THE INSTRUCTIVE GROUP
The Instructive Group is composed of those narratives whose chief
purpose is to inform the reader of certain conditions and problems of
which he ought to take intelligent account. The writer may offer a
solution, as in the moral story; or a theory, as in the pedagogical
narrative; or he may simply present the picture, as in a realistic
sketch, and leave knowledge to bring reform by the sheer natural law by
which daylight scatters the evils of darkness.
I. The Moral Story
[Distinguished from symbolic-didactic group]
The moral story must not be confused with the fable, parable, or
allegory. It is like them in that its chief purpose is to teach, but
it differs from them in not being figurative or symbolic. It is always
particular and professedly literal. Its boast is that it sticks close
to facts--the facts of "life," people's needs, if not their history. In
other words, though fictitious, it pretends to be entirely worth while
because of the concrete lesson it teaches. It sets out to show you the
evil consequences of some vice or folly or the good result of a pious
act.
The critics have never had a very cordial word for this type of
narrative: the usual smugness of it is offensive. Many old legends are
moral tales. The "Gesta Romanorum" was largely meant to instruct in
pious ways. Boccaccio, even, cares for ethical effect, when he writes
such stories as "Griselda." A modern reader is entirely out of patience
with the complacent self-righteousness of Gualtieri. Chaucer's easy
and captivating style and his true pathos and appreciation of dramatic
moments can not altogether keep down our irritation at an egregious
monster parading under the guise of a beneficent lord and a loving
husband. Our irritation, of course, is really directed not toward
Chaucer or Boccaccio, but toward the Middle Ages, that could take such
a character as this and feel no umbrage--no shadowing of the brute over
man.
[Hawthorne]
There have been a number of examples of moral tales in modern
literature. Hawthorne's "Ambitious Guest" is one. "Lady Eleanor's
Mantle" is another, though it is also a legend; for a moral narrative,
just as an occasional narrative, may be of any type the author chooses.
"Murad the Unlucky" by Maria Edgeworth is the Oriental wonder tale
turned didactic. What makes this or that a story with a moral is
the author's obvious concern about the lesson he means to teach.
His narrative is nothing in itself: it is what it is because of the
author's purpose. [Stowe] Doubtless the most widely influential moral
story ever written is "Uncle Tom's Cabin." It is a striking example of
how much more powerful is concrete narrative than abstract argument.
The Americans were ready for the sermon, but they never would have
listened to it from the pages of a controversial tract. A story,
they took to their heads and their hearts. It is the fate of moral
narratives of this sort, however, to be for the time only; and seldom
do any rise to the plane of real literature. "Rasselas" has endured
partly because of the fame of its great author, and partly because of
its high and true pessimism. Readers naturally like pessimism, and
when it is of this good, philosophic sort, they feel justified in
their taste. [Johnson and Voltaire] The theme is Johnson's favorite
topic--the vanity of human wishes, the futility of the quest for
happiness. Voltaire's "Candide," which came out in France two weeks
before "Rasselas," is on the same topic with practically the same
moral. But Voltaire was an agnostic and a cynic, while Johnson was
a most conventional pietist. Addison and Steele as well as Johnson
included didactic stories in their periodicals. [Tolstoy, Cervantes]
Count Tolstoy, in his desire to help his countrymen, has written many
parables, allegories, and moral tales. They are read by foreigners
because of the pictures of Russian life. So are Cervantes's "Novelas
Ejemplares" read for their fresh and spritely character-pictures of
Andalusia. They are instructive moral tales, as their name indicates
and as their author very definitely asserted. So idiomatic, spirited,
and graceful are they that, though the oldest stories of their class in
Spanish literature, they are without successful rivals.
An exercise in this kind of narrative surely will not hurt you, and you
may get some benefit from it, even if the chance reader should not like
your preaching. Try, however, to make the story interesting in itself
and to have the moral seem to grow naturally out of the action, rather
than the action out of the moral. Avoid platitudes, and reveal the
customs and manners of your people so faithfully that the student of
social science might use your narrative for data.
=Jeannot and Colin=
Many trustworthy persons can vouch for having seen Jeannot and Colin
when they went to school at Issoire in Auvergne, a town famous all
over the world for its college and its kettles. Jeannot was the son
of a dealer in mules, a man of considerable reputation; Colin owed
his existence to a worthy husbandman who dwelt on the outskirts of
the town, and cultivated his farm with the help of four mules, and
who, after paying tolls and tallage, scutage and salt duty, poundage,
poll-tax, and tithes, did not find himself particularly well off at the
end of the year.
Jeannot and Colin were very handsome lads for natives of Auvergne;
they were much attached to each other, and had little secrets together
and private understandings, such as old comrades always recall with
pleasure when they afterward meet in a wider world.
Their school days were drawing near their end, when a tailor one
day brought Jeannot a velvet coat of three colors, with a waistcoat
of Lyons silk in excellent taste to match. This suit of clothes was
accompanied by a letter addressed to Monsieur de La Jeannotiere. Colin
admired the coat, and was not at all jealous; but Jeannot assumed an
air of superiority which distressed Colin. From that moment Jeannot
paid no more heed to his lessons, but was always looking at his
reflection in the glass, and despised everybody but himself. Some time
afterward a footman arrived post-haste bringing a second letter,
addressed this time to His Lordship the Marquis de La Jeannotiere; it
contained an order from his father for the young nobleman, his son,
to be sent to Paris. As Jeannot mounted the chaise to drive off, he
stretched out his hand to Colin with a patronizing smile befitting his
rank. Colin felt his own insignificance, and wept. So Jeannot departed
in all his glory.
Readers who like to know all about things may be informed that Monsieur
Jeannot, the father, had rapidly gained immense wealth in business.
You ask how those great fortunes are made? It all depends upon luck.
Monsieur Jeannot had a comely person, and so had his wife; moreover,
her complexion was fresh and blooming. They had gone to Paris to
prosecute a lawsuit which was ruining them, when Fortune, who lifts up
and casts down human beings at her pleasure, presented them with an
introduction to the wife of an army hospital contractor, a man of great
talent, who could boast of having killed more soldiers in one year
than the cannon had destroyed in ten. Jeannot took the lady's fancy,
and Jeannot's wife captivated the gentleman. Jeannot soon became a
partner in business, and entered into other speculations. When one is
in the current of the stream, one need only let one's self drift, and
thus an immense fortune may sometimes be made without any trouble. The
beggars watch you from the bank, as you glide along in full sail, open
their eyes in astonishment; they wonder how you have managed to get on;
they envy you, at all events, and write pamphlets against you which
you never read. That was what happened to Jeannot senior, who was soon
styled Monsieur de La Jeannotiere, and, after buying a marquisate, at
the end of six months he took the young nobleman, his son, away from
school, to launch him into the fashionable world of Paris.
Colin, always affectionately disposed, wrote a kind letter to his old
schoolfellow, offering his congratulations. The little marquis sent him
no answer, which grieved Colin sorely.
The first thing that his father and mother did for the young gentleman
was to get him a tutor. This tutor, who was a man of distinguished
manners and profound ignorance, could teach his pupil nothing. The
marquis wished his son to learn Latin, but the marchioness would not
hear of it. They consulted the opinion of a certain author who had
obtained considerable celebrity at that time from some popular works
which he had written. He was invited to dinner, and the master of the
house began by saying:
"Sir, as you know Latin, and are conversant with the manners of the
court--"
"I, sir! Latin! I don't know a word of it," answered the man of
learning; "and it is just as well for me that I don't, for one can
speak one's own language better when the attention is not divided
between it and foreign tongues. Look at all our ladies; they are far
more charming in conversation than men; their letters are written with
a hundred times more grace of expression. They owe that superiority
over us to nothing else but their ignorance of Latin."
"There, now! Was I not right?" said the lady. "I want my son to be a
man of wit, and to make his way in the world. You see that if he were
to learn Latin it would be his ruin. Tell me, if you please, are plays
and operas performed in Latin? Are the proceedings in court conducted
in Latin, when one has a lawsuit on hand? Do people make love in Latin?"
The marquis, confounded by these arguments, passed sentence, and it was
decided that the young nobleman should not waste his time in studying
Cicero, Horace, and Virgil.
"But what is he to learn, then? For, I suppose, he will have to know
something. Might he not be taught a little geography?"
"What good will that do him?" answered the tutor. "When my lord marquis
goes to visit his country-seat, will not his postillions know the
roads? There will be no fear of their going astray. One does not want a
sextant in order to travel, and it is quite possible to make a journey
between Paris and Auvergne without knowing anything about the latitude
and longitude of either."
"Very true," replied the father; "but I have heard people speak of a
noble science, which is, I think, called _astronomy_."
"Bless my soul!" rejoined the tutor. "Do we regulate our behavior in
this world by the stars? Why should my lord Marquis wear himself out
in calculating an eclipse, when he will find it predicted correctly
to a second in the almanac, which will moreover inform him of all the
movable feasts, the age of the moon, and that of all the princesses in
Europe?"
The marchioness was quite of the tutor's opinion, the little marquis
was in a state of highest delight, and his father was very undecided.
"What is my son to be taught, then?" said he.
"To make himself agreeable," answered the friend whom they had
consulted; "for, if he knows the way to please, he will know everything
worth knowing. It is an art which he will learn from her Ladyship, his
mother, without the least trouble to either of them."
The marchioness, at these words, smiled graciously upon the courtly
ignoramus, and said:
"It is easy to see, sir, that you are a most accomplished gentleman; my
son will owe all his education to you. I imagine, however, that it will
not be a bad thing for him to know a little history."
"Nay, madam, what good would that do him?" he answered. "Assuredly,
the only entertaining and useful history is that of the passing hour.
All ancient history, as one of our clever writers has observed, is
admitted to consist of nothing but fables, and for us moderns it is an
inextricable chaos. What does it matter to the young gentleman, your
son, if Charlemagne instituted the twelve Paladins of France, or if his
successor had an impediment in his speech?"
"Nothing was ever more wisely said!" exclaimed the tutor. "The minds
of children are smothered under a mass of useless knowledge, but of
all sciences, that which seems to me the most absurd, and the one
best adapted to extinguish every spark of genius, is geometry. That
ridiculous science concerns itself with surfaces, lines, and points
which have no existence in nature. In imagination a hundred thousand
curved lines may be made to pass between a circle and a straight line
which touches it, although in reality you could not insert as much as a
straw. Geometry, indeed, is nothing more than a bad joke."
The marquis and his lady did not understand much of the meaning of
what the tutor was saying, but they quite agreed with him. "A nobleman
like his Lordship," he continued, "should not dry up his brain with
such unprofitable studies. If, some day, he should want one of those
sublime geometricians to draw a plan of his estates, he can have them
measured for money. If he should wish to trace out the antiquity of his
lineage, which goes back to the most remote ages, all he will have to
do will be to send for some learned Benedictine. It is the same with
all the other arts. A young lord born under a lucky star is neither a
painter, nor a musician, nor an architect, nor a sculptor, but he may
make all these arts flourish by encouraging them with his generous
approval. Doubtless it is much better to patronize than to practice
them. It will be quite enough if my lord the young Marquis has taste;
it is the part of artists to work for him, and thus there is a great
deal of truth in the remark that people of quality (that is, if they
are very rich), know everything without learning anything, because,
in point of fact and in the long run, they are masters of all the
knowledge they can order and pay for."
The agreeable ignoramus then resumed his part in the conversation, and
said:
"You have well remarked, madam, that the great end of man's existence
is to succeed in society. Is it, forsooth, any aid to the attainment of
this success to have devoted one's self to the sciences? Does any one
ever think in select company of talking about geometry? Is a gentleman
ever asked what star rises to-day with the sun? Does any one at the
supper-table ever want to know if Clodion, the Long-Haired, crossed the
Rhîne?"
"No, indeed!" exclaimed the marchioness de la Jeannotiere, whose
charms had been her passport into the world of fashion, "and my son
must not stifle his genius by studying all that trash. But, after all,
what is he to be taught? For it is a good thing that a young lord
should be able to shine when occasion offers, as my noble husband has
said. I remember once hearing an abbé remark that the most entertaining
science was something the name of which I have forgotten--it begins
with a B."
"With a B, madam? It was not botany, was it?"
"No, it certainly was not botany that he mentioned; it began, as I tell
you, with a B, and ended in onry."
"Ah, madam, I understand! It was blazonry, or heraldry. That is
indeed a most profound science. But it has ceased to be fashionable
since the custom has died out of having one's coat of arms painted
on one's carriage doors; it was the most useful thing imaginable in
a well-ordered state. Besides, that line of study would be endless,
for at the present day there is not a barber who is without his
armorial bearings, and you know that whatever becomes common loses its
attraction."
Finally, after all the pros and cons of the different sciences had been
examined and discussed, it was decided that the young marquis should
learn dancing.
Dame Nature, who arranges everything according to her own will and
pleasure, had given him a talent which soon developed, securing him
prodigious success; it was that of singing street ballads in a charming
style. His youthful grace accompanying this superlative gift caused him
to be regarded as a young man of the highest promise. He was a favorite
with the ladies, and, having his head crammed with songs, he had no
lack of mistresses to whom to address his verses. He stole the line
"Bacchus with the Loves at play" from one ballad, and made it rhyme
with "night and day" taken from another, while a third furnished him
with "charms" and "alarms." But inasmuch as there were always a few
feet more or less than were wanted in his verses, he had them corrected
at the rate of twenty sovereigns a song. And "The Literary Year"
placed him in the same rank with such sonneteers as La Fare, Chaulieu,
Hamilton, Sarrasin, and Voiture.
Her ladyship the marchioness then believed that she was indeed the
mother of a genius, and gave a supper to all the wits of Paris. The
young man's head was soon turned; he acquired the art of talking
without knowing the meaning of what he said, and perfected himself in
the attainment of being fit for nothing. When his father saw him so
eloquent, he keenly regretted that he had not had him taught Latin,
or he would have purchased some high legal appointment for him. His
mother, who was of more heroic sentiments took upon herself to solicit
a regiment for her son; in the meantime he made love--and love is
sometimes more expensive than a regiment. He squandered his money
freely, while his parents drained their purses and credit to a lower
and lower ebb by living in the grandest style.
A young widow of good position in their neighborhood, who had only a
moderate income, was kind enough to make some effort to prevent the
great wealth of the Marquis and Marchioness de La Jeannotiere from
going altogether, by consenting to marry the young marquis with a
view to appropriating what remained. She enticed him to her house,
let him make love to her, allowed him to see that she was not quite
indifferent to him, and made him her devoted slave without the least
difficulty. At one time she would give him commendation, and at another
time counsel; she became his father's and mother's best friend. An old
neighbor suggested marriage. The parents, dazzled with the splendor
of the alliance, joyfully fell in with the scheme, and promised their
only son to their most intimate lady friend. The young marquis was thus
about to wed the woman he adored, and by whom he was loved in return.
The friends of the family congratulated him; the marriage settlement
was ready to be signed; the bridal dress and the nuptial hymn were both
well under way.
One morning our young gentleman was on his knees before the charmer
whom fond affection and esteem were so soon to make his own. They were
tasting in animated and tender converse the first fruits of future
happiness, settling how they should lead a life of perfect bliss, when
one of his mother's footmen presented himself, scared out of his wits.
"Here's fine news which may surprise you!" said he; "the bailiffs are
in the house of my lord and lady, removing the furniture. Everything
has been seized by the creditors. There is talk of arresting people,
and I am going to do what I can to get my wages paid."
"Let us see what has happened," said the marquis, "and discover the
meaning of all this."
"Yes," said the widow, "go and punish those rascals--go, at once!"
He hurried homeward. When he arrived at the house his father was
already in prison, and all the servants had fled, each in a different
direction, carrying off whatever they had been able to lay their hands
on. His mother was alone, helpless, forlorn, and bathed in tears; she
had nothing left her but the remembrance of her former prosperity, her
beauty, her faults, and her foolish extravagance.
After the son had condoled with his mother for a long time, he said at
last:
"Let us not despair. This young widow loves me to distraction; she is
even more generous than she is wealthy, I can assure you. I will fly to
her for help, and bring her to you."
So he returned to his mistress, and found her engaged in private
conversation with a fascinating young officer.
"What! Is that you, my Lord de La Jeannotiere? What business have you
with me? How can you leave your mother by herself in this way? Go, and
stay with the poor woman, and tell her that she shall always have my
good wishes. I am in want of a waiting woman now, and will gladly give
her the preference."
"My lad," said the officer, "you seem pretty tall and straight; if you
would like to enter my company, I will make it worth your while to
enlist."
The marquis, utterly astounded and inwardly furious, went off in search
of his former tutor, confided all his troubles to him, and asked his
advice. He proposed that he should become like himself, a tutor of the
young.
"Alas! I know nothing; you have taught me nothing whatever, and you are
the primary cause of all my unhappiness!" And as he spoke he began to
sob.
"Write novels," said a wit who was present; "it is an excellent
resource to fall back upon in Paris."
The young man, in more desperate straits than ever, hastened to the
house of his mother's father-confessor. He was a Theatine monk of the
very highest reputation, who had charge of the souls of none but ladies
of the first rank in society. As soon as he saw him, the reverend
gentleman rushed to meet him.
"Good gracious! My lord Marquis, where is your carriage? How is your
honored mother, the Marchioness?"
The unfortunate young fellow related the disaster that had befallen
his family. As he explained the matter further the Theatine assumed a
graver air, one of less concern and more self-importance.
"My son, herein you may see the hand of Providence; riches serve only
to corrupt the heart. The Almighty has shown special favor to your
mother in reducing her to beggary. Yes, sir, so much the better! She is
now sure of her salvation."
"But, father, in the meantime are there no means of finding some help
in this world?"
"Farewell, my son! A lady of the court is waiting for me."
The marquis almost fainted. He was treated after much the same manner
by all his friends, and learned to know the world better in half a day
than he had in all the rest of his life.
While thus plunged in overwhelming despair, he saw an old-fashioned
traveling chaise, more like a covered tumbril than anything else, and
furnished with leather curtains, followed by four enormous wagons, all
heavily laden. In the chaise was a young man in rustic attire; his
round and rubicund face had an air of kindness and good temper. His
little wife, whose sunburnt countenance had a pleasing if not refined
expression, was jolted about as she sat beside him; and since the
vehicle did not go quite so fast as a dandy's chariot, the traveler had
plenty of time to look at the marquis as he stood motionless, absorbed
in his grief.
"Oh, good heavens!" he exclaimed, "I believe that is Jeannot there!"
Hearing that name, the marquis raised his eyes, and the chaise stopped.
"'Tis Jeannot himself! Yes, it is Jeannot!"
The fat little man sprang to the ground with a single leap, and ran to
embrace his companion. Jeannot recognized Colin, shame showing in his
face.
"You have forsaken your old friend," said Colin, "but be you as grand a
lord as you like, I shall never cease to love you."
Jeannot, confounded and cut to the heart, amid sobs, told him something
of his history.
"Come into the inn where I am lodging, and tell me the rest," said
Colin; "kiss my little wife, and let us go and dine together."
They went, all three of them, on foot, and the baggage followed.
"What in the world is all this paraphernalia? Does it belong to you!"
inquired Jeannot.
"Yes, it is all mine and my wife's; we are just come from the country.
I am at the head of a large tin, iron, and copper factory, and have
married the daughter of a rich tradesman and general provider of all
useful commodities for great folks and small. We work hard, and God
gives us His blessing. We are satisfied with our condition in life,
and are quite happy. We will help our friend Jeannot. Give up being a
marquis; all the splendor in the world is not worth a good friend.
Return with me into the country. I will teach you my trade, which is
not a difficult one to learn; I will give you a share in the business,
and we will live together with light hearts in the little place where
we were born."
Jeannot, overcome by this kindness, struggled between sorrow and joy,
tenderness and shame. He said to himself:
"All my fashionable friends have proved false to me, and Colin, whom I
despised, is the only one who comes to my rescue. What a lesson!"
Colin's example in generosity revived in Jeannot's heart the germ of
goodness that the world had never quite choked. He felt that he could
not desert his father and mother.
"We will take care of your mother," said Colin, "and as for your good
father, who is in prison--I know something of business matters--his
creditors, when they see that he has nothing more, will agree to an
easy settlement. I will see to all that myself."
Colin was as good as his word, and succeeded in effecting the father's
release from prison. Jeannot returned to his old home with his parents,
who resumed their former occupation. He married Colin's sister, who,
being like her brother in disposition, rendered her husband very happy.
And so Jeannot the father, and Jeannotte the mother, and Jeannot the
son, came to see that vanity is no true source of happiness.
--Francois Marie Arouet de Voltaire.
From "Little Masterpieces of Fiction," Vol. VII (Doubleday, Page &
Co).
II. The Pedagogical Narrative
[Some famous pedagogical books]
The pedagogical narrative can hardly be called "story," not only
because of the intent of the writer to instruct, but also because of
the specialness of the subject-matter itself. "Leonard and Gertrude,"
however, has continued to be read as story in an interpreted form for
many years. "Interpreted" connotes what the modern versions of "Leonard
and Gertrude" really are, redactions. When the cumbersome and somewhat
eccentric sentences of the original were made over, the plot was found
to be of a good deal of interest, the character-sketching peculiarly
fine, and the lessons taught high and noble and practical as well.
Pestalozzi himself had gradually learned how to teach children, and
he not only told, but showed others. For that is what a pedagogical
story is--a working theory of instruction set up in scenes and actions:
it is exposition made narrative. Do you want to know how to teach
Jimmy and Margaret? This good old Swiss pedagogue will show you how
Gertrude taught her children, mother and school mistress, priest and
village reformer as she was. If you had lived in Queen Elizabeth's day
and wanted to know how and what to teach your boy or girl, you could
have asked the gentle Roger, the queen's own schoolmaster. You can
ask him now how he taught; for he put his thoughts down in a volume
which bears the name of his professional office--quaintly spelled
"Scholemaster"--and shows you his methods of work in forming the mind
of the perfect gentleman. This sober pedagogical treatise, which is
not narrative, not story, was published only after Ascham's death;
but many years before, when he was a very young man and much gayer but
hardly less wise, he set forth in "Toxophilus," the archer, a picture
of how amusement and learning can be combined. The exposition proceeds
in the form of a dialogue (the old fashioned literary type called
_débat_) between a lover of books and a lover of exercise. "Toxophilus"
is not exactly story either, but it approaches story, and is important
to our type because of the intense and far-reaching influence it has
had on modern pedagogy in inspiring a looking-out for the development
of the body as well as the mind, and in emphasizing the giving of
instruction in an interesting form.
From Ascham's "Schoolmaster" John Lyly got the suggestion for his
two famous romances of Euphues, the "well-formed" one. A young man
should be euphues in all things, said Ascham, and Lyly undertook to
show a Briton thus as he moved about in society, at home, abroad, in
friendship and love. So popular did Euphues become that all the ladies
and gentlemen of Elizabeth's court modelled their speech on his.
Charming old Sir Isaac Walton joined the pedagogues and gave us a
set of delightful walks and talks on angling. He teaches one to be a
"complete" angler--an artist at his pastime.
A sort of hand-book of etiquette for the golden youths of the
Renaissance was Castiglione's "Courtier," "a sketch of a cultivated
nobleman in those most cultivated days." The author shows by what
precepts and practice a fine gentleman is made. So well did he write
that his own name ever since has been a synonym for nobility and
manliness. He gives us a picture of the purest and most elevated
court in Italy, that of Guidobaldo da Montefeltra, duke of Urbino.
A discussion is held in the duchess's drawing-room to settle the
question, what constitutes a perfect courtier. The type selected
differs in no material way from the ideal gentleman of the present day.
All of these books are the work of persons who set out seriously to
teach--except perhaps the gentle Isaac, who probably wrote what he
wrote for sheer pleasure and taught by the way. And they all include
what the modern pedagogical narrative includes--disguised exposition.
For the most part the modern species is short. A publisher now-a-days,
I suppose, could hardly be induced to present an educational system
thinly disguised in a long romance. Consequently most of such stories
come out in our educational periodicals as better or poorer literature,
better or poorer teaching.
Rousseau's "The New Héloise" and "Emile" might be mentioned here were
they not more nearly harangues than stories. Their effect in renovating
France domestically, though, will forever connect them with the word
pedagogy. They are surely a pedagogue's "fiction," since their author
took no care of his real children.
These treatises were almost immediately influential in England, but
now the theories began to be set forth in more truly narrative form.
In "The Fool of Quality" (by Henry Brooke), the hero goes about
spreading benevolence and cash and displaying his physical strength
and an educational theory as well, as to how an English Christian
young gentleman should be brought up. The later development of such
teaching was naturally books addressed directly to children. Thomas
Day's "Sandford and Merton" had in it stories and dialogues for young
people to read for themselves, in which they were taught the value of
the sciences and the virtues. Maria Edgeworth's "Frank" and "Rosamond"
and Jacob Abbott's "Rollo Books" are for still more juvenile audiences,
and in Froebel's "Mother Plays" the baby, even, comes into its own.
[Froebel]
This work necessarily, however, was addressed to the parent. A tiny
cyclopedia of story, song, game, and theory, it is great pedagogy,
and in the original, at least, acceptable literature. The object of
all teaching-narratives should be that which Froebel expresses in his
comment on one of his own little games taught in a dialogue between a
mother and her son. You recall that his double purpose is to teach the
mother what and how to teach the child. He says, "The deep import of
The Light-Bird is hinted in the song and motto. Beware, however, of the
only one contained in the play. Not only The Light-Bird but all the
plays which precede and follow it have many meanings. Neither must it
be supposed that the meaning suggested by me is, if not the sole, at
least the highest one. My songs, mottoes, and commentaries are offered
simply with the hope that they may aid you to recognize and hold fast
some part of what you yourself feel while playing these games and to
suggest to you how you may awaken corresponding feelings in your child."
If you want to write a pedagogical narrative that will startle the
world, adopt the motto of Froebel, the charm of Ascham and Walton, the
graciousness of Castiglione, and the hard common sense of Pestalozzi,
and then proceed. But hold! You will need to have something to teach.
Perhaps you would better not try romance as a vehicle, but would better
stick to our briefer types. Suppose you put into narrative form, as
others have done since the days of the great kindergartner, a simple
game for children, or your favorite and most helpful method of study.
=Gertrude's Method of Instruction=
It was quite early in the morning when Arner (the people's father),
Glulhi (his lieutenant), and the pastor went to the mason's cottage.
The room was not in order when they entered, for the family had just
finished breakfast, and the dirty plates and spoons still lay upon
the table. Gertrude was at first somewhat disconcerted, but the
visitors reassured her, saying kindly: "This is as it should be; it is
impossible to clear the table before breakfast is eaten!"
The children all helped wash the dishes, and then seated themselves in
their customary places before their work. The gentlemen begged Gertrude
to let everything go on as usual, and after the first half hour, during
which she was a little embarrassed, all proceeded as if no stranger
were present. First the children sang their morning hymns, and then
Gertrude read a chapter of the Bible aloud, which they repeated after
her while they were spinning, rehearsing the most instructive passages
until they knew them by heart. In the mean time, the oldest girl had
been making the children's beds in the adjoining room, and the visitors
noticed through the open door that she silently repeated what the
others were reciting. When this task was completed, she went into the
garden and returned with vegetables for dinner, which she cleaned while
repeating Bible-verses with the rest.
It was something new for the children to see three gentlemen in the
room, and they often looked up from their spinning toward the corner
where the strangers sat. Gertrude noticed this, and said to them:
"Seems to me you look more at these gentlemen than at your yarn." But
Harry answered: "No, indeed! We are working hard, and you'll have finer
yarn to-day than usual."
Whenever Gertrude saw that anything was amiss with the wheels or
cotton, she rose from her work, and put it in order. The smallest
children, who were not old enough to spin, picked over the cotton for
carding, with a skill which excited the admiration of the visitors.
Although Gertrude thus exerted herself to develop very early the
manual dexterity of her children, she was in no haste for them to
learn to read and write. But she took pains to teach them early how to
speak; for, as she said, "of what use is it for a person to be able
to read and write, if he cannot speak?--since reading and writing are
only an artificial sort of speech." To this end she used to make the
children pronounce syllables after her in regular succession, taking
them from an old A-B-C book she had. This exercise in correct and
distinct articulation was, however, only a subordinate object in her
whole scheme of education, which embraced a true comprehension of
life itself. Yet she never adopted the tone of instructor toward her
children; she did not say to them: "Child, this is your head, your
nose, your hand, your finger;" or: "Where is your eye, your ear?"--but
instead, she would say: "Come here, child, I will wash your little
hands," "I will comb your hair," or: "I will cut your finger-nails."
Her verbal instruction seemed to vanish in the spirit of her real
activity, in which it always had its source. The result of her system
was that each child was skillful, intelligent and active to the full
extent that its age and development allowed.
The instruction she gave them in the rudiments of arithmetic was
intimately connected with the realities of life. She taught them to
count the number of steps from one end of the room to the other; and
two of the rows of five panes each, in one of the windows, gave her
an opportunity to unfold the decimal relations of numbers. She also
made them count their threads while spinning, and the number of turns
on the reel, when they wound the yarn into skeins. Above all, in
every occupation of life she taught them an accurate and intelligent
observation of common objects and the forces of nature.
All that Gertrude's children knew, they knew so thoroughly that they
were able to teach it to the younger ones; and this they often begged
permission to do. On this day, while the visitors were present, Jones
sat with each arm around the neck of a smaller child, and made the
little ones pronounce the syllables of the A-B-C book after him; while
Lizzie placed herself with her wheel between two of the others, and
while all three spun, taught them the words of a hymn with the utmost
patience.
When the guests took their departure, they told Gertrude they would
come again on the morrow. "Why?" she returned. "You will only see the
same thing over again." But Glulphi said: "That is the best praise you
could possibly give yourself." Gertrude blushed at this compliment, and
stood confused when the gentlemen kindly pressed her hand in taking
leave.
The three could not sufficiently admire what they had seen at the
mason's house, and Glulphi was so overcome by the powerful impression
made upon him, that he longed to be alone and seek counsel of his own
thoughts. He hastened to his room, and as he crossed the threshold,
the words broke from his lips: "I must be schoolmaster in Bonnal!" All
night visions of Gertrude's schoolroom floated through his mind, and he
only fell asleep toward morning. Before his eyes were fairly open, he
murmured: "I will be schoolmaster!"--and hastened to Arner to acquaint
him with his resolution.
--Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi.
"Leonard and Gertrude" (D. C. Heath & Co.).
=Lawin-Lawinan=
In the beautiful town of Santa Maria, children were very fond of
playing many curious games. Not a single day or moonlight evening could
pass without one's seeing some children playing along the wide streets.
One bright evening in the month of July, after the angelus bell rang,
Mapacla, in company with some playmates, went to Zandoval Street, where
many children were romping. When they reached the place, they agreed
to play _Lawin-lawinan_. Mapacla was chosen by all to be the _sisiw_
(chicken), and a playmate, Malacas by name, to be the _lawin_ (hawk).
The chicken and the hawk were the principal characters of the game. The
rest of the children formed a circle: each one with outstretched arms
held the hand of the one next him till the circle was formed. The space
between each two children was called the door, the owners of which
were the children by whom it was formed. The chicken stood inside the
circle, and the hawk stood outside.
The game was then begun. The hawk went to the first door, asking, "What
door is this?"
"To your honorable stomach," answered the owner of the door.
"And this?" asked the hawk, after approaching another door.
"To your long throat," answered the owner.
The hawk repeated the same question, as he went around from door to
door, till he reached the last one.
"Have you anything to sell me?" asked the hawk of the door owner.
"A good fat red chicken!" answered the owner.
"Let me see its scales," remarked the hawk, as he grasped the feet of
the chicken. "This is a fine quality of wild bird," he added; "will you
have him crow?"
"Crow!" said the owner to the chicken.
"Tic--to--la--la--oe," cried the chicken.
"Fine!" said the hawk. "How much will you sell him for?"
"For one peso," answered the owner.
After the bargain had been made and the hawk was about to catch the
chicken, the circle began to whirl around, allowing no space for the
hawk to enter. By chance, however, the hawk, thrusting himself through
a space, reached the interior of the circle. Every owner was then
afraid that the chicken might be caught by the hawk. The whirling of
the circle was immediately stopped, and every door was left wide open.
The chicken with all his might ran swiftly out of the circle. The
hawk was so slow in following that he was captured inside. The circle
began to whirl again, till, accidentally, the hawk, struggling for his
escape, made his way out. Sometimes the chicken, pursued by the hawk,
entered the circle, but immediately ran out whenever there was danger
of being caught. At last when the chicken became tired, the hawk caught
him.
The punishment was then inflicted. The hawk ordered himself to be
carried on the shoulders of the chicken. The order was obeyed without
delay. After the chicken had walked a few paces with the heavy load on
him, he stopped and started another game, choosing another chicken to
be chased by the hawk.
--Leopoldo Uichanco.
III. The Story of Present Day Realism
[Realism]
"Realism," says Mr. Howells, "is nothing more and nothing less than
the truthful treatment of material." The business of the narrator is
to observe and record, he says; all that enters into fiction should
be simple, natural and honest. The material must be plain, average,
everyday humanity. There is no need of a hero or heroine. There is no
need of a plot. The love of the passionate and heroic is a crude and
unwholesome thing.
Following these tenets there has grown up a school of writers who
undertake to present the world just as it is with no heightening and
no lowering of color. They select bits of life and reproduce them
exactly. The process is "not so much photographic as microscopic."
Nothing is too inane or commonplace. All that a workman needs is a
seeing eye, honesty, and a vocabulary, say they. Many of the sketches,
of course, seem extremely flat, and the reader involuntarily asks,
Why and wherefore? The answer is laconic--life: these are the actual
problems of humanity rather than abstract moral truths or highflown
idealism; the Scab and Trusty No. 49 are with us in the street; these
are the Children of the Public, the Children of the Ghetto; this is the
modern Jungle; these are Vignettes of Manhattan; these are the feelings
of a maiden lady in a Massachusetts village; these are the happenings
of a real Wedding Journey; thus the new-rich build houses in the Back
Bay district and attempt to get into society; this is a Modern Instance.
For source of realistic method we shall need to notice again the
audacious intimacy of the picaresque romance and the extraordinary
minuteness of detail that marked the illustrations and pretended
anecdotes of the controversial pamphleteers of the early eighteenth
century. Take for illustration the verisimilitude of the repetitions
and digressions in the "True Relation of the Apparition of Mrs. Veal,"
by which Defoe hoodwinked the public--so completely, in fact, that
critics are even now divided on the question as to whether he was or
was not reporting a real interview. Most of his contemporaries took the
matter as _bona fide_ news; their successors took it as invention; and
now Mr. George Aitken comes forward with proof of its occurrence; that
is, he maintains that Defoe got--in just the way he says he got it--the
written report of the actual interview with the person who saw the
ghost. The contention only goes to demonstrate that Defoe was a great
captain of the pen who could sail extremely close to life. That he
could make romance truer than fact we well know.
Added to the patient minuteness of the controversialists and the
boldness of the rogue narrators who dared to take us to the back-doors
and bed-rooms of the nobility and to the haunts of criminals, came
later as an element of realistic method, Jane Austen's home subjects,
non-partizanship, and gentle raillery.
[Some realistic writers]
When "Daisy Miller" was written a few decades ago, the Americans
were incensed. Henry James did not care, however. Just so we appear
abroad, he said, among the more restrained and more cultivated peoples.
Howells's "Lady of the Aroostook" seemed a kinder if similar and no
less true picture. These brief narratives are hardly novels; and though
they are more than tales, they yet are not what we technically call the
artistic short-story; they are surely, however, studies in realism.
It is upon this distinction,--namely, that absolute realism would
naturally preclude even the slight artificiality that there must be
about the truly technical short-story--that we make two divisions in
our study of such work as that of Howells, James, and Mary E. Wilkins
Freeman. The point is, realism may be as long-drawn out or as brief as
life. The technical short-story, however, has a limit on both sides.
So has the novel. Each of our great realists has attempted novels; all
have written exquisite short stories.
[Suggestions on characters to treat]
To write a present-day realistic sketch you will not need to look
far for a subject. Just divest yourself of preconceived ideas of the
romantic in fiction, and begin anywhere. Everything is of interest to
the realist. A butcher's boy; an octogenarian millionaire; a petty
thief; a plodding, respectable, humdrum government clerk; an ordinary
mother with her ordinary baby on an ordinary day; a flighty society
belle, and a society belle who is not flighty; a sensible matron; an
idiot child,--all are his. The interest of your sketch will be in
the particularity and niceness of details. You will need to be more
truthful than a camera, which always makes people and surroundings
look either better or worse than they are. Color and sound and smell
and atmosphere and temperature, and temperament, gesture and thought,
passing impression and settled purpose, you can record. If any of
your characters succeeds, it must be as in life--with half defeat;
if any one is defeated, it must be as in life--with half success and
a conflicting sense of shame and of relief. You must have something
happening, however slight, and thus avoid a mere enumeration of
characteristics. You are to show us the person in action. A mere
analysis of his vices and virtues, his general mental attitude, would
be pure exposition, when you want narrative.
Your diction should be as good as you can make it by care and revision.
Howells and James are both stylists of the most polished kind; though
Tolstoy, whom Howells recognizes as master, thirty years ago left off
any concern for sentence effect. He repeats or reiterates at will. You,
however, cannot afford to disregard the rules of the rhetoricians--not
until you have become as famous as the Russian count or have a message
as distinct as his.
Remember, then, that a good realistic sketch demands on your part an
honest, and truthful purpose, a mind freed from the glamor of romance
or climax, a sure eye, and exquisite workmanship, in the relation of an
ordinary, every-day event.
=The Piece of String=
On all the roads leading to Goderville the peasants and their wives
were coming to town for market day. The men shambled along at an
easy-going gait, with bodies bent forward. Their long legs were
deformed and twisted through hard work--from the weight of the plough,
which at the same time throws the left shoulder too high and ruins
the figure; from mowing the grain, which effort causes the knees to
spread too far apart; and from all the other slow and painful labours
of country life. Their blue blouses, starched to a sheenlike varnish
and finished at collar and waistbands with little designs in white
stitching, stood from their bony bodies like balloons ready for flight,
with a head, two arms and two feet protruding.
Some of the men had a cow or calf in tow at the end of a rope, while
their wives followed close behind the animal, switching it over the
haunches with a leafy branch to hasten its pace.
The women carried large baskets, out of which stuck the heads of
chickens and ducks. They took much shorter and quicker steps than the
man. Their lanky, spare figures were decorated with mean little shawls
pinned across their flat breasts. Each head bore a white linen cover,
bound close to the hair and surmounted by a cap.
Now and then there went by a waggonette drawn by a pony on a jerky
trot, which jostled the two men on the seat in a ludicrous manner and
made the woman at the end of the cart hold the sides firmly for ease
from the rough jolting.
In the Goderville market-place was a great crowd of men and animals.
The horns of the cattle, the high, long-napped hats of the well-to-do
peasants, and the head-dresses of women bobbed above the level of that
crowd. Noisy voices, sharp and shrill, kept up a wild and ceaseless
clamour, only outdone now and then by a great guffaw of laughter from
the strong lungs of a jolly bumpkin, or a prolonged moo from a cow tied
to the wall of some house.
Everywhere it smelled of stables, of milk and manure, of hay and sweat.
The air was redolent with that sourish, disagreeable odour savouring of
man and beast which is peculiar to the labourers of the fields.
Master Hauchecorne, of Bréauté, had just arrived at Goderville and
was directing his steps to the square when he observed on the ground
a little bit of string. Economical like all true Normans, Master
Hauchecorne considered that anything useful was worth picking up, and
he bent down painfully, for he suffered from rheumatism. He picked up
the scrap of twine from the ground, and was preparing to wind it up
carefully when he noticed Master Malandain, the harness-maker, looking
at him from his doorway. Once they had a quarrel over a halter and had
kept angry ever since, both of them holding spite. Master Hauchecorne
was smitten with a certain sense of shame at being seen thus by his
enemy searching in the dirt for a mere bit of string. He hastily hid
his find under his blouse, then in the pocket of his breeches--after
which he pretended to be still looking at his feet for something which
he had not yet found. At length, he started toward the market-place,
his body almost bent double by his chronic pains.
He lost himself at once in the slow, clamorous throng, which was
agitated by perpetual bickerings. The prospective buyers, after looking
the cows over, would go away only to return perplexed; always fearing
to be taken in; never reaching a decision, but narrowly watching the
seller's eyes, seeking in the end to detect the deceit of the man and
the defect in his animal.
The women, having put their big baskets at their feet, had pulled out
the poultry, which lay upon the ground with legs tied, with frightened
eyes and scarlet combs.
They listened to offers, maintaining their prices with a sharp air and
impressive face, or else at a sweep accepting a reduced price, crying
after the customer who left reluctantly, "It's settled, Anthime; I'll
let you have them!"
Then, by degrees, the square emptied, and, as the Angelus struck noon,
those living at a distance flocked to the inns.
At Jourdain's, the dining-room was filled with guests, as full as the
great courtyard was with vehicles of every description--carts, gigs,
waggonettes, tilburies, nondescript jaunting cars, yellow with mud,
misshapen, patched up, lifting their shafts to heaven like two arms,
or else in a sorry plight with nose in the mud and back in the air.
Right opposite to where the diners were at table, the immense
fireplace, all brightly aflame, imparted a genial warmth to the backs
of the people ranged on the right. Three spits were turning, loaded
with chickens, with pigeons, and with legs of mutton; and a delicious
odour of roast meat and of gravy gushing over roast brown skin took
wing from the hearth, kindled good humour, and made mouths water.
All the aristocracy of the plough were eating there at Jourdain's, the
innkeeper who dealt in horses--a shrewd fellow, who had a goodish penny
put by.
The dishes were passed and emptied, as were likewise huge jugs of
yellow cider. Every one recounted his dealings--his buying and selling.
They gave news of the crops. The weather was good for greens, but
somewhat wet for wheat.
All at once a drum rolled in the court before the house. Almost
everybody save the too indifferent, immediately sprang to their feet
and ran to the door, or to the windows, with mouth still full and
napkin in hand.
After the public crier had stopped his racket, he launched forth in a
jerky voice, making his pauses at the wrong time:
"Be it known to the inhabitants of Goderville, and in general to all
persons present at the market, that there was lost this morning on
the Beauzeville road, between nine and ten o'clock, a black leather
pocketbook containing five hundred francs and business papers. You are
requested to return it to the mayor's office at once, or to Master
Fortune Houlbreque, of Manneville. There will be twenty francs reward."
Then the man went away. They heard once more from afar the dull
drum-beats and the fading voice of the crier.
After that, they began to discuss this event, counting the chances
Master Houlbreque yet had of recovering or not recovering his
pocketbook.
And the meal went on.
They were finishing their coffee when the corporal of police appeared
on the threshold.
He asked:
"Master Hauchecorne, of Bréauté--is he here?"
Hauchecorne, seated at the other end of the table, answered:
"Here I am."
And the corporal resumed:
"Master Hauchecorne, will you have the kindness to come with me to the
mayor's office? The mayor would like to speak to you."
The peasant, surprised and disturbed, tossed off his drink and arose,
worse bent than in the morning; because the first steps after a rest
were always especially difficult. He started off, repeating:
"Here I am; here I am."
And he followed the corporal.
The mayor was awaiting him, seated in his official chair. He was the
notary of the place, a large, grave man of pompous speech.
"Master Hauchecorne," he said, "you were seen this morning, on the
Beauzeville road, to pick up the pocket-book lost by Master Houlbreque,
of Manneville."
The countryman, confused, stared at the mayor, already frightened by
this suspicion attaching to him--why he could not understand.
"I--I--I picked up that pocket-book?"
"Yes, you."
"On my word of honour, I didn't even know nothing about it."
"You were seen."
"They saw me--me? Who's they what saw me?" said Master Hauchecorne.
"Master Malandain, the harness-maker."
Then the old man remembered, understood, and reddened with anger.
"Ah! he saw me, did he, the rascal? He saw me pick up this here string.
Look, your worship."
And, rummaging at the bottom of his pocket, he pulled out the little
piece of string.
But the incredulous mayor shook his head.
"You will not make me believe, Master Hauchecorne, that Master
Malandain, who is a man worthy of all respect, has taken this bit of
cord for a pocket-book."
The peasant, furious, raised his hand, and spit at his side to bear
witness to his honour, repeating:
"F'r all that, it's God's truth, holy truth, your worship. There! My
soul and my salvation knows it's true!"
The mayor resumed:
"After having picked the article up, you even searched also a long
while in the mud to make sure if money had fallen out of it."
The good man choked with rage and terror.
"If them can say--if them can say--such lies as that to take away an
honest man's name! If them can say--"
However he might protest, he was not believed.
He was confronted by Master Malandain, who repeated and supported his
statement. They railed at each other for an hour. Master Hauchecorne
demanded that they search his pockets. Nothing was found upon him.
Finally, the mayor, very much perplexed, let him go with the warning
that he would inform the public prosecutor, and ask for orders.
The news had spread abroad. When he came out of the mayor's office, the
old man was the centre of curiosity and questioning, both serious and
jeering, but into which not the least resentment entered. And he began
recounting the long rigmarole of the string. They did not believe him.
They grinned.
He went along, stopped by every one, or accosting his acquaintances,
going over and over his story and his protestations, pointing to his
pockets turned inside out to prove he had nothing.
They said to him:
"Come now, you old rascal!"
And he became angry, exasperated, feverish, disconsolate at being
doubted, and forever telling his story.
Night fell. It became time to go home. He started out with three of his
neighbours, to whom he pointed out the spot where he had picked up the
bit of string; and, all along the road, he recited his adventure.
That evening he made a round of the village of Bréauté so as to tell
everyone. He found only unbelievers.
He was ill of it all through the night.
The next day about one in the afternoon, Marius Paumelle, a farm helper
of Master Breton, the market-gardener at Ymauville, returned the
pocket-book and its contents to Master Houlbreque of Manneville.
This man maintained he had found it on the road, but, not knowing how
to read, had carried it home and turned it over to his master.
The news spread to the suburbs. Master Hauchecorne was informed.
Immediately he set himself the task of going about relating his story,
capping it with this climax. He was triumphant.
"What hurt me the mostest," he said, "was not the thing itself, don't
you see, but the lies. Nothing hurts so as when lies 's told about you."
All day long he talked of his adventure. He told it on the roads to the
people passing, at the tavern to people who were drinking, and then
to the people coming out of church the next Sunday. He even stopped
strangers to tell them the tale. He felt relieved by this time, yet
something troubled him without his knowing just what it was. People had
a mocking manner as they listened.
They did not appear convinced. He almost felt their tattle behind his
back.
Tuesday of the next week, he went to the Goderville market, solely
impelled by the need of recounting his affair.
Malandain, standing in his doorway, began to laugh as he saw him pass.
For what?
He accosted a farmer of Criquetot who did not permit him to finish,
but, landing him a thump in the pit of the stomach, cried in his face,
"Get out, you great rogue!" Then he turned on his heel.
Master Hauchecorne, altogether abashed, grew more and more disturbed.
Why had he been dubbed "a great rogue?"
When seated at table in Jourdain's tavern, he again began to explain
the particulars.
A Montvilliers horse-dealer yelled at him:
"Don't tell me, you old fox! I know your piece of string yarn!"
Hauchecorne stammered, "B--b--but it's found, the pocket-book!"
To which the other retorted:
"That'll do, daddy! There's one who finds, and another who gives up.
Neither is no one the wiser."
The peasant was choked off. At last he understood. They accused him of
having had the pocket-book returned by a crony--by an accomplice.
He tried to protest. The whole table started to laugh.
He could not finish his meal, and took his leave amidst their mocking
and derision.
He returned to his home, ashamed and indignant, stifled with rage, with
confusion; all the more dejected because, with his Norman cunning,
he was capable of having done what they accused him of, and even of
bragging of it as a good trick. His innocence vaguely appeared to him
as impossible to prove; his roguery was too well known. And he felt
struck to the heart by the injustice of the suspicion.
Again he commenced to tell of his adventure; every day its recital
lengthened, each time containing new proofs, more energetic
protestations, and more solemn oaths which he prepared in his solitary
hours. His mind was altogether occupied by the story of the piece
of string. He was believed all the less as his defense grew more
complicated and his arguments more artful.
"Now, those are the proofs of a liar," they said behind his back.
He felt this. It consumed his strength. He exhausted himself in useless
efforts.
He went into a visible decline.
The jokers now made him detail the story of "The Piece of String" to
amuse them, just as you persuade a soldier who has come through a
campaign to tell his version of a battle. At last his mind began to
give way.
Near the end of December he took to his bed.
He died the first week in January, and, in the delirium of the throes
of death he protested his innocence, repeating, "A little piece of
string--little piece of string--see, here it is, your worship."
--Henri René Albert Guy de Maupassant.
"Little Masterpieces of Fiction," Vol. VI (Doubleday, Page & Co.).
=A Social Error=
The little kindergarten teacher turned hastily from the office window.
"Miss Adams," she said abruptly, "I'm worried."
The "Lady Head" looked up from her ledger.
"Worried," she repeated, with an odd little smile, "are you ever
anything so plebeian?"
The other woman tossed her chin impatiently.
"Really, Miss Adams," she said stiffly, "I wish you had given that
class of Italians to--well, anyone but Caroline."
The lady at the desk stiffened perceptibly.
"And why not?" she inquired tersely. "You certainly must be aware that
the reason I chose Caroline to fill the vacancy was because I thought
her fitted--particularly fitted," she added, with deliberate emphasis.
The little woman looked down at her excited chief with a quietly
speculative smile.
"Do you think," she said slowly, "that Caroline has the real social
instinct?"
The Lady Head was becoming annoyed.
"One might think," she snapped, "that the training Caroline has
received in her own home would amply fit her to meet--"
"Any of the men of her own set," interrupted the other woman. "But as
for managing a club of hot-headed Italians--"
"Well, doesn't she manage them?" reiterated the woman at the desk, half
rising from her low chair. "I should like to have you name a club that
is more orderly--more--"
"Indeed, it is orderly enough," admitted the little kindergartner.
"There!" sniffed the Lady Head triumphantly, then with a sudden change
of tone, "I really do not understand your objection. As for the
boys--they adore her!"
"That is where the trouble lies." The little kindergartner leaned
forward over the desk and her voice was very serious. "Miss Adams," she
began slowly, "you have been here five weeks--I have worked in this
district for fifteen years. I know every boy and girl, every man and
woman, who comes to this house. And I also know"--the speaker paused
impressively--"that when a girl who is as young and as good-looking as
Caroline treats the young men of her club with the same informality
that she would show to the callers in her father's home--believe me,
there will be disastrous consequences."
"Do you mean--Do you dare--" the Lady Head's lifted eyebrows completed
her question.
This little kindergartner stood firm. "I think Caroline should
be warned," she insisted quietly. "Her Italians are so young--so
hot-blooded, and I'm afraid she has been encouraging them a little,
too--"
"Nonsense!" the other woman sprang quickly to her feet. "I have never
heard anything so ridiculous--so utterly preposterous! Do my years of
experience count for nothing in comparison with yours? Am I entirely
lacking in good judgment--in common sense? My dear woman, I have always
made friends of my club boys, invited them to my home--even young
anarchists! Falling in love with her! Preposterous!" She paused for a
moment breathless, and then began a fresh onslaught.
"If Caroline has not sufficient tact--"
A girl's blonde head appeared in the office doorway.
"Did you call met?" she lisped sweetly. "I was passing through the hall
and I thought I heard my name spoken." She paused, with a questioning
glance at the two women.
The Lady Head was the first to recover her composure, and she rustled
across the room with outstretched hands. "My dear Caroline," she said.
"We were just speaking of you--and your charming little club," she
added, with a side glance at her assistant.
The girl threw back her dark furs with a smile. "How good of you," she
said gratefully. "I'm frightfully late to-day, but to-night is our
party, and I stopped down town for the boys."
The Lady Head patted the girl's plump fingers. "Are you going to dance,
too?" she inquired.
The girl laughed. "Indeed I am. But I really don't know how I'm going
to manage it. The boys are all so jealous, and Tony--oh, Tony is the
grandest dancer!"
She flitted out of the tiny office, and the two women watched her
as she climbed the broad stairs followed closely by her chattering,
gesticulating pupils.
As the last peal of laughter floated down over the balusters the little
kindergartner turned to the Lady Head.
"You see?" she said simply.
The Lady Head turned upon her a sweet, uncomprehending smile. "I think
it is lovely!" she breathed.
The night lamp burned steadily in the office of the settlement. The
wind howled through the deserted street, flinging the rain in noisy
gusts against the window panes and shrieking dismally down the empty
corridors. From somewhere on the floor above came the rhythmic banging
of a piano and the shuffle and stamp of dancing feet.
The Lady Head closed her book with a yawn.
"What a stupid evening," she sighed. The kindergarten teacher laid down
her sewing and walked slowly to the window.
"The elements are attempting to enliven things," she remarked dryly as
she lifted the heavy curtains. Even as she spoke there was a blinding
flash, a click and the house was dark.
Up stairs the music ceased, there was a confused murmur of voices--a
shout--a crash--and a woman's scream. The lights come on again--the two
women turned, their faces ashen, and hastened up the long stairs.
A pale-faced girl was crouched against the farther wall of the big
gymnasium. At her feet sprawled the limp body of a man, and behind her
a swarthy black-browed girl was struggling in the grasp of two stalwart
Italians who were trying to wrest something from her frantic fingers.
Her hands relaxed as the two women appeared in the door, and a shining
bit of steel flew across the room and tinkled on the floor at the feet
of the Lady Head. She picked it up grimly and pushed her way to the
center of the crowd. The girl by the wall sprang to her feet with a
wild shriek, but the woman turned on her savagely.
"Hush!" she hissed, "you little fool!" Then to the crowd, "What does
this mean?" she demanded sternly. "What does this mean?"
A young Italian, who stood at one side nursing his slashed knuckles,
was the spokesman.
"Him--" with a wave towards the man on the floor--"he's Tony De Sil',
and her"--the gesture included the hysterical girl--"She dance with
Ton' all-a-time."
"And she?" The Lady Head looked toward the Italian girl whose stiletto
she was holding gingerly between her fingers.
"Her?"--the narrator pointed a laconic forefinger. "She's Tony's girl."
When the weeping Caroline had been sent home in her father's carriage,
and when the ambulance had creaked out through the gateway, the Lady
Head turned to her little assistant.
"If there are any fatal results from this--this criminal bit of
negligence," she stated coldly, "I shall hold you personally
responsible. You should have informed me of this long ago. Remember,
you have been here fifteen years!"
--Ida F. Treat.
=The Lot of the Poor=
Two women were walking with rapid but tired steps down one of the most
disreputable streets in the city.
"My," said the tallest one, turning up the collar of her threadbare
coat, "don't this wind make you feel like you was dressed in your
bones?"
The other woman, who was, if possible, more shabby-looking, pushed her
red gloveless hands deeper into her pockets.
"Yes, and I forgot to wear my sables to-day, ain't it too bad?" she
returned in a dreary tone, whose irony was somewhat modified by the
chattering of her teeth.
"Mary Jane, you just quit talkin' like that," burst out the other,
evidently the older of the two. "You didn't never use to be that way
before you commenc't workin' out by the day. Why you was the jolliest
girl in the factory and allays made the best of everything; but now
nothin' is ever good enough for you. Of course none of us would
mind having things a little better, but as far as I can see, things
have allays been this way with us and allays will be, wishin' or no
wishin'."
"I ain't sayin' they won't," Mary Jane said shortly.
"Well, I know it, you ain't sayin' nothin'; that's just the trouble.
I wish you'd tell me what's the matter with you, Mary Jane, 'Tain't
natural for a girl like you to be so dull and sulky."
"'Tain't natural, did you say?" flared up the other. "'Tain't natural
to wonder why the lady you work for wears silks and satins, while your
own clothes are almost too ragged to cover you? Ain't it natural," she
asked with blazing eyes, "to want to tear a few silks off of her back
to cover your own? You ain't never seen nice things near you, Ann.
You've allays worked in the factory; so what do you know about such
things? I tell you, if you worked in one of those palaces on Fifth
Avenue all day and then come back to this at night, you'd see the
difference."
"Don't you s'pose I've seen swell things and people?" remonstrated the
older woman. "I ain't no fool; but I've reasoned out that there's a few
people meant to be rich, and the rest of us ain't, that's all!"
"But it ain't a few people, Ann. It seems like most everybody had
plenty to eat and wear but us. Why ain't we in it, too? Why don't I
live in that fine house where I work instead down in this hole? It
seems like we'd been cheated somewhere; but I s'pose there ain't no use
talkin' about it. Good-night."
Ann watched the girl as she climbed the rickety steps of the "palace"
which fate had assigned to her.
"They're all that way sometimes. I remember--well, she'll get used to
it like all the rest of us."
--Agnes Palmer.
=Filipino Fear.=
One cloudy afternoon when a heavy rain seemed swaying back and forth in
a thick mist which was then lowering, and long red streaks of lightning
followed by loud rolling thunder seemed trying to break the mist to
let the rain fall, there were in a little nipa house in the country
below, among aged cocoanut palms, two lonely persons suffering from
superstition and fear of the extraordinary phenomena that surrounded
them.
The house was just big enough for the two. Its roof, windows and sides
were made of _cogon_. The floor and door were made of narrow bamboo
strips nailed side by side. In one corner of the room on a bed, made
also of bamboo, sat a boy of eight. There was in the expression and
look of the boy a feeling of unknown fear mingled with surprise,
because his father, a lusty old superstitious man, who was then holding
a blunt stick, had driven their domestic creatures from the house
to the open field where there was no means of securing shelter from
the heavy rain, whose first large drops were now clattering on the
leaves. The boy had a kind disposition, especially toward his pets--a
sense that he had inherited from his father. This was the first time
that he had seen his father act thus unkindly toward their animals.
His surprise was much increased when he saw his father dash at the
windows and doors and fling everyone of them open, then retreat to
the middle and look sideways. He saw him draw a long agitated breath.
Then, seeming to have recovered his wits, he hastened toward one of the
windows and took from the outside a portion of a dried cocoanut leaf.
He cut two long narrow strips from it and made them into loops. After
placing one around his neck, he uttered a short prayer. He then handed
the other loop to his still amazed child and said, "Wear this, dear
child, around thy neck."
"Why, father?" inquired the innocent boy, "can this protect me?"
"Yes, child, prayer and that alone can save us."
"What has this in it, father? It seems to me to be nothing but a piece
of cocoanut leaf. Isn't it?" said the boy.
"It is a strip from a cocoanut leaf, but--it has--"
"If so, then," interrupted the acute boy, "why can't these palms around
us that bear these leaves protect themselves against the elements. I
have often seen, father, palms burned to their very stalks, which older
people told me had been struck by lightning. Where did you get this
strip, father?"
"Well, I got this from a bunch of leaves which is tied just below our
front window," pointing to the place, "together with some live leaves.
That bunch you yourself carried to the church two years ago when your
mother was yet living. You have never peeped into church since then.
But once a year in town the mass of the Sunday immediately before Fast
Friday is dedicated to palm and olive leaves. Hundreds of children like
you crowd the church on that day carrying with them their bunch of
leaves, and while the service is being celebrated they will joyfully
shake them. After holy water has been sprinkled on the leaves, then
they are holy, and it is not pious to play with them. After the mass
the bunch of leaves is to be tied to the door or to the window of the
house as a protection from thunder and lightning. On days of this kind
every one wears a strip of these leaves around his neck. When you go
out again, you may look at the windows of the houses to see if what I
say is true."
Indeed; those bunches of palms and olive leaves are marked
characteristics of typical Filipino houses. The leaves are usually tied
or wound in artistic ways, with beautiful hangings on them. All the
decorations, however, are composed of the same kind of leaves.
The boy was quite satisfied at his father's story. After a little
reflection he remembered that he had truly carried such leaves to
church. The rain was then falling fast, and the lightning and thunder
still followed one another in rapid succession. The cold winds from
outside and the fearful sight of the brilliant flashes made the boy
shrink.
"I am cold, father, and I fear those long and fiery zigzag paths which
the whip of the driver of that rolling thunder is making in heaven. I
wonder why you don't shut those windows," said the boy.
"Never, my son, for there is danger in shutting them. Remember that
the thunder will pass thru anything and burn that which dares obstruct
its way. Besides, my grandfather told me that days of this kind are
rare, for they are days for scourging foul things on earth. If we shut
ourselves up here, Bathala, the ruler of the earth, who watches and
sees all things done, may suspect that we are hiding something foul and
so send his scourger here to punish us."
The young listener who was attentive to the story of his father started
up at a sudden and astounding crash of thunder. He curled himself up in
the lap of his father, folded his arms around his father's neck, and
shut his eyes. After a while he continued, "And, therefore, every foul
deed on earth will be punished?"
"Yes, everything foul; so runs our proverb: 'Debt must be paid.' If you
commit a sin you must be punished according to the nature of your sin."
The fearful peal of thunder that had so frightened the boy was the
last. It silenced the fury of the weather. The rain was falling lightly
now and sheets of fire were distinguished only from afar, but no more
thunder sounded. The boy was dropping off into a light slumber when
he heard his kitty mew. He opened his eyes and saw his pet very wet
and cold. He pitied the little creature, so he said almost with tears,
"I wish, father, you had not been so unkind to our animals, our sole
friends in this solitary place. See what you have done. You have driven
them out in the rain where they could get no shelter; and now every one
of them is wet and shivering."
"Now, don't worry about them, my boy," said his father rather moved by
his filial appeal, "they are not hurt at all. I drove them away, not
because I was cross or unkind, but because it is not safe to keep them
inside on such a stormy day as this. For thunder is likely to strike
them. Boys of your age are likely to be harmed by such animals. For to
some of them thunder imparts its explosive power. And sometimes thunder
takes the form of animals. Here is a story that has been told to me by
many and which they believe true.
"'Once there was a boy riding on a carabao on a stormy day. He was
hurrying home lest the rain should catch him, but when he was near home
he caught sight of a small pig wandering aimlessly down the road. It
was very fat and very tame. The boy dismounted from the carabao and
tried to catch the pig, but when he was yet quite a long way off from
it the animal ran against a tree and there was a loud sound of thunder.
The tree ignited. The boy fell down unconscious and was slightly hurt.
He recovered only at home. His story has been told and retold ever
since. It was said that if that boy had caught the animal and it had
received a jar while in the boy's arms it would have burst like thunder
and so burned the boy. But if the boy had safely carried it home and
treated it with a vinegar bath the explosive power would have been gone
and the animal would have been the best kind of food on earth.' Old men
say that such animals are fruits of thunder."
"Oh, then, it would not be so bad after all, father. I might try to
catch one some time," said the boy.
"That you must not," said the father sternly.
"But is that true, father, that the fungi which we find abounding
in bamboo groves are the flowers caused by thunder?" said the boy
inquisitively.
"Yes, my son, truly, and that's why they are very delicious. You can't
find them growing except after stormy days and after thunder and
lightning. After days of lightning and thunder like the present, groups
of women and boys may be seen roaming about the country in search of
these delicious flowers for their food."
By this time the storm was over. The two prepared their supper, since
it was already evening. After eating they went to bed feeling secure in
the efficacy of the palm leaves hung in the door.
--Walfrido de Leon.