Part 15
Tell a man how great he is and will he come to tea? for there are crowds dying to meet him; why, of course he will come. Who has ever yet met a really celebrated recluse. One has heaps of recluses who professed to like solitude, but only in a crowd, but there was never one, however famous, who chose to exile himself in a desert island without the morning paper.
It is said of a famous poet, whose footsteps were much dogged by the enterprising tourist, that he complained bitterly and wrathfully of his inability to have even his own privacy; but that his bitterness and wrath were as nothing to what he felt when the blameless tripper was discovered to be paying no attention to him whatever. One wonders if this innocent form of soft-soap is out of fashion, or are the poets less great? How many pious pilgrims wandered to the old Colonial house in Cambridge, America, where Longfellow lived, and looked with awe at his front windows. Did not pilgrims by the car-load go to Concord to catch a glimpse of the great Emerson, while they leaned reverently across the philosopher's white picket-fence?
The poets of the past were accustomed to this innocent worship; what about the poets of to-day? Do they also walk along the streets haughtily (like the illustrious Mr. and Mrs. Crummles) whilst admiring passers-by stop and say with bated breath, "This is the great Smith!" or is that involuntary form of flattery out of fashion, or haven't the new poets grown up yet?
Perhaps an ardent admirer might suggest Miss Marie Corelli as one to whom the twentieth century pilgrim makes pilgrimages; but that isn't fair, for how can any one distinguish her pilgrims from Shakespeare's pilgrims? Pilgrims are not labelled like trunks. One hardly ventures to say so, but it seems to me that in this Miss Corelli has taken an unfair advantage of Shakespeare and the other poets.
There is nothing so democratic as true greatness, and this is a democratic age, and everybody exhibits to the public. We are either a great orator or we loop the loop, or we are a transcendent poet, or we walk from Cheapside to the Marble Arch on a wager. But do we do all these great things alone, unseen or unheard of by the world? No, we don't! Not a bit of it! It is not praise we want--we want more. We clamour for soft-soap; we demand it at the point of the bayonet.
It is an age of coarse effects, an age of advertisement. A poet could not conscientiously sing now about a rose left to bloom unseen, for excursion trains would be sure to be arranged there at reduced rates. It is a confidential age, and we demand a confidant as much as a matter of course as the heroine of the old-fashioned Italian opera,--in fact we demand the undivided attention of the whole world.
We sing our songs and listen greedily for the applause of the gallery; we meet with domestic misfortune, and we weep on the bosom of the divorce court, and the daily papers weep with us. We do not do good by stealth, but rather in such a way that we get a baronetcy or a decoration; so when you see a man all tinkley with little stars and things, you will know that he is always a very great and charitable man indeed, and charity is not only alms bestowed on the poor. It is the beauty of charity that it is not bigoted.
We put our breaking hearts under a microscope and make "copy" out of them and money and notoriety,--and notoriety in these days pays much better than mere celebrity, and what therefore so fitting a tribute to notoriety as soft-soap? Ah me! it is enough to make the cat laugh! I really have never understood this curious fact in natural history, though I know how hard it is to make a cat laugh; this whole morning I spent trying to make Mr. Boxer laugh (Mr. Boxer being the purry commander-in-chief of our mouse-holes), and did not succeed.
Our modern world is a hippodrome, and we demand hippodrome effects and thunders of applause, because ordinary applause cannot be heard. Watch the next painted face you see, and observe how familiarity with the process has coarsened it. Not that one has any objection to paint if it is well done. It is a woman's duty to look her best; and if paint makes her more beautiful, let her put it on--but, one does implore, not with the trowel.
The other night there was a great unbecoming function, but then all great functions are unbecoming by reason of the presence of woman's arch-enemy--electricity. It is quite certain that the first electrician was not only deplorably ignorant of the social virtues of soft-soap, but he was, besides, a jilted and misanthropic old bachelor who avenged his wrongs by harnessing electricity to a lamp, and cynically rejoiced when, for the first time, he turned its cruel light on the wrinkles, the hair-dye, and the dull jaded eyes of Society, and changed the pink of art into an unconvincing blue.
It was on that same occasion that I became deeply impressed by the tiara of Great Britain, which, it appears, is a National Institution, worn by the Aged instead of caps, only caps are much more comfortable. I also discovered that it need have nothing in common with the rest of the toilet; at any rate one worthy lady so adorned had a little breakfast-shawl about her shoulders.
If it is true that the ladies of the United States have recently plucked up enough courage to adopt the tiara of Great Britain, and should any one perhaps insinuate that this is inconsistent with austere republican principles, a sufficient and crushing reply is that in America every woman is a "lady," and every "lady" is a queen.
To return to her of the tiara and the breakfast-shawl. One did wonder what illusion she laboured under when she fastened that diamond structure to the thin bandeaux of her faded hair, where it swayed insecurely. Did some one send the poor soul away from home and tell her she looked lovely, and as she trundled off in her brougham did fifty years slide temporarily from her old shoulders? After all, soft-soap has its virtues; it is just the thing for the aged!
What are illusions but soft-soap self-administered, and what would life be without illusions? Show me the heroic soul who can look into a mirror and who sees what she really sees! O self-administered soft-soap! what does she really see?
Upon my word, I have come to the conclusion that a certain measure of soft-soap is not only a social necessity, it is more, it is a social duty; only one would like to offer a plea, just a little plea, for a fair division of labour! It is _so_ hard always to say delightful things, especially if you don't mean them! It is being a thirsty Ganymede at the feast of the gods.
O, great humourist of soft-soap, you made two mistakes when you invented your wonderful lubricator of social intercourse; not only, like patent medicine, does the dose require to be constantly increased, but you forgot to insist on what is most vital--a periodic change of parts.
My plea is that the soft-soaped one should occasionally be obliged to step down from his pedestal and turn his own insincere admiration, his surface enthusiasm, and the countless and well-meant lies with which he helps to make the existence of the soft-soaped so pleasant, upon that unwearied and energetic prevaricator, whose mission it is to praise, no matter how untruthfully.
Yes, even "little tin gods on wheels" should be made to step down from high Olympus and, in turn, serve their thirsting and patient Ganymede.
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KITWYK
BY MRS. JOHN LANE
With numerous illustrations by Albert Sterner, Howard Pyle, and George Wharton Edwards.
_SOME PRESS OPINIONS_
"Mrs. Lane has succeeded to admiration, and chiefly by reason of being so much interested in her theme herself that she makes no conscious effort to please. She just tells her tales with no more artifice than one might use in narrative by word of mouth, and she keeps the reader's interest as keenly alive as if he were really listening to an amusing story of what had once actually happened. Every one who seeks to be diverted will read 'Kitwyk' for its obvious qualities of entertainment."--_Times._
"Dip where one will into her startling pages one is certain to find entertainment, and the charm is much assisted by the delightful illustrations."--_Daily Telegraph._
"'Kitwyk' is destined to be in fiction what an old Dutch master painter is in painting--a work at once typical of kind, unique of entity. The design of this charming book is original. All the people are alive in the not wonderful but strangely engrossing story, which is so comical and pathetic, so quaint and 'racy of the soil,' so wide in sympathy, so narrow of stage. All the drawings are excellent."--_World._
"Very charming. Admirers will say, not without reason, that 'Kitwyk' recalls 'Cranford.'"--_Standard._
"A charming book; resting to read. It has style, and is written with a whimsical humour which gives it distinction."--_Westminster Gazette._
"There is delicious humor, not only of incident, but of phrase and expression. We should be glad of a second series."--_Literary World._
"'Kitwyk' is the daintiest morsel of idyllic fiction we have had since Mr. Barrie opened that wonderful window in 'Thrums.' Few books are so exquisitely wrought; so cunningly polished."--_Mr. James Douglas in The Star._
"The Dutch kingdom is enchanting, and Mrs. John Lane's charming book will help to make the fact more widely known."--_Gentlewoman._
"We have only faintly indicated what a vein of jest and humour Mrs. John Lane possesses."--_The Echo._
"This is a most graceful and altogether charming Dutch version of Auld Licht Idylls. If such a village and such people, and such quaint causes of laughter and of tears do indeed exist, then Kitwyk were well worth visiting, but the next best thing is to read Mrs. John Lane's prettily bound and illustrated little volume."--_Scotsman._
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PETERKINS:
THE STORY OF A DOG
Translated from the German of Ossip Schubin
by MRS. JOHN LANE
With numerous illustrations by T. COTTINGTON TAYLOR and DONALD MAXWELL