Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 5, March, 1858 by Various
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Various >> Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 5, March, 1858
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IX.--CLAUDE TO EUSTACE.
It is most curious to see what a power a few calm words (in
Merely a brief proclamation) appear to possess on the people.
Order is perfect, and peace; the city is utterly tranquil;
And one cannot conceive that this easy and _nonchalant_ crowd, that
Flows like a quiet stream through street and market-place, entering
Shady recesses and bays of church, _osteria_ and _caffe_,
Could in a moment be changed to a flood as of molten lava,
Boil into deadly wrath and wild homicidal delusion.
Ah, 'tis an excellent race,--and even in old degradation,
Under a rule that enforces to flattery, lying, and cheating,
E'en under Pope and Priest, a nice and natural people.
Oh, could they but be allowed this chance of redemption!--but clearly
That is not likely to be. Meantime, notwithstanding all journals,
Honor for once to the tongue and the pen of the eloquent writer!
Honor to speech! and all honor to thee, thou noble Mazzini!
X.--CLAUDE TO EUSTACE.
I am in love, meantime, you think; no doubt, you would think so.
I am in love, you say; with those letters, of course, you would say so.
I am in love, you declare. I think not so; yet I grant you
It is a pleasure, indeed, to converse with this girl. Oh, rare gift,
Rare felicity, this! she can talk in a rational way, can
Speak upon subjects that really are matters of mind and of thinking,
Yet in perfection retain her simplicity; never, one moment,
Never, however you urge it, however you tempt her, consents to
Step from ideas and fancies and loving sensations to those vain
Conscious understandings that vex the minds of man-kind.
No, though she talk, it is music; her fingers desert not the keys; 'tis
Song, though you hear in her song the articulate vocables sounded,
Syllabled singly and sweetly the words of melodious meaning.
XI.--CLAUDE TO EUSTACE.
Ah, let me look, let me watch, let me wait, unbiased, unprompted!
Bid me not venture on aught that could alter or end what is present!
Say not, Time flies, and occasion, that never returns, is departing!
Drive me not out, ye ill angels with fiery swords, from my Eden,
Waiting, and watching, and looking! Let love be its own inspiration!
Shall not a voice, if a voice there must be, from the airs that environ,
Yea, from the conscious heavens, without our knowledge or effort,
Break into audible words? Let love be its own inspiration!
XII.--CLAUDE TO EUSTACE.
Wherefore and how I am certain, I hardly can tell; but it is so.
She doesn't like me, Eustace; I think she never will like me.
Is it my fault, as it is my misfortune, my ways are not her ways?
Is it my fault, that my habits and modes are dissimilar wholly?
'Tis not her fault, 'tis her nature, her virtue, to misapprehend them:
'Tis not her fault, 'tis her beautiful nature, not even to know me.
Hopeless it seems,--yet I cannot, hopeless, determine to leave it:
She goes,--therefore I go; she moves,--I move, not to lose her.
XIII.--CLAUDE TO EUSTACE.
Oh, 'tisn't manly, of course, 'tisn't manly, this method of wooing;
'Tisn't the way very likely to win. For the woman, they tell you,
Ever prefers the audacious, the wilful, the vehement hero;
She has no heart for the timid, the sensitive soul; and for knowledge,--
Knowledge, O ye gods!--when did they appreciate knowledge?
Wherefore should they, either? I am sure I do not desire it.
Ah, and I feel too, Eustace, she cares not a tittle about me!
(Care about me, indeed! and do I really expect it?)
But my manner offends; my ways are wholly repugnant;
Every word that I utter estranges, hurts, and repels her;
Every moment of bliss that I gain, in her exquisite presence,
Slowly, surely, withdraws her, removes her, and severs her from me.
Not that I care very much!--any way, I escape from the boy's own
Folly, to which I am prone, of loving where it is easy.
Yet, after all, my Eustace, I know but little about it.
All I can say for myself, for present alike and for past, is,
Mary Trevellyn, Eustace, is certainly worth your acquaintance.
You couldn't come, I suppose, as far as Florence, to see her?
XIV.--GEORGINA TREVELLYN TO LOUISA ------.
* * * To-morrow we're starting for Florence,
Truly rejoiced, you may guess, to escape from republican terrors;
Sir. C. and Papa to escort us; we by _vettura_
Through Siena, and Georgy to follow and join us by Leghorn.
Then----Ah, what shall I say, my dearest? I tremble in thinking!
You will imagine my feelings,--the blending of hope and of sorrow!
How can I bear to abandon Papa and Mamma and my sisters?
Dearest Louisa, indeed it is very alarming; but trust me
Ever, whatever may change, to remain your loving Georgina.
P.S. BY MARY TREVELLYN.
* * * "Do I like Mr. Claude any better?"
I am to tell you,--and, "Pray, is it Susan or I that attract him?"
This he never has told, but Georgina could certainly ask him.
All I can say for myself is, alas! that he rather repels me.
There! I think him agreeable, but also a little repulsive.
So be content, dear Louisa; for one satisfactory marriage
Surely will do in one year for the family you would establish,
Neither Susan nor I shall afford you the joy of a second.
P.S. BY GEORGINA TREVELLYN.
Mr. Claude, you must know, is behaving a little bit better;
He and Papa are great friends; but he really is too _shilly-shally_,--
So unlike George! Yet I hope that the matter is going on fairly.
I shall, however, get George, before he goes, to say something.
Dearest Louisa, how delightful, to bring young people together!
* * * * *
Is it to Florence we follow, or are we to tarry yet longer,
E'en amid clamor of arms, here in the city of old,
Seeking from clamor of arms in the Past and the Arts to be hidden,
Vainly 'mid Arts and the Past seeking our life to forget?
Ah, fair shadow, scarce seen, go forth! for anon he shall follow,--
He that beheld thee, anon, whither thou leadest, must go!
Go, and the wise, loving Muse, she also will follow and find thee!
She, should she linger in Rome, were not dissevered from thee!
[To be continued.]
A WELSH MUSICAL FESTIVAL.
I had been knocking about London, as the phrase goes, for more months
than I choose to mention, when, my purse presenting unmistakable
symptoms of a coming state of collapse, I began seriously to look about
me for the means of replenishing it. Luckily, I had not to wait long for
an opportunity. One morning, as I sat in the box of a coffee-room in
Holborn, running my eye over the advertisement columns of the "Times,"
I met with one which promised novelty, at least; I had had too much
experience in such matters to anticipate from it any very great
_pecuniary_ compensation. The said advertisement was to the effect,
that a gentleman who combined literary tastes with business habits was
required to edit a paper published in a town in South Wales; and it went
on to state, that application, personally or by letter, might be made to
the proprietor of the said journal at M----.
That I possessed some taste for literature I was well enough assured;
but as for my "business habits," perhaps the least said about them, the
better. This condition of candidateship, however, I quietly shirked,
while counting over my few remaining coins, scarcely more than
sufficient, after paying my landlady, to defray my expenses to M----,
some one hundred and sixty miles distant. Determining, then, to assume a
commercial virtue, though I had it not, I quitted the metropolis, and in
due time reached the land of leeks, with a light heart, and seven and
sixpence sterling in my pocket.
A queer little Welsh town was M----, with an androgynous population,--or
so it seemed to me, who had never before beheld women wearing men's hats
and coats, and men with head-coverings and other articles of apparel
of a very ambiguous description. It chanced to be market-day when I
arrived, so that I had a capital opportunity of observing the population
for whose edification my "literary tastes" were, I hoped, to be called
into requisition. But at the very outset a tremendous difficulty stared
me in the face. Nine out of every ten of the people I met or passed
spoke in a language that to me was as unintelligibly mysterious as the
cuneiform characters on Mr. Layard's Nineveh sculptures. It was a hard,
harsh, guttural dialect, which even those who were to the manner born
seemed to jerk out painfully and spasmodically from their lingual
organs. This was especially obvious during a bargain, where an excited
market-man was endeavoring to pass off a tough old gander as a tender
young goose, to some equally excited customer. It was dissonant enough
to _my_ ear, but I fancy it would have driven a sensitive Italian to
distraction. After listening to the horrible jargon for some time, I
could easily believe the story which poor William Maginn used to tell
with such unction, of the origin of the Welsh language. It was to this
effect.--When the Tower of Babel was being built, the workmen all spoke
one tongue. Just at the very instant when the "confusion" occurred, a
mason, trowel in hand, called for a brick. This his assistant was so
long in handing to him, that he incontinently flew into a towering
passion, and discharged from the said trowel a quantity of mortar, which
entered the other's windpipe just as he was stammering out an excuse.
The air, rushing through the poultice-like mixture, caused a spluttering
and gurgling, which, blending with the half-formed words, became that
language ever since known as Welsh.--I think it my duty to advise the
reader never to tell this anecdote to any descendants of Cadwallader,
who are peculiarly sensitive on the subject, and so hot-blooded, that it
is not at all unlikely the injudicious story-teller might be deprived of
any future opportunity of insulting the Ap-Shenkins, the Ap-Joneses, and
the race of very irascible Taffys in general.
I had, however, little time to study either language or character; so,
after a plain dinner at the Merlin's Head, the chief inn of the place, I
set out for the purpose of seeing the newspaper proprietor. Fortified by
a letter of introduction and some testimonials, I entered his shop,--he
was a bookseller and stationer,--and inquired for Mr. F----.
"That's my name," said a red-faced man behind the counter. I handed him
the introductory note, he glanced at it and then at me, thrust it into
his waistcoat pocket, and, as soon as he had served the customer with
whom he was engaged, led the way into a little room adjoining the place
of business.
Mr. F--- owned the newspaper; but, as he never ventured in a literary
way beyond reading proofs of advertisements, he was compelled to employ
an editor to do the leaders, select from the exchanges, prepare the
local news, and get up the reporting. He was, however, a practical
printer, and, in the main, a good fellow. After looking at my
testimonials and asking a few questions, my services were accepted,
and I was duly installed as editor of the "M---- Beacon," a small,
but rather influential county sheet. I ought to observe, that, as it
circulated chiefly in places where English was generally spoken, my
ignorance of Welsh was of but little importance, especially as the
foreman of the printing-office was a Cambrian, who could correct any
errors I might make in Taffy's orthography, which, prodigal as it is of
consonants and penurious of vowels, and, as it regards pronunciation,
embarrassing to the last degree, might drive Elihu Burritt back to his
smithy in an agony of despair.
Thus assisted, I got on tolerably well, though at first I made some
awful mistakes in the names of places mentioned by witnesses in courts
of justice and elsewhere. For instance, at the assizes, a man swore that
he resided at a place which he pronounced Monothosluin, and so I spelt
it in my report. "Cot pless me, Sur!--sure inteed, and you have
not spelt hur right," remarked Mr. Morgan, the foreman; and for my
edification he set it up thus,--_Mynyddysllwyn_. I almost turned my
tongue into a corkscrew, trying to speak the word as he did, and I
fairly gave up in despair. After that, I made it a rule, when I did
not know how to spell some unpronounceable word, to huddle a number of
consonants together in most admired disorder, and I was then usually
nearer correctness than if I had orthographized by ear.
I had been installed in the editorial chair some six months when Mr.
F---- informed me it was necessary I should visit Abergavenny, a town
some twenty-five miles distant, for the purpose of reporting the
proceedings at the CYMREIGGDDYON.
"And what the deuse is that?" I inquired.
I learned that it was a Triennial Musical Festival, so called,--at which
all the musical talent of Wales would be present; in short, that it was
a very grand occasion indeed, would be patronized by the aristocracy
of the Principality, and full reports of each of the three days'
proceedings were absolutely necessary.
Here again the Welsh difficulty started up; but as the Cymreiggddyon
would be quite a novelty, I determined to trust to Chance and
Circumstance,--two allies of mine who have gallantly aided me in many a
tough battle of literary life.
Remembering the words of Goldsmith,--"The young noble who is whirled
through Europe in his chariot sees society at a peculiar elevation, and
draws conclusions widely different from him who makes the grand tour on
foot," I determined to make my way to Abergavenny either by means of my
own legs or through the chance aid of those of a Welsh pony. So,
one bright morning, with stick in hand, knapsack on shoulder, and a
wandering artist for a companion, I started for the iron district,
as that part of Wales is termed. Wildly romantic were the roads we
traversed; and after having threaded many a glen, leaped frequent
torrents, ascended and descended mountains with impossible names, and
plodded wearily across dreary moors, glad enough were we to observe, in
the less thinly scattered cottages, indications of a town.
The clouds had been gathering ominously during the latter half of our
long day of travel,--and as the sun set blood-red behind a heavy bank of
vapor, it cast lurid reflections on large bodies of dense mist, which
sailed heavily athwart the crests of the mountains, with low, ragged,
trailing edges, that were too surely the precursors of a storm. Just
before the orb finally disappeared, its slant rays streamed through some
dark purple bars on the horizon's verge, and for an instant tinged the
opposite distant mountains with strange supernatural hues. The Blorenge
and the Sugar Loaf glowed like huge carbuncles, while the pale green
light which bathed their bases gleamed faintly like a setting of
aqua-marina. My artist companion incontinently fell into professional
raptures, and raved of "effect," and "Turner," and "Ruskin," heedless of
my advice that he had better hasten onward, lest night should overtake
us in that wild region, where sheep-tracks, scarcely visible even by
daylight, were our sole guides. At length, however, I managed to
start him, and on we stalked, the decreasing twilight and the distant
reverberations of thunder among the mountains hastening our steps, until
they became almost a trot.
But soon the trot declined once more into a walk, and a slow one
too,--for we entered a gloomy pass or gorge, whose rocky walls on either
side effectually excluded what little light yet lingered in the sky.
Cautiously picking our way, we slowly travelled on, until at length
we became sensible of a faint red flush in the narrow strip of sky
overhead. It seemed as though the sun had just wheeled back to give a
forgotten message to some starry-night-watcher,--or so my companion
intimated. But, unfortunately for his theory, the dull red glare
above us, which every moment deepened in intensity, was evidently
the reflection of earthly, not heavenly fire. I had seen too many
conflagrations to doubt that for an instant. Presently a dull, confused
sound fell on our ears, and at a sudden turn round an angle of our
mountain road we stood speechless as we gazed on a spectacle which
Milton might have conceived and Martin painted.
"Far other light than that of day there shone
Upon the wanderers entering Padalon,"
murmured the artist, as he gazed on the strange scene. And strange
indeed was it to our startled eyes. We stood on the end and summit of a
mountain spur, some two thousand feet above the valley, or rather basin,
below, from the centre of which burst forth a thousand fires, whose
dull roar--dulled by distance--was like "the noise of the sea on an
iron-bound shore." The extent of space covered by those strange, fierce
fires must have amounted to many acres,--in fact, did so, as we
afterwards ascertained,--and the effect produced by them may be
partially imagined when it is remembered that these flames were of all
hues, from rich ruby-red, to the pale lurid light of burning sulphur.
Fancy all the gems of Aladdin's Palace or Sinbad's Valley in fierce
flashing combustion, immensely magnified, and you may form some faint
idea of the scene in that Welsh valley.
Stretching out, like spokes of a gigantic wheel, from their fiery
centre, were huge embankments, like those of Titanic railways, whose
summits and sides, especially towards their extremities, glowed in
patches with all the hues of the rainbow. As I gazed wonderingly on one
of these,--a real mountain of light, far surpassing the Koh-i-Noor,--I
observed a dark figure gliding along its summit, pushing something
before it, like a black imp conveying an unfortunate soul from one part
of Tophet to another. At the extremity of the ridge the imp stopped, and
suddenly there shot down the steep, not a tortured ghost, but a shower
of radiant gems even more brilliant than those to which I have already
referred.
"What, in the name of all that's wonderful, is _that_?" said my friend,
Mr. Vandyke Brown; and I was also trying to account for the phenomena,
when a voice close to my ear--a voice which I was certain belonged
neither to Mr. B. nor myself--uttered the mysterious word,--
"Sl-aa-g!"
I looked round, and, sure enough, there stood a being who might very
easily be mistaken for a new arrival from the bottomless pit. Such,
however, it was evident he was not. Though he was black enough, in all
conscience, he had neither horns, hoof, nor tail, and he was redolent
rather of 'bacco than brimstone; a queer old hat, in the band of which
was stuck an unlighted candle, covered a mass of matted red hair; his
eyes were glaring and rimmed with red; and there was a gash in his face
where his mouth should have been. A loose flannel shirt, which had once
been red, a pair of indescribable trowsers, and thick-soled shoes,
completed his dress,--an attire which I at once recognized as that
common among the coal-miners of the district.
"'Deed and truth, Sur, they is cinder-heaps and slag from the
iron-works, Sur; and yon is Merthyr-Tydvil, sure."
Piloted by our dusky guide,--not exactly, though, like Campbell's
"_Morning_ brought by Night,"--we soon reached the town,--which is named
after a young lady of legendary times named Tydfil, a Christian martyr,
of which Merthyr-Tydvil is a corruption,--and made the best of our
way to the Bush Inn, where we treated our sable friend to some _cwrw
dach,--Anglice_, strong ale; and after a hearty supper of Welsh rabbit,
which Tom Ingoldsby calls a "bunny without any bones," and "custard with
mustard,"--which, as made in the Principality, it much resembles,--I
took a stroll through the town. It was a dull-looking place enough, and
as dirty as dull; every house was built with dingy gray stones, without
any reference whatever to cleanliness or ventilation; and as to the
civilization of the inhabitants, I saw enough to convince me, that, to
see real barbarism, an Englishman need only visit that part of Great
Britain called Wales. It was eight in the evening, and the day-laborers
at the furnaces had just left work. The doors of all the cottages were
open, and, as I passed them, in almost every one was to be seen a
perfectly naked stalwart man rubbing himself down with a dirty rough
towel, while his wife and grown-up daughters or sisters, almost as nude
and filthy as himself, stood listlessly by, or prepared his supper.
Glad to escape from such disgusting objects, I hurried back to the Bush
and to bed. But not to rest, though; for during that long, miserable
night, the eternal rattle of machinery, clattering of hammers, whirling
of huge wheels, and roaring of blast-furnaces completely murdered sleep.
Never, for one instant, did these sounds cease,--nor do they, it is
said, the long year through; for if any accident happens at one of the
five great iron-works, there are four others which rest not day nor
night. Little, however, is this heeded by the people of Merthyr; _they_
are lulled to repose by the clatter of iron bars and the thumping of
trip-hammers, but are instantaneously awakened by the briefest intervals
of silence.
Glad enough was I, the next morning early, to cross an ink-black stream
and leave the town, and pleasant was it to breathe the free, fresh
mountain air, after inhaling the foul smoke of the iron-works. Towards
the close of the afternoon, after a delightful walk, a great portion
of it on the banks of the picturesque river Usk, we came in sight of
Abergavenny, where the Cymreiggddyon was to be held.
The first of the glorious three days was duly ushered in with the firing
of cannon, ringing of bells, and all kinds of extravagant jubilation.
It wasn't quite as noisy as a Fourth of July, but much more discordant.
Strings of flags were suspended across the streets,--flags with harps
of all sorts and sizes displayed thereon,--flags with Welsh mottoes,
English mottoes, Scotch mottoes, and no mottoes at all. In front of the
Town Hall was almost an acre of transparent painting,--meant, that is,
to be so after dark, but mournfully opaque and pictorially mysterious in
the full glare of sunshine. As far as I could make it out, it was the
full-length portrait--taken from life, no doubt--of an Ancient Welsh
Bard. He was depicted as a baldheaded, elderly gentleman, with upturned
eyes, apparently regarding with reverence a hole in an Indian-ink cloud
through which slanted a gamboge sunbeam, and having a white beard,
which streamed like a (horse-hair) "meteor on the troubled air." This
venerable minstrel was seated on a cairn of rude stones, his white robe
clasped at his throat and round his waist by golden brooches, and with a
harp, shaped like that of David in old Bible illustrations, resting on
the sward before him. In the background were some Druidical remains, by
way of audience; and the whole was surrounded by a botanical border,
consisting of leeks, oak-leaves, laurel, and mistletoe, which had a very
rare and agreeable effect. Nor were these hieroglyphical decorations
without a deep meaning to a Cambrian; for while the oak-leaf typified
the durability of Welsh minstrelsy, the mistletoe its mysterious origin,
and the laurel its reward, the national leek was pleasantly suggestive
of its usual culinary companions, Welsh mutton and toasted cheese.
As in America, so in Wales, almost every public matter is provocative of
a procession, and the proceedings of the Festival commenced with one. No
doubt, it was to the eyes of the many, who from scores of miles round
had travelled to witness it, a very imposing and serious demonstration;
but anything more ridiculously amusing it was never my good fortune to
see. I had, however, to keep all my fun to myself, for Welshmen are not
to be trifled with. Any one who wishes to be convinced of this need only
walk into a Welsh village, singing the old child-doggerel of
"Taffy was a Welshman, Taffy was a thief,
Taffy came to my house and stole a piece
of beef," etc.,
and, my life on it, he will not leave it without striking proofs of
Welsh sensitiveness, and voluble illustrations of some Jenny Jones's
displeasure. By no means inclined to subject myself to such inconvenient
experiences, I prudently kept my eyes wide open and my mouth shut,--or
if I spoke, I merely asked questions, by which means I acquired
necessary information and passed off for a gratified stranger and an
admiring spectator.
All the resources of the town and its neighborhood, and indeed of the
county itself, had been exhausted to give due effect to the parade,
of which I regret to say that I cannot hope to give any adequate
description. All the usual elements of processions were to be seen.
Bands of music,--there were at least a dozen of them, all playing
different pieces at one and the same moment, which had a somewhat
distracting effect on those sensitively-eared people who weakly prefer
one air at a time and do not appreciate tuneful tornadoes. As the
procession went by at a brisk pace, it was curious enough to notice how
the last wailing notes of "A noble race was Shenkin," played by a band
in advance, blended with the brisk music of "My name's David Price, and
I'm come from Llangollen," performed by a company in the rear. In fact,
it was a genuine Welsh musical medley, and the daring genius who would
have occupied himself in "untwisting all the links which tied its hidden
soul of harmony," would have had about as difficult and distressing a
task as he who tried to make ropes out of sea-sand.
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