Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 52, February, 1862 by Various

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She ceased coming at last. One of the sisters went out to see her, and
told him she was too weak to walk, but meant to be better soon,--quite
well by the holidays. He wished the poor thing had told him what she
wanted of him,--wished it anxiously, with a dull presentiment of evil.

The days went by, cold and slow. He watched grimly the preparations
the hospital physician was silently making in his case, for fever,
inflammation.

"I must be strong enough to go out cured on Christmas eve," he said to
him one day, coolly.

The old doctor glanced up shrewdly. He was an old Alsatian, very
plain-spoken.

"You say so?" he mumbled. "Chut! Then you will go. There are
some--bull-dog men. They do what they please,--they never die unless
they choose, begar! We know them in our practice, Herr Holmes!"

Holmes laughed. Some acumen there, he thought, in medicine or mind: as
for himself, it was true enough; whatever success he had gained in life
had been by no flush of enthusiasm or hope; a dogged persistence of
"holding on," rather.

Christmas eve came at last; bright, still, frosty. "Whatever he had to
do, let it be done quickly "; but not till the set hour came. So he laid
his watch on the table beside him, waiting until it should mark the time
he had chosen: the ruling passion of self-control as strong in this turn
of life's tide as it would be in its ebb, at the last. The old doctor
found him alone in the dreary room, coming in with the frosty breath of
the eager street about him. A grim, chilling sight enough, as solitary
and impenetrable as the Sphinx. He did not like such faces in this
genial and gracious time, so hurried over his examination. The eye was
cool, the pulse steady, the man's body, battered though it was, strong
in its steely composure. "_Ja wohl!--ja wohl_!" he went on chuffily,
summing up: latent fever,--the very lips were blue, dry as husks; "he
would go,--_oui_?--then go!"--with a chuckle. "All right, _glueck zu_!"
And so shuffled out latent fever? Doubtless, yet hardly from broken
bones, the doctor thought,--with no suspicion of the subtile,
intolerable passion smouldering in every drop of this man's phlegmatic
blood.

Evening came at last. He stopped until the cracked bell of the chapel
had done striking the Angelus, and then put on his overcoat, and went
out. The air was cold and pungent. The crowded city seemed wakening to
some keen enjoyment; even his own weak, deliberate step rang on the
icy pavement as if it wished to rejoice with the rest. I said it was a
trading city: so it was, but the very trade to-day had a jolly Christmas
face on; the surly old banks and pawnbrokers' shops had grown ashamed
of their doings, and shut their doors, and covered their windows with
frosty trees, and cathedrals, and castles; the shops opened their
hearts; some child's angel had touched them, and they flushed out into
a magic splendor of Christmas trees, and lights, and toys; Santa Claus
might have made his head-quarters in any one of them. As for children,
you stumbled over them at every step, quite weighed down with the
heaviness of their joy, and the money burning their pockets; the acrid
old brokers and pettifoggers, that you met with a chill on other days,
had turned into jolly fathers of families, and lounged laughing along
with half a dozen little hands pulling them into candy-stores or
toy-shops: all the churches whose rules permitted them to show their
deep rejoicing in a simple way had covered their cold stone walls with
evergreens and wreaths of glowing fire-berries: the child's angel had
touched them too, perhaps,--not unwisely.

He passed crowds of thin-clad women looking in through open doors, with
red cheeks and hungry eyes, at red-hot stoves within, and a placard,
"Christmas dinners for the poor, gratis"; out of every window on the
streets came a ruddy light, and a spicy smell; the very sunset sky had
caught the reflection of the countless Christmas fires, and flamed up to
the zenith, blood-red as cinnabar.

Holmes turned down one of the back streets: he was going to see Lois,
first of all. I hardly know why: the child's angel may have touched him,
too; or his heart, full of a yearning pity for the poor cripple, who,
he believed now, had given her own life for his, may have plead for
indulgence, as men remember their childish prayers, before going into
battle. He came at last, in the quiet lane where she lived, to her
little brown frame-shanty, to which you mounted by a flight of wooden
steps: there were two narrow windows at the top, hung with red curtains;
he could hear her feeble voice singing within. As he turned to go up
the steps, he caught sight of something crouched underneath them in the
dark, hiding from him: whether a man--or a dog he could not see. He
touched it.

"What d' ye want, Mas'r?" said a stifled voice.

He touched it again with his stick.

The man stood upright, back in the shadow: it was old Yare.

"Had ye any word wi' me, Mas'r?"

He saw the negro's face grow gray with fear.

"Come out, Yare," he said, quietly. "Any word? What word is arson, eh?"

The man did not move. Holmes touched him with the stick.

"Come out," he said.

He came out, looking gaunt, as with famine.

"I'll not flurr myself," he said, crunching his ragged hat in his
hands,--"I'll not."

He drove the hat down upon his head, and looked up with a sullen
fierceness.

"Yoh've got me, an' I'm glad of 't. I'm tired, fearin'. I was born for
hangin', they say," with a laugh. "But I'll see my girl. I've waited
hyur, runnin' the resk,--not darin' to see her, on 'count o' yoh. I
thort I was safe on Christmas-day,--but what's Christmas to yoh or me?"

Holmes's quiet motion drove him up the steps before him. He stopped at
the top, his cowardly nature getting the better of him, and sat down
whining on the upper step.

"Be marciful, Mas'r! I wanted to see my girl,--that's all. She's all I
hev."

Holmes passed him and went in. Was Christmas nothing to him? How did
this foul wretch know that they stood alone, apart from the world?

It was a low, cheerful little room that he came into, stooping his tall
head: a tea-kettle humming and singing on the wood-fire, that lighted up
the coarse carpet and the gray walls, but spent its warmest heat on
the low settee where Lois lay sewing, and singing to herself. She was
wrapped up in a shawl, but the hands, he saw, were worn to skin and
bone; the gray shadow was heavier on her face, and the brooding brown
eyes were like a tired child's. She tried to jump up when she saw him,
and not being able, leaned on one elbow, half-crying as she laughed.

"It's the best Christmas gift of all I I can hardly b'lieve
it!"--touching the strong hand humbly that was held out to her.

Holmes had a gentle touch, I told you, for dogs and children and women:
so, sitting quietly by her, he listened with untiring patience to her
long story; looked at the heap of worthless trifles she had patched up
for gifts, wondering secretly at the delicate sense of color and grace
betrayed in the bits of flannel and leather; and took, with a grave look
of wonder, his own package, out of which a bit of woollen thread peeped
forth.

"Don't look till to-morrow mornin'," she said, anxiously, as she lay
back trembling and exhausted.

The breath of the mill! The fires of want and crime had finished their
work on her life,--so! She caught the meaning of his face quickly.

"It's nothin'," she said, eagerly. "I'll be strong by New-Year's; it's
only a day or two rest I need. I've no tho't o' givin' up."

And to show how strong she was, she got up and hobbled about to make the
tea. He had not the heart to stop her; she did not want to die,--why
should she? the world was a great, warm, beautiful nest for the little
cripple,--why need he show her the cold without? He saw her at last go
near the door where old Yare sat outside, then heard her breathless cry,
and a sob. A moment after the old man came into the room, carrying her,
and, laying her down on the settee, chafed her hands and misshapen head.

"What ails her?" he said, looking up, bewildered, to Holmes. "We've
killed her among us."

She laughed, though the great eyes were growing dim, and drew his coarse
gray hair into her hand.

"Yoh wur long comin'," she said, weakly. "I hunted fur yoh every
day,--every day."

The old man had pushed her hair back, and was reading the sunken face
with a wild fear.

"What ails her?" he cried. "Ther' 's somethin' gone wi' my girl. Was it
my fault? Lo, was it my fault?"

"Be quiet!" said Holmes, sternly.

"Is it _that_?" he gasped, shrilly. "My God! not that! I can't bear it!"

Lois soothed him, patting his face childishly.

"Am I dyin'?" she asked, with a frightened look at Holmes.

He told her no, cheerfully.

"I've no tho't o' dyin'. I dunnot thenk o' dyin'. Don't mind, dear!
Yoh'll stay with me, fur good?"

The man's paroxysm of fear for her over, his spite and cowardice came
uppermost.

"It's him," he yelped, looking fiercely at Holmes. "He's got my life in
his hands. He kin take it. What does he keer fur me or my girl? I'll not
stay wi' yoh no longer, Lo. Mornin' he'll send me t' th' lock-up, an'
after"----

"I care for _you_, child," said Holmes, stooping suddenly close to the
girl's livid face.

"To-morrow?" she muttered. "My Christmas-day?"

He wet her face while he looked over at the wretch whose life he held
in his hands. It was the iron rule of Holmes's nature to be just; but
to-night dim perceptions of a deeper justice than law opened before
him,--problems he had no time to solve: the sternest fortress is liable
to be taken by assault,--and the dew of the coming morn was on his
heart.

"So as I've hunted fur him!" she whispered, weakly. "I didn't think it
wud come to this. So as I loved him! Oh, Mr. Holmes, he's hed a pore
chance in livin',--forgive him this! Him that'll come to-morrow'd say to
forgive him this."

She caught the old man's head in her arms with an agony of tears, and
held it tight.

"I hev hed a pore chance," he said, looking up,--"that's God's truth,
Lo! I dunnot keer fur that: it's too late goin' back.--Mas'r," he
mumbled, servilely, "it's on'y a little time t' th' end: let me stay
with Lo. She loves me,--Lo does."

A look of disgust crept over Holmes's face.

"Stay, then," he muttered,--"I wash my hands of you, you old scoundrel!"

He bent over Lois with his rare, pitiful smile.

"Have I his life in my hands? I put it into yours,--so, child! Now put
it all out of your head, and look up here to wish me good-bye."

She looked up cheerfully, hardly conscious how deep the danger had been;
but the flush had gone from her face, leaving it sad and still.

"I must go to keep Christmas, Lois," he said, playfully.

"Yoh're keepin' it here, Sir." She held her weak gripe on his hand
still, with the vague outlook in her eyes that came there sometimes.
"Was it fur me yoh done it?"

"Yes, for you."

She turned her eyes slowly around, bewildered. The clear evening light
fell on Holmes, as he stood there looking down at the dying little
lamiter: a powerful figure, with a face supreme, masterful, but tender:
you will find no higher type of manhood. Did God make him of the same
blood as the vicious, cringing wretch crouching to hide his black face
at the other side of the bed? Some such thought came into Lois's brain,
and vexed her, bringing the tears to her eyes: he was her father, you
know.

"It's all wrong," she muttered,--"oh, it's far wrong! Ther' 's One could
make them 'like. Not me."

She stroked her father's head once, and then let it go. Holmes glanced
out, and saw the sun was down.

"Lois," he said, "I want you to wish me a happy Christmas, as people
do."

Holmes had a curious vein of superstition: he knew no lips so pure as
this girl's, and he wanted them to wish him good-luck that night. She
did it, laughing and growing red: riddles of life did not trouble her
childish fancy long. And so he left her, with a dull feeling, as I said
before, that it was good to say a prayer before the battle came on. For
men who believed in prayers: for him, it was the same thing to make one
day for Lois happier.

METHODS OF STUDY IN NATURAL HISTORY.

IV.

In presenting Classification as the subject of a series of papers in
the "Atlantic Monthly," I am aware that I am drawing largely upon the
patience of its readers; since the technical nature of the topic renders
many details necessary which cannot be otherwise than dry to any but
professional naturalists. Yet believing, as I do, that classification,
rightly understood, means simply the creative plan of God as expressed
in organic forms, I feel the importance of attempting at least to
present it in a popular guise, divested, as far as possible, of
technicalities, while I would ask the indulgence of my readers for such
scientific terms and details as cannot well be dispensed with, begging
them to remember that a long and tedious road may bring us suddenly upon
a glorious prospect, and that a clearer mental atmosphere and a new
intellectual sensation may well reward us for a little weariness in the
outset. Besides, the time has come when scientific truth must cease to
be the property of the few, when it must be woven into the common life
of the world; for we have reached the point where the results of science
touch the very problem of existence, and all men listen for the solving
of that mystery. When it will come, and how, none can say; but this much
at least is certain, that all our researches are leading up to that
question, and mankind will never rest till it is answered. If, then, the
results of science are of such general interest for the human race, if
they are gradually interpreting the purposes of the Deity in creation,
and the relation of man to all the past, then it is well that all
should share in its teachings, and that it should not be kept, like the
learning of the Egyptians, for an exclusive priesthood who may expound
the oracle according to their own theories, but should make a part of
all our intellectual culture and of our common educational systems. With
this view, I will endeavor to simplify as far as may be my illustrations
of the different groups of the Animal Kingdom, beginning with a more
careful analysis of those structural features on which classes are
founded.

I have said that the Radiates are the lowest type among animals,
embodying, under an infinite variety of forms, that plan in which all
parts bear definite relations to a vertical central axis. The three
classes of Radiates are distinguished from each other by three distinct
ways of executing that plan. I dwell upon this point; for we shall never
arrive at a clear understanding of the different significance and value
of the various divisions of the Animal Kingdom, till we appreciate the
distinction between the structural conception and the material means by
which it is expressed. A comparison will, perhaps, better explain my
meaning. There are certain architectonic types, including edifices of
different materials, with an infinite variety of architectural details
and external ornaments; but the flat roof and the colonnade are typical
of all Grecian temples, whether built of marble or granite or wood,
whether Doric or Ionic or Corinthian, whether simple and massive or
light and ornamented; and, in like manner, the steep roof and pointed
arch are the typical characters of all Gothic cathedrals, whatever be
the material or the details. The architectural conception remains
the same in all its essential elements, however the more superficial
features vary. Such relations as these edifices bear to the
architectural idea that includes them all, do classes bear to the
primary divisions or branches of the Animal Kingdom.

The three classes of Radiates, beginning with the lowest, and naming
them in their relative order, are Polyps, Acalephs or Jelly-Fishes, and
Echinoderms or Star-Fishes and Sea-Urchins. In the Polyps the plan is
executed in the simplest manner by a sac, the sides of which are folded
inward, at regular intervals from top to bottom, so as to divide it by
vertical radiating partitions, converging from the periphery toward the
centre. These folds or partitions do not meet in the centre, but leave
an open space, which is the main cavity of the body. This open space,
however, occupies only the lower part of the body; for in the upper
there is a second sac hanging to a certain distance within the first.
This inner sac has an aperture in the bottom, through which whatever
enters it passes into the main cavity of the body. A central opening
in the top forms a kind of mouth, around which are radiating tentacles
connecting with the open chambers formed by the partitions within.
Cutting such an animal across in a transverse section, we shall see
the radiation of the partitions from the centre to the circumference,
showing still more distinctly the typical structure of the division to
which it belongs.

[Illustration: Vertical section of a Sea-Anemone of Actinia: _o_, mouth;
_t_, tentacles; _s_, inner sac or stomach; _b_, main cavity; _ff_,
reproductive organs; _g_, radiating partition; _eee_, radiating
chambers; _cc_, circular openings in the partitions; _aa_, lower floor.]

[Illustration: Transverse section of a Sea-Anemone or Actinia.]

[Illustration: Staurophera seen in profile.]

[Illustration: Hippocrene seen in profile.]

[Illustration: Melicertum seen from above, with the tentacles spreading:
_oo_, radiating tubes with ovaries; _m_, mouth; _tttt_, tentacles.]

The second class is that of Jelly-Fishes or Acalephs; and here the same
plan is carried out in the form of a hemispherical gelatinous disk, the
digestive cavity being hollowed, or, as it were, scooped, out of the
substance of the body, which is traversed by tubes that radiate from
the centre to the periphery. Cutting it across transversely, or looking
through its transparent mass, the same radiation of the internal
structure is seen again; only that in this instance the radiating lines
are not produced by vertical partition-walls, with open spaces between,
as in the Polyps, but by radiating tubes passing through the gelatinous
mass of the body. At the periphery is a circular tube connecting them
all, and the tentacles, which hang down when the animal is in its
natural position, connect at their base with the radiating tubes, while
numerous smaller tentacles may form a kind of fringe all round the
margin.

The third and highest class includes the Star-Fishes, Sea-Urchins, and
Holothurians or Beches-de-Mer. The radiation is equally distinct in each
of these; but here again the mode of execution differs from that of the
two other classes. The internal cavity and the radiating tubes, instead
of being connected with the outer wall of the body as in Polyps, or
hollowed out of the substance of the body as in Jelly-Fishes, are here
inclosed within independent walls of their own, quite distinct from the
wall of the body. But notwithstanding this difference, a transverse
section shows in these animals, as distinctly as in all the rest, the
radiating structure typical of the whole branch. In these three classes
we have no difference of plan, nor even any modification of the same
plan,--for either one of them expresses it as clearly as any other,--but
simply three different ways of executing one structural idea.

[Illustration: Common Sea-Urchin, Echinus, seen from above]

[Illustration: Echinarachnius, opened by a transverse or horizontal
section, and showing the internal arrangement: c, mouth; eeeee,
ambulacra, with their ramifications cmcmcm; wwww, interambulacra.]

I have mentioned only three classes of Radiates. Cuvier had five in his
classification; for he placed among them the Intestinal Worms and the
Infusoria or Animalcules. The Intestinal Worms are much better known
now than they were in his day. Their anatomy and embryology have been
traced, and it has been shown that the essential features of these
parasites are the same as those of all Articulates, their whole body
being divided into successive, movable joints or rings. Cuvier was
misled by the circular arrangement of certain parts around the mouth,
and by the presence of a wreath of feelers around the head of some
of these Worms, resembling the tentacles of many Radiates. This is,
however, no indication of radiate structure, but a superficial feature
in no way related to the internal organization.

We must carefully distinguish between affinity and analogy among
animals. The former is founded on identity of plan; the latter only upon
external resemblance, produced by similar features, which, when they are
intimately connected with the whole internal organization, as in some
groups, may be considered as typical characters, but when only grafted,
as it were, in a superficial manner on animals of another type, have
no relation to the essential elements of structure, and become at
once subordinate and unimportant. Such is the difference between the
tentacles in a Radiate and the wreath of feelers in a Worm;--the
external effect may be much the same; but in the former every tentacle
opens into one of the chambers as in a Polyp, or connects with one of
the radiating tubes as in Acalephs, or with the locomotive suckers as
in Star-Fishes, and is therefore closely linked with the whole internal
organization; whereas the feelers in the latter are only external
appendages, in no way connected with the essential structural elements.
We have a striking illustration of this superficial resemblance in the
wings of Birds and Insects. In Birds, wings are a typical feature,
corresponding to the front limbs in all Vertebrates, which are
constructed in the same way, whether they are arms as in Man, or
forelegs as in Quadrupeds, or pectoral fins as in Fishes, or wings as in
Birds. The wing in an Insect, on the contrary, is a flattened, dried-up
gill, having no structural relation whatever to the wing of a Bird. They
are analogous only because they resemble each other in function, being
in the same way subservient to flight; but as organs they are entirely
different.

In adding Infusoria to the Radiates, Cuvier was false to his own
principle of founding all classification on plan. He was influenced by
their seeming simplicity of structure, and placed them in the lowest
division of the Animal Kingdom on that account. But even this simplicity
was only apparent in many of them. At certain seasons of the year
myriads of these little Animalcules may be seen in every brook and
road-side pool. They are like transparent little globules, without any
special organization, apparently; and were it not that they are in
constant rotation, exhibiting thus a motion of their own, one would
hardly suspect that they were endowed with life. To the superficial
observer they all look alike, and it is not strange, that, before they
had been more carefully investigated, they should have been associated
together as the lowest division of the Animal Kingdom, representing, as
it were, a border-land between animal and vegetable life. But since the
modern improvements in the microscope, Ehrenberg, the great master in
microscopic investigation, has shown that many of these little
globules have an extraordinary complication of structure. Subsequent
investigations have proved that they include a great variety of beings:
some of them belonging to the type of Mollusks; others to the type of
Articulates, being in fact little Shrimps; while many others are
the locomotive germs of plants, and so far from forming a class by
themselves, as a distinct group in the Animal Kingdom, they seem to
comprise representatives of all types except Vertebrates, and to belong
in part to the Vegetable Kingdom, Siebold, Leuckart, and other modern
zooelogists, have considered them as a primary type, and called them
Protozoa; but this is as great a mistake as the other. The rotatory
motion in them all is produced by an apparatus that exists not only
in all animals, but in plants also, and is a most important agent in
sustaining the freshness and vitality of their circulating fluids and of
the surrounding medium in which they live. It consists of soft fringes,
called Vibratile Cilia. Such fringes cover the whole surface of these
little living beings, and by their unceasing play they maintain the
rotating motion that carries them along in the water.

The Mollusks, the next great division of the Animal Kingdom, also
include three classes. With them is introduced that character
of bilateral symmetry, or division of parts on either side of a
longitudinal axis, that prevails throughout the Animal Kingdom, with the
exception of the Radiates. The lowest class of Mollusks has been named
Acephala, to signify the absence of any distinct head; for though their
whole organization is based upon the principle of bilateral symmetry, it
is nevertheless very difficult to determine which is the right side and
which the left in these animals, because there is so little prominence
in the two ends of the body that the anterior and posterior extremities
are hardly to be distinguished. Take the Oyster as an example. It has,
like most Acephala, a shell with two valves united by a hinge on the
back, one of these valves being thick and swollen, while the other is
nearly flat. If we lift the shell, we find beneath a soft lining-skin
covering the whole animal and called by naturalists the mantle, from the
inner surface of which arise a double row of gills, forming two pendent
folds on the sides of the body; but at one end of the body these folds
do not meet, but leave an open space, where is the aperture we call the
mouth. This is the only indication of an anterior extremity; but it is
enough to establish a difference between the front and hind ends of
the body, and to serve as a guide in distinguishing the right and
left sides. If now we lift the mantle and gills, we find beneath the
principal organs: the stomach, with a winding alimentary canal; the
heart and liver; the blood-vessels, branching from either side of the
heart to join the gills; and a fleshy muscle passing from one valve
of the shell to the other, enabling the animal by its dilatation or
contraction to open and close its shell at will. A cut across an animal
of this class will show us better the bilateral arrangement of the
parts. In such a section we see the edge of the two shells on either
side; within these the edge of the mantle; then the double rows of
gills; and in the middle the alimentary canal, the heart, and the
blood-vessels branching right and left. Some of these animals have
eye-specks on the edge of the mantle; but this is not a constant
feature. This class of Acephala includes all the Oysters, Clams,
Mussels, and the like. When named with reference to their double shells,
they are called Bivalves; and with them are associated a host of less
conspicuous animals, known as Ascidians, Brachiopods, and Bryozoa.

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