is the prevalent habit of travel; and although the incessant and huge
caravans that rush along the numerous railways which make an iron network
over this Union are, for the most part, impelled by motives of enterprise
and thrift, yet the common idea of recreation is associated with a 'trip.'
Whether the facilities or the temperament of our country, or both, be the
reason of this locomotive propensity, it is a characteristic which at once
distinguishes the American from the home-tethered German, the Paris-bound
Frenchman, and the locally-patriotic Italian. The schoolboy in vacation,
the college graduate, the bridegroom, the overtasked professional
man,--all Americans who give themselves a 'holiday,' are wont to dedicate
it to a journey. But even this resource has lost much of its original
charm from the catastrophes which have associated some of the most
beautiful scenery of the land with the most agonizing of human tragedies.
In the crystal waters of Lake George, by the picturesque banks of the
Hudson, amid the fertile valleys of the Connecticut, on the teeming
currents of Long Island Sound, have perished, often through reckless
hardihood, always by more or less reprehensible negligence, some of the
fairest and the noblest of our citizens. The statistics of these
melancholy events, which have so often appalled the public, have yet to be
written; but their moral effect may be divined by a mere glance at the
mercenary hardihood and soulless haste that mark our civilization. 'Les
dangers personnels,' says an acute writer; 'quand ils attegnent une
certaine limite, bouleversent tous les rapports et l'oublie de l'espérance
changé presque notre nature.' The zest, too, of a journey in America is
much diminished by the monotonous character of the people, and by the
gregarious habits, the rapid transits, and the business motives of the
_voyageurs_, so that it is only at the terminus that we enjoy our
pilgrimage; there the sight of a magnificent prairie or mountain range,
cataract or mammoth cave, may, indeed, vindicate our locomotive taste, and
the wonders of Nature make, for the imaginative and reverential, a
glorious holiday.
A pleasing feature in the recreative aspect of American life is the
literary festival. It is a beautiful custom of our scholars annually to
meet amid the scenes of their academical education and renew youthful
friendships, while they listen to the orator and poet, who dwell upon
those problems of the times which challenge an intellectual solution and
identify the duties of the citizen with the offices of learning. Within
the memory of almost all, there is probably at least one of these
occasions when the interest of the performances or the circumstances of
the hour lent a memorable charm to the collegiate holiday; when, under the
shade of venerable elms that witnessed the first outpouring of mental
enthusiasm or the earliest honours of genius and attainment, they who
parted as boys meet as men, and the classic dreamer felt himself a
recognized and practical thinker for the people; when the language of
eloquent wisdom or poetic beauty came warm from lips hallowed by the
chalice of fame. Who that listened ever can forget the anniversary graced
by the chaste eloquence of Buckminster, that on which Bryant recited _The
Ages_, or Everett's musical periods welcomed Lafayette to the oldest seat
of American learning? What New England scholar, after years of
professional labour in a distant State, ever found himself once more
within the charmed precincts of his _alma mater_, and surrounded by the
companions of his youthful studies, without a thrill of happy
reminiscence? Yet even these rational opportunities for what should be a
genuine holiday to mind and heart are but casually appreciated. The sultry
period of their occurrence, the irregularity of attendance, and the
precarious quality of the 'feast of reason' provided, have caused them
gradually to lose a tenacious hold upon the affections, while there are
few _habitués_, the majority, especially those who live at a distance from
the scene, and whose presence is therefore especially desirable,--are not
loyal pilgrims to the shrine where their virgin distinction was earned and
their intellectual armour forged. To many, our literary festivals are but
technical ceremonies; to not a few, wearisome forms; associated rather
with fans, didactics, perspiration, and cold viands, than with any social
or intellectual refreshment. The 'lean annuitant' who loved to visit
'Oxford in vacation,' and fancy himself a gownsman, and the ingenious
'Opium Eater' who has recorded the enduring claims of those venerable
cloisters to the scholar's gratitude, enjoyed speculatively more of the
real luxury of academic repose and triumph than is often attained by those
who ostensibly participate in our college festivals; and seldom do her
children go up to the altars of wisdom consecrated by the pious zeal of
our ancestors, with the faithful recognition of the venerable pastor, so
long the statistical oracle of the surviving graduates, who, while his
strength sufficed, cheerily walked from his rural parish to Old Harvard,
to lead off the anniversary psalm, with genial pride and honest
self-gratulation.
Of our purely social holidays, New Year's day, as observed in the city of
New York, bears the palm. Initiated by the hospitable instinct of the
Dutch colonists, neither the heterogeneous population which has succeeded
them, nor the annually enlarged circuit of the metropolis, has diminished
the universality or the heartiness of its observance. When the snow is
massed in the thoroughfares, and the sunshine tempers a clear, frosty
atmosphere, a more cheerful scene, on a large scale, it is impossible to
imagine. From morning to midnight, sleighs, freighted with gay companions
and drawn by handsome steeds, dash merrily along,--the tinkling of their
bells and the scarlet lining their buffalo-robes redolent of a _fête_;
the sidewalks are alive with hurrying pedestrians who exchange cordial
greetings as they pass one another; doors incessantly fly open; guests
come and go; every one looks prosperous and happy; business is totally
suspended; in warm parlours, radiant with comfort or splendid with luxury,
sit the wives, daughters, sisters, or fair favourites of these innumerable
visitors, the queens of the day; the neglects of the past are forgiven and
forgotten in the welcome of the present; kindred, friends, and
acquaintances all meet and begin the year with mutual good wishes; in
every dwelling a little feast stands ready, encompassed with smiles; and
all varieties of fortune, all degrees of intimacy, all tastes in dress,
entertainment, and manners, on this one day, are consecrated by the
liberal and kindly spirit of a social carnival.
Of associations expressly instituted for the observance of holidays there
is no lack; of days technically devoted to festivity, in the aggregate,
our proportion equals that of older communities; and the legitimate
occasions for pastime and ceremony, social pleasure, or historical
commemoration, are as numerous as is consistent with the industrious
habits and the civic prosperity of the land. The traveller who should make
it his specialty to discover and note the ostensible merrymakings and
pageants of America would find the list neither brief nor monotonous. In
the summer he would light upon many an excursion on our beautiful lakes,
many a chowder-party to the seaside, and picnic in the grove; and in the
winter would catch the shrill echo of the skating frolic. Here, through
pillared trunks, he would behold the smoke-wreaths of the sugar-camp;
there watch laughing groups clustered round the cider-mill or hop-field;
and in woods radiant with autumnal tints, or prairies balmy with a million
flowers, would sounds of merriment announce to him the cheerful bivouac.
Nor have American holidays, even in their most primitive aspect, been
devoid of use and beauty. The once-renowned 'musters' fostered military
taste, and the cattle-shows encouraged agricultural science; with the
increase of horticultural festivals, our fruits and flowers have
constantly improved; regattas and yacht-clubs have indirectly promoted
nautical architecture; school festivals attest the superiority of our
system of popular education; family gatherings, on the large scale
observed in several instances, have induced genealogical research;
historical celebrations have led to the collection and preservation of
local archives and memorials; the Cincinnati Society annually renews the
noblest patriotic sympathies; and the genius for mechanical invention is
proclaimed by the fairs which, every October, bring together so many
trophies of skilful handiwork and husbandry, and recognize so emphatically
the dignity and scientific amelioration of labour. Yet these facts do not
invalidate the general truth that our festivals are too much tinctured
with utilitarian aims to breathe earnestness and hilarity; that they are
so specific as to represent the division rather than the social triumphs
of human toil; that they are too partial in their scope, too sectional in
their objects, and too isolated in their arrangements, to meet the claims
of popular and permanent interests. Our harvests are songless.
Reaping-machines have diminished the zest of autumn's golden largess, as
destructive inventions have lessened the miracles of chivalry. Here and
there may yet convene a quilting-party, but locomotive facilities have
deprived rural gatherings, in sparse neighbourhoods, of their marvel and
their joy; and the hilarious huskings of old chiefly survive in Barlow's
neglected verse:--
'The days grow short; but though the fallen sun
To the glad swain proclaims his day's work done;
Night's pleasant shades his various tasks prolong,
And yield new subjects to my various song.
For now, the corn-house filled, the harvest home,
The invited neighbours to the _husking_ come;
A frolic scene, where work and mirth and play,
Unite their charms to chase the hours away.
Where the huge heap lies centred in the hall,
The lamp suspended from the cheerful wall,
Brown, corn-fed nymphs, and strong, hard-handed beaux,
Alternate ranged, extend in circling rows,
Assume their seats, the solid mass attack;
The dry husks rustle, and the corn-cobs crack;
The song, the laugh, alternate notes resound,
And the sweet cider trips in silence round.
The laws of husking every wight can tell,
And sure no laws he ever keeps so well:
For each red ear a general kiss he gains,
With each smut ear he smuts the luckless swains;
But when to some sweet maid a prize is cast,
Red as her lips and taper as her waist,
She walks the round and culls one favoured beau,
Who leaps the luscious tribute to bestow.
Various the sports, as are the wits and brains
Of well-pleased lasses and contending swains;
Till the vast mound of corn is swept away,
And he that gets the last ear wins the day.'
Progress in taste and sentiment, however, is already obvious in our
recreative arrangements. There is vastly more of intellectual dignity and
permanent use in the _fêtes_ of the Lyceum than in those of the
training-days and election-jubilees which formerly were the chief holidays
of our rural population; exhibitions of flowers mark a notable advance
upon the coarse diversions of the ring and the race-ground; and, within a
few years, statues by native artists, worthy of their illustrious
subjects, have been inaugurated by public rites and noble eloquence.
A radical cause of the inefficiency, and therefore of the indifferent
observance of our holidays, may be found in our national inadequacy of
expression, in the want of those modes of popular rejoicing and ceremonial
that win and triumph, from their intrinsic beauty. As a general truth, it
may be asserted that but two methods of representing holiday sentiment are
native to the average taste of our people,--military display and oral
discourse. These exhaust our festal resources. Our citizens have an
extraordinary facility in making occasional speeches; and the love of
soldiership is so prevalent that it is the favourite sport of children,
and all classes indulge in costly uniforms and volunteer parades. But the
language of art, which in the Old World lends such a permanent attraction
to holidays, with us hardly finds voice. Had we requiems conceived with
the eternal pathos of Mozart; harmonious embodiments of rural pastime,
like that which Beethoven caught while sitting on a style amid the subdued
murmurs of a summer evening; melodious invocations to freedom, such as
Bellini's thrilling _duo_; were a symphony as readily composed in America
as an oration; tableaux, costumes, and processions as artistically
invented here as in France; were dance and song as spontaneously
expressive as among the European peasantry; had we vast, open, magnificent
temples, free gardens, statues to crown, shrines to frequent, palatial
balconies, fields Elysian for both rich and poor, a sensibility to music,
and a sense of the appropriate and beautiful, as wide and as instinctive
as our appreciation of the useful, the practical, and the comfortable,--it
would no longer be requisite to resort exclusively to drums, fifes,
powder, substantial viands, and speechifying, to give utterance to the
common sentiment, which would find vent in tones, forms, hues,
combinations, and sympathies, that respond to the heart, through the
imagination, and conform 'the show of things to the desires of the mind.'
Other causes of our deficient holidays are obvious. The primary are to be
found in the absorption in business and the dominion of practical habits,
both of thought and action. Enterprise holds Carnival while Poetry keeps
Lent. The facts of to-day shut out of view the perspective of time, or, at
best, lure the gaze forward with boundless expectancy. To rehearse the
fortunate achievements of the past gratifies our national egotism; but the
sensibility and meditation which consecrate historical associations find
no room amid the rush and eagerness of the passing hour. Content to point
to the heroic episode of the Revolution, to the wisdom and justice of our
Constitution, to the caravans that sweep on iron tracks over leagues of
what a few years ago was a pathless forest, to the swiftest keels and most
graceful models that traverse the ocean, to the aërial viaducts that span
dizzy heights and impetuous torrents, to the exquisite vignettes of a
limitless paper currency, to the dignified and consistent maintenance of
usurped law in younger States of the Union, and to the continually
increasing resources of its older members; we are disposed to sneer at the
childish love of amusement which beguiles the inhabitants of European
capitals, and to pity the superstition and idleness which retain, in this
enlightened age, the melodramatic church shows of Romanism. In all this
there is doubtless a certain manly intelligence; but there is also an
inauspicious moral hardihood. If, as a people, we cultivated more heartily
the social instincts and humane sentiments expressed in holiday rites,
life would be more valued, the whole nature would find congenial play, and
our taskwork and duty, our citizenship and our natural advantages, would
be adorned by gracefulness, alacrity, and repose. Quantity would not be so
grossly estimated above quality, speed above security, routine above
enjoyment. We need to win from time what is denied to us in material.
Other nations have in art a permanent and accessible refreshment, which
prevents life from being wholly prosaic; the humblest dweller on English
soil can enter a time-hallowed and beautiful cathedral; the poorest rustic
in Italy can feel the honest pride of a distinctive festal attire; the
veriest clod-hopper in Germany can soften the rigours of poverty by music;
the London apprentice may wander once a week amid the venerable beauties
of Hampton Court; and the Parisian shopkeeper may kindle pride of country
by reading the pictorial history of France at Versailles. It is not the
expensive arrangements, but the national provision, and, above all, the
personal sentiment, which makes the holiday. There was more holy rapture
in the low cadence of the hymn stealing from the Roman catacombs, where
the hunted Christians of old kept holy the Sabbath day, than there is in
the gorgeous display and complex melody under the magnificent dome of St.
Peter's. There was more of the grace of festivity in such a dance as poor
Goldsmith's flute enlivened on the banks of the Loire, than there is in
the grand ball which marks the season's climax at an American
watering-place. In public not less than private banquets, the scriptural
maxim holds true: 'Better is a dinner of herbs _where love is_.' Our
national life is too diffusive to yield the best social fruits. The extent
of territory, the nomadic habits of our people, the alternations of
climate, the vicissitudes of trade, the prevalence of spasmodic and
superficial excitements, the boundless passion for gain, the local
changes, the family separations, and the incessant fevers of opinion,
scatter the holy fire of love, reverence, self-respect, contemplation, and
faith. What a senseless boast, that the United States has thirty-five
thousand miles of railroad,[19] while England claims but ninety-two
hundred, France forty-eight hundred, if against the American overplus are
to be arrayed countless hecatombs of murdered fellow-citizens, and
desolating frauds unparalleled in the history of finance! What a mockery
the distinction of having accumulated a fortune in a few years, by
sagacity and toil, if, to complete the record, it is added that mercenary
ambition risked and lost it in as many months, or the want of self-control
and mental resources made its possession a life-long curse from _ennui_ or
tasteless extravagance! It is as a check to the whirl of inconsiderate
speculation, an antidote to the bane of material luxury, an interval in
the hurried march of executive life, that holidays should 'give us
pause,' and might prove a means of refinement and of disinterestedness. We
could thus infuse a better spirit into our work-day experience, refresh
and warm the nation's heart, and gradually concentrate what of higher
taste and more genial sympathy underlies the restless and cold tide that
hurries us onward, unmindful of the beauty and indifferent to the
sanctities with which God and Nature have invested our existence.
Of natal anniversaries we have in our national calendar one which it would
augur well for the Republic to observe as a universal holiday. Every
sentiment of gratitude, veneration, and patriotism has already consecrated
it to the private heart; and every consideration of unity, good faith, and
American feeling designates its celebration as the most sacred civic
_fête_ of the land. Recent demonstrations in literature, art, and oratory,
indicate that the obligation and importance of keeping before the eyes,
minds, and affections of the people the memory of Washington, are
emphatically recognized by genius and popular sentiment. Within a few
years, the pen of our most endeared author, the eloquence of our most
finished orator, and the chisel of our best sculptors, have combined to
exhibit, in the most authentic and impressive forms of literary and
plastic art, the character and image of the Father of his Country. Copies
of Stuart's masterly portrait have multiplied. A monument bearing the
revered name is slowly rising at the Capital, the materials of which are
gathered from every part of the globe. One of the last and most noble
efforts to renew the waning national sentiment, ere its lapse brought on
civil war, was that of a New England scholar, patriot, and orator who,
despite the allurements of prosperity and the claims of age and long
service, traversed the length and breadth of the Republic, eloquently
expatiating on the character of Washington, retracing his spotless and
great career, and evoking his sacred memory as a talisman to quicken and
combine a people's love. With the large contributions thus secured, and
those gathered by the daughters of the Republic, the home and grave of
Washington has been redeemed as national property. Let the first homage of
a free people be paid at that shrine; and alienated fellow-citizens gather
there as at a common altar: his tomb is thus doubly hallowed. In Virginia
is a sculptured memorial of enduring beauty and historical significance. A
new and admirable biography, with all the elements of standard popularity,
makes his peerless career familiar to every citizen from the woods of
Maine to the shores of the Pacific. One effective statue already ornaments
the commercial emporium, and another is about to be erected in the city of
Boston. These, and many other signs of the times, prove that the
fanaticism of party strife has awakened the wise and loyal to a
consciousness of the inestimable value of that great example and canonized
name, as a bond of union, a conciliating memory, and a glorious watchword.
Desecrated as has been his native State by rebels against the government
he founded and the nation he inaugurated, profaned as has been his memory,
now that Peace smiles upon the land his august image will reappear to
every true, loyal, and patriotic heart with renewed authority, and
hallowed by a deeper love. The present, therefore, is a favourable moment
to institute the birthday of Washington--hitherto but partially and
ineffectually honoured--as a solemn National Festival. Around his tomb let
us annually gather; let eloquence and song, leisure and remembrance,
trophies of art, ceremonies of piety, and sentiments of gratitude and
admiration, consecrate that day with an unanimity of feeling and of rites,
which shall fuse and mould into one pervasive emotion the divided hearts
of the country, until the discordant cries of faction are lost in the
anthems of benediction and of love; and, before the august spirit of a
people's homage, sectional animosity is awed into universal reverence.
LAWYERS.
'To vindicate the majesty of the law.'--JUDGE'S CHARGE.
'Why may not this be a lawyer's skull? Why does he suffer this rude
knave to knock him about the sconce with a dirty shovel, and will not
tell him of his action for battery?'--HAMLET.
The miniature effigy of a town-crier, with a little placard on his bell,
inscribed '_Lost--a Lawyer's conscience!_' was a favourite toy for
children not many years ago; and about the same time a song was in vogue,
warbled by a whole generation of young misses, 'all about the L-A-W,' in
which that venerable profession was made the subject of a warning chant,
whose dolorous refrain, doubtless, yet lingers in many an ear. Thus early
is law associated with uncertainty and shamelessness; Messrs. Roe and Doe
become the most dreaded of apocryphal characters; red-tape the clew of an
endless labyrinth; Justice Shallow, with all his imbecility, a dangerous
personage; and human beings, even a friend, transformed by the mysterious
perspective of this anomalous element to a 'party.' The most popular of
modern novelists have found these associations sufficiently universal to
yield good material in 'dead suitors broken, heart and soul, on the wheel
of chancery;' and Flite, Gridley, and Rick, are fresh and permanent
scarecrows in the harvest-field of the law.
From the Mosaic code, enrolled on tables of stone, to the convention which
inaugurated that of the modern conqueror of Europe, law has been a field
for the noblest triumphs and most gross perversions of the human
intellect. No profession offers such extremes of glory and shame. From the
most wretched sophistry to the grandest inference, from a quibble to a
principle, from the august minister of justice to the low pettifogger, how
great the distance; yet all are included within a common pale.
In every social circle and family group there is an oracle--some
individual whose age, wit, or force of character, gives an intellectual
ascendency,--and there are always Bunsbys, to 'give an opinion' among the
ignorant, to which the others spontaneously defer; and thus instinctively
arises the lawgiver, sometimes ruling with the rude dogmatism of Dr.
Johnson, and at others, through the humorous good sense of Sydney Smith,
or the endearing tact of Madame Recamier. These authorities, in the sphere
of opinion and companionship, indicate how natural to human society is a
recognized head, whence emanates that controlling influence to which we
give the name of law. Like every other element of life, this loses
somewhat of its native beauty, when organized and made professional. To
every vocation there belong master-spirits who have established
precedents, and there are natural lawgivers; as in art, Michael Angelo and
Raphael; in oratory, Demosthenes; in philosophy, Bacon. The endowments of
each not only justify, but originate their authority; they interpret truth
through their superior insight and wisdom in their respective departments
of action and of thought; but of the vast number who undertake to
illustrate, maintain, or apply the laws which govern states, a small
minority are gifted for the task, or aspire to its higher functions; hence
the proverbial abuse of the profession, its few glorious ornaments, and
its herd of perverted slaves.