Part 25

It is I, Mànus MacCodrum, I am telling you that, you, Anndra of my blood, And you, Neil my grandfather, and you, and you, and you! Ay, ay, Mànus my name is, Mànus MacMànus! It is I myself, and no other. Your brother, O Seals of the Sea! Give me blood of the red fish, And a bite of the flying _sgadan_: The green wave on my belly, And the foam in my eyes! I am your bull-brother, O Bulls of the Sea, Bull—better than any of you, snarling bulls! Come to me, mate, seal of the soft, furry womb, White am I still, though red shall I be, Red with the streaming red blood if any dispute me! Aoh, aoh, aoh, arò, arò, ho-rò! A man was I, a seal am I, My fangs churn the yellow foam from my lips: Give way to me, give way to me, Seals of the Sea; Give way, for I am fëy of the sea And the sea-maiden I see there, And my name, true, is Mànus MacCodrum, The bull-seal that was a man, Arà! Arà!

By this time he was close upon the great black seal, which was still monotonously swaying its gory head, with its sightless eyes rolling this way and that. The sea-folk seemed fascinated. None moved, even when the dancer in the moonshine trampled upon them.

When he came within arm-reach he stopped.

“Are you the Ceann-Cinnidh?” he cried.

“Are you the head of this clan of the sea-folk?”

The huge beast ceased its swaying. Its curled lips moved from its fangs.

“Speak, Seal, if there’s no curse upon you! Maybe, now, you’ll be Anndra himself, the brother of my father! Speak! _H’st—are you hearing that music on the shore?_ ’Tis the ‘Dàn-nan-Ròn’! Death o’ my soul, it’s the ‘Dàn-nan-Ròn’!

“Aha, ’tis Gloom Achanna out of the Grave. Back, beast, and let me move on!”

With that, seeing the great bull did not move, he struck it full in the face with clenched fist. There was a hoarse, strangling roar, and the seal champion was upon him with lacerating fangs.

Mànus swayed this way and that. All he could hear now was the snarling and growling and choking cries of the maddened seals. As he fell, they closed in upon him. His screams wheeled through the night like mad birds. With desperate fury he struggled to free himself. The great bull pinned him to the rock; a dozen others tore at his white flesh, till his spouting blood made the rocks scarlet in the white shine of the moon.

For a few seconds he still fought savagely, tearing with teeth and hands. Once, a red irrecognisable mass, he staggered to his knees. A wild cry burst from his lips, when from the shore-end of the reef came loud and clear the lilt of the rune of his fate.

The next moment he was dragged down and swept from the reef into the sea. As the torn and mangled body disappeared from sight, it was amid a seething crowd of leaping and struggling seals, their eyes wild with affright and fury, their fangs red with human gore.

And Gloom Achanna, turning upon the reef, moved swiftly inland, playing low on his feadan, as he went.

CRITICAL COMMENT

THE ADVENTURES OF SIMON AND SUSANNA By JOEL CHANDLER HARRIS

NO one knows when story telling began. It is as old as the human race. It goes beyond history into the unknown darkness of the past. Some of the stories we still read originated far back in primitive life. Such stories, that have been told for many years, and are common to the race, we call “Folk-Lore” stories.

Every Folk-Lore story probably began in the simplest form. Something happened,—and someone tried to tell about the event. If the story was interesting enough to repeat, it gradually became exaggerated. Thus the germ of _The Adventures of Simon and Susanna_ is the common-enough story of a successful elopement in which the cleverness of the young people,—of the girl in particular,—eluded the pursuing father. Their means of making their escape must have been quite ordinary, but when the story was told again and again,—if this really is a Folk-Lore story, the cleverness was exaggerated and gradually turned into magic.

In reading this story we come into close touch with the origin of all story telling. We see one man, a common, ignorant man, telling a story to an interested listener, and undoubtedly “putting in a few extra touches” to make the story more wonderful. The primitive stories must always have been presented orally, and at first to few listeners. Then came the days of story tellers for the crowd, and finally the written story.

The author of _The Adventures of Simon and Susanna_, Joel Chandler Harris, retold many folk-lore stories. He was born in Georgia in 1848, and died there in 1908. He devoted all his mature life to journalism and literature. His many books about Uncle Remus presented that person so clearly that the good-natured negro story teller has almost ceased to be merely a book-character, and has become a living reality.

Every story that Mr. Harris wrote has plot interest, but it also has pith and wisdom.

THE CROW-CHILD By MARY MAPES DODGE

The ordinary “Fairy Story” is a developed form of the “Folk-Lore” story. Instead of having the roughness, and naïve simplicity characteristic of primitive ways of story telling it has polish, and definite literary or moral purpose. It is not a mere wonder story told in the first person by some definite individual, and made by the exaggeration of an actual event. It is a written rather than a spoken story, based, in the remote past, on some actual event, but now told in the third person, and directed strongly to an artistic, literary purpose,—frequently to a moral purpose. In every way the best type of “Fairy Story” is a distinct advance towards developed story telling.

_The Crow Child_ is not an actual “Fairy Story,” but it illustrates remarkably well the way in which “Fairy Stories” developed. Every event in _The Crow Child_ is strictly true, but much of the story appears to be based on magic. A true story of this sort, told in primitive times, and retold again and again, with new emphasis placed on the elements of wonder, would have developed into a pure story of wonder,—a “Fairy Story.”

The author of this original, and modern, “Fairy Story,” Mary Mapes Dodge, was born in New York in 1838. For many years she was the efficient editor of _St. Nicholas_, a young people’s magazine of the highest type. In addition to her editorial work she wrote many books for young people, the most famous being _Hans Brinker, or the Silver Skates_. She died in 1905.

THE SOUL OF THE GREAT BELL By LAFCADIO HEARN

Very often the earliest stories are not crude accounts of ordinary events, exaggerated enough to be worthy of note. They are poetic narratives founded on matters of deep significance in the life of a people. All primitive people are poetic, because they see the world through the eyes of emotion rather than of scientific understanding. They also have an instinctive recognition of fundamental nobility. Therefore we have such stories as the legends of Hiawatha, in which an ideal man is presented, bringing benefit to his kind. Any story that is handed down from generation to generation, and that presents as facts matters that have no other verification, is legendary. The highest type of legendary story is one that presents high ideals.

The Chinese, whose literature is exceedingly ancient, have always been an idealistic people. It is not surprising that they should create such an appealing legendary tale as _The Soul of the Great Bell_. Although the elements are quite simple the story has been turned from being a simple account of tragic self-sacrifice, and has become an explanation of the music of the bell, as well as an example of filial devotion. The preservation of such stories shows natural appreciation of short story values.

The present rendering of _The Soul of the Great Bell_ undoubtedly far surpasses the Chinese version. The story has been appropriately introduced, amplified and given added poetic and dramatic effect by careful choice of words, descriptive passages, suspense, onomatopœia, and climax.

Lafcadio Hearn was born in 1850, of Irish and Greek parentage, in Leucadia, of the Greek Ionian Islands. At 19 he came to America and engaged in newspaper work, living at various times in New Orleans and in New York. From 1891 until his death in 1904 he made his home in Japan, where he became a Buddhist and a naturalized Japanese citizen under the name of Yakumo Koizumi. He learned to know the oriental peoples as few others have known them. His literary work is marked by poetic treatment, and an atmosphere of the Orient. He wrote _Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan_, _Out of the East_, _Some Chinese Ghosts_, and many other books on oriental subjects.

=Ta-chung sz’.= Temple of the Bell. A building in Pekin, holding the bell that is the subject of the story. The bell was made in the reign of Yong-lo, about 1406 A. D. It weighs over 120,000 pounds, and is the largest bell known to be in actual use.

=Kwang-chan-fu.= The Broad City. Canton.

THE TEN TRAILS By ERNEST THOMPSON SETON

The fable and the proverb are much alike in that both are highly condensed, and both are told to instruct. The short, direct, applied narratives known as “Fables” are among the oldest ancestors of the short story. Even in the most ancient times there were fables, those of Æsop having been told perhaps as early as the sixth century, B.C. Many familiar fables have animals for their characters, their known characteristics needing no comment. Thus the fox and the wolf appear frequently, their mere names suggesting traits of character. The fable, as a type of wisdom literature, is always short, simple, and emphatic. It always emphasizes marked human characteristics, and usually ends with a “moral” that adds to the emphasis. The influence of the fable helped to make the story short, condensed, vivid, pointed, and based on character.

_The Ten Trails_ is a modern imitation of older fables. Its directness, simplicity, clear story, and appended moral are characteristic of the type.

Ernest Thompson Seton, born in England in 1860, has written many stories in which he presents animal life with appealing sympathy. He has devoted himself particularly to cultivating a love for outdoors life, and for animate nature. _Wild Animals I Have Known_, _The Biography of a Grizzly_, and similar books, are full of original interest.

WHERE LOVE IS, THERE GOD IS ALSO By COUNT LEO TOLSTOI

An allegory is a story that has an underlying meaning or moral. It is in some ways an expanded fable, with the meaning understood rather than presented. The chief difference between the “Fable” and the “Allegory” lies in length and complexity of treatment, and in the way of presenting the underlying meaning. The “Fable” is short and usually appends the moral. The “Allegory” is usually long, and tells the story in such a way that the reader is sure to grasp the meaning without further comment. The purpose, as in the “Fable,” is double,—to tell a story, and to teach a truth. All literatures have numerous allegories, Spenser’s _Faerie Queene_, Bunyan’s _Pilgrim’s Progress_, and Tennyson’s _Idylls of the King_ being notable examples in English literature.

_Where Love Is, There God Is Also_ is an allegorical story of a pleasing type that is often found in our present-day literature. The story has such evident good humor, appreciation of the needs of humble life, and such an unselfish spirit of sympathy that it appeals to any reader. Its strong realism, effective plan, and clear, emphatic presentation make the story one of the best of its kind.

Count Leo Tolstoi, born at Yasnaya Polyana, in Russia, in 1828, and dying at Astapovo in 1910, is one of the greatest and most interesting figures in all modern literature. The story of his career, with its surprising changes from the life of a nobleman to that of a peasant, from a life given over to pleasure to a life devoted to the moral uplift of a whole people, is even more astonishing than any of the stories he told in his many works of fiction. Student, soldier, traveler, lover of social life, philosopher, reformer, and self-sacrificing idealist, he developed a personality unique in the extreme, and became a world-wide influence for good. His best known novels are _War and Peace_, and _Anna Karenina_. In them, as in all that he wrote, the notable qualities are realism, dramatic force, original thought, and courageous expression of beliefs.

=Grivenki.= A grivenka is 10 copecks, or about five cents.

WOOD-LADIES By PERCEVAL GIBBON

There is a strange fascination about the supernatural, for men of all races instinctively believe that they are surrounded by a world of good and evil that lies just beyond their touch. Some have thought the woods and mountains peopled with unseen divinities; others have believed in strange gnomes and dwarfs who are thought to live in the depths of the earth; some have believed in pale ghosts, specters that move by night, haunting the scenes of unattoned crime. One of the most pleasing beliefs is that in fairies, or “Little Folk,”—unseen, beautiful, and usually beneficent beings who live in woodland places and are endowed with all powers of magic.

Stories of the unseen world that may lie about us have appeared in all ages. Sometimes such stories have been beautiful and fanciful, and sometimes filled with the spirit of fear. In the latter part of the eighteenth century and the first of the nineteenth it became quite the fashion to tell stories of ghosts and strange terrors. Ernst Hoffmann and Ludwig Tieck in Germany set an example that was followed by Washington Irving, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Edgar Allan Poe in this country, as well as by many other writers since their time.

There is another and more healthful attitude of mind. Instead of the horror of Gothic romance it presents the fancy of Celtic thought. In stories of this gentler type one does not feel that the unseen world is wholly to be feared.

Such a story is _Wood-Ladies_, in which the spirit of Celtic fancy has found full play. In this story everything is woodsy, delicate, half-seen, as though one were treading the very edges of fairyland without knowing it. Mother-love fills the whole story and gives it a noble beauty. And yet, in a certain sense, the child, conscious of another world, is wiser than the mother. A story of this sort, dealing with the supernatural, rests the mind like sweet music.

Perceval Gibbon was born in Carmarthenshire in South Wales, in 1870. He has spent much time in the merchant service on British, French, and American vessels. He has done unusual work as war correspondent. Among his literary works are _Souls in Bondage_, _The Adventures of Miss Gregory_, _The Second Class Passenger_, and a collection of Poems. His work is marked by originality, and a clever mastery of technique.

ON THE FEVER SHIP By RICHARD HARDING DAVIS

Love is so essential a part of life that it must also be a part of literature; therefore romantic love has been a leading literary theme for centuries. Some of the world’s greatest stories of love flash into our minds when we repeat the names of Juliet, Rosalind, Portia, Elaine, and Evangeline. Such stories suggest depth of emotion, charm, womanly worth, pure and innocent love, or a love that lasts beyond the years. In the days of chivalry the knight bore his lady’s token, and fought in her honor. to-day men love just as deeply, and fight for land and hearth and sweetheart just as truly as men did in the long ago.

_On the Fever Ship_ is the story of a modern knight,—a soldier who went into his country’s war, bearing in his heart the memory of one he loved. When he is wounded, and lies fever-stricken on the deck of a transport, he does not think at all of himself but only of the one who is far away. That is the story, an abiding love in absence, with dreams at last made true.

The author makes the story notably strong and tender. Without formal introduction he presents the realistic picture of the fever ship,—the inexplicable monotony, the dream-world, the child-likeness of the wounded man’s life. Old scenes and faces come before the wounded soldier in tantalizing dreams. Little by little the author draws us closer into sympathy with the central figure. He makes us share in the man’s intensity of feeling. We feel the force of the strong episode of the somewhat unfeeling nurse, and become indignant in the man’s behalf. Finally, lifted by the power of the story, we rise with it into full comprehension of the depth of the hero’s love. Then, quickly and with artistic effect, the story comes to an end. Simply, surely, strongly, with real sentiment instead of sentimentality, it has made us realize the all-powerful force of love.

The story is written with much sympathy and evident tenderness of spirit, and is so touched with real pathos, that it comes to us as a transcription of some real story the author had found in his work as war correspondent.

Richard Harding Davis was one of the most romantic figures in recent literary life. As war correspondent he saw fighting in the Spanish-American War, the Boer War, the Japanese-Russian War, and the Great War. He traveled in all parts of Europe, in Central and in South America, and in the little-visited districts of the Congo in Africa. He saw the magnificent coronation ceremonies of the King of Spain, the King of England, and the Czar of Russia. He attended gorgeous state occasions in various lands. He also lived the hard field and camp life of a soldier and an explorer.

He wrote a number of extraordinarily good short stories, several stirring novels,—among which are _The King’s Jackal_, _Ransom’s Folly_, _The White Mice_, and _The Princess Aline_,—several plays, and a number of works of travel and war correspondence.

Richard Harding Davis was born in Philadelphia in 1864, and died in New York in 1916.

=San Juan.= A fortified hill position in Cuba, near Santiago de Cuba, captured in the Spanish-American War by the United States soldiers July 1, 1898.

=Maitre d’hotel.= Chief attendant—head-waiter.

=Embankment.= The Thames Embankment, a noted part of London.

=Chasseur.= Footman.

=Numero cinq, sur la terrace, un couvert.= Number five, on the terrace, one place.

=Baiquiri.= A landing place in Cuba near Santiago de Cuba. The United States soldiers landed here, June 21-23, 1898.

=Tampa.= A seaport in Florida.

A SOURCE OF IRRITATION By STACY AUMONIER

An interesting type of story shows an ordinary person in an extraordinary situation. In _Robinson Crusoe_, for example, an ordinary Englishman is left alone on an uninhabited island; in Stockton’s _The Casting Away of Mrs. Lecks and Mrs. Aleshine_ two good old New England women with little worldly experience are wrecked on a mysterious island in the Pacific; in Howard Pyle’s _The Ruby of Kishmore_ a peace-loving Philadelphia Quaker is suddenly involved in a series of bloody encounters in the West Indies. Such stories always arouse interest or develop humor by the astonishing contrast between setting and characters, and they always emphasize character by showing how it acts in unusual circumstances. Thus _Robinson Crusoe_ at once attracts our interest and awakens admiration for the hero.

_A Source of Irritation_ is especially clever in every way. There could be no greater contrast than that between old Sam Gates’ usual hum-drum, eventless life, and the sudden transfer to an aeroplane, a foreign land, the trenches, battle, and the search for a spy. Very rarely, too, is a character presented so emphatically as this 69-year-old gardener, with his irritable moods, his insistence on the habits of a life-time, his stolidity, and his real manliness. Equally rare is a story told so effectively, with just the proper combination of realism and romance, with quick touches of comedy and of tragedy, with a closeness to life that is indisputable, and a romance that is unusual. In its every part the story is a masterpiece of construction.

Stacy Aumonier is an Englishman of Huguenot descent.

=Swede.= A Swedish turnip.

=Shag.= A fine-cut tobacco.

“=Mare vudish.=” Merkwürdig, remarkable.

=A fearful noise.= The English made an attack on the German aeroplane.

=Uglaublich.= Incredible.

=A foreign country.= Evidently Flanders.

=Boche.= German.

=G.H.Q.= General Head Quarters.

=Norfolk.= One of the eastern counties of England, bordering on the North Sea.

MOTI GUJ—MUTINEER By RUDYARD KIPLING

One of the pleasures of life is to travel and see the world. If we are unable to travel far in reality we may at least see much of strange lands through short stories of distant places and ways of life different from the ordinary.

_Moti Guj—Mutineer_ is a story of life in India, of elephants and mahouts and strange events. It has all the atmosphere of India, given by half-humorous realistic touches that transport us from the land of everyday. It is a story of animal life, told with an intimate knowledge that shows close familiarity with “elephanthood.” Beyond that, it has what every story must have,—close relation to human character as we see it in any land at any time. Even the elephant is made to act and to think as if he were a human being. The humorous style, and the quickness with which the story is told, as well as the vivid pictures it gives, are typical of its author’s work.

Rudyard Kipling was born in Bombay, India, in 1865. After education in England he became a sub-editor of a paper published in Lahore, India, where he lived for some years, becoming intimate with all the life of the land. He has lived at various times in India, the United States, South Africa, and England. He has written a great number of astonishingly clever stories, poems, and novels, all in quick, vigorous style, with freedom from restraint, with rough realism, and with genuine humor and pathos. Among his most notable books are: _Plain Tales from the Hills_, _The Jungle Book_, _Captains Courageous_, _The Day’s Work_, and _Puck of Pook’s Hill_.

=Arrack.= A fermented drink.

=Coir-swab.= A mop made from cocoanut fiber.

GULLIVER THE GREAT By WALTER A. DYER