Part 7
There are many people who falter and tremble as long as there is any mixture of doubt in their minds as to what they can, or what they ought to do, but who, the moment that doubt ceases, have power and will to dare every thing.
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_The Drowning Fly._
In yonder glass behold a drowning fly, Its little feet how vainly does it ply! Its cries we hear not, yet it loudly cries; And gentle hearts can feel its agonies. Poor helpless victim! and will no one save? Will no one snatch thee from the threat’ning wave? Is there no friendly hand, no helper nigh? And must thou, little struggler, must thou die? Thou shalt not, whilst this hand can set thee free, Thou shalt not die; this hand shall rescue thee. My finger’s tip shall prove a friendly shore; There, trembler, all thy dangers now are o’er. Wipe thy wet wings, and banish all thy fear; Go, join thy num’rous kindred in the air. Away it flies, resumes its harmless play, And lightly gambols in the golden ray.
Smile not, spectators, at this humble deed; For you, perhaps, a nobler task’s decreed!
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[Sidenote: Mulgrave Family.]
The first diving bell was nothing but a very large kettle, suspended by ropes, with the mouth downwards, and planks to sit on fixed in the middle of its concavity. The Greeks at Toledo, in 1588, made an experiment before the Emperor Charles V. with it, when they descended with a lighted candle to a considerable depth. In 1683, William Phipps, the son of a blacksmith, formed a project for unloading a rich Spanish ship, sunk at Hispaniola; Charles II. gave him a ship, with every necessary for the undertaking, but being unsuccessful, Phipps returned in great poverty. He then endeavoured to procure another vessel, but failing, he got a subscription, to which the Duke of Albemarle contributed. In 1687, Phipps set sail in a ship of 200 tons, having previously engaged to divide the profits according to the twenty shares of which the subscription consisted. At first all his labours proved fruitless, but at length, when he seemed almost to despair, he was fortunate enough to bring up so much treasure that he returned to England with £200,000 sterling. Of this sum he got about £20,000, and the Duke of Albemarle £90,000. Phipps was knighted by the King, and laid the foundation of the present house of Mulgrave.
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[Sidenote: Le Bonheur.]
Il ne faut jamais renoncer au bonheur. Les sources du bien et du mal sont cachées, et nous ignorons laquelle doit s’ouvrir pour arroser l’espace de la vie.
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After the massacre of St. Bartholomew, the following lines were stuck up in every part of France:
L’on demande la convenance De Catherine et Jesabel, L’une Reine d’Israel, L’autre Reine de la France, L’une étoit de malice extrême, Et l’autre est la malice même; Enfin le jugement est tel, Par une vengeance divine, Les chiens mangèrent Jesabel, La charogne de Catherine Sera différente en ce cas, Car les chiens n’en voudront pas!
The murders that Catherine is accused of, with too great probability, are a fearful list: Queen Jane of Navarre, her own son Charles IX. the Viscount de Chartres, the Secretary Lomerica, Du Guast, favourite of Henri III. and others ad infinitum.
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[Sidenote: Epitaph.]
I’ve lost my mistress, horse, and wife, And when I think on human life, It’s well it is no worse; My mistress violent and bold, My wife curst ugly and a scold; I’m sorry for my horse!
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[Sidenote: Prosperity and Adversity.]
The virtue of prosperity is temperance. The virtue of adversity is fortitude. Prosperity is not without many fears and distastes; and adversity is not without comforts and hopes. We see in needle-works and embroidery it is more pleasing to have a lively work upon a sad and solemn ground, than to have a dark and melancholy work upon a lightsome ground. Judge therefore of the pleasure of the heart by the pleasure of the eye. Certainly, virtue is like precious odours, most fragrant when they are incensed or crushed; for prosperity doth best discover vice, but adversity doth best discover virtue.
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[Sidenote: Condé.]
“On marche lentement, sous le poids des Lauriers,” was the answer of Louis XIV. to the apology of the great, but gouty Condé, for detaining him on the staircase of Versailles.
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[Sidenote: Resignation.]
“The miseries, the calamities, the heart-rendings, and the tears, which are so intimately interwoven by the great Artist in our natures as not to be separated in a single instance, are in the first place, our security of a future state, and in the next place, seem to slope the way before us, and by gradual operation fit our minds for viewing, with some sort of fortitude, that hideous chasm that lies between us and that state, death. View those miseries, then, as the special acts of mercy and commiseration of a beneficent Creator, who with every calamity, melts away a link of that earthly chain that fetters our wishes to this dismal world. Accept his blessings and his goods when he sends them, with gratitude and enjoyment; receive his afflictions too with as joyous acceptance, and as hearty gratitude.
Thus, and not otherwise, you will realize all your Utopian flights of desire; by turning every thing to matter of comfort, and living contented with dispensations which you cannot alter, and if you could, would most assuredly alter for the worse. So limited is man, so imperfect in his nature, that the extent of his virtues borders on vice, and the extent of his wisdom on error.”
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[Sidenote: Le Tems.]
Le tems passe, la vie s’écoule, l’homme meurt et s’anéantit; rien ne lui survit que le bien ou le mal qu’il a fait.
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The good things which belong to _prosperity_ are to be wished, but the good things that belong to _adversity_ are to be admired.
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[Sidenote: Maréchale de Luxembourg.]
La Maréchale de Luxembourg retirait de ses promenades deux effets très-salutaires, l’exercice du corps, et la satisfaction de faire du bien; car pour ne pas être prise au dépourvu elle imagina de remplir la pomme de sa longue canne de pièces de monnaie. La Maréchale aimait les inventions singulières. Un jour, qu’elle avait une fluxion, elle imagina de faire monter une chaise à porteur dans son salon, et elle s’y trouva si bien qu’elle y resta tout l’hiver. Quel est le plus grand des deux? lui demanda-t-on, La Fontaine, ou Molière?--Celui-ci, répondit-elle, sans balancer, en montrant La Fontaine, est plus parfait, dans un genre moins parfait.
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[Sidenote: The Spider.]
It is an oriental idea, that the spider draws its venom from the rose; and thus it is that too often from the sweetest sources comes the blight of happiness and human affections.
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[Sidenote: Sur Fénélon.]
Sous cette pierre repose Fénélon; Passant, n’efface point par tes pleurs cette épitaphe, afin que d’autres la lisent, et pleurent comme toi.
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[Sidenote: Flowers.]
“Flowers are one of the many beautiful gifts of God to man.”
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[Sidenote: To-morrow.]
See where the falling day In silence steals away, Behind the western hills withdrawn; Her fires are quench’d, her beauty fled, With blushes all her face o’erspread, As conscious she had ill fulfill’d The promise of the dawn.
Another morning soon shall rise, Another day salute our eyes, As smiling and as fair as she, And make as many promises. But do not thou The tale believe, They’re sisters all Born to deceive.
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_Letter of Marian Delorme to M. de Cinq. Mars._
Paris, Feb. 1641. My dear Effiat,
While you are forgetting me at Narbonne, and giving yourself up to the pleasures of the court and the delight of thwarting M. le Cardinal de Richelieu, I, according to your express desire, am doing the honours of Paris to your English lord, the Marquis of Worcester; and I carry him about, or rather he carries me, from curiosity to curiosity, choosing always the most grave and serious, speaking very little, listening with extreme attention, and fixing on those whom he interrogates two large blue eyes, which seem to pierce to the very centre of their thoughts. He is remarkable for never being satisfied with any explanations which are given him; and he never sees things in the light in which they are shown him: you may judge of this by a visit we made together to Bicêtre, where he imagined he had discovered a genius in a madman. If this madman had not been actually raving, I verily believe your Marquis would have entreated his liberty, and have carried him off to London, in order to hear his extravagancies, from morning till night, at his ease. We were crossing the court of the madhouse, and I, more dead than alive with fright, kept close to my companion’s side, when a frightful face appeared behind some immense bars, and a hoarse voice exclaimed, “I am not mad! I am not mad! I have made a discovery which would enrich the country that adopted it.” “What has he discovered?” I asked of our guide. “Oh!” he answered, shrugging his shoulders, “something trifling enough; you would never guess it: it is the use of the steam of boiling water.” I began to laugh. “This man,” continued the keeper, “is named Solomon de Caus: he came from Normandy four years ago, to present to the king a statement of the wonderful effects that might be produced from his invention. To listen to him, you would imagine that with steam you could navigate ships, move carriages, in fact, there is no end to the miracles which, he insists upon it, could be performed. The Cardinal sent the madman away without listening to him. Solomon de Caus, far from being discouraged, followed the Cardinal wherever he went, with the most determined perseverance, who, tired of finding him for ever in his path, and annoyed to death with his folly, ordered him to be shut up in Bicêtre, where he has now been for three years and a half, and where, as you hear, he calls out to every visitor that he is not mad, but that he has made a valuable discovery. He has even written a book on the subject, which I have here.”[6] Lord Worcester, who had listened to this account with much interest, after reflecting a time, asked for the book, of which, after having read several pages, he said, “This man is not mad. In my country, instead of shutting him up, he would have been rewarded. Take me to him, for I should like to ask him some questions.”
He was, accordingly, conducted to his cell, but after a short time, he came back sad and thoughtful--“He is, indeed, mad now,” said he, “misfortune and captivity have alienated his reason, but it is you who have to answer for his madness: when you cast him into that cell, you confined the greatest genius of the age.”
After this, we went away, and since that time he has done nothing but talk of Solomon de Caus.
Adieu, my dear friend and faithful Henry. Make haste and come back, and pray do not be so happy where you are, as not to keep a little love for me.
MARIAN DELORME.
[6] This book is entitled, “Les raisons de forces mouvantes avec diverses machines tant utiles que puissantes.” Published 1615.
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[Sidenote: Physiognomy.]
Was there ever seen a smile on the lip, with which the upper part of the face agrees not in expression, that was not evidently feigned and forced,[7] to be the disguise of a mind ill at ease, and of a sick spirit? The mind looks through the eyes, and the brow should smile in unison with the lip, to show the joy sincere.
[7] This was uniformly remarked of Napoleon’s smile.
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[Sidenote: A Father’s Death Bed.]
How solemn is the sick man’s room, To friends or kindred lingering near; Poring on that uncertain gloom In silent heaviness and fear!
How sad, his feeble hand in thine, The start of every pulse to share; With painful haste each wish divine, Yet feel the hopelessness of care.
To turn aside the full fraught eye, Lest those faint orbs perceive the tear; To bear the weight of every sigh, Lest it should reach that wakeful ear.
In the dead stillness of the night, To lose the faint, faint sound of breath; To listen in restrain’d affright, To deprecate each thought of death.
And when a movement chased that fear, And gave thy heart-blood leave to flow, In thrilling awe the prayer to hear, Through the clos’d curtain murmur’d low.
The prayer of him whose holy tongue Had never yet exceeded truth; Upon whose guardian care had hung The whole dependance of thy youth.
Who noble, dauntless, frank, and mild, Was for his very goodness fear’d; Beloved with fondness like a child, And like a blessed saint rever’d.
I have known friends--but who can feel The kindness such a father knew? I serv’d him still with tender zeal, But knew not then how much was due.
And did not Providence ordain That we should soon be laid as low, No heart could such a stroke sustain, No reason would survive the blow.
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[Sidenote: The Plague.]
The fearful progress and effects of the dreadful pestilence which visited England during the reign of Edward III. are traced by a masterly hand in the work from which this extract is made.
“In the malignancy of this extraordinary disease, it engrossed the ill of all other maladies, and made doctors despicable. Of a potency equal to death, it possessed itself of all its armouries, and was itself the death of every other mortal distemper. The touch, yea, the very sight of the infected was deadly; and its signs were so sudden, that families seated in happiness at their meals, have seen the _plague-spot_ begin to redden, and have wildly scattered themselves for ever. The cement of society was dissolved by it. Mothers, when they saw the sign of the infection on the babes at their bosom cast them from them with abhorrence. Wild places were sought for shelter: some went into ships, and anchored themselves afar off on the waters. But the angel that was pouring the vial had a foot on the sea as well as on the dry land. No place was so wild that the plague did not visit,--none so secret that the quick-sighted pestilence did not discover--none could fly that it did not overtake.
“It was as if Heaven had repented the making of mankind, and was shovelling them all into the sepulchre. Justice was forgotten, and her courts deserted. The terrified jailors fled from the felons that were in fetters; the innocent and the guilty leagued themselves together, and kept within their prisons for safety; the grass grew in the market places; the cattle went moaning up and down the fields, wondering what had become of their keepers: the rooks and the ravens came into the towns, and built their nests in the mute belfries; silence was universal, save when some infected wretch was seen clamouring at a window.
“For a time all commerce was in coffins and shrouds; but even that ended. Shrift there was none; churches and chapels were open, but neither priests nor penitent entered; all went to the charnel-house. The sexton and the physician were cast into the same deep and wide grave; the testator and his heirs and executors were hurled from the same cart into the same hole together. Fire became extinguished, as if its element too had expired; the seams of the sailorless ships yawned to the sun. Though doors were open, and coffers unwatched, there was no theft; all offences ceased, and no cry but the universal woe of the pestilence was heard of among men. The wells overflowed, and the conduits ran to waste; the dogs banded themselves together, having lost their masters and ran howling over all the land; horses perished of famine in their stalls; old friends but looked at one another when they met, keeping themselves far aloof; creditors claimed no debts, and courtiers performed their promises; little children went wandering up and down, and numbers were seen dead in all corners. Nor was it only in England that the plague raged; it travelled over a third part of the whole earth, like the shadow of an eclipse, as if some dreadful thing had been interposed between the world and the sun-source of life.”
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[Sidenote: Trifles.]
Since trifles make the sum of human things, And half our misery from trifles springs, Since life’s best joys consist in peace and ease, And few can serve, or save, but all may please, Oh! let the ungentle spirit learn from hence, A small unkindness is a great offence! Large bounties to bestow, we wish in vain, But all may shun the guilt of giving pain. To bless mankind with tides of flowing wealth, With power to give them, or to crown with health, Our little lot denies.--But Heaven decrees To all the gift of minist’ring to ease! The gentle offerings of patient love, Beyond all flattery, and all praise above; The mild forbearance of another’s fault, The taunting word suppress’d as soon as thought; On these Heaven made the bliss of man depend, And crush’d misfortune, when it made a _friend_. A solitary blessing few can find: Our joys, with those we love, are intertwined. And he whose helpful tenderness removes Th’ obstructing thorn that wounds the breast he loves, Smooths not another’s rugged path alone, But scatters roses to adorn his own!
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So little resemblance in character was there between Margaret of Anjou, wife of Henry VI. and her father Renè, King of Sicily and Jerusalem, that it is related of him, that when the news of the loss of one of his kingdoms was brought to him, while he was engaged in painting a partridge from nature, he paid no attention to the communication, nor would he see the messenger till he had given the finishing strokes to his design. Renè’s compositions in music, are at this very time the delight of his native country, and indeed of Europe. He was the inventor of the Opera ballet; and the drama of _La Tentation_, lately revived with so much splendour at Paris in 1832, was originally composed by this Prince. The wild story is his own, and the delightful melodies his composition, which have been merely tamed and regulated by modern art. This Prince, adored for his beneficence by his people, who named him the “_Good_,” was scorned by the destructive nobles of his era as _fainéant_ and feeble-minded. After the death of his first wife, Isabella of Lorraine, he married Jeanne de Lovel. She was of so grave a character, that she was never known to laugh but once, at a pageant devised by her royal husband--namely, a boat filled with water-pipes, which played on every side, and completely drenched the spectators that did not use some agility in getting out of the way.
Margaret’s elder sister, Yolente, survived her two years; she had a beautiful daughter called Margaret of Anjou the younger. Maria Louisa, Napoleon’s Empress, possessed the breviary of this Princess, in which there is one sentence supposed to have been written by the once beautiful, powerful, and admired Margaret, Queen of England, her aunt:
“Vanité des vanités, tout est vanité.”
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_To Julia._
Sweet, be not proud of those fair eyes, Which star-like sparkle in their skies; Be ye not proud of that rich hair, Which wantons in the love-sick air, Nor be you proud because you see All hearts your captives, yours yet free. When as that jewel which you wear Sunk from the tip of your soft ear, Will last to be a precious stone, When all your world of beauty’s gone.
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[Sidenote: Good Nature.]
Good nature must be a qualification peculiar to the English, as it is remarkable that there is no term for it in any other language.
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Among the most beautiful of the Welsh Melodies still exists the well known air of “Sweet Richard.” Tradition declares this melody was composed by Owen Glendower, as a tribute of regret to his Prince, it was afterwards sung and played in the many risings in favour of Richard II. with the same powerful effect that the celebrated Jacobite airs had on the partisans of the house of Stuart.
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The following touching lines, which have been attributed to Henry VI. were probably written during his long imprisonment in the Tower.
“Kingdoms are but cares, State is devoid of stay; Riches are ready snares, And hasten to decay.
Who meaneth to remove the rock Out of his slimy mud, Shall mire himself, and hardly ’scape The swelling of the flood.”
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[Sidenote: Manner.]
There is no policy like politeness; and a good manner is the best thing in the world, either to get a good name or to supply the want of it.
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_Found in Sir Walter Raleigh’s Bible in the Gate House at Westminster._
Even such is time, that takes on trust Our youth, our joys, our all we have, And pays us but with age and dust; Who in the dark and silent grave, When we have wandered all our ways, Shuts up the story of our days! But from this earth, this grave, this dust, The Lord shall raise me up, I trust.
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_Speech of a Shawanese Chief to Lord Dunmore._
“I appeal to any white man to-day, if ever he entered Logan’s cabin hungry, and he gave him not meat; if he ever came cold or naked, and he gave him not clothing. During the last long and bloody war, Logan remained idle, ignominious in his cabin, an advocate for peace. Such was my love of the Whites, that those of my own country pointed at me as I went by, and said, Logan is the friend of white men! I had even thought to live with you, but the iniquities of one among you did away that thought, and dragged me from my cabin of peace. Colonel Cressop the last spring, in cold blood, cut off all the relations of Logan, sparing neither woman nor child. There runs not a drop of the blood of Logan in the veins of any human creature. This called on me for revenge; I have sought it; I have killed many; revenge has been fully glutted.
“For my country, I rejoice at the beams of peace; but harbour not the thought, that mine is the joy of fear. Logan never felt fear; he will not turn his heel to save his life. Who is there to mourn for Logan?--not one.”
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[Sidenote: Costume of a Greek Woman.]
Over the petticoat a loose jacket of white cloth, reaching to the knee, and open in front; its edges and sleeves wrought very tastefully with red cord. The head dress was composed entirely of money. A fillet of gold sequins was first put, _à la feronière_, around the forehead, and a close cap, with a throat piece like the gorget of a helmet, fitted the skull exactly, stitched with coins of all values, folded over each other according to their sizes, like scales. The hair was then braided, and fell down the back, loaded also with money. The greater proportion of pieces are _paras_, a small and thin Turkish coin of small value. Among the larger pieces are dollars and coins of all nations. This head dress often constitutes the marriage portion of the wearer.
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_On a Rose which was growing in a Skull._
Bella flor donde naciste? Que temprana fué tu suerte! Que al primer paso que diste, Encontraste con la muerte Dejarte es cosa triste, Llevarte es cosa fuerte, Dejarte donde naciste, Es dejarte con la muerte.
_Translation by Gen. Carrol._
Beauteous flower! where hast thou grown? How early is thy doom! Thy scented blossoms scarce are blown, When destined to the tomb! ’Tis hard to pluck thee at thy birth, ’Tis sad to leave thee in this bed; To leave thee in thy native earth, Is but to leave thee with the dead.
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[Sidenote: A fearful Witness.]
In the commission of evill, feare no man so much as thy own selfe. Another is but one witnesse against thee; thou art a thousand. Another thou may’st avoid, but thyself thou can’st not. Wickedness is its own punishment.
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[Sidenote: Thirteenth Century.]