in the world, including logs and sections of trees, worked lumber in the form of beams, planks, shingles, etc., dye-woods and barks, mosses, gums, resins, vegetable ivory, rattan, willow-ware, and wooden-ware generally, etc. There will also be a large exhibit of saw-mill and wood-working machinery, including four complete saw-mills, which will be seen in an annex attached to the Forestry Building.
Close by the Forestry Building is the Dairy Building, which will contain not only a complete exhibit of dairy products, but also a dairy school, in connection with which will be conducted a series of tests for determining the relative merits of different breeds of dairy cattle as producers of milk and butter. This structure stands near the lake shore and is 95 by 200 feet in area, and two stories high. On the first floor, besides office headquarters, there is a large room devoted to exhibits of butter, and further back an operating room, in which a model dairy will be conducted. On two sides of this room are seats for 400 spectators, to witness the operations of the model dairy. In a gallery about this room will be the exhibits of cheese.
The Horticultural Building stands immediately south of the entrance to Jackson Park from the Midway Plaisance, facing on the lagoon. Between it and the lagoon is a terrace devoted to out-door exhibits of flowers and plants, including large tanks for various lilies and other aquatic plants. The building is 1,000 feet long and 250 feet wide, consisting of a central pavilion with two end pavilions, each of the latter connected with the central one by front and rear curtains, forming two interior courts, each 88 by 270 feet. These courts are planted with ornamental shrubs and flowers. Over the central pavilion rises a glass dome 187 feet in diameter, and 113 feet high, under which will be exhibited the tallest palms and tree ferns that can be procured. The building will be devoted to exhibition of flowers, plants, vines, seeds, horticultural implements, and all allied objects and industries.
The enormous mining industries of America, apart from those of the rest of the world, would call for much space for their proper accommodation. The Hall of Mines and Mining stands at the southern extremity of the western lagoon, and is 700 feet long by 350 wide. Its architecture is early Italian renaissance. Within it consists of a single story surrounded by galleries 60 feet wide. There is thus a huge interior space 630 feet long and 230 feet wide, with an extreme height of 100 feet at the centre and 40 feet at the sides. It is spanned by a steel cantilever roof, abundantly lighted with glass.
The Fine Arts Building is a noble specimen of classic Grecian architecture. Its area is 500 by 320 feet, divided within by nave and transepts 100 feet wide and 70 feet high, at the intersection of which is a dome 60 feet in diameter. The top of the dome is 125 feet above the ground, and is surmounted by a colossal statue representing a Winged Victory. The building is beautifully located in the northern part of the park, the south front facing the lagoon, from which it is separated by beautiful terraces, ornamented with balustrades. A huge flight of steps leads from the main entrance down to the water’s edge. The north front faces a wide lawn and a group of State buildings. The grounds about it are richly ornamented with groups of statues, and other artistic works.
The great development in late years of electrical science calls for a large building in which to display one of the most novel and brilliant of all the exhibits in the fair. The Electrical Building, 345 feet wide and 700 feet long, has its south front on the great Quadrangle, its north front on the lagoon, its east front toward the Manufactures Building, and its west front toward the Hall of Mines and Mining. Its plan comprises a longitudinal nave 115 feet wide and 114 feet high, with a central transept of the same dimensions. These have a pitched roof. The remainder of the building, filling the external angles of the nave and transept, is 62 feet high with a flat roof. The outer walls are composed of a continuous series of Corinthian pilasters resting upon a stylobate, and supporting a massive entablature. At the centre of the north side is a pavilion flanked by two towers 195 feet high. At its centre is a huge semicircular window, above which, 102 feet from the ground, is an open gallery commanding a splendid view of the lake and park. At the south side is a vast niche 78 feet wide and 103 feet high, its opening framed by a semicircular arch. In the centre of this niche, upon a lofty pedestal, is a colossal statue of Franklin. The east and west central pavilions are composed of towers 168 feet high. At each of the four corners of the building is a pavilion with a tower 169 feet high. The building also bears 54 lofty masts, from which banners will be displayed by day and electric lamps at night.
The Fisheries Building consists of a large central structure with two smaller polygonal buildings connected with it on either end by arcades. The total length is 1,100 feet, and the width 200 feet. In the central portion will be the general fisheries exhibit; in one of the polygonal buildings the angling exhibit, and in the other the aquaria. The external architecture is Spanish Romanesque. The ingenuity of the architect has designed after fishes and other sea forms all the capitals, medallions, brackets, cornices, and other ornamental details. The aquaria will contain about 140,000 gallons of water, 40,000 of it being salt. They will consist of a series of ten tanks, with glass fronts to afford an easy view of their contents.
The contribution of the United States Naval Department is one of the most novel ever seen at any World’s Fair. It is comprised in a structure which, to all outward appearance, is one of the newest and most powerful ships of war. This is, however, only an imitation battle-ship, composed of masonry and resting on piling in the lake. It has all the fittings that belong to an actual ship, such as guns, turrets, torpedo tubes, nets and booms, anchors, chain cables, davits, awnings, smoke-stacks, a military mast, etc., together with all appliances for working the same. Near the top of the military masts are shelters for sharpshooters in which are mounted rapid firing guns. The battery consists of four 13-inch breech loading rifles, eight 8-inch rifles, four 6-inch rifles, twenty 6-pounder rapid firing guns, six 1-pound rapid firing guns, two Gatling guns, and six torpedo tubes. These are all placed and mounted exactly as in a genuine battle-ship. All along the starboard side is a torpedo protection net. The entire structure is 348 feet long and 69 feet 3 inches wide. It will be manned during the Exhibition by officers and men detailed by the Navy Department who will give boat, torpedo, and gun drills and maintain the discipline and mode of life to be observed on the real vessels of the Navy.
The Woman’s Building, which was fittingly designed by a woman, is architecturally one of the most attractive. It is encompassed by luxuriant shrubbery and beds of flowers with a background of stately forest trees, and faces the great lagoon. Between the building and the lagoon are two terraces ornamented with balustrades and crossed by splendid flights of steps. The principal façade of the building is 400 feet long and the depth of the building is 200 feet. The architecture is Italian renaissance. The main grouping consists of a centre pavilion, flanked at each end by corner pavilions, connected in the first story by open arcades in the curtains, forming a shaded promenade extending the whole length of the building. The structure throughout is two stories high, with a total elevation of 60 feet. At the centre is a fine rotunda, 65 by 70 feet, crowned with a richly ornamented skylight. The building contains a model hospital, a model kindergarten, a model kitchen, a library, refreshment rooms, a great assembly room, and other departments for displaying the varied industries in which women are especially interested.
It is impossible here to describe in detail the architectural features or the marvellous contents of the great Machinery Hall. It is one of the most splendid structures on the grounds, measuring 850 by 500 feet in ground area, and standing at the extreme south end of the Park, just south of the Administration Building, and west from the Agricultural Building, from which it is separated by a lagoon. The general design of its interior is that of three enormous railroad train houses side by side, each spanned by trussed arches, and surrounded on all four sides by a gallery, 50 feet wide. The bulk of the machinery exhibited will be placed in this edifice and its large annex.
The building devoted to displays of Manufactures and Liberals Arts is the largest of all. Its ground area measures 1,687 by 787 feet, or nearly 31 acres. Within a gallery 50 feet wide extends around all the four sides, and projecting from this are 86 smaller galleries, 12 feet wide. These are reached from the main floor by 30 staircases, each 12 feet wide. An aisle 50 feet wide, called Columbia Avenue, extends from end to end of the building, and a transept of similar width crosses it at the centre. The main roof is of iron and glass, and its ridge pole is 150 feet from the ground. It covers an area 1,400 by 385 feet. The actual floor space of the building, including galleries, is about 40 acres. The general style of architecture is Corinthian, with almost endless arrays of columns and arches. There are four great entrances, one in the centre of each façade. These have the appearance of triumphal arches, the central opening of each being 40 feet wide and 80 feet high. Above each is a great attic story, ornamented with sculptured eagles 18 feet high. At each corner of the building is a pavilion with huge arched entrances corresponding in design with the principal portals of the building. This stately edifice faces the lake, with only lawns and promenades between it and the water. North of it is the United States Government Building, south of it the harbor and injutting lagoon, and west of it the Electrical Building and the lagoon separating it from the great island.
The Transportation exhibit is one of the most interesting of the whole display and is housed in a huge Romanesque building, standing between the Horticultural and Mining Buildings. It faces the east and commands a fine view of the lagoon and great island. Its area measures 960 by 250 feet, besides a vast annex covering 9 acres more. The principal entrance to the building is through a huge arch, very richly decorated. Within the building is treated after the manner of a Roman Basilica, with broad nave and aisles. At the centre is a cupola rising 165 feet above the ground, and reached by eight elevators. The exhibits in this building and its annex will comprise everything pertaining to transportation, including all manner of railroad engines and cars, steamboats and other vessels, coaches, cabs and carriage balloons and carrier pigeons, bicycles and baby carriages, cash conveyors for stores, pneumatic tubes, passenger and freight elevators, etc.
The United States Government Building stands near the lake shore, south of the main lagoon. Its architecture is classic, resembling the National Museum and other Government Buildings at Washington. It is made of iron, brick, and glass and measures 350 by 420 feet. At the centre is an octagonal dome, 120 feet in diameter and 150 feet high. The south half of the building is devoted to exhibits of the Post Office, Treasury, War, and Agricultural Departments. The north half is given up to the Interior Department, the Smithsonian Institute, and the Fisheries Commission. The State Department exhibit is between the rotunda and the east, and the Department of Justice between the rotunda and the west end. The rotunda itself will be kept clear of all exhibits.
The gem of all the buildings is that occupied by the Administration of the Exhibition. It stands at the west end of the great court, looking eastward, just in front of the railroad stations. It covers an area 260 feet square and consists of four pavilions, each 84 feet square, connected by a vast central dome 120 feet in diameter and 220 feet high, leaving at the centre of each façade a recess of 82 feet wide within which are the grand entrance to the building. The general design is in the style of the French renaissance. The first story is Doric, of heroic proportions, and the second Ionic. The four great entrances are each 50 feet wide and 50 feet high, deeply recessed and covered by semicircular arches. The great dome, which will be one of the most striking features in the landscape of the Exhibition, is richly gilded externally. Within it is decorated with a profusion of sculpture and paintings.
The Illinois State Building is naturally by far the finest of all the structures erected by the various States of the Union. It stands on a high terrace in one of the choicest parts of Jackson Park, commanding a splendid view of the grounds. It is 450 feet long and 160 feet wide. At the north Memorial Hall forms a wing 50 by 75 feet. At the south is another wing, 75 by 123 feet, three stories high, containing the executive offices and two large public halls. Surmounting the central portion of the building is a fine dome 72 feet in diameter and 235 feet high. The entire edifice is constructed, almost exclusively, of wood, stone, brick, and steel produced by the State of Illinois.
No sketch of the Columbian Exhibition would be complete without some mention of its principal projectors and managers. The President of the World’s Fair Columbian Commission is Thomas Wetherill Palmer, who was born at Detroit, Michigan, on June 25th, 1830. He is of New England descent and his parents were among the early settlers in Michigan. Mr. Palmer was educated at St. Clair College and the University of Michigan, and after his college days made a long pedestrian tour through Spain, thus becoming familiar with the country to which he was afterward sent as United States Minister. After some years of prosperous mercantile life in Detroit, and honorable participation in State politics he was elected United States Senator and served six years. In 1889 he was made Minister to Spain. At the first meeting of the World’s Fair Columbian Commission, held in Chicago on June 26th, 1890, he was unanimously elected President and at once entered upon the duties of the office.
Women and their work will be more conspicuously represented at this Exhibition than at any of its predecessors, and there has therefore fittingly been formed a Board of Lady Managers. At its first session, on November 20th, 1890, Mrs. Potter Palmer, of Chicago, was unanimously elected President. She was born at Louisville, Kentucky, her maiden name being Bertha Honore, and she was educated at Louisville and Baltimore, Maryland. She was married in 1871 to Potter Palmer, one of the foremost business men of Chicago, and has since been one of the most prominent and most admired leaders of society in that city, besides being identified with innumerable benevolent and educational enterprises.
The Director-General of the Exhibition, its chief executive officer, upon whom the real responsibility for the conduct of the World’s Fair rests, is Col. George R. Davis, of Chicago. He was born in Massachusetts in 1840, and was educated in the schools of that State. Early in the war of the Rebellion, he became a volunteer in the Union Army and served through the entire struggle with great distinction. In 1871 he retired from military service and entered business life in Chicago, where he was eminently successful. In 1878 he was elected to Congress and was re-elected in 1880 and 1882, and in the fall of 1886 he was elected Treasurer of Cook County, Illinois, which includes the city of Chicago.
The President of the Directory of the World’s Columbian Exhibition is W. T. Baker, a prominent commission merchant of Chicago, who was born in New York State in 1841. He has been elected and re-elected President of the Chicago Board of Trade.
Benjamin Butterworth, of Ohio, was chosen Secretary of the World’s Columbian Exposition. He has for years been known as one of the most brilliant men in the National House of Representatives at Washington. During the debate in Congress on the question of an appropriation for the National Fair Commission he spoke strongly in favor of such an appropriation, and it was owing chiefly to his efforts that it was finally passed.
The Hon. John T. Dickinson, Secretary of the World’s Columbian Commission, was born in 1858, at Houston, Texas, and has for some years been a conspicuous lawyer, editor, and politician in that State.
The head of the Department of Publicity and Promotion of the Exhibition is Major Moses T. Handy, one of the best known newspaper men in the United States. He was born in Missouri in 1847, and was educated in Virginia, and has had a brilliant career as a journalist on the staffs of the Richmond Dispatch, Richmond Inquirer, New York Tribune, Philadelphia Times, Philadelphia Press, and Philadelphia News.
The Exhibition is to be formally dedicated with appropriate ceremonies on October 12th, 1892, being the 400th anniversary of the landing of Columbus. It will not be opened to the public, however, for the general purposes of the Exhibition until May 1st, 1893, and it will continue open from that day until October 30th, 1893. During its progress there will be held on its grounds and in its buildings innumerable conventions and festivals of national and international interest, and it will doubtless be a more truly universal exhibition than any that has yet been held in the world. The spirit animating the projectors of the enterprise cannot perhaps be better expressed than they were by President Palmer in his eloquent address before the Columbian Commission in Chicago, on June 26th, 1890. “Education,” he said, “is the chief safeguard for the future; not education through books alone, but through the commingling of our people from East, West, North, and South, from farm and factory. Such great convocations as that of our projected fair are the schools wherein our people shall touch elbows, and the men and women from Maine and Texas, from Washington and South Carolina learn to realize that all are of one blood, speak the same language, worship one God, and salute the same flag.
“If we are to remain a free people, if the States are to retain their autonomy, if we are to take a common pride in the name of American, if we are to avoid the catastrophe of former years Americans must commingle, be brought in contact, and acquire that mutual sympathy that is essential in a harmonious family. Isolated, independent travel may do this, but not to any such extent as will be accomplished by gatherings like this, where millions will concentrate to consult and compare the achievements of each other, and of those from across the sea. All must have observed the effect of the Centennial Exhibition in educating even what are called educated people, and in the impetus derived therefrom. It gave to all a larger outlook, it repressed egotism, quickened sympathies, and set us to thinking.
“It has been well said that the ‘Industrial Expositions are the mile-stones of progress, the measure of the dimensions of the productive activity of the human race. They cultivate taste, they bring nations closer to one another, and thus promote civilization, they awaken new wants and lead to an increased demand, they contribute to a taste for art, and thus encourage the genius of artists.’
“And this is civilization—a process by which
the citizens of each State, foreign as well as domestic, will learn their inter-dependence upon each other. Many will come from selfish motives, possibly, but the social atmosphere they will here breathe; that undefinable influence which pervades and affects people who come together in masses with a common purpose, will broaden them and teach them that discussion and not violence is the proper way to adjust differences or promote objects—and thus prepare humanity for that good time so long coming.
“The world will come to us, by its representatives, if not en masse, and our own people should be drawn to this great school of the citizen by every device which can be imagined and afforded, while it remains for all connected with this management to see that no just expectation shall be disappointed.
“In other times there were convocations where the spirit of rivalry and comparison appeared, but in them few were invited to participate, and only a limited number of spectators could afford to attend. In those tournaments muscle was of more importance than mind. Those exhibitions taught how to destroy, and not how to create. The rivalry now is in methods to create and not to destroy, and the knights who participate are those of the active brain and cunning hand, whose spectators and judges are the better behaved and better educated citizens of to-day.
“This Exposition—on a new site, in a new world—assumes greater dimensions than a market for merchandise or than figures of finance. We should make it a congress of the nations wherein agriculture, manufactures, and commerce should be the handmaids of ideas—where art should paint the allegory of Peace and chisel the statue Fraternity—where music should play a dirge to dead hastes and an epithalamium on the marriage of the nations.
“Our country has led the advance in peaceful arbitration. The Geneva Commission, the Fisheries Commission in the settlement of difficulties already existing, the Pan-American Congress has opened the way for the peaceful settlement of questions that may arise hereafter to the people of the hemisphere. I regard these great achievements of our capital government as more illustrious than any act of any government since our great Civil War.
“Let the Exposition be fruitful in profit, not only to the exhibitors, but to all comers, and that they shall carry away a higher conception of the duty of the citizen and the mission of the State. Our material power is very great, too great for us to act on any other plane than the highest. Our resources and capacity to meet our financial obligations are a wonder to the powers of the old world. It should be our aim to make our moral altitude on all public questions, national or international, as unassailable as our monetary credit. Our bonds are higher in the markets of the world than any other—our opinions and acts should, relatively, hold as high a place.
“The first 400 years have passed—they have been illuminated by the heroic deeds of men and women, and shaded by crimes, national and individual. The descendants of the Puritans and Cavalier, of the Huguenot and the Catholic, of the slave and the Indian, together with those from other continents and the isles of the sea meet in peaceful rivalry where the forest fades away and the prairie expands.
“At last we are a nation with common inheritance. Lexington and Yorktown, Bunker Hill and Eutaw, Saratoga and Guildford Court House, New Orleans and Plattsburg, are our common glory.
“We have people to the north and south who can be linked to us with hooks of steel if we continue to retain their respect and confidence. I want no forcible addition to our territory, were it practicable. I want them to come as a bride comes to her husband—in love and confidence—and because they wish to link their fortunes with ours, to make their daily walk by our side. To bring about this consummation will be the work of time, of forbearance, of rigid observance of their rights, of due regard for their prejudices, of an unselfish desire for welfare—wherein all the amenities of life shall be cultivated. We must enforce their respect by order at our own home, and show them that our composite civilization—wherein we select all that is good from abroad, and retain all that is good in our own, is calculated to make them also happier and greater.
“Should this occasion, this National Exposition, promote such a purpose as if we are rightly inspired, this meeting of all people would be more than a financial success—more than a vain commercial triumph. It would emphasize the new era, which I hope is dawning, and take the initiative in what may result in the federation of this hemisphere.”
Thus the Columbian Exhibition will nobly close the first four centuries of American history, and by the splendor of its display shed brilliant rays upon the unknown years and centuries to come. The future must be estimated from the past and the present. As the present is grander than the past, so, may we hope, will the future be grander than the present.
Mr. Chauncey M. Depew has drawn this comparison most graphically.
“At the time of the Centennial Exhibition we had 45,000,000 people; now our numbers reach the grand total of 64,000,000. Then we had thirty-seven States, but we have since added seven stars to our flag. Then the product of our farms in cereals was about $2,200,000,000; now it is over $4,000,000,000. Then the output of our factories was about $5,000,000,000; now it is over $7,000,000,000. Such progress, such development, such advance, such accumulation of wheat and the opportunities for wealth—wealth in the broad sense, which opens new avenues for employment and fresh chances for independence and for homes—have characterized no other similar period of recorded time.
“The Columbian World’s Exposition will be international because it will hospitably welcome and entertain the people and the products of every nation in the world. It will give to them the fullest opportunity to teach us, and learn from us, and to open new avenues of trade with our markets, and discover materials which will be valuable in theirs. But its creation, its magnitude, its location, its architecture, and its striking and enduring features will be American. The city in which it is held, taking rank among the first cities in the world after an existence of only fifty years, is American. The great inland fresh-water sea, whose waves will dash against the shores of Jackson Park is American. The prairie, extending westward with its thousands of square miles of land, a half century ago a wilderness, but to-day gridironed with railroads, spanned with webs of electric wires, rich in prosperous farms, growing villages, ambitious cities, and an energetic, educated, and progressive people is purely American.
“The Centennial Exhibition of 1876 celebrated the first hundred years of independence of the Republic of the United States. The Columbian Exhibition celebrates the discovery of a continent which has become the home of peoples of every race, the refuge for those persecuted on account of their devotion to civil and religious liberty, and the revolutionary factor in the affairs of this earth, a discovery which has accomplished more for humanity in its material, its intellectual, and its spiritual aspects than all other events since the advent of Christ.”
CHAPTER VI.
SOCIETY’S FOUNDATION-STONE.
THERE ought to be a radical change in marriage customs in the United States, if we would avoid a terrible deterioration of social life.
In the early days of our country, when most of the inhabitants were representatives of the classes which have supplied populations for all new countries, marriage, as among the lower order of peasantry everywhere else in the world, and among the savages besides, was a mere mating of male and female. Women were brought over by shiploads to be disposed of, as wives, to the earlier Virginia planters; no stories have come down to us of cruelties or mismatings, yet the transactions were as plainly a matter of purchase and sale as any in the subsequent trade in black slaves. The rapid settlement of the country, the improvement in civilization, which has come through the multiplication of large villages and of cities, the general facilities for obtaining education, such as exist in no other country, have made ours the land above all others in which generations may rise rapidly from the social position of their ancestors. Consequently there is no part of the world in which the marriage relation should be so closely guarded as here.
Does this seem over particular, in this land of freedom and era of emancipation from narrow views? Then look carefully over a list of the richest and most influential men who have come to the front within the past few years, particularly in the newer States; regard their marital relations—this will do no harm to any of them who are respectable—and consider the nature of the influence which these people exert upon society around them. The subject is not easy or pleasant to discuss, but, fortunately, there are not many people who cannot discuss it for themselves.
To expect to bring about the desired change by religious means, which are the first to suggest themselves either to the Christian or the philosopher, is impossible. However desirable it may be our political system has made it impossible for us as a body of people to go back to the customs of a period which was superior to ours in regard to the sanctity of marriage relations. However much these relations may be regarded as sacraments by some, and as specially sanctified by others, the making of the marriage relation a matter of mere civil contract has become so generally a fact in law that it is impossible any longer to expect the majority of people to abide by the precedents and customs of different churches. The fact is, the churches don’t do it themselves. Divorced people who have no moral right to remarry are continually taking new partners and ministers are performing the ceremony.
The danger, aside from easy divorce, of which more anon, is in the probable change of social condition of the contracting parties. Men and women, mating in their very early years, as is the custom in all small villages and agricultural districts, frequently find themselves, by some happy accident, raised to a higher degree of financial standing than they had expected, and in the newer portions of the country, which contain a large majority of our population, such change of material condition carries social importance and influence with it. As would be the case anywhere else in the world, the change of condition shows itself differently in man and woman. The man of means quickly finds himself a man of mark among his fellows, and rapidly receives a vast amount of that valuable education which comes from what some philosopher has called “the attrition of minds.” His wife, relieved of the drudgery which is almost inseparable from poverty, does not follow her husband intellectually, unless such is her natural bent. She consequently devotes her leisure and improved material condition to luxury and to show. From this difference of conditions in a family which was once united can be found the basis of many thousands of divorce suits.
You take exception to the expression “intellectual?” You are wrong. I know it is the fashion to regard literature, law, theology and other so-called learned professions as sole possessors of the world’s intellect, but this is all nonsense. It requires just as much intellect—intellect of just as high order—to put a railroad through a new country, or to invent a new threshing machine, or to manage a turbulent town-meeting, or to work a bill through the Legislature, as to write a poem, sermon, or novel, or to plead a case in court. Edison and Ericsson are as much men of intellect as Longfellow or Lowell; the difference in their lives is one of taste and detail—not of brain and intellectual endeavor. The position in which money places a man anywhere, except in the large cities—and it isn’t safe to except these much—compels him to use his intellect a great deal, and to sharpen it frequently. Unless his wife is his partner in every sense of the word, she is going to be left behind. That is not the worst of it; there are plenty of bright women lying in wait for the man who has plenty of money and a stupid wife.
Among those not yet married the same danger is ever apparent. Men have always been guided more by impulse than reason in the selection of their mates, and to this day philosophers often marry fools. Consequently it is not surprising that young men of strong natural intelligence and great energy, who nevertheless have not yet received their fair start in life or developed their powers to the uttermost, select their brides through some mere fancy or caprice, which might never lead to bad results were their condition in life always to remain as it was in the beginning. But the reports of hundreds of divorce cases, which have amused the public to some extent, disgusted it still more, and horrified the thinking portion, show that alleged incompatibilities are generally the results of changes of condition, which have caused husband and wife to drift apart for reasons not at all related to the conjugal state.
It would be natural to suppose that the churches would give the subject special attention, the world’s morality being more dependent upon proper marriage than all other influences combined, religion itself not excepted. Well, the church does something in this direction. It does a great deal, but not one-thousandth part of what is necessary. A pastor of no matter what denomination gladly welcomes the opportunity, which, nevertheless, is seldom made by himself, to urge upon young people the seriousness of the marriage relation, the necessity of affection, constancy and forbearance, and to show them to the best of his ability glowing pictures of the final results of conjugal faithfulness. But constant warnings, such as are given against a great many sins of less serious influence upon the world, are seldom heard in churches. Homilies on the subject of marriage are ordered by some denominations to be delivered once in three months. If they were heard once in three days their injunctions would be none too frequent for the necessities of the great mass of people who are most interested in the marriage relation, or, at least, most curious about it.
A happy wife, happy during and after half a lifetime spent in wedlock which did not escape the usual number of family troubles and sorrows, said once to me that the trouble with marriage was that conjugal impulse and conjugal sense were the scarcest faculties of the feminine nature. I would not dare quote this if it were not said by a woman instead of a man. Desiring at times to raise expectant brides to the highest sense of their coming responsibilities and privileges, but reluctant to put her own heart upon her sleeve, she tried to find something in print to give them by way of counsel and admonition, but she did not succeed. Novels about love and marriage can be found by the thousands. How many of them are of any value at all for purposes of instruction and forewarning? I leave the answer to women who most read novels. From those who are mothers I have never been able to obtain the names of a half dozen.
There seems to be such a thing as inheritance by sex. Woman was for thousands of years the slave or the plaything of man, and she is unconsciously but terribly avenging herself for the wrongs done her by the ruder sex. The best she could hope for in earlier days, the best that many of her sex now dare hope for, is home, protection and kind treatment. The kindness may be that the man shows to his horse or his dog, perhaps to his friend, but the fact that the woman is to be legally his equal, the appreciation of this, is as rare as the resolve of the woman herself to make herself equal to the position.
What is the result? Why, girls, sweet girls, girls whom good men regard as only a little lower than the angels, often marry for causes which should not justify any but the commonest women in marrying at all. A girl whom all of us adore for her goodness, delicacy and sweetness, suddenly appalls us some day by accepting as her husband some gross fellow who has nothing but his pocket-book to recommend him. Were she to attach herself to him without marriage vows and ceremony, although perhaps with absolute honesty of devotion and singleness of purpose, the world would be horrified. Yet where is the difference as regards her own life? Many other women know, if she does not, that no elaborateness of ceremony or solemnity can ever make a perfect marriage between a woman and a boor. Yet the old story of “Beauty and the Beast” is repeated every day a thousand times, except that the fairy touch which transformed the beast into a gentleman never occurs nowadays—except in novels.
There is prevalent a stupid notion, born of vulgar natures, too vulgar to understand that the Almighty never endowed humanity with any quality which had not a noble purpose, that it is not safe to let young people know or think anything about the realities of marriage. People allude at once to fixed passion as if the only passion possible to the marriage state were physical, and as if the companionship, sympathy, devotion, tenderness and continuity of a friendship solemnly pledged for life, a friendship of a character that children instinctively long for and youths desire more earnestly than all things else combined, never entered into the thoughts of young people. This is an insulting imputation upon your children and mine and of every other man’s beside.
Strong sense of duty may do much to correct the ruinous notion of young women regarding marriage, but it is not enough in itself. Women of strong sense of duty are probably commoner than men with the same desirable qualification. Yet all of us know of men who have strayed from married mates who were pure, faithful, and dutiful—well, everything that a conscientious servant could be. But, if a man’s wife is no more to him than a first-class servant, she cannot prevent him yielding to temptation if he is so disposed. No man worthy of the name marries for the sake of obtaining a servant. It is far more convenient, besides infinitely cheaper, to obtain servants and housekeepers through the ordinary channels. Religion is the strongest influence for good that humanity knows, but religion alone cannot make a perfect wife of a well-meaning woman. There is no condition of life in which one virtue can be successfully substituted for another, and no amount of prayer and faith can make a good wife of a good woman without distinct conjugal impulse and purpose.
Neither can the maternal instinct, an honest impulse which of itself has made wives of many good women, who otherwise never would have married at all. To be the mother of a man’s children should and may entitle a woman to high respect, but many Mormons, who heartily respect their wives, do not hesitate to seek companionship of other women.
A woman needs the conjugal instinct to make a good wife of herself and a happy and faithful man of her husband. If it is not in her she should acquire it before giving her hand and life to any man. The better the man, the more persistently should she hesitate before marrying without this requisite quality. The mother who does not inculcate the necessity of this impulse and quality is more remiss of her duty than if she left her children’s stockings undarned and their dinners uncooked.
As nearly all affection concerns itself with the relations of the sexes, and particularly with what is alleged to be love, it is commonly assumed that young women are sufficiently instructed through desultory reading on what is frequently called the grand passion. This appellation, “grand passion,” truly describes what the novelists usually give us as love, and is no more education or preparation of the young person contemplating marriage than the outside of a lot of school-books would be to a student desiring to graduate at a college. The novelist prudently ends his story where marriage begins. Up to that time everything is very plain sailing for both man and woman, but there, where the necessity for knowledge begins, the novelist discreetly ends his tale. How can he do more? Were he to make his story as it should be, in the light of human experience, it is doubtful whether young men and young women would read it at all.
Is all the blame of marriage failures to be attributed to women? By no means. The men are terribly faulty creatures, but it is the general
opinion that, through some reason or collection of reasons, the conjugal instinct in man is more fully developed than in woman. Most of us know of men not very good, some of them not good at all, who become model husbands from the time of marriage. How many know of wild women, of careless girls, of whom the same could be said? Whether this is due to the invisible connection between the material and the spiritual; whether woman’s nature is kept in an embryonic state to the verge of deterioration by the modern custom of bringing up girls in-doors, denying them physical exercise, separating them from associations with their brothers, to say nothing of other members of the ruder sex; whether the increasing prosperity of the world, which makes it no longer necessary that the entire interests of the family, including some of the confidences between husband and wife, should be heard by children as once they were, the fact certainly is that the opinion which the young girl at the present day has of matrimony is one of the most appallingly inaccurate notions that can be encountered in conversation anywhere.
Then how is the desired change to be brought about? Only through public sentiment, in which the churches ought to take the lead. Marriage by accident, which is the common method, should be frowned upon and discouraged, no matter how romantic or “cunning” the preliminaries may seem. Everybody knows that men never enter into a business partnership, which may be terminated at any time, without some sense of the fitness and compatibility of the contracting parties. Were they to fail in this respect, all of their friends would protest, and all of their acquaintances would make fun of them. Both parties would suffer in business reputation by such a blunder. It should be the same, though far more earnestly, regarding the life-partnership that is formed at a wedding. All relatives of the contracting parties have at least one interest at stake which justifies them in protesting against a blunder—I allude to family reputation.
Then aren’t young, tender, loving hearts to be allowed to choose for themselves? Nonsense! How much of love, in the true meaning of the word, is to be found in the great majority of marriages? If men, as a class, loved their sweethearts as much as they loved their dogs, there would be less ground for complaint; but men seldom tire of their dogs; who is there that does not know men who tire of their wives?
Am I harping again upon woman’s failure to remain dear to her husband? No; but I do say that the girl who makes the “best match,” as the saying is, and by marrying money marries above her station, is accepting more than she may afterward be able to live up to. Marriages should be between equals—persons who are competent to support one another in any and every condition to which their material life can ever lead them.
As for men, the greatest sinners, though not the greatest sufferers, by marriage blunders, the man who marries except with the idea of making his wife his closest companion, should be regarded by all his acquaintances a deliberate scoundrel. A chance passion is no excuse for marriage; neither is a condescending pity. The man who marries merely for the sake of getting a permanent cook, housekeeper or plaything, is equally a scoundrel, and deserves more earnest and general execration than if he entered into familiar relations with a woman without the formality of marriage. The whole community should be on guard against man or woman who makes any less of marriage ties than the highest honor demands.
Some people whose conjugal relations are irregular, are irreproachable otherwise, do you say? Yes; but you can say as much about some thieves and forgers; except for their one fault they are good fellows. The moral influence upon the community of an unfaithful or careless husband or wife is worse than that of a common criminal, for there is no fixed passion in human nature that causes people’s minds to dwell upon theft or forgery or murder, and to make excuses for the persons who are guilty of them.
CHAPTER VII.
THE DEMON OF DIVORCE.
IN one of the older theological periods, yet not so very old, there was a theory that Satan was a necessary part of the godhead. At present there seems to be a theory like unto it. It is that divorce is a necessary feature of the marriage system.
This notion is working fully as much mischief in morals and manners as Satan could do if he were part of Omnipotence.
Divorce is popular with certain classes, because married life—not marriage—is sometimes a failure, but the fault is not with the institution, but the individual. When Mrs. Mona Caird’s low-toned essay, “Is Marriage a Failure?” was being talked of a few months ago, Rev. David Swing, of Chicago, said the question should have been, “Is Good Sense a Failure?” Dr. Swing then struck at the root of the trouble by saying, “Ill comes not because men and women are married, but because they are fools.” Yet this is almost the only class for whom our divorce laws are made, and the more liberal the laws, the more foolish the fools can afford to be.
Were divorce popular only for the sake of getting rid of undesirable partners it would be bad enough. Really it is a thousand times worse because its principal purpose is to help husband or wife to a new partner. This cause never is assigned in a petition for divorce; it doesn’t need to be; the community has learned to assume it, as a matter of course.
The case was well put a short time ago by Rabbi Silverman, at the great Temple Emanu-El, in New York, when he said, “The real cause for divorce is that there is nothing behind the civil contract that cements the marriage union and so welds it that nothing can tear it asunder. The real cause for divorce is that the marriage was a failure because it was not a marriage in fact, but merely in name. It was not a union of hearts for mutual happiness, but merely a partnership for vain pleasure and profit.” So long as we allow divorce to be easy, do we not encourage such marriages?
Any divorce except for the one cause recognized by the founder of Christianity is more injurious to society at large than any other crime, murder not excepted. Most crimes may have a good reflex influence by persuading men to be more watchful of their own impulses and lives, but the men or women who obtain divorces for any but the gravest cause are sure, aside from the effect upon themselves, to increase the discontent of acquaintances whose married life is not all that had been hoped or wished.
One condition absolutely necessary to a pure and happy married life is the belief from the beginning that wedlock is to last as long as life itself. Without the stimulus of this tremendous sense of responsibility no person will unmake and remake himself so as to be the fit companion of another. Even with this impulse the effort often fails, as all of us know from observation of our own acquaintances. To admit the possibility of a cessation of relations or, worse still, a change of marital relations, is to relax effort and to become a selfish time-server—to become a confidence man instead of a partner.
The effect of a divorce suit upon the plaintiff is something which does not require theorizing. It can be ascertained by personal observation in almost any American court which grants divorces, for such cases are becoming more and more frequent. Whether the plaintiff be man or woman, whether the cause be drunkenness, or desertion, or incompatibility of temper, or insanity, or improvidence, or any of the various causes for which divorces are granted in some States, the plaintiff or complainant, if closely watched from day to day during the proceedings, will be seen, even by his dearest friends, to show marks of mental deterioration. To tear two lives apart is a serious thing at best. Two friends bound only by ordinary ties have seldom separated without bad effects being visible upon both. Where the friendship is of a nature that has affected every portion of the life of each, as must have been the case even with wedded couples who have married at haste and have not even begun to repent at leisure, the effect is so marked that a person seeking divorce almost always loses some of his adherents, who previously had been his warmest friends, before the case is decided. Where love was, hatred is excited though it may not even have existed in the first place. The contest upon points of fact, upon recollections of difficulties and differences, the depressing literalness and materialism of proof such as is demanded in courts, the entire materialism, heartlessness, callousness, of all the proceedings, as they must be conducted under forms of law, are such as to debase any nature but the noblest—but noble natures do not seek divorce.
Bad as may be the condition of the complainant and the effect upon his own manner and conduct, it is not as deplorable as that visible upon the defendant. To face any direct charge in a court of law before witness, even if these be only officers of the law who are supposed to be impartial and judicial in their opinions and actions, the violation of privacy in regard to interests and relations, which above all others—except perhaps those of a human being toward his God—are sacred even to the rudest minds, cannot help have its effect upon any nature but the strongest. The life of the defendant in a divorce suit, unless the complaint is utterly groundless and unfair, is from the first likely to be blasted. The more at fault the more the defendant must suffer, not only in his own self-respect, but in the regard of those about him. The curious gaze of the spectators, the intent look of the jurors, the disgust of the judge upon the bench, the flippancy of the witness on the stand, all have influences which would make many innocent people show signs of guilt. Upon any one really at fault all these influences must be still more depressing.
It is a common saying among lawyers that a woman divorced from her husband, on no matter how slight cause, is pretty sure to go to the bad thereafter. This is not necessarily an indication, so the lawyers say, that the woman is at fault, but that the mental strain to which she has been subjected, the strain upon her self-respect, is greater than poor humanity is equal to. What the subsequent results are upon her in society we all know. The present ruler of England has decided that no divorced woman, no matter in what country her divorce was obtained, shall ever appear at court. The rule seems cruel, but social results certainly appear to justify it.
If there are children in the case, as usually there are—for somehow people without children seldom appear in the divorce courts—if there are children, the results upon them are worse than upon either the complainant or defendant. The principal good influence children are subject to is that of home. A disagreement between father and mother naturally interrupts this. An absolute break between the parents cannot fail to immediately have the worst possible effects upon the children. All children—except yours and mine—are at times brutes. There are no worse tale-tellers, no worse back-biters, no worse sayers of cruel things, than little children. It is not that they are unusually wicked or savage by nature, but insufficient training, lack of self-restraint, lack of adult sense of propriety, causes the tongue to say whatever is in the heart; and any adult who is obliged to keep a watch upon his own tongue should be able through sympathy to imagine the savagery which will be inflicted upon the children of divorced or divorcing people by their associates. However disobedient or irreverent children may be to their parents, the filial instinct exists in all of them, and a stab at either parent is felt most keenly by the children.
The ordinary consolations of a person wounded through the heart of another are denied the child. It has neither religion nor philosophy, nor even stoicism, to support it. It must suffer keenly, and when it looks for consolation or desires consolation, where is it to go, when the two authors of its being, whom it has been taught to regard with equal respect, are at difference, and each is ready to accuse the other and belittle the other? The child of a divorced person is a marked object of curiosity in the society of children, whether in neighborhood parties or at school or Sunday-school, or even in church. The slightest quarrel brings the inevitable taunt that “your mother ran away from your father,” or “your father is in love with somebody else’s mother,” or “you haven’t any father now,” or something of the kind. Only a short time ago the newspapers of the United States recorded the suicide of a child of nine years, who had sought death to avoid the torment of being twitted with the separation of its parents.
Four lines of one of Pope’s poems, which probably are familiar to every one, indicate the general effect of divorced persons upon society: