The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, November 17, 1895, Page 16

16 £ THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL, SUNDAY, MBER 17, 1895 i ~whispered about that the'time was ripe for the Kaightsof the Round Table to undertake the quest-of the Grail. The Round Table had a re- ligious. gnificance, for its members ‘were €worn Soldiers of the Cross, and there was one sedt at the.table thatwas alwaysvacant—many Bold knights had tried to occupy it, butali had met with disaster. That seat had: been vacant Einte the tragedy of Calvary, but fradition said that ene day & knight, pure and without stain, would accupy that seat then the quest of the Grail should begin. And when the stain- less young Galahad was made 8 knight of the order and took the seat s murmur ran round the room, ‘“The time has come!” & light brighter than noonday flashed through the hall, crashing thunder shook the castie and covered with white samite, the room over the heads of the They arose ore to the holy cup floated thro amazed knig its and_disappeared. arew their swords and s uest of the Grail. describe their marvelous adven- 1 they began to return empty-handed ointed. It was not a batile to be won by the strong or skillful; earthly weapons were of no availl. The warrior nceded 1o be clad in spiritual armor. Faith,purity and & holy life; these were his_weapons in the quest of the. Grail. The worldly Gawain and Ector soon wearied of the pursuit; the peerless ot stll clinging to his_guilty love hta glimpse of the holy emblem, but no more. Only the pure 1n heart can See God. Success was reserved for Galahad, “the pure maiden,” as Malory quaintly calls him, ana Percival, “the virgin knight,” and Bors, the white bull, with one black spot. They accom- plished their quest, and saw the sacred vision in the Holy City, where Galahad and Percival ended lives. When Bors returned and ur of their success, the good King ¥ tears of mingled joy and sorrow; iccess of the quest; but bitter sor- < hieart when he saw half the seats ind Table were empty, S0 many had perished in the perilous quest. jous order which Arthur had cherished the bulwark of his land was shattered for- ever. These Th sters were followed by frightful Launeelot and the Queen. knights, full of envy and hatred : rived the fatal scene which ach between the King and his dearest friem The inexorable were slowly weaving the net around Many he flush of youth he had unconscious: ted a heinous sin. My Lordy* seid’ Merlin, “God is displeased It you for this sin. The will destroy vou and t knights. hat .child -was Modred.” All through these vears Of".prosperity the dark cloud had lain #cross Arthur’s future, and now the storm be- gan 1o gathie By Modred’s cunning an impassable gulf was openéd: between - Arthur and the friends of 1 clot, and the brothers of the Round Ta- enmity against one enting warfare fol- King saw the blood or rusted rriends lowing blew ere-ranged in deadl: Years of -un nd the nnhapp ad been I reely Gu eitlier side. Atlastin the absence of Arthur the wretched throne and the Queen the news reached the King he hastened back; gathered his forces and routed Modred in battle, The traitor again gathered his army and was a second time defeated. A third time they “conironted one another on the downs bhordering on the seashore, when the ghost of Gawain appeared to Arthur in the night and werned him not.to fight the next day. Awed n the King consented to & truce, us fates were not to be baiked of As the coniending parties were an adder bit 1 of & knight. He drew his sword to reptile, but the flashing blade was n for & s al of battl nd in a moment wrderous conflict had begun. It lasted : with desperate {ury, and when the sun Gpon the waves all (he knights e > had perished except 1 I Te Ted the th frenzy him and | tak the Modr 8t the sight of Modred, ru. piereed him through w i his remaining on_the spear ind fell dea 2 wn 10 the the sea; as they barge, clad &l in black, came in 1, in which were three ladiesin Bedivere arge and it o he sea. He w Jore till the wailing of th n the distance, and at la st in the mist and twilight. gone, and the grand fabric of his hopés and ambition was utter It was the old story of man wrestling with fate: Men hed pondered over the problem since the dawn of time. The Greek has drawn ith a dignity, a calmnessand a poise that jever reaches, but in the picture honor, loyal pass this_story :tor over his grave, 1 Christian kn e truest 1to-thy lover that ever bestrode hor atid thou were the truest lover of a sinful thet_ever loved woman; ‘and thou an ana the gentlest that ever ate in iz ladies, and_ tho re the sternest 10 thy rtal foe that ever put spear in hed upo his epear. wa ¢ i5 muck in the story that we might ange, but Arthur and Launcelot are i ‘generous and devoted. A new nt-has come into the world and is re- d imits literature. 1t merks the dawn of terage to co The Chairman—TUpon the walls of liter- ¢'s temple are many pictures: They —its s, its ambitions, its disasters; there we $ee ‘rare peace, much struggling and frequent intrigue. The word artists, whose work hangs upon these walls—some to but many to deface—crowd about the gates. They are the toilers in modern fiction. Of them and of what they have . doné and have not done no one can tell us bettér than Professor Hudson of Leland Stanford Jr. University. DREEE T MODERN FICTION. _BY PROF: WILLIAM H. HUDSON. The topic with which I have been entrusted to-night. is difficult to handle briefly and to the point, partly because of its enormous ex- tént and complexity, partly on account of the important place which fiction is coming more and more to fill in our modern worid. In the few minutes now at my disposal I can hope to do nomore than touch with necessary suceinct- Nless upoi one or two questions which, in so rapid a sarvey of our subject, may haply seem of the most general interest and importance. 1tis now a number of years since thatsug- gestive- critic, Sidney Lanier, undertook to _unalyze the reasons for the universally recog- Inizéd fact that the novel is, and seems destined fo remain, the specific literary art form of the nineteenth century, and this in spite of Victor Iiugo’s well-known and eloguent plea on be- half of the drama. Mr. Lanier pointed out that prose fiction arose to take the place of the drama with the gradual rise of a large and general reading publie, with the spread of | theory, then we have & right to insist that, for tinued production of books like “Tess of the d'Urbevilles” and ‘‘Marcella,”” and just as dis- tinctly militate against the production of ems like' “Fifine at the Fair' “Aurora Fz‘igh," “The Princess” and the “ldylls of the King.” )'og\\'. if we are right in tracing bai he un- questionable pre-eminence of the novel to the general causes just touched upon—if in partie- ular we are warranted in concluding that it owes its power and position largely to those qudlities of flexibility and elasticity which render it singularly apt as a medium of ex- pression for the ever increasingly complex movements of the modern world; then I will ask you to observe one very important corollary which will be found to follow as a matter of course. T refer o the present extraordinary differentiation noticeable in our fiction itseif. No one can fail to be struck by the rapidity with which our producers of fiction are break- ing up into schoois and_sub-schools so numer- ous that it is almost impossible for even the most industrious and systematic student to keep pace with them. My point is, that this breaking up of the novel—this differentiation of fiction {'n(o 50 many various forms and branches, is not an accidental or extraneously produced result. It is a result to have been anticipated from the nature of the novel itself, and especially from its relation to our nine- teenth-century civilization. The same causes that have combined to bring about its adoption as the modern literary medium of self-expres- sion combine likewise to necessitate that ever- growing variety in theme and treatment, in material and handling, by which, as time goes on, the fiction of our day comes more and more to be marked. 3 Let us for & moment look at this point a little more closely. The fiction of our epoch bits—as no form of art has ever before hibited to anything 1iké the same extent—an interest in and sympathy with human life in all its forms and phases, in all its aspects and conditions. Just think of the enormously widearea over which our mod- ern novelists Tange in quest of subject and suggestion, of the heterogeneous masses of material which they lay under contribution. Manifestly the novel of to-day is broadly and deeply democratic. It studies Yr\s,«lun and ac tion, emotion and thought in all environme: and’ from every poiut of view. Among the most prominent of our living writers are many who owe their success largely to the revelation characterized by rhythm and rhyme, but thought has other and royal roads for its tri- umphs. It finds a-voice in the grace and grandeur of architecture; it speaks in the cau- vas and in the marble; it thrills in the Iyre as well as in the lyric. Art manifestsitself in method and execution. The aim and end of supreme art is the perfect expression of thought. As Lowell happily says, “The thought or fecling a thousand times repeated becomes his at last who utters it best.” Poetry can lay clajm to no special conception itis simply a form'of expression; without the form it would be prose and with the form it might be poetry. Apropos of this I open Bulwer’s “Last of the Barons’ at random. On page 381 I find this paragraph descriptive of the sleep of the young: “In the sleep of the young the traces of thought and care vanish, the aching heart is lulled in the body’s rest. The hard lines relax into flexile ease—a softer, warmer bloom steals over the cheek and, relieved from the stiff re- straints of dress, the rounded limbs repose in & more alluring grace. Youth seems younger in its sinmber and beauty more beautiful.” This might be rendered in verse thus: THE SLEEP OF YOUTH. A softer, warmer bloom Steals o'er the youthiul face; The rounded limbs repose In more alluring gra The heart is lulled (0 rest— No trace of thought or care, And youth has younger grown, And beauty is more fair. There is nothing remarkable in the quotation or in its versification. The thought is thesame, the language is the same. The only difference is that, by a slight transposition of the lines, rhythm and rhyme have been given to the verse. ¥ The mind instinetively finds pleasure in pro- portion and fitness, and these qualities are pe- culiarly manifested in poetry. ‘iv, takes delight in cadence and color, and it is the province of poetry to minister to this delight. A naked idea may have value. A simple statement of fact may affect the judgment or the conduct, given in their work of hitherto unexploited or but partfally exploited regions of human ex- istence. The names of Bret Harte, Cable, Charles Egbert Craddock, Kipling, Barry, Mac- Jeren, Pierre Loti and a dozen others o¢cur to us at once in this conneetion. Nor is this ali. The demoeratic extension of Interest in man as shown not merely by the new material for artistic purposes _outside the more familiar areas of iife. It is quite as instructively shown by the search for new material within those iamihar areas. 1t would be superfluous to dwell upon the large place now given in the novel to classes in our civilized communities which formerly received Do attention or were employed merely as_picturesque and conven- tional sccessories. The tramp, the thief, the peasant, the socialist and countless other types thrown up by or surviving amid the sresent conditione of ¢ ization. now have a farge body of fictitious literature especially devoted lo thelr interpretation. We may heartily disagree with Zola’s artistic methods and principles, but there is no overlooking the significance of his work. The discovery by Turgenev of the nihilist was only the first of many such discoveries. Only within very re- cent years, for_exmmpie, the young English- Hebrew writer, Mz Zangwill, has annexed the territory of the JAw, with striking and inter- estiug results, Meanwhile it is of course inevitable that our modern interest 1n social science and its multi- farious problems should make itself more and more distinctly manifest in a large pect of our fietion. We must, I feel convinced, ook forward to & tremendous development of the novel along these lines. The danger in this direction is, I take it, two-fold: First, lest thrown out of due balance by their earnest- ness of purpose, our novelists should lose sight of the eardinai and fundamental )vrin('i- H ples of ficticn as an art; and ‘secon , lest they should be misled—as indeed in many cases seems only too probable, as we may even go further and say that Zolaand others have al- Teady been misled—into # fatal confusion of the methods and ends of science and_the methods and ends of literature. Among English-speak- ing peoples, as M. David-Sauvageot has rightly insisted, realism is habitually associated with 8 strong more! purpose; and the danger with herefore, is lest the novelist should lose the scientist, but in the preacher. narrowly didactic novel threatens, indeed, to become & nuisance, and it should be treated without mercy. We can tolerate, we ean admire, a book like “Tess of the d'Urbevilles,” because, although it is & s craft remains supreme. But when a man or & woman—and unforiunately women are here only too frequently the prime offenders—writes & bad novel for the purpose of expounding some pet Social or ethical the sake of both purpose and art, the form of fiction shall be abandoned and the theory set before us in some other way. Good intentions are no excuse for bad art. We are not to be rired—to adopt a phrase of Fielding’s—to tolerate & dull story on account of a profound doctrine. Hy 1 social and religious re- formers used to be reminded that the final test of & novel is not, Is its moral new or old, true or fal but, Is it a successful novel—a fine piece of literary workmanship? And this leads me to the last point thatI now have time to touch upon—the battle at present raging furiously all around us between the so-called realists and the so-called roman- tic! To this struggle I do not myself attach any protound importance—the questions at stake seem tome to be currently treated with undue vehemence and seriousness, From the point of view here adopted the breaking up of fiction into diverse schools must, as I have be- fore implied, appear not only itable, but desirable; fo anticipate thatthe methods of any one of these schools will ultimately be adopted, to the abandonment of all others, is surely only possible o & eritic who studies 63 isting conditions with the overzeal of a parti- san and through the disturbing atmosphere of heated discussion. lern iticism, like modern art, must be eclectic. The realiSts—I do mnot mean those who distort their transcripts from life by throwing separate elements_into unnatural relief, but the true realists—have ample justification for their work, provided only that they bear constantly in mind the two elementary principles above stated—first, that the ultimate criterion of a novel is the art eriterio and secondly, that there is an everlasting distinction between tne methods and ends of science and_the methods and ends of literature. If they overlook or endeavor of set_purpose to_discard these prin- ciples their work will prove abortive and sterile; if, as earnest literary craftsmen, they accept and apply_them, they may labor on, secure of results. - Yet, while 1 speak thus of realism, 1 am none the less iree to confess that I regard the present revival of romanticism in the English novel with feclings of extreme satisfaction and hopefulness. Such a marked reaction is the most effective answer to the joolish lucubrations of ultra-realistic doctrinaires like D. Howells and the r Boyesen. There is large need we should lay continued and even increasing stresson what Miss Repplier has hap- pily called the “heresy of pleasure.” Few things seem to me more grimly indicative of our modern strenuous utilitarianism, our dread of frank, unsopbisticated enjoyment, than the widespread beliei—unfortunately shared by many in the ranks of our writers themselves—that the only proper and justi- fiable point of view for the novelist and the dramatist is that furnished by the laboratory, the rostrum or the pulpit. There may be, there certainly is, much to criticize in the pro- ductions of the neo-romanticists who have democratic feeling and the consequent exten- sioh of men’s interests over increasingly wide areas of human life, and with the crude begin- nings of what to-day we should call social science. The growing complexity of our eivil- ization, Gue to continual differentiation and the implied accentuation of personality, com- bine tQ render necessary for adequate interpre- tation an art form of an elastic and flexible character—and such art form is to be found in the novel. Itshould further be remarked that when we speak in this way of the novel as the’characteristic literary art form of our ers we mean something more than that it has become the widely accepted vehicle of literary expression. We mean that it has become such a widely ac- cepted vehicle to the more or iess complete exclusion of other literary art forms, It may be taken as a general principle that no period is intellectually strong and rich enough to produce and maintain more than one really living and representative form of art. In pro- portion as it pours its enérgy and genius into sprung into such prominence during the past few years, but their work at least comes as & protest against the narrow didacticism, the hysterical extravagance, the bastard science, by which our broad, genial, wholesome and finely imaginative English fiction seemed des- tined for a time to find itself submerged. Itis encouraging to be able to believe that we still have writers who, unlike Zola, are interested in something besides putrefaction; it is en- couraging to be reminded that we have not grown so abnormally and stupidly serious but that the dear old storv-teller's art may have but if the poet attempts to describe how nature gilds the dawn and crimsons the evening sk: how she embroiders the vernal fields and pain’ the pomp of autumn woods; how she awakens the diapason of the sea and trills the delicious quaver of brook-notes—he puts the tone and color and proportion into tite words, and the thought is poetized by its mode of expression. The rules which regulate the construction ot poetry relate to_the arrangement of sentences and syllables. Rhyme depends upon the selec- tion of terminating words having a similarity of sound. Inshort, every feature which makes poetry differ from prose is the resultof expres- sion. To exemplify how much poetry is dependent upon the choice and disposition of words, take for instance these lnes from Tennyson's “Charge of the Light Brigrde” : Cannon to right of them, Cannon to left of them, Cannon in front of them, Vorleyed and thundered. Rendered in prose it would read thus: There were some cannons on the Tight and some on the left and some in front, and they fired with a great noise. The same idea is here conveyed, but by the substitution of & word or two it has become commonplace. Poets sometimes select words the sound of which, independent of their signification, helps foimpart the idea they wish to expre: “The Cataract of Lodore,” by Southey, is an ingenious example of this use of word: And dashing and flashing and splashing and Clashing with & mighty uproar: And this way the water comes down av Lodore. they gurgle The very words have a voice; and gush and roar like the % Alliteration isanoiher feature which pertains to the use of words, and which, if discreetly applied, tends to cuphony. Most poets avail themselves of these tone_effects; it is a pre- vailing method with Swinburne—and even Poe, who condemns, adopts it unconsciously. Jteration is frequently employed with m velous force, as in the lines heretofore quoted: Cannon to right of them, Canuon to Jeft of them. And again, in thet sad, strange monody: Break, break, break, On thy cold gray O sea! Poetry, despite the restrictions of form, can indulge in epithet and metaphor which would seem inconsistent in prose, as when Lngland’s dead laureate bursts forth in that splendid panegyric to the Roman bard: Landscape lover, lord of language More than he that the works and days, All the chosen coin of fancy Flashing out from ma a golden phrase, Thou that singest wheat and woodland, Tilth and vineyard, hive and horse and herd: All the charm of all the muses Often flowering in a lonely word. Now thy Forum roars no longer, Fallen every purple C: s dome, Though thine ocean roll of rhythm Sound forever of imperial Kome. 1 salute thee, Mantovano, I that loved thee sines iy day began, Wielder of the stateliest measure Ever molded by the lips of man. Why are we enabled to distinguish the in- audible voice of this and that poet? It is not necessary to read an autograph to recognize the work of Milton and of Pope, of Swinburne and of Poe, of Browning and of Longfellow. Certainly it is not the thought expressed, but the mode of expressing it. It is this distinctive something which makes parody possible and permits the parodist to catch the verve and \'u%uv of the poet and to echo his very tone. While the grandeur of Milton, the simplicity of Wordsworth, the audacity of Byron, the sweetness of Shelley, the ambiguity of Brown- ing have each had their school of neophytes, there are other and later poets who, with keen- ness of artistic sense, have developed new methods. These clever versemakers know full well that an_excess of sweetness palls upon the taste. They hint at a sentiment rather than express it; they understand the value of restraint snd charm and surprise us with & fruitful word which haunts the memory. Like music, thyme and rhythm seem some- imes to be an instinct. There have been men vho have written prose poems to whom the divine gift was denied, while unlettered peas- ants have given to their simple speech the cadence and rhythm of sonnets, Of such “Poeta nascitur, non fit,” may have been written. There are examples of equal felicity in poth forms—notab) and Macaulay— but such are the rare éxceptions. Great thoughts, splendidly clothed, will and wmarshal sometimes come like a fllsz themselves in perfect array, but more fre- quently the genius which produces the immor- tal verse is the genius of labor. *“I sought twenty-four hours for & single word,” said Longiellow. I smoked & dozen pipes over that phrase,” said Tennyson. These are the un- written secrets of the craft. Each sentence, each word, has its history. The poet is the interpreter of nature as well s the servitor of art. He hears the song of the bird, the ripple of the rill, the voice of the wind, the thunder of the ocean, and he puts them into words. He sees the gl;rple eak, the sapphire ses, and a sounet is born. He must of necessity be epigrammatic; he makes a icture with a stroke of the pen; a single word s sometimes a flashlight which reveals a world. I quote two lines from Stedman’s poem, “Kearney at Seven Pines’: He rode down the length of the withering column, And his heart at our warery leaped up with a und. The word “withering” is the keynote and tells & terrible tale. You can see the heroic figure, you thrill with the magnetism of his ‘bravery, you can hear the bursting bomb and the hissing ball; you mark the dead and dying; you recognize the courage begotten of courage, which is manifested in the warcry of the rank and file. The glczm‘c is complete and its suggestions would fill a volume. This s the consummation of art and the inspiration of genius. Awed by criticism the poet sometimes hides some chance of flourishing among us yet. The Chairman—Poetry, 'tis the magic of thought combined with the music of words. The tone musicians of all time have labored in a world without words. But no music rises with grander swell than when thought is fitly voiced in words and attuned to supernal harmony. Blessed are they whose souls thrill with the possession of this power, and yet more blessed is he who, feeling the divine one channel of self-expression it must neces- sarily draw them from other possible channels. - I regard, therefore, the present pre-eminence of the novel as in itself the most fatal obstacle we have toreckon with to such an immediate renaissance of the drama as Mr. H. A. Jones hopesto witness and to the production of any large, new and original body of poetry. Alfred Austin, in the interesting but rather plaintive preface to his “Human Tragedy,” bemoans the fact that people no longer care to read long poems, and & man who wrote many volumes of verse, including one of the most lenginy poems. in our literature, Robert Browning, distinctly raises the question : 3 Have people time Or patience nowadays for thoughts in rnyme? 1do not think it is at bottom a guestion of time and patience; though—let it be said with- out irreverence—time and patience may have something to do with the matter when we find ourselves confror:ted by such a poem as “The Ring and the Book.” It is rather a question of the general absorption of power once given to -dramatic and narrative poetry by this other medium of prose fiction. At any Iate, we can Asardly mistake the general tendency of “things, or fail to realize that the liferary forces of our time distinctly favor the con- ~ touch, can lead all men wherever the glories of poetry may be found. Gentle- men, General Foote. L T WHAT IS POETRY? BY GENERAL LUCIUS H. FOOTE. Ii I were to say, as Poe does, that “poetry is exalted thought appealing to exalted feeling,” I might say as much of ‘‘Macaulay’s Essays” or ““Dr. Channing’s Sermons.” If I were to say, as Coleridge does, that ‘it is the blossom and fragrance of all human knowledge,” I should simply give utterance to a poetic fiction. If I were to declare poetry to be a device of expres- sion it might shock some fastidious ears; but there would be a deal of truth if there was no poetry in the assertion. Poetry, in common with prose, may be the product of spiritual exaltation—the flower and fruit of the imagination—but its valid distine- tion pertains solely to structure. It has two essentials—thought snd form. The form is behind o eeer and becomes a cynic. | He will even don the jester’s cap and bells that he may exercise the jester’s license. Locker say: O, for the pcet-voice that swells To Jofiy truths or noble curses— I only wear the cap and bells, Aud yet some tears are in my verses. Pathos provokes criticism and drollery dis- arms it. ‘heEdhlburih Review slaughtered Keats and lauded Hook; but Byron was “not to be terrified by abuse or bullied by review- ers.” “I well recollect,” he said in 1821, ‘“the effect which the critique of the Edinburgh was rage ana resistance and redress, but not despondency or despair.”” In this mooa he viewers 1n the teeth of his traducers. . For ages the satirists have resorted to thyme but I have long had a grave suspicion tha satire serves more frequently n armor than Humor and wit often happily enliven page of the poet, but it is the turnof Poets are largely influenced by tneir environ- ment. The artificial life and manners of ths but it could not produce Homer— i ‘sole woRder of a thousana years.” In their stress and strife, their pomp and pain, file past. and prophets; but the myths w! cinated ln{:enuuon will not satisfy doubt. icle the pageantry of a doubtful heaven, or, like Dante, conjure up the horrors of an im- able as scientists read the record of the rocks—to arrive at the truth. The cause they typify some beauty or grace or per- onify some passion or pang. The nipeteenth reviewers on my first poem had upon me; it hurled the English Bards and Scotch Re- to lampoon the follies and foibles of mankind, as & weapon. tge e phrase that feathers the shaft. Augustan oge could produce Horace & ately hexameters, dead centuries with In semi-barbaric days thejpoets were priests 4 Rioh - fax: The poets of to-day do l'lo:i like Milton, chron- })ounfln hell. * They analyze tradition and g:d- of Olympus are invoked, not as deities, but be- century would not tolerate the crusades, and it would laugh the frills and fustian of chiv- alry to scorn; but the poet has caught and crystallized the fire of its zeal and the flaunt of its panoplies. An ancient vogue in verse is sometimes hap- pily revived; even the arbitrary forms are be- ing called tolife again, and Villon, “Prince of the tripping, laughing thyme,” steps from his forgotten tomb and pipes his bellades to the nineteeth century: Ho. Villon! You conjured the rhymes in your day, Like a bold troubador, and a gallant free-lance, But your ghost is disturbed, and the devil’s to pay, For the foible just now is.the Muse of Romance. A new bouquet is often distilled from the flowers of alicn speech, as “When the Sultan Goes to Ispahan”: The pet of the harem, Rose-n-Bloom, Orders a feast in his favorite room: And stains with the henna plant the tips Of her pearly nails, and bites her lips Till they bloom again: but alas! that rose Not for the Suitan buds and blows! Not for the Sultan Shah-Zaman When he goes to the City Ispaban. The words are English, but Aldrich has given to them an Oriental flavor. The poet compels attention by a well-chosen epithet, as when Milton calls Athens . ‘The eye of Greece, and Byron calls Rome The Niobe of nations. He photographs a thought or an emotion by a vivid metaphor, as when Thomas Buchanan Read calls the thistle-down The only ghost of flowers, and Fawcett says of the humnTing-bird: Was it a bird half gem, Or was it a gem half bird? He fascinates us with a suggestive \'lfiuefless, as when our own Spontancous poet, Joaquin Miller, says at the grave of Walker: T sald some things with folded hands, Soft whispered in the dim sea sound. But I might quote indefinitely; the covers hide & galaxy of gems. Rhymes made for sound are impotent and empty. The poem must be food for thought and potent in suggestion ; its cadence and color, tone and tint are emphasized by expression. It is the airy, fairy touch, lighter than the fall of the snowflake, which Teveals the art of the poet. He tosses his meters to and fro in happy accord with his theme. He exuits in a pian, moans in a dirge and croons in a cradle song. Words are the many colored stones with which he constructs his mosaics; they impart grace and beauty to his thought; they lenditrhythm and rhyme; they glorify and immortalize it. In & word, poetry is the witchery of expression. The Chairman—There is no grace that so charms, no delight that so enthralls as madcap wit and pure, wholesome humor. ‘Wit and hunior, they are joy, radiance,, light, life itself and more. But all that these merry children are, it gives me very great pleasure to say that Dr.J. Dennis Arnold will show you. — - WIT AND FANCY 1N THE WORLD OF LETTER DENNIS ARNOLD. BY DR. I have lately read in & German treatise upon the “Power of Observation and Reasoning in Polities,” that the appreciation of wit and humor must be classed with insanity and in- temperance as a distinctive characteristic of the human race. The writer goes on to say animals have no sense of the ridiculous and never laugh. They have no games,no toys, no pastimes, no amusements, though their young sometimes play and gambol. If, there- fore, we cannot with the orthodox psycholo- gists deny the possession of some solid reason- ing power by brutes, it is still comforting to reflect in thesedays of Darwinism that man is clearly distinguished from the rest of the ani- mated series, not only by a more perfect de- velopment of the glutei muscles, but also by being, in one_sense of the word at least, an eminently ludicrous creaturs 1 think we must applaud the wisdom of a mysterious Providence which has ordained that the only being fully conscious of the mis- eries of life should also be the only one capa- ble of laughing at them—that man, solemnly placed between two_eternities, mindful of his moral responsibilities, should” yet be fitted by his nature 1o give way to unbridled mirth and indulge in unbounded facetiousness. Misfor- tune loses half its bitterness when its victim can smile upon it, and though the merey of heaven has not invariably restrained it from shearing the lamb somewhat too closely, It has induced itoften thusto temper the wind. In the sum of social factors the seuse of the ridiculous i considerable importance. Ithas,at timesin- gecd, sufficient strength to overcome all these feelings which we are in the habit of deeming the most powerful in our nature. For good or for evil the cap and bells are the emblem of an authority just as sure as the crown or mitre, the sword or the gown. To become a martyr for the truth’s sake has been the smbition of many noble minds, but_we never hear of any one voluntarily becoming a lnukghhlg stock in order to testify the sincerity of his opinions. Most men would rather be thought villains than fools, for it is more pleasing to our vanity {0 be hated than despised. Contemptisharder 1o bear than persecution, and Voltaire merely expressed the general sentiment when he said he would rather be abused than forgotten. The sense of the ridiculous, like all the other feculties of our minds, has its own appropriate sphere of action, the bounds of which, how- ever, it continually oversteps. Its legitimate rovince to soften the discomforts of our ives, 1o obliterate the eifects of everyday troubles, and to punish the neglect or the too pedantic observance of the decencies or con- ventionalities of polished society. It expands caution; it relaxes dignity; it thaws coldness; it teaches age and care o smile again; it re- calls the half-forgotten gleam of happiness to the face of melancholy; and when we are casu- ally thrown together with our fellow-men it often proves to be the “one touch of nature that makes the whole world kin.” TItis the guardian of what may be called the minor mo; It lays the basis of decorum and pro- priety of conduet. It curbs the sallies of the foolish and the impertinent. It is tne cor- rector of obtrusiveness. The very proper and the righteous over much are legitimately open toitsattacks,and itis the champion of common- sense and right reason in the ordinary affairs of life. But to laugh or join in a laugh implies a superiority so gratifying to self-esteem that it is difficult for this sense of the ridiculous to be kept within due limits. To many minds it is pleasing to gin even & transitory and merely apparent ascendency over that which is better and wiser than theinselves by the simple pro- cess of poking fun at it; and there isa wide tendency to deride things with which it is not safe 1o cope with more serious criticism Thus it happens that nothing is more signi cent of men’s character and culture thun what they find laughable. The last thing in which the'cultivated man can_have community with the vulgar is their jocularity. Thatany high order of wit is exceedingly complex and de- mands a ripe and strong mental development has one evidence in the fact that we do not find it in children at all in proportion to their manifestation of other powers. Clever boys generally aspire to the heroie and poetic rather than the comic, and the crudest of all their effortsare their joke: Is it not strange that wit and humor, which are so universaily admired, should be so little understood? Materials for illustration abound, but in the way of true definition or satisfying explanation very little of valuecan be had, The learned Barrow, who was both witty and pro- found, confesses at the very outset of his famous account his inability ‘to define it. He says: “It may be demanded what the thing we speak of is and what this facetionsness doth import. To which question I might repl as Democritus @id to him thatasked the defini- tion of a_man, ‘That which we all see and know,’ and one better apprehends what it isby acquaintance than 1 can inform him by de- scription,” In the same mood Cowley has conceived the ode beginning: Tell me, oh, tell—what kind of thing is wit, Thou, who master art of it. For the first matter loves varlety, less— Less women 1oy’ it—either in love or dress A thousana difterent shapes it bears, Comely in thousand shapes appears. Yonder we see it plain, and here 'tis now Like spirits in & place, we Know not how. “It is, indeed,” continues Barrow, “a thingso versatile and multiform, appearing in so many shapes and garbs, so yariously apprehended by several eyes and judgments, that it seems no less hard to settle a clear and certain notion thereof than to make a portrait of Proteus or to_define the figure of the fleeting wind.” Humor is of an earlier growth than wit, and J. it i8 in sccordance with this earlier growth that it has more affinity with the poetic tenden- cies. While wit 15 more nearly allied to the ratiocinative intellect, humor draws its materfals from situations and character- istics, Wit ~seizee on unexpected and complex relations; humor is chiefly represen- tative and descriptive; it is diffuse an along without any other law than its own fan- tastic will; evasive as a will-o’-the-wisp, full of whimsical transitions. Witis brief and su den—sharply defined as a crystal; it does not - makes pictures, it 1s mot fantastic, but it detects an unsuspected anal or suggests a slartling inference, & relationship of wit to the logical faculty is the more pronounced in its higher species. Some of Johnson’s most admirable witticisms con- sist in the suggestion of an analogy which im- mediately exposes the absurdity of an action or a provosition,”and it is only their inge- nuity, condensation and instantaneousness which 1lift them from reasoning into wit. They are reasoning raised to a higher }:ower. On the other hand, humor in ts bigher forms, and in proportion as it associates itself with the sympathetic emo- tions, continually passes inio poetry. Leigh Hunt hessaid: “Nearly all great humorists may be called prose-poets.” We can hardly avoid a sense of confusion as to the nature of humor from the fact that those who have written most_eloquently on it dwell almost exclusively on its higher forms, and in genersl, define humor as the sympa- thetic presentation of incongruous elements in human nature and life. Surely it is im- possible to deny a high degree of humor to many so-called practical jokes, and yet no sympathetic nature ‘can enjoy them. Much of the horse-play practiced in onr colleges under the name of “hazing” is distinctly humorous and at the same time un- mistakably cruel. Probably the reason why high culture demands more complete har- mony with its moral sympathies in humor than in wit is that’ humor is in its nature more prolix—that it has_not the direct and {rresistible force of wit. Wit is an electric shock which takes us by violence quite independently of our predominant mental disposition; but humor approaches us more deliberately and leaves us masters of ourselves. Hence it is that while coarse and cruel humor has almost disappearcd from modern litera- ture, coarse and cruel wit abounds; even re- fined men cannot help laughing at a coarse bon mot, or a lacerating personality, if the shock of the witticism is a poweriul one; while mere fun will* have no power over them if it jar on their moral taste. For this reason, 100, it is that wit is perennial, whereas humor quickly loses its zest. More than is usual with definitions and classifications do the common distinctions be- tween wit and humor fail to represent the actual fact. Like all other species, wit and humor overlap and blend with each other. There are bon mots, like many of Charles Lamb's, which are a sort of facetious hybrids— one hardly knows whether to call them witty or humorous. There are sustained narratives whick, like Voltaire’s ¥‘Akakia,” would be more humorous if they were not so sparkling, so antithetic, so pregnant with suggestion and satire that we are obliged to call them witty. In Leigh Hunt’s “Illustrative Essay on Wit and Humor” their manifestations are distrib- uted in fourteen different divisions, and _the range in his examples is from the multipli- cation table to the Rig- Veda. Hazlitt has written an essay upon the defini- tion of wit which is itself extremely witty, but his definition is solely by the method of exclusion; and his naive ending is that to define wit is no less difficult than to de- fine humor; for, like that, it is of infinite variety. While wit deals with the relations of ideas, umor has for its subject always chi acter, but not everything in charac 1ts foibles generally, its extravagancies, weak ies, childish fondness, pertness, end self-concelt. It is humor created Don Quixote, Sir Roger de Coverly, Parson Adams and My Uncle Toby. The essence of humor is incongruity; as incongre- ity is increased, just in that measure is the humor greater. It is the incongruity apparent between the proclivities to universal enev- olence and ~to war in the character of Uncle Tob; o manliness and gullibility in Parson Adams; to simplicity and common- sense in Sir Roger; to wisdom and folly in Don Quixote; to shrewdness and stupidity in Sancho Paunza—which gives to these creations their peculiar power and charm. The fact that & joke will not bear repetition serves as the clew to the tundamental condition upon which the feelings of wit and humor depend. The first consists in the discovery of occult rela- tions between ideas, the second in the appre- bension of incongruities; or the conjunction of objects and circumstances not usually con- nected—but they both concur in this, that they must produce surprise. In point of fact, it is rare to find wit untempered by humor or humor without a spice of wit, and sometimes they are united in the highest degree in the same mind, as in Shakespeare and Cervantes and Goethe. And what a rare hapPX conjunc- tion is this, for wit is apt to be cold and thin- lipped and Mephistophelian in those who have no relish for humor, whose lungs do never crow at fun and drollery; and broad-faced, rol- licking humor needs the refining influence of wit. Indeed, it may be said that there is no really fine writing in which wit has not an implicit if not an explicit action. The wit may never rise to the surface,it may never flame out into a witticism; but it helps to give brightness and transparency; it warns off from flights and exaggera- tions which verge on the ridiculous; in every kind of writing it prevents a sinking into’ duliness. this officc in humorous writing, for, as_humor has no limits imposed on it by its ma- terial, no law but its own exuber- ance, it is apt to become preposterous and ‘wearisome, unless checked by wit, which is the enemy of all monotony, of all exag- geration. But much as wit and humor are admired by the world, wits and bhumorists have not always received adequately of its love or respect. The humorist is apt to get more than a moiety of contempt and the wit of fear and hatred. Per- haps this may be traced partly to the operation of that frame of thought known in the abstract as Respectability; the respectability of the Philistine who contemplates wit and humor as dangerous powere. It is true that they are dangerous; but everything is dangerous which is characterized by energy, or which is eminent in any degree. The ecnl- ture of science is~ dangerous; fool is nearly as dangerous as a great genius— nothing is safe but mediocrity. But, as is nearly always the case, popular opinion con- tains even here an adumbration of the truth. As wit must needs have an object for its dis- play, it were well that its possessor be also’ endowed with something of the miik of human kindness; with a spark of that catholic sympathy which shall prevent the ex- ercise of cruclty upon even his undeserving fellow. The intellectual bully is none the less a bully because we find his weapons admirable. As Jean Paul has said, “Niemand dsrf der i\]e;uchhelc spotten, der nicht die Menschheit iebt.” The Chairman—Our Godmotner Litera- ture must be gratified with the tributes laid upon her altar to-night. We all are grateful to those who have made this anni- versary memorable. For me my only re- gret it is that now I have to say that this meeting is adjourned. SERSR A ol AT THE DINNER. THOSE WHO ENJOYED THE EVEN- ING’S ENTERTAINMENT. The list of guests included many repre- sentative citizens in different walks of life. Among them were: Hon. Horace Davis, Frank P. Deering, James D. Phe lan, Charles M. Shortridge, W. C. Mor- row, Professor John M. Stillman, Rev. W. C. Elliott, John J. Valentine, James S. Bunnell, James Hutchinson, Alfred Holman, Professor O, L. Elliott, Colonel Thomas F. Barry, J. J. Dwyer, William Greer Harrison, Jerome Hart, William H. Mills, Joseph HasBrouck, Professor William R. Hudson, Sheldon G. Kellogg, Albert Gerberding, George W. Haight, Alex F. Morrison, Charles A. Murdock, E. A. Foerster, Hon. W. H. Mynick, Willard B. Harrington, Dr. J. Dennis Arnold, Professor Edward B. Clapp, General Lucius H. Foote. And it is eminently needed in | Alleged Conspiracy in the Los Angeles District Board. A W. BARRETTS VERSION. | Governor Markham Was Consulted and Authorized the Payment of the Money. In reference to the statement telegraphed from Sacramento and published in yester- day’s CALL that six directors of the Los Angeles Agricultural District Board had been charged with misappropriation of money, and in answer to a personal re- quest from Governor Budd had visited Sacramento to square themselves, Adju- tant-General Barrett in an interview last evening imparted some information. < “To begin at the beginning,” he said, “in 1880 or 1881 the association at Los An- geles was $13,000 in debt. The managers agreed that if the debt was paid they would deed the racetrack to the State. Then 130 certificates of membership, each share representing $100, were issued and taken up. The association had some forty acres of land outside of the driving park and it was stipulated that each owner of a certificate should be entitled to alot in this tract, in addition to the privileges of membership which the certificate con- ferred on the owner and his family. The property of the Agricultural Park to my mind is worth $250,f to-day. It is near the city, some of the land being within the city limits. “When its_real value began to be appre- ciated a syndicate of two or three started in to purchase the certificates. Following this a bill was introduced by John Lynch, which passed the Legislature at its last session. This bill was retroactive, and aimed to make the holders of these certifi- cates a corporation. I did not like the bill and opposed it. I believe now thatitisun- constitutional, and think that the parties who favored its passage are now convinced of that fact. In the course of time Lewis Thorn, who was secretary of the associa- tion, was discharged, and he at once pre- ferred charges that the directors had mis- appropriated the money of the association. ““Yes, I am a director and so is Senator Androus. Now here is how this comes about. You know in the first place the PAD FAIR DIRECTORS: | HEALTH LAWS. NERVOUSNESS. Exercise moderately. Sleep from six to elght hours. Retire at 10 o’clock. * If you don't sleep soundly use Joy's Vege- table Sarsaparilla. It will clean the organsof the body and you can sleep refreshingly. % ¥ If you wake tired you need better heailth, and Joy's Vegetable Sarsaparilla will bring this. g When nervous and restless take moderately long walks and use Joy’s Vegetable Sarsapa- rilla. *x The heart, lungs and stomach are governed by nerves originating in theé brain, and these netves are quieted by what you take into the - stomach, if you take Joy's Vegetable Sarsapa- rilla. . * * & Twitchings of the eyes and musctes of the face are symptoms of nervous. prostration. Youneed rest, change and- Joy's Vegetable sarsaparilla. . * ¥ A nervous man or womaii should never over- load, the stomach. Moderation ineyerything, even J oy's Vegetable Sarsaparilla, is ‘essential, * 0 . 2 Nervousness, melancholy and'a torpid liver go hand in hand. Joy’s Vegetable Sarsaparilla will stir the liver, quiet the nerves énd banish melancholy. St * Substitutes are poor, but poorer are the peaple who take the proffered substitute for Joy's Vegetable Sarsapariila. g X 5 last Legislature made no appropriation for district fairs, but the year before under Governor Markham there was an appro- riation. We sent a man to see Governor Markham to ask him if we should not be allowed a per diem once a month for at- tending meetings and per diem while the fair was going on. The Governor thought we should be paid. Therefore each direc- tor charged $5 for each monthly meeting and $5a day from the opening until the closing of the fair. We did not spend the money to hire snperintendents and judges as some other associations did, but each director performed the work necessary in his own department. J “The amount allowed was $5a day and the service performed was worth the money. We kad also the opinion of the Governor that we had a right to receive the money. Our association is out of debt. Our fairs have been highly successful. We have offered the largest premiums and paid them. There is no agricultural dis- trict society of the State in better condition than the Los Angeles society. “Now as to a reported conspiracy on my part to gain possession of property belong- ing to the State, L can say that I opposed the bill introduced by Lynch.” REPUBLICANS BANQUETED. Reunion and Dinner by the Executive Council of Cali- fornia. Republicanism to Be Advocated by Dis- tinguished Representatives on Thursday. The Republican Executive Council of California will give a grand reunion and banquet at the Zinkand Cafe on Thursday evening. Invitations will be issued to fifty or more distinguished Republicans in this City and throughout the State, besides members of the council. Covers will be laid for 160 persons. Judge M, Cooney, president of the coun- cil, will be the master of ceremonies, and Senater Perkins, Hon. A. P. Williams, Charles M. Shortridge, Samuel Shortridge, M. H. de Young, Juage Waymire of Ala- meda, Judge Buckles of Solano, Colonel George A. Knight and others wi' be in- vited to respond to toasts. The committee bn the reunion and ban- quet, appointed at a recent meeting of the | Olmstead, L. Shaffer and George W. Eider, acting in conjunction with the finance committee, C. Wetjen, and J. 3{ Roberts, have affair, which cessful one. J arranged for the promises to be a highly suc- DT S— They meet her by moonlight alone seems to held its rec i oy, ecord, even if it isall of the Great Jewelry Auction Tuesday, Nowv. 19, 2P. M. Continuation Since the temporary interruption we have secured the services of Mr. J. H. FRENCH of New York, the most popular hich class Jewelry Auctioneer in America. We must and will rafse that $75,000 de- manded by our creditors. We need a crowd. The fact that our stock of : DIAMONDS, WATCHES, JEWELRY, SILVERWARE, One of the finest in the country, will be of- fered to the highest bidders WITHOUT RESERVE (no matter how ridiculous the price), ought to fill.the store. - Be oneof the many—PREPARE EARLY FOR CHRISTMAS. HAMMERSMITH & FIELD, 118 Su_tter Street. council, James E. Field, Tirey L. Ford. General Friedrich, George W. Dixon, Dr.| consisting of George W. Root,. James Gilleran, Edgar Briggs | After using one bottle of Joy’s Vegetable Sa sapari lla you will agree it is good-medicine: * < : o ® _A nervy man may ‘offer a substitute.for Joy's Vegetable Sarsaparilla, but you ¢an refusé the substitute. SKIN DISEASES. Castile soap and warm wiur:us_ed nightand morning will dry up pimples and ‘blackh<ads, ¥ Don’t pick pimples with-your nails. e Uleers, body sores, scrofuls and eczema'dise appear with the use of Joy’s Sarsaparilla. Sweaty hands and feet should be washed daily with cold salt water. P iy . If you have a sRin disease don'teat fats or take mineral drugs. Use Joy's Vegetable Sar- saparilla; it is made of herbs. - * % * Dandruff is due to the oils of the head dry- ing and scaling. Use cold water in the morn- ing and rub the head thoroughly. % ¥ ‘When your hair is falling it s time to use Joy’s Vegetable Sarsaparilla. You can then put the body in good health. % * Itching, burning skin often comes ffom dyse pepsia. If you use Joy's Vegetable Sarsapae rilla the burning will cease. ~~ ° * ¥ Shun the substitule. i 3 Itching, blotches all over the body, in hands, face, neck, loins and back aré.the resultofa disturbance of the digestive tract. Use Joy's Vegetable Sarsaparilla, and - they will -disap- pear. . = S P ,-Rushing of blood to the head, hot ahd -cold flashes and bearing:down .pains dre :stapped with the usé of Joy’s Vegetable Sarsaparilla. No matter how smiling: thg face 6f the sub~ stituter may be; refuse his. substitul Joy’s Vegetable Sarsaparill ol clothing and ‘draughts: bring on: col them. - - > *Qe > Apain in the back ineans a disordered kide ney, often produced by a coid. g : e L - A pain in the face, neck, head or chestis to0 often neuralgia. Hot applications are benefie cial, and be sure to use Joy's Vegetable Sarsae parilla moderately. b Pains in the joints and muscles are:.rheu- matic pains, produced often by exposure and cold and cured often by the moderate use of Joy’s Vegetable Sarsaparills. : s Pains in the bowels may mean & disordered liver, & cold in the bowels or chronic constipa- tion; if you use Joy's Vegetable Sarsaparilla these pains will disappear and mean nothing. R ¥ Pains in the stomach spring from disordered digestion and spring out again when y_g’\"l use Joy’s Vegetable Sarsaparilla, . ; 2 : Away with substitutes, they fill the the druggists and that’s all. Headaches, pains over the brow, painsat the back of the head, pains on the top of -tie head or temple are relieved and completely cured. by Joy’s Vegetable Sarsaparilla. z E e Pains in the shoulder usually mean & torjid liver, but this torpid Iiver can be made active coftges of by the use of Joy’s Vegetable Sarsaparills, and - the pains will cease. S e Violent pains in the region caused often from gallstones, are relieved. by - the use of Joy’s Vegetable Sarsaparilla. e o 5 If you wish to use Joy’s Vegetable Sarsi parilla ask your druggist for it. Ifh to substitute leave his place and try another druggist. This is certeinly fair. o ttempis. A »