whirling around in his arms. I had felt curious about him
for a long time: I did not know just what the state of my feeling toward
him was. I did not know whether I liked or disliked him, but I had
often experienced a sort of thrilling sensation when he happened to pass
by or touch me, or even when he mentioned my name, which had occurred
only once since I knew him. 'Good evening, Marie,' was all he said. But
the name and the way he said it seemed new, and it kept recurring to me
at unexpected times and always troubled me. When I fancy I hear that
name in his voice I feel sad and lonely, and my heart aches. I see him
often, mostly at our Sunday evening lectures. We are very distant, and I
am often rude to him, not answering when he speaks to me.
"So when I danced with him the other night, I was agreeably surprised to
find that I did not experience any unusual sensation at all. And I was
relieved, too, for I had a sort of instinctive feeling that he was not
worthy of any strong interest. After the dance was over, we went
down-stairs together and he kissed me. You know, the radicals all kiss
one another freely and it does not mean anything special, as a rule:
often it is done without any feeling at all, just a common habit. But
this time I was astonished to find that the moment he touched me I had
the same thrilling sensation, only more intense, as when I heard him
speak my name. I resisted however, and just then I heard Rose's voice
ring out exultantly, 'Oh, if you knew how crazy Marie is about you, how
she raved when she first met you and so on.' You can imagine how I felt
then. I managed to get away and drank and smoked and danced all the
evening and never looked at him again. When we all went away Rose and I
kissed each other and called each other 'darling girl.'
"In some moods I would like to be a big, beautiful, heartless woman like
one or two I know. In such moods, how I would make men suffer! I was
talking about this to little Sadie the other day, and she assured me
solemnly that she would do that when she was thirty, but not merely to
make men suffer, but to develop them."
As Terry continued to read aloud and talk in his Rogues' Gallery, Marie
grew to reflect more and more the results of the reading of good things,
and of the thinking and talking about these things. It shows how some
temperaments are able to connect literature and philosophy with life,
and thereby see their real meaning, quite independently of any merely
conventional culture or education. One of the greatest prejudices of our
time (and of all times) is the belief that intellectual culture, which
is merely the perception in detail of how life and thought is expressed
in form, is peculiarly dependent upon academic or conventional
education. And yet, of course, somewhere or other, the nature capable of
understanding form must come in contact with it, before the meaning of
the whole thing is incorporated into its daily habit. Terry was Marie's
point of contact with form, in its deep relation to life. Marie felt
this and loved him and was grateful, to the depths of her nature, so
different from his, so animal, so unideal, in comparison! She wrote:
"Terry gave me a new way to express myself, and that, after all, is the
only thing worth living for. And he gave me this new way without trying
to make me give up any other way of self expression, my sensuality, for
example. This sensuality I have sometimes regretted, but not directly
through Terry's influence, except that he has shown me the beauty of
something else. He is a winged thing in comparison with me, but he is
so wonderfully tolerant that he can see beauty in even the baser part
of my nature. Why should I regret what I am, anyway? I believe that the
only purity that means anything is that which results from working one's
nature out harmoniously, not suppressing it. Terry must be a wonderful
man, to have been able to encourage me in many new directions, and to
take away the maiming sting of regret for what I inevitably was and
could not help being.
"I do not think an ordinary person could have made me see the beauty of
anarchism. I know that the anarchistic ideas are rather shocking, even
at their best, and of course they naturally appeal most to the man with
the hoe, inciting him to rebel, while the man behind the idea is usually
endowed with so much sensitiveness that he shrinks from the rebellion
part of the programme himself; he is not a man of action, only a man of
ideas. It is shameful, some think, to disturb the blissful ignorance of
the man with the hoe, for when the gleam of intelligence shines in his
eye and he is aroused to the knowledge of his degrading position, he is
likely to rebel in the most healthy but brutal manner, so much so that
the aesthetic reformer shrinks back from the consequences of the
propagation of his own ideas. Of course, the brutality of the
proletariat is not nearly so subtle as that of the aristocracy, and it
takes some cleverness to discover that the latter is brutality at all.
It requires time and patience to drive into the thick heads of the
workers that they are downtrodden, and that their oppressors are
worthless parasites. When they finally do awaken to this idea and rebel,
how terribly shocked the world is because these brutes have not the
cleverness or delicacy to be more subtle in their brutalities.
"In your last letter you wrote of the crudeness of most propagandists of
anarchism, naming Anatole France as one of the rare anarchists who
express themselves otherwise than crudely. He rarely or never, you say,
ever mentions the word 'anarchism,' although much of his writing is
calculated to destroy belief in the value of organised society as it now
exists. Don't you think you are perhaps prejudiced too much against
certain words because of their associations? I know that many words are
objectionable to refined, cultured people because they have been so
long associated with the coarse and brutal mob, the working class, as
the socialists would say. But you must remember that anarchism is
intended to appeal to this 'mob' especially; that its doctrines might
not be needed by refined people who ought to have enough sensibility not
to enjoy 'freedom' unless it is shared by the coarse and brutal workers.
Believe me, there is nothing so degrading as poverty. It makes the slave
more slavish and the brute more brutal. It acts like a goad, spurring
people on to do things which make them seem to themselves and others
lower and lower, until they are truly no longer human beings but
animals.
"Therefore it is that the propaganda of anarchism is generally crude. It
is true that much good literature is permeated with the ideals of
anarchism, for instance, Shelley, Whitman, Thoreau, and Emerson. Such
reading is excellent as a means of humanising and making anarchists of
refined people, but how could you appeal to the rebellious workers with
such books as these? For instance, my father, do you think he could read
Ibsen or any of the others? Indeed not; but let him go to a meeting
where he can hear Emma Goldman speak, or let him read Jean Grave, or
Bakunin, or some other writer of 'crude' pamphlets, and he might become
interested, he might be able to understand. But since it seems that
truly refined people cannot enjoy the pleasures of freedom without
being, at any rate at times, worried because of the condition of the
'mass,' what is to be done? This objectionable crudity must remain until
there is a demand for something more subtle on the part of the workers
for whom is intended all propaganda. The rich and cultured presumably
have brains which they can use to solve the problems for themselves or
to digest the things written by Anatole France and others. But how do
you suppose that I, for instance, could a few years ago have relished
Anatole France? Wouldn't you think it idiotic for anyone to have given
me such books, at that time, with any expectation of my appreciating
their refined and evanescent anarchism?"
It must have been a strange sight that of Terry sitting on his
dilapidated bed in the Rogues' Gallery, with his eternal cigarette in
his mouth, talking to Marie and perhaps to some prostitute or
pickpocket! We begin already to see the result on Marie's education:
that will appear complex and manifold, but it is likely that on many a
half-formed creature who afterward passed out of Terry's life, his words
yet made an impression which perhaps in some later darkness revived an
idea which explained and justified his miserable existence.