Part 5

Staring with a hazy glow

On the purple plain below,

Where (like burning embers shed

From the sunset's glowing bed,

Dying out or burning bright,

Every leaf a blaze of light)

Ran the maple swamps ablaze;

Everywhere amid the haze,

Floating strangely in the air,

Farms and homesteads gather'd fair;

And the River rippled slow

Thro' the marshes green and low,

Spreading oft as smooth as glass

As it fringed the meadow grass,

Making 'mong the misty fields

Pools like golden gleaming shields.

Thus I walked my steed along,

Humming a low scrap of song,

Watching with an idle eye

White clouds in the dreamy sky

Sailing with me in slow pomp.

In the bright flush of the swamp,

While his dogs bark'd in the wood,

Gun in hand the sportsman stood;

And beside me, wading deep,

Stood the angler half asleep,

Figure black against the gleam

Of the bright pools of the stream;

Now and then a wherry brown

With the current drifted down

Sunset-ward, and as it went

Made an oar-splash indolent;

While with solitary sound,

Deepening the silence round,

In a voice of mystery

Faintly cried the chickadee-

Suddenly the River's arm

Rounded, and a lonely Farm

Stood before me blazing red

To the bright blaze overhead;

In the homesteads at its side,

Cattle lowed and voices cried,

And from out the shadows dark

Came a mastiff's measured bark.

Fair and fat stood the abode

On the path by which I rode,

And a mighty orchard, strown

Still with apple-leaves wind-blown,

Raised its branches gnarl'd and bare

Black against the sunset air,

And with greensward deep and dim,

Wander'd to the River's brim.

Close beside the orchard walk

Linger'd one in quiet talk

With a man in workman's gear.

As my horse's feet drew near,

The labourer nodded rough "good-day,"

Turned his back and loung'd away.

Then the first, a plump and fat

Yeoman in a broad straw hat,

Stood alone in thought intent,

Watching while the other went,

And amid the sunlight red

Paused, with hand held to his head.

In a moment, like a word

Long forgotten until heard,

Like a buried sentiment

Born again to some stray scent,

Like a sound to which the brain

Gives familiar refrain,

Something in the gesture brought

Things forgotten to my thought;

Memory, as I watched the sight.

Flashed from eager light to light

Remember'd and remember'd not,

Half familiar, half forgot.

Stood the figure, till at last,

Bending eyes on his, I passed,

Gazed again, as loth to go,

Drew the rein, stopt short, and so

Rested, looking back; when he,

The object of my scrutiny,

Smiled and nodded, saying, "Yes!

Stare your fill, young man! I guess

You'll know me if we meet again!"

In a moment all my brain

Was illumined at the tone,

All was vivid that had grown

Faint and dim, and straight I knew; him,

Holding out my hand unto him,

Smiled, and called him by his name.

Wondering, hearing me exclaim.

Abraham Clewson (for'twas he)

Came more close and gazed at me,

As he gazed, a merry grin

Brighten'd down from eyes to chin:

In a moment he, too, knew me,

Reaching out his hand unto me,

Crying "Track'd, by all that's blue

Who'd have thought of seeing _you?_

Then, in double quicker time

Than it takes to make the rhyme,

Abe, with face of welcome bright,

Made me from my steed alight;

Call'd a boy, and bade him lead

The beast away to bed and feed;

And, with hand upon my arm,

Led me off into the Farm,

Where, amid a dwelling-place

Fresh and bright as her own face,

With a gleam of shining ware

For a background everywhere,

Free as any summer breeze,

With a bunch of huswife's keys

At her girdle, sweet and mild

Sister Annie blush'd and smiled,--

While two tiny laughing girls,

Peeping at me through their curls,

Hid their sweet shamefacëdness

In the skirts of Annie's dress.

*****

That same night the Saint and I

Sat and talked of times gone by,

Smoked our pipes and drank our grog

By the slowly smouldering log,

While the clock's hand slowly crept

To midnight, and the household slept

"Happy?" Abe said with a smile,

"Yes, in my _inferior_ style,

Meek and humble, not like them

In the New Jerusalem."

Here his hand, as if astray,

For a moment found its way

To his forehead, as he said,

"Reckon they believe I'm dead?

Ah, that life of sanctity

Never was the life for me.

Couldn't stand it wet nor dry,

Hated to see women cry;

Couldn't bear to be the cause

Of tiffs and squalls and endless jaws

Always felt amid the stir

Jest a whited sepulchre;

And I did the best I could

When I ran away for good.

Yet, for many a night, you know

(Annie, too, would tell you so),

Couldn't sleep a single wink,

Couldn't eat, and couldn't drink,

Being kind of conscience-cleft

For those poor creatures I had left,

Not till I got news from there,

And I found their fate was fair,

Could I set to work, or find

Any comfort in my mind.

Well (here Abe smiled quietly),

Guess they didn't groan for me!

Fanny and Amelia got

Sealed to Brigham on the spot;

Emmy soon consoled herself

In the arms of Brother Delf;

And poor Mary one fine day

Packed her traps and tript away

Down to Fresco with Fred Bates,

A young player from the States:

While Sarah,'twas the wisest plan,

Pick'd herself a single man--

A young joiner fresh come down

Out of Texas to the town--

And he took her with her baby,

And they're doing well as maybe.'"

Here the Saint with quiet smile,

Sipping at his grog the while,

Paused as if his tale was o'er,

Held his tongue and said no more.

"Good," I said, "but have you done?

You have spoke of all save one--

All your Widows, so bereft,

Are most comfortably left,

But of one alone you said

Nothing. Is the lady _dead?"

Then the good man's features broke

Into brightness as I spoke,

And with loud guffaw cried he,

"What, Tabitha? Dead! Not she.

All alone and doing splendid--

Jest you guess, now, how she's ended!

Give it up? This very week

I heard she's at Oneida Creek,

All alone and doing hearty,

Down with Brother Noyes's party.

Tried the Shakers first, they say,

Tired of them and went away,

Testing with a deal of bother

This community and t'other,

Till she to Oneida flitted,

And with trouble got admitted.

Bless you, she's a shining lamp,

Tho' I used her like a scamp,

And she's great in exposition

Of the Free Love folk's condition,

Vowing, tho' she found it late,

Tis the only happy state....

"As for me," added the speaker,

"I'm lower in the scale, and weaker;

Polygamy's beyond my merits,

Shakerism wears the spirits,

And as for Free Love, why you see

(Here the Saint wink'd wickedly)

With my whim it might have hung

Once, when I was spry and young;

But poor Annie's love alone

Keeps my mind in proper tone,

And tho' my spirit mayn't be strong,

I'm lively--as the day is long."

As he spoke with half a yawn,

Half a smile, I saw the dawn

Creeping faint into the gloom

Of the quickly-chilling room.

On the hearth the wood-log lay,

With one last expiring ray;

Draining off his glass of grog,

Clewson rose and kick'd the log;

As it crumbled into ashes,

Watched the last expiring flashes,

Gave another yawn and said,

"Well! I guess it's time for bed!"

THE END.

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE ON ST. ABE AND HIS SEVEN WIVES.

St. Abe and his Seven Wives was written in 1870, at a time when all the Cockney bastions of criticism were swarming with sharp-shooters on the look-out for "the d------d Scotchman" who had dared to denounce Logrolling. It was published anonymously, and simultaneously _The Drama of Kings_ appeared with the author's name. The _Drama_ was torn to shreds in every newspaper; the Satire, because no one suspected who had written it, was at once hailed as a masterpiece. Even the _Athenaum_ cried "all hail" to the illustrious Unknown. The _Pall Mall Gazette_ avowed in one breath that Robert Buchanan was utterly devoid of dramatic power, while the author of _St. Abe_ was a man of dramatic genius. The secret was well kept, and the bewildered Cocknies did not cease braying their hosannahs even when another anonymous work, _White Rose and Red_, was issued by the same publisher. _St. Abe_ went through numerous editions in a very short space of time.

To one familiar with the process of book-reviewing, and aware of the curious futility of even honest literary judgments, there is nothing extraordinary in the facts which I have just stated. Printed cackle about books will always be about as valuable as spoken cackle about them, and the history of literature is one long record of the march of genius through regions of mountainous stupidity. But there were some points about the treatment of _St. Abe_ which are worth noting, as illustrating the way in which reviewing "is done" for leading newspapers. Example. The publisher sent out "early sheets" to the great dailies, several of which printed eulogistic reviews. The _Daily Telegraph_, however, was cautious. After receiving the sheets, the acting or sub-editor sent a message round to the publisher saying that a cordial review had been written and was in type, but that "the Chief" wanted to be assured, before committing himself to such an advertisement, about the authorship of the work. "_Is_ it by _Lowell?_" queried the jack-in-office; "only inform us in confidence, and the review shall appear." Mr. Strahan either did not reply, or refused to answer the question. Result--the cordial review never appeared at all!

The general impression, however, was that the poem was written by James Russell Lowell. One or two kind critics suggested Bret Harte, but these were in a minority. No one suspected for one moment that the work was written by a Scotchman who, up to that date, had never even visited America. The _Spectator_ (A Daniel come to judgment!) devoted a long leading article to proving that humour of this particular kind could have been produced only in the Far West, while a leading magazine bewailed the fact that we had no such humourists in England, since "with Thackeray our last writer of humour left us."

In America itself, the success of the book was less remarkable, and the explanation was given to me in a letter from a publisher in the States, who asserted that public feeling against the Mormons was so fierce and bitter that even a joke at their expense could not be appreciated. "The very subject of Mormondom," wrote my friend, "is regarded as indecent, unsavoury, and offensive." In spite of all, the satire was appreciated, even in America.

Already, however, its subject has ceased to be contemporary and become historical. Mormonism, as I depicted it, is as dead as Slavery, for the Yankee--as I foreshadowed he would do, in this very book--has put down Polygamy. Future generations, therefore, may turn to this book as they will turn to _Uncle Tom's Cabin_, for a record of a system which once flourished, and which, when all is said and done, did quite as much good as harm. I confess, indeed, that I am sorry for the Mormons; for I think that they are more sinned against than sinning. Polygamy is abolished in America, but a far fouler evil, Prostitution, flourishes, in both public and private life. The Mormons crushed this evil and obliterated it altogether, and if they substituted Polygamy, they only did openly and politically what is done, and must be done, clandestinely, in every country, under the present conditions of our civilisation.

The present is the first cheap edition of the book, and the first which bears the author's name on the title page. It will be followed by a cheap edition of _White Rose and Red_. I shall be quite prepared to hear now, on the authority of the newspapers, that the eulogy given to _St. Abe_ on its first appearance was all a mistake, and that the writer possesses no humour whatsoever. I was informed, indeed, the other day, by a critic in the _Daily News_, that most of my aberrations proceeded from "a fatal want of humour." The critic was reviewing the _Devil's Case_, and his suggestion was, I presume, that I ought to have perceived the joke of the Nonconformist Conscience and latterday Christianity. I thought that I had done so, but it appears that I had not been funny at all, or not funny enough. But my real misfortune was, that my name was printed on the title page of the work then under review.

I cannot conclude this bibliographical note without a word concerning the remarkable artist who furnished _St. Abe and his Seven Wives_ with its original frontispiece. The genius of the late A. B. Houghton is at last receiving some kind of tardy recognition, chiefly through the efforts of Mr. Pennell, whose criticisms on art have done so much to free the air of lingering folly and superstition. When I sought out Mr. Houghton, and persuaded him to put pencil to paper on my behalf, he was in the midst of his life-long struggle against the powers of darkness. He died not long afterwards, prematurely worn out with the hopeless fight. One of the last of the true Bohemians, a man of undoubted genius, he never learned the trick of wearing fine linen and touting for popularity; but those who value good work hold him in grateful remembrance, and I am proud to think that so great a master in black and white honoured me by associating himself with a book of mine.

Robert Buchanan.

ORIGINALLY PREFACED TO SAINT ABE AND HIS SEVEN WIVES.

TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS.

I. From P----------t G------t, U.S.

Smart. Polygamy is Greek for Secesh. Guess Brigham will have to make tracks.

II. From R. W. E------n, Boston, U.S.

Adequate expression is rare. I had fancied the oracles were dumb, and had returned with a sigh to the enervating society of my friends in Boston, when your book reached me. To think of it! In this very epoch, at this very day, poetry has been secreting itself silently and surely, and suddenly the whole ocean of human thought is illumined by the accumulated phosphoresence of a subtle and startling poetic life.. . . Your work is the story of Polygamy written in colossal cipher the study of all forthcoming ages. Triflers will call you a caricaturist, empty solemnities will deem you a jester. Fools! who miss the pathetic symbolism of Falstaff, and deem the Rabelaisan epos fit food for mirth.... I read it from first page to last with solemn thoughts too deep for tears. I class you already with the creators, with Shakespere, Dante, Whitman, Ellery Channing, and myself.

III. From W------t W----------n, Washington, U.S.

I

Our own feuillage;

A leaf from the sweating branches of these States;

A fallen symbol, I guess, vegetable, living, human;

A heart-beat from the hairy breast of a man.

2

The Salon contents me not;

The fine feathers of New England damsels content me not;

The ways of snobs, the falsettos of the primo tenore, the legs

of Lydia Thomson's troupe of blondes, content me not;

Nor tea-drinking, nor the twaddle of Mr. Secretary Harlan,

nor the loafers of the hotel bar, nor Sham, nor Long-

fellow's Village Blacksmith.

3

But the Prairies content me;

And the Red Indian dragging along his squaw by the scruff of

the neck;

And the bones of mules and adventurous persons in Bitter

Creek;

And the oaths of pioneers, and the ways of the unwashed,

large, undulating, majestic, virile, strong of scent, all

these content me.

4

Utah contents me;

The City by the margin of the great Salt Lake contents me;

And to have many wives contents me;

Blessed is he who has a hundred wives, and peoples the

solitudes of these States.

5

Great is Brigham;

Great is polygamy, great is monogamy, great is polyandry,

great is license, great is right, and great is wrong;

And I say again that wrong is every whit as good as right, and

not one jot better;

And I say further there is no such thing as wrong, nor any

such thing as right, and that neither are accountable, and

both exist only by allowance.

6

O I am wonderful;

And the world, and the sea, and joy and sorrow, and sense

and nonsense, all content me;

And this book contents me, with its feuillage from the City of

many wives.

IV. From Elder F------k E----------s, of Mt. L------n, U.S.

An amusing attempt to show that polygamy is a social failure. None can peruse it without perceiving at once that the author secretly inclines to the ascetic tenets of Shakerism.

V. From Brother T. H. N------s, O----------a C--------k.

After perusing this subtle study, who can doubt that Free Love is the natural human condition? The utter selfishness of the wretched monogamist-hero repels and sickens us; nor can we look with anything but disgust on the obtusity of the heroine, in whom the author vainly tries to awaken interest. It is quite clear that the reconstruction of Utah on O--------a C------k principles would yet save the State from the crash which is impending.

VI. From E---------a F-------n H-------m, of S----------n Island.

If _Polygamy_ is to continue, then, I say, let _Polyandry_ flourish! Woman is the sublimer Being, the subtler Type, the more delicate Mechanism, and, strictly speaking, _needs_ many pendants of the inferior or masculine Type to fulfil her mission in perfect comfort. Shall Brigham Young, a mere Man, have sixteen wives; and shall one wretched piece of humanity content _me_, that supreme Fact, _a perfect Woman_, highest and truest of beings under God? No; if these things be tolerated, I claim for each Woman, in the name of Light and Law, twenty ministering attendants of the lower race; and the day is near when, if this boon, or any other boon we like to ask, be denied us, it will be _taken with a strong hand!_

VII. From T------s C--------e, Esq., Chelsea, England.

The titanic humour of the Conception does not blind me to the radical falseness of the Teaching, wherein, as I shall show you presently, you somewhat resemble the miserable Homunculi of our I own literary Wagners; for, if I rightly conceive, you would tacitly and by inference urge that it is expressly part of the Divine Thought that the _Ewigweibliche_, or Woman-Soul, should be _happy_. Now Woman's _mundane_ unhappiness, as I construe, comes of her inadequacy; it is the stirring within her of the Infinite against the Finite, a struggle of the spark upward, of the lower to the higher Symbol. Will Woman's Rights Agitators, and Monogamy, and Political Tomfoolery, do what Millinery has failed to do, and waken one Female to the sense of divine Function? It is not _happiness_ I solicit for the Woman-Soul, but _Identity_; and the prerogative of Identity is great work, Adequacy, pre-eminent fulfilment of the Function; woman, in this country of rags and shams, being buried quick under masses of Sophistication and Upholstery, oblivious of her divine duty to increase the population and train the young masculine Idea starward. I do not care if the wives of Deseret are pale, or faint, or uncultured, or unhappy; it is enough for me to know that they have a numerous progeny, and believe in Deity or the Divine Essence; and I will not conclude this letter without recording my conviction that yonder man, Brigham Young by name, is perhaps the clearest Intellect now brooding on this planet; that Friedrich was royaller but not greater, and that Bismarck is no more than his equal; and that he, this American, few in words, mark you, but great in deeds, has decided a more stupendous Question than ever puzzled the strength of either of those others,--the Question of the Sphere and Function in modern life of the ever-agitating _Feminine Principle_. If, furthermore, as I have ever held, the test of clearness of intellect and greatness of soul be _Success_, at any price and under any circumstances, none but a transcendental Windbag or a pedantic Baccalaureus will doubt my assertion that Young is a stupendous intellectual, ethical, and political Force--a Master-Spirit--a Colossal Being, a moral Architect of sublime cunning--as such to be reverenced by every right-thinking _Man_ under the Sun.

VIII. From J------n R------n, Esq., London.

I am not generally appreciated in my own country, because I frequently change my views about religion, art, architecture, poetry, and things in general. Most of my early writings are twaddle, but my present opinions are all valuable. I think this poem, with its nervous Saxon Diction, its subtle humour, its tender pathos and piteousness, the noblest specimen of narrative verse of modern times; and, indeed, I know not where to look, out of the pages of Chaucer, for an equally successful blending of human laughter and ethereal mystery. At the same time, the writer scarcely does justice to the subject on the aesthetic side. A City where the streets are broad and clean and well-watered, the houses surrounded by gardens full of fruit and flowers; where the children, with shining, clean-washed faces, curtsey to the Philosophers in the public places; where there are no brothels and no hells; where life runs fresh, free, and unpolluted,--such a City, I say, can hardly be the symbol of feminine degradation. More than once, tired of publishing my prophetic warnings in the _Daily Telegraph_, I have thought of bending my weary footsteps to the new Jerusalem; and I might have carried out my intention long ago, if I had had a less profound sense of my own unfitness for the duties of a Saint.

IX. From M--------w A--------d, Esq., England.

Your poem possesses a certain rough primitive humour, though it appears to me deficient in the higher graces of _sweetness_ and _light._ St. Paul would have entirely objected to the monogamical inference drawn in your epilogue; and the fact that you draw any such inference at all is to me a distressing proof that your tendency is to the Philistinism of those authors who write for the British Matron. I fear you have not read "Merope."

SOME NOTICES OF THE FIRST EDITION.

From the "GRAPHIC."

"Such vigorous, racy, determined satire has not been met with for many a long day. It is at once fresh and salt as the sea.... The humour is exquisite, and as regards literary execution, the work is masterly."

From the "PALL MALL GAZETTE."

"Although in a striking address to Chaucer the author intimates an expectation that Prudery may turn from his pages, and though his theme is certainly a delicate one, there is nothing in the book that a modest man may not read without blinking, and therefore, we suppose, no modest woman. On the other hand, the whole poem is marked with so much natural strength, so much of the inborn faculties of literature--(though they are wielded in a light, easy, trifling way)--that they take possession of our admiration as of right. The chief characteristics of the book are mastery of verse, strong and simple diction, delicate, accurate description of scenery, and that quick and forcible discrimination of character which belongs to men of dramatic genius. This has the look of exaggerated praise. We propose, therefore, to give one or two large samples of the author's quality, leaving our readers to judge from them whether we are not probably right. If they turn to the book and read it through, we do not doubt that they will agree with us."

From the "ILLUSTRATED REVIEW."

"The tale, however, is not to be read from reviews.... The variety of interest, the versatility of fancy, the richness of description with which the different lays and cantos are replete, will preclude the possibility of tediousness. To open the book is to read it to the end. It is like some Greek comedy in its shifting scenes, its vivid pictures, its rapidly passing 'dramatis personae' and supernumeraries.. .. The author of 'St. Abe,' who can write like this, may do more if he will, and even found a new school of realistic and satirical poetry."

From the "DAILY NEWS."