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VOLUME 54 HARPER'S MAGAZINE. NEW YORK,
NUMBER 320. }

CONTEMPORARY ART IN ENGLAND

JANUARY, 1877.

ILLUSTRATIONS.-Winter.-Esther's Banquet.-J. C. Hook.-"Luff, Boy, luff!"-The Huguenot Lovers.-The First Whisper.-Enone: a Sketch.-The Light of the World.-Holman Hunt.-Thomas Faed.-The Mitherless Bairn.-Elizabeth Thompson.-Missing.-Vicat Cole.-J. E. Millais.-F. Leighton.-"What d'ye lack, Madam ?"-The Golden Age.-H. S. Marks.-The Princess and Pelicans. -Pillars of Terra Cotta.-Tile Mantel.-Landseer Plate.

IN THE GARDEN.-A POEM

"THE GOOD OLD TIMES" AT PLYMOUTH..

ILLUSTRATIONS.-Monument to Myles Standish.-The Mayflower.-Governor Bradford's House. -Old Church at Austerfield, England.-Bradford's Monument at Burial Hill.-Elder Brewster's Chair.-The President's Chair.-Peregrine White's Cradle.-The Cushman Cradle.-Chair and SeaChest.-Chest decorated.-Chest with Drawers.-The Standish House.-Kitchen of Standish House. -Standish Relics.--Standish's Sword, and the Barrel of the Gun with which King Philip was killed. -Keeping-Room of Alden House, 1653.-Kitchen of Major Alden's House, about 1788.-Dress of a Woman.-Occupations of Women.

A CRUISE AMONG THE MAGDALEN ISLANDS..

ILLUSTRATIONS.-Sand Dunes and Wrecks between Amherst and Grindstone Islands.-Map of the Magdalen Islands.-Amherst, looking toward Demoiselle Hill.-Landing on Entry Island.-Old Man and Old Woman.-Dragging the Hull of a Schooner to the Beach.-Through the Surf.-Port and Village of Etang du Nord, Grindstone Island.-Part of Cape Alright.-Cap au Meule and Wreck, Grindstone Island.-The serene Joseph.

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EREMA; OR, MY FATHER'S SIN......

CHAPTER VII. Discomfiture.

CHAPTER VIII. A doubtful Loss.
CHAPTER IX. A Water-Spout.

MARTHE'S CHEVALIER.-A STORY

ANSWER FOR ME.-A POEM

THE OLD DEACON'S LAMENT.-A POEM......

ILLUSTRATIONS."There, Week by Week, the Parson stood, the Scripter to expound."—"I tell you it was grand to hear our Leader start the Tunes."-" Well, well! I tried to keep Things straight: I went to ev'ry Meetin"."

A CRANIOLOGIST.

ILLUSTRATIONS.-"The Locket contained a Miniature on Porcelain of a beautiful Girl."-"I saw the Figure of a Man on his Knees."-"She held out a small white Hand with charming Grace." GARTH.-A NOVEL..

FIZZ AND FREEZE.--A STORY OF THE NORTH POLE

ILLUSTRATIONS.-Frigimand.-The King's Kitchen.-" Fizz."-" Freeze."-The Petition.-Skimantaste's Return.-On the Sly.-Frigimrand at Dinner.-"Empty."-Royal Vengeance.-Origin of Icebergs.-Birth of the Aurora.

RECOLLECTIONS OF THACKERAY..

ILLUSTRATION.--Fac-Simile of an improvised Sketch by Thackeray.

MISS TRUEPENNY'S FORTIETH CHRISTMAS.-A STORY.

A WOMAN-HATER.-PART VII...

THE LITTLE PEOPLE'S NEW-YEAR.

GRIT. A STORY..

EDITOR'S EASY CHAIR..

Mr. Seward's Statue.-Diary of John Quincy Adams.-Mr. Tibs on the Delights of a Suburban Residence.-Doré's Illustrations of "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner."-Boanerges Greatorex on our traveling Manners.

EDITOR'S LITERARY RECORD.

Longfellow's Poems of Places.-Poetical Works of Alice and Phoebe Cary.-Wilson's Poets and Poetry of Scotland. The Skeleton in Armor.-The Mistress of the Manse.-The Village School.Sir Rae. Poems of William Cullen Bryant.-Wallace's The Geographical Distribution of Animals. -Coffin's The Boys of '76.-Italy from the Alps to Mount Etna.-Manning's American Pictures drawn with Pen and Pencil.-The Arctic World Illustrated.-Devout Classics.-Stothert's French and Spanish Painters.-Wild Flowers of America.-Hayden's The Yellowstone National Park, etc.Berjold's Theory of Color.-Gems of the Dresden Gallery.-The Gallery of Great Artists.-Gems of the Gray Collection.-The Titian Gallery.-The Ancient Mariner, illustrated by Doré.-The Wisdom Series. Juvenile.

EDITOR'S SCIENTIFIC RECORD...

Astronomy.-Meteorology.-Physics.-Chemistry.-Anthropology.-Zoology.-Botany.—Agricul

tural Science.-Engineering.

EDITOR'S HISTORICAL RECORD.....

The Presidential Election.-Re-Election of President Lerdo de Tejada.-European Affairs.-Disasters.-Obituary.

EDITOR'S DRAWER......

Winter Poetry (with an Illustration).-A Freshman's Idea of Co-Education.-An Omnibus Driver's Joke. A Milesian Ticket.-A Poet in his own Country.-Speaking to the Question. A new Astronomical Theory.-A facetious Student.-The Town Council of Galway.-Some Scottish Humors.Execution of Music in Church.-A Teutonic Explanation of a Bazar Pattern.-Journalistic Experience in Texas.-Parting Advice.-Epitaphs.-A new Story of Davy Crockett.-Bridget's Unpresumptuousness.-An impudent Retort.-Anecdote of Professor Aytoun.-Illicit Distillation in Scotland.-Explanation of the Electric Telegraph.-" An Ideal."

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FAC-SIMILE OF AN IMPROVISED SKETCH BY THACKERAY.-[SEE PAGE 264.]

RECENT perusal of several tributes to | of his arrival, upon his first visit to the the memory of Thackeray induces me United States. He had brought a letter to to revive such recollections as I may of a literary friend of mine, who saw fit to that truly good and great man of genius. conduct him directly to my place of busiWhen one applies epithets of such singular ness, though I had no reason to suppose import to any human being whatever, the that he had ever heard my name before. meaning can not be that he had not faults, Our interview was, nevertheless, of some failings, and weaknesses, but that the real length, and very agreeable. I was more or excellences of his character far outweighed less familiar with his fascinating producany deviations into less estimable manifes- tions, though far less so than I have since tations of disposition or manner. Although become. Our conversation turned princimy notes will consist merely of impressions pally upon the subject of the city, which recorded after a considerable lapse of time, evidently struck Mr. Thackeray with the since I never before attempted to set down most unqualified amazement. "Why," said a single memorandum upon the subject, and he, "there is nothing that looks new about they will be necessarily, therefore, some- it; it has every appearance of solidity, just what brief and slight, yet even such traces like an English city." I was a little surof a person so distinguished as Thackeray prised at this remark, considering that he could scarcely fail to possess a certain in- had seen so much of the world, and must terest, and none the less, perhaps, that my have heard something about Boston, since acquaintance and familiar intercourse with he had made it his first point of destination him happened to be of the most informal in this country, and might be supposed to character. I was, in fact, introduced to him have learned something of our history and in Boston upon the very day next to that condition. I ventured jokingly to inquire

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ly the same as to make no real difference, and in every respect equally absurd, and, Í believe, in fact, however incredible, exactly as I have stated it.* A singular mistake in point of historical accuracy has also been made very recently by Mr. Green, of Oxford, in his valuable and exceedingly interesting History of the English People, in which he characterizes the Pilgrims of Plymouth as "simply poor men and artisans." No doubt most of those worthies were in the middling, and many in the humbler, walks of life, and few, perhaps, of equal rank with the Puritans in general and "merchant adventurers" who resorted to the "Bay" and other more north

if he expected to see log-huts, wigwams, or | been precisely as here set down, but so nearbuildings of rough boards. "Not that, of course," he said; but he "certainly had no idea of finding every thing in such a settled and improved condition, so that he should not have known but what he was actually in Europe." I said that Boston having been settled nearly two hundred and fifty years, and having had not a little commercial and general intercourse with the world abroad, it had made much advance from its aboriginal state, and that Bostonians, who had long enjoyed some advantages of education, were as eager to hear his proposed lectures as would be the most cultivated people on the other side of the ocean. We parted with mutual expres-erly shores of Massachusetts; but Brewster sions of good-will, expecting to meet soon again at the Tremont House, where he had taken up his quarters, and where at that time I also had my lodgings.

In thinking over our conversation of the morning, I could not but wonder at the exceedingly superficial knowledge which Englishmen of cultivated minds and much general intelligence often display in regard to this country, though to a far greater degree at that period than since important and stirring public events have attracted toward us so much more interest and attention. I have observed some truly ludicrous mistakes as to the geographical features of the United States by writers who ought to have known better, and who might have informed themselves more correctly with the most ordinary pains. This must have been owing to sheer indifference, much modified, however, of late years through more frequent intercommunication between the people of the several countries. This state of things is powerfully illustrated by a remark in the Memoirs of Bunsen in relation to the entire ignorance he found, upon his arrival in England, in 1838, of "the state of the case" between the papal government and that of Prussia, which had resulted in his own recall from the Roman court, "having then to learn, what he had afterward frequent opportunities of observing, that the English public mind, dwelling upon an immense amount of interests, general and individual, which belong to national concerns, requires time in order to take any cognizance of foreign transactions not selfevidently having a bearing on England." This is the remark, by-the-way, of Baroness Bunsen, the writer of her husband's Memoirs, herself of English birth and education in the upper circle of English society. Not much before the period of Thackeray's first visit to the United States, I remember to have read in the Quarterly Review a reference to the seat of our national government as "Washington, near Albany, the capital of New England." The language, remembered after so many years, may not have VOL. LIV.-No. 320.-17

was designated in his time as "the learned," was a Cambridge University man, and had been in the diplomatic service of Queen Elizabeth; the title of "gentleman" was attached to Winslow's name; and Standish, who rendered such signal military service, claimed descent from a noble family. Surely "poor men and artisans" merely could not have contemplated and carried out such an enterprise; for though they could never have conceived of its ultimate grand results, yet there was true manly heroism at the bottom of it; and if in their general feebleness they might be compared to the army of sheep, according to the old fable, yet they had lion-like commanders, and were thus better off than if, in their main body as strong and bold as lions, they had been led on merely by sheep.‡

Carver, their first Governor, chosen on board the Mayflower, was evidently a man of mark; Bradford, who succeeded him, is famous for his invaluable "Journal;" and Allerton is well known to have been an intelligent and accomplished person. Their legal papers and records in existence make plainly manifest that the leaders of this little band of exiles for conscience' sake were well versed in the technicalities and essential principles of law. But if there were no surer evidence of their superiority to the standing which Mr. Green, inadvertently, of course, but too indiscriminately, assigns them, what can be said of the fact that they so early instituted a record office for deeds of landed estate ?—a safeguard of titles not

* An English letter was recently received in this city bearing the remarkable inscription, “Member New York Press Box 5 New Hampshire Boston Mass United States." The member did not claim it, either here or in New York, and it is now at Concord awaiting an owner.-Boston Advertiser, March 9, 1876.

"The best linguist in the colony."-Rev. B. F. De Costa's "Footprints of Miles Standish." Pamphlet. Charlestown: 1864.

In a mention of Mr. Edward Winslow, Macaulay says: "Hampden, the first of those great English commoners, whose plain addition of Mister has, to of the feudal titles."-Macaulay on "Lord Nugent's our ears, a more majestic sound than the proudest Memorials of Hampden."

then known in England, in which country | classes of the city; and although Boston the written evidences of rights to estates has little pretension to aristocracy, in the were preserved until long afterward in mu- European sense of the word, yet, owing to niment chests of private mansions. In re- its wealth and the higher style of intellectality, these "poor men and artisans," in the ual culture enjoyed by its people, it is probexercise of a broader intelligence than they ably the most exclusive in its social habits had left behind them, immediately upon and requirements of any American city. their arrival at the inhospitable shores to With this society, after a while, Mr. Thackbecome their home, laid the foundation of a eray became familiarly acquainted, and regovernment from, for, and of the people, aft-ceived from it every possible attention, but erward infused into and popularizing the not so much at first as on his second vismore aristocratic institutions and practices of the Massachusetts with which they became eventually incorporated. For it was there, before they had landed from their frail bark, they drafted and executed, as was never such instrument made before, that brief and noble declaration of principles looking to the future formation of a frame of civil government, which should be known to all future times as the Constitution of the Mayflower. It is of these wise and devout men that Webster said, in his oration upon Plymouth Rock, at the celebration of Forefather's-day, in 1820, "The mild dignity of Carver and Bradford; the decisive and soldier-like air of Standish; the devout Brewster;* the enterprising Allerton; the general firmness and thoughtfulness of the whole band; their conscious joy for dangers escaped; their deep solicitude about dangers to come; their trust in Heav-selves to the comments of the uncharitable; en; their high religious faith, full of confidence and anticipation-all these seem to belong to this place, and to be present on this occasion, to fill us with reverence and admiration."

it. Indeed, outside of the lecture-room, when he came in 1855, his life in Boston was one round of dinner parties and evening entertainments. On both occasions I sat by him at dinner at the Tremont House almost every day when he was not engaged abroad, and had the pleasure of his conversation there and in his apartments. I suppose an allusion in one of his essays to the enormity of eating pease with a knife, and his partial extenuation of the offense by reference to the practice of his greatgrandmother, " one of the finest ladies of the old school I ever saw," led me to pay some attention to his own manner at table; and I remarked that he was especially observant of those small but essential requirements of refined society for neglect or ignorance of which Americans of a certain class have sometimes exposed them

though I imagine that any thing remarkably Johnsonian on such occasions would hardly be seen in these days on the part of a real American gentleman, or of any one entitled by station to mingle with the higher classes of society.

But this is a wide divergence from the main purpose of this paper. Of course I observe in one of the papers of the "BricThackeray was very soon much sought aft-à-Brac Series" a reference to Thackeray's aler in the literary and social circles of Bos-leged brusqueness toward those, in a casual ton. To a large extent these constitute meeting in the street, with whom he had one and the same body of intelligent and been only a few hours before in the free encultivated persons. The neighborhood of joyment of social and friendly communicathe university has had the influence for tion. I certainly saw nothing of the kind. many years to diffuse education and a mark- My meetings with him were uniformly easy ed degree of refinement among the upper and friendly. For instance, Blanchard Jerrold gives the following account of his personal demeanor:

SOROOBY.-"This remote hamlet of Nottingham"There were times, and many, when shire, adjacent to the borders of Yorkshire, which now echoes to the whistle of the Great Northern Railway- Thackeray could not break through his here in the old manor-house of Scrooby (the outline outward austerity, even when passing an of whose moat may still be seen), this ancient hunting-intimate friend in the street. I and a museat of the Archbishop of York, the resting-place of

Queen Margaret of Scotland, daughter of Henry VII., tual friend met him one afternoon in Fleet on her journey to Scotland in 1503; where disappoint-Street, ambling to Whitefriars on his cob; ed Wolsey retired after his fall, to discover too late and a very extraordinary figure he made. that fidelity to God brings a higher and more certain He caught sight of us, and my companion

blessing than the most devoted fidelity to an earthly king; here, where Wolsey's royal rival, Henry, passed a night in 1541; here, where James I. solicited of the archbishop that he might take his royal pastime in the forest of Sherwood; in this very manor-house, or in one of its offices, met the simple, humble Separatist worshipers, Robinson, Brewster, and Bradford, the leaders of the Pilgrim band, the founders of the civil and religious liberties of America."-"The Pilgrim Fathers," etc. A lecture delivered in London 18th January, 1866, by Benjamin Scott, F.R.A.S., Chamber lain of the city of London. London: MDCCCLXIX.

was about to grasp his hand, but he just touched his hat with his finger, and without opening his lips or relaxing the solemn cast of his features, he passed on. My companion stamped his foot on the pavement and cried, 'Who would think that we were up till four o'clock this morning together, and that he sang his "Reverend Dr. Luther," and was the liveliest of us!"

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