"So great is the good I look for, that every hardship delights me."
—St. Francis.
The period of our country's history in which these characters were formed was one of tremendous moral earnestness. In that struggle in which man pitted himself against primeval forest and aboriginal inhabitant, the strongest types of manhood and womanhood were evolved, and those who conceived the idea of living a righteous life set themselves to its realization with the same energy with which they addressed themselves to the conquest of nature itself. To multitudes of them, this present world took a place that in the fullest sense of the word was secondary to that other world in which they lived by anticipation.
David Corson was only one of many who, to a degree which in these less earnest or at least more materialistic times appears incredible, had determined to trample the world under their feet. He awoke next morning with an unabated purpose and at an early hour set resolutely about its execution. He bade a brave farewell to Pepeeta, exhorted her to seek with him that preparation of heart which alone could fit them for the future, and then with a bag of provisions over his shoulder and an axe in his hand started forth to carry out a plan which he had formed in the night.
At the head of the little valley where Pepeeta had built her gypsy fire, and experienced her great disillusionment, was a piece of timber land belonging to his mother's estate. He determined to make a clearing there and establish a home for himself and Pepeeta.
He wisely calculated that the accomplishment of this arduous task would occupy his mind and strength through the year of expiation which he had condemned himself to pass.
It is one of the most impressive spectacles of human life to see a man enter a primeval forest and set himself to subdue nature with no implement but an axe! Those of us who require so many luxuries and who know how to maintain existence only by the use of so many curious and powerful pieces of mechanism would think ourselves helpless indeed in the center of a wilderness with nothing but an axe or a rifle!
No such apprehensions troubled the heart of the young woodsman, for from his earliest childhood he had handled that primitive implement and knew its exhaustless possibilities. He was young and strong, for reckless as his recent life had been, the real sources of his physical vitality had not been depleted.
When David had passed out of sight of the house and entered the precincts of the quiet forest, there surged up from his heart those mighty impulses and irresistible tides of energy which are the sublime inheritance of youth. He counted off the months and they seemed to him like days. Already he heard the monarchs of the forest fall beneath his blows, already he saw the walls of his log cabin rising in an opening of the vast wilderness, already he beheld Pepeeta standing in the open door. The vast panorama of this virgin world began to unroll itself to his delighted vision. The splendid spectacle of a morning as new and wonderful as if there had never been another, drew his thoughts away from himself and his cares. The dew was sparkling on the grass; the meadow larks were singing from every quarter of the fields through which he was passing; the great limbs of the trees were tossed by the fresh breezes of June. Everywhere were color, music, fragrance, motion. The burden rolled from his heart; remorse and guilt faded like dreams; the sad past lost its hold; the present and the future were radiant! To even the worst of men, in such surroundings, there come moments of exemption from the ennui and shame of life, and to this deep soul which had issued, purified, from the fires through which it had passed, they lengthened into glorious hours, hours such as kindled on the lips of the poet those exultant and exquisite words:
"The year's at the
spring
And day's at the
morn;
Morning's at seven;
The hillside's
dew-pearled;
"The lark's on the
wing;
The snail's on the
thorn;
God's in his
heaven—
All's right with the
world!"
He climbed a steep hillside, descended into a secluded and beautiful valley, pressed his way through dense underbrush, and while the day was still young stood on the spot where he had determined to lay the foundation of his cabin.
Two ranges of hills came together and enclosed it as if in giant arms. Two pure crystal springs issued from clefts in the bases of these hills, and after flowing towards each other for perhaps a quarter of a mile, mingled their waters in a brawling brook. It was at the point of their junction that David had determined to erect that primitive structure which has afforded a home to so many families in our American wildernesses. He threw his bundle down and gazed with admiration on the scene.
Here was the virgin and unprofaned loveliness of Nature. He felt her charm and prostrated himself before her shrine. But he rendered to that invisible spirit of which these forms were only an imperfect manifestation, a worship deeper still, and by an instinct of pure adoration lifted his face toward the sky.
Having refreshed his soul by this communion, he drank a deep draught of the sparkling water at the point where the rivulets met. Then he threw off his coat, took his axe in hand and selected a tree on which to begin his attack.
It was an enormous oak which, with roots struck deep into the soil and branches lifted high and spread wide in the air, had maintained itself successfully against innumerable foes for perhaps a thousand years. He reflected long before he struck, for to him as to all lovers of nature there is a certain inviolable sacredness about a tree.
"Should you see me at the point of death," said Rousseau, "carry me under the shade of an oak and I am persuaded I shall recover."
David was a lover of trees. From the summits of the hills he had often gazed down upon the forests and observed how "all the tree tops lay asleep like green waves on the sea." He had harvested the fruits of the apple and peach, clubbed the branches of the walnut, butternut and beach, and boiled the sap of the maple. He had seen the trees offer their hospitable shelter to the birds and the squirrels, had basked beneath their umbrageous shadows and had listened to their whispers in the summer, and to their wild music "when winter, that grand old harper, smote his thunder-harp of pines."
It cost him pain to lay violent hands on a thing so sacred; nevertheless he swung his axe in the air and a loud reverberating blow broke the immense solitude. There are many kinds of music; but there is none fuller of life and power and primal energy than the ring of the woodsman's axe as blow after blow, through hour after hour, falls rhythmically upon the wound which he cuts in the great hole of a forest monarch.
The gash deepened and widened, the chips flew in showers and the woodchopper's craft, long unpracticed, came back to him with every stroke. The satisfying consciousness of skill and power filled him with a sort of ecstasy. Just as the sun reached the zenith and looked down to see what devastation was being wrought in this solitude, the giant trembled; the blade had struck a vital place; he reeled, leaned forward, lurched, plunged headlong, and with a roar that resounded through the wide reaches of the forest, fell prone upon the ground.
The woodsman wiped the perspiration from his brow and smiled. The appetite of the pioneer had been whetted with his work. He kindled a fire, boiled a pot of coffee, fried a half dozen slices of bacon, remembered his sickly appetite in the luxurious restaurants of great cities, and laughed aloud for joy—wild, unbounded joy—the joy of primitive manhood, of health, of strength, of hope. And then he stretched himself on the ground and looked up into the blue sky through the opening he had made in the green canopy above him and through which the sun was gazing with bold, free glances on the face of the modest valley and whispering amorously of its love.
Those glances fell soft and warm on his own upturned countenance, and the rays of life-giving power penetrated the inmost core of his being, finding their way by some mysterious alchemy through the medium of matter into the very citadel of the spirit itself. They imparted a new life. He basked in them until he fell asleep, and when he awakened he felt anew the joy of mere physical existence; he rose, shook himself like a giant, and resumed his work.
He now began to prepare for himself a temporary booth which should shelter him until he had erected his cabin; and the rest of the day was consumed in this enterprise. At its close this simple task was done, so easy is it to provide a shelter for him who seeks protection and not luxury! Having once more satisfied his hunger, he built a fire in front of his rude booth, and lay down in its genial rays, his head upon a pillow of moss. The stillness of the cool, quiet evening was broken only by the crackling of the flames, the quiet murmurs of the two little rills which whispered to each other startled interrogations as to the meaning of this rude invasion, the hoot of owls in the tall tree tops, and the stealthy tread of some of the little creatures of the forest who prowled around, while seeking their prey, to discover, if possible, the meaning of this great light, and the strange noises with which their forest world had resounded.
There came to the recumbent woodsman a deep and quiet peace. He felt a new sense of having been in some way taken back into the fraternity of the unfallen creatures of the universe, and into the all-embracing arms of the great Father. He fell asleep with pure thoughts hovering over the surface of his mind, like a flock of swallows above a crystal lake. And Nature did take him back into that all-enfolding heart where there is room and a welcome for all who do not alienate themselves. Her latchstrings are always out, and forests, fields, mountains, oceans, deserts even, have a silent, genial welcome for all who enter their open doors with reverence, sympathy and yearning. A man asleep alone in a vast wilderness! How easy it would be for Nature to forget him and permit him to sleep on forever! What gives him his importance there amid those giant trees? Why should sun, moon, stars, gravity, heat, cold, care for him? How can the hand that guides the constellations—those vast navies of the infinite sea—pause to touch the eyelids of this atom when the time comes for him to rise?
"Stranger, if thou hast
learned a truth which needs
No school of long experience,
that the world
Is full of guilt and misery, and
hast seen
Enough of all its sorrows, crimes
and cares
To tire thee of it, enter this
wild wood
And view the haunts of Nature.
The calm shade
Shall bring a kindred calm, and
the sweet breeze
That makes the green leaves
dance, shall waft a balm
To thy sick heart."
—Bryant.
When the sleeper woke, refreshed and rested, in the morning, it was to take up the routine of duties which were to be only slightly varied for many months to come.
One after another the great trees succumbed to the blows of his axe and from their prostrate forms he carefully selected those which were best adapted to the structure of his cabin, while over the others he piled the limbs and brush and left them to dry for the conflagration which at the end of the hot summer should remove them from the clearing.
When the rainy days came he spent his time in the shelter of his little arbor cutting the "shakes," or shingles, which were to furnish the roof of Pepeeta's home.
The days and weeks fled by and the opening in the forest grew apace. He measured it by night with a celestial arithmetic, using the stars for his triangulations, and as one after another of them became visible where before they had been obscured by the foliage of the trees, he smiled, and felt as if he were cutting his farm out of heaven instead of earth. It was really cut out of both!
His Sundays were spent at the old homestead with his loved ones, and once every week Pepeeta came with Steven to bring him luxuries which her own hands had prepared, and to pass the afternoon with him at his work in the "clearing."
Those were memorable hours, possessing that three-fold existence with which every hour can be endowed by the soul of man—anticipation—realization—recollection. In this way a single moment sometimes becomes almost synchronous with eternity.
It would have been impossible to tell which of the three was happiest, but Pepeeta was always the center of interest, attention and devotion. Her whole nature seemed to be aroused and called into play; all her countless charms were incessantly evoked; her inimitable laughter resounded through the woods and challenged the emulous birds to unsuccessful competition. Seriousness alternated with gaiety, coquetry with gravity. Some of the time she spent in gathering flowers to adorn her lover's booth, and some in carrying to the rubbish pile such limbs and branches as her strength would permit her to handle.
Nothing could have been more charming than the immense efforts that she put forth with such grace, to lift with all her might some branch that her lover had tossed aside with a single hand! The attitudes into which these efforts threw her body were as graceful as those into which the water threw the cresses by its ceaseless flow, or the wind bent the tree tops by its fitful gusts.
Steven was frantic with delight at the free, open life of the woods. He chased the squirrels and rabbits, he climbed the trees to gaze into the nests of the birds, and caught the butterflies in his hat.
David entered into all their pleasures, but with a chastened and restrained delight, for he could never forget that he was an exile and a penitent.
There were two days in the season when the regular routine of the woodsman's work was interrupted by functions which possess a romantic charm. One was when the Friends and neighbors from a wide region assembled to help him "raise" the walls of his cabin.
From all sides they appeared, in their picturesque costumes of homespun or fur. Suddenly, through the ever-open gates of the forest, teams of horses crashed, drawing after them clanking log chains, and driven by men who carried saws and "cant hooks" on their broad shoulders. Loud halloos of greeting, cheerful words of encouragement, an eager and agreeable bustle of business, filled the clearing.
Log by log the walls rose, as the horses rolled them into place with the aid of the great chains which the pioneers wrapped around them. It was only a rude log cabin they built—with a great, wide opening through the middle, a room on either side, and a picturesque chimney at either end; but it was not to be despised even for grace, and when warmth and comfort and adaptability to needs and opportunities are considered, there have been few buildings erected by the genius of man more justly entitled to admiration.
When this single day's work was ended there remained nothing for David to do but chink and daub the walls with mud, cover the rude rafters of the roof with his shakes, build the chimneys out of short sticks, cob-house fashion, and cement them on the inside with clay to protect them from the flames.
The other day was the one on which, at the close of the long and genial summer, when the mass of timber and brushwood had been thoroughly seasoned by the hot suns, he set his torches to the carefully constructed piles.
Steven and Pepeeta were to share with him in the excitement of this conflagration, and David had postponed it until dusk, in order that they might enjoy its entire sublimity. He had taken the precaution to plow many furrows around the cabin and also around the edge of the clearing, so the flames could neither destroy his house nor devastate the forest.
Such precautions were necessary, for nothing can exceed the ferocity of fire in the debris which the woodsmen scatter about them. When the dusk had settled down on this woodland world and long shadows had crept across the clearing, wrapping themselves round the trees at its edge and scattering themselves among the thick branches till they were almost hid from view, David lighted a pine torch and gave it into the hands of the eager boy, who seized it and like a young Prometheus started forth. A single touch to the dry tinder was enough. With a dull explosion, the mass burst into flame. Shouting in his exultation, the little torch-bearer rushed on, igniting pile after pile, and leaving behind him almost at every step a mighty conflagration. At each new instant, as the night advanced, a new outburst of light illumined the darkness, until ten, twenty, fifty great heaps were roaring and seething with flames! Great jets spouted up into the midnight heavens as if about to kiss the very stars, and suddenly expired in the illimitable space above them. Immense sparks, shot out from these bonfires as from the craters of volcanoes, went sailing into the void around them and fell hissing into the water of the brooks or silently into the new-plowed furrows.
The clouds above the heads of the subdued and almost terrified beholders, for no one is ever altogether prepared for the absolute awfulness of such a spectacle, were glowing with the fierce light which the fires threw upon them. Weird illuminations played fantastic tricks in the foliage from which the startled shadows had vanished. The roar of the ever-increasing fires became louder and louder, until in very terror Pepeeta crept into David's arms for protection, while the child who had fearlessly produced this scene of awful grandeur and destruction shouted with triumph at his play.
"Thee's a reckless little fire-eater!" said David, watching his figure as it appeared and disappeared. "How youth trifles with forces whose powers it can neither measure nor control! It was well that I drew a furrow around our cabin or it would have been burned."
His gaze was fixed on the little cabin which seemed to dance and oscillate in the palpitating light; and touched by the analogies and symbols which his penetrating eye discovered in the simple scenes of daily life, he continued to soliloquize, saying, "I should have drawn furrows around my life, before I played with fire!"
"Nay, David," replied Pepeeta, "we should never have played with fire at all."
"How wise we are—too late!"
"Shall we walk any more cautiously when the next untried pathway opens?" he added, somewhat sadly, as he recalled the errors of the past.
"We ought to, if experience has any value," said Pepeeta.
"But has it? Or does it only interpret the past, and not point out the future?"
"Something of both, I think."
"Well we must trust it."
"But not it alone. There is something, better and safer."
"What is that, my love?"
"The path-finding instinct of the soul itself."
"Do you believe there is such an instinct?"
"As much as I believe the carrier pigeon has it. It is the inner light of which you told me. You see, I remember my lesson like an obedient child."
"Why, then, are we so often misled?" he asked, tempting her.
"Because we do not wholly trust it!" she said.
"But how can we distinguish the true light from the false, the instinct from imagination or desire? If the soul has a hundred compasses pointing in different ways, what compass shall lead the bewildered mariner to know the true compass?"
"He who will know, can know."
"Are you speaking from your heart, Pepeeta?"
"From its depths."
"And have you no doubts that what you say is true?"
"None, for I learned it from a teacher whom I trust, and have justified it by my own experience."
"And now the teacher must sit at the feet of the pupil! Oh! beautiful instructress, keep your faith firm for my sake! I have dark hours through which I have to pass and often lose my way. The restoration of my spiritual vision is but slow. How often am I bewildered and lost! My thoughts brood and brood within me!"
"Put them away," she said, cheerily. "We live by faith and not by sight. We need not be concerned with the distant future. Let us live in this dear, divine moment. I am here. You are here! We are together; our hands touch; our eyes meet; our hearts are one; we love! Let us only be true to our best selves, and to the light that shines within! Oh! I have learned so much in these few months, among these people of peace, David! They know the way of life! We need go no farther to seek it. It lies before us. Let us follow it!"
"Angel of goodness," he exclaimed, clasping her hand, "it must be that supreme Love reigns over all the folly and madness of life, or to such a one as I, a gift so good and beautiful would never have been given!"
She pressed his hand for response, for her lips quivered and her heart was too full for words.
And now, through the ghastly light which magnified his size portentously and painted him with grotesque and terrible colors, the child reappeared, begrimed with smoke and wild with the transports of a power so vast and an accomplishment so wonderful.
The three figures stood in the bright illumination, fascinated by the spectacle. The flames, as if satisfied with destruction, had died down, and fifty great beds of glowing embers lay spread out before them, like a sort of terrestrial constellation.
The wind, which had been awakened and excited to madness as it rushed in from the great halls of the forest to fan the fires, now that it was no longer needed, ceased to blow and sank into silence and repose. Little birds, returning to their roosts, complained mournfully that their dreams had been disturbed, and a great owl from the top of a lofty elm hooted his rage.
It was Saturday night. The labors of the week were over. The time had come for them to return to the farm house. They turned away reluctantly, leaving nature to finish the work they had begun.
"Not in the clamor of the
crowded street,
Not in the shouts and plaudits of
the throng,
But in ourselves, are triumph and
defeat."
—Longfellow.
The emotions of the woodsman's heart had been in the main cheerful and full of hope during the springtime and the summer; but when the autumn came, with its wailing winds, its dying vegetation, and falling leaves, new moods were superinduced in his sensitive soul.
It is impossible even for the good and innocent to behold this universal dissolution and decay without remembering that they themselves must pass through some such temporary experience. But upon those who carry guilty secrets in their hearts these impressions descend with crushing weight. David felt them to the full when at last the winter set in; when the days were shortened and he was compelled to forego his toil at an early hour and retire to his cabin! There he was confronted by all the problems and temptations of a soul battling with the animal nature and striving to emancipate the spirit from its thraldom.
At the close of one cold, blustering day, when his evening meal had been eaten in solitude, he sat down before the great fire which roared in the chimney. He read awhile, but grew tired of his book and threw it down. The melancholy which he had suppressed so long rose at last, and there burst on him the apparent uselessness of the task he had gratuitously assigned himself. Why had he ever done it? Why should he be sitting there alone in his cabin when by his side there might be that radiant woman whose presence would dispel instantly and forever the loneliness which ceaselessly gnawed at his heart? What, after all, was to be gained by this self-sacrifice? Life is very short, and there are few pleasures to be had, at best. Why should he not seize them as fast as they came within his reach? Had he not suffered enough already? Who had ever suffered more? It was only an unnecessary cruelty that had even suggested such agony as he was now experiencing. He was being cheated out of legitimate pleasures, and that by the advice of an old ascetic whose own capacity for enjoyment had been dried up, and who was envious of the happiness of others! As these thoughts rushed through his soul, he could not but perceive that he had been forced once more to enter the arena and to fight over the old battle which he had lost in the lumberman's cabin three years before! And he found to his dismay how much harder it was to fight these foes of virtue when they come to us not as vague imaginations of experiences which we have never tried, but as vivid memories of real events. Then he had only dreamed of the sweet fruits of the knowledge of good and evil: but now the taste was in his mouth, to whet his appetite and increase his hunger. The slumbering selfhood of his soul woke and clamored for its rights.
It was Chateaubriand who affirmed that the human heart is like one of those southern pools which are quiet and beautiful on the surface, but in the bottom of which there lies an alligator! However calm the surface of the exile's soul appeared, there was a monster in its depth, and now it rose upon him. In his struggles with it he paced the floor, sank despairingly into his chair, and fell on his knees by turns. Animal desires and brute instincts grappled with intellectual convictions and spiritual aspirations; flesh and blood with mind and spirit; skepticism with trust; despair with hope.
The old forest had been the theater of many combats. In earth, air and water, birds, animals and fishes had struggled with each other for supremacy and existence. Beasts had fought with Indians and Indians with white men; but no battle had been more significant or tragic than the one which was taking place in the quiet cabin. There was no noise and no bloodshed, but it was a struggle to the death. It was no new strife, but one which has repeated itself in human hearts since they began to beat. It cannot be avoided by plunging into the crowds of great cities, nor by fleeing to the solitudes of forests, for we carry our battleground with us. The inveterate foes encamp upon the fields, and when they are not fighting they are recuperating their strength for struggles still to come.
But although neither combatant in this warfare is ever wholly annihilated, there is in every life a Waterloo. There comes a struggle in which, if we are not victorious, we at least remain permanent master of the field. This was the night of David's Waterloo. A true history of that final conflict in the soul of this hermit would not have disgraced the confessions of Saint Augustine!
He wrestled to keep his thoughts pure and his faith firm, until the sweat stood in beads on his forehead. He felt that to yield so much as the fraction of an inch of ground in his battle against doubt and sin this night was to be lost! And still the conflict went against him.
It turned upon another of those trivial incidents of which there had been a series in his life. His attention was arrested by a sound in the woods which summoned his consciousness from the inner world of thought and feeling to the great external world of action and endeavor. His huntsman's ear detected its significance at once, and springing to the corner of the room he seized his rifle, threw open the cabin door and stood on the threshold. A full moon shone on the snow and in that white and ghostly light his quick eye caught sight of a spectacle that made his pulses leap. A fawn bounded out into the open field and headed for his cabin, attracted by the firelight gleaming through the window and door. Behind her and snapping almost at her heels, came a howling pack of a half dozen wolves whose red, lolling tongues, white fangs and flaming eyes were distinctly visible from where he stood. Coolly raising his rifle he aimed at the leader and pulled the trigger. There was a quick flash, a sharp report, and the wolf leaped high in the air, plunged headlong, tumbled into the snow, and lay writhing in the pangs of death.
There was no time to load again, and there was no need, for the terrified fawn, impelled by the instinct of self-preservation, chose the lesser of two dangers and with a few wild bounds toward the cabin, flung herself through the wide-open door.
David had detected her purpose and stepped aside; and instantly she had entered closed and bolted the door upon the very muzzles of her pursuers. They dashed themselves against it and whined with baffled rage, while the half-frantic deer crawled trembling to the side of her preserver, licked his hands and lay at his feet gasping for breath.
To some men an incident like this would have been an incident and nothing more; but souls like Corson's perceive in every event and experience of life, elements which lie beneath the surface.
Not only was he saved from the spiritual defeat of which he was on the verge, by being summoned instantly from the subjective into the objective world; but the rescue of the deer became a beautiful and holy symbol of life itself, and so revealed and illustrated life's main end "the help of the helpless,"—that he was at once elevated from a region of struggle and despair into one of triumph and hope. He remained in it until he fell asleep. He awoke in it on the morrow. From that high plane he did not again descend so low as he had been. The courage that had been kindled and the purposes which had been crystallized by the joy of this rescue and the gratitude of the deer remained permanently in his heart. He lived in dreams of other acts like this, in which the objects saved by his strength were not the beasts of the field, but the hunted and despairing children of a heavenly Father.
The fawn became to him a continual reminder of this spiritual struggle and victory, for he kept it in his cabin, made it a companion, trained it to follow him about his work, and finally presented it to Pepeeta.
There were many beautiful things to be seen in the winter woods; snow hanging in plumes from the trees, the smoke of the cabin curling into the still air, rabbits browsing on the low bushes, the woodsman standing in triumph over a fallen tree; but when, on the days of her visits to the exile, Pepeeta entered the clearing and the deer, perceiving her approach, ran to greet her in flying leaps, bounded around her, looked up into her face with its gentle eyes, ate the food she offered and licked the hand of its mistress—David thought that there was nothing more beautiful in the world.
"The loves that meet in
Paradise shall cast out fear,
And Paradise hath room for you
and me and all."
—Christina
Rossetti.
At last—the springtime came!
The potent energy of the sun opened all the myriad veins of the great trees, wakened the hibernating creatures of the dens and burrows from their protracted sleep, caused the seeds to swell and burst in the bosom of earth, and sent the blood coursing through David's veins, quickening all his intellectual and spiritual powers.
And then, the end of his exile was near! In a few weeks he would have vindicated the purity of his purpose to attain the divine life, and have proved himself worthy to claim the hand of Pepeeta!
All the winter long he had plied his axe. Once more, now that the snow had vanished, he set fire to the debris which he had strewn around him, and saw with an indescribable feeling of triumph and delight the open soil made ready for his plow. He yoked a team of patient oxen to it and set the sharp point deep into the black soil. Never had the earth smelled so sweet as now when the broad share threw it back in a continuously advancing wave. Never had that yeoman's joy of hearing the ripping of roots and the grating of iron against stones as the great oxen settled to their work, strained in their yokes and dragged the plow point through the bosom of the earth, been half so genuine and deep. It was good to be alive, to sleep, to eat, to toil! Cities had lost their charm. David's sin was no longer a withering and blasting, but a chastening and restraining memory. His clearing was a kingdom, his cabin a palace, and he was soon to have a queen! He had reserved his sowing for the last day of his self-imposed seclusion, which ended with the month of May.
On the day following, having accomplished his vow, he would go to the house of God and claim his bride! This day he would devote to that solemn function of scattering the sacred seed of life's chief support into the open furrow!
No wonder a feeling of devotion and awe came upon him as he prepared himself for his task; for perhaps there is not a single act in the whole economy of life better calculated to stir a thoughtful mind to its profoundest depths than the sowing of those golden grains which have within them the promise and potency of life. Year after year, century after century, millions of men have gone forth in the light of the all-beholding and life-giving sun to cast into the bosom of the earth the sustenance of their children! It is a sublime act of faith, and this sacrifice of a present for a future good, an actual for a potential blessing, is no less beautiful and holy because familiar and old. The Divine Master himself could not contemplate it without emotion and was inspired by it to the utterance of one of his grandest parables.
And then the field itself inspired solemn reflections and noble pride in the mind of the sower. It was his own! He had carved it out of a wilderness! Here was soil which had never been opened to the daylight. Here was ground which perhaps for a thousand, and not unlikely for ten thousand years, should bring forth seed to the sower; and he had cleared it with his own hands! Generations and centuries after he should have died and been forgotten, men would go forth into this field as he was doing to-day, to sow their seed and reap their harvests.
He slung his bag of grain over his shoulder and stepped forth from his cabin at the dawn of day. The clearing he had made was an almost perfect circle. All around it were the green walls of the forest with the great trunks of the beeches, white and symmetrical, standing like vast Corinthian columns supporting a green frieze upon which rested the lofty roof of the immense cathedral. From the organ-loft the music of the morning breeze resounded, and from the choirs the sweet antiphonals of birds. Odors of pine, of balsam, of violets, of peppermint, of fresh-plowed earth, of bursting life, were wafted across the vast nave from transept to transept, and floated like incense up to heaven.
The priest, about to offer his sacrifice, the sacrifice of a broken heart and contrite spirit, about to confess his faith; in the beautiful and symbolic act of sacrificing the present for the future, stepped forth into the open furrow.
His open countenance, bronzed with the sun, was lighted with love and adoration; his lips smiled; his eyes glowed; he lifted them to the heavens in an unspoken prayer for the benediction of the great life-giver; he drew into his nostrils the sweet odors, into his lungs the pure air, into his soul the beauty and glory of the world, and then, filling his hand with the golden grain, he flung it into the bosom of the waiting earth.
All day long he strode across the clearing and with rhythmical swinging of his brawny arm lavishly scattered the golden grain.
As the sun went down and the sower neared the conclusion of his labor, his emotions became deeper and yet more deep. He entered more and more fully into the true spirit and significance of his act. He felt that it was a sacrament. Thoughts of the operation of the mighty energies which he was evoking; of the Divine spirit who brooded over all; of the coming into this wilderness of the woman who was to be the good angel of his life; of the ceremony that was to be enacted in the little meeting house; of the work to which he was dedicated in the future, kindled his soul into an ecstasy of joy. He ceased to be conscious of his present task. The material world loosened its hold upon his senses. His thoughts became riveted upon the elements of that spiritual universe that lay within and around him, and that seemed uncovered to his view as to the apostle of old. "Whether he was in the body, or out of the body, he could not tell!" Finally he ceased to move; his hand was arrested and hung poised in mid-air with the unscattered seed in its palm; he eyes were fixed on some invisible object and he stood as he had stood when we first caught sight of him in the half-plowed meadow—lost in a trance.
How long he stood he never knew, but he was wakened, at last, as it was natural and fitting he should be.
Fulfilling her agreement to come and bring him home on the eve of their wedding day, Pepeeta emerged like a beautiful apparition from an opening in the green wall of the great cathedral. She saw David standing immovable in the furrow. For a few moments she was absorbed in admiration of the grace and beauty of the noble and commanding figure, and then she was thrilled with the consciousness that she possessed the priceless treasure of his love. But these emotions were followed by a holy awe as she discovered that the soul of her lover was filled with religious ecstasy. She felt that the place whereon she stood was holy ground, and reverently awaited the emergence of the worshiper from the holy of holies into which he had withdrawn for prayer.
But the rapture lasted long and it was growing late. The shadows from the summits of the hills had already crept across the clearing and were silently ascending the trunks of the trees on the eastern side. It was time for them to go. She took a step toward him, and then another, moving slowly, reverently, and touched him on the arm. He started. The half-closed hand relaxed and the seed fell to the ground, the dreamer woke and descended from the heaven of the spiritual world into that of the earthly, the heart of a pure and noble woman.
"I have come," she said simply.
He took her in his arms and kissed her.
"Thee is not through yet?"
"So it seems! I must have lost myself."
"I think thee rather found thyself."
"Perhaps I did; but I must finish my labor. It will never do for me to let my visions supplant my tasks. They will be hurtful, save as incentives to toil. I must be careful!"
"Let me help thee. There are only a few more furrows. I am sure that I can sow," she said, extending her hand.
He placed some of the seed in her apron and she trudged by his side, laughing at her awkwardness but laboring with all her might. Her lover took her hand in his and showed her how to cast the seed, and so they labored together until every open furrow was filled. It was dark when they were done. They lingered a little while to put the cabin in order, and then turned their faces towards the old farmhouse.
The two little brooks were singing their evening song as they mingled their waters together in front of that wilderness home. The lovers stood a moment at their point of junction, as Pepeeta said, "It is a symbol of our lives." They listened to the low murmur, watched the crystal stream as it sparkled in the moonlight, stole away into the distance, chanting its own melodious lay of love. It led them out of the clearing and into the depths of the forest. They moved like spirits passing through a land of dreams. The palpable world seemed stripped of its reality. The creatures that stole across their path or started up as they passed, the crickets that chirped their little idyls at the roots of the great trees, the fire-flies that kindled their evanescent fires among the bushes, the night owls that hooted solemnly in the tree tops, the rustle of the leaves in the evening breeze, the gurgle of the waters over the stones in the bed of the brook, their own muffled footfalls, the patches of moonlight that lay like silver mats on the brown carpet of the woods, the flickering shadows, the ghostly trunks of the trees, the slowly swaying, plume-like branches, sounded only like faint echoes or gleamed only like soft reflections of a fairy world!
"It was here," Pepeeta said, pausing at the roots of a great beech tree, "that I came the day after we had first seen each other, to inquire of the gypsy goddess the secrets of the future. I have learned many lessons since!"
"It was here," said David, as they emerged from the forest into the larger valley, "that thee stood, a little way from the doctor's side, stroking the necks of his horses and peeping at us stealthily from under thy long dark lashes on the day when he tried to persuade me to join him in his roving life."
"It was here," Pepeeta said, as they approached the little bridge, "that we met each other and yielded our hearts to love."
"And met again after our tragedy and our suffering, to find that love is eternal," David added.
They stood for a few moments in silence, recalling that bitter past, and then the man of many sins and sorrows said, "Give me thy hand, Pepeeta. How small it seems in mine. Let me fold thee in my arms; it makes my heart bound to feel thee there! We have walked over rough roads together, and the path before us may not be always smooth. We have tasted the bitter cup between us, and there may still be dregs at the bottom. It is hard to believe that after all the wrong we have done we can still be happy. God is surely good! It seems to me that we must have our feet on the right path. He paused for a moment and then continued:
"I have brought thee many sorrows, sweetheart."
"And many joys."
"I mean to bring thee some in the future! The love I bear thee now is different from that of the past. I cannot wait until to-morrow to pledge thee my troth! Listen!"
She did so, gazing up into his face with dark eyes in which the light of the moon was reflected as in mountain lakes. There was something in them which filled his heart with unutterable emotion, and his words hung quivering upon his lips.
"Speak, my love, for I am listening," she said.
"I cannot," he replied.
Have been sold of this great historical love-story of Princess Mary Tudor, sister of Henry VIII Price, $1.50
WHEN KNIGHTHOOD WAS IN FLOWER
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ALICE OF OLD VINCENNES
By MAURICE THOMPSON
Mr. Thompson, whose delightful writings in prose and verse have made his reputation national has achieved his master stroke of genius in this historical novel of revolutionary days in Indiana.—The Atlanta Constitution.
There are three great chapters of fiction: Scott's tournament on Ashby field, General Wallace's chariot race, and now Maurice Thompson's duel scene and the raising of Alice's flag over old Fort Vincennes.—Denver Daily News.
More original than "Richard Carvel," more cohesive than "To Have and to Hold," more vital than "Janice Meredith," such is Maurice Thompson's superb American romance, "Alice of Old Vincennes." It is in addition, more artistic and spontaneous than any of its rivals.—Chicago Times-Herald.
12 mo. with five illustrations and a frontispiece in color, drawn by F.C. Yohn,
Price $1.50
The Bowen-Merrill Company, Indianapolis
The Story of a Strange Navy
By CLAUDE H. WETMORE
[From the St. Louis Mirror.]
The recital of the deeds of the "Sweepers of the Sea" is a breathless one.
The romance is heightened by the realism of the technique of naval warfare, by the sureness and voluminosity of nautical knowledge.
Imaginary sea fights are told with all the particularity of real events, and at the same time the descriptions have a breezy swing that hurries the reader along to most startling catastrophes.
Much of the material is evidently worked over from actual fact into the texture of romance.
The romance is evidently modern in action, but the motives are the grand and noble motives of a mysterious and splendid antiquity. The decendants of the Incas, moved by the Inca traditions, are not at all out of harmony with modern war-ships, or with a very modern war-correspondent, who is touched up a little to heroic proportions.
The book is pleasurable all the way through, and some of the descriptive passages are specimens of first-class writing. The work bears every evidence of having been carefully done, and yet the story reels off as naturally and easily as if it were a running record of fact.
That the general public will take to the book is a safe conclusion. It is just different enough from the ordinary, romantic novel to be essentially new.
Illustrated Price, $1.50
The Bowen-Merrill Company, Indianapolis
THE PENITENTES
By LOUIS HOW.
To describe the customs of this band of intensely religious people without laying on the color too thickly and without melodramatic exaggeration, to retain all the color and picturesqueness of the original scene without excess, was the difficult task which Mr. How had to accomplish, and it is one which he has done well.—Chicago Record.
"The Penitentes" abounds in dramatic possibilities. It is full of action, warm color, and variety. The denouement at the little church of San Rafael, when the soldiers surprise the Penitentes at mass in the early dawn of their fete day, appeals strongly to the dramatizer.—Chicago Tribune.
Mr. How has done a truly remarkable piece of work * * * any hand, however practiced, might well be proud of the marvelously good descriptions, the dramatic, highly unusual story, the able characterizations. If "The Penitentes" does not make its author notable it will not be for lack of every "promising" condition.— The Interior.
12 mo. Cloth, ornamental Price $1.50 The Bowen-Merrill Company, Indianapolis
THE LEGIONARIES
By HENRY SCOTT CLARK.
"The Legionaries" is pervaded with what seems to be the true spirit of artistic impartiality. The hero, to be sure, is a secessionist, but the author, at least in this book, is simply a narrator. He stands aside, regarding with equal eye all the issues involved and the scales dip not in his hands. To sum up, the first romance of the new day on the Ohio is an eminently readable one—a good yarn well spun.—Cincinnati Commercial Tribune.
The appearance of a new novel in the west marks an epoch in fiction relating to the war between the sections for the preservation of the Union. "The Legionaries," by an anonymous writer, said to be a prominent lawyer of the Hoosier state, concerns the raid made by the intrepid Morgan through the southeastern corner of Indiana, through lower Ohio and to the borders of West Virginia, where his depleted command ran into a trap set by the federal authorities. It is a remarkable book, and we can scarcely credit the assurance that it is the work of a new writer.—Rochester Herald.
The scene is laid in Kentucky and Indiana, and the backbone of the story is Morgan's great raid—one of the most romantic and reckless pieces of adventure ever attempted in the history of the world. Mr. Clark's description of the "Ride of the Three Thousand" is a piece of literature that deserves to live; and is as fine in its way as the chariot race from "Ben Hur."—Memphis Commercial Appeal.
12 mo. Illustrated Price $1.50
The Bowen-Merrill Company, Indianapolis
The Black Wolf's Breed
BY HARRIS DICKSON.
A vigorous tale of France in the old and new world during the reign of Louis XIV.—Boston Globe.
As delightfully seductive as certain mint-flavored beverages they make down South.—Philadelphia Press.
The sword-play is great, even finer than the pictures in "Two Have and To Hold."—Los Angeles Herald.
As fine a piece of sustained adventure as has appeared in recent fiction.—San Francisco Chronicle.
There is action, vivid description and intensely dramatic situations.—St. Louis Globe-Democrat.
So full of tender love-making, of gallant fighting that one regrets it's no longer.—Indianapolis News.
12 mo., Illustrated by C.M. Relyea,
Price $1.50
The Bowen-Merrill Company, Indianapolis
WITH HOOPS OF STEEL
By FLORENCE FINCH KELLY.
"The friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, grapple them to thy soul With Hoops of Steel."
"With Hoops of Steel," is issued in handsome style, with several striking pictures in colors by Dan Smith, by The Bowen-Merrill Company of Indianapolis, a Western publishing house that has a long record of recent successes in fiction. This firm seems to tell by instinct what the public wants to read, and in Mrs. Kelly's case it is safe to say that no mistake has been made. Western men and women will read because it paints faithfully the life which they know so well, and because it gives us three big, manly fellows, fine types of the cowboy at his best. Eastern readers will be attracted by its splendid realism.—San Francisco Chronicle.
Mrs. Kelly's character stands out from the background of the New Mexican plains, desert and mountain with all the distinctness of a Remington sketch or of the striking colored illustrations drawn for the book by Dan Smith. It is not alone in the superb local coloring or the vivid character work that "With Hoops of Steel" is a notable book. The incidents are admirably described and full of interest, and the movement of the story is continuous and vigorous. The action is spirited and the climaxes dramatic. The plot is cleverly devised and carefully unfolded. After finishing the book one feels that he has just seen the country, has mingled with the characters and has been a witness of the incidents described.—Denver Times.
12 mo. with six illustrations, in color, by Dan Smith
Price, $1.50
The Bowen-Merrill Company, Indianapolis
PATROON VAN VOLKENBERG
BY HENRY THEW STEPHENSON.
The action of the story begins when New York was a little city of less than 5,000 inhabitants. The conflict between the law-abiding citizens, led by the Governor, Earl Bellamont, and the merchants, headed by Patroon Van Volkenberg, is at its height.
The Governor has forbidden the port to the free traders or pirate ships, which infested the Atlantic and sailed boldly under their own flag; while the Patroon and his merchant colleagues not only traded openly with the buccaneers, but owned and managed such illicit craft.
The atmosphere of the tale is fresh in fiction, the plot is stirring and well knit, and the author is possessed of the ability to write forceful, fragrant English.
12 mo., Illustrated in color
by C.M. Relyea, Price $1.50
The Bowen-Merrill Company, Indianapolis
Chimes From a Jester's Bells
A volume of humorous and pathetic stories and sketches. By Robert J. Burdette. Beautifully illustrated, bound in uniform style with Bill Nye's "A Guest at the Ludlow."
12 mo., cloth ornamental, illustrated.
Price $1.25
The Bowen-Merrill Company, Indianapolis