text:
Page:Avon Fantasy Reader 10.djvu/96

 than before—and that's like gravitation is anyway: inertia and acceleration. But we are talking about translation. The position of everything in the universe must be referred to some sort of coordinates. Suppose we change the angle or direction of the coordinates: then you have 'gone somewhere' and yet you haven't moved, nor has anything else moved."

I looked at him, holding my head in my hands.

"I couldn't swear that I understand that," I said slowly. "And I repeat, that it looks like lifting yourself by your own bootstraps."

The homely simile did not dismay him. He pointed a finger at me as he spoke:

"You've seen a chip of wood bobbing on the ripples of a pond. Now you think the chip is moving; now the water. Yet neither is moving; the only motion is of an abstract thing called a wave.

"You've seen those 'illusion' diagrams, for instance this one of a group of cubes. Make up your mind that you are looking down upon their upper surfaces, and indeed they seem below you. Now change your mind, and imagine that you are down below, looking up. Behold, you see their lower surfaces; you are indeed below them. You have 'gone somewhere,' yet there has been no translation of anything. You have merely changed coordinates."

"Which do you think will drive me insane more quickly—if you show me what you mean, or if you keep on talking without showing me?"

"I'll try to show you. There are some types of mind, you know, that cannot grasp the idea of relativity. It isn't the mathematics involved that matters; it's just the inability of some types of mental organization to grasp the fact that the mind of the observer endows his environment with certain properties which have no absolute existence. Thus, when you walk through the garden at night the moon floats from one tree top to another. Is your mind good enough to invert this: make the moon stand still and let the trees move backwards. Can you do that? If so, you can 'go somewhere' into another dimension."

Woleshensky rose and walked to the window. His office was an appropriate setting for such a modern discussion as was ours; situated in a new, ultra-modern building on the University campus, the varnish glossy, the walls clean, the books neatly arranged behind clean glass, the desk in most orderly array; the office was just as precise and modern and wonderful as the mind of its occupant.

"When do you want to go?" he asked.

"Now!"

"Then, I have two more things to explain to you. The fourth dimension is just as much here as anywhere else. Right here around you and me things exist and go forward in the fourth dimension: but we do not see them and are not conscious of them, because we are confined to our own three. Secondly: if we name the four coordinates as Einstein does, x, y, z, and t, then we exist in x, y, and z, and move freely about in them; but are powerless to move in t. Why? Because t is the time dimension; and the time dimension

title: Page:Avon Fantasy Reader 10.djvu/96


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/132

 124 on the scene, dressed up in women's dresses, and with straw masks completely covering their heads, in order to dance at the wedding. A gang consists of twelve men; the captain of the gang asks the bride to dance with him. It is thought to bring bad luck if anyone recognises the "straw-boys", as they are called. In a letter dated "Belmullet, Sept. 28, 1892", Mr. Green writes: "At a wedding our fish-curers were at the other day, several gangs of straw-boys turned up in succession. They drank very little, but the dancing went on till 6 A.M."

I immediately wrote to Mr. Green, asking whether it was possible to procure a photograph of a dance or of the men dressed up. Unfortunately this was impossible, but I do not despair of obtaining one in the future. However, Mr. Green was good enough to bring me a mask. For the present I propose to deposit it in the Pitt-Rivers Museum at Oxford.

This mask, which is entirely made of straw, is conical in shape, and surmounted by three rings of straw. It is oval in section, and the mask has a slight cant or rake. The mask is 21 inches in total height, and the extreme length in section is 11½ inches; the interior dimensions of the opening are about 10¼ X 5½ inches. Mr. Green adds, "the captain's mask or cap is adorned with colours, the others are plain."

.

Drinking the Moon.— Mrs. Meer Hasan Ali, in her work on the Manners and Customs of the Mussulmnans of India describes a curious practice which seems to have escaped notice by European writers on Moon-lore: "A silver basin, being filled with water, is held in such a situation that the full moon may be reflected in it. The person to be benefited by the draught is required to look steadfastly on the moon in the basin, then shut his eyes and quaff the liquid at a draught. This remedy is advised by medical professors in nervous cases, and also for palpitation of the heart." (Vol. i, 275.)

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


text: Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 3, 1892.djvu/6


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 3, 1892.djvu/7

 CONTENTS.

I.—( 1892.)

Opening Address to the Folk-Lore Society for the Session 1891-92. - 1 The Lai of Eliduc and the Märchen of Little Snow-White. - 26 Magic Songs of the Finns, IV. Hon. - 49 Guardian Spirits of Wells and Lochs. Rev. 67 Manx Folk-lore and Superstitions, II. Prof - 74 Discussion - 88 Folk-lore Tales of Central Africa. Rev. - 92 Report on Folk-tale Research, 1890-91. - - - - - - III Folk-Lore Society. Fourteenth Annual Report of the Council 130

II.—( 1892.) The Sin-Eater. - 145 Samoan Tales, II. Hon.  - 158 German Christmas and the Christmas-Tree. Dr.  - 166 The Baker of Beauly: a Highland version of the Tale of the “Three Precepts”. and 183 Divination among the Malagasy, together with Native Ideas as to Fate and Destiny. Rev. - 193 The Pied Piper of Hamelin. Mrs. - 227 “First Foot” in the British Isles. Prof and  - 253 Folk-Lore Society. Proceedings at Evening Meetings - 272

III.—( 1892.) Queries as to Dr. Tylor’s Views on Animism ..... 289 An Analysis of Certain Finnish Myths of Origin. Hon. ..... 308 Bantu Customs and Legends. Rev. - 337 Importance du Folk-lore pour les Études de l’Ancien Français. - 360


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 3, 1892.djvu/8

iv Folk-lore Miscellanea. Prof. - 375 Celtic Myth and Saga. Report upon the Progress of Research during the past two years. - 387

IV.—( 1892.)

The Easter Hare. - 441 The Bodleian Dinnshenchas. Edited and translated by 467 Index to Places - 516 Balochi Tales, I. 517 Recent Greek Archæology in its relation to Folk-lore. - 529 Title-page and Contents for Vol. III.

- 139, 270, 433, 554

 * Paul's Grundriss. - 425

Chained Images, Miss - 137 The Widow's Son; and Greek Folk-lore, Miss 265 Ethnologists and Anthropologists, - 267 Branchos, - 267 The Buck's Leap, Miss - 427 The Flat-foot Question, - 429 Chained Images, - 546 Mr. Hartland's "Sin-Eater", and Primitive Sacraments, Miss - 546 Christmas Mummers, 550 Folk-Songs and Music, Miss - 551 Errata in the September Number - 553

Churn Charm, and Sympathetic Bees, - 138 Exorcism in Wales, - 274 The Three Precepts: a Norse Variant, - 556 Folk-lore from South-East Suffolk, Lady 558 Folk-lore Bibliography - 141, 278, 435, 561

 * Articles—Bibliography - 569


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 1, 1890.djvu/6

iv


text: Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 1, 1890.djvu/5


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/442

T is the merit of every considerable body of facts, arranged methodically, to further the cause of study, not only by stimulating fresh research, but by crystallising theory as to the explanation of the facts. Such crystallisation is indispensable to that searching criticism of theory the outcome of which is a closer approximation to truth. That Miss Cox’s Cinderella has this merit few will deny who have read Mr. Newell’s brief but pregnant review (Journal of American Folk-Lore, No. XXI), and Mr. Jacobs’ article in the September number of. Both scholars have, it seems to me, put their theory, I will not say into a more definite form than heretofore, but into one more definitely correlated with particular facts, and thereby more susceptible of profitable discussion. Whilst differing from each other in important respects, both scholars are agreed as to the correct solution of certain elements in the folk-tale problem. Their utterances may therefore be considered together with advantage, although I would premise that, owing to the differences I have just spoken of, points scored against the one are by no means necessarily scored against both.

I assume that Mr. Newell’s views, fully set forth in his “Lady Featherflight” in the Transactions of the Second International Folk-Congress, are familiar to my hearers. He regards the folk-tale as originating from the more intellectual and artistic minds of the race, after it has already attained a, relatively, high level of intellectual and


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/443

 Rh artistic culture, and as percolating downwards both among the ruder, less advanced members of the particular section of the race to which its originators belonged, and among such ruder and less advanced sections of the race generally as may come into culture contact with the centre of origination. In the course of this process, the tale, which in its first shape may be comparatively free from what we call archaic features, acquires them, and it is this acquisition by degradation that gives them a false look of primitiveness to the eye of the modern folk-lorist.

Mr. Jacobs has certainly not formulated his views in an equally uncompromising way, but I think I am not doing him an injustice in saying that he shares with Mr. Newell the belief in a comparatively late origin of the bulk of our folk-tales, in a definite centre of origin for each tale, and in an absolutely late period of dispersion for a very considerable proportion of tales. Moreover, for him India is certainly the centre of origin in a large number of cases, and the period of dispersion is that during which India has been in culture contact with Europe. Such contact has been intermittent, and successive phases of contact have introduced successive strata of folk-literature from India into Europe, or, at all events as far as the later phases are concerned, from Europe into India.

It is worth while pausing a moment to ask why these particular explanations of an exceedingly complex group of facts should have commended themselves to these two scholars, neither of whom would deny that alternative explanations have much in their favour. In the case of Mr. Newell I cannot doubt that he has been influenced by his work on games, on the merit of which it would be superfluous to enlarge. In a large number of cases the origin of children's games has been successfully sought for in the imitation of rites and customs of grown-up people, rites and customs which may often have completely died out save in the survival due to the imitative propensity of the child. Substitute "folk" for "child", and generalise


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/445

 Rh inclined to look upon the Catskin form as the eldest, and to hold that it originated in the thirteenth or fourteenth century somewhere in Central Europe, whence it has spread over the world. Here I note at once a tacit admission. The earliest recorded version goes back to the early sixteenth century, yet the origin is dated back to the fourteenth or thirteenth century. So that during a period of two or three centuries it must have been current orally. To this I have of course no objection, but how does it fit in with Mr. Newell's theory? According to him, the story is a definite combination of incidents due to a definite thirteenth or fourteenth century minstrel. But there is absolutely no traceable literary connection between this unknown minstrel and the sixteenth century Straparola or Bonaventure. His tale must therefore have gone at once into the popular story-store, and there remained buried until it was dug forth again in the sixteenth century. Yet if this is admitted, who does not see that the attribution to the thirteenth or fourteenth century rests upon no certain foundation, and that we might substitute fifth or fifteenth without either strengthening or invalidating the argument? The point to note is that Mr. Newell is forced to postulate a lengthened period of purely oral transmission, the determination of that period being purely arbitrary, and that he deprives himself of any, to him, secure foothold for working back to the original form of the story; for who can tell what modification it may not have undergone during its two hundred years of oral life?

Mr. Jacobs' conclusions are in general agreement with those of Mr. Newell. He detects a "feudal character underlying the whole conception" (of the Cinderella story), which would fall in with Mr. Newell's dates. Is this "feudal" character due to the fact that the hero is a king's son, and that he has apparently unlimited rights in the way of throwing the handkerchief? But, centuries before feudalism. Psyche was the daughter of a king and queen who lived once upon a time, and we have the testimony of


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/444

436 from games to folk-lore (or rather folk-literature) at large, and one approximates to Mr. Newell's theory. But a more potent factor with Mr. Newell, as certainly it is the most potent factor with Mr. Jacobs, is what may be termed, in no invidious sense, the "literary-historical idol". In dealing with the history of individualistic, consciously artistic literature we attach, and rightly, extreme importance to questions of date. In the case of two writers dealing with the same theme, dependence of the later upon the earlier writer is the obvious explanation of any similarity. The same principle is applied to folk-literature; the date of appearance of a folk-theme is treated as its date of origin, the earliest recorded version is, half unconsciously, regarded as being in some way the fount of later versions. That I am not overstating the case is, I think, evident from an admission of Mr. Newell's. In speaking of the Cinderella story he says: "The separate incidents are, of course, of indefinite antiquity." But if this be so, why must the combination be regarded as modern? Simply because, as a matter of fact, it is not recorded as a whole until modern times, and the literary student is not willing to go behind his chronological data. For there is obviously no reason in the nature of things why a story first recorded in modern times, and presenting a mixture of modern and archaic elements, should not have acquired its modern features in the course of the ages. The prejudice of the literary student in favour of the simultaneity of origin and record causes him to reject this, the natural explanation, and leads him to look upon the archaic as the extraneous element. So, too, with regard to the "Indian" hypothesis. No one will deny that, whatever reasons it may rest upon now, it was at first due to observation of the prior publication, so to say, of Indian tale collections, and was in fact nothing but a gigantic exemplification of the principle post hoc ergo propter hoc.

Bearing all these facts in mind, let us see how the two scholars approach the Cinderella problem. Mr. Newell is


text:
Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 60.djvu/207

 Wellesley  of national defence before the Russell cabinet. Sir John Fox Burgoyne [q. v.] had furnished him with a memorandum, and sent a copy of it to Wellington. This drew from the duke his letter of 9 Jan. 1847, which, much to his annoyance, was published in the 'Morning Chronicle' of 4 Jan. 1848 (, Life of Burgogne, i. 433-51). In spite of Cobden's suggestion that the duke was in his dotage (Cobden's Speeches, i. 458), the letter made a deep impression, and its main recommendation, organisation of the militia, was proposed to parliament in February, though not carried till 1852.

As commander-in-chief, as in other positions, Wellington was averse from change. He held that the British army must always be recruited from 'the scum of the earth,' and that corporal punishment was indispensable for it (Despatches, 22 April 1829, &c.;, p. 18). He regarded old soldiers as the 'heart and soul' of a regiment, and was against passing them into an army reserve (Speeches, ii. 274;, ii. 438). He was not a friend to military education; the public school and the regiment were the best training for officers. Improvements in weapons did not meet with ready acceptance from him, yet it was in his time and with his approval that the Minié rifled musket was introduced (, iv, 102-8). He was very desirous that Prince Albert should succeed him in the command of the army, in order that it might 'remain in the hands of the sovereign and not fall into those of the House of Commons,' but he admitted the force of the prince's reasons against it. The queen remarked at this time (6 April 1850), 'How powerful and how clear the mind of this wonderful man is, and how honest and how loyal and kind he is to us both' (, ii. 252-63).

When London was threatened by the chartists on 10 April 1848 he personally planned the measures for protecting it and saw to their execution. His consultation with the cabinet was described by Macaulay as the most interesting spectacle he had ever witnessed (, p. 297). He gave much attention to Indian affairs. He was opposed from the first to Lord Auckland's policy in Afghanistan, but, as it could not be stopped in time, he would not have it attacked as a party question (, ii. ii. 100). He laughed privately at Lord Ellenborough's proclamations (ib. p. 138), but he gave him strong support and blamed, his recall (Speeches, 20 Feb. 1843, &c.;, ii. 593, &c.) After Chillianwallah he said to Sir Charles Napier, 'Either you must go out or I must;' but when Napier quarrelled with Lord Dalhousie and resigned, Wellington's opinion was against him (, iv. 117; Memo, of 30 July 1850).

He was elected master of the Trinity House on 22 May 1837, having become an elder brother on 9 May 1829; and was made ranger of Hyde Park and St. James's Park on 31 Aug. 1850. His many functions were no sinecures to him, and outside of them he had a large correspondence. 'He was profuse, but careless and indiscriminating in his charities, and consequently he was continually imposed upon,' says the brother of his private secretary (. iii. 478). It was his habit to open and answer all letters himself, though sometimes this became impossible. An instance is to be found in the 'Letters of Wellington to Miss J.,' published in 1890. A stranger to him, but a religious enthusiast bent on his conversion, this young lady wrote to him in 1834 and interested him. They seldom met, but the correspondence was carried on actively, especially on her side, till 1851, when her pertinacity and self-assertion at length exhausted his forbearance (cf. Notes and Queries, 7th ser. ix. 217;, p. 104). He had other and closer intimacies with ladies, which caused reports that he meant to marry again (. iii. 97, 476); but he once said emphatically, 'no woman ever loved me; never in my whole life' (, p. 97). In 1850 he stood godfather to the third of the queen's sons, and he was painted in 1851 in the wellknown group by Winterhalter with his godson, the queen, and Prince Albert, and the exhibition building in the background.

He was a frequent visitor to the Great Exhibition of 1851, and Cobden noted with vexation that when he entered 'all other objects of interest sank to insignificance.' He was in his usual health till September 1852, and on the 13th he drove over to Dover from Walmer. He returned to dinner two hours later than usual, was very hungry, and ate hastily and heartily. He had a fit in the night, and in the course of the 14th he gradually sank, and died in the afternoon (, pp. 354-7). Palmerston, who so often differed from him, wrote: 'Old as he was, and both bodily and mentally enfeebled by age, he still is a great loss to the country. His name was a tower of strength abroad, and his opinions and counsel were valuable at home. No man ever lived or died in the possession of more unanimous love, respect, and esteem from his countrymen ' (, ii. 250). But the finest tribute, and the best picture of him, is Tennyson's ode on his death.


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/446

438 Irish and Scandinavian sagas quite unaffected by feudalism properly so called, that the chiefs son was of as much interest to the maidens of his day as he would be in the Middle Ages or at the present time. Indeed, it might rather be argued that the mediaeval story-teller would insist upon good blood in his heroine—beautiful, of course, she must needs be, or she were not a heroine at all, but in addition she must also turn out to be a king's daughter, or else she were no mate for a king's son. So that internal evidence seems to me rather against than in favour of the "feudal" origin of the story, if "feudal" is used to design a definite historical period characterised by definite political and social institutions. Again, in his comment on the "Tattercoats" variant, Mr. Jacobs says: "It is an instance of the folk-novel pure and simple, without any admixture of those unnatural incidents which transform the folk-novel into the serious folk-tale as we are accustomed to have it. Which is the prior, folk-novel or tale, it would be hard to say." Mr. Newell would probably disavow the dubitative turn of the last sentence, and would unhesitatingly assert the priority of the folk-novel "transformed by the admixture of unnatural incidents" into the fairy tale we all know.

Here we are brought face to face with the real crux of the märchen or "serious folk-tale", namely, the presence of "unnatural incidents". How skilfully does Mr. Jacobs suggest that this element is extraneous by his use of the word "admixture"! Yet that is the very point that has to be decided, and the word is a wholly question-begging one. How then is the crux dealt with? It need hardly be said that in Cinderella, almost more than in any other folk-tale, it is indeed the crux. For in the Cinderella group we find animal parentage, animal help, speaking animals, resuscitation from bones, magic dresses, transformation, mutilation, all of which are certainly "unnatural" incidents, if by unnatural is meant out of accord with the observed facts of life.


text:
Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 60.djvu/208

 Wellesley He was buried with unexampled magnificence at St. Paul's on 18 Nov. After lying in state at Walmer, the body was brought to Chelsea Hospital on the night of the 10th, and lay in state there till the 17th. On that night it was taken to the Horse Guards, and next morning the funeral procession passed by Constitution Hill, Piccadilly, and the Strand to St. Paul's, in the presence, as was estimated, of a million and a half of people (supplement to London Gazette of 3 Dec. 1852; cf. Ann. Regist. 1852, pp. 482-96). Out of 80,000l. voted, there remained 20,000l. for a monument, of which nearly one-third was spent in the choice of an artist. The commission was given to Alfred Stevens [q. v.] in 1858, and the work was worthy of the man and the place; but it was not till forty years after the duke's death that it was erected in St. Paul's Cathedral in the position for which it was designed, in one of the arches on the north side of the nave.

A colossal statue on horseback by Matthew Cotes Wyatt [q. v.] had been placed on the top of an archway opposite Apsley House in 1846. Universally condemned, it would have been removed at once but for Wellington's own objection (, ii. 328, iii. 120-8). It was taken down in January 1883, and transferred to Aldershot, being replaced by a smaller statue on horseback by Sir Joseph Edgar Boehm in 1888. Equestrian statues were also erected near the Royal Exchange (by Chantrey) in 1844, at Glasgow (by Marochetti) in the same year, and at Edinburgh (by Hall) in 1852. In the Phoenix Park, Dublin, an obelisk (by Smirke) had been put up in 1821. A pillar was also erected near Wellington, Somerset, and a statue (by Marochetti) near Strathfieldsaye. The statue of Achilles in Hyde Park (by Westmacott) was a memorial to Wellington and his army by the ladies of England in 1822, the metal being furnished by guns taken from the French. In the same year the Wellington shield (by Stothard), suggested by Flaxman's shield of Achilles, was presented to the duke by merchants and bankers of London. The national memorial to him, for which 100,000l. was subscribed, took the form of a college near Sandhurst for the education of sons of officers. The first stone of Wellington College was laid by the queen on 2 June 1856, and it was opened by her majesty on 29 Jan. 1859. At the instance of Edward Gibbon Wakefield the capital city of the new colony of New Zealand was named after the Duke (28 Nov. 1840). The mountain in Tasmania at the foot of which the town of Hobart stands was likewise called after him.

Among the many portraits of Wellington the best is a half-length by Sir Thomas Lawrence, engraved by Samuel Cousins in 1828. There are earlier ones by John Hoppner, representing him as a lieutenant-colonel, and on his return from India; and there is an admirable profile picture of him in 1845 by Count d'Orsay, which is in the National Portrait Gallery; one replica of this is in White's Club, of which Wellington was elected a member in 1812. A portrait by Wilkie is in Merchant Taylors' Hall, and a full-length by Pickersgill was painted for Lord Hill. He was painted by Franz Winterhalter for the queen, in company with Peel. He is the central figure in a large number of subject-pictures, e.g. his meeting with Nelson, by J. P. Knight; the storming of Badajoz, by Caton Woodville; the entry into Madrid, by W. Hilton; the battle of the Nivelle, by T. Heaphy (which gives portraits of most of the Peninsular generals, taken on the spot); the meeting of Wellington and Blücher, by T. J. Barker; the fresco on the same subject, by D. Maclise, in the Houses of Parliament; the Waterloo banquet, by W. Salter; 'A Dialogue at Waterloo,' by Sir Edwin Landseer (in the National Gallery); and the last return from duty, by C. W. Glass.

While he was on Lord Westmorland's staff at Dublin (1790-3) Wellington formed an engagement with Catherine Sarah Dorothea, third daughter of Edward Michael Pakenham, second baron Longford, by Catherine, daughter of the Right Hon. Hercules Langford Rowley. Her family was opposed to their marriage at that time, and while he was in India Miss Pakenham had small pox, and wrote to release him from his engagement. He declined to be released, and on 10 April 1806 they were married at St. George's, Dublin. They were not congenial, and, though there was no formal separation, they lived a good deal apart (, iv. 86). She died on 24 April 1831, and was buried at Strathfieldsaye. They had two sons—Arthur Richard, second duke of Wellington (b. 3 Feb. 1807, d. 13 Aug. 1884), and General Charles Wellesley (b. 16 Jan. 1808, d. 9 Oct. 1858), father of the present and third duke.

Wellington was five feet nine inches in height, spare and muscular, with aquiline features and penetrating grey eyes. He is described in February 1814 as 'remarkably neat, and most particular in his dress, considering his situation. He is well made, knows it, and is willing to set off to the best what nature has bestowed' (, ii. 162). 'He had the most elastic and springy, yet firm and resolute step that I had ever seen in a


text:
Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/45

Rh he was a most excellent man, a great shot, and possessed of extraordinary learning aye,—far beyond my comprehension. A few days after this first interview with the family the Perkiomen chanced to be bound with ice, and many a one from the neighborhood was playing pranks on the glassy surface of that lovely stream. Being somewhat of a skater myself, I sent a note to the inhabitants of Fatland Ford, inviting them to come and partake of the simple hospitality of Mill Grove farm, and the invitation was kindly received and accepted. My own landlady bestirred herself to the utmost in the procuring of as many pheasants and partridges as her group of sons could entrap, and now under my own roof was seen the whole of the Bakewell family, seated round the table which has never ceased to be one of simplicity and hospitality.

After dinner we all repaired to the ice on the creek, and there in comfortable sledges, each fair one was propelled by an ardent skater. Tales of love may be extremely stupid to the majority, so that I will not expatiate on these days, but to me, my dear sons, and under such circumstances as then, and, thank God, now exist, every moment was to me one of delight.

But let me interrupt my tale to tell you somewhat of other companions whom I have heretofore neglected to mention. These are two Frenchmen, by name Da Costa and Colmesnil. A lead mine had been discovered by my tenant, William Thomas, to which, besides the raising of fowls, I paid considerable attention; but I knew nothing of mineralogy or mining, and my father, to whom I communicated the discovery of the mine, sent Mr. Da Costa as a partner and partial guardian from France. This fellow was intended to teach me mineralogy and mining engineering, but, in fact, knew nothing of either; besides which he was a covetous wretch, who did all he could to ruin my father, and indeed swindled both of us to a large amount. I had to go to France and expose him to my father to get rid of him, which I fortunately accomplished at first sight of my kind parent. A greater scoundrel than Da Costa never probably existed, but peace be with his soul.

The other, Colmesnil, was a very interesting young Frenchman

title: Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/45


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/447

 Rh Mr. Newell has no doubt upon the subject: "Archaic additions", says he, "are always made by savage races to tales which they have received from civilised peoples." Whence we may conclude that the "unnatural" incidents I have just cited are additions made by the "savage" folk of Central Europe to the tale of the "civilised" thirteenth or fourteenth century minstrel. Nay, we can determine the date of this "admixture" yet more closely; for, as I have shown, Mr. Newell's view postulates the oral transmission of the proto-Catskin (the earliest form of the whole group, according to him) during a period of some 200 years. And during this period the admixture cannot have taken place, for the tale as we find it in Bonaventure and Straparola is singularly free from "archaic" incidents. Nor will it be denied that the "fairy godmother" of Perrault is less archaic than the mother transformed after death into an animal of countless modern versions. Ergo, in Perrault's time the full archaisation of the tale had not taken place, and this must be ascribed to the West European savages of the last two centuries.

I had almost added the Euclidean "which is absurd". Yet the conclusion flows logically from Mr. Newell's premises. For him Cinderella starts with a Catskin story of the thirteenth or fourteenth century; for him archaism is no test of age, savage races receiving their tales from civilised peoples and spicing them with archaic traits; for him Cinderella, as a whole, is a purely European creation, the few non-European variants being due to quite recent transmission. What explanation remains, then, save that the "unnatural" incidents have been foisted in during the century of reason and enlightenment which lies between Perrault and the Grimms?

Mr. Jacobs has thought the matter out more warily. He refuses assent to Mr. Newell's postulate of the priority of Catskin over all other forms of the Cinderella, justly observing that the appearance of Catskin in Straparola 100 years earlier than the first recorded true Cinderella in


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/448

 440 Basile is a "somewhat insufficent basis for such a conclusion". For a moment he hesitates, but only for a moment. "It remains to be proved", says he, "that the introductory part of the story with the helpful animal was necessarily part of the original." Heretical doctrine this from an adherent of the principle that a tale is a definite combination of incidents; but let that pass. He then goes on: "The possibility of the introduction of an archaic formula which had become a convention of folk-telling cannot be left out of account."

It is amazing that a scholar of Mr. Jacobs' acuteness should not see that this argument from convention not only gives away his own case but practically establishes that of his opponents. What is a convention? A form of incident or wording accepted as appropriate in a given situation owing to long use in similar situations. It must be accepted as appropriate by both reciter and hearers, and acceptance is mainly determined by familiarity due to long use. The rapidity with which a new convention establishes itself depends chiefly upon the degree of advance and variation in a society. In a backward, conservative society such as that of the peasantry in many parts of modern Europe, conventions live long and die hard; as a matter of fact, the Gaelic story-teller of to-day, both in Ireland and Scotland, habitually uses conventions which we know to have been in force for over a thousand years. If, therefore, the archaic traits in Cinderella are really due to conventional analogy, the existence of a folk-literature of immemorial antiquity is thereby amply and irrefragably proved. You cannot have conventions without literature, whether written and conscious, or oral and unconscious. The theory to which Mr. Newell and Mr. Jacobs have, with varying degrees of confidence, pinned their faith may be stated as follows: Fairy tales are not really old, but are stuffed full of imitations of old fairy tales which have disappeared. One is reminded of the famous theory that Shakspeare's plays


text:
Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 60.djvu/209

 Wellesley man,' says John Doyle (H.B.) of him in 1822 (, p. 619). Hls activity and endurance, physical and mental, were extraordinary. His papers were marked, as Peel said, by 'comprehensiveness of views, simplicity, and clearness of expression and profound sagacity' (, ii. 535). De Quincey spoke of his 'Despatches' as 'a monument raised to his reputation which will co-exist with our language,' showing for the first time to his countrymen the 'quality of intellect which had been engaged in their service' (Postscript on the Duke of Wellington and the Opium Question). Cobbett might find flaws in his grammar, but to a larger-minded critic he has the gift of style, and 'is able to stamp both his speech and his bearing with the indefinable mark of greatness' (Birrell, Nineteenth Century, xxv. 224). He was not a good speaker; his articulation was indistinct, and his delivery, 'without being either fluent or rapid, was singularly emphatic and vehement' (, p. 127;, p. 141). This striving for emphasis made him prone to superlatives, both in speaking and writing, though no one could measure his words better when he chose.

His chief characteristics were manliness and public spirit. The former showed itself in his simplicity, straightforwardness, self-reliance, imperturbable nerve, and strength of will. He was lively, buoyant, and quick-tempered; but temper and feelings were under strict control. He was 'placable because occasions rise so often that demand such sacrifice,' but he sometimes forgot services as well as injuries. He regarded his friends as possible enemies, his enemies as possible friends (, v. 16). He had 'an active busy mind, always looking to the future,' and did not dwell long on losses (, i. 285). Not only his soldiers, but his principal officers and his political colleagues were in his eyes mere tools for the public service; and he won their confidence and admiration rather than their affection. He sought neither one nor the other; his aim was to do his duty, to 'satisfy himself (Desp. 22 July 1829). The name of 'the Iron Duke' is said to have been borrowed from a steamboat (, iv. 305), but it attached itself to him by its fitness. Yet there are many instances of his kindliness and generosity (e.g. to Alava, see, p. 241), and between him and Charles Arbuthnot there was the truest friendship (, iv. 150; . iii. 302). His self-esteem made him very slow to own himself in the wrong, or to admit any infirmity (, iii. 187, iv. 170). As a rule he took no notice of reports about him; but when John Adolphus instanced him as a gambler, he wrote to say that 'in the whole course of his life he had never won or lost 20l. at any game;' and in reply to a letter of good advice from Henry Phillpotts, bishop of Exeter, he assured him that he was not the irreligious libertine he was represented to be (Desp. 17 Sept. 1823, and 6 Jan. 1832).

As a general he has been variously estimated. French critics, following Napoleon's lead, dwell on his good luck. But Thiers admits that if he did not create opportunities, he seized upon those which fortune ottered him; and 'I propose to get into fortune's way' was a favourite phrase of his (ib. 10 Dec. 1812). As his motto ran, 'Virtutis fortuna comes.' With some inconsistency, the same critics lay stress on his extreme caution, and some English writers have associated his name with that of Fabius. How little justification there is for this has been shown by Napier (vi. 196; cf., iv. 265). He was much more akin to Hannibal than to Fabius. His caution came of his situation. By nature he was inclined to daring enterprises, 'to throw for victory at all hazards, with a coolness and self-possession that nothing could shake' (, p. 177). But with him, as with Moltke, it was 'erst wäg's, dann wag's.' 'Nul ne se rendit jamais un compte plus exact de la portée de ses enterprises, nul ne prépara et ne mérita mieux ses succés, nul ne les arracha plus opiniâtrement à l'aveugle fortune' (, v. 377). 'It may be conceded that the schemes of the French emperor were more comprehensive, his genius more dazzling, and his imagination more vivid than Wellington's. On the other hand, the latter excelled in that coolness of judgment which Napoleon himself described "as the foremost quality in a general"' (, p. 190).

[Wellington's published correspondence is in three series: Despatches, 1799-1815, including general orders (ed. Gurwood), 13 vols. 1834-9 (2nd ed in 8 vols. 1844-7); Supplementary Despatches, &c., 1794-1818 (ed. his son), 15 vols. 1858-72; Despatches, &c., 1819-32 (ed. his son), 8 vols. 1867-80. Selections from the first series were published in 1851, and from the Indian despatches in 1880. Many letters written during '.he last twenty years of his life are to be found in the Croker Papers; Sir Robert Peel's papers (ed. Parker); T. Raikes's correspondence with him; Lord Ellenborough's Indian Administration (ed. Lord


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/449

 Rh were not written by Shakespeare, but by another fellow of the same name.

Thus, accept the convention theory, and the main point in dispute between Mr. Newell and Mr. Jacobs on the one hand, and numerous folk-lorists, myself amongst them, on the other, is conceded in our favour: there has existed from of very old in Europe a body of folk-literature presenting archaic traits. But more follows. Mr. Jacobs' favourite grievance against the anthropologists is deprived of all point, though, strangely enough, he is blind to the fact. You use folk-tales, says he, as evidence of the social and intellectual condition of a race; error! the race may have borrowed its tales. But if the tales came to the borrowing race destitute of those traits upon which the anthropologist relies, and if these were so engrained in the mental and artistic equipment of the race that it could not refrain from introducing them into its borrowed literature, surely "the archaeological value of such traits is much enhanced"—no, says Mr. Jacobs, reduced—"by such considerations."

Is it possible, I ask, to go farther astray? Yet Mr. Jacobs' errements are almost inevitable consequences from his acceptance of a postulate not only false but unnecessary. And I am not without hopes that by setting forth the straits into which he is driven he may be induced to see that his starting-point is false. Let yourself be dominated by the idea that the folk-tale is a conscious creation, the origin of which is more or less contemporaneous with its first appearance in literature, and at every step you will be driven to such expedients as I have just discussed; accept, on the other hand, the theory that the folk-tale is merely a new combination of extremely familiar incidents of great antiquity, and that citation in literature, whilst of the highest value in enabling us to determine a terminus ad quem, is of absolutely no value whatever (if I could use stronger words I would) in determining a terminus a quo—questions of origin and diffusion assume a new aspect, and


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Thackwell, Joseph


text:
Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/46

20 with whom I became acquainted. He was very poor, and I invited him to come and reside under my roof. This he did, remaining for many months, much to my delight. His appearance was typical of what he was, a perfect gentleman; he was handsome in form, and possessed of talents far above my own. When introduced to your mother's family he was much thought of, and at one time he thought himself welcome to my Lucy; but it was only a dream, and when once undeceived by her whom I too loved, he told me he must part with me. This we did with mutual regret, and he returned to France, where, though I have lost sight of him, I believe he is still living. During the winter connected with this event your uncle Thomas Bakewell, now residing in Cincinnati, was one morning skating with me on the Perkiomen, when he challenged me to shoot at his hat as he tossed it in the air, which challenge I accepted with great pleasure. I was to pass by at full speed, within about twenty-five feet of where he stood, and to shoot only when he gave the word. Off I went like lightning, up and down, as if anxious to boast of my own prowess while on the glittering surface beneath my feet; coming, however, within the agreed distance the signal was given, the trigger pulled, off went the load, and down on the ice came the hat of my future brother-in-law, as completely perforated as if a sieve. He repented, alas! too late, and was afterward severely reprimanded by Mr. Bakewell. Another anecdote I must relate to you on paper, which I have probably too often repeated in words, concerning my skating in those early days of happiness; but, as the world knows nothing of it, I shall give it to you at some length. It was arranged one morning between your young uncle, myself, and several other friends of the same age, that we should proceed on a duck-shooting excursion up the creek, and, accordingly, off we went after an early breakfast. The ice was in capital order wherever no air-holes existed, but of these a great number interrupted our course, all of which were, however, avoided as we proceeded upward along the glittering, frozen bosom of the stream. The day was spent in much pleasure, and the game collected was not inconsiderable.

title: Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/46


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Thane, John


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/450

 442 such difficulties as beset Mr. Newell in his attempt to account for the development of the Cinderella group within the last 500 years, simply do not arise at all.

I confess that Mr. Jacobs' polemic against the anthropologists leaves me as cold as does much of Mr. Lang's polemic against the nature mythologists. It is so largely unnecessary. What is the utmost claim of the anthropologist? That a number of tales originate in a social and intellectual stage out of which our own race has emerged, and in which other races have remained. Had we only the evidence of nursery tales as to this stage, I could understand the pother, but their evidence is, at the best, subsidiary. We have so much more evidence, and evidence of such infinitely greater cogency, that I cannot understand why Mr. Jacobs who accepts that evidence, who is, in sociology, an evolutionist, should hesitate to accept evolution in folk-literature, should range himself on the side of the revelationist and "degradationist", if I may coin an ugly word for an irrational thing. Has man struggled upwards from savagery? If so, then most assuredly his tales have struggled upwards with him. If not, let us frankly confess we have all been wrong, and that Bryant and Mr. Casaubon are in the right.

The error, if I may venture to say so, lies in considering folk-literature apart from folk-lore at large, and folk-lore itself apart from the history of all the various phases of man's activity. I would fain for a moment glance at universal history from the sole standpoint of our studies. From the earliest date to which we can penetrate backwards in the story of our race down to the appearance of Christianity, we find man governed by certain religious and social conceptions, manifesting themselves in divers forms according to the varying genius of each race, but all animated by a common spirit. Parallels and similars to


text:
Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 33.djvu/114

 sixty horsemen armed with culverins, unhorsing five of them with his spear before it broke. He made his way back to the constable of France, his horse dropping down dead at the constable's feet. He was brought into the king's tent, and died of his wounds on 29 Aug., fifteen days afterwards (, Memoirs, pp. 25–6). His bravery and the manner of his death so impressed the French king that he used his influence with the queen-regent and the estates to obtain for the other confederates against Beaton the reversion of their lands.

Leslie was married to Isobel Lindsay, daughter of John, fourth lord Lindsay of the Byres, but left no issue.

LESLIE, THOMAS EDWARD CLIFFE (1827?–1882), political economist, second son of Edward Leslie, prebendary and treasurer of Dromore and rector of Annahilt, co. Down, a descendant of [q. v.] the nonjuror, was born in the county of Wexford about 1827. His mother was Margaret, daughter of the Rev. Thomas E. Higginson of Lisburne. He was at first educated by his father, and afterwards at King William's College in the Isle of Man, and at Trinity College, Dublin, where he took a classical scholarship in 1845, and graduated B.A. with a senior moderatorship and gold medal in ethics and logic in 1847. He proceeded LL.B. in 1851, and was afterwards created hon. LL.D. In 1853 he was elected to the chair of jurisprudence and political economy in Queen's College, Belfast. He had entered Lincoln's Inn on 12 Jan. 1848, and his professorial duties permitting of his residing for the greater part of each year in London, he qualified himself for the practice of the law, and was called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn in Easter term 1857. He was also called to the Irish bar, but never practised. He attended the lectures of Sir Henry Sumner Maine [q. v.], and studied the philosophy of Auguste Comte. Maine taught him the value in jurisprudence of the historical and comparative method, and he inferred the need of a similar treatment of economics. Comte taught him to regard economics as a fragment of the as yet inchoate science of sociology, though he never became a Comtist.

Leslie's first publication was a professorial lecture, delivered 14 Dec. 1855, on ‘The Military Systems of Europe economically considered,’ Belfast, 1856, 8vo. Soon afterwards he began to contribute to ‘Fraser's,’ ‘Macmillan's,’ and other magazines and reviews. In these early papers, most of which are reprinted in his ‘Essays on Political and Moral Philosophy,’ Dublin, 1879, 8vo (2nd edit., with some additions and omissions, entitled ‘Essays in Political Philosophy,’ 1888, 8vo), he appeals from the then dominant Ricardian school to Adam Smith, whom he represents as a far more philosophical thinker than any of his successors. An article on ‘The Distribution and Value of the Precious Metals in the Sixteenth and Nineteenth Centuries’ (Macmillan's Magazine, August 1864), in which he showed that the depreciation of the currency by the discovery of new mines in the two centuries under consideration had been far less general and uniform than had been commonly supposed, attracted the notice and secured him the friendship of J. S. Mill. Following the lead of W. T. Thornton, who had already attacked the generally received theory of wages in the ‘Fortnightly Review’ (May 1867), he published in ‘Fraser's Magazine’ for July 1868 an article on ‘Political Economy and the Rate of Wages,’ in which he not only demolished the ‘wages fund’ theory, but impugned with less success the doctrine that competition tends to equalise wages. Two autumn holidays (1868 and 1869) passed with Léonce de Lavergne at his country seat, Peyrusse in La Creuse, and some tours in Belgium, Westphalia, and other parts of the continent, furnished Leslie with materials for a series of articles on continental land tenures and methods of cultivation, which formed the basis of a volume of essays entitled ‘Land Systems and Industrial Economy of Ireland, England, and Continental Countries,’ published in 1870, London, 8vo. This work was highly praised by Mill in the ‘Fortnightly Review’ for June 1870. An article by him on ‘French Land Tenures’ appeared in ‘Essays on Land Tenures’ (Cobden Club, 1870). In an article in ‘Hermathena’ in 1876 ‘On the Philosophical Method of Political Economy’ he severely criticised the cardinal doctrines of the deductive economics, and ended by declaring the entire system to be ‘an idol of the tribe,’ owing its attractive simplicity and symmetry to its remoteness from actual fact. In 1878 he contributed an introduction to Mr. Marriott's translation of M. Emile de Laveleye's work on ‘Primitive Property,’ London, 8vo. Leslie died unmarried at Belfast on 27 Jan. 1882.

The fragmentary nature of Leslie's work is attributable partly to chronic ill-health, partly to a natural preponderance of the


text: Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/47

title: Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/47


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Thayre, Thomas


text: Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/48

title: Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/48


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Theakston, Joseph


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/451

 Rh these conceptions, manifestations of this common spirit, are furnished at the present day by races and classes wholly or partially unaffected by Christian civilisation. That the spirit was one, though the forms of its manifestation were diverse, explains the ease with which these acted and reacted upon each other. Grasp this point, and much discussion about the borrowed nature of Hellenic mythology, for instance, becomes meaningless. No psychological obstacle forbade the attribution to Zeus of that which elsewhere was attributed to Ammon Ra or to Bel; all three were resultants of man's fancy working from a common set of intellectual, moral, and artistic data. To assign mythology to any one race, to treat all other races as its debtors in this respect, is irrational. We can only note that each race puts its own impress upon the common hoard of mythic material.

The common spirit underlying and animating a number of closely related conceptions of the universe may be styled the antique, in contradistinction to the modern, which is partly the result of Christianity, partly the result of forces independent of Christianity. Prior to the establishment of Christianity the antique spirit had its strongest support in religious organisation. The State had already begun to discard it, to introduce new conceptions. For the antique theory of the world flourished best, as it still does, in small communities strongly individualised against other communities, but internally socialistic; whereas the tendency of the State is to fuse small communities into one, and, by freeing the individual from socialistic shackles, to increase his taxable value. This tendency, which in the ancient world culminated in the Roman Empire, received tremendous impetus from the establishment of Christianity. For the first time, so far as we know certainly, the might of religion was arrayed against the antique theory of things; the local sanctuary, the strongest bulwark of the small community against the centralising State, was menaced with destruction. The Church,


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Theed, William


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Thellusson, Peter


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/452

 444 indeed, outstripped the State, and for a time there was fierce antagonism, but with the acceptance of Christianity by the Empire the two dominating forces that shape the fate of mankind were again, after a divorce of centuries, animated by a common theory of Hfe. Then, however, the forces of the older world were reinforced, all at once and incalculably, by the barbarian invasions. Church and State had to compromise all along the line, to what extent as regards Christianity we can trace in saints' lives and local festivals, whilst decrees of councils, episcopal charges, penitentials, witness the bitterness of the struggle against paganism. As regards the Empire, the compromise resulted in feudalism, a state of society resembling in many and not unimportant respects that which had formerly obtained both among the barbarian conquerors of the Empire and among the ancestors of the Greeks and Romans: a state of society singularly favourable to the growth of heroic romance. As regards Christianity, there came into existence a common stock of legendary romance, the scope and framework of which were as rigidly determined by psychological considerations as had been those of the mythological romance of antiquity, and the diverse forms of which acted and reacted upon each as freely as had the diverse forms of pre-Christian mythology.

The compromise was, upon the whole, more permanently satisfying to the Church, which indeed contrived to embody under its sway an ideal singularly beautiful and achieved, than to the State; although the Reformation may be regarded as a step onwards in the strife of Christian and pre-Christian theories of life, so that Puritanism, the most logical exponent of the Reformation, became of necessity the deadly foe of folk-lore. But at the present day it is the modern State, with its centralised, uniformitarian system of education, that threatens with imminent destruction that older interpretation of the universe which more than any other partially fulfils the test of catholicity, for it has, so far as


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Thelwall, Eubule


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Thelwall, John


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Theobald (d.1161)


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/453

 Rh we can learn, been held of all peoples and from immemorial antiquity.

Correlate these broad groupings of historic fact with the record of literature. This, in its earliest forms, is wholly mythic and heroic; it has a common fund of personages and situations which are differentiated chiefly by association with the origin and fortunes of small, strongly individualised communities. The vital power of this literature had well-nigh faded away by the time Christianity established itself, though it lived on as a subject of literary or academic exercise. During the first seven or eight centuries of Christianity mythico-heroic literature disappears. The classic form died away owing to the divorce between the highest thought and fancy of dying paganism and the conceptions upon which the older literature was based; the barbaric forms could not attain to expression so long as the strife between the invaders and the Empire was engaging all the energies of both sides. They emerged as soon as the compromise in Church and State had finally been settled, and then proved to be essentially of the same character as the mythico-heroic literature of classic and oriental antiquity. Mingling with the scattered remnants of this latter that had survived the shocks of the invasion period, mingling with and influenced by Christian legendary romance, they formed the staple of the highest literary art so long as the feudal state of society lasted. With the waning of feudalism, with the advent of the modern State, mediaeval romance waned also, gradually deserted as it was by the best imaginative and creative thought and fancy of the race.

The agreement between the historic and the literary record is perfect down to a comparatively recent period. Then, apparently without originating cause, an immense mass of popular literature, mythic and heroic in its essence, clad in comparatively novel form, comes to light. This phenomenon it is that has led to the false theory I have endeavoured to combat; observed of late, it must, so it is


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Theobald, Lewis


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Theodore


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Therry, John Joseph


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/454

 446 held, be of recent origin, and that origin must be external, and, being of foreign introduction, the phenomenon cannot be correlated with intellectual and artistic conceptions to the existence of which on European soil we have unbroken testimony of 3,000 years' standing. So easily does an unnecessary postulate lead to circular reasoning.

That the postulate is unnecessary seems to me hardly to require demonstration. The explanation of the phenomenon is so simple. As long as the whole of literature was mythico-heroic in essence and spirit, the lower forms were inevitably disregarded. To the men who told of Apollo the Python Slayer, or of Sigurd Fafnerbane, a story such as Jack the Giant Killer must have seemed an inferior variant of what they possessed in perfect form. Not until the divorce between culture and traditional literature was complete could the folk-version of that literature stand a chance of recognition. And then it shared the attention bestowed for the first time upon folk-lore generally, because for the first time that lore, ceasing to be a living factor in the higher ethics and philosophy, became susceptible of disinterested scientific examination. But the apparent new birth of folk-literature was chiefly determined by a rebirth of artistic literature. The consideration of this point will, I trust, enable me to make my peace both with Mr. Newell and with Mr. Jacobs.

The antique theory of life, whether as a mere survival, or still in full force, manifests itself in three ways: in religion, politico-legal organisation, and literature. But whilst polity, whether spiritual or secular, having once discarded the antique conceptions, became actually hostile to them, it was otherwise with literature. For this aims at depicting man in the sum total of his activities and emotions, whilst religion and law aim at disciplining and modifying


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Therry, Roger


text:
Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/49

Rh On our return, in the early dusk of the evening, I was bid to lead the way; I fastened a white handkerchief to a stick, held it up, and we all proceeded toward home as a flock of wild ducks to their roosting-grounds. Many a mile had already been passed, and, as gayly as ever, we were skating swiftly along when darkness came on, and now our speed was increased. Unconsciously I happened to draw so very near a large air-hole that to check my headway became quite impossible, and down it I went, and soon felt the power of a most chilling bath. My senses must, for aught I know, have left me for a while; be this as it may, I must have glided with the stream some thirty or forty yards, when, as God would have it, up I popped at another airhole, and here I did, in some way or another, manage to crawl out. My companions, who in the gloom had seen my form so suddenly disappear, escaped the danger, and were around me when I emerged from the greatest peril I have ever encountered, not excepting my escape from being murdered on the prairie, or by the hands of that wretch S—— B——, of Henderson. I was helped to a shirt from one, a pair of dry breeches from another, and completely dressed anew in a few minutes, if in motley and ill-fitting garments; our line of march was continued, with, however, much more circumspection. Let the reader, whoever he may be, think as he may like on this singular and, in truth, most extraordinary escape from death; it is the truth, and as such I have written it down as a wonderful act of Providence. Mr. Da Costa, my tutor, took it into his head that my affection for your mother was rash and inconsiderate. He spoke triflingly of her and of her parents, and one day said to me that for a man of my rank and expectations to marry Lucy Bakewell was out of the question. If I laughed at him or not I cannot tell you, but of this I am certain, that my answers to his talks on this subject so exasperated him that he immediately afterward curtailed my usual income, made some arrangements to send me to India, and wrote to my father accordingly. Understanding from many of my friends that his plans were fixed, and finally hearing from Philadelphia, whither Da Costa had gone, that he had taken my passage from Philadelphia to Canton, I walked to Philadelphia,

title: Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/49


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Thesiger, Alfred Henry


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Thesiger, Frederick (d.1805)


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Thesiger, Frederick (1794-1878)


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/455

 Rh him. Literature then cannot disassociate itself from the past of the race: for the artist, what has been, is. Nay more; literature by its nature is bound to be, in the Miltonic phrase, simple, sensuous, and passionate, conditions fulfilled far more perfectly in the antique societies which gave birth to romance than in the present day. The greatest literature of the world has its roots in myth and romance, and these are the spring-heads at which modern literature drinks when it would fain renew its youth and strength.

Thus a survival in folk-literature cannot be treated in the same way as a survival in folk-belief or folk-custom. In the one case the communion between the folk-spirit and the higher culture has been broken, in the other it still exists, and were it to disappear, one might almost predict the disappearance of literature itself. This much I admit, but not that folk-literature must therefore be investigated by the same critical method as artistic conscious literature. Here I join issue with Mr. Newell and Mr. Jacobs, as well as with other scholars.

As regards Cinderella I am not without hopes that further discussion as to whether the tale has sprung fully equipped into existence during the last six centuries may be held unnecessary. But I may also illustrate the difference in point of view between Mr. Jacobs and myself by reference to a couple of stories included in his More English Fairy Tales. One is a version of the Pied Piper, located at Newport in the Isle of Wight, on the authority of Abraham Elder, who wrote in 1830. Mr. Jacobs would hold this to be a forged transfer, so to say, of the well-known Hameln legend. The utmost he admits is that a local disappearance of children legend may have suggested to Elder the idea of giving a new home to the Hamein story. I cannot agree, I am willing to admit that had the Hamein story never become famous, never worked its way through Howell and Verstegan into English literature, we should not have had the Newport version of the Pied Piper legend. But this, because Elder would not have


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Thew, Robert


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Theyer, John


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Thicknesse, Ann


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Thicknesse, George


text:
Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/50

 entered his room quite unexpectedly, and asked him for such an amount of money as would enable me at once to sail for France and there see my father.

The cunning wretch, for I cannot call him by any other name, smiled, and said: "Certainly, my dear sir," and afterward gave me a letter of credit on a Mr. Kauman, a half-agent, half-banker, then residing at New York. I returned to Mill Grove, made all preparatory plans for my departure, bid a sad adieu to my Lucy and her family, and walked to New York. But never mind the journey; it was winter, the country lay under a covering of snow, but withal I reached New York on the third day, late in the evening.

Once there, I made for the house of a Mrs. Palmer, a lady of excellent qualities, who received me with the utmost kindness, and later on the same evening I went to the house of your grand-uncle, Benjamin Bakewell, then a rich merchant of New York, managing the concerns of the house of Guelt, bankers, of London. I was the bearer of a letter from Mr. Bakewell, of Fatland Ford, to this brother of his, and there I was again most kindly received and housed.

The next day I called on Mr. Kauman; he read Da Costa's letter, smiled, and after a while told me he had nothing to give me, and in plain terms said that instead of a letter of credit, Da Costa—that rascal!—had written and advised him to have me arrested and shipped to Canton. The blood rose to my temples, and well it was that I had no weapon about me, for I feel even now quite assured that his heart must have received the result of my wrath. I left him half bewildered, half mad, and went to Mrs. Palmer, and spoke to her of my purpose of returning at once to Philadelphia and there certainly murdering Da Costa. Women have great power over me at any time, and perhaps under all circumstances. Mrs. Palmer quieted me, spoke religiously of the cruel sin I thought of committing, and, at last, persuaded me to relinquish the direful plan. I returned to Mr. Bakewell's low-spirited and mournful, but said not a word about all that had passed. The next morning my sad visage showed something was wrong, and I at last gave vent to my outraged feelings.

title: Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/50


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Thicknesse, Philip


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Thierry, Charles Philip Hippolytus


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Thirlby, Styan


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Thirlby, Thomas


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Thirlwall, Connop


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/456

 448 transcribed it, not because it would not have existed. For the collector is often a professed man of letters, and he is naturally attracted by anything at all akin to what is familiar to him from his reading. And I also admit that Elder, in shaping for the press the story, whatever it was, that he heard at Newport, was in all probability largely influenced by the Hameln legend. But it seems to me extremely unlikely that he simply transferred the story, body and bones, from the pages of Howell or Verstegan to the shores of the Solent. Mr. Jacobs' proof of this seems to me a disproof. He knew and cited Verstegan, says Mr. Jacobs. Just so. Would he have cited Verstegan had the latter been his sole authority? Would he not, had he been a mere forger, have endeavoured to cover his tracks?

No better instance of two diverse methods in storiological investigation could be well chosen than Mr. Jacobs' and Mr. Baring Gould's treatment of the Pied Piper. The latter accumulates a vast mass of interesting legendary parallels, but the whole discussion hangs in the air, and is never brought to the touch of historic or literary criticism; the former establishes to his own satisfaction the dependence of the English upon the German version, and there leaves the matter. Neither method seems to me satisfactory.

Mr. Jacobs finds in England a version of the Blinded Giant story. For him "there can be little doubt that it is ultimately to be traced back to the Odyssey I see no reason to assume this. For it further involves the assumption that the Odyssey version is the origin of the legend, an assumption to which I emphatically demur. The story existed before the author of the Odyssey worked it into his epic; it would have gone on existing had he not done so; in the latter case it probably would not have been so widely spread as it now is, but even this is conjectural, a point upon which dogmatism is impossible.

In both these cases the defect of the purely literary


text:
Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/51

Rh Benjamin Bakewell was a friend of his brother (may you ever be so toward each other). He comforted me much, went with me to the docks to seek a vessel bound to France, and offered me any sum of money I might require to convey me to my father's house. My passage was taken on board the brig "Hope," of New Bedford, and I sailed in her, leaving Da Costa and Kauman in a most exasperated state of mind. The fact is, these rascals intended to cheat both me and my father. The brig was bound direct for Nantes. We left the Hook under a very fair breeze, and proceeded at a good rate till we reached the latitude of New Bedford, in Massachusetts, when my captain came to me as if in despair, and said he must run into port, as the vessel was so leaky as to force him to have her unloaded and repaired before he proceeded across the Atlantic. Now this was only a trick; my captain was newly married, and was merely anxious to land at New Bedford to spend a few days with his bride, and had actually caused several holes to be bored below watermark, which leaked enough to keep the men at the pumps. We came to anchor close to the town of New Bedford; the captain went on shore, entered a protest, the vessel was unloaded, the apertures bunged up, and after a week, which I spent in being rowed about the beautiful harbor, we sailed for La Belle France. A few days after having lost sight of land we were overtaken by a violent gale, coming fairly on our quarter, and before it we scudded at an extraordinary rate, and during the dark night had the misfortune to lose a fine young sailor overboard. At one part of the sea we passed through an immensity of dead fish floating on the surface of the water, and, after nineteen days from New Bedford, we had entered the Loire, and anchored off Painboeuf, the lower harbor of Nantes.

On sending my name to the principal officer of the customs, he came on board, and afterward sent me to my father's villa, La Gerbétière, in his barge, and with his own men, and late that evening I was in the arms of my beloved parents. Although I had written to them previous to leaving America, the rapidity of my voyage had prevented them hearing of my intentions, and to them my appearance was sudden and unexpected. Most

title: Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/51


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/457

 Rh method is patent; concerned solely with the literary record of the story, it neglects the really interesting and important point, the sociological and ethnologic significance.

Mr. Jacobs made an undoubted hit with the epithet "casual" applied to the anthropological school. Prof. Rhys, as maybe remembered, was converted on the spot, and Mr. Lang has, seemingly, felt his withers wrung, though, if an outsider may guess, because he denied rather than because he admitted the justice of the taunt. A fair retort is to style Mr. Jacobs' the "spontaneous generation" school. Practically, it postulates creation ex nihilo by the exercise of individual fancy. It thus ignores the fact that every story has a past far older than the first recorded example, that the first combination into a story is merely the grouping together of incidents and conceptions familiar both to tellers and hearers; and, by insistence solely upon the combination and the tracking of its possible wanderings, it obscures for us the earlier history and real meaning of those incidents and conceptions.

Finally, I would note Mr. Jacobs' assertion concerning Cinderella: "The Borrowing Theory comes out triumphant as the sole working hypothesis that will explain the same story existing in so many lands. That in this particular case the borrowing is not from India does not affect the general question." Does it not? I should have thought it did. But I accept Mr. Jacobs' assertion, for it reduces


text:
Page:Christmas Fireside Stories.djvu/12

xii make us forget the author, and fancy that we are walking in the body through the country of his affection. In Asbjörnen's tales the English reader will find, in its quintessence, the genius and temper of the Norwegian peasant. EDMUND W. GOSSE

title: Page:Christmas Fireside Stories.djvu/12


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/458

 450 the Borrowing Theory to the statement that tales can and do spread. With that statement, provided it be added—so long as the sociological and psychological conditions are favourable—I have no quarrel. What I have always opposed is the theory, whether openly or tacitly maintained, that all tales are borrowed from one country. The moment it is admitted that tales may spring up everywhere, provided the conditions be favourable, the question of borrowing becomes a secondary one.


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Theinred


text:
Page:Christmas Fireside Stories.djvu/328

316 , "but I never saw anything like this before; when the queen comes towards me, I fancy it will be a prince, and when she walks away from me, it seems to me as if it will be a princess." It turned out in time to be twins, and so the charcoal-burner had made a lucky hit that time also. And thus for telling what no one could know anything about he got loads of money, and he became next man to the king. Snip, snap, snout, that man knew what he was about.


text:
Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/52

24 , however, I was; I found my father hale and hearty, and chère maman as fair and good as ever. Adored maman, peace be with thee!

I cannot trouble you with minute accounts of my life in France for the following two years, but will merely tell you that my first object being that of having Da Costa disposed of, this was first effected; the next was my father's consent to my marriage, and this was acceded to as soon as my good father had received answers to letters written to your grandfather, William Bakewell. In the very lap of comfort my time was happily spent; I went out shooting and hunting, drew every bird I procured, as well as many other objects of natural history and zoölogy, though these were not the subjects I had studied under the instruction of the celebrated David. It was during this visit that my sister Rosa was married to Gabriel Dupuy Gaudeau, and I now also became acquainted with Ferdinand Rozier, whom you well know. Between Rozier and myself my father formed a partnership to stand good for nine years in America. France was at that time in a great state of convulsion; the republic had, as it were, dwindled into a half monarchical, half democratic era. Bonaparte was at the height of success, overflowing the country as the mountain torrent overflows the plains in its course. Levies, or conscriptions, were the order of the day, and my name being French my father felt uneasy lest I should be forced to take part in the political strife of those days. I underwent a mockery of an examination, and was received as midshipman in the navy, went to Rochefort, was placed on board a man-of-war, and ran a short cruise. On my return, my father had, in some way, obtained passports for Rozier and me, and we sailed for New York. Never can I forget the day when, at St. Nazaire, an officer came on board to examine the papers of the many passengers. On looking at mine he said: "My dear Mr. Audubon, I wish you joy; would to God that I had such papers; how thankful I should be to leave unhappy France under the same passport."

title: Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/52


text:
Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/53

Rh About a fortnight after leaving France a vessel gave us chase. We were running before the wind under all sail, but the unknown gained on us at a great rate, and after a while stood to the windward of our ship, about half a mile off. She fired a gun, the ball passed within a few yards of our bows; our captain heeded not, but kept on his course, with the United States flag displayed and floating in the breeze. Another and another shot was fired at us; the enemy closed upon us; all the passengers expected to receive her broadside. Our commander hove to: a boat was almost instantaneously lowered and alongside our vessel; two officers leaped on board, with about a dozen mariners; the first asked for the captain's papers, while the latter with his men kept guard over the whole.

The vessel which had pursued us was the "Rattlesnake" and was what I believe is generally called a privateer, which means nothing but a pirate; every one of the papers proved to be in perfect accordance with the laws existing between England and America, therefore we were not touched nor molested, but the English officers who had come on board robbed the ship of almost everything that was nice in the way of provisions, took our pigs and sheep, coffee and wines, and carried off our two best sailors despite all the remonstrances made by one of our members of Congress, I think from Virginia, who was accompanied by a charming young daughter. The "Rattlesnake" kept us under her lee, and almost within pistol-shot, for a whole day and night, ransacking the ship for money, of which we had a good deal in the run beneath a ballast of stone. Although this was partially removed they did not find the treasure. I may here tell you that I placed the gold belonging to Rozier and myself, wrapped in some clothing, under a cable in the bow of the ship, and there it remained snug till the "Rattlesnake" had given us leave to depart, which you may be sure we did without thanks to her commander or crew; we were afterward told the former had his wife with him. After this rencontre we sailed on till we came to within about thirty miles of the entrance to the bay of New York, when we

title: Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/53


text:
Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/54

26 passed a fishing-boat, from which we were hailed and told that two British frigates lay off the entrance of the Hook, had fired an American ship, shot a man, and impressed so many of our seamen that to attempt reaching New York might prove to be both unsafe and unsuccessful. Our captain, on hearing this, put about immediately, and sailed for the east end of Long Island Sound, which we entered uninterrupted by any other enemy than a dreadful gale, which drove us on a sand-bar in the Sound, but from which we made off unhurt during the height of the tide and finally reached New York. I at once called on your uncle Benjamin Bakewell, stayed with him a day, and proceeded at as swift a rate as possible to Fatland Ford, accompanied by Ferdinand Rozier. Mr. Da Costa was at once dismissed from his charge. I saw my dear Lucy, and was again my own master. Perhaps it would be well for me to give you some slight information respecting my mode of life in those days of my youth, and I shall do so without gloves. I was what in plain terms may be called extremely extravagant. I had no vices, it is true, neither had I any high aims. I was ever fond of shooting, fishing, and riding on horseback; the raising of fowls of every sort was one of my hobbies, and to reach the maximum of my desires in those different things filled every one of my thoughts. I was ridiculously fond of dress. To have seen me going shooting in black satin smallclothes, or breeches, with silk stockings, and the finest ruffled shirt Philadelphia could afford, was, as I now realize, an absurd spectacle, but it was one of my many foibles, and I shall not conceal it. I purchased the best horses in the country, and rode well, and felt proud of it; my guns and fishing-tackle were equally good, always expensive and richly ornamented, often with silver. Indeed, though in America, I cut as many foolish pranks as a young dandy in Bond Street or Piccadilly. I was extremely fond of music, dancing, and drawing; in all I had been well instructed, and not an opportunity was lost to confirm my propensities in those accomplishments. I was, like most young men, filled with the love of amusement, and not a ball, a skating-match, a house or riding party took place without me.

title: Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/54


text:
Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/55

Rh Withal, and fortunately for me, I was not addicted to gambling; cards I disliked, and I had no other evil practices. I was, besides, temperate to an intemperate degree. I lived, until the day of my union with your mother, on milk, fruits, and vegetables, with the addition of game and fish at times, but never had I swallowed a single glass of wine or spirits until the day of my wedding. The result has been my uncommon, indeed iron, constitution. This was my constant mode of life ever since my earliest recollection, and while in France it was extremely annoying to all those round me. Indeed, so much did it influence me that I never went to dinners, merely because when so situated my peculiarities in my choice of food occasioned comment, and also because often not a single dish was to my taste or fancy, and I could eat nothing from the sumptuous tables before me. Pies, puddings, eggs, milk, or cream was all I cared for in the way of food, and many a time have I robbed my tenant's wife, Mrs. Thomas, of the cream intended to make butter for the Philadelphia market. All this time I was as fair and as rosy as a girl, though as strong, indeed stronger than most young men, and as active as a buck. And why, have I thought a thousand times, should I not have kept to that delicious mode of living? and why should not mankind in general be more abstemious than mankind is?

Before I sailed for France I had begun a series of drawings of the birds of America, and had also begun a study of their habits. I at first drew my subjects dead, by which I mean to say that, after procuring a specimen, I hung it up either by the head, wing, or foot, and copied it as closely as I possibly could. In my drawing of birds only did I interest Mr. Da Costa. He always commended my efforts, nay he even went farther, for one morning, while I was drawing a figure of the Ardea herodias he assured me the time might come when I should be a great American naturalist. However curious it may seem to the scientific world that these sayings from the lips of such a man should affect me, I assure you they had great weight with me, and I felt a certain degree of pride in these words even then. Too young and too useless to be married, your grandfather

title: Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/55


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/10

 2 by the fact that for the second year we have missed one of those brilliant studies we were accustomed to look for from our Treasurer, Mr, Edward Clodd, and for the first time, I think, we have not been favoured by Mr. Alfred Nutt. We have not adopted the practice of taking down our discussions, or allowing speakers to transcribe for us afterwards the observations they made upon the papers; and I think this is a matter that we might very well improve upon, because I bear in mind one or two occasions where facts were mentioned by members or their friends which were of some moment. A new feature of the past year has been the exhibition of folk-lore objects at our meetings, and there can be no doubt that this is a highly desirable part of our proceedings, to which we might perhaps pay somewhat more attention. Furthermore, the claims we have upon amateur photographers have been clearly put forward by Mr. Ordish, and most significantly illustrated by Professor Haddon, whose marriage-masks from County Mayo are about the most curious things we have yet had brought to our notice. There are numbers of other things to photograph, and I hope during the coming year we may be able to form an album of photographs which might be placed upon the table at each of our meetings. We are not in the habit of proposing votes of thanks to the readers of papers at our meetings; indeed, our expressions of thankfulness are singularly few, and in this respect we depart from the custom of our compeers. I suppose it is that our subject is sufficient return for labour, and because, when Mr. Hartland gives us a brilliant study, when Mr. Billson comes forward for the first time to show that the cause is extending, when Professor Rhys gives us what he is pleased to call "Stray Notes", we get exactly what we are accustomed to expect from these scholars, and our thanks die away with the fascination of the subject. None the less, however, we are indebted to those members who give us the result of their labours, and personally I am greatly obliged that they should have


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/11

Rh signalised my term of office by such sound contributions to our science.

If I attempt to sum up in one sentence what, so far as I have been able to interpret it, is the chief lesson to be drawn from the past year's work of our Society, and of folk-lore studies generally, I should unhesitatingly affirm it to be the need for formulating the principles of the science of Folk-lore, Once more there is a move forward, and our Society, in this case as in previous departures in the methods of studying folk-lore, takes the lead.

I want to lay a little stress upon this, because it really is so important for our future progress. I will accordingly very briefly note what strikes me as the principles of folklore which have been discussed during the past year. It may be, of course, that some of our decisions will have to be surrendered as our science develops, nay, that all of them will have to be surrendered. But of one thing I am quite certain: no true progress can be made unless these principles are set forth and discussed, and if they serve simply as the stepping-stones to the discovery of a Grimm's Law in folk-lore, as last year I ventured to call it, I for one shall be very glad to surrender them to that use, and to be proud if I should happen to have provided one of such stepping-stones.

The first principle, then, which appears to me to have been established is that folk-lore must be studied item by item in its own home, before it can properly be applied to other uses demanded by the comparative method of scientific inquiry. This principle has been asserted practically, if not in terms, by three different authorities, and quite independently of each other—by Mr. Abercromby in his paper on "Finnish Origins", read at one of our meetings; by Mr. Karl Krohn in a valuable paper on the "Geographical Distribution of Esthonian Songs", and by myself in my "Ethnology in Folk-lore". Each item of folk-lore has a biography which must be written. It may happen, if we are ignorant of this biography, that we get hold of a


text:
Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/56

28 William Bakewell advised me to study the mercantile business; my father approved, and to insure this training under the best auspices I went to New York, where I entered as a clerk for your great-uncle Benjamin Bakewell, while Rozier went to a French house at Philadelphia. The mercantile business did not suit me. The very first venture which I undertook was in indigo; it cost me several hundred pounds, the whole of which was lost. Rozier was no more fortunate than I, for he shipped a cargo of hams to the West Indies, and not more than one-fifth of the cost was returned. Yet I suppose we both obtained a smattering of business. Time passed, and at last, on April 8th, 1808, your mother and I were married by the Rev. Dr. Latimer, of Philadelphia, and the next morning left Fatland Ford and Mill Grove for Louisville, Ky. For some two years previous to this, Rozier and I had visited the country from time to time as merchants, had thought well of it, and liked it exceedingly. Its fertility and abundance, the hospitality and kindness of the people were sufficiently winning things to entice any one to go there with a view to comfort and happiness. We had marked Louisville as a spot designed by nature to become a place of great importance, and, had we been as wise as we now are, I might never have published the "Birds of America;" for a few hundred dollars laid out at that period, in lands or town lots near Louisville, would, if left to grow over with grass to a date ten years past (this being 1835), have become an immense fortune. But young heads are on young shoulders; it was not to be, and who cares?

On our way to Pittsburg, we met with a sad accident, that nearly cost the life of your mother. The coach upset on the mountains, and she was severely, but fortunately not fatally hurt. We floated down the Ohio in a flatboat, in company with several other young families; we had many goods, and opened a large store at Louisville, which went on prosperously when I attended to it; but birds were birds then as now, and my thoughts were ever and anon turning toward them as the objects of my greatest delight. I shot, I drew, I looked on nature only; my days were happy beyond human conception, and beyond this I really cared not.

title: Page:Audubon and His Journals.djvu/56


text:
Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 33.djvu/115

 Leslie critical over the constructive faculty, partly so the loss, while travelling in France in 1872, of the manuscript of a work which he was preparing on the economic and legal history of England. An essay on 'The History and Future of Interest and Profit,' published originally in the 'Fortnightly Review' for November 1881, and reprinted in 'Essays in Political Philosophy,' is understood to represent the substance of a chapter of the lost manuscript. His critical work has led to some important modifications of economic doctrines, but has by no means produced the effect which he desired.

[Times, 30 Jan. 1882; Ann. Reg. 1882. pt. ii. p. 113; Cotton's Fasti Eccl. Hibern. iii. 302; Foster's Alumni Oxon., 'Leslie, Edward;' Foster's Baronetage, 'Leslie, Sir John:' Dublin Univ. Cal. 1846 p. 127. 1817 pp. 76, 124; Inns of Court Cal. 1878, p. 431; Athenæum. 1882, i. 130; Revue des Deux Mondes, 3me Période, tom. xlix. 621 et seq.; Westminster Review, cxx. 470 et seq., Encycl. Brit. For more detailed criticisms of Leslie's work see Sidgwick's Principles of Political Economy; Marshall's Principles of Economics; and Keynes's Scope and Mothod of Political Economy.]  LESLIE, WALTER, (1606–1667), soldier of fortune and diplomatist, second son of John Leslie of Balquhain, by his third wife, Jean, daughter of Sir Alexander Erskine of Gogar, and sister of Thomas, first earl of Kellie, was born in Scotland in 1606. His family, which bore the motto 'Grip Fast,' was among the proudest and the poorest of the nobility of Aberdeenshire, and Leslie as a younger son went abroad to push his fortunes. Though bred a Calvinist he entered the imperial service, received his baptism of fire in Flanders, and fought his way to an ensign's commission in Italy, during the war of the Mantuan succession, in 1630. He afterwards served with distinction in Germany, and in 1632 held the rank of major in one of Count Terska's musketeer regiments. This corps, composed largely of Scotchmen, and commanded by a Scotchman, Lieutenant-colonel John Gordon, bore an honourable part in the campaign by which the Saxons were driven out of Bohemia, and in the subsequent operations round Nürnberg displayed extraordinary gallantry in the defence against numerical odds of a difficult position on the road to Freystadt 8 Aug. (N.S.) 1632. On this occasion Leslie was taken prisoner, but was released without ransom and with a handsome compliment by Gustavus Adolphus. After the battle of Lützen, 16 Nov. (N.S.) 1632, he was quartered with his regiment in the fortress of Eger, on the western frontier of Bohemia, where Wallenstein arrived on 24 Feb. (N.S.) 1634, soon after he had been deposed from the office of commander-in-chief by the emperor, and while he was engaged in treasonable intrigues. In the measures taken to defeat them Leslie look an active part [see ]. On the morning of 25 Feb. Count Ilow, Wallenstein's adherent, tendered in Wallenstein's name an oath of allegiance to Leslie, Buller, and other officers at Eger. From motives of policy they evaded rather than refused to take it. At the same time Ilow issued orders to Leslie to summon for the following morning a meeting of the burgomaster and town council for the administration of a similar oath to them. It was immediately after this overt act of rebellion that Leslie met the officers whom Wallenstein had not gained to his side in a council of war, and on Leslie's motion it was then resolved for the first time to 'kill the traitors' (cf. Apologia of Leslie and his brother officers, issued at Eger, 6 March 1634). Leslie gave the signal for the commencement of the bloody work, which resulted in the slaughter of Wallenstein and his friends. He maintained order in the town during the anxious interval between the aasassination of the suite and that of their chief, and rode to Vienna with the news. His fidelity and energy were at once rewarded with the office of imperial chamberlain, the command of two regiments, a captaincy in the king of Hungary's bodyguard, a seat in the imperial council of war, and the lordship of Neustadt on the Mettau, formerly Count Terzka's; in 1637 the title of count was awarded him by a patent couched in unusually honorific terms.

Leslie fought at the siege of Ratisbon, and after its fall, at the decisive battle of Nordlingen (7 Sept. N.S. 1634), when his desperate valour was rewarded by the Cardinal Infant Ferdinand with a liberal largesse and ownership of a regiment of foot, to which the king of Hungary added another of dragoons. He served under Savelli before Rheinfelden and Breisach in 1638, and in the campaign of the following year in Bohemia and Saxony. In July 164O he was the bearer of an imperial rescript to Neustadt in Franconia, and a year later in the same capacity he passed through Eger on his way to Ratisbon. In 1645 he was employed in negotiating loans for the emperor in Rome and Naples, in 1646 he was made master of the ordnance, in 1650 vice-president of the council of war, and warden of the Sclavonian marches, with the rank of field-marshal, and in 1655 he was sworn of the privy council. Then years later he was invested with the order of the


text:
Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/12

 4 item, and in the single form in which it has come to hand, we proceed to use it in comparison with some foreign parallel or with some savage parallel. But that comparison must be imperfect unless we know that the example is in fact the most perfect survival of the original that is to be found. Its relationship to other examples of the same species must be carefully traced out, and the particular evidence which that relationship brings out must be taken into account. The work here indicated is a laborious one and a lengthy one, but, being necessary and being scientific, it is a work which I would urge the Society in every way to encourage, if not to actually commence undertaking it for our own country.

The second principle, which I think flows from the first, is what I would call the measurement of the survival. To some extent I indicated this also in my little book already referred to; but it is to Mr. Abercromby that we owe a clear pronouncement on the subject. "Though the word survival", says Mr. Abercromby, "strictly connotes the notion of uninterrupted continuity between its extreme terms it does not involve any exact notion of length. Survivals may therefore be of different lengths or ages. If a line AZ be taken to represent the earliest possible survival down to the present time, then FZ, SZ, VZ will represent shorter ones, the alphabetical distance of F S V and Z showing their relative distances from that point." These are weighty words, and they formulate a principle which, though existing in many of our minds, has not yet been actually set forth and expressed. I would, however, venture to make an amendment upon Mr. Abercromby's plan. I would use figures up to a hundred, instead of the alphabet; and then our measurer would assume somewhat the form of a barometer, the several stages being marked according to the circumstances of each country. So that Mr. Abercromby's suggestion may not fall idly by, I have ventured to construct, for the purpose of criticism, what we might call the British measurement of the survival,