way I had been expecting to happen for some time. It almost amounted to
my making the acquaintance of a pre-civilization man of a very high
type. I have mentioned how the _Bhagavat Gita_ falling into my hands at
a certain date, gave the clue to and precipitated the crystallization of
_Towards Democracy_. From that time of course I was intensely interested
in the wise men of the East, and that germinal thought which in various
ages of the world has become the nucleus and impulse of new movements.
During the years ’80 to ’90 there was a great deal of Theosophy and
Oriental philosophy of various sorts current in England, and much talk
and speculation, sometimes very ill-founded, about ‘adepts,’ ‘mahatmas,’
and ‘gurus.’ I too felt a great desire to see for myself one of these
representatives of the ancient wisdom. But it did not seem very clear
how the thing would come about. However at last there came a very
pressing letter from my friend Arunáchalam in Ceylon (the very friend
who had given me the _Bhagavat Gita_ at an earlier date), asking me to
come out and meet a certain Gñani to whose discourses and teaching he
was himself already deeply indebted, and who was willing to give some
time to me if I should come. So the way was made plain, and I
immediately made arrangements to go.
I have given a careful account of this Gñani, his personality and
teaching, in my book _Adam’s Peak to Elephanta_—and I need not repeat
the material here. As I say, he was in some respects a high type of
pre-civilization man. For, like most men of this class in India, he
identified himself so closely with the ancient religious tradition that
one could almost feel him to be one of the old Vedic race of two
thousand or three thousand years back. His modes of thought, appearance,
personality, all suggested this. And here in this man it was of
absorbing interest to feel one came in contact with the root-thought of
all existence—the intense _consciousness_ (not conviction merely) of the
oneness of all life—the germinal idea which in one form or another has
spread from nation to nation, and become the soul and impulse of
religion after religion. However one might differ from him in points of
detail, in matters of modern science or of politics, one felt that he,
and his predecessors three thousand years ago, had seized the central
stronghold, and were possessors of an outlook and of intuitions which
the modern might truly envy. After seeing Whitman, the amazing
representative of the same spirit in all its voluminous modern
unfoldment—seven years before—this visit to the Eastern sage was like
going back to the pure lucid intensely transparent source of some mighty
and turbulent stream. It was a returning from West to East, and a
completing of the circle of the Earth.
It is curious that _his_ teacher (Tilleinathan Swamy) seems to have told
this Gñani many years before that an Englishman or Englishmen would come
to him. Probably he foresaw, from the growth of the English mind, that
the time was not very far distant when the English would rise to an
understanding of the great Indian tradition and would come over to study
it.
Looking back now [1901] after ten years, on my personal experiences of
the Eastern teachings, I seem to realize more and more that the true
line is that (first adequately pointed out by Whitman) which consists in
combining and harmonizing _both_ body and soul, the outer and the inner.
They are the eternal and needful complements of each other. The Eastern
teaching has or has had a tendency to err on one side, the Western on
the other. The Indian methods and attitude cause an ingathering and
quiescence of the mind, accompanied often by great illumination; but if
carried to excess they result in over-quiescence, and even torpor. The
Western habits tend towards an over-activity and external distraction of
the mind, which may result in disintegration. The true line (as in other
cases) is not in mediocrity, but in a bold and sane acceptance of both
sides, so as to make them offset and balance each other, and indeed so
that each shall make the extension of the other more and more possible.
Growth is the method and the solution. The soul goes out and returns,
goes out and returns; and this is its daily, almost hourly, action—just
as it is an epitome of the æonian life-history of every individual.
This visit to the East in some sense completed the circle of my
experiences. It took two or three years for its results to soak and
settle into my mind; but by that time I felt that my general attitude
towards the world was not likely to change much, and that it only
remained to secure and define what I had got hold of, and to get it
decently built out if possible into actual life and utterance.
With regard to this process of “building out” into the actual world I
should feel very ungrateful if I did not acknowledge my indebtedness to
the Nature-conditions around me. For any sustained and more or less
original work it seems almost necessary that one should have the
quietude and strength of Nature at hand, like a great reservoir from
which to draw. The open air, and the physical and mental health that
goes with it, the sense of space and freedom in the Sky, the vitality
and amplitude of the Earth—these are real things from which one can only
cut oneself off at serious peril and risk to one’s immortal soul. And
there is somewhat of the same potency and vitality in the very life of
the mass-peoples who are in touch with these foundation-facts and
outdoor occupations. It was a true instinct or a gracious Fate—and I
realized this more and more—which had compelled me to locate myself in
the midst of such surroundings.
I should feel ungrateful too if I did not express my indebtedness to the
lovely little stream which like a live thing ran night and day, winter
and summer, full of grace and music at the foot of my garden. It entered
into my life and became part of it.[16] The hut, which I had built at
Bradway to write the earlier part of _Towards Democracy_ in, I
transported with me to Millthorpe, and planked it down on the edge of
the brook, facing the sun and the south; and thenceforth it served a
double purpose—that of a study in which, a hundred yards away from the
house, I could write in comparative safety from interruption; and that
of a bathing shelter with its feet almost in the water. Here through
uncounted hours I continued the production of _Towards Democracy_ and my
other books, avoiding always the act of writing within the house except
when absolutely forced to retire by stress of weather or other causes,
and rejoicing always to get the sentiment of the open free world into my
pages; and here I came, either alone or with friends, to rest from
labour in the garden, or to bathe and be refreshed after the heat of the
day.
[Illustration:
THE HUT AND THE BROOK.
]
IX
MILLTHORPE AND HOUSEHOLD LIFE
It must be admitted, however, that the acclimatization to the new and
somewhat limited and strenuous life at Millthorpe did not take place all
at once; and perhaps the fact of my having burnt my boats, as it were,
and committed myself as I had done, was after all a good thing. For some
little time I felt restive and unsettled at the enchainment—partly, as I
have said, because the Thoreau ideal, opening out _underneath_, took the
bottom out of the commercial and rather materialistic life in the way of
Trade in which I was embarking; and partly because anyhow the latter
sort of life—though valuable as an experience—was not by its nature
likely to hold my interest for long. The rustics too and farmfolk around
me were on my first arrival a little strange, and inclined, as often
happens in such cases, to hold off and be suspicious of a newcomer; my
reputation as a Socialist alarmed them; there was none of the cordiality
of little Bradway; the climate was damp and the winters were long; and I
had occasional relapses of feeling about it all.
Yet if I _had_ cut the painter and floated my little boat away onto the
great deep I doubt whether the result would have been favorable. After
all, all life means a denial of _part_ of oneself. It is obviously
impossible to find a situation or conditions which will satisfy _all the
demands_ of one’s nature—millionfold complex as they are. Some must be
sacrificed. To moan over that necessity or to pose as a martyr is
absurd. All one can reasonably do is to find a situation which will
satisfy the _root_-demands, and the _rooting_ demands—those that have
the power of growth in them. Then the seed, though it seem to die in its
prison-house, will assuredly find its outlet and quicken into a new
life.
I could not complain in this case that the root-needs of my temperament
were unsatisfied. Quite the contrary. I was plunged in the very heart of
Nature—that Nature which for many years I had felt the need of—in a
singularly beautiful Derbyshire valley with plentiful woods, streams and
moors; I had already become familiar with the mass-folk of Sheffield,
and found friends among the workers in many trades; and was beginning to
know the rustics of my own neighborhood. I was leading an outdoor life,
and my health was every day becoming firmer and more consolidated. I had
escaped from the domination of Civilization in its two most fatal and
much-detested forms, respectability and cheap intellectualism. In my
happy valley there was no resident squire of any kind, nor even a single
“villa,” while the church, more than a mile distant, was quite amiably
remote! We were just a little population of manual workers, sincerely
engrossed in our several occupations. And finally, and perhaps more than
all, I had found a firm basis and secure vantage-ground for my literary
and productive work.
People have often asked me if I did not miss the life I had left behind.
I cannot truly say that I ever did. At Brighton and at Cambridge and
partly in London I had had my fill of balls and dinner-parties and the
usual entertainments, and when at the close of those two dispensations
(somewhere in the early ’eighties) _I gave my dress clothes away_, I did
so without any misgiving and without any fear that I should need them
again. The fact is that though it is perfectly true that by steadily and
persistently going to evening parties and social functions one may come
into touch with interesting or remarkable people of sorts, yet the game
is hardly worth the candle. Through leagues of boredom, platitudes and
general futility one occasionally has the satisfaction of exchanging a
wink of recognition, so to speak, with some really congenial and
original woman or man; but at all such functions the severe flow of
amiable nonsense soon cuts any real conversation short, and if one wants
to continue the latter the only way is to arrange a meeting quite
outside and apart—which after all one might have done in other and
simpler ways. As to the matter of dress, the adoption of a pleasant yet
not strictly conventional evening garb of one’s own has the useful
effect of automatically closing doors which are not “worth while” and
opening those that _are_—so in that way it is much to be recommended!
On the whole, though just the first few years at Millthorpe were
somewhat isolated I believe my independent life there has really enabled
me to see more of the great world than I should otherwise have done.
Visitors from a distance have often many and intimate things to tell
one, and questions can be discussed in a more leisurely way than in a
great centre where every one stands watch in hand, counting the minutes.
And on the other hand, by going myself to London for a fortnight or so
three or four times a year, I found I could get into touch with all
sorts of cliques and circles—such as I perhaps should not have cared to
be involved in if I had been permanently living there! The country
became a splendid basis for literary work, with the opportunity it
afforded (so priceless to me) of writing in the open air and in close
contact with the ordinary realities of life; it supplied a good basis
for my lecturing and other excursions into the Northern Towns; and with
its market-gardening and sandal trades kept my hands busy when my head
required a rest.
Of the many years mainly spent here at Millthorpe, the first
fifteen—from 1883 to 1898—were somewhat handicapped for me by the
presence of a small working-family in the house; first, for ten years,
the Fearnehoughs of whom I have already spoken; and afterwards, for five
years, the Adams’. No other arrangement was at that time possible. Both
families were charming and interesting in their different ways; but
necessarily they hampered my freedom a good deal. With children in the
house (in both cases) the domestic arrangements had largely to be suited
to their necessities and convenience, and my interests had to come very
decidedly second. This did not so much matter at the beginning of the
time, but later with the expansion of my own sphere of operations a
different household arrangement became imperative.
Fearnehough, as I have said, was of a “powerful uneducated” type—a good
specimen of the British worker—a bit slow in brain, but exceedingly
thorough and downright in all his dealings. His wife possessed the
infinite patience and kindliness of the household guardian—going always
about her work with untiring forethought and industry—even when, as
often happened, she was silently suffering from bad headaches. There was
a certain native grace about her, and dignity about him, which well
became them. The two children, boy and girl of about nine and ten when
they first arrived, were sensible and natural too. To have this family
living with me—though it may have been hampering in some ways—was for
some years very helpful. Whether at meals, or working in the fields, or
sitting round the fire of an evening, to be in close touch with so sane
and simple an outlook on life, and one so entirely different from that
to which I had generally been accustomed, was in itself an education.
The very downrightness of daily existence among those who live close
upon absolute necessity is a thing hardly realized even by the most
well-meaning of the well-to-do, unless they positively share that
existence. Of course it cuts away a vast deal of sentimentalism,
æstheticism, and all that. But on the whole it is rather healthy.
I remember one day—in later years when Annie, the daughter, had gone
away to work in Sheffield—speaking to her mother about the girl (whose
absence I knew she felt) and saying rather sentimentally, “I expect you
miss Annie a good deal nowadays.” The answer was characteristic, and in
its way quite lovely: “_Yes, I do miss her—especially on washing days!_”
It was not that Mrs. Fearnehough cared one whit less for her daughter
than many a very cultured mother might, but simply that her answer
allowed the bed-rock of human nature to be seen. At any rate it took the
wind out of my sentimentality! Not long ago I was asking a neighboring
farmer—whose son had just got married and migrated on to a little farm
of his own—how the son “liked his new place.” “Like it?” said the old
man with a dryish sort of laugh—“well, I guess he’ll like it if he can
any way make a living out of it—and if he can’t he won’t; he’ll be
better able to say in a year or two.” It is from answers like these that
one perceives how close on the rocks the lives of the mass peoples are
thrust—too close indeed to allow much scope for expression of their real
life or liking.
Fearnehough and I stumbled away at our market-gardening for a good many
years. Being both to begin with quite ignorant of the trade we made our
full complement of mistakes and purchased our experience sometimes
dearly. Yet by degrees we got the land into good order. We dug it over,
made drains to carry off the water, planted a hundred or two of fruit
and forest trees, built bits of walls and fences, kept a horse, and
fowls, and grew our crops, and took our produce into market—a strenuous
time, but greatly interesting in its way. My commercial instinct was
weak, but Albert’s was perhaps even weaker! With his real love of good
work he would spend as much time preparing an onion-bed as could only be
paid for by ten times the value of the crop; and at one period he
insisted on rooting every bit of rock and stone out of the subsoil so
persistently that I began to think the garden would be turned into a
quarry! It was characteristic of him when I remonstrated, to say: “I
can’t help it—if I didn’t do my work thorough when I’m at it, I should
only keep awake at night thinking about it.” I have already given some
of the general results and conclusions of our labours of that time. When
the period of our experiment came to an end, Fearnehough returned again
to his scythe-making trade in Sheffield, which he still carries on, hale
and hearty, down to this day [1915].
I cannot pass this period by without dwelling for a moment on another
friend at that time a member of the household. I mean my dog
Bruno[17]—so called not from his colour, for he was a very handsome
black spaniel, but from some fanciful association with Giordano Bruno
the Italian. That dog—like so many black animals, black horses, black
cats, black poodles, black-plumaged birds, rooks, jackdaws, starlings,
and so forth—had something _demonic_ about him. The tenderness and
gentleness of his spirit, combined with a penetrative vision which
searched one’s very soul, was almost superhuman. I came first to know
him when he was merely a puppy at a friend’s house. We almost fell in
love with each other then and there, and I was not altogether surprised
when a few weeks afterwards he arrived at my door, sent on as a present
from the said friends. He never doubted for a moment that he had come to
his true home, and he settled down at once, a most loving member of the
household. The Fearnehoughs took to him right cordially, and Albert
himself a year or so later had the great satisfaction of saving him from
a horrible death.
I had been out somewhere on foot with Bruno and arriving back within a
couple of hundred yards of my gate I perceived the local pack of
foxhounds (the pests of this as of all countrysides!) scattered about
the road between me and home—the huntsmen having gone into the
public-house for a moment to have a drink. But that moment was more than
sufficient—for hounds are dangerous things unless under severe control.
Something occurred—I know not what. A hound gave cry; the others joined
in; and in an instant, to my horror and despair, the whole pack was
yelling in pursuit, and Bruno flying for his life—in the only direction
he _could_ at the moment fly, away from home! The dog was swift and
active, but what chance had he? I gave him up for lost. With
extraordinary agility however and much presence of mind he doubled and,
clearing ever so many garden walls and gates, dashed through the little
hamlet back again, finally racing across one of my fields with the whole
pack close behind and of course gaining on him. Most luckily Albert was
in our yard at the moment, and hearing the hullabaloo rushed out with a
pitchfork in his hand, just in time to check the ravening horde while
Bruno rushed past him to safety. A moment more and the dog would have
been torn to fragments.
Bruno showed in high degree that curious quality resembling _conscience_
in man, by which dogs, having contracted and adopted a new standard of
life from their masters, betray an emotional conflict going on within
them. Sometimes—as is often the case where fowls are kept—we would have
a nest of newly-hatched chicks being kept warm and dry in a basket on
the hearth. On such occasions Bruno was torn by conflicting passions.
The very sight and smell of the chicks roused the old primitive hunting
instinct, and he would creep nearer and nearer to the basket in a very
ecstasy of excitement—his limbs trembling and his nose quivering as he
sniffed the prey. Yet he knew perfectly well that he must not touch; and
his fidelity was so absolute that I firmly believe he harboured no
intention of doing so. But who can tell? We felt that possibly a sudden
frenzy of the animal nature might overtake him; and we could not do
otherwise than keep on the watch. As a matter of fact he never did do
anything rash; but the tension on him, poor dog, was so great that
sometimes for two or three days he would hardly touch his food, and he
positively grew quite thin under the strain. It was really a relief for
all of us when the hatching days were over.
There is something strangely touching in the fact that dogs not only
thus develop a conscience and a morality foreign to their canine nature,
but that also from their intense devotion to their so-called ‘masters’
they are severed and alienated to some degree from the natural loves of
their race—at any rate on the affectional side. I think Bruno nourished
in his heart a strange susceptibility to beauty. His amours with other
dogs were only of the ordinary kind; but he cherished for a certain
white kitten a positive adoration. The kitten was certainly
beautiful—snow-white and graceful to a degree—and to Bruno obviously a
goddess; but alas! like other goddesses only too fickle and even cruel.
When Bruno arrived on the scene, the kitten would skip on to the
vantage-ground of a chair-seat; and from thence torment the pathetic and
pleading nose of the dog with naughty scratches. Again and again would
Bruno—wounded in his heart as well as in his head—return to his
ineffectual suit, only to have his advances rejected as before. At last
he had to abandon this quest, but it was curious that a year or two
later he fell in love with _another_ white kitten in much the same way
and with much the same result.
“Everything however comes to him who waits”; and the most curious and
pathetic part of this story is its ending. For, a good many years
afterwards when Bruno had become quite an old dog and had lost much of
his activity, a _cat_ came and fell in love with him! This cat used to
come from a neighboring farm and spend much of its time with the dog,
and frequently at night would stay with him in the little outhouse which
he used as a kennel, sleeping between the dog’s paws. Ultimately the cat
was there when Bruno died.
Fearnehough’s place, when he returned to Sheffield, was taken by George
Adams, who (also with wife and two children) came to share the
Millthorpe Cottage with me. Adams was in most ways the very reverse of
Albert Fearnehough. Town bred, rather slight and thin, with a forward
stoop and a shock of black hair, he was of an impetuous humorous and
rather artistic temperament—not too exact or precise about details, but
one who could cover a good deal of ground in a day. Born in the poorest
slums of Sheffield he told me more than once how, after his mother died,
he was left alone a mere urchin in a tiny lodging with his father. His
father was a cobbler by trade rather given to drink, and in the habit of
going out early of a morning to work as a wage-slave in some shop, and
returning late. When he went out he left a _halfpenny_ on the table for
the boy to find his food with during the day! Not a very good start in
life. The boy roamed about, half-starved, cadging or ‘snaking’ what he
could—but developed, perhaps in consequence, a singular resourcefulness.
When about thirteen his father died, and he was left absolutely alone in
the world. The neighbours may have been kind in their way, but he was
alone and without refuge to flee to. Then something pathetic happened.
An orphanage for little _girls_ had lately been opened in the
neighborhood, and the boy knew one or two of these girls. One evening,
at closing time, the matron discovered among her little flock this
large-eyed, thin-legged almost rickety ragamuffin sitting! Asked what he
was doing there he replied that he wanted to be taken in. “But the
orphanage is for girls only,” said the matron, “and you are not a girl.”
It was no use, he would not go; tears ran down his face; he told his
plight; and they were fain to find him a bed in an attic for the night.
Needless to say he remained a second and a third night. The pale mobile
face made friends; and the end of it was that a boys’ _side_ was created
in the orphanage and added to that of the girls!