Текст книги "Julia Ward Howe"

Автор книги: Laura E. Richards

Соавторы: Maud Howe Elliott
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"June 10. Small beer going out of fashion leaves women one occupation the less. Fools are still an institution; and will remain such."[71]

"June 16.... A good attendance in spite of the heat.... Agonized over my failure to come up to what I had designed to do in the discourse."

"June 18.... Saw the last of my dear friend E. Twisleton, who took me to the National Gallery, where we saw many precious gems of art.... At parting, he said: 'The good Father above does not often give so great a pleasure as I have had in these meetings with you.' Let me enshrine this charming and sincere word in my most precious recollection, from the man of sixty-three to the woman of fifty-three."

"June 27. Left Leeds at 7 A.M., rising at 4.30.... To Miss [Frances Power] Cobbe's, where met Lady Lyall, Miss Clough, Mrs. Gorton, Jacob Bright, et al. Then to dinner with the dear Seeleys. An unceremonious and delightful meal. Heart of calf. Then to John Ridley's.... Home late, almost dead—to bed, having been on foot twenty hours."

"July 4.... Saw a sight of misery, a little crumb of a boy, barefoot, tugging after a hand-organ man, also very shabby. Gave the little one a ha'penny, all the copper I had. But in the heartache he gave me, I resolved, God helping me, that my luxury shall henceforth be to minister to human misery, and to redeem much time and money spent on my own fancies, as I may...."

She had been asked to attend two important meetings as American delegate: a peace congress in Paris, and a great prison reform meeting in London.

The French meeting came first. She crossed the Channel, reaching Paris in time to attend the principal séance of the congress. She presented her credentials, asked leave to speak, and was told "with some embarrassment" that she might speak to the officers of the society, when the public meeting should be adjourned! She makes no comment on this proceeding, but says, "I accordingly met a dozen or more of these gentlemen in a side room, where I simply spoke of my endeavors to enlist the sympathies and efforts of women in behalf of the world's peace."

Returning to London, she had "the privilege of attending as a delegate one of the great Prison Reform meetings of our day."

In 1843, Julia the bride would not have considered it a privilege to attend a meeting for prison reform. She would have shrugged her shoulders, would perhaps have pouted because the Chevalier cared more for these things than for the opera, with Grisi, Mario, and Lablache: she might even have written some funny verses about the windmill-tilting of her Don Quixote. Now, she stood in the place that failing health forbade him to fill, with a depth of interest, an earnestness of purpose, equal to his own. She, too, now heard the sorrowful sighing of the prisoners.

At one of the meetings of this congress, a jailer of the old school spoke in defence of the system of flogging refractory prisoners, and described in brutal fashion a brutal incident. Her blood was on fire: she asked leave to speak.

"It is related," she said, "of the famous Beau Brummel that a gentleman who called upon him one morning met a valet carrying away a tray of neck-cloths, more or less disordered. 'What are these?' asked the visitor; and the servant replied, 'These are our failures!' When I see the dark coach which in our country carries the criminal to his place of detention, I say, 'Society, here are your failures.'"

Her words were loudly applauded, and the punishment was voted down.

The Journal gives her further speech on this occasion: "Spoke of justice to women. They had talked of fallen women. I prayed them to leave that hopeless phrase. Every fallen woman represents a man as guilty as herself, who escapes human detection, but whose soul lies open before God. Speak of vicious, dissolute women, but don't speak of fallen women unless you recognize the fall of man, the old doctrine."

Two days before this she had preached her last sermon in London. The Journal says: "All Sunday at work upon my sermon, the last in London. 'Neither height nor depth, nor any other creature.' The sermon of high and low, and the great unity beyond all dimensions. A good and to me a most happy delivery of opinions and faith which I deeply hold.... So ended my happy ministration in London, begun in fear and anxiety, ended in certainty and renewed faith, which God continue to me."

August found her back at Oak Glen, exhausted in body and mind. She is almost too tired to write in the Journal, and such entries as there are only accentuate her fatigue.

"I am here at my table with books and papers, but feel very languid. My arms feel as if there were no marrow in their bones. I suppose this is reaction after so much work, but unless I can get up strength somehow I shall not accomplish anything. Weakness in all my limbs. Have had my Greek lesson and begun to read the Maccabees and the Apocrypha. I shall probably come up after a few days, but feel at present utterly incapable of exertion. I must help Maud—have helped her with music to-day...."

"Walked about with dear Chev, whose talk is always instructive. Every break in our long-continued habits shows us something to amend in our past lives. What do I see in mine after this long break? That I must endeavor to have more real life and more religion. The passive and contemplative following of thought, my own or other people's, must not de-energize my sympathies and my will. I must daily consult the divine will and standard which can help us to mould our lives aright without running from one extreme to another. My heart's wish would now be to devote myself to some sort of religious ministration. God can open a way for this in which the spirit of my desire may receive the form of his will. I must lecture this winter to earn some money and spread, I hope, some good doctrine...."

Such was the beginning of her work for peace, which was to end only with her life. Disappointed in her hope of a world congress, she turned the current of her effort in a new direction. She would have a festival, a day which should be called Mothers' Day, and be devoted to the advocacy of peace doctrines. She chose the second day of June; for many years she and her friends and followers kept this day religiously, with sweet and tender observances which were unspeakably dear to her.

In 1876 there was a great peace meeting in Philadelphia. The occasion is thus described by the Reverend Ada C. Bowles: "There were delegates from France, Italy, and Germany, each with a burning desire to be heard, and all worth hearing, but none able to speak English. The audience looked to the anxious face of the President with sympathy; then a voice was heard, 'Call for Mrs. Howe.' Those present will never forget how her presence changed the meeting from a threatened failure to a noble success. The German, Frenchman, and Italian stood in turn by her side. At the proper moment she lifted a finger, and then gave in her perfect English each speech in full to the delight of the delegates and the admiration of all."

The last celebration of her Mothers' Day was held in Riverton, New Jersey, on June 1, 1912, by the Pennsylvania Peace Society, in conjunction with the Universal Peace Union. On the printed invitation to this festival we read

"Aid it, paper, aid it, pen,

Aid it, hearts of earnest men.

Julia Ward Howe, 1874."

And further on, "Thirty-nine years ago Julia Ward Howe instituted this festival for peace,—a time for the women and children to come together; to meet in the country, invite the public, and recite, speak, sing and pray for 'those things that make for peace.'"

CHAPTER XV

SANTO DOMINGO

1872-1874; aet. 53-56

A PARABLE

"I sent a child of mine to-day;

I hope you used him well."

"Now, Lord, no visitor of yours

Has waited at my bell.

"The children of the Millionnaire

Run up and down our street;

I glory in their well-combed hair,

Their dress and trim complete.

"But yours would in a chariot come

With thoroughbreds so gay;

And little merry maids and men

To cheer him on his way."

"Stood, then, no child before your door?"

The Lord, persistent, said.

"Only a ragged beggar-boy,

With rough and frowzy head.

"The dirt was crusted on his skin,

His muddy feet were bare;

The cook gave victuals from within;

I cursed his coming there."

What sorrow, silvered with a smile,

Slides o'er the face divine?

What tenderest whisper thrills rebuke?

"The beggar-boy was mine!"

J. W. H.

We must go back a little to tell another story.

In the winter of 1870-71 the Republic of Santo Domingo sent through its president an urgent request for annexation to the United States. President Grant appointed a commission to visit this island republic, to inquire into its conditions and report upon the question. Of this commission Dr. Howe was one, the others being Messrs. Benjamin Wade and Andrew D. White.

The commissioners sailed on the government steamer Tennessee. At parting the Doctor said, "Remember that you cannot hear from us under a month; so do not be frightened at our long silence."

A week later came reports of a severe storm in the Southern seas. A large steamer had been seen struggling with wind and wave, apparently at their mercy. Some newspaper thought it might be the Tennessee. All the newspapers took up the cry: it probably was the Tennessee; most likely she had foundered and gone down with all on board.

Mindful of the Doctor's warning, our mother tried to disregard these voices of terror. She went quietly about her work as usual, but none the less the days of suspense that followed were "dark indeed and hard to live through."[72]

We remember these days well, the resolute cheerfulness, the avoidance of outward sign of anxiety, the sudden lifting of the cloud when the good news came of the steamer's safe arrival.

The prayer of Santo Domingo was not to be answered, spite of the favorable report of the commission: but the Doctor had been so delighted with the island that when, a year later, he was asked to visit it in the interests of the Samana Bay Company, he gladly accepted the commission.

This time our mother went with him, together with Maud and a party of friends. She had been loth to go, for she had already planned her peace crusade in England, but finding how much he desired it, she compromised on part of the time.

They sailed from New York early in February, 1872, in the steamer Tybee. The voyage was rough and stormy. The companion daughter of the time remembers how the wretched little Tybee pitched and heaved; even more vividly she recalls the way in which our mother from the first made society out of the strangely assorted company on board. She was the magnet, and drew them all to her: the group of conventional ladies who had never before been at sea, the knot of naval officers going to join their ship,—among them George W. De Long, the hero of the ill-fated Jeannette expedition; a colonel, and a judge, the former interested in the Samana Bay Company. She made out of this odd company and the gruff old captain a sort of court which she ruled in a curious way. She did not seem to compel their admiration so much as to compel each to give his best.

The Tybee cast anchor in the harbor of Puerto Plata, and the voyagers saw Mont Isabel towering above them, its foot in the clear beryl water where the palms grew down to the very edge of the yellow sea sand, its head wrapped in the clouds. The Doctor came to the stateroom, crying, "Come up and see the great glory!"

Our mother's delight can be imagined when they sailed into the harbor of Santo Domingo and landed near an immense and immemorial tree, where, they were told, Columbus had landed.

The party lodged in a fine old Spanish palacio, built round a courtyard. It had been originally a convent. The nuns were gone, and their place was now taken by the gay company of American ladies, who possibly gave the sleepy little city more new ideas than it had ever received in so short a space of time. President Baez put the palace at the Doctor's disposal; he was an important person to the President and to the Dominicans, for at that time the hope of annexation had not died out. All the party were treated with extraordinary courtesy. Not only were they given the presidential palace to live in, but a guard of honor was kept in the courtyard. Their horses were lodged, Spanish fashion, on the ground floor. The trampling, the neighing, and the fleas made them rather uncomfortable neighbors. Our mother soon found out that the only way she could see the country, or enjoy its life, was by riding. At first she was a little nervous, but she soon regained her courage and her seat. This was her first riding since the days of Cora, the wicked little mare, when she read her Bible and said her prayers before every ride. She thus describes it:—

"In Santo Domingo, nothing is more charming than the afternoon ride. It is, of course, the great event of the neighborhood. Our cavalcade usually numbers four or five ladies. Sometimes we cross the river in a flat-bottomed boat, which is pulled over by a rope stretched and made fast at either end. We then visit the little village of Pajarita, and trot along under the shade of heavy mango trees. Or we explore the country on this side the river. The great thing to guard against is the danger of rain. This we encountered one afternoon in some severity. Suddenly one of the party cried 'Llava!' and down came the waters. We were somewhat heated with our ride, and the penetrating rain fell chill upon us. A large tree gave us shelter for a few moments, but we were soon forced to seek more effectual protection. This we found, after some delay, in a boio, or hut, into which horses and riders were dragged pell-mell. The night was closing in, the Chief at home, and presumably anxious, the rain unabating. Which of the tropical spasms would end our far-spent life? Would it be lockjaw, a common result of severe chill in these regions? Would it be a burning, delirious fever with a touch of yellow; or should we get off with croup and diphtheria?

"The rain presently stopped, and we returned to the saddle, and then, by easy stages, to the city. On reaching home, we were advised to bathe the chilled surfaces with rum, not the wicked New England article, but the milder product of the country. Of all the evil consequences spoken of as sure to follow such an exposure, fever, lockjaw, and sore throat, we have so far not seen the earliest symptom."

It was Carnival. All the cabinet officers and their wives devoted themselves to the entertainment of the party. The Minister of War, Señor Curiel, a little twinkling fiery man, devoted himself especially to our mother, and was her right hand in the many expeditions she arranged. The Secretary of State, Señor Gautier, a grave person with more culture than most of the Dominicans, was the Doctor's chosen friend. To return the many attentions showered upon them, a ball in the old convent was arranged. The Doctor once said to her, "If you were on a desert island with nobody there but one old darkey, you would give a party." (But it was from Cuba that he wrote, "Julia knows three words of Spanish, and is constantly engaged in active conversation.")

To find herself at Carnival, the leader of a gay party, living in a spacious palace, supported by the guns and the officers of an American warship (the Narragansett, with De Long and other officers on board), was an opportunity not to be missed. She thus describes the entertainment:—

"Hans Breitmann gife a barty.

"So did we. To see Santo Domingo was little, without seeing the Dominicans also. Some diplomatic overtures were made. Would the first families come and pass an evening with us at the Palacio? Yes, they would. Which were the first families? That would have been for us a point very difficult to determine. The family of the President and those of the heads of departments would certainly stand in that prominence. For the necessary beaux we were referred to a society recently established here, calling itself 'La Juventad,' 'the young people.' This body of philanthropists, being appealed to, consented to undertake the management of our party. The occasion was announced as a bailecita, 'little ball.' We asked them to provide such refreshments as are customary in this place. Thirty dollars' worth of sweet cake and a bottled ocean of weak beer formed the principal items of the bill, as brought to us. The friends came at 5 P.M., to decorate the room with flowers, also to arrange two tables, on one of which las dulces were arrayed, while the other was made to display a suspicious-looking group of glasses. A band, we were told, would be indispensable. We demurred at this, having intended to musicate upon our own grand piano. Hearing, however, that the band could be had for the sum of twelve dollars, we gave in on this point.

"One long room runs the whole length of one side of the palace, and serves us at once for dining and reception room. A long corridor encounters this room at right angles, entirely open to the weather, on one side. These two spaces constitute all our resources for receiving company. We lit them with Downer's best [kerosene] and ranged rows of rocking-chairs, opposite to each other, after the manner of this country, and also of Cuba.

"The company began to arrive at 8 P.M. The young ladies were mostly attired in colored tarlatans, prettily trimmed with lace and flowers. Some of them were not over fourteen years of age. All were quite youthful in their appearance, and unaffected in their manners. The young men, mostly employed in the various shops of the city, were well-dressed and polite. The band was somewhat barbaric in its aspect. A violin, a 'cello, a tambourine, and a clarinet. The clarinet-player was of uncommon size, with wild, dark eyes, which seemed to dilate as he played....

"The dancing continued with little interruption until nearly 2 A.M. We were told that it is often continued till daylight. From time to time an attack was made upon the two tables. But the enjoyment of the good things provided was quite moderate compared with the cramming of a first-class party in Boston or New York. The guests were of many shades, as to color, although the greater number would have passed for white people, anywhere. Some of the handsomest among them were very dark. One young man reminded us of Edwin Booth in "Othello."... None of these people look like the mulattoes in the North. The features and the fibre appear finer, and the jet-black hair often suggests an admixture of Indian blood. The difference of social position shows itself in the manners of these people. The cruel colorphobia has never proscribed them. They have no artificial sense of inferiority, but take themselves as God made them, and think that if He is content with their complexions, mankind at large may be so.

"We were much pleased with our party, and with the simple and unaffected gayety of our guests. It was really a party in the open air, one whole side of our ballroom being unenclosed, save by the infrequent colonnade. We looked from the dancers to the stars, and back again to the dancers. It was all fairylike and dreamlike. The favorite 'dansa' much resembles, not a ballet, but a stage dance, such as is introduced in the course of the drama. The beer flowed, and the couples flew. One innovation we introduced, a Virginia reel, which the clever clarinet-player caught and accompanied. The figures much amazed the natives. The dénouement of Mr. Leland's classic ballad was wanting. No

"'Gompany fited mit daple lecks

Till de coonshtable made em shtop';

yet we may quote further from that high source:—

"'Hans Breitmann gife a barty,

Where ish that barty now?

*        *        *        *        *        *

All goned afay mit der lager pier,

Afay in der Ewigkeit!'"

The Journal gives pleasant glimpses of the Santo Domingo days.

"M. Marne, a Frenchman ninety-seven years old, paid us a visit. Had been secretary of Joseph Buonaparte in Madrid—praised him much. Talked very copiously and not ill. Enjoys full mental and physical activity. Lives at a small village in sight of our windows, but on the other side of the river. Talked much of the Roi Cristophe."

The mention of this old gentleman recalls her visit to a Dominican padre, himself in extreme age, who told her that he had known a negress who lived to the age of one hundred and forty-three; he had confessed and buried her. "She had her teeth and her hair still."

"Not to market to-day, but breakfast early—then all hands to the cathedral to see the high mass performed—to-day in honor of the independence of the island....

"Baez' face, cunning, pretty strong, enjoué, as if he must be, or seem, a bon enfant.... The noise at the elevation of the Host a perfect Babel. Music, 'Ernani,' 'Fra Diavolo,' with some similar things. A single trumpet shrieked at some high moments. The bells rang like a thousand tin pans. Orchestra and chorus not together and both out of tune. The ceremony otherwise perhaps as well as usual. A priest made a brief address in Spanish, praising the day and complimenting the President...."

"Studied Baur, Aristophanes, and 'Etudes sur la Bible.' Music lesson to Maud. O'Sullivan to dine.... Baez sent word that he would visit us between 5 and 6 P.M. We accordingly put things in the best order possible under the circumstances. Ung puo de tualetta for the ladies seemed proper. At dinner received Baez' card with a great dish of fine sapotes. Baez arrived. He speaks French quite tolerably, is affable, and has an intelligent face; in fact looks like a person of marked talent. We talked of things in the United States. He has made fourteen voyages to Europe.... I sang 'Una Barchetta' for him. He came with one servant, who stayed outside—no ceremony and no escort...."

After the beauty of the place—indeed possibly before it—she valued the opportunity that came to her of preaching. On the voyage to Santo Domingo she had learned of a shepherdless flock of colored Protestants, their minister dead, their "elder" disabled by lameness. Here was an opportunity not to be lost. She engaged to hold Sunday evening services in their church, a small wooden building with a mud floor and a mahogany pulpit. The "Reminiscences" describe these services; the tattered hymn-books whose leaves were turned mechanically while the congregation (few of whom could read) sang with a will the hymns they knew by heart; the humble, devout people with their attentive faces.

When Holy Week came, the congregation begged her to hold special services. They wished their young people to understand that these sacred days meant as much to them as to the surrounding Catholics. Accordingly she and her companion "dressed the little church with flowers. It looked charmingly. Flowers all along the railing [here follows in the Journal a pen-and-ink sketch], flowers in the pulpit over my head. Church was crowded. Many people outside and at the windows."

She always remembered with pleasure one feature of her Easter sermon, her attempt to describe Dante's vision of a great cross in the heavens, formed of star clusters, each cluster bearing the name of Christ. "The thought," she says, "that the mighty poet of the fourteenth century should have something to impart to these illiterate negroes was very dear to me."

One of the party has an undying impression of this Easter service: the shabby little chapel crowded with dark faces, and the preacher, standing touched by a ray of sunlight, speaking to that congregation of simple black people. In her notes she speaks of these services.

"A pastoral charge bringing me near to the hearts and sympathies of the people. I have preached five times in the little church, including Good Friday and Easter Monday. This service, which has not been without its difficulties, is so much better to me in remembrance than anything else I have done here that I must make a little break and pause before I speak of other things.

"In this pause I remember my prayer at Puerto Plata, that I and mine might come to this new region with a reverent and teachable spirit. That prayer was an earnest one to me. I hope it has, as all prayers should, accomplished its own fulfilment. I have been here among dear people. I find all the human varieties in this society, not digested and harmonized by noble culture, but existing and asking for the centralizing and discriminating agencies which in civilization sort out the different tastes, characters, and capacities, and assign to each its task, giving devotion its wings and crime its treadmill. This little population in a great country, a country in which Nature allows no one to starve, has lived and so shown its right to live and maintain itself. It has accomplished its political division from a state antipathetic to it, having its dark face turned fixedly towards barbarism [Hayti].

"I stood in a little church in the city and island of Santo Domingo, to preach the glad tidings of the gospel of Peace. It was a humble little temple, with a mud floor, and plastered walls, and a roof which scarcely kept out the rain, but it was a place full of comfort to me and to others. The seats and spaces were all filled, for it had no aisles. The small windows and doors were cushioned, so to speak, with human countenances, wearing an expression of curiosity or attention. The way to the church was lined on both sides with the simple people, who held their service at night because the poverty of their attire made them ashamed to hold it by day. And this crowd came together, Sunday after Sunday, because a woman from a distant country stood in that little church to tell them what a woman can tell about the kingdom of heaven."

Loth as she had been to go to Santo Domingo, she was far more loth to leave it; but the time appointed for her peace crusade in London was at hand, and she could tarry no longer. On April 5 she writes:—

"Ah! my time is nearly out. Dear Santo Domingo, how I do love you, with your childish life, and your ancestral streets—a grandam and a babe! To-day I read my last in Baur and Greek for some time, probably, as must pack to-morrow. As at present advised, God grant that we may come here again."

"April 6. Here to-day and gone to-morrow, literally. Mostly packed—have left out my books for a last sweet morsel.... Did not get that sweet morsel. Was busy all day—farewell calls from friends, little talks, and the fear of sitting down and forgetting my preparations in my books. In the evening the Gautiers came and I played for them to dance. So, one last little gayety in common."

"Sunday, April 7. Got up at 4 A.M. Dressed and got off pretty easily.... The parting from Maud was very hard. Oh! when the line was drawn in, and my darling and I were fairly sundered, my old heart gave way, and I cried bitterly....

"Henry Blackwell is a dear, comforting man, most kind and companionable. A woman on board with a wretched baby of six months, he in a muslin gown and nothing else, crying with cold. I got out a cotton flannel dressing-sack, and wrapped him up in it and tended him a good deal....

"May the purpose for which I undertake this painful and solitary journey be ever strong enough in my thoughts to render every step of it pure, blameless and worthy. Great God, do not let me desert thee! For that is the trouble. Thou dost not desert us. I dread unspeakably these dark days of suffering and confusion. To go is like being hanged...."

"Captain said something about my preaching on Sunday, so I have been laying out some points for a sermon.... But it is not very likely that the Captain will really ask me to hold service.

"Talk with purser about Homer. He has a vivacious mind, and might easily learn Greek, or anything else he would have a mind to."

"Sunday. It turned out that the Captain and passengers did wish me to hold a little service to-day, so at 10.30 A.M. I met them in the dining-saloon. I had a Bible, from which I read the 116th Psalm—a prayer followed—then the missionary hymn, 'From Greenland's icy mountains'—then my little sermon, of which I have the headings. I am so very glad to have been able and enabled to do this.

"Began to teach the purser to read from notes with a leaf of music out of some periodical. Copied Baur a little—talked and heard much talk."

"April 17.... Expect to get in to-morrow, not very late, unless another contrary gale. Frigate birds and petrels yesterday—to-day, whales, blackfish, and an immense number of porpoises. Revelation cannot go beyond human consciousness.

"The Western mind has taken Christ's metaphorical illustrations literally, and his literal moral precepts metaphorically."

"April 18.... Very thankful to have got through so well so far."

As at the beginning of this chapter we took a step backward, so we must now take one forward and speak briefly of the second visit to Santo Domingo in 1874.

The Doctor's health was failing; he had suffered from the winter's cold, and longed for the warm sunshine of the beloved island. Would she go with him? he asked. She should preach to her colored folks as much as she liked.

They sailed together in the Tybee in March. After a brief visit to the capital (where Revolution had been before them, expelling the friendly Baez, and putting in his place a man opposed to the Samana Bay Company), they took up their quarters at Samana, in a little hillside cottage about a mile from the town.

Our mother writes in her Journal:—

"March 20. In Santo Domingo as glad as a child.... Went to Garcia's and foolishly bargained for the gold necklace and emerald ring I fancied the last time I was here. The necklace is for Maud."

The love of jewelry was one of the "little passions" of her whole life. Speaking once of this as her "besetting sin," she said: "It is rather respectable to have a besetting sin, as it shows one must have had an ancestor from whom it was inherited!" She enjoyed a jewel as she did a flower or a song: she loved to deck her dear ones and herself with trinkets; a jeweller's window was a thing of delight to her, not to be passed without the tribute of a pause and a glance at its treasures. Yet a purchase of this kind seldom failed to bring its retributive pang the day after.