Produced by Brian Sogard, Douglas L. Alley, III and the
Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
(This file was produced from images generously made
available by The Internet Archive/Million Book Project)
KENTUCKY IN
AMERICAN LETTERS
OTHER WORKS BY MR. TOWNSEND
_Richard Hickman Menefee._ 1907
_Kentuckians in History and Literature._ 1907
_The Life of James Francis Leonard._ 1909
_Kentucky: Mother of Governors._ 1910
_Lore of the Meadowland._ 1911
KENTUCKY IN
AMERICAN LETTERS
1784-1912
BY
JOHN WILSON TOWNSEND
WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY
JAMES LANE ALLEN
IN TWO VOLUMES
VOL. II
THE TORCH PRESS
CEDAR RAPIDS, IOWA
NINETEEN THIRTEEN
_Of this edition one thousand sets have been printed, of which
this is number_
241
COPYRIGHT 1913
BY THE TORCH PRESS
PUBLISHED SEPTEMBER 1913
[Illustration]
To
Mary Katherine Bullitt
and
Samuel Judson Roberts
and to their memories
CONTENTS
JAMES N. BASKETT 1
"I 'OVES 'OO BEST, 'TAUSE 'OO BEAT 'EM ALL" 2
JAMES LANE ALLEN 4
KING SOLOMON OF KENTUCKY: AN ADDRESS 9
THE LAST CHRISTMAS TREE 13
NANCY HUSTON BANKS 17
ANVIL ROCK 18
THE OLD FASHIONED FIDDLERS 19
WILLIAM B. SMITH 20
A SOUTHERN VIEW OF THE NEGRO PROBLEM 22
THE MERMAN AND THE SERAPH 24
ANDERSON C. QUISENBERRY 27
THE DEATH OF CRITTENDEN 27
ROBERT BURNS WILSON 29
LOVINGLY TO ELIZABETH, MY MOTHER 32
WHEN EVENING COMETH ON 32
DANIEL HENRY HOLMES 36
BELL HORSES 39
MY LADY'S GARDEN 40
LITTLE BLUE BETTY 42
THE OLD WOMAN UNDER THE HILL 44
MARGERY DAW 45
WILLIAM H. WOODS 47
SYCAMORES 48
ANDREW W. KELLEY 49
THE OLD SCISSORS' SOLILOQUY 50
LATE NEWS 52
YOUNG E. ALLISON 53
ON BOARD THE DERELICT 54
HESTER HIGBEE GEPPERT 57
THE GARDENER AND THE GIRL 58
HENRY C. WOOD 60
THE WEAVER 61
WILLIAM E. CONNELLEY 63
KANSAS HISTORY 65
CHARLES T. DAZEY 67
THE FAMOUS KNOT-HOLE 70
JOHN P. FRUIT 72
THE CLIMAX OF POE'S POETRY 72
HARRISON ROBERTSON 74
TWO TRIOLETS 75
STORY OF THE GATE 75
INGRAM CROCKETT 77
AUDUBON 78
THE LONGING 79
DEAREST 80
ELIZA CALVERT OBENCHAIN 81
"SWEET DAY OF REST" 82
KATE SLAUGHTER MCKINNEY 85
A LITTLE FACE 85
CHARLES J. O'MALLEY 86
ENCELADUS 88
NOON IN KENTUCKY 90
LANGDON SMITH 91
EVOLUTION 92
WILL J. LAMPTON 98
THESE DAYS 98
OUR CASTLES IN THE AIR 99
CHAMPAGNE 100
MARY ANDERSON DE NAVARRO 101
LAZY LOUISVILLE 102
MARY R. S. ANDREWS 104
THE NEW SUPERINTENDENT 106
ELVIRA MILLER SLAUGHTER 110
THE SOUTH AND SONG 111
SUNDOWN LANE 113
JOSEPH S. COTTER 115
NEGRO LOVE SONG 115
ETHELBERT D. WARFIELD 116
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS 117
EVELYN S. BARNETT 119
THE WILL 119
JOHN PATTERSON 123
A CLUSTER OF GRAPES 124
CHORAL ODE FROM EURIPIDES 125
WILLIAM E. BARTON 126
A WEARY WINTER 128
BENJ. H. RIDGELY 129
A KENTUCKY DIPLOMAT 131
ZOE A. NORRIS 135
THE CABARET SINGER 137
IN A MOMENT OF WEARINESS 138
LUCY CLEAVER MCELROY 139
OLD ALEC HAMILTON 140
MARY F. LEONARD 142
GOODBY 143
JOSEPH A. ALTSHELER 144
THE CALL OF THE DRUM 146
OSCAR W. UNDERWOOD 150
THE PROTECTION OF PROFITS 151
ELIZABETH ROBINS 156
A PROMISING PLAYWRIGHT 158
ELLEN CHURCHILL SEMPLE 162
MAN A PRODUCT OF THE EARTH'S SURFACE 163
ANNIE FELLOWS JOHNSTON 165
THE MAGIC KETTLE 167
EVA A. MADDEN 170
THE END OF "THE I CAN SCHOOL" 170
JOHN FOX, JR. 172
THE CHRISTMAS TREE ON PIGEON 176
FANNIE C. MACAULAY 181
APPROACHING JAPAN 183
JAMES D. BRUNER 184
THE FRENCH CLASSICAL DRAMA 185
MADISON CAWEIN 187
CONCLUSION 191
INDIAN SUMMER 192
HOME 193
LOVE AND A DAY 193
IN A SHADOW GARDEN 195
UNREQUITED 196
A TWILIGHT MOTH 196
GEORGE MADDEN MARTIN 198
EMMY LOU'S VALENTINE 199
MARY ADDAMS BAYNE 202
THE COMING OF THE SCHOOLMASTER 203
ELIZABETH CHERRY WALTZ 205
PA GLADDEN AND THE WANDERING WOMAN 207
REUBENA HYDE WALWORTH 209
THE UNDERGROUND PALACE OF THE FAIRIES 210
CRITTENDEN MARRIOTT 211
THE ARRIVAL OF THE ENEMY 213
ABBIE CARTER GOODLOE 217
A COUNTESS OF THE WEST 218
GEORGE LEE BURTON 222
AFTER PRISON--HOME 223
JAMES TANDY ELLIS 228
YOUTHFUL LOVERS 229
GEORGE HORACE LORIMER 230
HIS SON'S SWEETHEART 232
SISTER IMELDA 233
A JUNE IDYL 234
HEART MEMORIES 235
A NUN'S PRAYER 235
HARRISON CONRAD 236
IN OLD TUCSON 236
A KENTUCKY SUNRISE 237
A KENTUCKY SUNSET 237
ALICE HEGAN RICE 238
THE OPPRESSED MR. OPP DECIDES 239
RICHARD H. WILSON 244
SUSAN--VENUS OF CADIZ 245
LUCY FURMAN 247
A MOUNTAIN COQUETTE 249
BERT FINCK 254
BEHIND THE SCENES 254
OLIVE TILFORD DARGAN 255
NEAR THE COTTAGE IN GREENOT WOODS 258
HARRY L. MARRINER 262
WHEN MOTHER CUTS HIS HAIR 263
SIR GUMSHOO 264
LUCIEN V. RULE 265
WHAT RIGHT HAST THOU? 265
THE NEW KNIGHTHOOD 266
EVA WILDER BRODHEAD 267
THE RIVALS 269
CORDIA GREER PETRIE 273
ANGELINE JINES THE CHOIR 274
MARIA THOMPSON DAVIESS 279
MRS. MOLLY MORALIZES 281
CALE YOUNG RICE 284
PETRARCA AND SANCIA 285
ROBERT M. MCELROY 289
GEORGE ROGERS CLARK 290
EDWIN D. SCHOONMAKER 293
THE PHILANTHROPIST 294
CREDO HARRIS 295
BOLOGNA 295
HALLIE ERMINIE RIVES 297
THE BISHOP SPEAKS 298
EDWIN CARLILE LITSEY 300
THE RACE OF THE SWIFT 301
MILTON BRONNER 303
MR. HEWLETT'S WOMEN 304
A. S. MACKENZIE 305
A KELTIC TALE 306
LAURA SPENCER PORTOR 308
THE LITTLE CHRIST 309
BUT ONE LEADS SOUTH 310
LEIGH GORDON GILTNER 311
THE JESTING GODS 311
MARGARET S. ANDERSON 318
THE PRAYER OF THE WEAK 318
NOT THIS WORLD 319
WHISTLER 320
ABBY MEGUIRE ROACH 320
UNREMEMBERING JUNE 321
IRVIN S. COBB 323
THE BELLED BUZZARD 327
ISAAC F. MARCOSSON 343
THE WAGON CIRCUS 344
GERTRUDE KING TUFTS 345
SHIPWRECKED 346
CHARLES HANSON TOWNE 350
SPRING 351
SLOW PARTING 351
OF DEATH 352
WILLIAM E. WALLING 353
RUSSIA AND AMERICA 354
THOMPSON BUCHANAN 355
THE WIFE WHO DIDN'T GIVE UP 358
WILL LEVINGTON COMFORT 363
AN ACTRESS'S HEART 364
FRANK WALLER ALLEN 366
A WOMAN ANSWERED 367
VENITA SEIBERT 368
THE ORIGIN OF BABIES 369
CHARLES NEVILLE BUCK 371
THE DOCTRINE ACCORDING TO JONESY 373
GEORGE BINGHAM 375
HOGWALLOW NEWS 377
MABEL PORTER PITTS 379
ON THE LITTLE SANDY 379
MARION FORSTER GILMORE 380
THE CRADLE SONG 381
APPENDIX 383
MRS. AGNES B. MITCHELL 385
WHEN THE COWS COME HOME 385
KENTUCKY IN AMERICAN LETTER
JAMES NEWTON BASKETT
James Newton Baskett, novelist and scientist, was born near Carlisle,
Kentucky, November 1, 1849. He was taken to Missouri in early life by
his parents. He was graduated from the University of Missouri in 1872,
since which time he has devoted himself almost exclusively to fiction
and to comparative vertebrate anatomy, with ornithology as his
particular specialty. At the world's congress of ornithologists at the
Columbian Exposition in 1893, Mr. Baskett presented a paper on _Some
Hints at the Kinship of Birds as Shown by Their Eggs_, which won him the
respect of scientists from many lands. He has published three scientific
works and three novels: _The Story of the Birds_ (New York, 1896); _The
Story of the Fishes_ (New York, 1899); _The Story of the Amphibians and
Reptiles_ (New York, 1902); and his novels: _At You All's House_ (New
York, 1898); _As the Light Led_ (New York, 1900); and his most recent
book, _Sweet Brier and Thistledown_ (Boston, 1902). Of this trio of
tales the first one, _At You All's House_, is the best and the best
known, Mr. Baskett's masterpiece hitherto. For the Texas Historical
Society he wrote, in 1907, a series of papers upon the _Early Spanish
Expedition in the South and Southwest_. With the exception of three
years spent in Colorado for the benefit of his health, Mr. Baskett has
resided at Mexico, Missouri, since leaving Kentucky.
BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Athenaeum_ (July 28, 1900); _The Book Buyer_
(October, 1900); _Library of Southern Literature_ (Atlanta, 1909,
v. i).
"I 'OVES 'OO BEST, 'TAUS 'OO BEAT 'EM ALL"[1]
[From _As the Light Led_ (New York, 1900)]
They had been boy and girl together, not schoolmates nor next-farm
neighbors, but their homes were in the same region. Her father's house
was far enough away to make the boy's visits not so frequent as to
foster the familiarity which breeds contempt, yet they gave him an
occasional little journey out of the humdrum of home lanes, and away
from the monotonous sweep of the prairie's flat horizon.
Hers was rather a timber farm, located on the other side of Flint
Creek, where the woods began to fringe out upon the treeless plain
again; but his was high out eastward upon the prairie swell, several
miles from water. From his place the wooded barrier between them
seemed only a brown level brush-stroke upon the sky's western margin.
Sometimes, when he was tired from his day's work afield, he watched the
sun sink behind this border, which the distance made so velvety; and, if
the day were clear, it looked to him as if the great glowing ball were
lying down upon a cushion for its comfort. If it set in a bank of cloud
or storm, it seemed to send up long streaming, reaching stripes, as if
it waved a farewell to the sky, and stretched a last grasp at the day as
it left it, or shot a rocket of distress as it sank.
When a child he had often sent her his good-will upon the westering
messenger, and he imagined that the beams, sometimes shot suddenly out
from beneath a low-hung cloudy curtain, were answers to his greetings.
Long after it was dreary at his place, he fancied the light was still
cuddling somewhere in the brush near her and that it was cheery yet
over there.
When he was seven and she was three, he was visiting at her house one
day. She was sitting on a bench in the old, long porch, shouting to
him, her elder brother, and some others, as they came toward her from
a romp out in the orchard. Suddenly Bent bantered the boys for a race
to the baby; and, swinging their limp wool hats in their hands, they
sped toward her. The child caught the jubilance of the race, and when
Bent dropped first beside her, she grabbed him about the neck, laid
the rose of her cheek against the tan of his, and said:
"I 'oves 'oo best, 'tause 'oo beat 'em all."
The act was an infant tribute to prowess, a bound here in babyhood of
the heart which wants but does not weigh; of the body which asks but
does not question. The boy felt his heart go to meet hers, so that the
little girl stood ever after as his idol. As time went on, his
reverence for her as a lisper grew as she became a lass; and though,
out of the dawning to them of what the years might bring, there came
eras of pure embarrassment, wherein their firmness and trust wavered a
little, yet confiding companionship came anew and stayed, till some
new revelation of each to self or other barred for a time again their
ease and intimacy. They were man and woman now, with a consciousness
of much that the grown-up state must finally mean to them, if this
continued. There was the freedom from embarrassment which experience
brings; but there came with all this a sort of proximity of hopes and
aims, which, burdened sweetly with its own importance, persisted with
a presage of a crisis down the line.
He could no longer ride up to her side as she left the stile at church,
and, without a previous engagement or the lubricant of a commonplace,
open a conversation right into the heart of things. When she responded
to him now it was with a shy sort of confidence which admits so much yet
defines so little. Yet never when they met did they fail to pick up the
thread, which tended to bind them closer and closer, and give it a
conscious snatch of greater strain, till, as either looked back at the
skein of incidents, there came a delightful feeling of hopeless
entanglement in this fibre of their fate. However, the ends of the
filament were free and floating yet, as the fray of a swirling gossamer
in the autumn wind. Day by day these two felt that these frayed ends
would meet sometime; and hold? or snap? and then? and then!
Nothing had ever strongly tried their attachment. Yet there was
creeping now into the heart of each a sort of heaviness--a wondering,
at least--if the other was still holding true to the childish troth; a
definite sort of mental distrust was abiding between them, along with
a readiness to be equal to anything which an emergency might bring.
But in their hearts they were lovers still.
FOOTNOTE:
[1] Copyright, 1900, by the Macmillan Company.
JAMES LANE ALLEN
James Lane Allen, the foremost living American master of English
prose, was born near Lexington, Kentucky, December 21, 1849. His home
was situated some five miles from Lexington, on the old Parker's Mill
road, and it was burned to the ground more than thirty years ago. He
was the seventh and youngest child of Richard Allen, a Kentuckian, and
his wife, Helen Foster Allen, a native of Mississippi. Lane Allen, as
he was known in Kentucky until he became a distinguished figure in
contemporary letters, was interested in books and Nature when a boy
under his mother's tutelage. He was early at Kentucky University, now
rechristened with its ancient name, Transylvania. Mr. Allen was
valedictorian of the class of 1872; and five years later the degree of
Master of Arts was granted him, after an amusing quibble with the
faculty regarding the length of his oration, _The Survival of the
Fittest_. He began his career as teacher of the district school at the
rural village of Slickaway, which is now known as Fort Spring, about
two miles from his birthplace. He taught this school but one year,
when he went to Richmond, Missouri, to become instructor of Greek in
the high school there. A few years later he established a school for
boys at Lexington, Missouri. Mr. Allen returned to Kentucky to act as
tutor in a private family near Lexington; and in 1878, he was elected
principal of the Kentucky University Academy. He resigned this
position, in 1880, to accept the chair of Latin and English in Bethany
College, Bethany, West Virginia, which he occupied for two years, when
he returned once more to Lexington, Kentucky, to open a private school
for boys in the old Masonic Temple. In 1884 Mr. Allen discarded the
teacher's garb for that of a man of letters, and since that time he
has devoted his entire attention to literature.
While his kinsfolk and acquaintances regarded him with quiet wonder,
if not alarmed astonishment, he carefully arranged his traveling bags
and set his face toward the city of his dreams and thoughts--New York.
Once there he shortly discovered that it was a deal easier to get into
the kingdom of heaven than into the pages of the great periodicals,
yet he had come to the city to make a name for himself in literature
and he was not to be denied. His struggle was most severe, but his
victory has been so complete that the bitterness of those days has
been blown aside. The first seven or eight years of his life as a
writer, Mr. Allen divided between New York, Cincinnati, and Kentucky.
He finally quit Kentucky in 1893, and he has not been in the state
since 1898, at which time his _alma mater_ conferred the honorary
degree of LL. D. upon him. He now resides in New York.
Mr. Allen began with short essays for _The Critic_, _The Continent_,
_The Independent_, _The Manhattan_, and other periodicals; and he
contributed some strong and fine poems to _The Atlantic Monthly_, _The
Interior_, _Harper's Monthly_, _Lippincott's Magazine_, _The
Independent_, and elsewhere. But none of these represented the true
beginning of his work, of his career. His first short-story to attract
general attention was _Too Much Momentum_, published in _Harper's
Magazine_ for April, 1885. It, however, was naturally rather stiff, as
the author was then wielding the pen of a 'prentice. This was followed
by a charming essay, _The Blue-Grass Region of Kentucky_, in
_Harper's_ for February, 1886, and which really pointed the path he
was to follow so wonderfully well through the coming years.
His first noteworthy story, _Two Gentlemen of Kentucky_, appeared in
_The Century Magazine_ for April, 1888. Then followed fast upon each
other's heels, _The White Cowl_; _King Solomon of Kentucky_, perhaps
the greatest short-story he has written; _Posthumous Fame_; _Flute
and Violin_; and _Sister Doloroso_, all of which were printed in the
order named, and in _The Century_, save _Flute and Violin_, which was
originally published in _Harper's Magazine_ for December, 1890. These
"Kentucky tales and romances" were issued as Mr. Allen's first book,
entitled _Flute and Violin_ (New York, 1891; Edinburgh, 1892, two
volumes). Many of the author's admirers have come to regard these
stories as the finest work he has done. As backgrounds for them he
wrote a series of descriptive and historical papers upon Kentucky,
originally published in _The Century_ and _Harper's_, and collected in
book form under the title of the first of them, _The Blue Grass Region
of Kentucky_ (New York, 1892). Up to this time Mr. Allen had written
nothing but short-stories, verses, and sketches. While living at
Cincinnati he wrote his first novelette, _John Gray_ (Philadelphia,
1893), which first appeared in _Lippincott's Magazine_ for June, 1892.
This is one of the author's strongest pieces of prose fiction, though
it has been well-nigh forgotten in its original form.
These three books fitted Mr. Allen for the writing of an American
classic, _A Kentucky Cardinal_ (New York, 1894), another novelette,
which was published in two parts in _Harper's Magazine_ for May and
June, 1894, prior to its appearance in book form. This, with its
sequel, _Aftermath_ (New York, 1895), is the most exquisite tale of
nature yet done by an American hand. It at once defies all praise, or
adverse criticism, being wrought out as perfectly as human hands can
well do. At the present time the two stories may be best read in the
large paper illustrated edition done by Mr. Hugh Thomson, the
celebrated English artist, to which Mr. Allen contributed a charming
introduction. _Summer in Arcady_ (New York, 1896), which passed
through the _Cosmopolitan Magazine_ as _Butterflies_, was a rather
realistic story of love and Nature, and somewhat strongly drawn for
the tastes of many people. When his complete works appear in twelve
uniform volumes, in 1913 or 1914, this "tale of nature" will be
entitled _A Pair of Butterflies_.
_The Choir Invisible_ (New York, 1897), Mr. Allen's first really long
novel, was an augmented _John Gray_, and it placed him in the forefront
of American novelists. Mr. Orson Lowell's illustrated edition of this
work is most interesting; and it was dramatized in 1899, but produced
without success, as the author had prophesied. Later in the same year
_Two Gentlemen of Kentucky_ appeared as a bit of a book, and was
cordially received by those of the author's admirers who continued to
regard it as his masterpiece. _The Reign of Law_ (New York, 1900), a
tale of the Kentucky hemp-fields, of love, and evolution, was published
in London as _The Increasing Purpose_, because of the Duke of Argyll's
prior appropriation of that title for his scientific treatise. The
prologue upon Kentucky hemp strengthened Mr. Allen's reputation as one
of the greatest writers of descriptive prose ever born out of Europe. It
was widely read and discussed--in at least one quarter of the
country--with unnecessary bitterness, if not with blind bigotry.
_The Mettle of the Pasture_ (New York, 1903), which was first
announced as _Crypts of the Heart_, is a love story of great beauty,
saturated with the atmosphere of Kentucky to a wonderful degree, yet
it has not been sufficiently appreciated. For the five years following
the publication of _The Mettle_, Mr. Allen was silent; but he was
working harder than ever before in his life upon manuscripts which he
has come to regard as his most vital contributions to prose fiction.
In the autumn of 1908 his stirring speech at the unveiling of the
monument to remember his hero, King Solomon of Kentucky, was read; and
three months later _The Last Christmas Tree_, brief prelude to his
Christmas trilogy, appeared in _The Saturday Evening Post_. _The Bride
of the Mistletoe_ (New York, 1909), part first of the trilogy, is one
of the finest fragments of prose yet published in the United States.
It aroused criticism of various kinds in many quarters, one declaring
it to be one thing, and one another, but all agreeing that it was
something new and wonderful under our literary sun. The critics of
to-morrow may discover that _The Bride_ was the foundation-stone of
the now much-heralded _Chunk of Life School_ which has of late taken
London by the ears. Yet, between _The Bride_ and _The Widow of the Bye
Street_ a great gulf is fixed. Part two of the trilogy was first
announced as _A Brood of the Eagle_, but it was finally published as
_The Doctor's Christmas Eve_ (New York, 1910). This, one of Mr.
Allen's longest novels, was met by adverse criticism based on several
grounds, but upon none more pointedly than what was alleged to be the
unnatural precocity of the children, who do not appear to lightly flit
through the pages in a way that our old-fashioned conventions would
prescribe they should, but somewhat seem to clog the unfolding of the
tale. Whatever estimate one may place upon _The Doctor_, he can
scarcely be held to possess the subtile charm of _The Bride_. The
third and final part of this much-discussed trilogy will hardly be
published before 1914, or perhaps even subsequent to that date.
_The Heroine in Bronze_ (New York, 1912), is Mr. Allen's latest novel.
It is an American love story with all of the author's exquisite
mastery of language again ringing fine and true. For the first time
Mr. Allen largely abandons Kentucky as a landscape for his story, the
action being in New York. The phrase "my country," that recurs
throughout the book, succeeds the "Shield," which, in _The Bride of
the Mistletoe_, was the author's appellation for Kentucky. The sequel
to _The Heroine_--the story the boy wrote for the girl--is now
preparing.
Twenty years ago Mr. Allen wrote, "Kentucky has little or no
literature;" and while he did not write, perhaps, with the whole
horizon of its range before him, there was substantial truth in the
statement. The splendid sequel to his declaration is his own
magnificent works. He pointed out the lack of merit in our literature,
but he did a far finer and more fitting thing: he at once set out upon
his distinguished career and has produced a literature for the state.
He has created Kentucky and Kentuckians as things apart from the
outside world, a miniature republic within a greater republic; and no
one knows the land and the people other than imperfectly if one cannot
see and feel that his conception is clear and sentient. With a light
but firm touch he has caught the shimmering atmosphere of his own
native uplands and the idiosyncrasies of their people with all the
fidelity with which the camera gives back a material outline.
BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Stories of James Lane Allen_, by L. W. Payne,
Jr., in _The Sewanee Review_ (January, 1900); _James Lane Allen's
Country_, by Arthur Bartlett, _The Bookman_ (October, 1900);
_Famous Authors_, by E. F. Harkins (Boston, 1901); _Authors of Our
Day in Their Homes_, by F. W. Halsey (New York, 1902); _Social
Historians_, by H. A. Toulmin, Jr. (Boston, 1911).
KING SOLOMON OF KENTUCKY: AN ADDRESS[2]
[From _The Outlook_ (December 19, 1908)]
We are witnessing at present a revival of conflict between two ideas
in our civilization that have already produced a colossal war; the
idea of the greatness of our Nation as the welded and indissoluble
greatness of the States, and the idea of the separate dignity and
isolated power of each sovereign commonwealth. The spirit of the
Nation reaches out more and more to absorb into itself its own parts,
and each part draws back more and more into its own Attic supremacy
and independence, feeling that its earlier struggles were its own
struggles, that its heroes were its own heroes, and that it has
memories which refuse to blend with any other memories. It will
willingly yield the luster of its daily life to the National sun, but
by night it must see its own lighthouses around its frontiers--beacons
for its own wandering mariner sons and a warning to the Nation itself
that such lights are sacred wherever they stand and burn.
But if the State more and more resists absorption into the Federal
life, then less and less can it expect the Nation to do what it
insists is its own peculiar work; the greater is the obligation
resting upon it to make known to the Nation its own peculiar past and
its own incommunicable greatness. Among the States of the Union none
belongs more wholly to herself and less to the Nation than does
Kentucky; none perhaps will resist more passionately the encroachments
of Federal control; and upon her rests the very highest obligation to
write her own history and make good her Attic aloofness.
But there is no nobler or more eloquent way in which a State can set
forth its annals than by memorializing its great dead. The flag of a
nation is its hope; its monuments are its memories. But it is also true
that the flag of a country is its memory, and that its monuments are its
hopes. And both are needed. Each calls aloud to the other. If you should
go into any land and see it covered with monuments and nowhere see its
flag, you would know that its flag had gone down into the dust and that
its hope was ended. If you should travel in a land and everywhere see
its flag and nowhere its monuments, you would ask yourself, Has this
people no past that it cares to speak of? and if it has, why does it not
speak of it? But when you visit a country where you see the flag proudly
flying and proud monuments standing everywhere, then you say, Here is a
people who are great in both their hopes and in their memories, and who
live doubly through the deeds of their dead.
Where are Kentucky's monuments for her battlefields? There are some;
where are the others? Where are her monuments for her heroes that she
insists were hers alone? Over her waves the flag of her hopes; where
are the monuments that are her memories?
This man whom you memorialize to-day was not, in station or
habiliment, one of Kentucky's higher heroes; his battlefield was the
battlefield of his own character; but the honor rightly heaped upon
him at last makes one remember how many a battlefield and how many a
hero remain forgotten. Not alone the fields and heroes of actual war,
but of civic and moral and scientific and artistic leadership. These
ceremonies--whom will they incite to kindred action elsewhere? What
other monuments will they build?
There is a second movement broader than any question of State or
National patriotism, in which these ceremonies also have their place.
It is the essential movement of our time in the direction of a new
philanthropy.
No line of Shakespeare has ever been perhaps more quoted than this:
"The evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft interred with
their bones." It is true that he put the words into the mouth of a
Roman of old; but they were true of the England of his time and they
remained true for centuries after his death. But within the last one
hundred years or less an entirely new spirit has been developed; a
radically new way of looking at human history and at human character
has superseded the old. The spirit and genius of our day calls for the
recasting of Shakespeare's lines: Let the evil that men do be buried
with them; let the good they did be found out and kept alive.
I wish to take one illustration of the truth of this from the history
of English literature.
Do you know when and where it was that satire virtually ceased to exist
in English literature? It was at the birthplace and with the birth of
Charles Darwin. From Darwin's time, from the peak on which he stood, a
long slope of English literature sinks backward and downward toward the
past; and on that shadowy slope stand somewhere the fierce satirists of
English letters. Last of them all, and standing near where Darwin stood,
is the great form of Thackeray. All his life he sought for perfection in
human character and never found it. He searched England from the throne
down for the gentleman and never found the gentleman. The life-long
quest sometimes left him bitter, always left him sad. For all of
Thackeray's work was done under the influence of the older point of
view, that the frailties of men should be scourged out of them and
could be. Over his imagination brooded the shadow of a vast myth--that
man had thrown away his own perfection, that he was a fallen angel, who
wantonly refused to regain his own paradise.
And now from the peak of the world's thought on which Darwin stood,
the other slope of English literature comes down to us and will pass
on into the future. And as marking the beginning of the modern spirit
working in literature, there on this side of Darwin, near to him as
Thackeray stood near to him on the other side, is the great form of
George Eliot. George Eliot saw the frailties of human nature as
clearly as Thackeray saw them; she loved perfection as greatly as he
loved perfection; but on her lips satire died and sympathy was born.
She was the first of England's great imaginative writers to breathe in
the spirit of modern life and of modern knowledge--that man himself is
a developing animal--a creature crawling slowly out of utter darkness
toward the light. You can satirize a fallen angel who willfully
refuses to regain his paradise; but you cannot satirize an animal who
is developing through millions of years his own will to be used
against his own instincts.
And this new spirit of charity not only pervades the new literature of
the world, but has made itself felt in every branch of human action.
It has affected the theatre and well-nigh driven the drama of satire
from the stage. Every judge knows that it goes with him to the bench;
every physician knows that it accompanies him into the sick-room;
every teacher knows that he must reckon with it as he tries to govern
and direct the young; every minister knows that it ascends with him
into his pulpit and takes wing with his prayer.
And thus we come back around a great circle of the world's endeavor to
the simple ceremony of this hour and place. There is but one thing to
be said; it is all that need be said; it is an attempt to burnish one
corner of a hero's dimmed shield.
It is autumn now, the season of scythe and sickle. Time, the Reaper,
long ago reaped from the field of this man's life its heroic deed; and
now after so many years it has come back to his grave and thrown down
the natural increase. On the day when King Solomon was laid here the
grass began to weave its seamless mantle across his frailties; but out
of his dust sprang what has since been growing--what no hostile hand can
pluck away, nor any wind blow down--the red flower of a man's passionate
service to his fellow-men when they were in direst need of him.
And so, long honor to his name! A new peace to his ashes!
THE LAST CHRISTMAS TREE[3]
[From _The Saturday Evening Post_ (Philadelphia, December 5, 1908)]
The stars burn out one by one like candles in too long a night.
Children, you love the snow. You play in it, you hunt in it; it brings
the tinkling of sleighbells, it gives white wings to the trees and new
robes to the world. Whenever it falls in your country, sooner or later
it vanishes: forever falling and rising, forming and falling and
melting and rising again--on and on through the ages.
If you should start from your homes and travel northward, after a
while you would find that everything is steadily changing: the air
grows colder, living things begin to be left behind, those that remain
begin to look white, the music of the earth begins to die out; you
think no more of color and joy and song. On you journey, and always
you are traveling toward the silent, the white, the dead. And at last
you come to the land of sunlessness and silence--the reign of snow.
If you should start from your homes and travel southward, as you crossed
land after land, in the same way you would begin to see that life was
failing, colors fading, the earth's harmonies being replaced by the
discords of Nature's lifeless forces, storming, crushing, grinding. And
at last you would reach the threshold of another world that you dared
not enter and that nothing alive ever faces--the home of the frost.
If you should rise straight into the air above your housetops, as
though you were climbing the side of an unseen mountain, you would
find at last that you had ascended to a height where the mountain
would be capped with snow. All round the earth, wherever its mountains
are high enough, their summits are capped with the one same snow; for
above us, everywhere, lies the upper land of eternal cold.
Some time in the future, we do not know when, but some time in the
future, the Spirit of the Cold at the north will move southward; the
Spirit of the Cold at the south will move northward; the Spirit of the
Cold in the upper air will move downward to meet the other two. When the
three meet there will be for the earth one whiteness and silence--rest.
* * * * *
A great time had passed--how great no one knew; there was none to
measure it.
It was twilight and it was snowing. On a steep mountainside, near its
bald summit, thousands of feet above the line that any other living
thing had ever crossed, stood two glorious fir trees, strongest and last
of their race. They had climbed out of the valley below to this lone
height, and there had so rooted themselves in rock and soil that the
sturdiest gale had never been able to dislodge them; and now the twain
occupied that beetling rock as the final sentinels of mortal things.
They looked out toward the land on one side of the mountain; at the
foot of it lay a valley, and there, in old human times, a village had
thriven, church spires had risen, bridal candles had twinkled at
twilight. On the opposite side they looked toward the ocean--once the
rolling, blue ocean, singing its great song, but level now and white
and still at last--its voice hushed with all other voices--the roar of
its battleships ended long ago. One fir tree grew lower down than the
other, its head barely reached up to its comrade's breast. They had
long shared with each other the wordless wisdom of their race; and
now, as a slow, bitter wind wandered across the delicate green harps
of their leaves, they began to chant--harping like harpers of old who
never tired of the past.
The fir below, as the snowflakes fell on its locks and sifted closely
in about its throat, shook itself bravely and sang:
"Comrade, the end for us draws nigh; the snow is creeping up. To-night
it will place its cap upon my head. I shall close my eyes and follow
all things into their sleep."
"Yes," thrummed the fir above, "follow all things into their sleep.
If they were thus to sleep at last, why were they ever awakened? It is
a mystery."
The whirling wind caught the words and bore them to the right and to
the left over land and over sea:
"Mystery--mystery--mystery."
Twilight deepened. The snow scarcely fell; the clouds trailed through
the trees so close and low that the flakes were formed amid the boughs
and rested where they were created. At intervals out of the clouds and
darkness the low musings went on:
"Where now is the Little Brother of the Trees--him of the long
thoughts and the brief shadow?"
"He thought that he alone of earthly things was immortal."
"Our people, the Evergreens, were thrust forth on the earth a million
ages before he appeared; and we are still here, a million ages since
he left, leaving not a trace of himself behind."
"The most fragile moss was born before he was born; and the moss
outlasted him."
"The frailest fern was not so perishable."
"Yet he believed he should have eternal youth."
"That his race would return to some Power who had sent it forth."
"That he was ever being borne onward to some far-off, divine event,
where there was justice."
"Yes, where there was justice."
"Of old it was their custom to heap white flowers above their dead."
"Now white flowers cover them--the frozen white flowers of the sky."
It was night now about the mountaintop--deep night above it. At
intervals the communing of the firs started up afresh:
"Had they known how alone in the universe they were, would they not
have turned to each other for happiness?"
"Would not all have helped each?"
"Would not each have helped all?"
"Would they have so mingled their wars with their prayers?"
"Would they not have thrown away their weapons and thrown their arms
around one another? It was all a mystery."
"Mystery--mystery."
Once in the night they sounded in unison:
"And all the gods of earth--its many gods in many lands with many
faces--they sleep now in their ancient temples; on them has fallen at
last their unending dusk."
"And the shepherds who avowed that they were appointed by the Creator
of the universe to lead other men as their sheep--what difference is
there now between the sheep and the shepherds?"
"The shepherds lie with the sheep in the same white pastures."
"Still, what think you became of all that men did?"
"Whither did Science go? How could it come to naught?"
"And that seven-branched golden candlestick of inner light that was
his Art--was there no other sphere to which it could be transferred,
lovely and eternal?"
"And what became of Love?"
"What became of the woman who asked for nothing in life but love and
youth?"
"What became of the man who was true?"
"Think you that all of them are not gathered elsewhere--strangely
changed, yet the same? Is some other quenchless star their safe
habitation?"
"What do we know; what did he know on earth? It was a mystery."
"It was all a mystery."
If there had been a clock to measure the hour it must now have been
near midnight. Suddenly the fir below harped most tenderly:
"The children! What became of the children? Where did the myriads of
them march to? What was the end of the march of the earth's children?"
"Be still!" whispered the fir above. "At that moment I felt the soft
fingers of a child searching my boughs. Was not this what in human
times they called Christmas Eve?"
"Hearken!" whispered the fir below. "Down in the valley elfin horns
are blowing and elfin drums are beating. Did you hear that--faint and
far away? It was the bells of the reindeer! It passed: it was the
wandering soul of Christmas."
Not long after this the fir below struck its green harp for the last
time:
"Comrade, it is the end for me. Good-night!"
Silently the snow closed over it.
The other fir now stood alone. The snow crept higher and higher. It
bravely shook itself loose. Late in the long night it communed once
more, solitary:
"I, then, close the train of earthly things. And I was the emblem of
immortality; let the highest be the last to perish! Power, that put
forth all things for a purpose, you have fulfilled, without explaining
it, that purpose. I follow all things into their sleep."
In the morning there was no trace of it.
The sun rose clear on the mountaintops, white and cold and at peace.
The earth was dead.
FOOTNOTES:
[2] Copyright, 1908, by the Outlook Company.
[3] Copyright, 1908, by the Curtis Publishing Company.
NANCY HUSTON BANKS
Mrs. Nancy Huston Banks, novelist, was born at Morganfield, Kentucky,
about 1850. She is the daughter of the late Judge George Huston, who
for many years was an attorney and banker of her native town. When a
young woman Miss Huston was married to Mr. James N. Banks, now a
lawyer of Henderson, Kentucky. Mrs. Banks's first book, _Stairs of
Sand_ (Chicago, 1890), has been forgotten by author and public alike,
but shortly after its publication, she went to New York, and there she
resided at the Hotel St. James for many years. At the present time she
is living in London. She became a contributor to magazines, her
critical paper on Mr. James Lane Allen and his novels, which appeared
in _The Bookman_ for June, 1895, being her first work to attract
serious attention. A few years later Mrs. Banks dropped her magazine
work in order to write her charming novel of life in southern
Kentucky, _Oldfield_ (New York, 1902). This story was highly praised
in this country and in England, the critics of London coining a
descriptive phrase for it that has stuck--"the Kentucky Cranford." Her
next novel, _'Round Anvil Rock_ (New York, 1903), was a worthy
follower of _Oldfield_. One reviewer called it "a blend of an
old-fashioned love story and an historical study." Mrs. Banks's most
recent novel is _The Little Hills_ (New York, 1905). The opening words
of this story: "The air was the breath of spice pinks," was seized
upon by the critics and set up as a sign-post for the book's tone.
Mrs. Banks has been a great traveler. She was sent to South Africa
during the Boer war by _Vanity Fair_ of London, and her letters to
that publication were most interesting. She knew Cecil Rhodes and
George W. Steevens, the war correspondent, and, with her beauty and
charm, she became a social "star" in the life about her. Mrs. Banks's
one eccentricity--according to the literary gossips of New York--is
her distaste for classical music; and that much of her success is due
to the fact that she knows how to handle editors and publishers, we
also learn from the same source. At least one of her contemporaries
once held--though he has since wholly relented and regretted
much--that, in a now exceedingly scarce first edition, she
out-ingramed Ingram! But, of course, that is another story.
BIBLIOGRAPHY. _The Critic_ (September, 1902); _The Nation_
(February 5, 1903); _The Bookman_ (February, 1904).
ANVIL ROCK[4]
[From _'Round Anvil Rock_ (New York, 1903)]
The courage and calmness which he had found in himself under this test,
heartened him and made him the more determined to control his wandering
fancy. Looking now neither to the right nor the left, he pressed on
through the clearing toward the buffalo track in the border of the
forest which would lead him into the Wilderness Road. Sternly setting
his thoughts on the errand that was taking him to the salt-works, he
began to think of the place in which they were situated, and to wonder
why so bare, so brown, and so desolate a spot should have been called
Green Lick. There was no greenness about it, and not the slightest sign
that there ever had been any verdure, although it still lay in the very
heart of an almost tropical forest. It must surely have been as it was
now since time immemorial. Myriads of wild beasts coming and going
through numberless centuries to drink the salt water, had trodden the
earth around it as hard as iron, and had worn it down far below the
surface of the surrounding country. The boy had seen it often, but
always by daylight, and never alone, so that he noted many things now
which he had not observed before. The huge bison must have gone over
that well-beaten track one by one, to judge by its narrowness. He could
see it dimly, running into the clearing like a black line beginning far
off between the bordering trees; but as he looked, the darkness
deepened, the mists thickened, and a look of unreality came over
familiar objects. And then through the wavering gloom there suddenly
towered a great dark mass topped by something which rose against the
wild dimness like a colossal blacksmith's anvil. It might have been
Vulcan's own forge, so strange and fabulous a thing it seemed! The boy's
heart leaped with his pony's leap. His imagination spread its swift
wings ere he could think; but in another instant he reminded himself.
This was not an awful apparition, but a real thing, wondrous and
unaccountable enough in its reality. It was Anvil Rock--a great,
solitary rock rising abruptly from the rockless loam of a level country,
and lifting its single peak, rudely shaped like a blacksmith's anvil,
straight up toward the clouds.
THE OLD-FASHIONED FIDDLERS
[From the same]
Those old-time country fiddlers--all of them, black or white--how
wonderful they were! They have always been the wonder and the despair
of all musicians who have played by rule and note. The very way that
the country fiddler held his fiddle against his chest and never
against his shoulder like the trained musician! The very way that the
country fiddler grasped his bow, firmly and squarely in the middle,
and never lightly at the end like a trained musician! The very way
that he let go and went off and kept on--the amazing, inimitable
spirit, the gayety, the rhythm, the swing! No trained musician ever
heard the music of the country fiddler without wondering at its power,
and longing in vain to know the secret of its charm. It would be worth
a good deal to know where and how they learned the tunes that they
played. Possibly these were handed down by ear from one to another;
some perhaps may have never been pent up in notes, and others may have
been given to the note reader under other names than those by which
the country fiddlers knew them. This is said to have been the case
with "Old Zip Coon," and the names of many of them would seem to prove
that they belonged to the time and the country. But there is a
delightful uncertainty about the origin and the history of almost all
of them--about "Leather Breeches" and "Sugar in the Gourd" and
"Wagoner" and "Cotton-eyed Joe," and so on through a long list.
FOOTNOTE:
[4] Copyright, 1903, by the Macmillan Company.
WILLIAM B. SMITH
William Benjamin Smith, perhaps the greatest scholar ever born on
Kentucky soil, first saw the light at Stanford, Kentucky, October 26,
1850. Kentucky (Transylvania) University conferred the degree of
Master of Arts upon him in 1871; and the University of Goettengen
granted him his Doctor of Philosophy degree in 1879. Dr. Smith was
professor of mathematics in Central College, Missouri, from 1881 to
1885, when he accepted the chair of physics in the University of
Missouri. In 1888 he was transferred to the department of mathematics
in the same institution, which he held until 1893, when he resigned
to accept a similar position at Tulane University. In 1906 Dr. Smith
was elected head of the department of philosophy at Tulane, which
position he holds at the present time. He was a delegate of the United
States government to the first Pan-American Scientific Congress, held
at Santiago, Chile, in 1908. Dr. Smith is the author of the following
books, the very titles of which will show his amazing versatility:
_Co-ordinate Geometry_ (Boston, 1885); _Clew to Trigonometry_ (1889);
_Introductory Modern Geometry_ (New York, 1893); _Infinitesimal
Analysis_ (New York, 1898); _The Color Line_ (New York, 1905), a
stirring discussion of the Negro problem from a rather new
perspective; two theological works, written originally in German, _Der
Vorchristliche Jesus_ (Jena, Germany, 1906); and _Ecce Deus_ (Jena,
Germany, 1911), the English translation of which was issued at London
and Chicago in 1912. These two works upon proto-Christianity have
placed Dr. Smith among the foremost scholars of his day and generation
in America. Besides his books he wrote two pamphlets of more than
fifty pages each upon _Tariff for Protection_ (Columbia, Missouri,
1888); and _Tariff Reform_ (Columbia, Missouri, 1892). These show the
author at his best. And his biography of James Sidney Rollins, founder
of the University of Missouri, was published about this time. During
the month of October, 1896, Dr. Smith published six articles in the
Chicago _Record_, on the sliver question and in defense of the gold
standard, which were certainly the most thorough brought out by the
presidential campaign of that year. Among his many public addresses,
essays, and articles, _The Pauline Codices F and G_ may be mentioned,
as well as his articles on _Infinitesimal Calculus_ and _New Testament
Criticism_ in the _Encyclopaedia Americana_ (New York, 1906); and he
compiled the mathematical definitions for the _New International
Dictionary_ (New York, 1908). Dr. Smith's fine poem, _The Merman and
the Seraph_, was crowned in the _Poet Lore_ competition of 1906. As a
mathematician, philosopher, sociologist, New Testament critic,
publicist, poet, and alleged prototype of _David_, hero of Mr. James
Lane Allen's _The Reign of Law_--which he most certainly was not!--Dr.
Smith stands supreme among the sons of Kentucky.
BIBLIOGRAPHY. _Current Literature_ (June, 1905); _The Nation_
(November 23, 1911).
A SOUTHERN VIEW OF THE NEGRO PROBLEM[5]
[From _The Color Line_ (New York, 1905)]