though we must needs hope that the United's atmosphere of academic
refinement will temper somewhat the scorching glare with which the
bright orb has risen.
* * * * *
=The Conservative= for April opens with Andrew Francis Lockhart's
melodious and attractive poem entitled "Benediction". As a whole, this
is possibly the best piece of verse which Mr. Lockhart has yet written;
the sentiment is apt, if not entirely novel, whilst the technical
construction is well-nigh faultless. Such expressions as "pearl-scarr'd"
serve to exhibit the active and original quality of Mr. Lockhart's
genius. "Another Endless Day", by Rheinhart Kleiner, is a beautiful and
harmonious poetical protest against monotony. Much to be regretted is
the misprint in line 3 of the third stanza, where the text should read:
"=A= love to thrill with new delight".
"April", by Winifred Virginia Jordan, is a seasonable and extremely
tuneful poem whose imagery is of that dainty, sprightly sort which only
Mrs. Jordan can create. "In Morven's Mead", also by Mrs. Jordan,
contains an elusive and haunting suggestion of the unreal, in the
author's characteristic style. "The Night Wind Bared My Heart" completes
a highly meritorious trilogy. In justice to the author, it should be
stated that the last of these three poems is, as here presented, merely
a rough draft. Through our own reprehensible editorial oversight, the
printer received this unpolished copy instead of the finished poem. The
following emendations should be observed:
Stanza I, line 4, to read: "Awak'd my anguish'd sighs".
Stanza II, line 3, to read: "But Oh, from grief =were= prest".
"The Best Wine", by William de Ryee, is an earnestly introspective poem,
well cast in iambic pentameter quatrains. "Ye Ballade of Patrick von
Flynn" is a comic delineation of the cheap pseudo-Irish, England-hating
agitators who have been so offensively noisy on this side of the
Atlantic ever since the European war began, and particularly since the
late riots in Dublin. This class, which so sadly misrepresents the loyal
Irish people, deserves but little patience from Americans. Its members
stutter childishly about "breaches of neutrality" every time a real
American dares speak a word in favour of the Mother Country; yet they
constantly violate neutrality themselves in their clumsy attempts to use
the United States as a catspaw against England. The actual German
propagandists have the excuse of patriotism for their race and
Vaterland, but these Hibernian hybrids, neither good Irishmen nor good
Americans, have no excuse whatever when they try to subvert the
functions of the country which is giving them protection and livelihood.
* * * * *
=The Conservative= for July pays a deserved tribute to one of the most
lucid and acute of our amateur essayists, by devoting the entire issue
to his work. Henry Clapham McGavack, in "The American Proletariat versus
England", exposes with admirable fearlessness the silly Anglophobic
notions which a mistaken conception of the Revolution, and an ignorant
Irish population, have diffused among our lower classes. It is seldom
that an author ventures to speak so frankly on this subject, for the
servile tendency of the times impels most writers and publishers to play
the demagogue by essaying to feed the Irish masses with the anti-English
swill they desire; but Mr. McGavack wields an independent pen, and
records the truth without fear of the =mobile vulgus= and its shallow
views. In power, directness, urbanity, and impartiality, Mr. McGavack
cannot be excelled. He marshals his arguments without passion, bias, or
circumlocution; piling proof upon proof until none but the most stubborn
England-hater can fail to blush at the equal injustice and stupidity of
those who malign that mighty empire to whose earth-wide circle of
civilisation we all belong.
* * * * *
=The Coyote= for April is a Special English Number, dedicated to our
soldier-member, George William Stokes of Newcastle-on-Tyne. The opening
poem "To England", well exhibits the versatility of Mrs. Winifred V.
Jordan, who here appears as a national panegyrist of commendable dignity
and unexceptionable taste. The word at the beginning of the fourth line
should read "=Is=" instead of "=To=". The short yet stirring metre is
particularly well selected. "Active English Amateurs I Have Met", by
Ernest A. Dench, is a rather good prose piece, though not without marks
of careless composition. "The Vultur", by Henry J. Winterbone of the
B. A. P. A., is a remarkably good story whose development and conclusion
would do credit to a professional pen. We hope Mr. Winterbone may join
the United, thereby giving American readers a more ample opportunity to
enjoy his work. Editor William T. Harrington, whose prose is so rapidly
acquiring polish and fluency, contributes two brief but able essays:
"History Repeats" and "How Great Britain Keeps Her Empire". In "History
Repeats", certain parts of the second sentence might well be amended a
trifle in structure, to read thus: "it must be remembered =that= the
first half was a series of victories for the South, and =that= only
after the Battle of Gettysburg did the strength of the North begin to
assert itself". This number of =The Coyote= is an exceedingly timely and
tasteful tribute to our Mother Country, appearing at an hour when the
air of America reeks with the illiterate anti-British trash of the "Sinn
Fein" simpletons and Prussian propagandists.
* * * * *
=Invictus= for July is the second number of Mr. Paul J. Campbell's
personal organ, and represents the strictly individual magazine in its
most tasteful and elaborate form. Unimpeachably artistic in appearance,
its contents justify the exterior; the whole constituting a publication
of the first rank, wherein are joined the virtues both of the old and of
the new schools of amateur journalism. Since Mr. Campbell is
preeminently an essayist, it is to his dissertations on "The Pursuit of
Happiness" and "The Age of Accuracy" which we turn most eagerly; and
which in no way disappoint our high expectations. The first of these
essays is a dispassionate survey of mankind in its futile but frantic
scramble after that elusive but unreal sunbeam called "happiness". The
author views the grimly amusing procession of human life with the
genuine objective of an impartial spectator, and with commendable
freedom from the hypocritical colouring of those who permit commonplace
emotions and tenuous idealizings to obscure the less roseate but more
substantial vision of their intellects. "The Age of Accuracy" presents
an inspiring panorama of the evolution of Intellect, and of its
increasing domination over the more elemental faculties of instinct and
emotion. At the same time, much material for reflection is furnished,
since it is obvious that the advance is necessarily confined to a
comparatively small and select part of humanity. Instinct and emotion
are still forces of tremendous magnitude, against which Reason wages an
upward struggle of incredible bravery. Only the strong can escape the
clutch of the primitive, wherefore there can be no successful social
order which does not conform in its essentials to the blind impulses of
the natural man or man-ape. We are in danger of overestimating the
ascendancy and stability of Reason, for it is in reality the most
fragile and rudimentary element in our mortal fabric. A heavy blow on
certain parts of the skull, or a bullet in certain parts of the brain,
can destroy in an instant all the accumulated intellect which aeons of
heredity have bestowed, depressing the victim from the zenith of culture
and refinement to a condition separated only by colour and contour from
that of the negro or the gorilla; yet not all the edicts of the
lawgiver, devices of the educator, measures of the reformer, or skill of
the surgeon, can extirpate the ingrained instincts and seated
superstitions of the average human animal.
The poetry of Mr. Campbell is represented in =Invictus= by three
specimens, whose merit speaks well for the author's progress in the art.
"The Sunshine Girl" is an amatory panegyric of no small skill and
polish, though not strikingly novel in sentiment or expression. "German
Kultur" is a scathing and virile indictment of the present enemies of
humanity. The versification is bold, and in places rugged, whilst the
imagery is appropriately grim and sardonic. Points which we might
criticise are the repeated use of "=civilization=" as a word of only
four syllables, and the archaic pronunciation of "=drown-ed=" as a
dissyllable. This latter usage would be objectionable in verse of
stately or conservative cast, but here grates upon the ear as an
anachronism. The trenchant wit of the piece is well sustained, and
brought out with particular force in the second and fourth stanzas. "The
Major Strain" is without doubt the foremost verse of the issue. This is
real poetry. The sustained rhyming, whereby each stanza contains only
one rhyming sound, is pleasing and unusual. Mr. Campbell's comment on
"Amateur Affairs" really deserves to be classed as an essay, for its
thoughtful conclusions and intelligent analyses of human nature
certainly draw it within the pale of true literature. The broad
comprehension and continued love of amateur journalism here exhibited,
are potent justifications of the author's practically unanimous election
to the Presidency of the United. =Invictus= is one of the very foremost
journals of the amateur world, and the only possible objection which can
be raised against it, is its infrequency of appearance. It is the voice
of a virile and vibrant personality who unites vigour of thought with
urbanity of expression.
* * * * *
=The Scot= for May marks the advent of this highly entertaining and well
conducted magazine to the United, and extends the northern frontier of
amateur journalism to Bonnie Dundee, in Auld Scotland, the Land of
Mountain and Flood. "Hidden Beauty", a poem in blank verse by R. M.
Ingersley, opens the issue with a combination of lofty conceptions,
vivid imagery, and regular structure. "England's Glory", by Clyde Dane,
is a stirring tale of that fearless and self-sacrificing honour which
has given to the Anglo-Saxon the supremacy of the world. It would be in
bad taste to cavil at slight technical imperfections or instances of
triteness when considering so earnest and glowing a delineation of the
British character; the noblest human type ever moulded by the Creator.
"Oh Rose, Red Rose!" is a tuneful little lyric by Winifred V. Jordan,
whose work is never too brief to be pleasing, or too long to be
absorbing. "Clemency versus Frightfulness", by William T. Harrington, is
a thoughtful and lucid exposition of the British governmental ideal of
lenient justice; an ideal whose practical success has vividly
demonstrated its thorough soundness. "At Last", by Muriel Wilson, is a
blank verse poem of much merit. "Do You Remember?", by the late Lieut.
Roy Arthur Thackara, R. N., is a delicate sketch possessing the
additional interest of coming from the pen of one who has now given his
life for King and Country; the author having gone down with H. M. S.
=India=. "A Battle with the Sea", a sketch by Midshipman Ernest L.
McKeag, exhibits descriptive power of no common order, yet might well
have a less abrupt conclusion. "To Some One", by Margaret Trafford, is a
poem in dactylic measure, dedicated to the women of Britain. The
sentiment is noble, and the encomium well bestowed, though the metre
could be improved in polish. "Gum", by Henry J. Winterbone, is a
delightfully humorous sketch. It is evident that those who depreciate
British humour must have taken pains to avoid its perusal, since it has
a quietly pungent quality seldom found save among Anglo-Saxons.
Personally, we believe that the summit of clumsy pseudo-jocoseness is
attained by the average "comic" supplement of the Hearst Sunday papers.
These, and not the British press, present the pathetic spectacle of
utter inanity and repulsive grotesqueness without the faintest redeeming
touch of genuine comedy, legitimate satire, or refined humour. "Life's
Voyage", by Matthew Hilson, is a poem of great attractiveness, though of
scarcely impeccable construction. Concerning the expression "tempests
wild do roar", we must reiterate the advice of Mr. Pope, who condemned
the expletive "do", "doth", or "did" as a "feeble aid". Such usage has,
in fact, been in bad taste ever since the reign of Queen Anne; Dryden
being the last bard in whom we need not censure the practice. Mr.
McColl's editorials are brief but informing. He may well be
congratulated on his work as a publisher, and he certainly deserves as
hearty a welcome as the United can give.
* * * * *
=The Scot= for June is a "British Old-Timers' Number", confined wholly
to the work of the senior amateur journalists of the Mother Country.
Edward F. Herdman, to whom this number is dedicated, opens the issue
with a religious poem entitled "Life", which compares well with the bulk
of current religious verse. Mr. Herdman also contributes one of several
prose essays on amateur journalism, in which the various authors view
our field of endeavor from similar angles. "A Song of a Sailor", by
R. D. Roosemale-Cocq, exhibits buoyant animation, and considerable ease
in the handling of a rollicking measure. The internal rhymes are for the
most part well introduced, though greater uniformity might have been
used in their distribution. The first two lines have none. In the last
stanza there are two lines whose metre seems deficient, but being
conscious of the uncertainties of the secretarial and typographical
arts, we suspend judgment on the author. "A Song of Cheer", by Alfred H.
Pearce, is an optimistic ode of real merit. The last line furnishes a
particularly pleasing example of sprightly wit. Mr. Gavin T. McColl is
sensible and perspicuous in all his editorial utterances. His work in
issuing one of the only two regular monthly magazines in amateurdom has
already brought him to prominence, though his connexion with the press
associations is still new.
* * * * *
THE UNITED AMATEUR for June is given over largely to critical and
official matter, though two pieces of verse serve to vary the monotony.
"Content", from our own pen, is an answer to Mr. Rheinhart Kleiner's
delightful poem in the April =Conservative=, entitled "Another Endless
Day". The lines are notable chiefly on account of some fearful and
wonderful typographical errors. In the fourth line "=sublime=" should
read "=sublimer=". In the eighth line there should be no apostrophe in
the word "=stars=". In the second column, eleventh line from the end,
there should be no apostrophe in the word "=fathers=", and finally, in
the ninth line from the end, "=hollow'd=" should read "=hallow'd=". "The
Swing in the Great Oak Tree", by Mrs. Agnes Richmond Arnold, is a
reminiscent poem whose measure is as swinging as its subject, and whose
atmosphere is pleasantly rural. There are flaws in the metre, and
irregularities in the rhyming arrangement, but the spirit of the whole
rises blithesomely above such slight technical matters. Editor
Schilling's column is to be praised for its dignified style, and
endorsed for its sound opinions.
* * * * *
=The Woodbee= for July is an attractive and important contribution to
the history of amateur journalism; since it is entirely devoted to the
biographies of the gifted Columbus amateurs, and to the annals of their
brilliant local organization. The Woodbees undoubtedly form the most
active and representative adult club in the United; to which only the
Appleton Club, representing the juvenile Muse, may justly be compared.
The Woodbees are typical, in a sense, of all that is best in the entire
association. They are pursuing courses of serious literary study,
producing a regularly issued magazine of unfailing merit and good taste,
working enthusiastically for the welfare and expansion of the United,
and leading or following every worthy or progressive movement in amateur
politics. They reflect credit upon themselves, their society, the
Association, and amateur journalism as a whole. The delightful
biographical article which occupies the major portion of the current
=Woodbee= is unsigned; but deserves particular praise, whoever the
author may be. The various characters are well displayed, and their
pleasing qualities and manifold activities well exhibited.
Mr. Fritter's editorials are as usual timely, lucid, and sensible. His
advocacy of the Campbell Amendment is to be applauded; and will, we
trust, be justified by the year's trial which that measure is now
undergoing. The present issue marks the conclusion of Mr. Fritter's term
as editor. He has given the amateur public a creditable volume, and is
entitled to the gratitude of every member of our Association. A final
word of praise is due the excellent group photograph of the Woodbees
which forms the frontispiece of the magazine. Added to the biographical
matter, it completes a thoroughly commendable introduction to a
thoroughly commendable body of literary workers.
H. P. LOVECRAFT,
Chairman.
THE UNITED AMATEUR
OFFICIAL ORGAN OF THE UNITED AMATEUR PRESS ASSOCIATION
VOLUME XVI GEORGETOWN, ILL., NOVEMBER, 1916 NUMBER 4
THE ALCHEMIST
High up, crowning the grassy summit of a swelling mound whose sides are
wooded near the base with the gnarled trees of the primeval forest,
stands the old chateau of my ancestors. For centuries its lofty
battlements have frowned down upon the wild and rugged countryside
about, serving as a home and stronghold for the proud house whose
honoured line is older even than the moss-grown castle walls. These
ancient turrets, stained by the storms of generations and crumbling
under the slow yet mighty pressure of time, formed in the ages of
feudalism one of the most dreaded and formidable fortresses in all
France. From its machicolated parapets and mounted battlements Barons,
Counts, and even Kings had been defied, yet never had its spacious halls
resounded to the footstep of the invader.
But since those glorious years all is changed. A poverty but little
above the level of dire want, together with a pride of name that forbids
its alleviation by the pursuits of commercial life, have prevented the
scions of our line from maintaining their estates in pristine splendour;
and the falling stones of the walls, the overgrown vegetation in the
parks, the dry and dusty moat, the ill-paved courtyards, and toppling
towers without, as well as the sagging floors, the worm-eaten wainscots,
and the faded tapestries within, all tell a gloomy tale of fallen
grandeur. As the ages passed, first one, then another of the four great
turrets were left to ruin, until at last but a single tower housed the
sadly reduced descendants of the once mighty lords of the estate.
It was in one of the vast and gloomy chambers of this remaining tower
that I, Antoine, last of the unhappy and accursed Comtes de C----, first
saw the light of day, ninety long years ago. Within these walls, and
amongst the dark and shadowy forests, the wild ravines and grottoes of
the hillside below, were spent the first years of my troubled life. My
parents I never knew. My father had been killed at the age of
thirty-two, a month before I was born, by the fall of a stone somehow
dislodged from one of the deserted parapets of the castle, and my mother
having died at my birth, my care and education devolved solely upon one
remaining servitor, an old and trusted man of considerable intelligence,
whose name I remember as Pierre. I was an only child, and the lack of
companionship which this fact entailed upon me was augmented by the
strange care exercised by my aged guardian in excluding me from the
society of the peasant children whose abodes were scattered here and
there upon the plains that surround the base of the hill. At the time,
Pierre said that this restriction was imposed upon me because my noble
birth placed me above association with such plebeian company. Now I know
that its real object was to keep from my ears the idle tales of the
dread curse upon our line, that were nightly told and magnified by the
simple tenantry as they conversed in hushed accents in the glow of their
cottage hearths.
Thus isolated, and thrown upon my own resources, I spent the hours of my
childhood in poring over the ancient tomes that filled the
shadow-haunted library of the chateau, and in roaming without aim or
purpose through the perpetual dusk of the spectral wood that clothes the
sides of the hill near its foot. It was perhaps an effect of such
surroundings that my mind early acquired a shade of melancholy. Those
studies and pursuits which partake of the dark and occult in nature most
strongly claimed my attention.
Of my own race I was permitted to learn singularly little, yet what
small knowledge of it I was able to gain, seemed to depress me much.
Perhaps it was at first only the manifest reluctance of my old preceptor
to discuss with me my paternal ancestry that gave rise to the terror
which I ever felt at the mention of my great house, yet as I grew out of
childhood, I was able to piece together disconnected fragments of
discourse, let slip from the unwilling tongue which had begun to falter
in approaching senility, that had a sort of relation to a certain
circumstance which I had always deemed strange, but which now became
dimly terrible. The circumstance to which I allude is the early age at
which all the Comtes of my line had met their end. Whilst I had hitherto
considered this but a natural attribute of a family of short-lived men,
I afterward pondered long upon these premature deaths, and began to
connect them with the wanderings of the old man, who often spoke of a
curse which for centuries had prevented the lives of the holders of my
title from much exceeding the span of thirty-two years. Upon my
twenty-first birthday, the aged Pierre gave to me a family document
which he said had for many generations been handed down from father to
son, and continued by each possessor. Its contents were of the most
startling nature, and its perusal confirmed the gravest of my
apprehensions. At this time, my belief in the supernatural was firm and
deep-seated, else I should have dismissed with scorn the incredible
narrative unfolded before my eyes.
The paper carried me back to the days of the thirteenth century, when
the old castle in which I sat had been a feared and impregnable
fortress. It told of a certain ancient man who had once dwelt on our
estates, a person of no small accomplishments, though little above the
rank of peasant; by name, Michel, usually designated by the surname of
Mauvais, the Evil, on account of his sinister reputation. He had studied
beyond the custom of his kind, seeking such things as the Philosopher's
Stone, or the Elixir of Eternal Life, and was reputed wise in the
terrible secrets of Black Magic and Alchemy. Michel Mauvais had one son,
named Charles, a youth as proficient as himself in the hidden arts, and
who had therefore been called Le Sorcier, or the Wizard. This pair,
shunned by all honest folk, were suspected of the most hideous
practices. Old Michel was said to have burnt his wife alive as a
sacrifice to the Devil, and the unaccountable disappearances of many
small peasant children were laid at the dreaded door of these two. Yet
through the dark natures of the father and the son ran one redeeming ray
of humanity; the evil old man loved his offspring with fierce intensity,
whilst the youth had for his parent a more than filial affection.