ï»¿The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Magnificent Ambersons, by Booth TarkingtonThis eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and withalmost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it awayorre-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License includedwith this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.orgTitle: The Magnificent AmbersonsAuthor: Booth TarkingtonRelease Date: September, 2005 [EBook#8867]Posting Date: August 2, 2009Language: English*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS ***Produced by An Anonymous VolunteerTHE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONSByBooth TarkingtonChapter IMajor Amberson had "made a fortune" in 1873, when other people werelosing fortunes, and the magnificence of the Ambersons began then.Magnificence, like the size of a fortune, is alwayscomparative, as evenMagnificent Lorenzo may now perceive, if he has happened to haunt NewYork in 1916; and the Ambersons were magnificent in their day and place.Their splendour lasted throughout all the yearsthat saw their Midlandtown spread and darken into a city, but reached its topmost during theperiod when every prosperous family with children kept a Newfoundlanddog.In that town, in those days, all the women whowore silk or velvet knewall the other women who wore silk or velvet, and when there was a newpurchase of sealskin, sick people were got to windows to see it go by.Trotters were out, in the winter afternoons, racinglight sleighs onNational Avenue and Tennessee Street; everybody recognized boththe trotters and the drivers; and again knew them as well on summerevenings, when slim buggies whizzed by in renewals of thesnow-timerivalry. For that matter, everybody knew everybody else's familyhorse-and-carriage, could identify such a silhouette half a mile downthe street, and thereby was sure who was going to market, or toareception, or coming home from office or store to noon dinner or eveningsupper.During the earlier years of this period, elegance of personal appearancewas believed to rest more upon the texture of garments thanupon theirshaping. A silk dress needed no remodelling when it was a year or soold; it remained distinguished by merely remaining silk. Old men andgovernors wore broadcloth; "full dress" was broadcloth with"doeskin"trousers; and there were seen men of all ages to whom a hat meant onlythat rigid, tall silk thing known to impudence as a "stove-pipe."In town and country these men would wear no other hat, and,withoutself-consciousness, they went rowing in such hats.Shifting fashions of shape replaced aristocracy of texture: dressmakers,shoemakers, hatmakers, and tailors, increasing in cunning and in power,found means tomake new clothes old. The long contagion of the "Derby"hat arrived: one season the crown of this hat would be a bucket; thenext it would be a spoon. Every house still kept its bootjack, buthigh-topped boots gave wayto shoes and "congress gaiters"; and thesewere played through fashions that shaped them now with toes likebox-ends and now with toes like the prows of racing shells.Trousers with a crease were considered plebeian;the crease proved thatthe garment had lain upon a shelf, and hence was "ready-made"; thesebetraying trousers were called "hand-me-downs," in allusion to theshelf. In the early 'eighties, while bangs and bustles werehavingtheir way with women, that variation of dandy known as the "dude" wasinvented: he wore trousers as tight as stockings, dagger-pointed shoes,a spoon "Derby," a single-breasted coat called a "Chesterfield,"withshort flaring skirts, a torturing cylindrical collar, laundered to apolish and three inches high, while his other neckgear might be a heavy,puffed cravat or a tiny bow fit for a doll's braids. With evening dresshe wore atan overcoat so short that his black coat-tails hung visible,five inches below the over-coat; but after a season or two he lengthenedhis overcoat till it touched his heels, and he passed out of his tighttrousers into trouserslike great bags. Then, presently, he was seenno more, though the word that had been coined for him remained in thevocabularies of the impertinent.It was a hairier day than this. Beards were to the wearers' fancy,andthings as strange as the Kaiserliche boar-tusk moustache werecommonplace. "Side-burns" found nourishment upon childlike profiles;great Dundreary whiskers blew like tippets over young shoulders;moustaches weretrained as lambrequins over forgotten mouths; and itwas possible for a Senator of the United States to wear a mist of whitewhisker upon his throat only, not a newspaper in the land finding theornament distinguishedenough to warrant a lampoon. Surely no more isneeded to prove that so short a time ago we were living in another age!At the beginning of the Ambersons' great period most of the houses ofthe Midland town were of apleasant architecture. They lacked style, butalso lacked pretentiousness, and whatever does not pretend at all hasstyle enough. They stood in commodious yards, well shaded by leftoverforest trees, elm and walnut andbeech, with here and there a line oftall sycamores where the land had been made by filling bayous from thecreek. The house of a "prominent resident," facing Military Square, orNational Avenue, or Tennessee Street,was built of brick upon a stonefoundation, or of wood upon a brick foundation. Usually it had a "frontporch" and a "back porch"; often a "side porch," too. There was a "fronthall"; there was a "side hall"; and sometimesa "back hall." From the"front hall" opened three rooms, the "parlour," the "sitting room," andthe "library"; and the library could show warrant to its title--for somereason these people bought books. Commonly, thefamily sat more inthe library than in the "sitting room," while callers, when they cameformally, were kept to the "parlour," a place of formidable polish anddiscomfort. The upholstery of the library furniture was a littleshabby;but the hostile chairs and sofa of the "parlour" always looked new. Forall the wear and tear they got they should have lasted a thousand years.Upstairs were the bedrooms; "mother-and-father's room" thelargest; asmaller room for one or two sons another for one or two daughters; eachof these rooms containing a double bed, a "washstand," a "bureau," awardrobe, a little table, a rocking-chair, and often a chair or twothathad been slightly damaged downstairs, but not enough to justify eitherthe expense of repair or decisive abandonment in the attic. And therewas always a "spare-room," for visitors (where thesewing-machineusually was kept), and during the 'seventies there developed anappreciation of the necessity for a bathroom. Therefore the architectsplaced bathrooms in the new houses, and the older houses tore outacupboard or two, set up a boiler beside the kitchen stove, and soughta new godliness, each with its own bathroom. The great American plumberjoke, that many-branched evergreen, was planted at this time.At the rearof the house, upstairs was a bleak little chamber, called"the girl's room," and in the stable there was another bedroom,adjoining the hayloft, and called "the hired man's room." House andstable cost seven or eightthousand dollars to build, and people withthat much money to invest in such comforts were classified as the Rich.They paid the inhabitant of "the girl's room" two dollars a week, and,in the latter part of this period, twodollars and a half, and finallythree dollars a week. She was Irish, ordinarily, or German or it mightbe Scandinavian, but never native to the land unless she happened to bea person of colour. The man or youth who livedin the stable had likewages, and sometimes he, too, was lately a steerage voyager, but muchoftener he was coloured.After sunrise, on pleasant mornings, the alleys behind the stables weregay; laughter and shoutingwent up and down their dusty lengths, witha lively accompaniment of curry-combs knocking against back fences andstable walls, for the darkies loved to curry their horses in the alley.Darkies always prefer to gossip inshouts instead of whispers; andthey feel that profanity, unless it be vociferous, is almost worthless.Horrible phrases were caught by early rising children and carried toolder people for definition, sometimes atinopportune moments; whileless investigative children would often merely repeat the phrases insome subsequent flurry of agitation, and yet bring about consequences soemphatic as to be recalled with ease in middlelife.They have passed, those darky hired-men of the Midland town; and theintrospective horses they curried and brushed and whacked and amiablycursed--those good old horses switch their tails at flies no more. Foralltheir seeming permanence they might as well have been buffaloes--orthe buffalo laprobes that grew bald in patches and used to slide fromthe careless drivers' knees and hang unconcerned, half way to theground. Thestables have been transformed into other likenesses, orswept away, like the woodsheds where were kept the stove-wood andkindling that the "girl" and the "hired-man" always quarrelled over: whoshould fetch it. Horseand stable and woodshed, and the whole tribe ofthe "hired-man," all are gone. They went quickly, yet so silently thatwe whom they served have not yet really noticed that they are vanished.So with other vanishings.There were the little bunty street-cars on thelong, single track that went its troubled way among the cobblestones.At the rear door of the car there was no platform, but a step wherepassengers clung in wet clumpswhen the weather was bad and the carcrowded. The patrons--if not too absent-minded--put their fares into aslot; and no conductor paced the heaving floor, but the driver would rapremindingly with his elbow upon theglass of the door to his little openplatform if the nickels and the passengers did not appear to coincide innumber. A lone mule drew the car, and sometimes drew it off the track,when the passengers would get out andpush it on again. They really owedit courtesies like this, for the car was genially accommodating: a ladycould whistle to it from an upstairs window, and the car would haltat once and wait for her while she shut thewindow, put on her hat andcloak, went downstairs, found an umbrella, told the "girl" what to havefor dinner, and came forth from the house.The previous passengers made little objection to such gallantry on thepart ofthe car: they were wont to expect as much for themselves on likeoccasion. In good weather the mule pulled the car a mile in a littleless than twenty minutes, unless the stops were too long; but when thetrolley-carcame, doing its mile in five minutes and better, it wouldwait for nobody. Nor could its passengers have endured such a thing,because the faster they were carried the less time they had to spare! Inthe days beforedeathly contrivances hustled them through their lives,and when they had no telephones--another ancient vacancy profoundlyresponsible for leisure--they had time for everything: time to think, totalk, time to read, timeto wait for a lady!They even had time to dance "square dances," quadrilles, and "lancers";they also danced the "racquette," and schottisches and polkas, andsuch whims as the "Portland Fancy." They pushed back thesliding doorsbetween the "parlour" and the "sitting room," tacked down crash overthe carpets, hired a few palms in green tubs, stationed three or fourItalian musicians under the stairway in the "front hall"--and hadgreatnights!But these people were gayest on New Year's Day; they made it a truefestival--something no longer known. The women gathered to "assist" thehostesses who kept "Open House"; and the carefree men,dandified andperfumed, went about in sleighs, or in carriages and ponderous "hacks,"going from Open House to Open House, leaving fantastic cards in fancybaskets as they entered each doorway, and emerging a littlelater, morecarefree than ever, if the punch had been to their liking. It alwayswas, and, as the afternoon wore on, pedestrians saw great gesturing andwaving of skin-tight lemon gloves, while ruinous fragments of songweredropped behind as the carriages rolled up and down the streets."Keeping Open House" was a merry custom; it has gone, like the all-daypicnic in the woods, and like that prettiest of all vanished customs,theserenade. When a lively girl visited the town she did not longgo unserenaded, though a visitor was not indeed needed to excuse aserenade. Of a summer night, young men would bring an orchestra undera pretty girl'swindow--or, it might be, her father's, or that of anailing maiden aunt--and flute, harp, fiddle, 'cello, cornet, and bassviol would presently release to the dulcet stars such melodies as singthrough "You'll Remember Me,""I Dreamt That I Dwelt in Marble Halls,""Silver Threads Among the Gold," "Kathleen Mavourneen," or "TheSoldier's Farewell."They had other music to offer, too, for these were the happy daysof "Olivette" and "TheMacotte" and "The Chimes of Normandy" and"Girofle-Girofla" and "Fra Diavola." Better than that, these were thedays of "Pinafore" and "The Pirates of Penzance" and of "Patience." Thislast was needed in the Midlandtown, as elsewhere, for the "aestheticmovement" had reached thus far from London, and terrible things werebeing done to honest old furniture. Maidens sawed what-nots in two, andgilded the remains. They took therockers from rocking-chairs and gildedthe inadequate legs; they gilded the easels that supported the crayonportraits of their deceased uncles. In the new spirit of art theysold old clocks for new, and threw wax flowersand wax fruit, and theprotecting glass domes, out upon the trash-heap. They filled vases withpeacock feathers, or cattails, or sumac, or sunflowers, and set thevases upon mantelpieces and marble-topped tables. Theyembroidereddaisies (which they called "marguerites") and sunflowers and sumac andcat-tails and owls and peacock feathers upon plush screens and uponheavy cushions, then strewed these cushions upon floors wherefathersfell over them in the dark. In the teeth of sinful oratory, thedaughters went on embroidering: they embroidered daisies and sunflowersand sumac and cat-tails and owls and peacock feathers upon "throws"whichthey had the courage to drape upon horsehair sofas; they paintedowls and daisies and sunflowers and sumac and cat-tails and peacockfeathers upon tambourines. They hung Chinese umbrellas of paper tothechandeliers; they nailed paper fans to the walls. They "studied"painting on china, these girls; they sang Tosti's new songs; theysometimes still practiced the old, genteel habit of lady-fainting, andwere most charming ofall when they drove forth, three or four in abasket phaeton, on a spring morning.Croquet and the mildest archery ever known were the sports of peoplestill young and active enough for so much exertion; middle-ageplayedeuchre. There was a theatre, next door to the Amberson Hotel, and whenEdwin Booth came for a night, everybody who could afford to buy a ticketwas there, and all the "hacks" in town were hired. "The BlackCrook"also filled the theatre, but the audience then was almost entirely ofmen who looked uneasy as they left for home when the final curtain fellupon the shocking girls dressed as fairies. But the theatre did notoften doso well; the people of the town were still too thrifty.They were thrifty because they were the sons or grandsons of the "earlysettlers," who had opened the wilderness and had reached it from theEast and the South withwagons and axes and guns, but with no money atall. The pioneers were thrifty or they would have perished: they hadto store away food for the winter, or goods to trade for food, and theyoften feared they had notstored enough--they left traces of that fearin their sons and grandsons. In the minds of most of these, indeed,their thrift was next to their religion: to save, even for the sakeof saving, was their earliest lesson anddiscipline. No matter howprosperous they were, they could not spend money either upon "art," orupon mere luxury and entertainment, without a sense of sin.Against so homespun a background the magnificence of theAmbersons wasas conspicuous as a brass band at a funeral. Major Amberson bought twohundred acres of land at the end of National Avenue; and through thistract he built broad streets and cross-streets; paved themwith cedarblock, and curbed them with stone. He set up fountains, here and there,where the streets intersected, and at symmetrical intervals placedcast-iron statues, painted white, with their titles clear uponthepedestals: Minerva, Mercury, Hercules, Venus, Gladiator, EmperorAugustus, Fisher Boy, Stag-hound, Mastiff, Greyhound, Fawn, Antelope,Wounded Doe, and Wounded Lion. Most of the forest trees had been lefttoflourish still, and, at some distance, or by moonlight, the place wasin truth beautiful; but the ardent citizen, loving to see his city grow,wanted neither distance nor moonlight. He had not seen Versailles, but,standingbefore the Fountain of Neptune in Amberson Addition, at brightnoon, and quoting the favourite comparison of the local newspapers,he declared Versailles outdone. All this Art showed a profit from thestart, for the lotssold well and there was something like a rushto build in the new Addition. Its main thoroughfare, an obliquecontinuation of National Avenue, was called Amberson Boulevard, andhere, at the juncture of the newBoulevard and the Avenue, MajorAmberson reserved four acres for himself, and built his new house--theAmberson Mansion, of course.This house was the pride of the town. Faced with stone as far backas thedining-room windows, it was a house of arches and turrets andgirdling stone porches: it had the first porte-cochere seen in thattown. There was a central "front hall" with a great black walnutstairway, and open to agreen glass skylight called the "dome," threestories above the ground floor. A ballroom occupied most of thethird story; and at one end of it was a carved walnut gallery for themusicians. Citizens told strangers that thecost of all this blackwalnut and wood-carving was sixty thousand dollars. "Sixty thousanddollars for the wood-work alone! Yes, sir, and hardwood floors all overthe house! Turkish rugs and no carpets at all, except aBrussels carpetin the front parlour--I hear they call it the 'reception-room.' Hot andcold water upstairs and down, and stationary washstands in every lastbedroom in the place! Their sideboard's built right into the houseandgoes all the way across one end of the dining room. It isn't walnut,it's solid mahogany! Not veneering--solid mahogany! Well, sir, I presumethe President of the United States would be tickled to swap theWhiteHouse for the new Amberson Mansion, if the Major'd give him thechance--but by the Almighty Dollar, you bet your sweet life the Majorwouldn't!"The visitor to the town was certain to receive further enlightenment,forthere was one form of entertainment never omitted: he was alwayspatriotically taken for "a little drive around our city," even if hishost had to hire a hack, and the climax of the display was the AmbersonMansion. "Lookat that greenhouse they've put up there in the sideyard," the escort would continue. "And look at that brick stable! Mostfolks would think that stable plenty big enough and good enough to livein; it's got running waterand four rooms upstairs for two hired men andone of 'em's family to live in. They keep one hired man loafin' in thehouse, and they got a married hired man out in the stable, and his wifedoes the washing. They gotbox-stalls for four horses, and they keepa coupay, and some new kinds of fancy rigs you never saw the beat of!'Carts' they call two of 'em--'way up in the air they are--too high forme! I guess they got every new kind offancy rig in there that's beeninvented. And harness--well, everybody in town can tell when Ambersonsare out driving after dark, by the jingle. This town never did see somuch style as Ambersons are putting on, thesedays; and I guess it'sgoing to be expensive, because a lot of other folks'll try to keep upwith 'em. The Major's wife and the daughter's been to Europe, and mywife tells me since they got back they make tea there everyafternoonabout five o'clock, and drink it. Seems to me it would go against aperson's stomach, just before supper like that, and anyway tea isn't fitfor much--not unless you're sick or something. My wife saysAmbersonsdon't make lettuce salad the way other people do; they don't chop itup with sugar and vinegar at all. They pour olive oil on it with theirvinegar, and they have it separate--not along with the rest of themeal.And they eat these olives, too: green things they are, something like ahard plum, but a friend of mine told me they tasted a good deal like abad hickory-nut. My wife says she's going to buy some; you got toeatnine and then you get to like 'em, she says. Well, I wouldn't eat ninebad hickory-nuts to get to like them, and I'm going to let these olivesalone. Kind of a woman's dish, anyway, I suspect, but most everybody'llbe


ï»¿The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Deserted Village, by Oliver GoldsmithThis eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and mostother parts of the world at no cost and with almost norestrictionswhatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms ofthe Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online atwww.gutenberg.org.  If you are not located in the United States,you'll haveto check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook.Title: The Deserted VillageAuthor: Oliver GoldsmithIllustrator: The Etching ClubRelease Date: November 19, 2015 [EBook#50500]Language: English*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DESERTED VILLAGE ***Produced by David Widger from page images generouslyprovided by Google BooksTHE DESERTED VILLAGEByOliver GoldsmithIllustrated by the Etching ClubNew York: D. Appleton And Co. BroadwayMDCCCLVII[Illustration: 0001][Illustration: 0008]The Illustrations in this Volume are copied, with permission,from a series ofEtchings published some years since by the"Etching Club." Only a few impressions of that work wereprinted, the copper-plates were destroyed, and the book, exceptin a very expensive form, has long been unattainable.Greatcare has been taken to render the present Wood-blocks as likethe original Etchings as the different methods of engraving willallow.ILLUSTRATIONS                                                                     Page    SweetAuburn! loveliest milage of the plain...T. Creswick, R.A....007    The never-failing brook, the busy mill........T. Creswick, R.A....008    The hawthorn bush, with seals in shade........C. W. Cope, R.A.....009    The matron'sglance that would reprove........H. J. Townsend......010    The hollow sounding bittern guards its nest...F. Tayler...........012    These, far departing, seek a kinder shore.....C. Stonhouse........014    Amidst the swainsshow my book-learn'd skill..J. C. Horsley.......015    And, as a hare, whom hounds and horns pursue..F. Tayler...........016    To spurn imploring famine from the gale.......C. W. Cope, R.A.....017    While resignationgently slopes the way.......T. Creswick, R.A....018    The playful children let loose from school....T. Webster, R.A.....019    All but yon widow'd solitary thing............F. Tayler...........020    The village preacher's modestmansion rose....T. Creswick, R.A....021    He chid their wanderings; relieved pain.......C. W. Cope, R.A.....022    Shoulder'd his crutch, and show'd fields won..C. W. Cope, R.A.....023    Beside the bed where parting lifewas laid....R. Redgrave, R.A....025    And pluck'd his gown, share the man's smile...J. C. Horsley.......026    The village master taught his little school...T. Webster, R.A.....027    Full well they laugh'd withglee..............T. Webster, R.A.....028    Convey'd the dismal tidings when he frown'd...T. Webster, R.A.....028    In arguing too the parson own'd his skill.....C. W. Cope, R.A.....029    Near yonder thorn, that lifts itshead high...T. Creswick, R.A....030    Where village statesmen with looks profound...F. Tayler...........031    But the long pomp, the midnight masquerade....J. C. Horsley.......033    Proud swells the tide with loads ofore.......T. Creswick, R.A....034    If to some common's fenceless limit stray'd...C. Stonhouse........036    Where the poor houseless female lies..........J. C. Horsley.......037    She left her wheel and robes ofbrown.........J. C. Horsley.......038    The rattling terrors of the vengeful snake....T. Creswick, R.A....040    The cooling brookt the grassy-vested green....T. Creswick, R.A....041    The good old sire the first prepared togo....C. W. Cope, R.A.....042    Whilst her husband strove to lend relief......R. Redgrave, R.A....043    Down where yon vessel spreads the sail........T. Creswick, R.A....044    Or winter wraps the polar world insnow.......T. Creswick, R.A....045    As rocks resist the billows aNd the sky.......T. Creswick, R.A....046Drawn on wood, from the original Etchings, by E. K. Johnson, andengraved by Horace Harral, Thomas Bolton, andJames Cooper.{007}[Illustration: 0016]THE DESERTED VILLAGESweet Auburn! loveliest village of the plain,Where health and plenty cheer'd the labouring swain,Where smiling spring its earliest visit paid,And partingsummer's lingering blooms delay'd.{008}[Illustration: 0017]Dear lovely bowers of innocence and ease,Seats of my youth, when every sport could please,How often have I loiter'd o'er thy green,Where humblehappiness endear'd each scene!How often have I paused on every charm,The shelter'd cot, the cultivated farm,{009}[Illustration: 0020]The never-failing brook, the busy mill,The decent church that topt theneighbouring hill,The hawthorn bush, with seats beneath the shade,For talking age and whispering lovers made!How often have I blest the coming day,When toil remitting lent its turn to play,{010}And all the villagetrain, from labour free,Led up their sports beneath the spreading tree;[Illustration: 0021]While many a pastime circled in the shade,The young contending as the old survey'd;And many a gambol frolick'd o'er theground,And sleights of art and feats of strength went round;{011}And still, as each repeated pleasure tired,Succeeding sports the mirthful band inspired:The dancing pair that simply sought renown,By holding out totire each other down;The swain mistrustless of his smutted face,While secret laughter titter'd round the place;The bashful virgin's sidelong looks of love,The matron's glance that would those looks reprove;These werethy charms, sweet village! sports like these,With sweet succession, taught e'en toil to please;These round thy bowers their cheerful influence shed,These were thy charms--but all these charms are fled.Sweet smilingvillage, loveliest of the lawn!Thy sports are fled, and all thy charms withdrawn;Amidst thy bowers the tyrant's hand is seen,And desolation saddens all thy green:One only master grasps the whole domain,And half atillage stints thy smiling plain:No more thy glassy brook reflects the day,But choked with sedges works its weedy way;Along thy glades a solitary guest,The hollow-sounding bittern guards its nest;{012}Amidst thydesert walks the lapwing flies,And tires their echoes with unvaried cries.[Illustration: 0025]Sunk are thy bowers in shapeless ruin all,And the long grass o'ertops the mouldering wall;And trembling, shrinking from thespoiler's hand,Far, far away thy children leave the land.{013}Ill  fares the land, to hastening ills a prey,Where wealth accumulates, and men decay:Princes and lords may flourish, or may fade;A breath can make them,as a breath has made:But a bold peasantry, their country's pride,When once destroy'd, can never be supplied.A time there was, ere England's griefs began,When every rood of ground maintain'd its man;For him lightlabour spread her wholesome store,Just gave what life required, but gave no more:His best companions, innocence and health;And his best riches, ignorance of wealth.But times are alter'd; trade's unfeeling trainUsurpthe land, and dispossess the swain;Along the lawn, where scatter'd hamlets rose,Unwieldy wealth and cumbrous pomp repose;And every want to luxury allied,And every pang that folly pays to pride.Those gentle hoursthat plenty bade to bloom,Those calm desires that ask'd but little room,Those healthful sports that graced the peaceful scene,Lived in each look, and brighten'd all the green;{014}These, far departing, seek a kindershore,And rural mirth and manners are no more.[Illustration: 0027]Sweet Auburn! parent of the blissful hour,Thy glades forlorn confess the tyrant's power.Here, as I take my solitary roundsAmidst thy tangling walksand ruin'd grounds,And, many a year elapsed, return to viewWhere once the cottage stood, the hawthorn grew,Remembrance wakes with all her busy train,Swells at my breast, and turns the past to pain.{015}In all mywanderings round this world of care,In all my griefs--and God has given my share--[Illustration: 0030]To husband out life's taper at the close,And keep the flame from wasting by repose:I still had hopes, my latesthours to crown,Amidst these humble bowers to lay me down;I still had hopes, for pride attends us still,Amidst the swains to show my book-learn'd skill,{016}Around my fire an evening group to draw,And tell of all Ifelt, and all I saw;And, as a hare, whom hounds and horns pursue,Pants to the place from whence at first he flew,[Illustration: 0031]I still had hopes, my long vexations past,Here to return--and die at home at last.Oblest retirement, friend to life's decline,Retreats from care, that never must be mine:How blest is he who crowns, in shades like these,A youth of labour with an age of ease;{017}Who quits a world where strongtemptations try,And since 'tis hard to combat, learns to fly!For him no wretches, born to work and weep,Explore the mine, or tempt the dangerous deep;[Illustration: 0034]No surly porter stands, in guilty state,To spurnimploring famine from the gate--But on he moves to meet his latter end,Angels around befriending virtue's friend;Sinks to the grave with unperceived decay,While resignation gently slopes the way;{018}And, all hisprospects brightening to the last,His heaven commences ere the world be past.[Illustration: 0035]Sweet was the sound, when oft, at evening's close,Up yonder hill the village murmur rose:There, as I pass'd withcareless steps and slow,The mingling notes came soften'd from below;The swain responsive as the milk-maid sung,The sober herd that low'd to meet their young;The noisy geese that gabbled o'er the pool,The playfulchildren just let loose from school;{019}The watch-dog's voice that bay'd the whispering wind,And the loud laugh that spoke the vacant mind;[Illustration: 0038]These all in sweet confusion sought the shade,And fill'deach pause the nightingale had made.But now the sounds of population fail:No cheerful murmurs fluctuate in the gale,No busy steps the grass-grown footway tread,But all the bloomy flush of life is fled;All but yonwidow'd solitary thing,That feebly bends beside the plashy spring:{020}She, wretched matron, forced in age, for bread,To strip the brook with mantling cresses spread[Illustration: 0039]To pick her wintry faggot fromthe thorn,To seek her nightly shed and weep till morn;She only left of all the harmless train,The sad historian of the pensive plain.{021}Near yonder copse, where once the garden smiled,And still where many a gardenflower grows wild,[Illustration: 0042]There, where a few torn shrubs the place disclose,The village preacher's modest mansion rose.A man he was to all the country dear,And passing rich with forty pounds ayear;{022}Remote from towns he ran his godly race,Nor e'er had changed, nor wish'd to change his place[Illustration: 0043]Unskilful he to fawn, or seek for power,By doctrines fashion'd to the varying hour;Far otheraims his heart had learn'd to prize,More bent to raise the wretched than to rise.{023}His house was known to all the vagrant train;He chid their wanderings, but relieved their pain:[Illustration: 0046]The longremember'd beggar was his guest,Whose beard descending swept his aged breast;The ruin'd spendthrift, now no longer proud,Claim'd kindred there, and had his claims allow'd;{024}The broken soldier, kindly bade tostay,Sate by his fire, and talk'd the night away;Wept o'er his wounds, or, tales of sorrow done,Shoulder'd his crutch, and show'd how fields were won.Pleased with his guests, the good man learn'd to glow,And quiteforgot their vices in their woe;Careless their merits or their faults to scan,His pity gave ere charity began.Thus to relieve the wretched was his pride,And e'en his failings lean'd to virtue's side;But in his duty prompt, atevery call,He watch'd and wept, he pray'd and felt for all:And, as a bird each fond endearment triesTo tempt its new-fledged offspring to the skies,He tried each art, reproved each dull delay,Allured to brighter worlds,and led the way.Beside the bed where parting life was laid,And sorrow, guilt, and pain, by turns dismay'd,The reverend champion stood. At his control,Despair and anguish fled the struggling soul;{025}Comfort camedown the trembling wretch to raise,And his last faltering accents whisper'd praise.[Illustration: 0050]At church, with meek and unaffected grace,His looks adorn'd the venerable place;Truth from his lips prevail'd withdouble sway,And fools, who came to scoff, remain'd to pray.The service past, around the pious man,With ready zeal each honest rustic ran:{026}E'en children follow'd with endearing wile,And pluck'd his gown, to sharethe good man's smile[Illustration: 0051]His ready smile a parent's warmth express'd,Their welfare pleased him, and their cares distress'dTo them his heart, his love, his griefs, were given,But all his serious thoughtshad rest in heaven.As some tall cliff, that lifts its awful form,Swells from the vale, and midway leaves the storm,{027}Though round its breast the rolling clouds are spread,Eternal sunshine settles on itshead.[Illustration: 0054]Beside yon straggling fence that skirts the wayWith blossom'd furze, unprofitably gay,There, in his noisy mansion, skill'd to rule,The village master taught his little school:A man severe he was,and stern to view;I knew him well, and every truant knew:[Illustration: 0055]Full well they laugh'd with counterfeited gleeAt all his jokes, for many a joke had he;{028}Well had the boding tremblers learn'd to traceTheday's disasters in his morning face:Full well the busy whisper, circling round,Convey'd the dismal tidings when he frown'd;{029}Yet he was kind, or if severe in aught,The love he bore to learning was in fault:The villageall declared how much he knew;'Twas certain he could write and cipher too:Lands he could measure, terms and tides presage,And e'en the story ran that he could gauge:[Illustration: 0058]In arguing too the parsonown'd his skill,For e'en though vanquish'd, he could argue still;{030}While words of learned length, and thundering sound,Amazed the gazing rustics ranged around;And still they gazed, and still the wonder grewThatone small head could carry all he knew.But past is all his fame: the very spot,Where many a time he triumph'd, is forgot.[Illustration: 0059]Near yonder thorn that lifts its head on high,Where once the sign-post caughtthe passing eye,Low lies that house where nut-brown draughts inspired,Where grey-beard mirth and smiling toil retired,{031}Where village statesmen talk'd with looks profound,And news much older than their alewent round.[Illustration: 0062]Imagination fondly stoops to traceThe parlour splendours of that festive place;The white-wash'd wall, the nicely-sanded floor,The varnish'd clock that click'd behind the door;{032}Thechest contrived a double debt to pay,A bed by night, a chest of drawers by day;The pictures placed for ornament and use,The twelve good rules, the royal game of gooseThe hearth, except when winter chill'd theday,With aspen boughs, and flowers, and fennel gayWhile broken tea-cups, wisely kept for show,Ranged o'er the chimney, glisten'd in a row.Vain, transitory splendours! could not allReprieve the tottering mansion fromits fall IObscure it sinks, nor shall it more impartAn hour's importance to the poor man's heart:Thither no more the peasant shall repairTo sweet oblivion of his daily care:No more the farmer's news, the barber's tale,Nomore the woodman's ballad shall prevail;No more the smith his dusky brow shall clear,Relax his ponderous strength, and lean to hear;The host himself no longer shall be foundCareful to see the mantling bliss goround;Nor the coy maid, half willing to be prest,Shall kiss the cup to pass it to the rest.{033}Yes! let the rich deride, the proud disdain,These simple blessings of the lowly train:To me more dear, congenial to myheart,One native charm, than all the gloss of art;Spontaneous joys, where nature has its play,The soul adopts, and owns their first-born sway;Lightly they frolic o'er the vacant mind,Unenvied, unmolested,unconfined.[Illustration: 0066]But the long pomp, the midnight masquerade,With all the freaks of wanton wealth array'd,In these, ere triflers half their wish obtain,The toilsome pleasure sickens into pain;{034}And,e'en while fashion's brightest arts decoy,The heart distrusting asks, if this be joy?Ye friends to truth, ye statesmen, who surveyThe rich man's joys increase, the poor's decay,'Tis yours to judge how wide the limitsstandBetween a splendid and a happy land.[Illustration: 0067]Proud swells the tide with loads of freighted ore,And shouting Folly hails them from her shore;Hoards e'en beyond the miser's wish abound,And rich menflock from all the world around.Yet count our gains. This wealth is but a nameThat leaves our useful product still the same.{035}Not so the loss. The man of wealth and prideTakes up a space that many poorsupplied;Space for his lake, his park's extended bounds,Space for his horses, equipage, and hounds;The robe that wraps his limbs in silken slothHas robb'd the neighbouring fields of half their growth;His seat, wheresolitary sports are seen,Indignant spurns the cottage from the green;Around the world each needful product flies,For all the luxuries the world supplies:While thus the land, adorn'd for pleasure all,In barren splendourfeebly waits the fall.As some fair female, unadorn'd and plain,Secure to please while youth confirms her reign,Slights every borrow'd charm that dress supplies,Nor shares with art the triumph of her eyes;But whenthose charms are past, for charms are frail,When time advances, and when lovers fail,She then shines forth, solicitous to bless,In all the glaring impotence of dress;Thus fares the land, by luxury betray'd,In nature'ssimplest charms at first array'd;{036}But verging to decline, its splendours rise,Its vistas strike, its palaces surprise;While, scourged by famine, from the smiling landThe mournful peasant leads his humble band;Andwhile he sinks, without one arm to save,The country blooms--a garden and a grave!Where then, ah! where shall poverty reside,To 'scape the pressure of contiguous pride?[Illustration: 0071]If to some common'sfenceless limits stray'd,He drives his flock to pick the scanty blade,Those fenceless fields the sons of wealth divide,And e'en the bare-worn common is denied.{037}If to the city sped--What waits him there?To seeprofusion, that he must not share;To see ten thousand baneful arts combinedTo pamper luxury, and thin mankind;To see each joy the sons of pleasure know,Extorted from his fellow-creature's woe.[Illustration:0074]Here, while the courtier glitters in brocade,There the pale artist plies the sickly trade;Here, while the proud their long-drawn pomp display,There the black gibbet glooms beside the way;{038}The dome wherepleasure holds her midnight reign,Here, richly deck'd, admits the gorgeous train;Tumultuous grandeur crowds the blazing square,The rattling chariots clash, the torches glare.Sure scenes like these no troubles e'erannoy!Sure these denote one universal joy!Are these thy serious thoughts? Ah, turn thine eyesWhere the poor houseless shivering female lies:She once, perhaps, in village plenty blest,Has wept at tales of innocencedistrest;[Illustration: 0075]Her modest looks the cottage might adorn,Sweet as the primrose peeps beneath the thorn;{039}Now lost to all; her friends, her virtue fled,Near her betrayer's door she lays her head,And,pinch'd with cold, and shrinking from the shower,With heavy heart deplores that luckless hourWhen idly first, ambitious of the town,She left her wheel and robes of country brown.Do thine, sweet Auburn, thine, theloveliest train,Do thy fair tribes participate her pain?E'en now, perhaps, by cold and hunger led,At proud men's doors they ask a little bread!Ah, no. To distant climes, a dreary scene,Where half the convex world intrudesbetween,Through torrid tracts with fainting steps they go,Where wild Altama murmurs to their woe.Far different there from all that charm'd before,The various terrors of that horrid shore;Those blazing suns that dart adownward ray,And fiercely shed intolerable day;Those matted woods where birds forget to sing,But silent-bats in drowsy clusters cling;{040}Those poisonous fields with rank luxuriance crown'd,Where the dark scorpiongathers death around;Where at each step the stranger fears to wakeThe rattling terrors of the vengeful snake;[Illustration: 0079]Where crouching tigers wait their hapless prey,And savage men more murderous stillthan they;While oft in whirls the mad tornado flies,Mingling the ravaged landscape with the skies.Far different these from every former scene,The cooling brook, the grassy-vested green,{041}The breezy covert of thewarbling grove,That only shelter'd thefts of harmless love.[Illustration: 0082]Good Heaven! what sorrows gloom'd that parting day,That call'd them from their native walks away!When the poor exiles, every pleasurepast,Hung round the bowers, and fondly look'd their last,And took a long farewell, and wish'd in vainFor seats like these beyond the western main;And shuddering still to face the distant deep,Return'd and wept, and still


ï»¿Project Gutenberg's Mrs. Warren's Profession, by George Bernard ShawThis eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and withalmost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away orre-use itunder the terms of the Project Gutenberg License includedwith this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.orgTitle: Mrs. Warren's ProfessionAuthor: George Bernard ShawRelease Date: February 11, 2006 [EBook#1097][Last updated: July 6, 2011]Language: English*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MRS. WARREN'S PROFESSION ***Produced by An Anonymous Volunteer and David WidgerMRS WARREN'SPROFESSIONby George Bernard Shaw1894With The Author's Apology (1902)THE AUTHOR'S APOLOGYMrs Warren's Profession has been performed at last, after a delay ofonly eight years; and I have once more sharedwith Ibsen the triumphantamusement of startling all but the strongest-headed of the Londontheatre critics clean out of the practice of their profession. Noauthor who has ever known the exultation of sending the Pressinto anhysterical tumult of protest, of moral panic, of involuntary and franticconfession of sin, of a horror of conscience in which the power ofdistinguishing between the work of art on the stage and the real lifeof thespectator is confused and overwhelmed, will ever care for thestereotyped compliments which every successful farce or melodramaelicits from the newspapers. Give me that critic who rushed from my playto declarefuriously that Sir George Crofts ought to be kicked. What atriumph for the actor, thus to reduce a jaded London journalist tothe condition of the simple sailor in the Wapping gallery, who shoutsexecrations at Iago andwarnings to Othello not to believe him! Butdearer still than such simplicity is that sense of the sudden earthquakeshock to the foundations of morality which sends a pallid crowd ofcritics into the street shrieking that thepillars of society arecracking and the ruin of the State is at hand. Even the Ibsen championsof ten years ago remonstrate with me just as the veterans of those bravedays remonstrated with them. Mr Grein, the hardyiconoclast who firstlaunched my plays on the stage alongside Ghosts and The Wild Duck,exclaimed that I have shattered his ideals. Actually his ideals! Whatwould Dr Relling say? And Mr William Archer himself disownsme because I"cannot touch pitch without wallowing in it". Truly my play must be moreneeded than I knew; and yet I thought I knew how little the others know.Do not suppose, however, that the consternation of thePress reflectsany consternation among the general public. Anybody can upset thetheatre critics, in a turn of the wrist, by substituting for theromantic commonplaces of the stage the moral commonplaces of thepulpit,platform, or the library. Play Mrs Warren's Profession to an audienceof clerical members of the Christian Social Union and of women wellexperienced in Rescue, Temperance, and Girls' Club work, and nomoralpanic will arise; every man and woman present will know that as longas poverty makes virtue hideous and the spare pocket-money of richbachelordom makes vice dazzling, their daily hand-to-hand fightagainstprostitution with prayer and persuasion, shelters and scanty alms,will be a losing one. There was a time when they were able to urge thatthough "the white-lead factory where Anne Jane was poisoned" may beafar more terrible place than Mrs Warren's house, yet hell is still moredreadful. Nowadays they no longer believe in hell; and the girls amongwhom they are working know that they do not believe in it, and wouldlaugh atthem if they did. So well have the rescuers learnt that MrsWarren's defence of herself and indictment of society is the thing thatmost needs saying, that those who know me personally reproach me, notfor writing thisplay, but for wasting my energies on "pleasantplays" for the amusement of frivolous people, when I can build up suchexcellent stage sermons on their own work. Mrs Warren's Profession isthe one play of mine which Icould submit to a censorship without doubtof the result; only, it must not be the censorship of the minor theatrecritic, nor of an innocent court official like the Lord Chamberlain'sExaminer, much less of people whoconsciously profit by Mrs Warren'sprofession, or who personally make use of it, or who hold the widelywhispered view that it is an indispensable safety-valve for theprotection of domestic virtue, or, above all, who aresmitten with asentimental affection for our fallen sister, and would "take her uptenderly, lift her with care, fashioned so slenderly, young, and SOfair." Nor am I prepared to accept the verdict of the medicalgentlemenwho would compulsorily sanitate and register Mrs Warren, whilst leavingMrs Warren's patrons, especially her military patrons, free to destroyher health and anybody else's without fear of reprisals. But Ishould bequite content to have my play judged by, say, a joint committee ofthe Central Vigilance Society and the Salvation Army. And the sternermoralists the members of the committee were, the better.Some of thejournalists I have shocked reason so unripely that they willgather nothing from this but a confused notion that I am accusing theNational Vigilance Association and the Salvation Army of complicity inmy own scandalousimmorality. It will seem to them that people who wouldstand this play would stand anything. They are quite mistaken. Suchan audience as I have described would be revolted by many of ourfashionable plays. Theywould leave the theatre convinced that thePlymouth Brother who still regards the playhouse as one of the gates ofhell is perhaps the safest adviser on the subject of which he knows solittle. If I do not draw the sameconclusion, it is not because I am oneof those who claim that art is exempt from moral obligations, and denythat the writing or performance of a play is a moral act, to be treatedon exactly the same footing as theft ormurder if it produces equallymischievous consequences. I am convinced that fine art is the subtlest,the most seductive, the most effective instrument of moral propaganda inthe world, excepting only the example ofpersonal conduct; and I waiveeven this exception in favor of the art of the stage, because it worksby exhibiting examples of personal conduct made intelligible and movingto crowds of unobservant, unreflecting peopleto whom real life meansnothing. I have pointed out again and again that the influence of thetheatre in England is growing so great that whilst private conduct,religion, law, science, politics, and morals are becomingmore andmore theatrical, the theatre itself remains impervious to commonsense, religion, science, politics, and morals. That is why I fight thetheatre, not with pamphlets and sermons and treatises, but with plays;andso effective do I find the dramatic method that I have no doubt Ishall at last persuade even London to take its conscience and its brainswith it when it goes to the theatre, instead of leaving them at homewith itsprayer-book as it does at present. Consequently, I am thelast man in the world to deny that if the net effect of performing MrsWarren's Profession were an increase in the number of persons enteringthat profession, itsperformance should be dealt with accordingly.Now let us consider how such recruiting can be encouraged by thetheatre. Nothing is easier. Let the King's Reader of Plays, backed bythe Press, make an unwritten butperfectly well understood regulationthat members of Mrs Warren's profession shall be tolerated on the stageonly when they are beautiful, exquisitely dressed, and sumptuouslylodged and fed; also that they shall, at theend of the play, die ofconsumption to the sympathetic tears of the whole audience, or stepinto the next room to commit suicide, or at least be turned out by theirprotectors and passed on to be "redeemed" by old andfaithful lovers whohave adored them in spite of their levities. Naturally, the poorer girlsin the gallery will believe in the beauty, in the exquisite dresses, andthe luxurious living, and will see that there is no real necessityforthe consumption, the suicide, or the ejectment: mere pious forms, allof them, to save the Censor's face. Even if these purely officialcatastrophes carried any conviction, the majority of English girlsremain so poor, sodependent, so well aware that the drudgeries of suchhonest work as is within their reach are likely enough to lead themeventually to lung disease, premature death, and domestic desertion orbrutality, that they wouldstill see reason to prefer the primrose pathto the strait path of virtue, since both, vice at worst and virtue atbest, lead to the same end in poverty and overwork. It is true that theBoard School mistress will tell you thatonly girls of a certain kindwill reason in this way. But alas! that certain kind turns out oninquiry to be simply the pretty, dainty kind: that is, the only kindthat gets the chance of acting on such reasoning. Read the firstreportof the Commission on the Housing of the Working Classes [Bluebook C4402, 8d., 1889]; read the Report on Home Industries (sacred word,Home!) issued by the Women's Industrial Council [Home IndustriesofWomen in London, 1897, 1s., 12 Buckingham Street, W. C.]; and askyourself whether, if the lot in life therein described were your lotin life, you would not prefer the lot of Cleopatra, of Theodora, of theLady of theCamellias, of Mrs Tanqueray, of Zaza, of Iris. If you cango deep enough into things to be able to say no, how many ignoranthalf-starved girls will believe you are speaking sincerely? To them thelot of Iris is heavenly incomparison with their own. Yet our King, likehis predecessors, says to the dramatist, "Thus, and thus only, shallyou present Mrs Warren's profession on the stage, or you shall starve.Witness Shaw, who told theuntempting truth about it, and whom We, bythe Grace of God, accordingly disallow and suppress, and do what in Uslies to silence." Fortunately, Shaw cannot be silenced. "The harlot'scry from street to street" is louderthan the voices of all the kings.I am not dependent on the theatre, and cannot be starved into makingmy play a standing advertisement of the attractive side of Mrs Warren'sbusiness.Here I must guard myself against amisunderstanding. It is not the faultof their authors that the long string of wanton's tragedies, from Antonyand Cleopatra to Iris, are snares to poor girls, and are objected toon that account by many earnest men andwomen who consider Mrs Warren'sProfession an excellent sermon. Mr Pinero is in no way bound to suppressthe fact that his Iris is a person to be envied by millions of betterwomen. If he made his play false to life byinventing fictitiousdisadvantages for her, he would be acting as unscrupulously as any tractwriter. If society chooses to provide for its Irises better than forits working women, it must not expect honest playwrights tomanufacturespurious evidence to save its credit. The mischief lies in thedeliberate suppression of the other side of the case: the refusal toallow Mrs Warren to expose the drudgery and repulsiveness of plying forhireamong coarse, tedious drunkards; the determination not to let theParisian girl in Brieux's Les Avaries come on the stage and drive intopeople's minds what her diseases mean for her and for themselves. Allthat, saysthe King's Reader in effect, is horrifying, loathsome.Precisely: what does he expect it to be? would he have us represent itas beautiful and gratifying? The answer to this question, I fear, mustbe a blunt Yes; for it seemsimpossible to root out of an Englishman'smind the notion that vice is delightful, and that abstention from itis privation. At all events, as long as the tempting side of it is kepttowards the public, and softened by plenty ofsentiment and sympathy, itis welcomed by our Censor, whereas the slightest attempt to place it inthe light of the policeman's lantern or the Salvation Army shelteris checkmated at once as not merely disgusting, but, ifyou please,unnecessary.Everybody will, I hope, admit that this state of things is intolerable;that the subject of Mrs Warren's profession must be either tapualtogether, or else exhibited with the warning side as freelydisplayedas the tempting side. But many persons will vote for a complete tapu,and an impartial sweep from the boards of Mrs Warren and Gretchen andthe rest; in short, for banishing the sexual instincts from thestagealtogether. Those who think this impossible can hardly have consideredthe number and importance of the subjects which are actually banishedfrom the stage. Many plays, among them Lear, Hamlet,Macbeth,Coriolanus, Julius Caesar, have no sex complications: the thread oftheir action can be followed by children who could not understand asingle scene of Mrs Warren's Profession or Iris. None of our plays rousethesympathy of the audience by an exhibition of the pains of maternity,as Chinese plays constantly do. Each nation has its own particular setof tapus in addition to the common human stock; and though each ofthese tapuslimits the scope of the dramatist, it does not make dramaimpossible. If the Examiner were to refuse to license plays with femalecharacters in them, he would only be doing to the stage what our tribalcustoms already doto the pulpit and the bar. I have myself written arather entertaining play with only one woman in it, and she is quiteheartwhole; and I could just as easily write a play without a woman init at all. I will even go so far asto promise the Mr Redford my supportif he will introduce this limitation for part of the year, say duringLent, so as to make a close season for that dullest of stock dramaticsubjects, adultery, and force our managers andauthors to find out whatall great dramatists find out spontaneously: to wit, that people whosacrifice every other consideration to love are as hopelessly unheroicon the stage as lunatics or dipsomaniacs. Hector is theworld's hero;not Paris nor Antony.But though I do not question the possibility of a drama in which loveshould be as effectively ignored as cholera is at present, there is notthe slightest chance of that way out of thedifficulty being taken bythe Mr Redford. If he attempted it there would be a revolt in which hewould be swept away in spite of my singlehanded efforts to defend him.A complete tapu is politically impossible. A completetoleration isequally impossible to Mr Redford, because his occupation would be goneif there were no tapu to enforce. He is therefore compelled to maintainthe present compromise of a partial tapu, applied, to the best ofhisjudgement, with a careful respect to persons and to public opinion. Anda very sensible English solution of the difficulty, too, most readerswill say. I should not dispute it if dramatic poets really were whatEnglishpublic opinion generally assumes them to be during theirlifetime: that is, a licentiously irregular group to be kept in orderin a rough and ready way by a magistrate who will stand no nonsensefrom them. But I cannotadmit that the class represented by Eschylus,Sophocles, Aristophanes, Euripides, Shakespear, Goethe, Ibsen, andTolstoy, not to mention our own contemporary playwrights, is as much inplace in Mr Redford's office as apickpocket is in Bow Street. Further,it is not true that the Censorship, though it certainly suppresses Ibsenand Tolstoy, and would suppress Shakespear but for the absurd rule thata play once licensed is always licensed(so that Wycherly is permittedand Shelley prohibited), also suppresses unscrupulous playwrights. Ichallenge Mr Redford to mention any extremity of sexual misconduct whichany manager in his senses would riskpresenting on the London stage thathas not been presented under his license and that of his predecessor.The compromise, in fact, works out in practice in favor of loose playsas against earnest ones.To carry convictionon this point, I will take the extreme course ofnarrating the plots of two plays witnessed within the last ten yearsby myself at London West End theatres, one licensed by the late QueenVictoria's Reader of Plays, theother by the present Reader to the King.Both plots conform to the strictest rules of the period when La Dame auxCamellias was still a forbidden play, and when The Second Mrs Tanqueraywould have been tolerated onlyon condition that she carefully explainedto the audience that when she met Captain Ardale she sinned "but inintention."Play number one. A prince is compelled by his parents to marry thedaughter of a neighboring king,but loves another maiden. The scenerepresents a hall in the king's palace at night. The wedding has takenplace that day; and the closed door of the nuptial chamber is in view ofthe audience. Inside, the princess awaitsher bridegroom. A duenna is inattendance. The bridegroom enters. His sole desire is to escape from amarriage which is hateful to him. An idea strikes him. He will assaultthe duenna, and get ignominiously expelled fromthe palace by hisindignant father-in-law. To his horror, when he proceeds to carry outthis stratagem, the duenna, far from raising an alarm, is flattered,delighted, and compliant. The assaulter becomes the assaulted. Heflingsher angrily to the ground, where she remains placidly. He flies. Thefather enters; dismisses the duenna; and listens at the keyhole ofhis daughter's nuptial chamber, uttering various pleasantries, anddeclaring, witha shiver, that a sound of kissing, which he supposes toproceed from within, makes him feel young again.In deprecation of the scandalized astonishment with which such a storyas this will be read, I can only say that itwas not presented on thestage until its propriety had been certified by the chief officer of theQueen of England's household.Story number two. A German officer finds himself in an inn with a Frenchlady who haswounded his national vanity. He resolves to humble her bycommitting a rape upon her. He announces his purpose. She remonstrates,implores, flies to the doors and finds them locked, calls for helpand finds none athand, runs screaming from side to side, and, aftera harrowing scene, is overpowered and faints. Nothing further beingpossible on the stage without actual felony, the officer then relentsand leaves her. When sherecovers, she believes that he has carried outhis threat; and during the rest of the play she is represented as vainlyvowing vengeance upon him, whilst she is really falling in love withhim under the influence of hisimaginary crime against her. Finally sheconsents to marry him; and the curtain falls on their happiness.This story was certified by the present King's Reader, acting for theLord Chamberlain, as void in its generaltendency of "anything immoralor otherwise improper for the stage." But let nobody conclude thereforethat Mr Redford is a monster, whose policy it is to deprave the theatre.As a matter of fact, both the above storiesare strictly in order fromthe official point of view. The incidents of sex which they contain,though carried in both to the extreme point at which another step wouldbe dealt with, not by the King's Reader, but by thepolice, do notinvolve adultery, nor any allusion to Mrs Warren's profession, nor tothe fact that the children of any polyandrous group will, when they growup, inevitably be confronted, as those of Mrs Warren's group arein myplay, with the insoluble problem of their own possible consanguinity.In short, by depending wholly on the coarse humors and the physicalfascination of sex, they comply with all the formulable requirements oftheCensorship, whereas plays in which these humors and fascinations arediscarded, and the social problems created by sex seriously faced anddealt with, inevitably ignore the official formula and are suppressed.If the oldrule against the exhibition of illicit sex relations on stagewere revived, and the subject absolutely barred, the only result wouldbe that Antony and Cleopatra, Othello (because of the Bianca episode),Troilus and Cressida,Henry IV, Measure for Measure, Timon of Athens,La Dame aux Camellias, The Profligate, The Second Mrs Tanqueray, TheNotorious Mrs Ebbsmith, The Gay Lord Quex, Mrs Dane's Defence, andIris would be swept fromthe stage, and placed under the same ban asTolstoy's Dominion of Darkness and Mrs Warren's Profession, whilst suchplays as the two described above would have a monopoly of the theatre asfar as sexual interest isconcerned.What is more, the repulsiveness of the worst of the certified playswould protect the Censorship against effective exposure and criticism.Not long ago an American Review of high standing asked me for anarticleon the Censorship of the English stage. I replied that such an articlewould involve passages too disagreeable for publication in a magazinefor general family reading. The editor persisted nevertheless; butnot untilhe had declared his readiness to face this, and had pledgedhimself to insert the article unaltered (the particularity of the pledgeextending even to a specification of the exact number of words in thearticle) did I consentto the proposal. What was the result?The editor, confronted with the two stories given above, threw hispledge to the winds, and, instead of returning the article, printedit with the illustrative examples omitted, and


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                             THE FAULT IN OUR STARS                                                           Written by                      Scott Neustadter &Michael H. Weber                                                                               Based on the novel by                                  John Green                                                                                May 1,2012                                                          FIRST DRAFT          HAZEL GRACE LANCASTER (16) lies in the grass, staring up at          the stars. We're CLOSE ON her FACE and we hear:           HAZEL(V.O.)           You have a choice in this world, I           believe, about how to tell sad           stories.          CUT TO a SERIES OF QUICK IMAGES:          - Hazel and the BOY we will come to know as AUGUSTUS"GUS"          WATERS (17) at an outdoor restaurant in some magical place.          [They look very much like the perfect Hollywood couple.]           HAZEL (V.O.)           On the one hand, you can sugarcoat           - the way they do in movies and           romance novels.          - "Perfect" Hazel and "Perfect" Gus sit on a BENCH          overlooking an incredible seascape in some foreign country.          She rests her headon his shoulder.           HAZEL (V.O.)           Where villains are vanquished           and... heroes are born and...          - "Perfect" Hazel and "Perfect" Gus kiss in a dark room.           HAZEL(V.O.)           ... beautiful people learn           beautiful lessons...          - "Perfect" Hazel and "Perfect" Gus fall onto a bed together.          They look deep into one another's eyes.           HAZEL(V.O.)           ... and nothing is too messed up           that can't be fixed with an apology           and a Peter Gabriel song.          BACK TO Hazel on the grass, still watching the stars. Were          those dreams orwere they memories? Still unclear.           HAZEL (V.O.)           I like that way as much as the next           girl, believe me. It's just not the           truth.          Hazel closes her eyes.           HAZEL(V.O.)           This is the truth.          And EVERYTHING GOES BLACK. We HEAR:           HAZEL (V.O.)           Sorry.           FADE IN ON:           2.                                   INTDOCTOR'S OFFICE - DAY          The real Hazel is no less beautiful than the one we just saw.           HAZEL (V.O.)           Late in the Winter of my 17th           year...          There are, however, some keyand obvious differences.          First, you'll notice the OXYGEN TUBE in her nostrils which          help her to breathe.          Second, you'll notice her hair - which we couldn't see in the          grass. It's much shorter thanthe "Perfect" version, the          result of someone whose head was completely shaved a few          years before.           HAZEL (V.O.)           ... my mother decided Iwas           depressed.                          HAZEL           I'm not depressed.          Hazel's legs dangle over the side of an exam table. Her          mother FRANNIE (early 40s, younger than she feels)explains          to the DOCTOR:                          FRANNIE           ... she eats like a bird. She           barely leaves the house,                          HAZEL           I'm notdepressed.                          FRANNIE           ... she reads the same book over           and over...                          DOCTOR           She's depressed.                          HAZEL           I'm notdepressed!          Off her look, CUT TO:          QUICK SEQUENCE, which play over:                          HAZEL (V.O.)           The booklets and web sites always           list depression as a side effectof           cancer...          - A SHOPPING MALL. Filled with TEENAGE GIRLS - gossipping,          laughing - being teenage girls, basically. And here's Hazel.          With her Mom. And her oxygen tank. Just anotherday.           3.                                                   HAZEL (V.O.)           Depression's not a side effect of           cancer...          - HAZEL'S LIVING ROOM. She sits watching game shows inthe          middle of the afternoon. Her Mom brings her a sandwich. A          glass of water. And then a whole host of prescription meds.          Hazel eyes them with indifference.                          HAZEL(V.O.)           ... it's a side effect of dying.          - A STARBUCKS. Hazel sits alone reading a dog-eared, heavily          underlined copy of a novel ("An Imperial Affliction" by Peter          Van Houten). She only looksup when distracted by a squeal of          delight. A YOUNG GUY has lifted a YOUNG GIRL over his          shoulder playfully. He spins her around. Hazel watches a beat          - goes back to thebook.                          HAZEL (V.O.)           Which is what was happening to me.          And we CUT BACK TO:                                   INT DOCTOR'S OFFICE - SAME          Frannie continues to talkto the doctor. Hazel continues to          dangle her feet.                          FRANNIE           ... some days she won't even get           out of bed.          The Doctor scratches his beard,thinking.                          DOCTOR           I may switch you to Zoloft. Or           Lexapro. And twice a day instead of           once.                          HAZEL           Why stopthere?                          DOCTOR           Hmm?                          HAZEL           Keep `em coming. I can take it. I'm           like the Keith Richards of cancer           kids.          The Doctor looks atFrannie who just shakes her head.                          DOCTOR           Have you been going to that Support           Group I suggested?          Instead of answering, Hazel looks at herMom.           4.                                                   FRANNIE           She's gone a few times.                          HAZEL           I'm not sure it's forme.                          DOCTOR           If you're depressed --                          HAZEL                          (EXASPERATED)           I'm notde--                          DOCTOR                          (IGNORING HER)           -- support Groups are a great way           to connect with people whoare...                          HAZEL           What?                          DOCTOR                          (BEAT)           On the same journey.                          HAZEL           "Journey?"Really?                          FRANNIE           Hazel.                          DOCTOR           Just give it a chance, ok? For me.          Hazel rolls her eyes, knows she's lost thisbattle.                          DOCTOR           Who knows? You might even find           it... enlightening.           SMASH CUT TO:                                   INT CHURCH BASEMENT -DAY          CLOSE UP on PATRICK (30s, pony-tail). He has a guitar.                          PATRICK           ... we are gathered here today -           literally - in the heart of Jesus.          ANGLE on Hazel whojust shakes her head. This is the lamest          thing she could be doing right now.                          PATRICK           Who would like to share their story           with the group?          The basement is filled withSICK PEOPLE. Hazel among them.          Most are under the age of 18. QUICK CUTS:           5.                                                   SPEAKER #1           Jillian. 15.Lymphoma.                          SPEAKER #2           Angel. 17. Ewing sarcoma.                          PATRICK           Patrick. 34. Testicular. It started           a few years ago, when I was...          As Hazelwatches, bored, and Patrick continues, we hear:           HAZEL (V.O.)           I'll spare you the gory details of           Patrick's ball cancer. Basically,           they found it in his nuts, cut most           of it out, healmost died, but he           didn't die, and now here he is -           divorced, friendless, addicted to           video games, exploiting his           cancertastic past in the heart of           Jesus - "literally" - to showus           that one day - if we're lucky - we           could be just like him.          They all say:           ALL IN UNISON           "We're here for you Patrick."          Hazel says it the least enthusiastically. She lockseyes with          her only friend in Support Group, a blonde kid with an eye          patch, ISAAC. He's also shaking his head.                          PATRICK           Who else would like toshare?                          (NO RESPONSE)           Hazel?          Oh no. Patrick gestures for her to speak. Reluctantly she          stands, sighs...                          HAZEL           I'm, uh, Hazel.16.                          (BEAT)           Thyroid originally but with quite           the impressive satellite colony in           my lungs.          Not much more to say, Hazel is about to sitdown.                          PATRICK           And how are you doing Hazel?          Hazel has no idea how to answer that.           HAZEL (V.O.)           You mean besides theterminal           cancer?           6.                                   But that's not what she says. She says:                          HAZEL           Alright? I guess...?          Isaac tries not to laugh at this. Hazel sitsback down.           ALL IN UNISON           "We're here for you Hazel."          Hazel exhales. This is not at all helpful. A few more beats.                          PATRICK           Maybe now I'll play asong...                                   EXT CHURCH - LATER          Frannie sits in the car in the parking lot, reading from a          book, waiting for Group to be over. She sees the church door          open and puts thebook away. Hazel comes out. Frannie looks          at her like "well, was it great?" Hazel just exhales and gets          in the car. CUT TO:                                   INT HAZEL'S LIVING ROOM - ANOTHERDAY          "America's Next Top Model" is on the TV. Hazel sits on one          side of the L-shaped couch, flipping through her novel.          Frannie and Hazel's dad MICHAEL (40s, kind, doing his best to          staypositive) sit on the other side, watching her - but          trying not to make it seem that way. After a few beats:                          FRANNIE           It's Fridaynight.                          HAZEL           Hmm?                          FRANNIE           I was just thinking... you should           call your friends, see what they're           upto.                          HAZEL                          (DISINTERESTED)           That's ok.          Frannie and Michael look at one another, don't sayanything.                          MICHAEL           Wanna see a movie?          Hazel looks up from the book. Sees her parents. Gets an idea.                          HAZEL           Why don't you guys go to a


ï»¿The Project Gutenberg EBook of War and the Future, by H. G. WellsThis eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and withalmost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away orre-use it underthe terms of the Project Gutenberg License includedwith this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.orgTitle: War and the FutureAuthor: H. G. WellsRelease Date: March 21, 2006 [EBook #1804]Language: English***START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WAR AND THE FUTURE ***Produced by Morgan L. Owens and David WidgerWAR AND THE FUTUREItaly, France and Britain at Warby H. G. WellsContents     The Passing ofthe Effigy     The War in Italy (August, 1916)     I. The Isonzo Front     II. The Mountain War     III. Behind the Front     The Western War (September, 1916)     I. Ruins     II. The Grades of War     III. The WarLandscape     IV. New Arms for Old Ones     V. Tanks     How People Think About the War     I. Do they Really Think at all?     II. The Yielding Pacifist and the Conscientious Objector     III. The Religious Revival     IV.The Riddle of the British     V. The Social Changes in Progress     VI. The Ending of the WarTHE PASSING OF THE EFFIGY1One of the minor peculiarities of this unprecedented war is the Tour ofthe Front. After somemonths of suppressed information--in which eventhe war correspondent was discouraged to the point of elimination--itwas discovered on both sides that this was a struggle in which Opinionwas playing a larger andmore important part than it had ever donebefore. This wild spreading weed was perhaps of decisive importance;the Germans at any rate were attempting to make it a cultivated flower.There was Opinion flowering awayat home, feeding rankly on rumour;Opinion in neutral countries; Opinion getting into great tanglesof misunderstanding and incorrect valuation between the Allies. Theconfidence and courage of the enemy; theamiability and assistance ofthe neutral; the zeal, sacrifice, and serenity of the home population;all were affected. The German cultivation of opinion began longbefore the war; it is still the most systematic and, becauseof thepsychological ineptitude of the Germans, it is probably the clumsiest.The French _Maison de la Presse_ is certainly the best organisation inexistence for making things clear, counteracting hostile suggestion,theBritish official organisations are comparatively ineffective; but whatis lacking officially is very largely made up for by the good willand generous efforts of the English and American press. An interestingmonographmight be written upon these various attempts of thebelligerents to get themselves and their proceedings explained.Because there is perceptible in these developments, quite over andabove the desire to influenceopinion, a very real effort to get thingsexplained. It is the most interesting and curious--one might almostwrite touching--feature of these organisations that they do notconstitute a positive and defined propaganda suchas the Germansmaintain. The German propaganda is simple, because its ends are simple;assertions of the moral elevation and loveliness of Germany; of theinsuperable excellences of German Kultur, the Kaiser, andCrown Prince,and so forth; abuse of the "treacherous" English who allied themselveswith the "degenerate" French and the "barbaric" Russians; nonsense about"the freedom of the seas"--the emptiest phrase inhistory--childishattempts to sow suspicion between the Allies, and still more childishattempts to induce neutrals and simple-minded pacifists of alliednationality to save the face of Germany by initiatingpeacenegotiations. But apart from their steady record and reminder of Germanbrutalities and German aggression, the press organisations of the Allieshave none of this definiteness in their task. The aim of thenationalintelligence in each of the allied countries is not to exalt one's ownnation and confuse and divide the enemy, but to get a real understandingwith the peoples and spirits of a number of different nations,anunderstanding that will increase and become a fruitful and permanentunderstanding between the allied peoples. Neither the English, theRussians, the Italians, nor the French, to name only the bigger Europeanallies,are concerned in setting up a legend, as the Germans areconcerned in setting up a legend of themselves to impose upon mankind.They are reality dealers in this war, and the Germans are effigymongers. Practically theAllies are saying each to one another, "Praycome to me and see for yourself that I am very much the human stuff thatyou are. Come and see that I am doing my best--and I think that isnot so very bad a best...." Andwith that is something else still moresubtle, something rather in the form of, "And please tell me what youthink of me--and all this."So we have this curious byplay of the war, and one day I find Mr.Nabokoff, the editorof the _Retch_, and Count Alexy Tolstoy, thatwriter of delicate short stories, and Mr. Chukovsky, the subtle critic,calling in upon me after braving the wintry seas to see the Britishfleet; M. Joseph Reinach follows thempresently upon the same errand;and then appear photographs of Mr. Arnold Bennett wading in the trenchesof Flanders, Mr. Noyes becomes discreetly indiscreet about what he hasseen among the submarines, and Mr.Hugh Walpole catches things from Mr.Stephen Graham in the Dark Forest of Russia. All this is quite over andabove such writing of facts at first hand as Mr. Patrick McGill and adozen other real experiencing soldiers--notto mention the soldiers'letters Mr. James Milne has collected, or the unforgettable andimmortal _Prisoner of War_ of Mr. Arthur Green--or such admirable warcorrespondents' work as Mr. Philip Gibbs or Mr. Washburnehas done. Someof us writers--I can answer for one--have made our Tour of the Frontswith a very understandable diffidence. For my own part I did not wantto go. I evaded a suggestion that I should go in 1915. I travelbadly,I speak French and Italian with incredible atrocity, and am an extremePacifist. I hate soldiering. And also I did not want to write anything"under instruction". It is largely owing to a certain stiffness inthecomposition of General Delme-Radcliffe is resolved that Italy shall notfeel neglected by the refusal of the invitation from the ComandoSupremo by anyone who from the perspective of Italy may seem to bearepresentative of British opinion. If Herbert Spencer had beenalive General Radcliffe would have certainly made him come,travelling-hammock, ear clips and all--and I am not above confessingthat I wish that HerbertSpencer was alive--for this purpose. I foundUdine warm and gay with memories of Mr. Belloc, Lord Northcliffe, Mr.Sidney Low, Colonel Repington and Dr. Conan Doyle, and anticipating thearrival of Mr. Harold Cox. Sowe pass, mostly in automobiles that bumptremendously over war roads, a cloud of witnesses each testifying afterhis manner. Whatever else has happened, we have all been photographedwith invincible patience andresolution under the direction of ColonelBarberich in a sunny little court in Udine.My own manner of testifying must be to tell what I have seen and whatI have thought during this extraordinary experience. It has beenmynatural disposition to see this war as something purposeful and epic,as it is great, as an epoch, as "the War that will end War"--but ofthat last, more anon. I do not think I am alone in this inclination to adramatic andlogical interpretation. The caricatures in the French shopsshow civilisation (and particularly Marianne) in conflict with a hugeand hugely wicked Hindenburg Ogre. Well, I come back from this tour withsomething not sosimple as that. If I were to be tied down to one wordfor my impression of this war, I should say that this war is _Queer._ Itis not like anything in a really waking world, but like something in adream. It hasn't exactlythat clearness of light against darkness orof good against ill. But it has the quality of wholesome instinctstruggling under a nightmare. The world is not really awake. This vagueappeal for explanations to all sorts ofpeople, this desire to exhibitthe business, to get something in the way of elucidation at presentmissing, is extraordinarily suggestive of the efforts of the mind towake up that will sometimes occur at a deep crisis. Mymemory of thistour I have just made is full of puzzled-looking men. I have seenthousands of _poilus_ sitting about in cafes, by the roadside, intents, in trenches, thoughtful. I have seen Alpini sitting restfully andstaringwith speculative eyes across the mountain gulfs towards unseenand unaccountable enemies. I have seen trainloads of wounded staringout of the ambulance train windows as we passed. I have seen thesedimintimations of questioning reflection in the strangest juxtapositions;in Malagasy soldiers resting for a spell among the big shells they werehoisting into trucks for the front, in a couple of khaki-clad Maorissitting uponthe step of a horse-van in Amiens station. It is always thesame expression one catches, rather weary, rather sullen, inturned. Theshoulders droop. The very outline is a note of interrogation. They lookup as theprivileged tourist of the front, in the big automobile orthe reserved compartment, with his officer or so in charge,passes--importantly. One meets a pair of eyes that seems to say:"Perhaps _you_ understand...."In whichcase---...?"It is a part, I think, of this disposition to investigate what makeseveryone collect "specimens" of the war. Everywhere the souvenir forcesitself upon the attention. The homecoming permissionaire bringswithhim invariably a considerable weight of broken objects, bits of shell,cartridge clips, helmets; it is a peripatetic museum. It is as if hehoped for a clue. It is almost impossible, I have found, to escape thesepieces inevidence. I am the least collecting of men, but I have broughthome Italian cartridges, Austrian cartridges, the fuse of an Austrianshell, a broken Italian bayonet, and a note that is worth half a francwithin the confines ofAmiens. But a large heavy piece of exploded shellthat had been thrust very urgently upon my attention upon the Carso Icontrived to lose during the temporary confusion of our party by thearrival and explosion ofanother prospective souvenir in our closeproximity. And two really very large and almost complete specimens ofsome species of _Ammonites_ unknown to me, from the hills to the eastof the Adige, partially wrapped ina back number of the _Corrieredella Sera_, that were pressed upon me by a friendly officer, wereunfortunately lost on the line between Verona and Milan through thegross negligence of a railway porter. But I doubt ifthey would havethrown any very conclusive light upon the war.2I avow myself an extreme Pacifist. I am against the man who first takesup the weapon. I carry my pacifism far beyond the ambiguous little groupofBritish and foreign sentimentalists who pretend so amusingly to besocialists in the _Labour Leader_, whose conception of foreign policy isto give Germany now a peace that would be no more than a breathing timefor afresh outrage upon civilisation, and who would even make heroes ofthe crazy young assassins of the Dublin crime. I do not understand thosepeople. I do not merely want to stop this war. I want to nail down warin itscoffin. Modern war is an intolerable thing. It is not a thingto trifle with in this Urban District Council way, it is a thing toend forever. I have always hated it, so far that is as my imaginationenabled me to realise it; andnow that I have been seeing it, sometimesquite closely for a full month, I hate it more than ever. I neverimagined a quarter of its waste, its boredom, its futility, itsdesolation. It is merely a destructive and dispersiveinstead of aconstructive and accumulative industrialism. It is a gigantic, dusty,muddy, weedy, bloodstained silliness. It is the plain duty of every manto give his life and all that he has if by so doing he may help to endit.I hate Germany, which has thrust this experience upon mankind, asI hate some horrible infectious disease. The new war, the war on themodern level, is her invention and her crime. I perceive that on ourside and in itsbroad outlines, this war is nothing more than a giganticand heroic effort in sanitary engineering; an effort to remove Germanmilitarism from the life and regions it has invaded, and to bank itin and discredit and enfeebleit so that never more will it repeat itspresent preposterous and horrible efforts. All human affairs and allgreat affairs have their reservations and their complications, but thatis the broad outline of the business as it hasimpressed itself on mymind and as I find it conceived in the mind of the average man of thereading class among the allied peoples, and as I find it understood inthe judgement of honest and intelligent neutralobservers.It is my unshakeable belief that essentially the Allies fight for apermanent world peace, that primarily they do not make war but resistwar, that has reconciled me to this not very congenial experienceoftouring as a spectator all agog to see, through the war zones. At anyrate there was never any risk of my playing Balaam and blessing theenemy. This war is tragedy and sacrifice for most of the world, forthe Germansit is simply the catastrophic outcome of fifty years ofelaborate intellectual foolery. Militarism, Welt Politik, and here weare! What else _could_ have happened, with Michael and his infernal WarMachine in the very centreof Europe, but this tremendous disaster?It is a disaster. It may be a necessary disaster; it may teach a lessonthat could be learnt in no other way; but for all that, I insist, itremains waste, disorder, disaster.There is adisposition, I know, in myself as well as in others, towriggle away from this verity, to find so much good in the collapse thathas come to the mad direction of Europe for the past half-century as tomake it on the wholealmost a beneficial thing. But at most I can findit in no greater good than the good of a nightmare that awakens thesleeper in a dangerous place to a realisation of the extreme danger ofhis sleep. Better had he beenawake--or never there. In Venetia CaptainPirelli, whose task it was to keep me out of mischief in the war zone,was insistent upon the way in which all Venetia was being opened upby the new military roads; there hasbeen scarcely a new road made inVenetia since Napoleon drove his straight, poplar-bordered highwaysthrough the land. M. Joseph Reinach, who was my companion upon theFrench front, was equally impressed by thestirring up and exchange ofideas in the villages due to the movement of the war. Charles Lamb'sstory of the discovery of roast pork comes into one's head with aneffect of repartee. More than ideas are exchanged in thewar zone,and it is doubtful how far the sanitary precautions of the militaryauthorities avails against a considerable propaganda of disease. A moreserious argument for the good of war is that it evokes heroicqualitiesthat it has brought out almost incredible quantities of courage,devotion, and individual romance that did not show in the suffocatingpeace time that preceded the war. The reckless and beautiful zeal ofthewomen in the British and French munition factories, for example, thegaiety and fearlessness of the common soldiers everywhere; these thingshave always been there--like champagne sleeping in bottles in a cellar.Butwas there any need to throw a bomb into the cellar?I am reminded of a story, or rather of the idea for a story that Ithink I must have read in that curious collection of fantasies andobservations, Hawthorne's _NoteBook._ It was to be the story of a manwho found life dull and his circumstances altogether mediocre. He hadloved his wife, but now after all she seemed to be a very ordinary humanbeing. He had begun life with highhopes--and life was commonplace. Hewas to grow fretful and restless. His discontent was to lead to someaction, some irrevocable action; but upon the nature of that action I donot think the _Note Book_ was very clear.It was to carry him in sucha manner that he was to forget his wife. Then, when it was too late,he was to see her at an upper window, stripped and firelit, a gloriousthing of light and loveliness and tragic intensity....Theelementary tales of the world are very few, and Hawthorne's storyand Lamb's story are, after all, only variations upon the sametheme. But can we poor human beings never realise our quality withoutdestruction?3Oneof the larger singularities of the great war is its failure toproduce great and imposing personalities, mighty leaders, Napoleons,Caesars. I would indeed make that the essential thing in my reckoningof the war. It is adrama without a hero; without countless incidentalheroes no doubt, but no star part. Even the Germans, with a nationalpredisposition for hero-cults and living still in an atmosphere ofVictorian humbug, can producenothing better than that timber image,Hindenburg.It is not that the war has failed to produce heroes so much as thatit has produced heroism in a torrent. The great man of this war is thecommon man. It becomesridiculous to pick out particular names. Thereare too many true stories of splendid acts in the past two years ever tobe properly set down. The V.C.'s and the palms do but indicate samples.One would need anencyclopaedia, a row of volumes, of the gloriousnessof human impulses. The acts of the small men in this war dwarf all thepretensions of the Great Man. Imperatively these multitudinous heroesforbid the setting up ofeffigies. When I was a young man I imitatedSwift and posed for cynicism; I will confess that now at fifty andgreatly helped by this war, I have fallen in love with mankind.But if I had to pick out a single figure to standfor the finest qualityof the Allies' war, I should I think choose the figure of GeneralJoffre. He is something new in history. He is leadership without vulgarambition. He is the extreme antithesis to the Imperial boomsterofBerlin. He is as it were the ordinary common sense of men, incarnate. Heis the antithesis of the effigy.By great good luck I was able to see him. I was delayed in Paris on myway to Italy, and my friend Captain Milletarranged for a visit to theFrench front at Soissons and put me in charge of Lieutenant de Tessin,whom I had met in England studying British social questions long beforethis war. Afterwards Lieutenant de Tessin took meto the great hotel--itstill proclaims "_Restaurant_" in big black letters on the gardenwall--which shelters the General Headquarters of France, and here Iwas able to see and talk to Generals Pelle and Castelnau as well astoGeneral Joffre. They are three very remarkable and very different men.They have at least one thing in common; it is clear that not one ofthem has spent ten minutes in all his life in thinking of himself asa Personageor Great Man. They all have the effect of being active andable men doing an extremely complicated and difficult but extremelyinteresting job to the very best of their ability. With me they had allone quality in common.They thought I was interested in what they weredoing, and they were quite prepared to treat me as an intelligent man ofa different sort, and to show me as much as I could understand....Let me confess that de Tessinhad had to persuade me to go toHeadquarters. Partly that was because I didn't want to use up eventen minutes of the time of the French commanders, but much more was itbecause I have a dread of Personages.Thereis something about these encounters with personages--as if one wasdealing with an effigy, with something tremendous put up to be seen.As one approaches they become remoter; great unsuspected crevassesarediscovered. Across these gulfs one makes ineffective gestures. They donot meet you, they pose at you enormously. Sometimes there is somethingmore terrible than dignity; there is condescension. They are affable.Ihad but recently had an encounter with an imported Colonial statesman,who was being advertised like a soap as the coming saviour of England.I was curious to meet him. I wanted to talk to him about all sorts ofthingsthat would have been profoundly interesting, as for example hisimpressions of the Anglican bishops. But I met a hoarding. I met a thinglike a mask, something surrounded by touts, that was dully trying--as wesay inLondon--to "come it" over me. He said he had heard of me. Hehad read _Kipps._ I intimated that though I had written _Kipps_ I hadcontinued to exist--but he did not see the point of that. I said certainthings to himabout the difference in complexity between politicallife in Great Britain and the colonies, that he was manifestly totallycapable of understanding. But one could as soon have talked with one ofthe statesmen at MadameTussaud's. An antiquated figure.The effect of these French commanders upon me was quite different frommy encounter with that last belated adventurer in the effigy line. Ifelt indeed that I was a rather idle and flimsyperson coming into thepresence of a tremendously compact and busy person, but I had none ofthat unpleasant sensation of a conventional role, of being expected toplay the minute worshipper in the presence of the