THE ENTERTAINING GROUP
In the group "entertaining" we may class all those narratives that
are told simply for the purpose of pleasing the reader and passing
away his time for him--tales of probable adventure, society stories,
humorous stories, and stories for special occasions, like Thanksgiving
and Christmas. The bulk of magazine fiction is of this kind. The chief
endeavor of the writer is to create the illusions of probability for a
series of events that after all is imaginary. However numerous may be
the actual incidents embodied, the course of the happening as a whole
is nevertheless made-up. There is always a heightening or lowering of
natural color, a modification of real occurrences, in order to produce
the desired effect; namely, acceptance by the reader of the whole
series, and especially the climax, which may be, for instance, the
capture of the wild animal, the culmination of the love episode, the
emphasis of the funny point, or the accident at the special celebration.
I. The Tale of Probable Adventure
Adventure narratives are essentially boys' stories--the grammar and
high school boys who are past the "foolishness" of fairy tales and
even of Oriental wonder stories, but are not yet appreciative of
realism, the quiet reflection of humdrum life. For many decades _The
Youth's Companion_ has furnished among its other good things excellent
stories of adventure probable and actual. Stevenson's masterpiece is,
of course, one of the two top-notches of excellence in the extended
form of this type of story. How the species may be historically but a
modification of the _voyages imaginaires_ is obviously suggested no
less by "Treasure Island" than by "Robinson Crusoe." It is the short
form of this type that we are dealing with at present.
[Definition]
Stories of probable adventure are narratives of exciting and
extraordinary events that, though really fictitious, might have
happened. We can tell many of them from true adventures only by the
testimony of the authors. "Captain Singleton's Tour Across Africa,"
critics have said, seems to the general reader quite as true an account
as Stanley's; while the "Memoirs of a Cavalier," which records the
adventures of a soldier in the army of Gustavus Adolphus, was long
mistaken for autobiography.
[The writing of a probable adventure]
To write a tale of this kind you must put yourself into the mood
of the bold hunter or traveller. You must imagine exciting things.
Many of your own experiences have just missed being astounding.
Add what-might-have-been, and you have a story of the type we are
discussing. You catch the bear or the bear catches you. You swim across
a turbulent river. You spend the night on an iceberg. You coast down
the frightful curves of the twenty-five miles of the Benguet road
with the steering gear of your automobile entirely useless. Remember,
though, that the adventure must seem real, however much you have drawn
on your reading and imagination. You must know enough of animal, plant,
and human life, and of geography, to be particular here and there and
thus give verisimilitude to your pictures. In order to get a subject,
suppose you think of what you consider the bravest physical act; then
build up around it a swift, crisp narrative. You may use technical
terms once in a while, such as a nervous story-teller would be likely
to fling off and then explain; only be sure they are intelligible very
soon.
An ordinary imagination supplemented by a "Baedeker" will enable any
one to construct an acceptable probable adventure. Superior excellence
will lie in the diction and style.
[A warning]
Because of the prevalence of this kind of narrative, you will need to
guard yourself with especial care against the temptation to plagiarize.
Be sure that your certification of authorship really tells the truth.
It is easier to be original than you think; as George Bernard Shaw
says, any man with brains can more easily compose a story or a play
than steal one.
=A Fight with a Bear=
One day, being in a forest a few leagues from Dusseldorf, as Gerard was
walking like one in a dream, thinking of Margaret and scarce seeing the
road he trod, his companion laid a hand on his shoulder, and strung his
cross-bow with glittering eye. "Hush!" said he, in a low whisper that
startled Gerard more than thunder. Gerard grasped his axe tight, and
shook a little; he heard a rustling in the wood hard by, and at the
same moment Denys sprang into the wood, and his crossbow went to his
shoulder, even as he jumped. =Twang!= went the metal string; and after
an instant's suspense he roared, "Run forward, guard the road! he is
hit! he is hit!"
Gerard darted forward, and, as he ran, a young bear burst out of the
wood right upon him; finding itself intercepted, it went upon its hind
legs with a snarl, and, though not half-grown, opened formidable jaws
and long claws. Gerard, in a fury of excitement and agitation, flung
himself on it, and delivered a tremendous blow on its nose with his
axe, and the creature staggered; another, and it lay groveling, with
Gerard hacking it.
"Hallo, stop! You are mad to spoil the meat."
"I took it for a robber," said Gerard, panting. "I mean I had made
ready for a robber, so I could not hold my hand."
"Ay, these chattering travelers have stuffed your head full of thieves
and assassins; they have not got a real live robber in their whole
nation. Nay, I'll carry the beast; bear you, though, my cross-bow."
"We will carry it by turns, then," said Gerard, "for 'tis a heavy load;
poor thing, how its blood drips. Why did we slay it?"
"For supper and the reward the baillie of the next town shall give us."
"And for that it must die, when it had but just begun to live; and
perchance it hath a mother that will miss it sore this night, and loves
it as ours love us; more than mine does me."
"What, know you not that his mother was caught in a pitfall last
month, and her skin is now at the tanner's? and his father was stuck
full of clothyard shafts t'other day, and died like Julius Cæsar, with
his hands folded on his bosom, and a dead dog in each of them?"
But Gerard would not view it jestingly. "Why, then," said he, "we have
killed one of God's creatures that was all alone in the world--as I am
this day, in this strange land."
"You young milksop," roared Denys, "these things must not be looked at
so, or not another bow would be drawn nor quarrel fly in the forest
nor battlefield. Why, one of your kidney consorting with a troop of
pike-men should turn them to a row of milk pails; it is ended; to Rome
thou goest not alone; for never wouldst thou reach the Alps in a whole
skin. I take thee to Remiremont, my native place, and there I marry
thee to my young sister. She is blooming as a peach. Thou shakest thy
head? Ah! I forgot; thou lovest elsewhere, and art a one-woman man, a
creature to me scarce conceivable. Well, then, I shall find thee, not
a wife, nor a leman, but a friend; some honest Burgundian who shall go
with thee as far as Lyons; and much I doubt that honest fellow will
be myself, into whose liquor thou hast dropped sundry powders to make
me love thee; for erst I endured not doves in doublet and hose. From
Lyons, I say, I can trust thee by ship to Italy, which being by all
accounts the very stronghold of milksops, thou wilt there be safe; they
will hear thy words, and make thee their duke in a twinkling."
Gerard sighed. "In sooth I love not to think of this Dusseldorf, where
we are to part company, good friend."
They walked silently, each thinking of the separation at hand; the
thought checked trifling conversation, and at these moments it is a
relief to do something, however insignificant. Gerard asked Denys to
lend him a bolt. "I have often shot with a long-bow, but never with one
of these."
"Draw thy knife and cut this one out of the cub," said Denys slyly.
"Nay, nay, I want a clean one."
Denys gave him three out of his quiver.
Gerard strung the bow and leveled it at a bough that had fallen into
the road at some distance. The power of the instrument surprised him;
the short but thick steel bow jarred him to the very heel as it went
off, and the swift steel shaft was invisible in its passage. Only the
dead leaves, with which November had carpeted the narrow road, flew
about on the other side of the bough.
"Ye aimed a thought too high," said Denys.
"What a deadly thing! No wonder it is driving out the long-bow--to
Martin's much discontent."
"Ay, lad," said Denys, triumphantly, "it gains ground every day, in
spite of their laws and their proclamations to keep up the yewen bow,
because, forsooth, their grandsires shot with it, knowing no better.
You see, Gerard, war is not pastime. Men will shoot at their enemies
with the hittingest arm and the killingest, not with the longest and
missingest."
"Then these new engines I hear of will put both bows down; for these,
with a pinch of black dust and a leaden ball, and a child's finger,
shall slay you Mars and Goliath and the Seven Champions."
"Pooh! pooh!" said Denys, warmly; "petrone nor harquebuss shall
ever put down Sir Arbalest. Why, we can shoot ten times while they
are putting their charcoal and their lead into their leathern smoke
belchers, and then kindling their matches. All that is too fumbling for
the field of battle; there a soldier's weapon needs be aye ready, like
his heart."
Gerard did not answer, for his ear was attracted by a sound behind
them. It was a peculiar sound, too, like something heavy, but not hard,
rushing softly over the dead leaves. He turned round with some little
curiosity. A colossal creature was coming down the road at about sixty
paces distance.
He looked at it in a sort of calm stupor at first; but the next moment
he turned ashy pale.
"Denys!" he cried. "O God! Denys!"
Denys whirled round.
It was a bear as big as a cart horse.
It was tearing along with its huge head down, running on a hot scent.
The very moment he saw it, Denys said in a sickening whisper:
"The cub!"
Oh! the concentrated horror of that one word, whispered hoarsely, with
dilating eyes! For in that syllable it all flashed upon them both
like a sudden stroke of lightning in the dark--the bloody trail, the
murdered cub, the mother upon them, and it. DEATH.
All this in a moment of time. The next she saw them. Huge as she was,
she seemed to double herself (it was her long hair bristling with
rage); she raised her head big as a bull's, her swine-shaped jaws
opened wide at them, her eyes turned to blood and flame, and she rushed
upon them, scattering the leaves about her like a whirlwind as she came.
"Shoot!" screamed Denys, but Gerard stood shaking from head to foot,
useless.
"Shoot, man! ten thousand devils, shoot! Too late! Tree! tree!" and he
dropped the cub, pushed Gerard across the road, and flew to the first
tree and climbed it, Gerard the same on his side; and, as they fled,
both men uttered inhuman howls like savage creatures grazed by death.
With all their speed one or other would have been torn to fragments at
the foot of his tree; but the bear stopped a moment at the cub.
Without taking her bloodshot eyes off those she was hunting, she smelt
it all round, and found, how, her Creator only knows, that it was dead,
quite dead. She gave a yell such as neither of the hunted ones had ever
heard, nor dreamed to be in nature, and flew after Denys. She reared
and struck at him as he climbed. He was just out of reach.
Instantly she seized the tree, and with her huge teeth tore a great
piece out of it with a crash. Then she reared again, dug her claws deep
into the bark and began to mount it slowly, but as surely as a monkey.
Denys's evil star had led him to a dead tree, a mere shaft, and of no
very great height. He climbed faster than his pursuer, and was soon at
the top. He looked this way and that for some bough of another tree
to spring to. There was none; and if he jumped down he knew the bear
would be upon him ere he could recover the fall, and make short work of
him. Moreover, Denys was little used to turning his back on danger, and
his blood was rising at being hunted. He turned to bay.
"My hour is come," thought he. "Let me meet death like a man." He
kneeled down and grasped a small shoot to steady himself, drew his long
knife, and clenching his teeth, prepared to job the huge brute as soon
as it should mount within reach.
Of this combat the result was not doubtful.
The monster's head and neck were scarce vulnerable for bone and masses
of hair. The man was going to sting the bear, and the bear to crack the
man like a nut.
Gerard's heart was better than his nerves. He saw his friend's mortal
danger, and passed at once from fear to blindish rage. He slipped down
his tree in a moment, caught up the cross-bow which he had dropped in
the road, and, running furiously up, sent a bolt into the bear's body
with a loud shout. The bear gave a snarl of rage and pain and turned
its head irresolutely.
"Keep aloof," cried Denys, "or you are a dead man."
"I care not," and in a moment he had another bolt ready and shot it
fiercely into the bear, screaming "Take that! that! that!"
Denys poured a volley of oaths down at him. "Get away, idiot!"
He was right; the bear finding so formidable and noisy a foe behind
him, slipped growling down the tree, rending deep furrows in it as
she slipped. Gerard ran back to his tree and climbed it swiftly. But
while his legs were dangling some eight feet from the ground the bear
came rearing and struck with her forepaw, and out flew a piece of
bloody cloth from Gerard's hose. He climbed and climbed, and presently
he heard as it were in the air a voice say, "Go out on the bough!" He
looked, and there was a long massive branch before him shooting upwards
at a slight angle; he threw his body across it, and by a series of
convulsive efforts worked up it to the end.
Then he looked round panting.
The bear was mounting the tree on the other side. He heard her claws
scrape; and saw her bulge on both sides of the massive tree. Her eye
not being very quick, she reached the fork and passed it, mounting the
main stem. Gerard drew breath more freely. The bear either heard him or
found by scent she was wrong; she paused; presently she caught sight of
him. She eyed him steadily, then quietly descended to the fork.
Slowly and cautiously she stretched out a paw and tried the bough. It
was a stiff oak branch, sound as iron. Instinct taught the creature
this; it crawled carefully out on the bough, growling savagely as it
came.
Gerard looked wildly down. He was forty feet from the ground. Death
below. Death moving slow but sure on him in a still more horrible
form. His hair bristled. The sweat poured from him. He sat helpless,
fascinated, tongue-tied.
As the fearful monster crawled growling towards him, incongruous
thoughts coursed through his mind. Margaret, the Vulgate, where it
speaks of the rage of a she-bear robbed of her whelps--Rome--Eternity.
The bear crawled on. And now the stupor of death fell on the doomed
man; he saw the open jaws and bloodshot eyes coming, but in a mist.
As in a mist he heard a twang; he glanced down; Denys, white and silent
as death, was shooting up at the bear. The bear snarled at the twang;
but crawled on. Again the cross-bow twanged; and the bear snarled and
came nearer. Again the cross-bow twanged, and the next moment the bear
was close upon Gerard, where he sat, with hair standing stiff on end,
and eyes starting from their sockets, palsied. The bear opened her jaws
like a grave, and hot blood spouted from them upon Gerard as from a
pump. The bough rocked. The wounded monster was reeling; it clung, it
stuck its sickles of claws deep into the wood; it toppled, its claws
held firm, but its body rolled off, and the sudden shock to the branch
shook Gerard forward on his stomach with his face upon one of the
bear's straining paws. At this, by a convulsive effort, she raised her
head up, up, till he felt her hot fetid breath. Then huge teeth snapped
together loudly close below him in the air, with a last effort of
baffled hate. The ponderous carcass rent the claws out of the boughs;
then pounded the earth with a tremendous thump. There was a shout of
triumph below, and the very next instant a cry of dismay, for Gerard
had swooned, and, without an attempt to save himself, rolled headlong
from the perilous height.
Denys caught at Gerard and somewhat checked his fall; but it may be
doubted whether this alone would have saved him from breaking his neck
or a limb. His best friend now was the dying bear, on whose hairy
carcass his head and shoulders descended. Denys tore him off her. It
was needless. She panted still, and her limbs quivered, but a hare was
not so harmless; and soon she breathed her last, and the judicious
Denys propped Gerard up against her, being soft, and fanned him. He
came to by degrees, but confused, and feeling the bear all round him,
rolled away, yelling.
"Courage," cried Denys, "_le diable est mort_."
"Is it dead, quite dead?" inquired Gerard from behind a tree; for his
courage was feverish, and the cold fit was on him just now, and had
been for some time.
"Behold," said Denys, and pulled the brute's ear playfully, and opened
her jaws and put in his head, with other insulting antics; in the midst
of which Gerard was violently sick.
Denys laughed at him.
"What is the matter now?" said he; "also, why tumble off your perch
just when we had won the day?"
"I swooned, I trow."
"But why?"
Not receiving an answer, he continued, "Green girls faint as soon as
look at you, but then they choose time and place. What woman ever
fainted up a tree?"
"She sent her nasty blood all over me. I think the smell must have
overpowered me. Faugh! I hate blood."
"I do believe it potently."
"See what a mess she has made me!"
"But with her blood, not yours. I pity the enemy that strives to
satisfy you."
"You need not to brag, Maitre Denys; I saw you under the tree, the
color of your shirt."
"Let us distinguish," said Denys coloring; "it is permitted to tremble
for a friend."
Gerard, for answer, flung his arm around Denys's neck in silence.
--Charles Reade.
From "The Cloister and the Hearth."
=The Secret of the Jade Tlaloc=
"If only this paper on jade were finished!" sighed tall,
dignified, blond Dolores. "These notes sound so interesting. 'Jade
implements,'" she read, "'found in Mexico--source of mineral not yet
discovered--theory that implements are relics of Eastern invasion
disproved--jade said to exist in America,' My! I do think jade is the
most delightful subject for investigation."
"Um-m!" Elsa, who, like her Spanish mother, was small, quick, dark,
and adventure-loving, did not consider jade a particularly fascinating
topic for study. "Now if--we--a--we--a----" she ruminated.
"If we--a----?" Dolores's sentences were always clearly thought out
before she spoke them.
"If we--a--now if we could finish that paper, we might be able to
sell it, you know," Elsa went on. "We certainly haven't an enviably
large fortune." She reached into one of the dark pigeon-holes of her
father's ponderous desk. "Ook-ook!" she pursed up her full red lips,
as she held a yellow scroll from her and gingerly flicked away the
dust which had collected upon it since her father's death. "Now here's
what I call interesting. An old letter or something, written on
agave-leaf paper." From their long association with their father in his
archeological researches, the girls had gained a more than superficial
knowledge of Aztec customs and antiquities. "'We, the Aztecs, are a
proud race,'" she readily translated. "'It is not for the Spaniards to
glory in complete victory over us, for though they have conquered our
bodies, they have not conquered our spirits. Well may they rejoice in
the ruining of our beautiful cities. But when they search, and search
in vain, for the wealth which they know has been ours, how they will
rage! But their anger shall be as vain as their searching. Those of
us who are left will not see the invaders glorying in what was once
the splendor of the Aztecs. Rather will we bury, and hide from all
future generations, if need be, the secrets of our riches. It is that
my descendants may one day scoff at the descendants of those who have
made me, who was a prince, a slave, that I am making this record. Among
the mountains which the Spaniards have called the "Corderillas" is one
in whose top is a hole of great depth, from which it is said, there
once flowed streams of liquid fire, the vengeance of the gods upon
the people. This mountain stands between two sister mountains of far
greater height than itself, and is near the middle of the range.' Why,
that might be Ahualtaper, right near here." Elsa had the topography of
the country around their home very clearly mapped out in her mind.
Dolores nodded. "Go on," she said.
"'Half-way up the side which faces the rising sun,'" Elsa continued,
"'is a ledge, upon which is a rock, apparently one with the
mountainside, and in which, when viewed from a distance, can be seen a
resemblance to the cross of Tlaloc. One day a descendant of mine will
find and displace this rock; whereupon, the entrance to the tomb of my
ancestors will be revealed. There are many such tombs and many such
mountains as those which I have described, but which I have not named.
However, in the particular burial place to which I refer is a jade
image of the god Tlaloc. It is studded with valuable turquoise. Where
this image is found will also be found what should be the source of
untold wealth to the discoverer.
"'In warning, let me say that none but the eldest son of a family must
ever know of this document; and should he be tempted, ever, to part
with it, let him remember that bodily want is preferable to the curses
of the dead!'"
The two girls remained silent for a few moments. "Well," asked Elsa, at
last, "what do you think of that?"
Dolores turned again to the desk. "It is interesting," she replied,
"but of what use can it ever be to us? We could never find the place.
Why, we've been in dozens of burial grottos already, and they are all
pretty much alike." She opened another drawer. "Here is father's diary."
The book fell open at the page upon which the last entry had been
made. "'May 15'--the day father became ill--'poor wrinkled old Gomez
died today,'" she read. "'He wanted to give me information about a
jade Tlaloc, some famous image which has been lost. He tried with his
last breath to do me the service of aiding me in my research. He gave
me also a very ancient manuscript. I do not know where he got it. I
hardly feel equal, to-night, to the task of translating it. Perhaps
Elsa will do the translation tomorrow. If I could find such an idol, it
would be of great value to me in my treatise on jade.'"
Elsa waited long enough only for Dolores to stop reading. "Dolores, we
must find that idol."
Dolores looked gravely at her sister. "This is really a serious matter,
Elsa. It would save us from the necessity of working if we could find
it. But how can you and I alone accomplish anything? We should have to
go into the mountains, and have a donkey, and camp in the open air,
and----"
"Well," Elsa impatiently interrupted the enumeration of objections,
"what of that? You and father and I used often to go into the
mountains, and have a donkey, and camp in the open air; and father
always depended more upon us than we upon him. You think it over while
I get tea." Elsa left her sister sitting alone and looking out of the
study windows to the solemn rugged Corderillas.
Dolores did consider the matter, with the result that, after a few
weeks of study, of consulting maps and plans, and of preparation for
the journey, the sisters were ready to begin the daring exploit whose
aim was to complete the investigations which their father had begun.
Clad in rough, unsightly denim, and leading a burro which carried a
very considerable store of provisions, they clambered up the jagged
sides of Ahualtapec; they tore their way through thickets and fell upon
cacti.
"We're lost," panted Dolores, finally, as she pulled the many thorns
from her clothing. "Elsa, we're lost."
They had stopped, at about noon on the tenth day of their trip, to
rest, and again to consult their maps.
Elsa stood upon a ledge and looked across to where, between two lofty
mountains, rising to the south of Ahualtapec, a smaller rock mass
showed itself, like a much overgrown hill-the shell of a long extinct
volcano, and a very counterpart of Ahualtapec.
"Dolores," she pointed straight before her, "do you remember? A stone
in which, when viewed from a distance, can be seen a resemblance to the
cross of Tlaloc?"
"Oh, dear," complained Dolores, dejectedly, "and all this time wasted!"
"Now, Dolores!" small Elsa turned about determinedly, "you ought to
shout for joy, for that certainly must be it. The rocks are bare around
that spot, and you can see it plainly from here. It's on a ledge, too,
just like the one we're on. We will start this very minute, Dolores."
Delaying long enough only for Elsa, who had a fine sense of location,
to impress upon her mind the position of the cross, they began once
more the tedious scrambling, tearing, tumbling down slopes and up
slopes, across streams and through, streams; but they did not lose
themselves again.
"Do you suppose," Dolores anxiously asked, "that we can ever move it?"
as she saw how the ages had packed, and hardened the damp soil about
the base of the boulder.
"We must." Elsa was resolved not to be defeated. "We absolutely must,"
she reiterated.
"How?" demanded Dolores.
Elsa's reply was to unstrap a bag from the burro's back, to take from
it two trowels, and silently to offer one to Dolores. No explanation
was necessary. For five days the girls scraped and dug away the
hardened soil from the lower part of the cross-shaped stone, until at
last the block began to tremble as though about to fall.
"Dolores! Dolores! It's top heavy, bless it!" Elsa was
enthusiastically, insanely happy.
The fact that the stone was top-heavy made it possible for the girls,
by dint of much tugging, heaving, and pushing, to roll it over the
ledge, and to send it bumping down the mountainside. A narrow passage,
wide enough to admit only one at a time, was thus opened. Pine torches
were lit. Even Dolores was excited. They squeezed into the entrance,
Elsa first. They rushed through the short tunnel, until, at the end,
Elsa stumbled and sank to her knees.
"Oh, my! Dolores, just look!" she was holding her torch down to see
what had caused her fall. "It's it," she remarked, disregarding
rhetoric, while she pointed to a small turquoise-studded image of
Tlaloc, the Neptune of the Aztecs.
The girls carried the idol into the little ante-room which was always
a part of the burial grotto of an Aztec noble family. How pleasant,
how cool, and damp it seemed in here, after their hot toil outside.
The sisters had been in too many tombs to know any fear, to have any
feeling of the presence of the dead. Their own breathing sounded loud
and labored amid the silence of the cave.
Dolores sat down on the moist floor, and examined the statues; she was
thinking of the treasure; but Elsa, now that she was sure of finding
the gold, or the jewels, or whatever the promise might have meant,
desired to explore the grotto.
From the little ante-room she passed into the larger chamber. Here, for
the first time, she felt chilled; she seemed so alone. She was sure she
felt a ghost whisper near her. Her feet slipped on the wet earth. On
the further side of the tomb she saw upon the ground an urn, on which
rested a skull. By the shape of the urn and by the arrangement of the
ornaments above it Elsa knew that it contained the ashes of a warrior.
A drop of water splashed down from the ceiling and aroused her. She
held her torch aloft. She looked unbelievingly at the roof. Then she
walked slowly around the room, wonderingly, feeling and scrutinizing
the walls.
"Dolores!" she called, "come quick!"
Dolores was not long in coming.
"And here is also what should be the source of untold wealth to the
discoverer," Elsa was murmuring. "Dolores, do you see that green, that
dull gray? How it shines? Don't you know, Dolores? It's jade, royal
jade, Dolores!"
--Dorothea Knoblock.
II. The Society Story
[What the society story is]
Society stories are those non-consequential narratives of modern
fashionable life which have in their very lightness their sole excuse
for being. They are set up as only partial reflections of the actual.
Since their chief purpose is to please, they have no studied realism
in them. All things intense and unattractive are omitted. If trouble
appears, it is but as "sweet bells jangled out of tune and harsh," as
one of their authors might promptly quote, and everything is brought to
harmonize with everything else at last. Richard Harding Davis for his
"Van Bibber" tales seems to have found a wide public.
[The pastoral romance]
An older representative of the society story is the pastoral romance,
once a very popular form of the love tale. In it we have a picture of
country life, but it is not the hard, toil-beleaguered life of the real
peasant. It is the imaginary out-of-doors living-for-a-few-days of the
courtier who masquerades as a shepherd and sits cavalierly on a grassy
bank with a golden crook in his hand, sighing out his heart in silvery
madrigals. His lady-love is no ordinary milk-maid, but a courtly
princess on vacation. In this romantic land of shepherd loves, nothing
realistic enters. The talk in even the first examples is philosophic
and in the later becomes euphuistic as well. The critics maintain that
the pastoral romance as a type does not go more than ten years back of
the middle of the fourteenth century, although we have "Aucassin and
Nicolette" of the thirteenth and "Daphnis and Chloe" of the fifth. The
prime fact of the history of the pastoral romance as a society story
is that it grew up as a revolt against the licentious realism of the
Italian novellieri. The "Arcadia" by Sannazaro, written about 1500, is
the book that made the epoch and established the rule for pastoral
romance in all languages. Sannazaro took what had been foreshadowed
by Boccaccio in the "Ameto" in 1340, and, enriching it with elements
derived from Theocritus and Virgil, created the "perfect" example. From
Sannazaro, Sir Philip Sidney borrowed the spirit, many episodes, and
part of the name for his notable combination of prose and verse--the
"Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia." Shakespeare, too, derived much from
this important Italian book. For one thing, he took the name Ophelia;
for another, his charming society pastoral drama "As You Like It" goes
historically back to Sannazaro's "Arcadia" for its lyrics, out-of-doors
courting, its real shepherds, its obvious love of nature, its touch of
magic, and its wholesome morality. The lack of allegorical significance
is also straight example from Sannazaro; but the love chain, the
disguised shepherd princesses, the humorous element in connection
with the coarse shepherds, a touch of adventure, and the cavalier
tone are of later Spanish and English contamination, immediately
through Lodge's prose romance "Rosalynd," and more remotely through
Greene's three pastorals--"England's Mourning Garment," "Menaphon,"
and "Pandosto,"--and through Cervantes's "Galatea" and Montemayor's
"Diana," and Ribeyro's Portuguese "Fragments."
Though the pastoral romance, as we notice, became more and more
artificial, it always remained pure in tone. It centered itself in
idealism and stood against the low, utterly debased, more realistic
novella, which was its predecessor and continued rival for popularity.
The pastoral held the field as the chief and most influential prose
form in Spain until the picaresque romance came to be recognized as a
distinct genre.
[Suggestions for writing]
To write a modern society story that will be worth while is no easy
task; for here an author readily descends to banalities, and the class
itself is hardly acceptable to the serious critic. Yet stories of
this kind are so popular and form (I am sorry to say) so large a part
of the reading of our young women--and our young men, too, for that
matter--that the type surely has come to stay for sometime and must be
taken account of. To make your story commendable, then, you will need
to be original and striking in your choice of situation and to write
with a succinctness and verve that will animate even the commonplace.
Be careful not to be sentimental. If you touch on love, do so with
dignity--with either clean, pure humor, or unaffected seriousness.
Try hard to save your hero from being a cad. The namby-pamby,
third-generation-millionaire protagonist, if not altogether
uninteresting, is surely exasperating to a sensible reader. By playful
imitation, you might write a good satire on this class of story. If you
do so, you will need to be familiar with one or more of the popular
examples in order to use them specifically. Or you might try your hand
at a pastoral, just for the history of the thing. If you care to adhere
to certain elements of the genre, you could put together under this
guise allegorical scenes in which the present lords of the earth figure
as weak or lusty shepherds piping a tune to the watch-dogs of war, the
sheep of commerce, and the Goddess of Getting-On. If you wish to be
more than half serious, you can find countenance in a number of our
most recent light stories that undoubtedly turn toward the pastoral.
This type, too, will give you a chance at a mixture of prose and verse.
Here you can put in some of those fetching sylvan lyrics that you must
have composed long before now and have always been afraid to mention.
=The Fur Coat=
Translated by Mrs. J. M. Lancaster. Copyright, 1903, by The Current
Literature Publishing Company. Reprinted by permission.
_Prof. Max Wiegand to Dr. Gustav Strauch_
BERLIN, November 20.
DEAR GUSTAV--I have some news to tell you to-day which will certainly
surprise you. I have separated from my wife, or rather we have
separated from each other. We have come to an amicable agreement
henceforth to live entirely independent of each other. My wife has gone
to her family in Freiburg, where she will no doubt remain. I am for
the present in our old house; perhaps in the spring I may look for a
smaller house--perhaps not, for I can hardly hope to find so quiet a
workroom as I now have, and the idea of moving appals me, especially
when I think of my large library. You will, of course, want to know
what has happened, though, to tell the truth, nothing has happened.
The world will seek for all possible and impossible reasons why two
people who married for love and who have for eleven years lived what
is called happily together should now have decided to part. Yes, this
world which thinks itself so wise, but whose judgments are nevertheless
so petty, so superficial, will doubtless be of the opinion that there
is something hidden--will include this case too in one of the two great
categories prepared for such affairs, because it can not conceive of
the fact that life in its inexhaustible variety never repeats itself
and that the same circumstances may assume different aspects according
to the character and disposition of those interested. I need not tell
you this, my dear Gustav. You will understand how two finely organized
natures should rebel against a tie which binds them together after they
have once become fully convinced that in all matters of real importance
a mutual understanding is possible.
My wife and I are too unlike. Between her views of life and mine there
yawns an impassable gulf. The first few years I hoped to influence
her, to win her to my ways of thinking--she seemed so docile, so
yielding, took so warm an interest in my work, so willingly allowed
herself to be taught by me. Not till after our children's death did
she begin to change. Her grief at this loss--a grief which neither of
us has ever been able to live down--matured her, made her independent
of me. A tendency to morbid introspection took possession of her,
and gave increased tenacity to those ideas and convictions which my
influence had hitherto held in check, though not wholly eradicated. She
plunged deeper and deeper into those mists of sentimentally fantastic
imaginings, passionately demanding my concurrence in her views. She
lost all interest in my professional work, evidently regarding the
results of my researches in natural science as troops from an enemy's
camp. At last there was hardly a subject in the wide realm of nature
and human existence on which we agreed. To be sure we never came to
an open quarrel, but the breach between us was constantly widening.
Every day we saw more and more plainly that though we lived side by
side, we no longer belonged to each other. This discovery irritated
and distressed us, and at last forced all other feelings into the
background. If we had not once loved each other so dearly, or even
if we had now ceased to feel a mutual respect, this state of affairs
might perhaps have lasted for years, but our ideas of the true meaning
of marriage were too lofty, our sense of our own dignity as human
beings too profound to permit us to be content with so incomplete a
realization of our ideals. I hardly know who spoke first, but our
resolution was at once taken, and the decisive words uttered as calmly
and naturally as the overripe fruit falls from the tree. For the first
time in many years we were able with perfect unanimity of sentiment
to discuss a subject of the greatest importance to us both, and this
fact alone soothed our overwrought nerves. We parted yesterday with the
utmost decorum, without a word of reproach, a note of discord.
The many beautiful memories of our early married life, of the long
years we had lived together, made it difficult to refrain from some
manifestation of tenderness, and I assure you that I never felt greater
respect for my wife than at the moment when, all petty considerations
cast aside, the true magnanimity of her nature asserted itself. Her
manner, what she said, and also what she did not say, robbed the
situation of all trace of the commonplace, and gave it dignity. Deeply
moved, almost in tears, we clasped hands in farewell, so we may
look back upon the closing scene of our wedded life with unalloyed
satisfaction.
I had already, with her consent, referred all business details to our
lawyers, for we were not even to communicate with each other by letter.
Life must begin again for both of us, and already I breathe more
freely. The Rubicon is passed. I believe that you will congratulate me.
_Prof. Max Wiegand to Dr. Gustav Strauch_
BERLIN, December 12.
DEAR GUSTAV--Pardon me that I have so long delayed thanking you for
your answer of friendly sympathy to my last letter.
I have been in no condition to write, and even now find it difficult.
You congratulate me without reserve on a step which you regard as
essential to my welfare and to my intellectual development, but you do
not take into consideration what it means to separate from one who has
for eleven years been one's constant companion, day and night. Indeed,
it is only during these last dreary weeks that I, myself, have realized
what the change signifies to me. Habit is all powerful, especially with
men who, like you and me, live in the intellectual world and so require
a solid sub-structure.
How are we to take observations from the tower battlements when its
foundations are not firmly established? Of course, I am as certain as
ever I was that our decision is for the best interests of us both, but
in this queer world of ours we can take no step without unlooked-for
results.
I am bothered from morn till night with trifles to which I have never
given a thought since my bachelor days--things which I will not
mention, so absurdly insignificant are they--and yet they rob me of my
time and destroy my peace. I am at a loss what steps to take to rid
myself of the thousand petty cares and annoyances which my wife has
hitherto borne for me. These servants! Now that the cat is away they
think that they can do just as they please, and you have no idea of the
silly obstacles over which I am continually stumbling, of the wretched
pitfalls which beset my path. Here is one instance out of many: For
several days it has been very cold, and I can not find my fur coat.
With the chambermaid's assistance I have turned the whole house upside
down, until she finally remembered that my wife, last spring, sent it
to a furrier's to be kept from the moth. But to which furrier? I have
been to a dozen and can not find it.
If I had only not agreed with my wife that we were, under no
circumstances, to write to each other, I should simply ask her--but
it is best so. No strain of the commonplace must mingle with the sad
echoes of our farewell. No--a farce never follows a drama. Perhaps she
might even imagine that I seize the first pretext to renew relations
with her.
Never!
To-day it is six below zero.
_Prof. Max Wiegand to Frau Emma Wiegand_
BERLIN, December 14.
DEAR EMMA--You will be greatly surprised at receiving a letter from
me in spite of our mutual agreement, but do not fear that I have
any intention of opening a correspondence with you. Our relations
terminated with all possible dignity, and the sealed door shall never
be re-opened. I have but to ask a simple question which you alone
can answer. What is the name of the man to whom you sent my fur coat
last spring? Lina has forgotten the address. Hoping soon to receive an
answer, for which I thank you in advance,
MAX.
_Frau Emma Wiegand to Prof. Max Wiegand_
FREIBURG, December 15.
DEAR MAX--His name is Palaschke, and he is on Zimmer Street. I can not
understand Lina's forgetfulness, as she took the coat there herself.
EMMA.
_Prof. Max Wiegand to Frau Emma Wiegand_
BERLIN, December 17.
DEAR EMMA--I must trouble you once more--for the last time. Herr
Palaschke refuses to let the coat go without the ticket, as he has had
several disagreeable experiences which have made it necessary to be
very strict. But where is the ticket? I spent the whole morning looking
for it, and, of course, Lina has not the slightest idea where it is.
She flew into a rage when I found a little fault with her, and she
leaves the house to-morrow. I prefer paying her till the end of her
engagement, and in addition shall give her a moderate Christmas gift,
for I can not stand for a great length of time such an impertinent
person about me.
Well--be so kind as to write me a line telling me where to find the
ticket. I have already taken a severe cold for want of the fur coat.
Hoping that you are well and quite comfortable with your family.
MAX.
_Frau Emma Wiegand to Prof. Max Wiegand_
FREIBURG, December 19.
DEAR MAX--The ticket is either in the second or third upper drawer of
the little wardrobe in the dressing-room or in my desk, in the right or
left pigeon-hole. I could find it in a minute if I were there. Lina has
great faults, but she is very respectable. I doubt whether you can do
better, and now, just before Christmas, you will not be able to replace
her. You should have put up with her at least a fortnight longer, but
it is none of my business. I hope your cold is better. I am quite well.
EMMA.
_Prof. Max Wiegand to Frau Emma Wiegand_
BERLIN, December 21.
DEAR EMMA--The ticket is not to be found either in the wardrobe or in
the desk. Perhaps it slipped out when you were packing, and was thrown
away. I can think of no other explanation.
To-morrow or next day I will again go to Herr Palaschke, and try to
wheedle him out of my property by all possible blandishments and
assurances, but to-day I am confined to my room, for my cold has
resulted in a severe attack of neuralgia.
I had a dreadful scene with the cook yesterday. On the day of your
departure she gave me notice, and when I tried to persuade her to
remain she turned on me and told me in a very insolent manner that I
knew nothing about house-keeping, and that it was only out of sympathy
for you, dear Emma, that she had so long remained with us at such low
wages, and that she should leave immediately. I answered calmly, but
firmly, that she must stay till the end of her engagement. Then she
began to cry and storm, and at last was so outrageously impertinent as
to declare that even _you_ could not manage to live with me. I lost
my temper and must, I suppose, have called her an "impudent woman,"
though I can not remember saying it. Unfortunately for me I have had no
experience in dealing with viragos.
Two hours later, after supper, I rang and discovered that she was
already gone, bag and baggage, leaving in the kitchen a badly spelled
_billet doux_, in which she threatened me with a lawsuit for calling
her an "impudent woman," in case I should refuse to give her a
certificate of character.
I am now entirely without servants. The porter's wife blacks my shoes
for a handsome consideration, and brings me from the café meals which
ought to be condemned by the health inspector. As you have truly
remarked, it will be impossible to replace these women before the New
Year, but I have already written to a dozen employment bureaus, and
will go myself as soon as I am able to leave the house. This has grown
into a long letter, my dear Emma, but when the heart is full the pen
runs rapidly.
I also suspect that abominable cook of taking my gold sleeve
buttons--those left me by Uncle Friedrich--though I have, of course, no
proof. Have you any idea where they are? If so please drop me a line.
Good-by, my dear Emma, and I trust you are more comfortable than I am.
Your MAX.
_Frau Emma Wiegand to Prof. Max Wiegand_
FREIBURG, December 23.
DEAR MAX--I have read with much sympathy your account of your little
mishaps and annoyances. The cook often spoke to me very much as she
did to you, but I put up with it because she is a good cook, and only
cooks who know nothing are polite. Now you see what I have had to stand
for years, and that there are problems in that department also which
can not be solved by natural science.
I can not, at this instance, advise you what to do, and should not
consider myself justified in doing so now that our intimate relations
have been terminated in so dignified a manner, as you so truly remark
in your first letter. As for the furrier's ticket and the sleeve
buttons, I will wager that I could find them both in five minutes. You
_must_ remember how often you have hunted in vain for a thing which I
have found at the first attempt. Men occasionally discover a new truth
but never an old button.
Since a correspondence has been begun by you, I have a little request
to make. I forgot before I left to ask you for the letters which you
wrote me during our engagement, and which at my request you put in
your safe. They are my property, and I should like to have them as a
reminder of happier days. Will you be so kind as to send them to me?
Wishing you a Merry Christmas,
EMMA.
_Prof. Max Wiegand to Frau Emma Wiegand_
BERLIN, December 25.
MY DEAR EMMA--Your kind wish that I might have a Merry Christmas has
not been fulfilled. I never spent so melancholy a Christmas Eve. You
will not wonder that I could not bear to accept the invitations of
friends--to be a looker-on at family rejoicings--so I stayed at home,
entirely alone. I found it utterly impossible to get a servant before
New Year's, and yesterday was even without a helper from outside.
The porter's wife put a cold supper on the table for me early in the
afternoon, for she was too busy later with Christmas preparations for
her children. A smoky oil lamp took the place of the Christmas tree
which you always adorned so charmingly and with such exquisite taste
every year, and there were none of those pretty surprises by which
you supplied my wants and wishes almost before I was conscious of
them. There was nothing on the Christmas table but my old fur coat,
which Herr Palaschke--softened by my entreaties and assurances and
perhaps also by the spirit of Christmastide--had allowed me to take the
preceding day. It was as cold as charity in the room, for the fire had
gone out and it was beyond my skill to rekindle it, so I put on the fur
coat, sat down by the smoky lamp, and read over the letters which I
wrote you during the time of our engagement and which I had taken from
their eleven years' resting-place to send to you to-day.
Dear Emma, I can not tell you how they have moved me. I cried like a
child, not over the tragic ending of our marriage alone, but at the
change in myself which I recognize. They are very immature and in many
ways not in accordance with my present way of thinking, but what a
fresh, frank, warm-blooded fellow I was then, and how I loved you! How
happy I was! How artlessly and unreservedly did I give myself up to my
happiness! Till now I have thought that there has been a gradual, slow
change in you alone, but now I see that I also have altered, and God
knows, when I compare the Max of those days with the Max of to-day, I
do not know to which to give the preference. In the sleepless nights
which I have lately spent, I have thought over the possibility of
transforming myself into the Max I then was, and grave doubts have
suggested themselves whether the differences in our views of matters
and things were really as great as they seemed to us, whether there
is not outside of them something eternally human, some neutral ground
where we might continue to have interests in common.
Try and see, dear Emma, whether such a voice does not speak also to
your soul. We can not undo the past, but nothing could give me greater
consolation in my present unhappy condition than to know that you could
say yes to this question, for your departure has left a void in my
house and in my life that I can never, never fill.
Thy most unhappy MAX.
_Frau Emma Wiegand to Prof. Max Wiegand_
FREIBURG, December 27.
DEAR MAX--I very willingly gave you information as long as it related
only to tickets and sleeve buttons, but I must decline answering the
question contained in your last letter. Did you really believe, you
old Pedant, that I left your home--which was also mine--because we
disagreed in our views of matters and things in general? Then you are
mightily mistaken. I left you because I saw more plainly every day that
you no longer loved me. Yes, I had become a burden to you--you wanted
to get rid of me. If in that dignified parting scene you had said one
single tender word to me, I should probably have stayed, but, as usual,
you were on your high horse, from which you have now had so lamentable
a tumble just because your servants have left you. _I_ too have served
you faithfully, though you do not seem to have recognized that fact.
_I_ never let the fire go out on your hearth. It was not _my_ fault
when it grew cold.
Who knows whether you would have noticed the void left by my going if
your fur coat had not also been missing? This gave you an opportunity
of opening a correspondence with me, and it seems to be only fitting
that it should now close, since you have once more regained possession
of your property. I, at least, have nothing more to say.
Good-by forever,
EMMA.
_Prof. Max Wiegand to Dr. Gustav Strauch_
BERLIN, January 8.
DEAR GUSTAV--I have a great piece of news to tell you. My wife
returned to me yesterday, and at my earnest solicitation. I thought
I could no longer live _with_ her, but I find it equally impossible
to live _without_ her. I have just discovered that she too was very
unhappy during the time of our separation, but she would never have
acknowledged it, for hers is the stronger character of the two. I do
not know how to explain the miracle, but we love each other more dearly
than ever. We are celebrating a new honeymoon. The great questions of
life drove us apart, but is it only the little ones which have reunited
us? Would you suppose that one could find a half-desiccated heart
in the pocket of an old fur coat? The stately edifice of my worldly
knowledge totters on its foundations, dear Gustav. I have a great deal
to unlearn.
MAX.
--Ludwig Fulda.
=The Lady in Pink=
If I hadn't had to stop in the middle of my painting and run down to
the house to get some more rose-madder I never in the world should
have seen her; I had to leave all my things up on the hill with little
David, and on the way down to the village I passed the place.
The only thing I remember now is that I was hurrying along by a stone
wall which was higher than my head and that above it dark pines
clustered in pointed masses against a blue and white sky--it was
just the kind of sky Bougereau would have loved, with soft, opaque
clouds--when I came past the gate, and one can never go by a gate,
you know, and not look in, and it was there that I saw her. She was
sitting on a bench built under a tree--the trunk of which did for the
perpendicular in the composition and gave such a good contrast in
color, too, for she--well, there she was just sitting there with her
hands in her lap, her head against the tree and her feet out in front
of her, and oh, dreams of loveliness--her dress was pink! Think of
that! Rose pink where it touched the grass, lavender pink where it fell
in shadows, shell pink where the sun flickered on it--and in her hand
she held a kind of golden straw hat, and that was just dripping with
roses, and they were the pinkest of all. Oh! it was a picture for the
gods. I made quick work of my errand and hastened back to tell David
about it.
"Well, I've seen it," I announced breathlessly, coming up the slope.
"Seen what?" asked David, not stopping from his clover chain.
"My masterpiece," I answered, squirting out much more of the
rose-madder than I needed--this paltry little sketch I was working on
now would have to be finished up and gotten out of the road for real
work.
"Where?" asked David, with the laconic briefness of childhood.
"Down inside the big gate--behind the stone wall."
"Oh, that's where the Cory's live--there's a stream there, with
pollywogs in it." David's mind was beginning to wander.
"But you never saw such a study in pink in all your life--think of
it--pink dress--all different shades of pink--pink roses for the
high-note, and then pale pink repeated in the cheeks and then way off
in the background there were some pink hollyhocks." "My, oh, my," I
added to myself, stubbing gamboge into the canvass to get a sunshiny
effect, "My, oh, my--she sat there just like a Grenze--a Gainsborough
lady, now, never would have had the courage to have leaned against the
tree in that lackadaisical manner; the Lady in Pink--Whistler painted a
Lady in White--I shall paint the Lady in Pink! Tomorrow I shall begin,
David," I said, "tomorrow I am going down to get my masterpiece."
"Well, but you can't go in the Cory's to get it," said David; "that's
private grounds."
Private grounds! The words stunned me. Couldn't an artist usually go
any place he liked?
"Private grounds!" I echoed, "oh, yes; why that's so. Why, what on
earth will I do?"
"I don't know," said David, with a half-rising inflection showing an
abstract sympathy.
"Think of that! And there it all is just waiting to be painted. Why,
look here, David, how on earth did you ever get in to know there were
pollywogs?"
"Oh," said David, "the folks were away."
"Well, I will wait then till they are all away! But, good heavens,
what am I thinking about! The garden isn't what I want--it's the Lady
in Pink." I began packing up my paints--there was no use trying to do
anything more now.
"Well, at any rate, we will go down tomorrow," said I, wiping some
brushes on my handkerchief, "and maybe in the meanwhile we can think up
a way to get in."
"Oh, let's go now," suggested David, seeing that things were really
moving.
"You mean it?" I asked, rather astonished at his sudden desire for
action.
"All right, then! You fold up the camp stool and umbrella and I'll take
the box and the pallet along with me."
"Dear me! What on earth now will we ever say when we get there?" I
began on the way down the hill.
"We might ask for a glass of milk."
"Oh, no, we can't do that--it isn't in the country."
"Well, I might ask for some hollyhocks."
"Well, I guess not! The hollyhocks can't be picked--they're part of the
masterpiece."
"Then you think something yourself," and David lapsed into a
discouraged silence.
But I couldn't think of anything save that I must and would have the
lady at any cost and though I couldn't see how I was going to get it,
I had a very clear picture of myself in the garden, painting away.
"You just wait till we get there," I said to David, as we stumped down
the walk together. David was used to my enthusiasms over all sorts
of things which he usually only vaguely assented that he could see,
and though he never said much when I fell to talking about principles
of art, I liked to have him with me always when I worked, because he
had such a joyous, fresh little face. I couldn't help but catch the
sunshine of it when I did an outdoor sketch; and if I had lived in the
days when no picture was complete without a Love in it, David would
always have been the one to have posed for me.
Presently we came near the gate and, to speak truly, I was becoming a
bit fearful as to just what was going to happen, but David, eager and
anticipatory, hopped on ahead of me and peered in.
"Oh!" he called back, "there isn't anything here at all."
"Oh, isn't there?" I said; "you don't mean to say it's gone in."
"If you mean the lady, she isn't here."
And true enough, when I came up there wasn't a soul in sight. How empty
the place looked! It was just like a disappointing exhibition--here
were all the people come to see the great works, and when the door
was reached, there hung a sign which said that the management was
sorry, but the best paintings had been delayed on the way, and
wouldn't be here till tomorrow at two o'clock! I gazed at my ruined
masterpiece--the background was all there, but there was no picture,
for what moaning had broad green masses of foliage and shaded distances
apart from a contrasting center of interest, of what meaning was there
anyhow in a landscape without a human touch?
David pressed his hand on the latch of the gate and it opened for him.
I have always liked to think since that he was the one that really
opened the way there.
"Let's go in," he said in a half challenging whisper, but with eyes
pleading authority from me.
I couldn't resist. "Well, all right--it will be like Corot wandering
around in the forest of Fontainbleau--and if anybody comes----" I
didn't know what I would do, so I took my pallet in my hand fancying to
myself it would do very well for a shield against any contingent. So we
slowly walked up the winding path together.
"The pollywogs are over there," said David, pointing a slender finger
toward the house.
"You never mind them," I answered, "what we are here for is to get the
setting of this picture. My! Almost any view would do--I never saw so
many colors in all my life. Look, David, at that bust over there with
the gray-green leaves brushing up against the gray stone--oh, there
ought to be a peacock under there, to give a strong iridescent blue
note--do you suppose there is a peacock around any place?" I said,
laying down my pallet and circling my eyes with my hands so as to
localize the color masses better.
But David was sorting pebbles on the walk and so I expected no answer
from him, but was scarcely prepared for the one I did receive.
"No, there is no peacock here, but--can I do anything for you?"
I swept around and there was that radiant figure in pink, melting
into the green behind her, the soft roundness of her figure echoed
in the larger circling outlines of the trees, her brown hair the
delicate counterpart in color of the ground she stood on, and her eyes,
deep ultramarine, the concentrated blue of all the pale sky--what a
picture, what a picture! My imagination flew to grasp it, and I forgot
everything but that I must have it, swept up clean from the pallet and
made living on the canvas.
"Yes," I said, "yes--there is something you can do for me. You can stay
right there--or you can go over there and sit down, while I get you,"
and I dashed back to the gate after my paints.
When I returned she was still standing and the corners of her lips were
twitching. They were very red. I began unpacking my tubes and unfolding
my easel. "Wouldn't you like to sit on the bench over there? You have
no idea how much the tree trunk will help out the composition." And I
begged her silently.
But she stood there perfectly still and looked at me with eyes full
of question; they had a moving highlight in them, like the sun on a
wave--if I could only catch that!
"You want to get me!" she finally stammered.
"Oh, yes!" I said, "don't you see? I was walking by the gate and I saw
you, and I want you to pose for me," and then as I saw her hesitate,
"oh, surely you don't mind being gotten?" With what a terror the
thought filled me--but I had to do it somehow.
"Well--only--but why don't you paint the little boy?"
"Oh, David! Oh, I paint him in everything--he comes in the sunshine
and the blowing wind and all the feeling of movement I ever get in a
picture--and then if people are happy when they look at the picture,
that is because David was with me when I painted it. David is a little
Love."
Well, she never said a word, but I think she understood what I meant,
because she went over and sat down and called David to her and began
talking with him. I am sure I had no idea what she was saying to him,
because I set to the work then with all my might. I sketched in the
figure, and set up my pallet with plenty of color and then flew to the
brushes; it seemed as if I could work with the culminative inspiration
of all the painting I had ever done.
While I was blocking in the hat with the roses, she looked up.
"Won't you tell me what it is going to be?" she asked with the air of
having thought of the question some time before.
"Well," I replied, knowing I would have to make a step somehow,
"Whistler painted a Lady in White, so I thought I would call this the
Lady in Pink; and if it comes out and I really get you----"
"If you really get me?"
"Why, yes; if I can just catch you the way I want you; that is one of
the troubles of the artist, you know--he never really is sure whether
he is going to be able to get what he wants or----"
"Not even when he is so eager about it?"
"No, not always then," I laughed, wondering though if she didn't know
that inspiration was in truth something more than eagerness.
"Not even--when he is painting in a garden--like this?"
Her eyes were brimming with a half-concealed mirth.
"Oh, this garden is a lovely place," I answered, "but it wouldn't make
all the picture--there's got to be some spirit in it beside--a kind of
informing mood. Now it is very quiet here and you are posing for me----"
"Oh! so I must be quiet, too?"
"Yes, I suppose so," I answered boldly enough; "only, of course, a
different kind of quiet, you know; for if the garden is still, that's
because--well, there isn't anybody mowing the grass, or there isn't any
wind or--oh, the quietness of a person sitting in a garden is quite a
different thing."
She kept looking at me all the time I was saying this, and then replied
slowly:
"I see; you don't want me just to sit still."
"Certainly not," I answered. "I want you to be--"
Her eyes suddenly became dreamy, and I felt much more at ease.
"It's like David and the sunshine," she went on.
"Yes, just exactly; you are to be the spirit of the garden, the
human symbol of its mood--its real meaning," and happy that she
understood the way I felt about David, I fell to laying on the paint
in broad, easy strokes, wondering how I could ever imitate the emerald
transparency of the trees.
She did not speak again and presently my glance returned to her. She
was holding David's cap in her hand and looking out--nowhere, I guess.
I stopped my work, stepping back to study it and survey the scene.
"I'm glad you like my garden," she finally said, smiling; and such a
smile as she gave me--it was like a stream of golden haze on a white
flower, a change very subtle, and yet so striking.
"Your garden is the very best place yet I've found to work in," I
said, well pleased. "It is just as fine a place as the Forest of
Fontainebleau, and Corot did some great masterpieces there."
"Well, then, this surely ought to be your masterpiece, because,
according to your own definition, you have all the conditions just
perfect; the garden, and David----"
"Besides you," I interrupted, looking at her through the point of the
easel, hoping to see the smile again; but she had suddenly changed
her position, quite unconscious that in doing so she had spoiled the
composition. But it made no difference, for I already had the posture,
and the dress with its lavender and shell-pink lights and all the green
behind--it was all there on the canvas, and the echo of it all on my
pallet just like the memory of an overture which has played with all
the various themes; and as to the rest--ah, she had indeed given me a
glimpse of the tender mood and the stilling charm with which I wished
to finish the picture. I was quite content.
Presently a tide of yellow evening light flooded into the garden,
making the ground luminous and throwing deep shadows everywhere. I laid
down my brushes.
"I shall have to stop now," I said, "evening is coming on--I shall have
to be going," and I whistled for David.
He came running across the grass, one hand full of hollyhocks. "Oh, my
stars, David!" I exclaimed, "what have you been doing?"
"Never mind," said the lady, "you know you have been helping yourself
to things, too," and she rose and came over.
"Oh, there I am," she said lightly, looking at what I had done.
"No, indeed," I hastened to assure her, "that isn't you--yet; so far it
is a composition in pink and green, but you aren't in it. When I put
in the sunlit background, then David comes, you know, and then when I
put a gentle repose in every line of the figure, and a dreamy, tender
sweetness in the face, then I will be painting the real spirit of the
garden--don't you see?"
And then, oh, my heart, she smiled again, but this time such a smile as
no man deserves twice--and stooped and kissed David.
"He says he wants to get me for his painting, David. Shall I let him?"
"Why, hasn't he gotten you already?" asked David, tying the hollyhocks
with grass.
"Yes, I think he has," she answered slowly. "David, you are a little
Love," she added.
"Yes, isn't he, though!" I said.
--Wilma I. Ball.