Donegal. "Comforting myself with the Russian proverb that 'game runs to
meet the hunter,' I set out on my pilgrimage, giving more prominence to
the study and investigation of Gaelic, which, though one of the two
objects of my visit, was not the first. In this way I thought to come
more surely upon men who had myth tales in their minds than if I went
directly seeking for them. I was not disappointed, for in all my
journeyings I did not meet a single person who knew a myth tale or an
old story who was not fond of Gaelic, and specially expert in the use of
it, while I found very few story-tellers from whom a myth tale could be
obtained unless in the Gaelic language; and in no case have I found a
story in the possession of a man or woman who knew only English."
There is something so interesting in this fact, and so pathetic in the
explanation of it, that we are tempted to quote further: "Since all
mental training in Ireland is directed by powers both foreign and
hostile to everything Gaelic, the moment a man leaves the sphere of that
class which uses Gaelic as an every-day language, and which clings to
the ancient ideas of the people, everything which he left behind seems
to him valueless, senseless, and vulgar; consequently he takes no care
to retain it, either in whole or in part. Hence the clean sweep of myth
tales in one part of the country,--the greater part, occupied by a
majority of the people; while they are still preserved in other and
remoter districts, inhabited by men who, for the scholar and the student
of mankind, are by far the most interesting in Ireland."
The fate of the Gaelic language has, indeed, been peculiarly sad. In
various parts of Europe, and especially among the western Slavs, the
native tongues have been to some extent displaced by the speech of
conquering peoples; yet it is only in Erin that, within modern times, a
"language of Aryan stock has been driven first from public use, and then
dropped from the worship of God and the life of the fireside." Hence,
while in many parts of Europe the ancient tales live on, often with
their incidents more or less dislocated and their significance quite
blurred, on the other hand, in English-speaking Ireland they have been
cleared away "as a forest is felled by the axe."
Nevertheless, in the regions where Irish myths have been preserved, they
have been remarkably well preserved, and bear unmistakable marks of
their vast antiquity. One very noticeable feature in these myths is the
definiteness and precision of detail with which the personages and their
fields of action are brought before us. This is a characteristic of
mythologies which are, comparatively speaking, intact; and, as Mr.
Curtin observes, it is to be seen in the myths of the American Indians.
As long as a mythology remains intact it "puts its imprint on the whole
region to which it belongs." Every rock, every spring, is the scene of
some definite incident; every hill has its mythical people, who are as
real to the narrators as the flesh-and-blood population which one finds
there. In this whole world of belief and sentiment there is the vigour
of fresh life, and the country is literally enchanted ground. But when,
through the invasion of alien peoples, there is a mingling and conflict
of sacred stories, and new groups of ideas and associations have partly
displaced the old ones, so that only the argument or general statement
of the ancient myth is retained, and perhaps even that but partially,
then "all precision and details with reference to persons and places
vanish; they become indefinite; are in some kingdom, some
place,--nowhere in particular." There is this vagueness in the
folk-tales of eastern and central Europe as contrasted with those of
Ireland. "Where there was or where there was not," says the Magyar,
"there was in the world;" or, if the Russian hero goes anywhere, it is
simply across forty-nine kingdoms, etc.; "but in the Irish tales he is
always a person of known condition in a specified place" (for example,
"There was a blacksmith in Dunkenealy, beyond Killybegs," etc., page
244).
As to the antiquity and the primitive character of Mr. Curtin's stories
an experienced observer can entertain no doubt. His book is certainly
the most considerable achievement in the field of Gaelic mythology since
the publication, thirty years ago, of Campbell's "Tales of the West
Highlands;" and it does for the folk-lore of Ireland what Asbjörnsen and
Moe's collection (the English translation of which is commonly, and with
some injustice, known by the name of the translator as Dasent's "Norse
Tales") did for the folk-lore of Norway. This is, of course, very high
praise, but we do not believe it will be called extravagant by any
competent scholar who reads Mr. Curtin's book. The stories have
evidently been reduced to writing with most scrupulous and loving
fidelity. In turning the Gaelic into English some of the characteristic
Hibernian phrases and constructions of our language have been employed,
and this has been done with such perfect good taste that the effect upon
the ear is like that of a refined and delicate brogue.
The mythical material in the stories is largely that with which the
student of Aryan folk-lore is familiar. We have variants of Cinderella,
the swan maidens, the giant who had no heart in his body, the cloak of
darkness, the sword of light, the magic steed which overtakes the wind
before and outstrips the wind behind; the pot of plenty, from which one
may eat forever, and the cup that is never drained; the hero who
performs impossible tasks, and wooes maidens whose beauty hardly
relieves their treacherous cruelty: "I must tell you now that three
hundred king's sons, lacking one, have come to ask for my daughter, and
in the garden behind my castle are three hundred iron spikes, and every
spike of them but one is covered with the head of a king's son who
couldn't do what my daughter wanted of him, and I'm greatly in dread
that your own head will be put on the one spike that is left uncovered."
The princess in this story--Shaking-Head--is such a wretch, not a bit
better than Queen Labe in the "Arabian Nights," that one marvels at the
hero for marrying her at last, instead of slicing off her head with his
two-handed sword of darkness, and placing it on the three-hundredth
spike. But moral as well as physical probabilities are often
overstrained in this deliciously riotous realm of folk-lore.
Along with much material that is common to the Aryan world there is some
that is peculiar to Ireland, while the Irish atmosphere is over
everything. The stories of Fin MacCumhail (pronounced MacCool) and the
Fenians of Erin are full of grotesque incident and inimitable drollery.
Fin and his redoubtable dog Bran, the one-eyed Gruagach, the hero
Diarmuid, the old hag with the life-giving ointment, the weird hand of
Mal MacMulcan, and the cowherd that was son of the king of Alban make a
charming series of pictures. Among Fin's followers there is a certain
Conán Maol, "who never had a good word in his mouth for any man," and
for whom no man had a good word. This counterpart of Thersites, as Mr.
Curtin tells us, figures as conspicuously in North American as in Aryan
myths. Conán was always at Fin's side, and advising him to mischief.
Once it had like to have gone hard with Conán. The Fenians had been
inveigled into an enchanted castle, and could not rise from their chairs
till two of Fin's sons had gone and beheaded three kings in the north of
Erin, and put their blood into three goblets, and come back and rubbed
the blood on the chairs. Conán had no chair, but was sitting on the
floor, with his back to the wall, and just before they came to him the
last drop of blood gave out. The Fenians were hurrying past without
minding the mischief-maker, when, upon his earnest appeal, Diarmuid
"took him by one hand, and Goll MacMornee by the other, and, pulling
with all their might, tore him from the wall and the floor. But if they
did, he left all the skin of his back, from his head to his heels, on
the floor and the wall behind him. But when they were going home through
the hills of Tralee, they found a sheep on the way, killed it, and
clapped the skin on Conán. The sheepskin grew to his body; and he was so
well and strong that they sheared him every year, and got wool enough
from his back to make flannel and frieze for the Fenians of Erin ever
after." This is a favourite incident, and recurs in the story of the
laughing Gruagach. In most of the Fenian stories the fighting is brisk
and incessant. It is quite a Donnybrook fair. Everybody kills everybody
else, and then some toothless old woman comes along and rubs a magic
salve on them, when, all in a minute, up they pop, and go at it again.
One of the quaintest conceits, and a pretty one withal, is that of Tir
na n-Og, the Land of Youth, the life-giving region just beneath the
ground, whence mysteriously spring the sturdy trees, the soft green
grass, and the bright flowers. The journey thither is not long;
sometimes the hero just pulls up a root and dives down through the hole
into the blessed Tir na n-Og,--as primitive a bit of folk-lore as one
could wish to find! A lovely country, of course, was that land of
sprouting life, and some queer customs did they have there. The mode of
"running for office" was especially worthy of mention. Once in seven
years all the champions and best men "met at the front of the palace,
and ran to the top of a hill two miles distant. On the top of that hill
was a chair, and the man that sat first in the chair was king of Tir na
n-Og for the next seven years." This method enabled them to dispense
with nominating conventions and campaign lies, but not with intrigue and
sorcery, as we find in the droll story of Oisin (or Ossian), which
concludes the Fenian series.
The story of the Fisherman's Son and the Gruagach of Tricks is
substantially the same with the famous story of Farmer Weathersky, in
the Norse collection translated by Sir George Dasent. Gruagach (accented
on the first syllable) means "the hairy one," and, as Mr. Curtin
cautiously observes, "we are more likely to be justified in finding a
solar agent concealed in the person of the laughing Gruagach or the
Gruagach of Tricks than in many of the sun myths put forth by some
modern writers." He reminds one of Hermes and of Proteus, and in the
wonderful changes at the end of the story we have, as in Farmer
Weathersky, a variant of the catastrophe in the story of the Second
Royal Mendicant in the "Arabian Nights;" but the Irishman gives us a
touch of humour that is quite his own. The Gruagach and his eleven
artful sons are chasing the fisherman's son through water and air, and
various forms of fish and bird are assumed, until at length the
fisherman's son, in the shape of a swallow, hovers over the summerhouse
where the daughter of the king of Erin is sitting. Weary with the chase,
the swallow becomes a ring, and falls into the girl's lap; it takes her
fancy, and she puts it on her finger. Then the twelve pursuers change
from hawks into handsome men, and entertain the king in his castle with
music and games, until he asks them what in the world he can give them.
All they want, says the old Gruagach, is the ring which he once lost,
and which is now on the princess's finger. Of course, says the king, if
his daughter has got the ring, she must give it to its owner. But the
ring, overhearing all this, speaks to the princess, and tells her what
to do. She gets a gallon of wheat grains and three gallons of the
strongest _potheen_ that was ever brewed in Ireland, and she mixes them
together in an open barrel before the fire. Then her father calls her
and asks for the ring; and when she finds that her protests are of no
avail, and she must give up, she throws it into the fire. "That moment
the eleven brothers made eleven pairs of tongs of themselves; their
father, the old Gruagach, was the twelfth pair. The twelve jumped into
the fire to know in what spark of it would they find the old fisherman's
son; and they were a long time working and searching through the fire,
when out flew a spark, and into the barrel. The twelve made themselves
men, turned over the barrel, and spilled the wheat on the floor. Then in
a twinkling they were twelve cocks strutting around. They fell to, and
picked away at the wheat, to know which one would find the fisherman's
son. Soon one dropped on one side, and a second on the opposite side,
until all twelve were lying drunk from the wheat."
One seems to see the gleam in the corner of the eye and the pucker in
the Gaelic visage of the old narrator. To be sure, it was the wheat. It
couldn't have been the mountain dew; it never is. Well, when things had
come to this pass, the spark that was the fisherman's son just turned
into a fox, and with one smart bite he took the head off the old
Gruagach, and the eleven other boozy cocks he finished with eleven other
bites. Then he made himself the handsomest man in Erin, and married the
princess and succeeded to the crown.
There is a breezy freshness about these tales, which will make the book
a welcome addition to young people's libraries. It is safe to predict
for it an enviable success. In the next edition there ought to be an
index, and we wish the author need not feel it necessary to be so
sparing with his own notes and comments. His brief Introduction is so
charming, from its weight of sense and beauty of expression, that one
would gladly hear more from the author himself. It is to be hoped that
the book lately published is the forerunner of many.
_August, 1890._
XII
GUESSING AT HALF AND MULTIPLYING BY TWO
"The small philosopher is a great character in New England. His
fundamental rule of logical procedure is to guess at the half and
multiply by two. [Applause.]"[31] It is [in 1880] only two or three
years since the philosopher from whom this text is quoted was himself a
great character in New England, inasmuch as he could give a lecture once
every week, in one of the largest halls of New England's principal city,
and could entertain his audience of two or three thousand people with
discussions of the most vast and abstruse themes of science and
metaphysics. The success with which he entertained his audience is
carefully chronicled for us in the volumes made up from the reports of
his lectures, in which parenthetical notes of "laughter," "applause,"
or "sensation" occur as frequently as in ordinary newspaper reports of
stump speeches or humorous convivial harangues. As a social phenomenon
this career of the Rev. Joseph Cook possesses considerable
interest,--enough, at any rate, to justify a brief inquiry as to his
"fundamental rule of procedure."
Among the wise and witty sayings of the ancients with which our children
are puzzled and edified in the first dozen pages of the Greek Reader,
there is a caustic remark attributed to Phokion, on the occasion of
being very loudly applauded by the populace. "Dear me," said the old
statesman, "can it be that I have been making a fool of myself?" So,
when three thousand people are made to laugh and clap their hands over
statements about the origin of species or the anatomy of the nervous
system, the first impulse of any scientific inquirer of ordinary
sagacity and experience is to ask in what meretricious fashion these
sober topics can have been treated, in order to have produced such a
result. The inference may be cynical, but is none the less likely to be
sound. In the present case, one does not need to read far in the
published reports of these lectures to see that the fundamental rule of
procedure is something very different from any of the rules by which
truth is wooed and won by scientific inquirers. Among Mill's
comprehensive canons of logical method one might search in vain for a
specimen of the method employed by Mr. Cook. Of the temper of mind,
indeed, in which scientific inquiries are conducted, he has no more
conception than Laura Bridgman could have of Pompeian red or a chord of
the minor ninth. The process of holding one's judgment in suspense over
a complicated problem, of patiently gathering and weighing the evidence
on either side, of subjecting one's own first-formed hypotheses to
repeated verification, of clearly comprehending and fairly stating
opposing views, of setting forth one's conclusions at last, guardedly
and with a distinct consciousness of the conditions under which they are
tenable,--all this sort of thing is quite foreign to Mr. Cook's nature.
To him a scientific thesis is simply a statement over which it is
possible to get up a fight. The gamecock is his totem; to him the bones
of the vertebrate subkingdom are only so many bones of contention, and
the sponge is interesting chiefly as an emblem which is never, on any
account, to be thrown up. He talks accordingly of scientific men lying
in wait for Mr. Darwin, ready to pounce on him like a tiger on its prey;
he is very fond of exhibiting what he calls the "strategic point" of a
scientific book or theory; and altogether his attitude is bellicose to a
degree that is as unbecoming in a preacher of the gospel as it is out of
place in a discussion of scientific questions. His favourite method of
dealing with a scientific writer is to quote from him all sorts of
detached statements and inferences, and, without the slightest regard to
the writer's general system of opinions or habits of thought, to praise
or vituperate the detached statements according to some principle which
it is not always easy for the reader to discover, but which has always
doubtless some reference to their supposed bearings upon the peculiar
kind of orthodoxy of which Mr. Cook appears as the champion. There are
some writers whom he thinks it necessary always to scold or vilify, no
matter what they say. If they happen to say something which ought to be
quite satisfactory to any reasonable person of "orthodox" opinions, Mr.
Cook either accuses them of insincerity or represents them as making
"concessions."
This last device, I am sorry to be obliged to add, is not an uncommon
one with theological controversialists, when their zeal runs away with
them. When a man makes a statement which expresses his deepest
convictions, there is no easier way of seeming to knock away the
platform on which he stands than to quote his statement, and describe
it as something which he has reluctantly "conceded." In dealing with the
principal writers on evolution, Mr. Cook is continually found resorting
to this cheap device. For example, when Professor Tyndall declares that
"if a right-hand spiral movement of the particles of the brain could be
shown to occur in love, and a left-hand spiral movement in hate, we
should be as far off as ever from understanding the connection of this
physical motion with the spiritual manifestations,"--when Professor
Tyndall declares this, he simply asserts what is a cardinal proposition
with the group of English philosophers to which he belongs. With
Professor Huxley, as well as with Mr. Spencer, it is a fundamental
proposition that psychical phenomena cannot possibly be interpreted in
terms of matter and motion, and this proposition they have at various
times set forth and defended. In the chapter on Matter and Spirit, in my
work on "Cosmic Philosophy," I have fully expounded this point, and have
further illustrated it in "The Unseen World." With the conclusions there
set forth the remark of Professor Tyndall thoroughly agrees, and it does
so because all these expressions of opinion and all these arguments are
part and parcel of a coherent system of anti-materialistic thought
adopted[32] by the English school of evolutionists. Yet when Mr. Cook
quotes Professor Tyndall's remark, he does it in this wise: "It is
notorious that even Tyndall _concedes_," etc., etc.
By proceeding in this way, Mr. Cook finds it easy to make out a
formidable array of what he calls "the concessions of evolutionists." He
first gives the audience a crude impression of some sort of theory of
evolution, such as no scientific thinker ever dreamed of; or, to speak
more accurately, he plays upon the crude impression already half formed
in the average mind of his audience, and which he evidently shares
himself. The _average_ notion of the doctrine of evolution, possessed in
common by an audience big enough to fill Tremont Temple, would no doubt
seem to Darwin or to Spencer something quite fearful and wonderful.
Playing with this sort of crude material, Mr. Cook puts together a
series of numbered propositions, which remind one of those interminable
auction catalogues of Walt Whitman, which some of our British cousins,
more ardent than discriminating, mistake for a truly American species of
inspired verse. In this long catena of statements, almost everything is
easily seen to disagree with the crude general impression to which the
speaker appeals, and almost everything is accordingly set down as a
"concession." And as the audience go out after the lecture, they
doubtless ask one another, in amazed whispers, how it is that sensible
men who make so many "concessions" can find it in their hearts to
maintain the doctrine of evolution at all!
Sometimes Mr. Cook goes even farther than this, and, in the very act of
quoting an author's declared opinions, expressly refuses to give him
credit for them. Thus he has the hardihood to say: "Even Herbert
Spencer, _who would be very glad to prove the opposite_,[33] says, in
his Biology, 'The proximate chemical principles or chemical
units--albumen, fibrine, gelatine, or the hypothetical proteine
substance--cannot possess the property of forming the endlessly varied
structures of animal forms.'" Mr. Cook here lays claim to a knowledge of
his author's innermost thoughts and wishes which is quite remarkable.
For a fit parallel one would have to cite the instance of the German who
flogged his son for profanity, though the boy had not opened his mouth.
"You dinks tamn," exclaimed the irate father, "and I vips you for dat!"
As there are some writers whom Mr. Cook thinks it always necessary to
vituperate, no matter what they say, so there are others whom he finds
it convenient to quote, as foils to the former, and to mention with
praise on all occasions, though it is difficult to assign the reasons
for this preference, except on the hypothesis that the lecturer has an
implicit faith in the simple and confiding nature of his audience.
Before giving these lectures Mr. Cook had studied awhile in Germany, and
his citations of German writers show how far he deems it safe to presume
on New England's ignorance of what the Fatherland thinks. It is nice to
have such a learned country as Germany at one's disposal to hurl at the
heads of people whose "outlook in philosophy does not reach beyond the
Straits of Dover;" it saves a great deal of troublesome argument, and
still more painful examination of facts. This English opinion is all
very well, you know, but it comes from a philosopher "whose star is just
touching the western pines," and a German professor whom I am about to
quote, whose book I "hold in my hand," and "whose star is in the
ascendant," does not agree with it. All this is extremely neat and
convincing, apparently, to the crowd in Tremont Temple. With all Germany
at his disposal, however, it must be acknowledged that our lecturer
makes a very sparing use of his resources. He quotes Helmholtz and
Wundt every now and then with warm approval, though wherein they should
be found any more acceptable to the orthodox world than Tyndall and
Spencer it is not easy to see, save that the ill repute of German free
thinkers takes somewhat longer to get diffused in New England than the
ill repute of English free thinkers.