CHAPTER X.

The reader must imagine a lapse of five years.

Hiram Meeker sits by an open window of his front parlor. It is the first

week in June; and, although early in the afternoon, the avenue is

beginning to be thronged with the fashionable world.

Hiram sits, idly regarding the passers by. If you observe particularly,

you will perceive that the chair in which he is sitting is of a peculiar

construction. It is made so as to be wheeled from one point to another,

without disturbing the occupant.

If you regard his countenance with a little more scrutiny, you will find

it greatly changed. There is no longer that firm texture of the skin

which indicates the vigor of health, and which shows that the muscles

are under full control. One side of the face is a very little out of

shape; not enough, however, to affect the appearance of the mouth, and

probably not to interfere with articulation.

* * * * *

Reader, the 'evil days' have come to Hiram. They _have_ come, but, as

one might say, gently, without aggravating circumstances or attending

misfortunes. Still, the evil days have come. The 'years,' too, draw nigh

when he shall have no pleasure in them.

It is a twelvemonth now since the fatal, long-dreaded _paralysis_ came.

The stroke was a mild one, but there it was. All that care, and

forethought, and the best medical advice could accomplish, had been put

in requisition, and not without effect; but the millionnaire could not

neglect his vast interests, nor fail to mature plans which his fertile

brain originated.

The machine gave occasional token of the wear and tear to which it was

subjected. Then Hiram would intermit his labor; would ride farther and

sharper of a morning; would subject himself to an extra amount of

friction. Presently the brain would work bravely on again, as of yore,

just the same--exactly the same. Hiram could perceive no

difference--none. Then would come another premonitory symptom, which

would be followed by other extra rides and various new courses of

treatment, till all worked well again. During these periods, Doctor

Frank, under whose charge Hiram had at length placed himself, would urge

on his brother the necessity of some relief from his self-imposed

labors. But, as I have intimated, the advice was heeded only while

danger was apparent.

When the fearful visitor _did_ appear, Hiram bitterly regretted tasking

his brain so severely. He was now quite willing to obey every injunction

and follow every suggestion of his physician.

To this is owing his present comfortable state and tolerable degree of

health. But privately let me tell you that he is failing--not fast, but

gradually, surely failing.

* * * * *

Let us return to the window.

Mrs. Meeker's carriage is at the door. In a few moments Arabella herself

comes out and enters it, and drives away. Positively she does not appear

in the least changed since we last saw her. In fact, her health was

never so good as at present.

'She will outlive me,' mutters Hiram--'she will outlive me, though she

is more than two years older than I am. Let me see, from April to

November is seven months. Yes, it is nearer three years than two. She

will outlive me, though.

'I say, Williams!'

'Yes, sir.'

'Williams, have you heard how Mr. Hill is to-day? I am told he is not

expected to live.'

'No more he wasn't sir; but I met his man this morning, at market, and

he says as how Mr. Hill is very much better, sir, very much better.'

'Humph!

'Williams, who was that young man I saw come to the door this morning?'

'I really couldn't say, sir--I didn't know of any, sir--oh, now I

recollect, sir: it was a messenger from the Doctor, sir, with the new

friction gloves.'

'Humph!--

'You understand, Williams, if _that_ young man ever comes near the

house--you know who I mean--I say, you--you understand what I told you?'

'Oh, yes, sir--certainly, sir.'

'That will do, Williams.--Hill is getting better, is he?' pursues Hiram

to himself. 'Let me see--Hill must be at least four years older than I.

Yes, I recollect perfectly when he was at Joslin's, the time I came down

from Burnsville. Why, I was a mere boy, then, and Hill--Hill was a young

man of five-and-twenty. Yes, I recollect perfectly'--and Hiram smiled,

as if his encounter with Joslin and his clerk was fresh in his mind. 'So

Hill is better to-day,' he continued. 'He will outlive me too. Yet he is

certainly four years older--four years older.'

* * * * *

There may be some of my readers who have taken sufficient interest in

'that scapegrace Hill' to wish to know something about him during these

last thirty years.

I will say, therefore, that when Hiram jilted Emma Tenant, Hill took a

perfect disgust toward him. He presently quit drinking and swearing, and

married a pretty--indeed, a very charming--rosy-cheeked girl, whose only

fault was, as he said, that she was foolish enough to love him. This

girl was the daughter of his landlady, and not worth a penny--in money.

Till Hiram's 'affair' with Emma Tenant, he had exercised sufficient

influence over Hill to prevent his committing himself. That resulted in

Hill's throwing off the yoke, and announcing his independence. Hill was

no fool. The fact is, Hiram, to a certain extent, was in his power. The

parties never quarrelled. But all accounts were closed between them the

following season. I am constrained to add Hill continued in the liquor

business, in which he amassed a pretty large fortune. He was afterward

made President of the Globe Bank, one of the largest in the city, as all

know, which office he continues to hold. He has proved a good husband, a

kind father, and a useful member of society. The phrase is a stereotyped

one, but it is true of Hill.

* * * * *

Leaving Hiram Meeker to pursue his soliloquy, I will endeavor to put the

reader in possession of such facts as may be necessary for the better

understanding of the narrative, and the present situation of affairs in

Hiram's own house.

After the departure of Belle, I remarked that Hiram was busily engaged

for more than a week in preparing his will. With the defection of his

son and the elopement of his favorite daughter, Hiram's ideas took a new

and distinctive turn.

He at one time had considerable pride in the idea of building up the

family name in his children, 'even unto his children's children.' This

he thought a laudable ambition, since he found the phrase in Scripture.

But when Belle deserted him, and he found himself not only forsaken but

duped, his feelings underwent an entire change.

When Harriet, in her anxiety to induce her father to bring back her

sister, said, 'Give her my share--I shall not require it,' there was

stirred in Hiram's heart the old demon of Calculation and

Acquisitiveness. It seemed as if something had been saved to him by

Harriet's untimely departure from the world. It is difficult fully to

understand this, since, while he lived, certainly he would retain

control of all his property; and after his death, what could it avail

him? Nevertheless, I but recount the simple truth.

That night he conceived the idea of a magnificent disposition of his

vast estate, to take place on his decease. Now he began to regard his

afflictions in a providential light. These were chastenings, at present

not joyous but grievous; but they would work out for him a more eternal

weight of glory.

The consequence was, that by his will be founded three distinct public

institutions, all bearing his name; and prepared, at the same time,

minute directions how to carry his bequests into effect. These

institutions were not what are called charitable, neither did their

establishment indicate a heart easily touched by human misfortune. They

were calculated, however, to adorn and ornament the city, and to blazon

forth _H. Meeker_ to the world so long as they stood.

One thing threatened to interfere with Hiram's arrangements. His wife

would have a right of dower in all his real estate, in case she survived

him. This annoyed Hiram greatly.

He got along with the matter in a business way. Arabella herself was

called in. Hiram announced, in general terms, what he proposed to do,

and suggested that he was ready to leave her a sum certain, provided she

would relinquish her rights in the real estate.

Under ordinary circumstances Arabella would have been indignant; but her

thoughts were of her son, now a wanderer from his home. She was

tolerably familiar with the laws which regulate property. She knew if

she insisted on her dower, which she had a right to do, that however

affluent she would be while she lived, she would have nothing to leave

her child. She did not give Belle a thought.

After a good deal of haggling, it was agreed that Hiram should give her

by his will three hundred thousand dollars (just about the sum, by the

way, she brought her husband), together with the household furniture,

plate, horses, carriages, and so forth, and the use of the house during

her life.

This settled, Hiram was left free to follow out his ambitious plans for

raising a monument to--himself.

These occupy him entirely. So much so, that he has no time to look

forward to the great future which cannot now be very far off to him.

Indeed, strange as one may think, although Hiram feels well assured of

his title to the kingdom, he _thinks_ very little about it; neither does

the prospect give him the least satisfaction.

* * * * *

Meanwhile, where is Harriet? What has become of Belle! How did Gus turn

out?

Harriet survived longer than one would have imagined, considering the

progress disease had made when we first became acquainted with her.

While she lived, she could not fail to impart her influence--the

influence of a gentle and a chastened spirit--over the whole household.

I have already intimated that there was a new tie between her and her

mother--the worldly minded and fashionable Arabella. It was in the

interest which both felt in Gus. It seemed to be the chief object of

Harriet in living, to bring back her brother to his home, and to see him

in the right path. The mother longed to bring about the same thing, but

probably for very different reasons from those which actuated the dying

girl. But here their sympathies met, and they could act in concert. Gus

had always been sensibly alive to Harriet's regard for him. He loved her

with real affection; and when, in a foreign land, he read her letters,

fraught with the strongest expressions of love and sympathy, and filled

with the most earnest appeals from his 'dying sister, whose every breath

was a prayer for him,' it was impossible for his nature to resist.

In a few months, Gus had taken his resolution. He abhorred trade. His

four years in college were not altogether lost on him. He felt quite

sure that his father would never relent. He believed he discovered in

himself a taste for the medical profession. So, after a short period,

Gus established himself in a very quiet way in Paris, and became a very

persevering and devoted student. His mother, of course, managed to keep

him in funds; but his drafts on her were very moderate. His reformation

seemed complete.

After devoting about eighteen months to the study of medicine abroad, he

returned to New York. This was the season before Harriet died. He said

he could not endure the idea of her passing out of the world without his

seeing her again, and telling her what was in his heart.

Hiram all this time remained, or professed to remain, profoundly

ignorant of what was going on. He continued to speak of his 'reprobate

son,' among his acquaintances in the church. The least attempt on

Harriet's part to introduce the forbidden subject was met by the most

stern repulse.

But Gus came back. He was obliged to enter his own home stealthily and

in secret, where he deserved to be welcomed back in honor and with

reward. But he came. What was the joy, the intense satisfaction of

Harriet, to see him again! And Arabella--it was a strange sight indeed

to see _her_ give way to any real emotion.

Perhaps, before this, you have guessed that Doctor Frank has had

something to do with Gus's return. He has had a great deal to do with

it. Doctor Frank is an old man. He has no boys--living. He wants Gus to

live with him. He will give him the benefit of his large experience, and

Gus in return will relieve the doctor of much of the hard work which is

constantly accumulating. This is Doctor Frank's plan. It has been

carried out, and Gus is now 'the young doctor.' Bravo Gus! God bless

you!

* * * * *

Poor Belle!

At the end of a single year, she was obliged to quit her husband. Quit

her husband, did I say? I mean that her husband quitted her. After

spending a few weeks in travelling, the two set off for Europe; and,

going to Paris, they gave themselves up to the enjoyment of the gay

scenes which this remarkable city affords.

'When the ocean shall be between us, papa will no longer hold out--I

know he will not.'

So Belle said to her husband. But Belle was mistaken. Months passed, and

destitution stared the couple in the face. Then the various articles of

jewelry went, one by one--and then the crisis arrived.

When Signor Filippo Barbone became fully satisfied that his

father-in-law was not to be turned from his resolution: when it became

apparent that the mother was not to be influenced, he came to the

conclusion that he had made a bad bargain, and resolved to escape as

soon as possible from the consequences of it.

Belle, on her part, began to be disenchanted. Then all the elements of

her imperious, passionate nature, broke out in the fiercest, most

vehement, most vindictive manner. She heaped reproaches, taunts, and

maledictions on the head of the signor, who bore them with more

equanimity than would be supposed, but who determined not to have

another such tempest. One night he decamped, taking with him the few

remaining valuables the miserable girl possessed.

Belle had not communicated with Gus, or even permitted him to know her

whereabouts. Now she wrote him a note, imploring him to come to her. He

responded at once, and instantly made what arrangements he could for her

comfort. After a season, and by the joint efforts of Gus and Harriet and

Doctor Frank, Belle was enabled to go back to New York. Her father would

not see her; her mother would not permit her to enter the house; but a

small weekly stipend was allowed, to enable her to board in a

respectable place, and to dress decently.

Her unfortunate marriage has had very little effect on her. She never

was so handsome in her life. She enjoys exciting the sympathies of those

by whom she is surrounded, including half-a-dozen gentlemen who are

constantly dangling around her. A young lawyer, who was boarding at the

same house, undertook to institute proceedings for a divorce against the

absent signor. He was successful in his application, and Belle is now

legally free. She will probably marry some man of coarse taste, who will

be attracted by her fine form and showy appearance, to say nothing of

the effect of the prevalent belief that she will certainly be provided

for 'on old Meeker's death.'

* * * * *

So much for the present situation of the Meeker family. While Arabella

is taking her drive, I have had time to tell the reader thus much about

it. The carriage is now approaching, and I must stop.

* * * * *

The shadows of evening begin to gather. Along the great artery of the

city press the crowd. Their steps tend homeward.

Still Hiram sits by the window, but oblivious of the current which

sweeps by.

His thoughts go back to Hampton. He is a clerk in the 'opposition

store,' making love to Mary Jessup.

'What a pretty girl she used to be!--how much she always did for

me--what pains she took to please me!' he mutters to himself.

* * * * *

Now he is thinking of Burnsville. His mind seems principally to dwell on

what was formerly of secondary importance to him.

'Those Hawkins girls--they were good girls--very kind to me always--nice

girls--handsome girls--both of them in love with me. The widow Hawkins,

too....

* * * * *

'Sarah Burns--she was a different sort from the rest. I don't think I

ever cared so much about her--too independent--thought too much of

herself. How quick she broke the engagement! I remember it was

preparatory lecture--preparatory lecture....

* * * * *

'Emma Tenant--_she_ wasn't proud--Emma really loved me--I always, knew

she did....'

He raised his eyes.

Was it through some species of traction, as believers in odic force

other peculiar affinities, attribute to their influences, that he did so

at that moment?

_There_ was Emma Tenant--Mrs. Lawrence--passing in her carriage,

surrounded by blooming, grown-up children.

Her attention, it seems, was directed for an instant to the window.

Their gaze met.

No outward sign that they were ever acquainted was manifested. But there

was, on both sides, a _recognition_, instantaneous and complete.

'Poor old man!' exclaimed Mrs. Lawrence, involuntarily.

'Who, mamma?'

'We have passed him now.' And no more was said.

'She loved me once,' was the soliloquy. 'That was a great while ago,

too....'

* * * * *

Another carriage passed. A bow from a lady, accompanied by a pleasant

smile. It is Miss Innis (Mrs. Leroy), driving out with _her_ children.

Though no longer young, she is still a most attractive and elegant

woman.

'What a wife she would have made me! I should not be in this state if I

had her to look after me. She has a kind heart--always smiling, always

happy.'

'Mr. Meeker!'

The shrill voice of Arabella is heard.

Hiram groans in spirit.

'Don't you think you had better be wheeled to your room? You know I dine

out to-day.'

'I prefer to sit here. Tell Williams to come to me.'

* * * * *

The shadows fall thicker and faster.

Still Hiram Meeker sits by the window.

Despite my real inclination, I have a morbid desire to linger by his

side.

* * * * *

I hear the sharp ring of the prompter's bell! The curtain is about to

fall. I _cannot_ stay in the gloom alone with that man!--Good by to you,

Hiram!

* * * * *

I breathe again--in the cheerful streets, surrounded by bustling,

earnest, sympathizing humanity.

* * * * *

Reader, what think you? WAS HE SUCCESSFUL?

APHORISMS.

NO. II.

One may effect an _absolute insurance against all real evil_ by the

adoption of a single rule, i. e., _never to do anything against

conscience_. This must be applied in our treatment of ourselves, in body

and mind--especially the former; because there we are most apt to fail.

It must be kept strictly toward the soul, in view of its endless

welfare, and in all our relations to God and man. This, I admit, may not

save us from the invasions of apparent ill; but from the entire

_reality_ of evil, the security thus furnished is absolute. Conscience

is the voice of God in the soul; and no one truly obeying this voice

will meet with permanent harm. This rule, let us further observe, is

most needed where it is least likely to be regarded, i. e., in

circumstances where the voice of conscience is not so decided as in the

case of temptations to palpable vice. Our danger is often greatest,

where we have to resist only an obscure sense of right and wrong, in

seeking the lower gratifications of life. So much the more scrupulous

must we there be.

BENEDICT OF NURSIA AND THE ORDER OF THE BENEDICTINES.

Benedict of Nursia, the founder of the celebrated order which bears his

name, gave to the Western monasticism a fixed and permanent form, and

thus carried it far above the Eastern with its imperfect attempts at

organization, and made it exceedingly profitable to the practical, and

incidentally also to the literary interests of the Catholic Church. He

holds, therefore, the dignity of patriarch of the Western monks. He has

furnished a remarkable instance of the incalculable influence which a

simple but judicious moral rule of life may exercise on many centuries.

Benedict was born of the illustrious house of Anicius at Nursia (now

Norcia), in Umbria, about the year 480, at the time when the political

and social state of Europe was distracted and dismembered, and

literature, morals, and religion seemed to be doomed to irremediable

ruin. He studied in Rome, but so early as his fifteenth year he fled

from the corrupt society of his fellow students, and spent three years

in seclusion in a dark, narrow, and almost inaccessible grotto at

Subiaco.[5] A neighboring monk, Romanus, furnished him from time to time

his scanty food, letting it down by a cord, with a little bell, the

sound of which announced to him the loaf of bread. He there passed

through the usual anchoretic battles with demons, and by prayer and

ascetic exercise attained a rare power over nature. At one time, Pope

Gregory tells us, the allurements of voluptuousness so strongly tempted

his imagination that he was on the point of leaving his retreat in

pursuit of a beautiful woman of previous acquaintance; but summoning up

his courage, he took off his vestment of skins, and rolled himself naked

on thorns and briers near his cave, until the impure fire of sensual

passion was forever extinguished. Seven centuries later, St. Francis of

Assisi planted on that spiritual battle field two rose trees, which grew

and survived the Benedictine thorns and briers. He gradually became

known, and was at first taken for a wild beast by the surrounding

shepherds, but afterward reverenced as a saint.

After this period of hermit life, he began his labors in behalf of the

monastery proper. In that mountainous region he established, in

succession, twelve cloisters, each with twelve monks and a superior,

himself holding the oversight of all. The persecution of an unworthy

priest caused him, however, to leave Subiaco, and retire to a wild but

picturesque mountain district in the Neapolitan province upon the

boundaries of Samnium and Campania. There he destroyed the remnants of

idolatry, converted many of the pagan inhabitants to Christianity by his

preaching and miracles, and in the year 529, under many difficulties,

founded upon the ruins of a temple of Apollo the renowned cloister of

Monte Cassino,[6] the alma mater and capital of his order. Here he

labored fourteen years till his death. Although never ordained to the

priesthood, his life there was rather that of a missionary and apostle

than of a solitary. He cultivated the soil, fed the poor, healed the

sick, preached to the neighboring population, directed the young monks,

who in increasing numbers flocked to him, and organized the monastic

life upon a fixed method or rule, which he himself conscientiously

observed. His power over the hearts and the veneration in which he was

held is illustrated by the visit of Jotila, in 542, the barbarian king,

the victor of the Romans and master of Italy, who threw himself on his

face before the saint, accepted his reproof and exhortations, asked his

blessing, and left a better man, but fell, after ten years' reign, as

Benedict had predicted, in a great battle with the Græco-Roman army

under Narses. Benedict died, after partaking of the holy communion,

praying, in standing posture at the foot of the altar, on the 21st of

March, 543, and was buried by the side of his sister, Scholastica, who

had established a nunnery near Monte Cassino, and died a few weeks

before him. They met only once a year on the side of the mountain for

prayer and pious conversation. On the day of his departure two monks saw

in a vision a shining pathway of stars leading from Monte Cassino to

heaven, and heard a voice that said by this road Benedict, the well

beloved of God, had ascended to heaven.[7]

His biographer, Pope Gregory I., in the second book of his Dialogues,

ascribes to him miraculous prophecies and healings, and even a raising

of the dead.[8] With reference to his want of secular culture and his

spiritual knowledge, he calls him a learned ignorant and an unlettered

sage.[9] At all events he possessed the genius of a lawgiver, and holds

the first place among the founders of monastic orders, though his person

and life are much less interesting than those of a Bernard of Clairvaux,

a Francis of Assisi, and an Ignatius of Loyola.

The rule of St. Benedict, on which his fame rests, forms an epoch in the

history of monasticism. In a short time it superseded all contemporary

and older rules of the kind, and became the immortal code of the most

illustrious branch of the monastic army, and the basis of the whole

Roman Catholic cloister life.[10] It consists of a preface or

_prologus_, and a series of moral, social, liturgical, and penal

ordinances, in seventy-three chapters. It shows a true knowledge of

human nature, the practical wisdom of Rome, and adaptation to Western

customs; and it combines simplicity with completeness, strictness with

gentleness, humility with courage, and gives the whole cloister life a

fixed unity and compact organization, which, like the episcopate,

possessed an unlimited versatility and power of expansion. It made every

cloister an _ecclesiola in ecclesia_, reflecting the relation of the

bishop to his charge, the monarchical principle of authority on the

democratic basis of the equality of the brethren, though claiming a

higher degree of perfection than could be realized in the great secular

church. For the rude and undisciplined world of the Middle Age, the

Benedictine rule furnished a wholesome course of training and a constant

stimulus to the obedience, self-control, order, and industry which were

indispensable to the regeneration and healthy growth of social life.[11]

The spirit of the rule may be judged from the following sentences of the

_prologus_, which contains pious exhortations: 'Having thus,' he says,

'my brethren, asked of the Lord who shall dwell in His tabernacle, we

have heard the precepts prescribed to such a one. If we fulfil these

conditions we shall be heirs of the kingdom of heaven. Let us, then,

prepare our hearts and bodies to fight under a holy obedience to these

precepts; and if it is not always possible for nature to obey, let us

ask the Lord that He would deign to give us the succor of His grace.

Would we avoid the pains of hell and attain eternal life while there is

still time, while we are still in this mortal body, and while the light

of this life is bestowed upon us for that purpose, let us run and strive

so as to reap an eternal reward. We must, then, form a _school of divine

servitude_, in which, we trust, nothing too heavy or rigorous will be

established. But if, in conformity with right and justice, we should

exercise a little severity for the amendment of vices or the

preservation of charity, beware of fleeing under the impulse of terror

from the way of salvation, which cannot but have a hard beginning. When

man has walked for some time in obedience and faith, his heart will

expand, and he will run with the unspeakable sweetness of love in the

way of God's commandments. May He grant that, never straying from the

instruction of the Master, and persevering in His doctrine in the

monastery until death, we may share by patience in the sufferings of

Christ, and be worthy to share together His kingdom.'

The leading provisions of this rule are as follows:

At the head of each society stands an abbot, who is elected by the

monks, and with their consent appoints a provost (_præpositus_), and,

when the number of the brethren requires, deans over the several

divisions (_decaniæ_), as assistants. He governs, in Christ's stead, by

authority and example, and is to his cloister what the bishop is to his

diocese. In the more weighty matters he takes the congregation of the

brethren into consultation; in ordinary affairs, only the older members.

The formal entrance into the cloister must be preceded by a probation or

novitiate of one year (subsequently it was made three years), that no

one might prematurely or rashly take the solemn step. If the novice

repented his resolution, he could leave the cloister without hindrance;

if he adhered to it, he was, at the close of his probation, subjected to

an examination in presence of the abbot and the monks, and then,

appealing to the saints, whose relics were in the cloister, he laid upon

the altar of the chapel the irrevocable vow, written or at least

subscribed by his own hand, and therewith cut off from himself forever

all return to the world.

From this important arrangement the cloister received its stability, and

the whole monastic institution derived additional earnestness, solidity,

and permanence.

The vow was threefold, comprising _stablitas_, perpetual adherence to

the monastic order; _conversio morum_, especially voluntary poverty and

chastity, which were always regarded as the very essence of monastic

piety under all its forms; and _obedientia coram Deo et sanctis ejus_,

absolute obedience to the abbot, as the representative of God and

Christ. This obedience is the cardinal virtue of a monk.[12]

The life of the cloister consisted of a judicious alternation of

spiritual and bodily exercises. This is the great excellence of the rule

of Benedict, who proceeded here upon the true principle that idleness is

the mortal enemy of the soul and the workshop of the devil.[13] Seven

hours were to be devoted to prayer, singing of psalms, and

meditation;[14] from two to three hours, especially on Sunday, to

religious reading; and from six to seven hours to manual labor indoors

or in the field, or, instead of this, to the training of children, who

were committed to the cloister by their parents (_oblati_).[15]

Here was a starting point for the afterward celebrated cloister schools,

and for that attention to literary pursuits which, though entirely

foreign to the uneducated Benedict and his immediate successors,

afterward became one of the chief ornaments of his order, and in many

cloisters took the place of manual labor.

In other respects the mode of life was to be simple without extreme

rigor, and confined to strictly necessary things. Clothing consisted of

a tunic with a black cowl (whence the name _Black Friars_); the material

to be determined by the climate and season. On the two weekly fast days,

and from the middle of September to Easter, one meal was to suffice for

the day. Each monk is allowed daily a pound of bread and pulse, and,

according to the Italian custom, half a flagon (_hemina_) of wine;

though he is advised to abstain from the wine, if he can do so without

injury to his health. Flesh is permitted only to the weak and sick,[16]

who were to be treated with special care. During the meal some edifying

piece was read, and silence enjoined. The individual monk knows no

personal property, not even his simple dress as such; and the fruits of

his labor go into the common treasury. He should avoid all contact with

the world as dangerous to the soul, and therefore every cloister should

be so arranged as to be able to carry on even the arts and trades

necessary for supplying its wants.[17] Hospitality and other works of

love are especially commanded.

The penalties for transgression of the rule are, first, private

admonition, then exclusion from the fellowship of prayer, next

exclusion from fraternal intercourse, and finally expulsion from the

cloister, after which, however, restoration is possible, even to the

third time.

Benedict had no presentiment of the vast historical importance which his

rule, originally designed simply for the cloister of Monte Cassino, was

destined to attain. He probably never aspired beyond the regeneration

and salvation of his own soul and that of his brother monks, and all the

talk of some later historians about his far-reaching plans of a

political and social regeneration of Europe, and the preservation and

promotion of literature and art, find no support whatever in his life or

in his rule. But he humbly planted a seed which Providence blessed a

hundredfold. By his rule, he became, without his own will or knowledge,

the founder of an order, which, until in the thirteenth century the

Dominicans and Franciscans pressed it partially into the background,

spread with great rapidity over the whole of Europe, maintained a clear

supremacy, formed the model for all other monastic orders, and gave to

the Catholic Church an imposing array of missionaries, authors, artists,

bishops, archbishops, cardinals, and popes, as Gregory the Great and

Gregory VII. In less than a century after the death of Benedict, the

conquests of the barbarians in Italy, Gaul, and Spain were reconquered

for civilization, and the vast territories of Great Britain, Germany,

and Scandinavia incorporated into Christendom or opened to missionary

labor; and in this progress of history the monastic institution

regulated and organized by Benedict's rule bears an honorable share.

Benedict himself established a second cloister in the vicinity of

Terracina, and two of his favorite disciples, Placidus and St.

Maurus,[18] introduced the 'holy rule,' the one into Sicily, the other

into France. Pope Gregory the Great, himself at one time a Benedictine

monk, enhanced its prestige, and converted the Anglo-Saxons to the Roman

Christian faith by Benedictine monks. Gradually the rule found so

general acceptance both in old and in new institutions, that, in the

time of Charlemagne, it became a question, whether there were any monks

at all who were not Benedictines. The order, it is true, has degenerated

from time to time, through the increase of its wealth and the decay of

its discipline, but its fostering care of religion, of humane studies,

and of the general civilization of Europe, from the tilling of the soil

to the noblest learning, has given it an honorable place in history and

won immortal praise.

The patronage of learning, however, as we have already said, was not

within the design of the founder or his rule. The joining of this to the

cloister life is due, if we leave out of view the learned monk Jerome,

to CASSIODORUS, who, in 538, retired from the honors and cares

of high civil office in the Gothic monarchy of Italy,[19] to a monastery

founded by himself at Vivarium[20] (Viviers), in Calabria, in Lower

Italy. Here he spent nearly thirty years as monk and abbot, collected a

large library, encouraged the monks to copy and to study the Holy

Scriptures, the works of the church fathers, and even the ancient

classics, and wrote for them several literary and theological text

books, especially his treatise _De institutione divinarum literarum_, a

kind of elementary encyclopædia, which was the code of monastic

education for many generations. Vivarium at one time almost rivalled

Monte Cassino, and Cassiodorus[21] won the honorary title of the

restorer of knowledge in the sixth century.

The Benedictines, already accustomed to regular work, soon followed this

example. Thus, that very mode of life which in its founder, Anthony,

despised all learning, became, in the course of its development, an

asylum of culture in the rough and stormy times of the immigration and

the crusades, and a conservator of the literary treasures of antiquity

for the use of modern times.

HANNAH THURSTON.

PAUL. Well, Dorcas, now you have finished the book, what do you

think of it?

DORCAS. I must confess, my expectations on the whole have been

agreeably disappointed. From the criticisms I had read, both favorable

and adverse, I was fully prepared to quarrel with it from beginning to

end. I find in it much power and sustained interest. The descriptions of

nature are admirable--fresh, unhackneyed, and vivid. Western New York,

with its blue lakes, sloping hills, shining brooks, quiet woodlands,

spring buds, autumn flowers, winding country roads, and laden grain

fields, stands before one, clearly pictured. The characters, with their

_isms_, seem like old acquaintances, and the seething, fermenting

condition of American society is most accurately represented. There is

pathos, too, in the story, and many will read it with moistened eyes.

PAUL. So far so good, but--?

DORCAS. But there runs through the entire work a vein of

sentiment or philosophy, which wears a very suspicious resemblance to

that of a certain school just now popular in France. I need not tell

you, Uncle Paul, how distasteful to me is that school, nor how false I

think the premises upon which it is founded. I am convinced there is a

difference in the mental and moral constitution of men and women. I will

not bore you by any disquisition upon relative superiority or

inferiority, but will simply give you a portion of my idea as I find it

laid down by St. John Chrysostom: 'Do not confound _submission_ with

_slavery_,' says the golden-mouthed Greek. 'The woman obeys, but

_remains free_; she is _equal_ in honor. It is true that she is subject

to her husband; and this is her punishment for having rendered herself

guilty in the beginning. Mark it well; woman was not condemned to

subjection at the time of her creation; when God made and presented her

to her husband, He said nothing of domination; we hear nothing from the

lips of Adam which supposes it. It was only after having violated her

duty by leading him astray to whom she had been given as a support, that

she heard these words: 'Thou shalt be under thy husband's power, and he

shall have dominion over thee.''

Now, in the book under consideration, we are led to suppose that even

the 'exceptional women' find submission and dependence, not only

delightful, but absolute necessities of their being. They are only too

happy to succumb to the powerful magnetism attributed to men by reason

alone of their manhood. (A doctrine too repulsive to admit of

discussion.) I fancy that thinking, sensitive, and high-spirited women

have not yet ceased to find submission and dependence a _punishment_.

They may take up their cross cheerily, and wear it gracefully, but none

the less do they feel it to be a cross. As for pecuniary dependence, so

long as all goes smoothly and matters are so arranged that the wife is

not obliged to ask the husband for funds, the power of custom and of

legal provisions may be sufficient to prevent any disquietude; but after

the first misunderstanding, the first unkind word, _his_ money, as it

passes through _her_ hands, burns like coals of fire, and the bitterness

of her heart, as she perhaps vainly longs for some means of employment

by which to procure at least sufficient for her own personal expenses,

would cause him a new and strange sensation, did she not deem it her

_duty_ to suppress all evidence, even the existence, of such

self-assertion, and quietly shoulder this with the rest, as a portion of

the burden to be borne through the valley of humiliation into which she

has entered, and wherein, by reason of the especial power granted her of

knowing and loving God, she usually finds herself Heaven's own

missionary, the keeper and guide of souls. Now, do not misunderstand me,

Uncle Paul; when I say that marriage is a valley of humiliation, I

intend no reproach to men; I simply state a fact dependent upon the

nature of things, and upon the primal sentence passed against the pride

that, in spite of the prohibition of the Almighty, sought to know all

things, 'to become as gods.' Meekness, humility, self-abnegation,

affection, are the beautiful flowers that grow by the wayside; but the

pathway is not the less thorny, and no good can be accomplished by

denying or sugar-coating the fact.

PAUL. I do not doubt the correctness of your views, Dorcas; but

your rather vehement statement of them somewhat surprises me, as you

yourself married of your own free will, and at an age when women, if

ever, are supposed to know their own minds.

DORCAS. That my own marriage has been a happy one, and that my

good husband has striven, by recognizing my womanly as well as

individual idiosyncrasies, to render the yoke as light as it possibly

can be, is the very circumstance that gives me a right to speak and

offer my testimony against ideas which I think wholly unwarranted by the

facts in the case. The views of modern philosophers, attacking the

sanctity of Christian marriage, are to me perfectly abhorrent. Deprive

marriage of its mystical, sacramental, penitential character, and it

ceases to be the bulwark of a well-ordered society. I must again call

upon St. John Chrysostom to speak for me. He says: 'Marriage is one of

the most surprising mysteries, by reason of the sublime character which

belongs to it, of representing the alliance of Jesus Christ with His

Church. The necessary consequence of which is, that it should not be

contracted lightly and through interested motives. No, marriage is no

bargain; it is the union of the entire life.' This is what true marriage

should be; but in so far as mankind fall below the lofty standards set

before them, so far does actual marriage fail to reach its glorious

ideal. Meantime, reverence for maidenhood is one of the strongest

safeguards of the sanctity of wedded life, and no delusions of any

school, whether romantic, sentimental, Micheletic, humanitarian, or

Lutheranistic, should be permitted to obscure this reverence. Neither my

own experience, nor that of the young maidens best known to me, teaches

me that the idle hours of women are haunted by dreams of some human

lover, who must be found to save them from despair. I cannot think that

marriage is essential to, or even best for, the happiness of women. If

we enter the nearest institution of Charity Sisters, Sisters of Mercy,

or of the Poor, we cannot fail to remark the contrast between the

healthful, cheery, unsolicitous countenances of the inmates, and the

nervous, suffering, careworn faces of the wives and mothers in our

midst. Both live in the conscientious performance of equally estimable

duties, but the pleasing of a Heavenly Master would seem to be a more

peaceful and less wearing task than the gratification of an earthly

lord. Let us hearken for a moment to an eloquent French theologian:

'Woman's nature, in some exceptional cases, rises to such a height of

intellect and sensitiveness, that it ceases to be capable of accepting

that subordination which constitutes the essence of Christian marriage.

Think you there are not women athirst for the ideal; who are crushed by

the commonplace of ordinary affections; who would go beyond that narrow

circle traced round them by domestic cares? Give to such natures as

good, kind, and conscientious a husband as you will, do you think he can

ever satisfy the ardent longings of their mind and heart? Do you think

they can find in the family the realization of the brilliant dream

caressed by them from the earliest years of infancy? Do you not believe

that they will constantly feel cruel disappointments, infinite tortures,

and the deepest anguish?'

PAUL. But if such be a true statement of the case, what are

these good ladies to do?

DORCAS. The world has always need of intellect and enthusiasm,

and these, directed by the spirit of devotion and self-sacrifice,

without which nothing good or great can be accomplished, will point the

way to the fulfilment of whatever may be the especial vocation of the

individual. The author above quoted continues: 'Some heroic virgins have

played so wonderful a part that, by the sublimity of their devotion and

the power of their intellect, they have occasionally eclipsed the renown

of the most illustrious men. A St. Catherine of Sienna was the light of

doctors, the ambassadress of nations, the counsellor of popes, and the

admiration of her age. A St. Rose of Viterbo, a charming and graceful

child, became the intrepid buckler of Rome against the pretensions of

the Ghibelline emperors. A St. Clara, by her ardent love for the poor

and the Cross, was worthy of aiding the Seraph of Assisi in his

admirable reform. A St. Theresa astonished the world by the grandeur of

her character in the age of the Loyolas, the Xaviers, and the Francis

Borgias.' To these few but striking instances we may add Joan of Arc,

whose patriotism and valor saved her country from the dominion of the

foreign invader, and, in our own day, Florence Nightingale and Miss Dix,

together with hosts of courageous maidens, who in every Christian land

yearly devote themselves to the service of suffering humanity. I should

weary you, uncle, were I to pursue this subject into farther depths:

suffice it to say that it is one which no man, however tender or

talented, could ever exhaust, for there are chords in the feminine

organization beyond his comprehension--strange chords, the resolution of

which will be found only in that heaven where there shall be no marrying

nor giving in marriage.

PAUL. You mentioned Joan of Arc: did you observe that the

author of 'Hannah Thurston' notices the fact, that while she has been

poetized by Schiller, Southey, and others, no woman has ever yet made

her the theme of song?

DORCAS. I was no little surprised to find such a reproach

issuing from the lips of one who must have known that no man had yet

sung her in his verse who had not violated the truth of history and

smirched the beauty of a noble character, devoted solely to her country

and her God, by picturing her as enamored of some mortal lover.

Shakspeare must here receive his share of blame, although the national

prejudices still existent in his age may offer some excuse. Voltaire is

not to be mentioned, Schiller twaddles through a tissue of sheer

inventions and impossible absurdities, and even Southey, who strives to

be faithful to history, thinks he must invest her with a 'suppressed

attachment' in order to render her sufficiently interesting to be the

heroine of a poem. (Inconceivable and insane vanity, that imagines no

woman can live her life through without laying her heart at the feet of

one of the 'irresistibles'!) The historic character of Joan of Arc has

been terribly maltreated and misrepresented by every man who has

attempted to portray it, with the single exception of the German

historian, Guido Goerres, whose work, by the way, has been reverently

done into English by two sister women.

PAUL. Well, and the final conclusion to all this?

DORCAS. The final conclusion is, that a large portion of even

the worthier souls in this world, is drifting away into a sea of

materialism, shrouded in rose-colored mists of poetry and sentiment, and

it behooves every earnest friend of humanity to sound the alarm, and at

least strive to give warning of the danger.

GLORIOUS!

'Far how can a man die better,

Than in facing fearful odds.

For the ashes of his fathers--

And the temples of his gods!'

MACAULAY'S _Ballads of Ancient Rome_.

Alone--and widowed so early,

Aged only twenty-one--

Only so few of her years are past,

And yet her life is quite done!

Quite concluded her life is--

Nothing for hopes, or for fears;

Nothing to think of, or look to see

But a barren desert of years!

Slender, lithe little figure--

Graceful and yielding form,

Never again to be held in the close

Clasp of a manly arm!

Oh the sweet oval face,

And the wonderful violet eyes!

No more to be sealed with true kisses,

And opened to love's paradise!

And oh the sunny, brown hair,

Which breaks into ripples and waves

O'er her sad brow--like the laughter

Of young children over graves!

Put it away under widow's weeds--

Draw it as straight as you can:

Never again will the dear little head

Be held to the heart of a man.

Dazed, she sits in the twilight

Of the funeral-darkened room,

Her whole soul gathered to listen--alas!

For a voice that is stilled in the tomb.

Dear voice, now silent forever!

God help her! It seems a dream!

She hopes, even now she may waken;

But see yonder cruel sunbeam.

How it wanders over the carpet--

It lights up the distant room--

It falls on his portrait--_his_ portrait!--

His face shines out in the gloom

As warmly and loving as ever;--

But, oh, there hangs under its frame

The sword he has wielded so bravely--

The blade that has lettered his name

On the tablets of Glory--erected

O'er the bodies of thousands of slain;

Who have died to preserve the Republic!

_Our_ loss--but the nation's great gain.

Wring the small, white hands together--

Clasp them close over the breast:--

Prisoned heart, throbbing so wildly,

Never again to know rest.

Can you not leap and be joyful,

Knowing the nation is free!

Gentle-eyed Peace is but waiting

Sure of a welcome, to be.

Ask not for pæans of triumph

From 'only a woman's' heart:

Alas! in the triumph of nations

She hath but an humble part!

Hers to be patient, and suffer--

While her soul goes out to the fray

With the one who is dearer than heaven,

To see him shot down by the way.

Anguished, for drops of cold water

That e'en to the vilest we give!

Mangled and crushed and insulted!

God! can I write it, and live!

Fold the hands o'er the soft bosom

Baby hands never caressed--

Hush into patience the sweet lips

Never to man's to be pressed.

There on the altar of nations

She has given the soul out of her life:

Holocaust greater was never:

God help the poor, little wife!

THE ISLE OF SPRINGS.

CHAPTER V.

HISTORICAL SKETCH.

Jamaica was discovered by Columbus himself, on the 3d of May, 1494,

while prosecuting his second voyage. On his fourth and last voyage he

was shipwrecked on its northern coast, and, through the cruel jealousy

of the governor of Hispaniola, was detained there nearly a year before

relief was sent. In the dearth of historical associations, I have

sometimes pleased myself with gazing at the high summit of Cape Clear

Hill, which is far and wide conspicuous along the northern shore, and

reflecting that the eye of the great discoverer may have often rested

upon it during his weary detention, endeavoring thus to raise present

insignificance somewhat by linking it with the one illustrious name in

the annals of the island.

Sevilla d'Oro, the first settlement of the Spaniards in Jamaica, was

founded in 1509, near the place of Columbus's shipwreck. It soon became

a splendid city. Traces of pavement are still discoverable two miles

distant from the church and abbey around which the town was built. In a

few years, however, it disappeared as suddenly as it had arisen. Even

the cause of its destruction is not certainly known. It is supposed,

however, to have been a sudden irruption of the Indians. These were of

the same voluptuous and gentle race which peopled the other Great

Antilles, but, like them, might have been roused to temporary madness by

the diabolical cruelties of the Spaniards. If so, their brief revenge

availed them little, for by 1558, the sixty thousand Indians, who

inhabited the island when discovered, had been extirpated, it is said,

to the very last one. Near the seashore in the east of the island are

some caves, in which mouldering bones of the unhappy aborigines are

still found, who had taken refuge here, preferring to die of famine

rather than to fall into the merciless hands of the Spaniards.

After the extirpation of the Indians, the labor of African slaves was

introduced. Some sugar was raised, but the greater part of the island

was devoted to the raising of cattle and swine. Besides the few whites

and negroes needed for this, and a small number at two or three

seaports, the population was mainly gathered in the town of St. Jago de

la Vega. This was built on the south side, a few miles from the sea,

after the destruction of Sevilla d'Oro. At the time of the English

conquest in 1655, during Cromwell's protectorate, the population

consisted of twelve hundred whites and fifteen hundred negro slaves.

They were summoned by the English admiral to take the oath of allegiance

to England or to leave the island. But they declared that they could do

neither; that they were born subjects of the King of Spain, and knew no

other allegiance; and, on the other hand, that they were natives of

Jamaica, and had neither friends nor kindred elsewhere. They implored

him, therefore, not to exact an impossible oath, nor yet to turn them

adrift in the wide world. But the misfortunes of Spanish Papists were a

matter of little concern to English Puritans. They were expelled the

island, but leaving their slaves in the mountain forests of the central

ridge, they planted a seed which for generations bore bitter fruit to

their cruel enemies. These slaves became the nucleus of those formidable

Maroon communities which for generations were a terror to the island.

Their masters, having conveyed their families across to Cuba, returned

with a body of Spanish troops, hoping, in their turn, to expel the

invaders. They intrenched themselves in a natural fastness that appeared

impregnable, and an English messenger being sent to demand a surrender,

the venerable governor, Don Arnoldo Sasi, it is said, ordered him to be

shown around the fortification, that he might see that it was impossible

to take it, and then dismissed him with a handsome present. But the

English soldiers knew no such thing as an impregnable fortress; they

soon stormed the height, and, as the Spaniards were fleeing along the

cliffs, picked them off like so many crows. A few attendants hurried

down the aged governor to the sea, and conveyed him across to Cuba. And

thus perished the tranquil and happy colony of St. Jago de la Vega. The

victors took possession of the deserted town, which has finally become

the seat of government. But they changed its Popish appellation of St.

Jago de la Vega to the homely but unimpeachably Protestant name of

Spanishtown, which it still bears in popular use, although officially it

has resumed its former designation. There were two Roman Catholic

churches in the town, each of which gave the name of its patron saint to

the street on which it stood. But the Puritans would know them only as

Whitechurch street and Redchurch street--names which, I believe, still

remain, curious monuments of Puritan scrupulosity in that southern land.

Spanishtown has increased in population to about five thousand, and in

its palmy days of slaveholding prosperity exhibited doubtless much pomp

of vice-regal splendor. But this has long fled, and its sandy streets

are now almost as silent and sombre in the glittering sunshine as if

traversed only by the ghosts of the Spanish colonists who dwelt here in

peace until ruthlessly thrust forth by the English invader.

After the conquest, the island filled up with English, partly by

voluntary emigration, and partly by a double deportation from home,

first of refractory Cavaliers during Cromwell's protectorate, and partly

of mutinous Puritans after the return of the Stuarts. These often

renewed in the streets of Spanishtown the brawls of the mother country,

and the exclamation, 'My king!' which the negroes are fond of using, is

said to be a genuine relic of the time when it was the watchword of the

outnumbered but courageous Cavaliers. Even after the Restoration, the

Puritans were for a while in the ascendant in the island which the

Puritan protector had wrested from the great foe of Protestantism; but

gradually all traces of that hardy sect disappeared from a land which

an enervating climate and the rapidly advancing barbarism of slavery

rendered far fitter for another sort of inhabitants, namely, the

buccaneers. The buccaneers, it will be remembered, were not exactly

pirates preying indiscriminately upon all. They were rather English

corsairs, who took advantage of the long enmity between England and

Spain to carry on, in time of peace and war alike, perpetual forrays

against the Spanish settlements and commerce of the West Indies. They

were simply the jayhawkers and border ruffians of their day, and, with

some traits of chivalry, differed probably as little from pirates as

Quantrell and his fellow scoundrels differ from robbers. This villanous

crew early resorted in great numbers to Jamaica, which became as good a

base of operations against a power with which England was professedly at

peace as Liverpool and Greenock are now against another power with which

she is professedly at peace. Dr. Arnold, in one of his letters, says he

imagines the British West Indies have never recovered from the taint of

buccaneer blood. It is hard to say, for the universal corruption of

morals and justice induced by slavery, existing in the overwhelming

proportions which it had in the West Indies, renders it almost

impossible to measure how far any subsidiary influence of evil may have

helped to aggravate the mischief.

Jamaica, like the other colonies, soon received a constitution. Like her

sisters on the continent, she opposed a spirited and successful

resistance to the early encroachments of the crown. When our Revolution

broke out, her Assembly passed resolutions declaring their entire

concurrence in the principles set forth by the Congress, and gave as the

reasons for not joining in our armed vindication of them, their insular

position, and the peculiar nature of their population. Had geography

permitted, Jamaica would doubtless have made one Slave State the more in

the original Union, and would have been one of the fiercest afterward in

the secession. We may well believe that nothing but the knowledge that

she would be crushed like an eggshell by the mighty power of England,

hindered her in 1834 from heading her sister islands in a revolt against

the impending abolition of slavery, and thus giving the world

twenty-seven years earlier the spectacle of a great slaveholders'

rebellion.

The history of Jamaica, otherwise so monotonous and devoid of interest,

even to its own people, yet includes one awful event, the destruction of

Port Royal by the earthquake of 1692. This city, built by the English

soon after the conquest, on the tongue of land which encloses the

present harbor of Kingston, soon became the most splendid city of the

English in America. Its quays and warehouses, Macaulay says, were

thought to rival those of Cheapside. This wealth and splendor were not

wholly the fruit of lawful commerce, for Port Royal was the favored

resort of the buccaneers. Their lawless forrays against the Spanish

filled it with wealth, and filled it also with voluptuous wickedness.

Tradition adds, perhaps to give emphasis to its doom, that just before

the earthquake, a successful expedition had filled the city with booty,

which loaded the warehouses, and even overflowed into the dwelling

houses and verandas. But the stroke of judgment came, and a few shocks

of an earthquake in a few seconds buried the greater part of the

dissolute and splendid city beneath the waters of its own harbor. The

decaying bodies that were thrown afterward on the shore produced a

pestilence which swept off three thousand of those who had survived the

earthquake. The sad remnant went over to the inside shore of the harbor,

and built Kingston. A poor village of some twelve or fifteen hundred

souls, adjoining the naval station, is now all that represents the once

wealthy and wicked city, the Sodom of the West, and smitten with a fate

like that of Sodom.

The same earthquake which destroyed Port Royal, almost ruined the

island. Whole plantations changed their places. The mountains were

strangely torn and rent. In many parts the immense accumulation of earth

fallen from the mountains choked up the course of the streams for

twenty-four hours, and when at last they burst their way through, they

bore down on their swollen floods thousands of trunks of trees,

branchless and barkless, to the sea. The gorge of the Bocaguas, through

which the Rio Cobre winds in a glorious succession of cascades and

whirling pools, is said to have been entirely filled up, causing the

waters to overspread the upland basin of St. Thomas-in-the-Vale with a

lake, which lasted nine days before the waters tore loose from their

confinement, and swept over the plains to the ocean. There was evidence

of a slight subsidence over the whole island. The earthquake of 1692 is

undoubtedly the most desolating convulsion of nature which has ever

befallen any portion of the English race.

For generations after the destruction of Port Royal, it was affirmed

that the spires and housetops of the sunken city could be discerned on a

clear day through the waters of the harbor. Even now there is a floating

belief that they may occasionally be dimly descried, though I have never

been able to ascertain whether it is worthy of credit.

Since then, although there are often shocks of earthquake, sometimes

several in a year, and though some have occurred quite destructive to

property, there has been none to divide with that of 1692 its awful

preeminence of desolation. It is true, we know not at what time such a

one may come, and it has been truly said that 'this beautiful island may

be regarded as a gorgeous carpet spread over the deeply charged mines of

a volcano.' Hurricanes, though very much less frequent than in the

Windward Islands, have yet left their traces in the annals of Jamaica.

Particularly noted are those of the 28th of August, 1712, of the 28th of

August, 1722, and the series which, with the exception of two years,

annually ravaged the island from 1780 to 1786 inclusive. It was in one

of these that the town of Savanna-la-Mar was so completely overwhelmed

by the sea, driven over it by the force of the wind, that when the flood

rolled back to its home, not the slightest vestige of the place was

discernible. In such a region the petition of the Litany, as it is here

offered, 'From lightning, tempest, and _earthquake_, good Lord, deliver

us,' falls on the stranger's ear with unwontedly solemn force.

The awful magnificence of these convulsions of nature is in strange

contrast with the insignificance of the record of human actions in this

island. Not that Jamaica was an insignificant member of the empire. Far

from it. The teeming source of wealth, she was, on the contrary, during

the whole of the eighteenth century, continually increasing in

importance. Even dukes were glad to leave England to assume the princely

state of a governor of Jamaica. Six hundred thousand African slaves were

introduced during the last century, of which number something over half

remained at the beginning of this. Human blood flowed in fertilizing

streams over the island, and out of this ghastly compost rose an

opulence so splendid as to silence for generations all inquiry into its

origin or character. It secured its possessors not only easy access, but

frequent intermarriages among the aristocracy of England, who thus in

time came to be among the largest West Indian slaveholders. Jamaica was

justly reckoned one of the brightest jewels in the British crown. But

the brilliancy was merely that of wealth, and as the ownership of this

was transferred more and more to Great Britain, the island itself at

length came to be of little more independent account than an outlying

estate. Petty squabbles between the governors and the Assembly,

occasional negro conspiracies, soon suppressed and cruelly punished, and

the wearying contests with the remaining negroes, who, under the name of

Maroons, long maintained a harassing warfare from their mountain

fastnesses, and yielded at last to favorable terms, are almost all that

fills the chronicles of the colony.

The island society, unrelieved by any eminence of genius or virtue, or

by the stir of great public interests, presented little more than a dull

monotony of sensuality and indolence, on a ground of inhumanity. It is

no wonder that Zachary Macaulay, from his experience in Jamaica as the

superintendent of an estate, formed in quiet sternness that resolution

to devote his life to uprooting a social system whose presiding

divinities he saw to be Mammon and Moloch, which he afterward so nobly

fulfilled. The graces and virtues of private character that lent some

relief to this dreary picture, I shall speak of hereafter.

One relief to the prevailing dulness of Jamaica life was found in a bar

of first-rate talent. There was so much wealth passing from hand to

hand, and so many disputed titles in the continual mutations of

ownership among the estates under the reckless system of conducting them

prevalent, that the disciples of the law found a rich harvest, and it

was worth while for a first-rate man to settle in the island. It is

thought that the lawyers of Jamaica used to receive not less than

£500,000 annually. Whether this was reckoned in sterling money or in the

island currency, I do not know, but probably the latter, equivalent to

£300,000 sterling. Of men not lawyers, Bryant Edwards is the only one of

the last century or the early part of this of any note whatever among

those permanently settled in the island. His chief claim to distinction

is found in his carefully prepared and judicious 'History of the West

Indies.' Beckford, the author of 'Vathek,' and Monk Lewis, christened

Matthew, the patent ghost-story teller of half a century ago, and more

honorably connected with the history of the island as a proprietor,

whose inexperienced kindness toward his negroes had almost led to his

prosecution, both resided in the island for a while. Jamaica had almost

drawn to herself a name far more illustrious than any or all which had

appeared in her annals--that of Robert Burns. It is known that he had

already engaged his passage to the island, when the course of events

turned him from it. He celebrates his expected departure in some verses

more witty than moral, in which he addresses our islanders as follows:

'Jamaica bodies, use him weel,

And hap him in a cosy biel,

Ye'll find him aye a dainty chiel,

And fu' of glee;

He wadna wrang the very deil,

That's ower the sea.'

Poor fellow! had he really gone, the admonition to 'Jamaica bodies' to

'use him weel,' would probably have been obeyed by making him drink

himself to death ten or twelve years earlier than he did in Dumfries,

and thus would one of earth's great, though stained names, have been

lost in the inglorious darkness of a Jamaica bookkeeper's short life, as

many a young countryman of his, perhaps not less gifted than he, had

perished before him.

Among the distinguished personages of Jamaica, I ought not to omit

mention of the Duke of Manchester, governor soon after the beginning of

this century, who was able to boast that no virtuous woman had crossed

the threshold of the King's House in Spanishtown during his

administration. So that if Jamaica has never had her _parc-aux-cerfs_,

she can at least boast her Regent Orleans. There is small need of any

special _parc-aux-cerfs_ in a slaveholding country.[22]

In brief, except a certain interest attached to the struggles of the

barbarous Maroons to maintain their wild freedom in the woods and

mountains, the human history of Jamaica, from the English conquest in

1655 to the abolition of slavery in 1834, is little more than a

monotonous blank.

She had a vigorous bar, a sumptuous church establishment, and boundless,

though shifting wealth. But all these together, smitten as they were

with the palsy of voluptuousness and oppression, had not the power to

bring forth one great name, to achieve one heroic deed, or on the other

hand, to foster any growth of humble, diffused happiness. Her sin,

plated with gold, dazzled the eyes and confounded the consciences of

men, but, like the ornaments of a sepulchre, it only beautified

outwardly what within was full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness.

Those events of her history which bear on the abolition of slavery will

be specially noticed hereafter.

THE DEVELOPMENT OF AMERICAN ARCHITECTURE.

The rule held, anciently, that a nation's architecture was the exponent

of its national character, growing with and out of its social, civil,

and religious peculiarities, and modified by climate, habit, and taste.

In those early ages, the halcyon days of the art, men built with a

purpose, built what they wanted in a natural and appropriate way,

and--built successfully. So true was this, that to this day, most of

their relics proclaim their own origin, just as fossils determine the

relative positions of their enclosing strata, and history owes to

architecture the solution of many of her hardest problems. The ancient

Egyptians, for instance, gloried in the erection of the most magnificent

tombs that their genius could produce, and, ruined as they are, we find

that it is in their sepulchral monuments--the rock-wrought mausoleum,

and the stupendous pyramid--that their art-current found its readiest

flow. Compare these with the light and graceful structures of the Moors,

the cool, arcaded courts, and the tesselated pavements, the orange

trees, and the fountains. 'But no comparison,' says Fergusson, 'is

applicable to objects so totally different. Each is a true

representative of the feeling and character of the people by whom it was

raised. The plaster Alhambra would be totally out of place and

contemptible beside the great temple-palace of Karnak. No less would the

granite works of Egypt be considered monuments of ill-directed labor if

placed in the palace of the gay and luxurious Arab fatalist, to whom the

present was everything, and with whom the enjoyment of the passing hour

was all in all.'

Still another idea, grander than any aspiration of Saracen or Egyptian,

we find, when Europe, slowly shaking off the lethargy of the Dark Ages,

was developing the idea of religion. It was material, however, as well

as spiritual. God was glorified, not only by repentance or holiness of

life, but also by the devotion of hand and heart and fortune to His

earthly temples and the jewelled shrines of His saints. All that impetus

which is now given to religion itself, was turned into the channels of

religious art. And yet, temporally speaking, how grand were the results!

Slowly but surely arose those vast and wonderful cathedrals, springing

lightly out of the quaintly gabled streets, with their richly wrought

transepts and their pinnacled spires. Not trailing along the ground like

the Greek temple or the Arab mosque--of the earth, earthy--but leading

the soul heavenward with their upward flow of harmony. Vast Bibles of

stone, bearing on lofty façade and on buttressed flank the sculptured

details of Holy Writ--silent lessons, but not lost upon the rude though

reverent men who dwelt within their shadow. It is sad to think that

there can never be any more cathedrals. For they _grew_ in those times:

now they would have to be built.

But we are following a tangent. Our idea is, that architecture, to be

good, must be appropriate--expressive of the spirit of the age. It

should be an epitome of the nation's progress, an abstract of its

guiding principles, condensed, as it were, and crystallized into an art.

Of what use would a garment be, though ever so elaborate, if it did not

fit? Just so our houses, which are but a broader kind of clothing,

should be fitted to their purpose, or they will never yield us any

pleasure.

Suppose that, in searching the ruins of ancient Greece, we found nothing

but pusillanimous, sham imitations of Egyptian art. Would we not despise

such a paltry method of making matter serve for mind--such a miserable

make-shift to save the labor of invention? And yet it is this same

servile imitation of classical and foreign models that is fettering the

progress of art in America. Instead of honestly constructing what we

want, and then decorating it with a style of ornament that should

assist, explain, and intensify it, we go wandering off to the ends of

the earth, building Grecian temples and Veronese palaces, some entire

and some in slices, dreary, indefinite-looking objects, devoid of all

constructive principles within, and ornamented with falsified gewgaws

without, stuck on in the hope of hiding rather than helping out the

flimsy design. Our 'national style' we are sure can never be born of any

such travesties. Borrowed architecture never fits well.

The fact is, we ignore the first great principle--the essence and _sine

qua non_, of the art--DECORATED CONSTRUCTION. By construction is meant

that mechanical arrangement of parts which is best suited to convenience

and most conducive to stability. It is what the French would call the

_motif_, the end in view, while decoration is only the means. And the

moment we lose sight of it, in our anxiety to make room for some pet

ornament, that very ornament becomes an eyesore, and will persist in

spoiling the design, for the simple reason that the end is sacrificed to

the means. Set it down, then, at the start, that ornament must be

dependent upon construction, and not construction upon ornament. The

useful begets the beautiful, and the order cannot be reversed.

But before proceeding to what American architecture might be, we must,

in all fairness, examine it as it is.

Our great cities, of course, claim our attention first, for these

centres of wealth and intellect must necessarily be centres of art, and

there, if at all, are we to discover our prospects for a national style.

As a single example of what it has attained to so far, nothing can be

better suited to our purpose than Broadway, New York, our best-known and

most essentially American thoroughfare. But what to compare it to we

know not. Neither history nor geography affords a parallel. It resembles

neither the London Strand nor the Parisian Boulevard, nor is it like the

Ludwig Strasse of Munich, nor the Grand Canal of Venice; and yet it has

something or other in common with all of these. There is all the

incongruity of the English thoroughfare and the brilliancy of the

French, while the frequent succession of vast palatial structures allies

it still closer to the last-named examples. Perhaps, after all, the

Grand Canal--the silent highway of the City of the Sea--is more like it

in general effect than any other street in Europe. The one, it is true,

is as straight as an airline, and the other nearly the shape of an S;

the one a paved roadway, noisy with the rush of traffic, and, in the

other, the water washing the very walls of palaces that are mournful and

deserted--while, as regards style, there is scarcely a single specimen

of the Venetian in this country.

But the resemblance is this: your prevailing impression from first to

last is the absence of all general arrangement, and the independent

elegance of each separate façade. Each tells the same story: it is the

wealth and enterprise of the citizen, and not the munificence of the

sovereign, that has added palace to palace, and made the dumb stones

eloquent. Remembering, then, that it is private taste and influence that

is to develop our art, we proceed to the analysis of the great

thoroughfare in question.

Fancy yourself, patient reader, at one end of this street, so as to

command its vista. What do you see? Architecture? Very little, we

imagine. Save the buildings immediately at your right and left, all the

others are seen in profile, a contingency never reckoned on by their

builders. The decoration is all piled on the front, as elaborate a

design, often, as Palladio ever dreamt of, but at the side, every

cornice and stringpiece stops as short as if it had been sawn off, and

the whole side is a flat blank piece of brickwork. This is greatly

aggravated by the disparity in height, and the ponderous cornices. As to

construction, the prevailing type is a flimsy pile of brick and timber,

'put up,' apparently, by mutual connivance of the contractor and the

coroner, and screened off from the street by a thin veneer of

'architecture.' Now there is a certain merit, _sui generis_, in a clever

deception, but those in vogue here are too utterly transparent to claim

even this. The telltale wall of brick cheats you out of the pleasure of

cheating yourself, no matter how charitably disposed.

Were it necessary to represent this street upon the stage, the decorator

would simply have to paint his scenes upon the edges, and leave the side

toward the audience bare. As you walk along you see a given building

sideways for five minutes or more, but you cannot see it as it was meant

to be seen--full in front--for as many seconds. We even know of churches

in the cross streets, though near Broadway, whose square towers are

stone-fronted after the usual fashion, but present nothing to the

crowded thoroughfare but undressed walls of brick! Yes, a Christian

church, _in flagrante delictu_.

It will be objected to this that there is no use in finishing the sides

of city buildings, as they may afterward be hidden by others. This would

do well enough if they were all of the same height; but they are not,

and never can be. Indeed, a house is by many considered 'handsomer' than

its neighbors, just so far forth as it overtops them. The builder would

hardly think it a fair beat if the cornices corresponded. The successive

erections on a row of vacant lots, usually illustrate this popular

ambition. Some one secures the corner and builds his house. So far, so

good. Presently number two comes along, and, to secure himself from

invidious comparison, piles his house half a story higher than number

one. But his triumph is short, for the third aspirant soon arrives, who,

true to principle, takes another step in the ascending series. So it

goes till the block is finished, the whole thing looking as if

architecture was a sort of auction, in which the prize of success was

awarded to the highest builder.

It being one of our social necessities that our houses differ in size,

we must pay some attention to their sides. Not giving them as decided a

treatment as the front, but something compatible with a plain surface.

And, above all, the principal cornice and roof lines should be carried

round on the sides, at least as far as they can be seen. In some rare

instances, where this has been done, it is astonishing to note the

improved appearance and _finish_, that it gives.

Did you ever consider the superior elegance of a corner house? Yet it is

not so much the position as the fact that the position is taken

advantage of. Being finished on both sides, it gives to the mind the

idea of thickness as well as length and breadth. It is, in short, a

_solid_, while the affair next door, overtopping it perhaps a story or

two, is merely a _superficies_.

But this is only a side thrust. Our 'commercial palaces' challenge the

same criticism face to face. For the front, considered by itself even,

is generally incomplete. A supposititious formula determines that the

house must be in the Italian palace style, but the narrow lot forbidding

an entire design, the builder, as he cannot put in all, puts in all he

can, so that, instead of the house being a house, it is only a specimen

slice of a palace. It has no particular beginning or middle or ending,

and, with the long viscera of brickwork trailing off behind, it looks as

if just wrenched out of the side of some Florentine or Genoese mansion.

And, in very truth, is it not?

The common cause of these errors and incongruities is our self-abasement

to a style which depends for its effect upon continuous uniformity of

design, while, from the very nature of our society, our houses must be

diverse in size and pretension. We are a social people, it is true, but

our individualities are strongly marked, and our dwellings, while

designed with reference to each other, should never be too uniform. How

frightful those white-shuttered brick piles which monotonize the streets

of Philadelphia! But to assert its individuality the house need not

shoot up like a vein of trap rock through a stratum of conglomerate: an

American rises, not through the mass, but out of it.