Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, No. 20, June, 1859 by Various

V >> Various >> Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, No. 20, June, 1859

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"But in a fiction, in a dream of passion,
Could force his soul so to his own conceit"

that his whole function would suit with expressions to his conceit.
He then withdrew his judgment from within, and cheated his fancy into
supposing he had given her the rein, letting the feigned state be as
real to him as it could, and writing from that primarily,--humoring
Nature by his art in leaving her to do what she alone could do. So that
the very gems we admire as natural are the offspring of Nature creating
under Art. To make streaked gillyflowers, we marry a gentler scion to
the wildest stock, and Nature does the rest. So in poetry, we cannot
get at the finest excellences by seeking for them directly, but we put
Nature in the way to suggest them. We do not strive to think whether
"the mobled queen" is good; we do not let our vanity keep such a
strict look-out upon Nature; she will not desert us, if we follow her
modes,--which we must do with all the art and fine tact we can acquire
and command, not only in order to gain the minute beauties, but to
compass the great whole.

The analogies that might be drawn from music would much assist in making
all this clear, if they could be used with a chance of being understood.
But, unfortunately, the ability to comprehend a great work, as a whole,
is even rarer in music than in poetry. The little taking bits of melody
are all that is thought of or perceived; the great _epos_ or rhapsody,
the form and meaning of the entire composition,--which is a work of Art
in no other sense than a poem is one, except that it uses, instead of
speech, musical forms, of greater variety and symmetry,--are not at all
understood. Nor is the subtile and irresistible coherence in successions
of clear sunny melody, in which Mozart so abounds, in any great degree
understood, even by some who call themselves artists. They think only
of the sudden flashes, the happinesses, and, if such a word may be used
once only, the smartnesses,--like children who care for nothing in their
cake but the frosting and the plums. But in continuing the study of the
art with such notions of its expression, the relish for it soon cloys,
the mind ceases to advance, the enthusiasm deadens, progress becomes
hopeless, and the little gained is soon lost; whereas, if the student is
familiarized with the most perfect forms of the art, and led on by them,
both by committing a few of them to memory, and by fully understanding
their structure, it will soon be evident that an intellectual study of
music, pursued with a true love of it, can, more than any other study,
strengthen the imaginative faculty.

The forms of poetry have only the rhythmic analogy, as forms, to those
of music; but in their foundation in the same Nature, and in their
manner of development, there is a closer resemblance. Both in music and
poetry, the older artists regarded with most strictness the carrying
through of the whole; they cared little for the taking tunes or the
striking passages; they looked with eyes single to their ultimate
purposes. Shakspeare came, and accomplished at once, for dramatic art,
what the fathers of modern music began for their art nearly a century
later. He made the strict form yield to and take new shape from natural
feeling. This feeling, whose expression is the musical element of
poetry, he brought up to its proper relation with all the other
qualities. Look at the terrific bombast which preceded him,--the mighty
efforts of mighty men to draw music or the power of sound into their
art; Hieronymo is like some portentous convulsion of Nature,--the
upheaval of a new geological era. The writers felt that there must be
style suited to passion, and that they must attain it,--but how? By
artificial pomp?--or by yielding with artful reserve to the natural
eloquence of passion?

Shakspeare has answered the question for all time; and he uses both,
each in its proper place. Nothing, even in music, ever showed an art
growing out of a nicer sensibility in sound than his variety and
appropriateness in style. For an art it is, and we cannot make a
definition of that word which shall include other forms of art and not
include it. If the passion and the feeling make the style, it is the
poet's art that leaves them free to do it; he superintends; he feigns
that which he leaves to make; he shares his art with "great creating
Nature." All is unreal; all comes out of him; and all that has to do
with the form and expression of his products is, of course, included
in the manifest when his ship of fancy gets its clearance at the
custom-house of his judgment. The style he assumes cannot but be present
to his consciousness in the progress of a long drama. He must perceive,
as he writes, if he has the common penetration of humanity, that the
flow and cadence of his "Henry the Eighth" are not like those of his
"Midsummer Night's Dream"; and he must preserve his tone, with, at
times, direct art, not leaving everything to the feeling. That he does
so is as evident as if he had chosen a form of verse more remote
from the language of Nature and obliged himself to conform to its
requirements. The terrible cursing of Margaret in "Richard III.," for
example, is not the remorseless, hollow monotony of it, while it so
heightens the passion, as evident to Shakspeare as to us; or had he no
ear for verse, and just let his words sound on as they would, looking
only at the meaning, and counting his iambics on his fingers,--not too
carefully either? If the last supposition is to be insisted on, we must
confine our notions of his perceptions and powers within very ordinary
bounds, and make dramatic art as unpoetic as the art of brickmaking.

The beauty of Shakspeare's art is in its comprehensiveness. It takes in
every quality of excellence. It looks at the great whole, and admits
the little charms and graces. It includes constructiveness in story,
character-drawing, picturesqueness, musicalness, naturalness,--in fine,
whatever art may combine with poetry or the soul of poetry admit in art.
To the young and unobservant, and all who are unable to consider the
poet's writing, as we have in this article endeavoured to study a single
passage of it, _from his position_, the art is not apparent; the mimic
scene is reality, or some supernatural inspiration or schoolboy-like
enthusiasm has produced the work. But there are others, created with
different faculties, who begin to perceive the art almost as soon as
they feel its power, and who love to study it and to live in the spirit
of poetry that breathes through it; these come gradually to think of the
man, as well as of his works,--to feel more and more the influence upon
them of his greatness and beauty of soul, and, as years pass by, to find
consolation and repose in the loftiness of his wisdom.

* * * * *

MIEN-YAUN.

I.

Young Mien-yaun had for two years been the shining centre of the
aristocratic circles of Pekin. Around him revolved the social system.
He was the vitalizing element in fashionable life,--the radiant sun,
diffusing conventional warmth of tone and brilliancy of polish. He
created modes. He regulated reputations.

His smile or his frown determined the worldly fate of thousands. His
ready assurance gave him preeminence with one sex, and his beauty made
him the admiration of the other. When he talked, Mandarins listened;
when he walked, maidens' eyes glistened. He was, in short, the
rage,--and he knew it, and meant to remain so. He was a wonderful
student, and understood politics like a second Confucius. With the
literature of all ages, from the Shee-king, written four thousand
years ago, down to the latest achievements of the modern poets, he was
intimately acquainted. His accomplishments were rich and varied, and his
Tartar descent endowed him with a spirit and animation that enabled him
to exhibit them to every advantage. He sang like a veritable Orpheus,
and sensitive women had been known to faint under the excitement of his
Moo-lee-wha, or national song. He even danced,--a most rare faculty in
Pekin, as in all China,--but this was frowned upon, as immoral, by his
family. Comely indeed he was, especially on state occasions, when he
appeared in all the radiance of rosy health, overflowing spirits, and
the richest crapes and satins,--decorated with the high order of the
peacock's feather, the red button, and numberless glittering ornaments
of ivory and lapis-lazuli. Beloved or envied by all the men, and with
all the women dying for him, he was fully able to appreciate the
comforts of existence. Considering the homage universally accorded him,
he was as little of a dandy as could reasonably be expected.

His family connections were very exalted. All his relatives belonged to
the Tse,--the learned and governing class. His father had been one of
the Tootche-yuen, a censor of the highest board, and was still a member
of the council of ministerial Mandarins. His uncle was a personal noble,
a prince, higher in rank than the best of the Mandarins, and directed
the deliberations of the Ping-pu, the Council of War. Thus his station
gave him access to all the best society. His career was a path of roses.
He never knew a sorrow. All were friendly to him, even the jealous,
because it was the fashion. The doors of the mighty opened at his
approach, and the smiles of the noble greeted him. He lived in an
atmosphere of adulation, and yet resisted the more intoxicating
influences of his dangerous elevation. Young as he was, he had
penetrated the social surface, and, marking its many uncertainties,
had laid out for himself a system of diplomacy which he believed best
calculated to fortify him in his agreeable position of master of modes
and dictator of fashionable public opinion.

The course he adopted was thoroughly effective. His sway was never
disputed for a moment. He knew his personal charms, and determined to
enhance their value by displaying them sparingly. Accordingly, he began
by refusing forty-nine out of every fifty public invitations,--his
former habit having been to refuse but one in five. He appeared on the
promenade only twice in three weeks, but on these occasions he always
artfully contrived to throw the community into the wildest excitement.
One day, he appeared arrayed from head to foot in yellow Nankin, a
color always considered a special abomination in Pekin, but which was
nevertheless instantly adopted by all the gallants about town,--a
proceeding which caused so much scandal that an imperial edict had to
be issued, forbidding the practice in future. Another time, he came out
with an unparalleled twist to his tail, the construction of which had
occupied his mind for some days, and which occasioned the death by
suicide of three over-ambitious youths who found themselves unable to
survive the mortification of an unsuccessful attempt to imitate it.
Again, to the infinite horror of the Mandarins, he paraded himself one
afternoon with decacuminated finger-nails, and came very near producing
a riot by his unwillingness to permit them to grow again, besides
calling forth another imperial decree, threatening ignominious death to
all nobles throughout the empire who should encourage the practice.
All these eccentricities served only to add to the consequence of the
multipotent Mien-yaun. Then again, he was gifted with a bewitching
smile; but he steadily refrained from making any use of it oftener than
once a month, at which times the enthusiasm of his adherents knew no
bounds, and it might have been supposed that all Pekin had administered
unto itself a mild preparation of laughing-gas, so universal were the
grimaces. On very rare and distinguished occasions, Mien-yaun permitted
himself to be persuaded to sing; but as ladies sometimes swooned under
his melodious influence, the natural goodness of his heart prevented him
from frequent indulgence in the exercise of this accomplishment.

It may naturally be supposed that the popular and fascinating young
Chinese nobleman was the devoted object of much matrimonial speculation.
Managing mammas and aspiring daughters gave the whole of their minds to
him. To look forward to the possible hope of sharing through life his
fortunes and his fame was the continual employment of many a high-born
damsel. And they the more readily and unreservedly indulged these
fancies, as nothing in the laws of China could prevent Mien-yaun from
taking as many wives as he chose, provided he could support them all,
and supply all their natural wants. But our hero knew his value. He was
fully conscious that a member of the Tse, a son of an ex-censor of the
highest board, a nephew of a personal noble and the Secretary of War,
and, above all, the brightest ornament of aristocratic society, was by
no means the sort of person to throw himself lightly away upon any woman
or any set of women. He preferred to wait.

His family had high hopes of him. He was largely gifted with filial
piety, which is everything in China. Politics, religion, literature,
government, all rest upon the broad principle of filial piety. Being
very filially pious, of course Mien-yaun was eminent in all these varied
accomplishments. Consequently his family had a right to have high hopes
of him. The great statesman, Kei-ying,--who has very recently terminated
a life of devoted patriotism and heroic virtues by a sublime death on
the scaffold,--undertook his instruction in Chinese politics. One lesson
completed his education. "Lie, cheat, steal, and honor your parents,"
were the elementary principles which Kei-ying inculcated. The readiness
with which Mien-yaun mastered them inspired his tutor with a lively
confidence in the young man's future greatness. He was pronounced a
rising character. His popularity increased. His name was in everybody's
mouth. He shunned society more sedulously than ever, and assumed new and
loftier airs. He was seized with fits of ambition, each of which lasted
a day, and then gave place to some new aspiration. First, he would be a
poet; but, after a few hours' labor, he declared the exertion of hunting
up rhymes too great an exertion. Next, he would be a moral philosopher,
and commenced a work, to be completed in sixty volumes, on the Whole
Duty of Chinamen; but he never got beyond the elementary principles he
had imbibed from Kei-ying. Again, he would become a great painter; but,
having in an unguarded moment permitted the claims of perspective to be
recognized, he was discouraged from this attempt by a deputation of the
first artists of the empire, who waited upon him, and with great respect
laid before him the appalling effects that would inevitably follow any
public recognition of perspective in painting. Finally, he renounced
all ambition but that of ruling his fellow-creatures with a rod more
tyrannical than that of political authority, and more respected than the
sceptre of government itself.

II.

Satiated with success, Mien-yaun at length became weary of the ceaseless
round of flattering triumphs, and began to lament that no higher step on
the social staircase remained for him to achieve. Alas that discontent
should so soon follow the realization of our brightest hopes! What, in
this world, is enough? More than we have! Mien-yaun felt all the pangs
of anxious aspiration, without knowing how to alleviate them. He was
only conscious of a deep desolation, for which none of the elementary
principles he had learned from Kei-ying afforded the slightest
consolation. He now avoided publicity from inclination, rather than from
any systematic plan of action. He dressed mostly in blue, a sufficient
sign of a perturbed spirit. He discarded the peacock's feather, as
an idle vanity, and always came forth among the world arrayed in
ultramarine gowns and cerulean petticoats. His stockings, especially,
were of the deepest, darkest, and most beautiful blue. The world of
fashion saw, and was amazed; but in less than, a week all Pekin had the
blues. Annoyed at what a few months before he would have delighted in as
another convincing proof of his influential position, Mien-yaun fled
the city, and sought relief in a cruise up and down the Peiho, in his
private junk. As he neared the Gulf of Pe-tche-lee, the sea-breeze
brought calm to his troubled spirit and imparted renewed vigor to his
wearied mind. A degree of resolution, to which he had heretofore been
a stranger, possessed him. His courage returned. He would go back to
Pekin. He would renounce those vain pursuits in which he had passed his
unworthy life. Henceforth he would strive for nobler aims. Something
great and wonderful he certainly would accomplish,--the exact nature of
which, however, he did not pause to consider.

As he reentered the city, he was obliged to pass through that quarter
which is inhabited by the Kung,--the working and manufacturing classes.
His attention was suddenly arrested by feminine cries of distress; and,
turning a corner, he came upon a domestic scene so common in China
that it would hardly have attracted his notice but for a peculiar
circumstance. A matron, well advanced in years, was violently beating
a young and beautiful girl with a bit of bamboo; and the peculiar
circumstance that enforced Mien-yaun's interest was, that, as the maiden
turned her fair face towards him, she smiled through her tears and
telegraphed him a fragrant kiss, by means of her fair fingers. Naturally
astounded, he paused, and gazed upon the pair. The younger female was
the loveliest maid he had ever looked upon. She had the smallest eyes in
the world, the most tempting, large, full, pouting lips, the blackest
and most abundant hair, exquisitely plaited, and feet no bigger than her
little finger. As these are the four characteristics of female beauty
dearest to a Chinaman's heart, it is no wonder that Mien-yaun thought
her a paragon. The old woman, on the contrary, was hideously ugly. Her
teeth were gone, and her eyes sought the comforting assistance of an
ill-fitting pair of crystal spectacles. She had no hair, and her feet
might have supported an elephant. As he rested his eyes wistfully upon
them, the young woman discharged a second rapturous salute. His heart
beat with singular turbulence, and he approached.

"What has the child done?" he asked.

Now the law of China is, that parents shall not be restrained from
beating and abusing their children as often and as soundly as is
convenient. The great principle of filial piety knows no reciprocity.
Should a child occasionally be killed, the payment of a small fine will
satisfy the accommodating spirit of the authorities. The ill-favored
mother was not, therefore, in any way bound to answer this somewhat
abrupt question; but, observing the appearance of high gentility, and
touched by the engaging manner of the interrogator, she answered, that
her appetite had of late been uncertain, and that she was endeavoring to
restore it by a little wholesome exercise.

So reasonable an explanation admitted of no reply; and Mien-yaun was
about to resume his way with a sigh, when the young lady insinuated a
third osculatory hint, more penetrating than either of the others,
and bestowed on him, besides, a most ravishing smile. He fluttered
internally, but succeeded in preserving his outward immobility. He
entered into conversation with the elderly female, observing that it was
a fine day, and that it promised to continue so, although destiny was
impenetrable, and clouds might overshadow the radiant face of Nature at
any unexpected moment. To these and other equally profound and original
remarks the old woman graciously assented, and finally invited the young
gentleman to partake of a cup of scau-tcheou. Now scau-tcheou, which is
the most ardent of Chinese spirits, was Mien-yaun's abomination; but he
concealed his disgust, and quietly observed that he should prefer a cup
of tea.

The old woman was delighted, and ran off to prepare the desired
refreshment, so that Mien-yaun was at length rewarded by the opportunity
of a few private words with the daughter.

"Tell me, Miss," said he,--"why did the sweetest of lips perform their
most delicate office when the brightest of eyes first turned upon me?"

The young lady, confused and blushing, answered, that the brilliancy of
the jewel which Mien-yaun wore in his hat had dazzled her vision, and
that she mistook him for an intimate friend of her youth,--that was all.

He knew this was a lie; but as lying was in exact accordance with the
elementary principles laid down by the learned Kei-ying, he was rather
pleased by it. Moreover, it was a very pretty lie, worthy of so pretty a
girl; and Mien-yaun, whose wits were fast leaving him, removed the jewel
from his hat, and begged the maiden to accept it. She, declaring that
she never could think of such a thing, deposited it in her bosom.
Evidently the twain were on the brink of love; a gentle push only was
needed to submerge them.

Mien-yaun speedily learned that his fair friend's name was Ching-ki-pin;
that she was the daughter of a wealthy manufacturer, named Tching-whang,
who owned extensive porcelain-factories at the North, and was besides a
considerable tobacco-planter; that her father was very kind to her,
but that the old woman, who was not her own mother, treated her very
cruelly; that her father married this ancient virago for her wealth, and
now repented the rash step, but found it impossible to retrace it, as
the law of China allows no divorces excepting when the wife has parents
living to receive and shelter her; and the obnoxious woman being nearly
a hundred years old herself, this was out of the question. When he
had learned so much, they were interrupted by the reappearance of the
Antique, who brought with her the cup of tea, most carefully prepared.
In deep abstraction, Mien-yaun seized it, and, instead of drinking the
boiling beverage, poured it upon the old woman's back, scalding her to
such a degree that her shrieks resounded through the neighborhood. Then
dropping the cup upon the ground, he put his heel into it, and, with a
burning glance of love at Ching-ki-pin, strode, melancholy, away.

III.

All that night, Mien-yaun's heart was troubled. The tranquillizing
finger of Sleep never touched his eyelids. At earliest dawn he arose,
and devoted some hours to the consideration of his costume. Never before
had he murmured at his wardrobe; now everything seemed unworthy of
the magnitude of the occasion. Finally, after many doubts and inward
struggles, and much bewilderment and desperation, the thing was done. He
issued forth in a blaze of splendor, preceded by two servants bearing
rare and costly presents. His raiment was a masterpiece of artistic
effect. He wore furs from Russia, and cotton from Bombay; his breast
sparkled with various orders of nobility; his slippers glistened with
gems; his hat was surmounted with the waving feather of the peacock.
Turning neither to the right nor to the left, he made his way to the
residence of Tching-whang. At the portal he paused, and sent in before
him his card,--a sheet of bright red paper,--with a list of the presents
he designed to offer the family whose acquaintance he desired to
cultivate.

As he had expected, his reception was most cordial. Though his person
was unknown, the magic of his name was not unfelt, even in the regions
of the Kung. A prince of the peacock's feather was no common visitor to
the home of a plebeian manufacturer; and when that prince was found
to be in addition the leader of the fashions and the idol of the
aristocracy, the marvel assumed a miraculous character. The guest was
ushered in with many low obeisances. How the too gay Ching-ki-pin
regretted those unlucky telegraphic kisses! What would he think of her?
She, too, had passed a most unquiet night, but had been able to relieve
her feelings to some extent at the sewing-circle, which had met at
her home, and at which she poured into the eager ears of her young
companions rapturous accounts of the beauty, elegance, dignity, and
tenderness of the enchanting stranger, and displayed before their
dazzled eyes the lustrous jewel he had presented to her. Having excited
a great deal of envy and jealousy, she was able to rest more in peace
than would otherwise have been possible. But she had never dreamed of
the real rank of her admirer. It came upon her like a lightning-flash,
and almost reduced her to a condition of temporary distraction. As for
the mother-in-law, she would infallibly have gone off into hysterics,
but for the pain in her back, which the barbers--who are also the
physicians in China--had not been able to allay. But the sight of a
peacock's feather under her roof was better than balm to her tortured
spine. Tching-whang lost his presence of mind altogether, and violated
the common decencies of life by receiving his visitor with his hat
off, and taking the proffered presents with one hand,--the other being
occupied in pulling his ear, to assure himself he was not dreaming.

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