Part 12

Modern artists buy their colors ready made, and spend large sums of money on pigments with which to color their canvases. The pictures of modern artists will be colorless when many of the works of ancient masters are as bright as they are to-day. Just as the secret of dyeing has been lost, so has the secret of preserving the colors of artists’ paints. Yet the secret was known to every ancient artist, for they all mixed their own colors.

Formula for Durable Ink.

How to make durable ink Is another great secret we have lost. Look at any letter five or ten years old and you will probably notice that the writing has faded to a brown color and is very indistinct. Go to any big museum, and you will find ancient manuscripts, the writing of which is as black and distinct as if the manuscript were written the day before yesterday.

The secret of glass blowing and tinting is not yet entirely lost; there are still a few men who can produce glass-work equal to that which the ancients turned out hundreds of years ago.

But the average glass manufacturer cannot produce anything that could at all compare with some of the commoner articles the Egyptians, and, later, the founders of Venice manufactured; and those who still hold the ancient secret guard it so closely that it will probably die with them and be added to the long list of things in which our ancestors beat us hollow.

THE WORLD’S HARVEST SEASONS.

There Is Not a Month in the Year That Does Not Find Several Nations Sending Reapers Into Fields of Golden Grain.

There is a procession of seed-time, blossom, and fruit around the globe which never ends. It is harvest-time on the earth at every time of year, just as there is always sunlight shining somewhere and always darkness somewhere else.

January sees harvest ended in most districts in Australia and New Zealand, while the people of Chile and other countries of southern South America are just beginning to reap the fruits of their toil.

Upper Egypt and India begin and continue harvest through the months of February and March.

April enlarges the number with harvest in Syria, Cyprus, coast of Egypt, Mexico, Cuba, Persia, and Asia Minor.

May is a busy time in Central Asia, Persia, Algeria, Morocco, southern Texas, Florida, China, and Japan.

June calls forth the harvest in California, Oregon, southern United States, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Hungary, Rumania, Turkey, Danubian States, southern France, Greece, and Sicily.

July sees harvest in England, Nebraska, Switzerland, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota, Upper Canada, northern France, Germany, Austria, and Poland.

August continues the gathering in the British Isles, France, Germany, Belgium, Holland, Manitoba, Lower Canada, Denmark, and Russia.

September rules northern Scotland, southern parts of Sweden and Norway, as well as the cold islands of the North Sea.

October is the harvest month for corn in America and for hardy vegetables in northern Sweden, Norway, and Ireland.

In November harvest times begin in South Africa, Patagonia, and South Australia.

AS SEEN BY THE DREAMER.

While Champions of the Strenuous Life Are Fulfilling Their Destiny By Winning Fame and Fortune, Another Sort of Fellow Is Getting Just As Much Satisfaction By Contemplating Things That Don’t Exist.

THE CRY OF THE DREAMER.

By John Boyle O’Reilly.

I am tired of planning and tolling In the crowded hives of men; Heart-weary of building and spoiling. And spoiling and building again. And I long for the dear old river, Where I dreamed my youth away; For a dreamer lives forever, And a toiler dies in a day.

I am sick of the showy seeming, Of a life that is half a lie; Of the faces lined with scheming In the throng that hurries by From the sleepless thoughts’ endeavor I would go where the children play; For a dreamer lives forever, And a thinker dies in a day.

I can feel no pride, but pity For the burdens the rich endure; There is nothing sweet in the city But the patient lives of the poor. Oh, the little hands too skilful, And the child-mind choked with weeds! The daughter’s heart grown wilful, And the father’s heart that bleeds!

No, no! from the street’s rude bustle, From trophies of mart and stage, I would fly to the woods’ low rustle And the meadow’s kindly page. Let me dream as of old by the river, And be loved for the dream alway; For a dreamer lives forever, And a toiler dies in a day.

GIVE ME MY DREAMS.

By A. J. Waterhouse.

Give me my dreams. All else is naught, At price of pain success is bought; We struggle upward but to fall; The prize we grasp but holds us thrall; The lips that cheer us through the years Some day smile not for all our tears; We build awhile, we know not what, And the toiler is forgot. Give me my dreams.

Give me my dreams. A child am I Who stands In darkness but to sigh, Until a hand doth backward roll The gray, damp mists about my soul, And then—oh, dream of dreams that cheers— They come, the loved of other years, And voices whisper soft and low The loving words of long ago. Give me my dreams.

Give me my dreams. Oh, little maid, With whom of old I laughed and played. They say the ivy loves to creep Above the grave where now you sleep; They say the robin’s song no more Can wake you as it did of yore. What matter? Still In dreams you creep Unto my side a tryst to keep. Give me my dreams.

Give me my dreams. All else is dross. But still I count it little loss, For yet in dreams the bright stars burn As in the years to which I turn; White hands reach to me through the mist, By lips I loved my lips are kissed; And all life’s fields are love aglow. As they were once, oh, long ago— Give me my dreams. _Los Angeles Herald._

THE PORT O’ DREAMS.

It is just beyond the sky-line With its poppy-fields of rest Where day’s storm-bewildered shallop Drops its anchor in the west, Where a silent sea of saffron Stretches inland toward the streams That go glimmering down the valleys Of the purple port o’ dreams.

In the far-off gloom behind it Earth’s dusky bound’ry lies, And a step beyond its outpost The hills of heaven rise; So near that in the glory Of their mystic haze it seems That the dear dead walk beside us In the peaceful port o’ dreams.

Oh, strange and wondrous country. Hiding close the goals of life, Who wins to thee brings courage For the long, dull march’s strife, And the prisoner of living Hope’s freedom pledge redeems In thine endless, boundless radiance. Oh, blissful port o’ dreams.

We have called thee Heart’s Desire, Or the Island of the Blest, And the Land of Finished Stories, Oh, dreamland in the west. Yet every heart’s the bound’ry Of thy soul-reposing beams— Art thou hope or love or heaven, Oh, happy port o’ dreams?

Sail away, oh, weary-hearted, To the bayous of release, Leave the drums o’ life behind you At the harbor bar of peace. Come to anchor off the headlands Where the light of heaven gleams In the haven where ye would be Past the purple port o’ dreams. _Army and Navy Journal._

THE DREAMER.

By Leon C. Prince.

Self-robbed victim, of will and purpose rid, Slave of the beckoning fantom, oblivious Of the talent lying hid; Knowing a store of varied fact, But not the art that transmutes Aspiration into act; Dreamer, thy vague and hopeless quest Makes thee, of friends, the secret mock; of men of deed, The tragic jest. _New York Sun._

WHEN THE CLOCK STRIKES SIX.

By McLandburgh Wilson.

I hold a modest clerkship this side the river Styx, Also a cheap alarm-clock to waken me at six. I dream I dwell in marble halls Worth millions cool in cash; Huge diamonds glitter on the walls Where precious jewels flash; A stranger wants to buy the place, I take his offer up apace— The Clock Strikes Six!

I put ten dollars on a horse, They say he cannot win; Like lightning round the muddy course I watch him swiftly spin. A thousand if he keeps the pace! Hurrah! My horse has won the race— The Clock Strikes Six!

The game is poker, and I hold Three aces in my hand; The jackpot, brimming full of gold, Contains a fortune grand. I draw a card with stolid face; Behold, it is the other ace— The Clock Strikes Six!

A girl with eyes of heaven’s blue Looks tenderly in mine. The world seems made for just us two, The pleasure is divine. I hold her fast in my embrace, I stoop to kiss her lovely face— The Clock Strikes Six!

Small wonder that when fortune plays me such scurvy tricks I curse the cheap alarm-clock that wakens me at six. _New York Times._

HEART OF THE FIRE.

From the heart of the fire does the vision rise, It is good to sit in the afterglow, While some one’s hand in your big one lies And nobody there to know, Ah, golden gleaming its many towers, The palace ye build, ye twain. Where two shall dwell thro’ the love-lit hours In a golden castle in Spain.

Who is it laughs in the dusk behind? Who lurks in the shadows there? Will the years that are coming to you be kind And the end of the dream be fair? Ah! boy and girl, with the love-lit eyes! Will the faith and the love remain When only a crumbling ruin lies— Your fallen castle in Spain? _Sydney Bulletin._

Major Namby.

BY WILKIE COLLINS.

Wilkie Collins (1824–1889) was distinguished chiefly for his tendency to confront his readers with a startling and apparently inexplicable situation, and then by a process of analysis, which, at times, was worthy of Poe, effect a solution of the mystery in a manner that left one amazed by the very simplicity of it all. Shortly after the death of Mr. Collins, the London _Spectator_ thus described his method:

“He was a literary chess-player of the first force, with power of carrying his plan right through the game and making every move tell. His method was to introduce a certain number of characters, set before them a well-defined object, such as the discovery of a secret, the revindication of a fortune, the tracking of a crime, or the establishment of a doubted marriage, and then bring in other characters to resist or counterplot their efforts. Each side makes moves, almost invariably well-considered and promising moves; the countermoves are equally good; the interest goes on accumulating till the looker-on—the reader is always placed in that attitude—is rapt out of himself by strained attention; and then there is a sudden and totally unexpected mate.”

But Collins had a lighter side. Nearly all his characters were invested with some degree of humor—a humor which could not forbear flashing into some of the novelist’s darker scenes. “The Stolen Letter,” which appeared in the June number of THE SCRAP BOOK, affords an example of the manner in which Collins was wont to blend humor and mystery. In “Major Namby,” which is printed herewith, we have a clever character-sketch in which humor is seen to be the dominant element.

I am a single lady—single, you will please to understand, entirely because I have refused many excellent offers. Pray don’t imagine from this that I am old. Some women’s offers come at long intervals, and other women’s offers come close together. Mine came remarkably close together—so, of course, I cannot possibly be old. Not that I presume to describe myself as absolutely young, either; so much depends on people’s points of view. I have heard female children of the ages of eighteen or nineteen called young ladies. This seems to me to be ridiculous—and I have held that opinion, without once wavering from it, for more than ten years past. It is, after all, a question of feeling; and, shall I confess it? I feel so young!

I live in the suburbs, and I have bought my house. The major lives in the suburbs, next door to me, and _he_ has bought his house. I don’t object to this, of course. I merely mention it to make things straight.

Major Namby has been twice married. His first wife—dear, dear! how can I express it? Shall I say, with vulgar abruptness, that his first wife had a family? And must I descend into particulars, and add that they are four in number, and that two of them are twins? Well, the words are written; and if they will do over again for the same purpose, I beg to repeat them in reference to the second Mrs. Namby (still alive), who has also had a family, and is—no, I really cannot say is likely to go on having one.

There are certain limits in a case of this kind, and I think I have reached them. Permit me simply to state that the second Mrs. Namby has three children at present. These, with the first Mrs. Namby’s four, make a total of seven. The seven are composed of five girls and two boys. And the first Mrs. Namby’s family all have one particular kind of constitution, and the second Mrs. Namby’s family all have another particular kind of constitution.

Let me explain once more that I merely mention these little matters, and that I don’t object to them.

My complaint against Major Namby is, in plain terms, that he transacts the whole of his domestic business in his front garden. Whether it arises from natural weakness of memory, from total want of a sense of propriety, or from a condition of mind which is closely allied to madness of the eccentric sort, I cannot say; but the major certainly does, sometimes partially and sometimes entirely, forget his private family matters, and the necessary directions connected with them, while he is inside the house, and does habitually remember them, and repair all omissions by bawling through his windows at the top of his voice, as soon as he gets outside the house.

It never seems to occur to him that he might advantageously return indoors, and there mention what he has forgotten in a private and proper way. The instant the lost idea strikes him—which it invariably does, either in his front garden or in the roadway outside his house—he roars for his wife, either from the gravel walk or over the low wall, and (if I may use so strong an expression) empties his mind to her in public, without appearing to care whose ears he wearies, whose delicacy he shocks, or whose ridicule he invites.

If the man is not mad, his own small family fusses have taken such complete possession of all his senses that he is quite incapable of noticing anything else, and perfectly impenetrable to the opinions of his neighbors. Let me show that the grievance of which I complain is no slight one, by giving a few examples of the general persecution that I suffer, and the occasional shocks that are administered to my delicacy, at the coarse hands of Major Namby.

We will say it is a fine, warm morning. I am sitting in my front room, with the window open, absorbed over a deeply interesting book. I hear the door of the next house bang; I look up, and see the major descending the steps into his front garden.

He walks—no, he marches—half way down the front garden path, with his head high in the air and his chest stuck out, and his military cane fiercely flourished in his right hand. Suddenly he stops, stamps with one foot, knocks up the hinder part of the brim of his extremely curly hat with his left hand, and begins to scratch at that singularly disagreeable-looking roll of fat, red flesh in the back of his neck (which scratching, I may observe, in parentheses, is always a sure sign, in the case of this horrid man, that a lost domestic idea has suddenly come back to him).

He waits a moment in the ridiculous position just described, then wheels round on his heel, looks up at the first-floor window, and, instead of going back into the house to mention what he has forgotten, bawls out fiercely from the middle of the walk:

“Matilda!”

I hear his wife’s voice—a shockingly shrill one; but what can you expect of a woman who has been seen, over and over again, in a slatternly striped wrapper, as late as two o’clock in the afternoon?—I hear his wife’s voice answer from inside the house:

“Yes, dear.”

“I said it was a south wind.”

“Yes, dear.”

“It isn’t a south wind.”

“Lor’, dear.”

“It’s a sou’east. I won’t have Georgina taken out to-day. (Georgina is one of the first Mrs. Namby’s family, and they are all weak in the chest.) Where’s nurse?”

“Here, sir.”

“Nurse, I won’t have Jack allowed to run. Whenever that boy perspires he catches cold. Hang up his hoop. If he cries, take him into my dressing-room and show him the birch-rod. Matilda?”

“Yes, dear.”

“What the devil do they mean by daubing all that grease over Mary’s hair? It’s beastly to see it—do you hear?—beastly! Where’s Pamby?” (Pamby is the unfortunate workwoman who makes and mends the family linen.)

“Here, sir.”

“Pamby, what are you about now?”

No answer. Pamby, or somebody else, giggles faintly. The major flourishes his cane in a fury.

“Why the devil don’t you answer me? I give you three seconds to answer me, or leave the house. One—two—three. Pamby! what are you about now?”

“If you please, sir, I’m doing something——”

“What?”

“Something particular for baby, sir.”

“Drop it directly, whatever it is. Nurse!”

“Yes, sir.”

“Mind the crossings. Don’t let the children sit down if they’re hot. Don’t let them speak to other children. Don’t let them get playing with strange dogs. Don’t let them mess their things. And above all, don’t bring Master Jack back in a perspiration. Is there anything more before I go out?”

“No, sir.”

“Matilda! Is there anything more?”

“No, dear.”

“Pamby! Is there anything more?”

“No, sir.”

Here the domestic colloquy ends, for the time being. Will any sensitive person—especially a person of my own sex—please to imagine what I must suffer as a delicate single lady, at having all these family details obtruded on my attention, whether I like it or not, in the major’s rasping martial voice, and in the shrill answering screams of the women inside? It is bad enough to be submitted to this sort of persecution when one is alone; but it is far worse to be also exposed to it—as I am constantly—in the presence of visitors, whose conversation is necessarily interrupted, whose ears are necessarily shocked, whose very stay in my house is necessarily shortened by Major Namby’s unendurably public way of managing his private concerns.

Only the other day, my old, dear, and most valued friend, Lady Malkinshaw, was sitting with me, entering at length into the interesting story of her second daughter’s unhappy marriage engagement, and of the dignified manner in which the family ultimately broke it off.

For a quarter of an hour or so our interview continued to be delightfully uninterrupted. At the end of that time, however, just as Lady Malkinshaw, with the tears in her eyes, was beginning to describe the effect of her daughter’s dreadful disappointment on the poor, dear girl’s mind and looks, I heard the door of the major’s house bang as usual, and, looking out of the window in despair, saw the major himself strut half way down the walk, stop, scratch violently at his roll of red flesh, wheel round so as to face the house, consider a little, pull his tablets out of his waistcoat pocket, shake his head over them, and then look up at the front windows, preparatory to bawling as usual at the degraded female members of his household.

Lady Malkinshaw, quite ignorant of what was coming, happened, at the same moment, to be proceeding with her pathetic story, in these terms:

“I do assure you, my poor, dear girl behaved throughout with the heroism of a martyr. When I had told her of the vile wretch’s behavior, breaking it to her as gently as I possibly could; and when she had a little recovered I said to her——”

(“Matilda!”)

The major’s rasping voice sounded louder than ever, as he bawled out that dreadful name just at the wrong moment. Lady Malkinshaw started as if she had been shot. I put down the window in despair; but the glass was no protection to our ears—Major Namby can roar through a brick wall. I apologized—I declared solemnly that my next door neighbor was mad—I entreated Lady Malkinshaw to take no notice, and to go on. That sweet woman immediately complied.

I burn with indignation when I think of what followed. Every word from the Nambys’ garden (which I distinguish below by parentheses) came, very slightly muffled by the window, straight into my room, and mixed itself up with her ladyship’s story in this inexpressibly ridiculous and impertinent manner:

“Well,” my kind and valued friend proceeded, “as I was telling you, when the first natural burst of sorrow was over, I said to her——”

“Yes, dear Lady Malkinshaw,” I murmured encouragingly.

“I said to her——”

(“By jingo, I’ve forgotten something! Matilda, when I made my memorandum of errands, how many had I to do?”)

“‘My dearest, darling child,’ I said——”

(“Pamby, how many errands did your mistress give me to do?”)

“I said, ‘My dearest, darling child——’”

(“Nurse, how many errands did your mistress give me to do?”)

“‘My own love,’ I said——”

(“Pooh! pooh! I tell you, I had four errands to do, and I’ve only got three of ’em written down. Check me off, all of you—I’m going to read my errands.”)

“‘Your own proper pride, love,’ I said, ‘will suggest to you——’”

(“Gray powder for baby.”)

—“‘the necessity of making up your mind, my angel, to——’”

(“Row the plumber for infamous condition of back kitchen sink.”)

“‘to return all the wretch’s letters, and——’”

(“Speak to the haberdasher about patching Jack’s shirts.”)

“‘all his letters and presents, darling. You need only make them up into a parcel, and write inside——’”

(“Matilda! is that all?”)