The Short-story Part 25

54. AQUA REGIA: (Latin) _royal water_. A chemical compound so called from its power of dissolving gold. REGULUS OF COBALT: early chemical term referring to the metallic ma.s.s of an ore.

55. CAPTAIN KIDD: William Kidd, about whose early life nothing is positively known, was commissioned by the Governor of Ma.s.sachusetts Bay Colony in 1695 to put down piracy. With a good ship under him, however, he himself turned pirate. On his return he was arrested, sent to England, tried, and executed in London in 1701. Some of his buried treasure was recovered by the colonial authorities in 1699.

58. GOLCONDA: a place near Hyderabad, India, noted for its diamonds.

CRYPTOGRAPHS: from two Greek words meaning _hidden_ and _write_. The commoner term is "cryptogram."

59. SPANISH MAIN: the ocean near the coast of South America and the adjacent parts of the Caribbean Sea over which the Spaniards exercised power.

67. INSIGNIUM: (Latin) _a sign_.

NOTES TO "THE PURLOINED LETTER"

This detective story was published in "The Gift" for 1845.

PAGE 69. NIL SAPIENTIae, etc.: (Latin) _Nothing is more hateful to wisdom than too great acuteness_. C. AUGUSTE DUPIN: clever amateur who solves the mysteries which baffle the police. Most writers of detective stories follow this example set by Poe. AU TROISIeME: (French) _on the third floor_. FAUBOURG: (French) section of a city. SAINT GERMAIN: a section of Paris on the south bank of the Seine, once the abode of the French n.o.bility. AFFAIR OF THE RUE MORGUE: a reference to the detective story, "The Murders in the Rue Morgue." THE MURDER OF MARIE ROGeT: a reference to another detective story, "THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGeT." The writer is playing the same part as does Dr. Watson in the various Sherlock Holmes stories by Conan Doyle. PREFECT: (French) _chief_.

71. CANT OF DIPLOMACY: set phrases used in intercourse between representatives of governments by which they hint at their meaning.

73. HoTEL: (French) _residence_. AU FAIT: (French) _expert_.

76. MICROSCOPE: since Poe's time the microscope is, in stories, almost an invariable part of a detective's outfit.

79. ABERNETHY: John Abernethy (1764-1831). A celebrated London physician.

80. ESCRITOIRE: "A piece of furniture with conveniences for writing, as an opening top or falling front panel, places for inkstand, pens, and stationery, etc."--_Century Dictionary_. PROCRUSTEAN BED: In Greek mythology, Procrustes (derivatively "the stretcher") was a giant who tied those whom he caught on a bed, making them fit by stretching them out if too short, and by cutting off their limbs if too long.

82. ROCHE FOUCALD: Francois La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680). A French moralist known for his "Maxims" published in 1665. LA BOUGIVE: In the edition of Poe's works prepared by Edmund Clarence Stedman and Professor George Edward Woodberry, this name is given as La Bruyere. Jean de La Bruyere (1645-1696) was a French moralist. MACHIAVELLI: Nicolo Machiavelli (1469-1527). A celebrated statesman and writer of Florence, Italy, whose book "The Prince" is based on unscrupulous principles.

CAMPANELLA: Tomaso Campanella (1568-1639). An Italian writer.

83. RECHERCHe: (French) _far-fetched_. POLITICAL: a rare word, meaning "pertaining to the police."

84. NON DISTRIBUTIO MEDII: (Latin) _a non-distribution of the middle, or the undistributed middle_. This is a mistake in reasoning. When the Prefect reasons that all fools are poets, therefore all poets are fools, he has no middle term at all; that is, no cla.s.s of which poets and fools are both members. Correct reasoning is represented by this: all men are mortal; John is a man; therefore John is mortal. Between mortal and John, two terms, there is a middle term, men, of which both are members.

DIFFERENTIAL CALCULUS a higher form of mathematics. PAR EXCELLENCE: (French) _above all_. IL Y A, etc.: (French). _The odds are that every public idea, every accepted convention, is a foolish trick, for it is suitable for the greatest number._ CHAMFORT: Sebastian Roch Nicolas Chamfort (1741-1794). A French writer of maxims. AMBITUS: (Latin) _a going around_. Poe means by this example and by those that follow that mere similarity of two words does not make them of the same meaning.

85. BRYANT: Jacob Bryant (1715-1804). An English writer on mythology.

86. INTRIGANT: (French) _intriger_.

87. VIS INERTIae: (Latin) _the force of inertia_, the same as _inertia_, a term of physics which denotes the tendency of a body to remain at rest or in motion.

88. MINISTERIAL HoTEL: house of the minister or cabinet officer.

92. FACILIS DESCENSUS AVERNI: a misquotation from Vergil's "Aeneid,"

Book VI, line 126. It should be "facilis descensus Averno," _easy is the descent to Avernus_. CATALANI: Angelica Catalani (1779-1849). An Italian singer. MONSTRUM HORRENDUM: (Latin) _a horrible monster_, the epithet applied to the one-eyed giant, Polyphemus, in Vergil's "Aeneid,"

Book III, line 658. UN DESSEIN, etc.: (French). _A design so fatal, if it is not worthy of Atree, it is worthy of Thyeste_. CReBILLON'S "ATReE": Prosper Jolyot de Crebillon (1674-1762). A French tragic poet.

His play, "Atree et Thyeste," bears the date 1707.

NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE

Nathaniel Hawthorne, or Hathorne, as it was spelled before he changed it, was born in Salem, Ma.s.sachusetts, July 4, 1804. His family, settled in New England since 1630, had played its part in the activities of the land in various capacities, including the persecution of so-called witches. His father, a sea-captain, died on a voyage when the lad was four years old. The excessive mourning then in vogue made the widow practically seclude herself in her room, throwing a consequent gloom over the household and affecting the boy's spirits. From this depressing atmosphere he found relief in an early developed taste for reading. In 1818 the family moved to a lonely part of Maine, where in roaming the lonely woods he gained a liking for solitude as well as for nature. He returned to Salem in 1819 to prepare for Bowdoin College, which he entered in 1821. After an undistinguished course he went back to his native town, whither his mother had also returned.

In Salem he remained for twelve years, a recluse in a family of recluses, devoting himself to reading and writing. In 1828 his first book, "Fanshawe," was published at his own expense. Its failure caused him to destroy all the copies he could find. Some of the stories which he wrote during this period were published in the annuals, then fashionable, and in _The New England Magazine_, but without making much impression.

This hermit-like existence was healthily broken in 1836 by his becoming the editor of an obscure magazine, though it was hack work and lasted but a short time. The anonymity to which he had stubbornly clung was also dispelled by one friend, and the publication of his "Twice-Told Tales" was arranged for by another, his cla.s.smate, Horatio Bridge. These two facts made him known and mark the beginning of the disappearance of his solitary depression, which was ended by his engagement to Sophia Peabody.

In January, 1839, he became a weigher and gauger in the Boston Custom House, a position which he lost in April, 1841, owing to a change in the political administration. Then for a few months he was a member of the Brook Farm Community, a group of reformers who tried to combine agriculture and education. In the Custom House and at Brook Farm he worked so hard as to have little energy for literature, publishing only some children's books. On July 9, 1842, occurred his marriage.

For the next three years Hawthorne resided in Concord at the Old Manse.

In this retired town, where such eminent people as Emerson and Th.o.r.eau were to be met, he lived a very happy, quiet life, given to musing and observation. But he had lost a considerable sum of money in the Brook Farm experiment, the failure of _The Democratic Review_ prevented payment for his contributions, and he began to feel the pinch of poverty. At this juncture his college mates, Bridge and Pierce, came to the rescue, and on March 23, 1846, he was appointed surveyor of the port of Salem, that spot in which the Hawthorne family was so firmly rooted, whither he had previously returned with his wife and daughter, Una, born in Concord in 1844.

Though happy for a short time at getting into the stir of actual life, the routine and sordidness soon palled and he began to fret in the harness. This mood kept him from composition till he forced from himself, in 1848, the last of his short stories, including "The Great Stone Face" and "Ethan Brand." Despite the effort, the stories rank well. In 1849 he was dismissed from office by a change of political administration, not because of inefficiency. He took this dismissal hard because some of his townspeople had been opposed to him. Again he was in money difficulties from which he was released by a donation from his loyal friends. The leisure thus made possible was devoted to the production of his greatest work, a novel, "The Scarlet Letter," which is a study in the darker side of Puritanism. Its publication in April, 1850, brought him fame. In the same year he moved to the Berkshire Hills.

The year and a half in the hills was thoroughly happy. He had the incentive of success, the tranquillity of mind due to sufficient means, physical comfort, and a loving household now enlarged by the birth of a second daughter, Rose. During this time he wrote and published (1851) his novel, "The House of the Seven Gables," the study of an inherited curse, made pleasing as a story by means of its realistic portrayal of ordinary life. He also put many of the stories of cla.s.sical mythology into a form understandable by children, publishing the results in "A Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys" (1852) and "Tanglewood Tales for Girls and Boys" (1853). In 1852 appeared "The Snow Image and Other Twice-Told Tales," containing hitherto uncollected contributions to various magazines.

Believing the Berkshire air rather enervating, Hawthorne moved in November, 1851, to a temporary residence in West Newton, where he wrote "The Blithedale Romance," which was published in 1852. This novel, founded on his Brook Farm experience, is a study of the failure of the typical reformer. In June, 1852, the family moved to a place of their own, called "The Wayside" in Concord. Here the ideal family life continued. In the summer he brought out "The Life of Franklin Pierce,"

the biography of his old college mate, who was shortly after elected to the presidency of the United States, and made Hawthorne United States Consul at Liverpool in 1853.

The holding of office was never a congenial occupation to Hawthorne, though he was a good official. It always became irksome and dried up his creative power. The consulship was no exception, and when he resigned in 1857 he felt much relief. By this time he had obtained a competence which afforded him the gratification of paying back the money once raised for him by his friends. When in England he had seen much of the country; now he determined to see more of Europe. The family travelled through France to Italy, which they greatly enjoyed, staying there till 1859. For some months they had occupied the old villa of Montauto, where Hawthorne composed most of "The Marble Faun." The illness of Una compelling them to seek a different climate, they returned to England, where he finished the book, which was published the next year. "The Marble Faun" is "an a.n.a.lytical study of evil"; but despite the subject, the artistic effects and the interpretation of Italy lend it charm.

In 1860 the family returned to Concord. Hawthorne's health had been failing for some time, and now he became incapable of sustained work.

However, in 1863 was published "Our Old Home," the theme of which is well expressed by the sub-t.i.tle "A Series of English Sketches," which had been composed previously. He continued to do some work, and even promised a new novel to the press, but he came to realize that he would never finish it. In 1864 he went on a carriage trip with his old friend Pierce, during which he peacefully died in his sleep.

REFERENCES

BIOGRAPHY: WOODBERRY: Nathaniel Hawthorne.

JAMES: Nathaniel Hawthorne.

CRITICISM: HUTTON: Literary Essays.

STEPHEN: Hours in a Library.

NOTES ON "HOWE'S MASQUERADE"

This story was first published in _The Democratic Review_ for May, 1838, and was republished in 1842 in an enlarged edition of "Twice-Told Tales." It exemplifies the work in which Hawthorne was the pioneer--that of building a story about a situation. The idea of this particular one is found in the following entry in "American Note-Books": "A phantom of the old royal governors, or some such showy shadowy pageant, on the night of the evacuation of Boston by the British." Hawthorne was accustomed to jot down in his note-books hints for stories which often can be traced in his developed writings.

In "Howe's Masquerade" can be clearly seen the fact that he had not mastered the method of writing the short-story as we have it to-day.

There is too much introduction and too much conclusion. He takes too long to get the story into motion, and he spoils the effect by tacking to the end a moral. These mistakes or crudities Poe did not make; however, each writer contributed to the development of the short-story some element of value, as has been pointed out in the Introduction.

This story is one of "The Legends of the Province House," stories joined together by the scheme of having an old inhabitant tell them to some visitor. Such machinery with its prologues and end-links, more or less elaborate, has been often used, as is seen in Chaucer's "Canterbury Tales" and in Longfellow's "Tales of a Wayside Inn." The taste for this method has largely pa.s.sed, though it has been recently revived by Alfred Noyes in "The Tales of the Mermaid Tavern."

PAGE 93. WASHINGTON STREET: the scene is laid in Boston. OLD PROVINCE HOUSE: the term Province House is used somewhat in the same sense as State House. The building was erected when Ma.s.sachusetts was a province and served as the headquarters and dwelling of the royal governor.

Hawthorne represents it as having descended to the condition of an inn or inferior hotel, the most important part of which was the bar for the sale of liquor.

94. LADY OF POWNALL: the wife of Thomas Pownall, a royal governor of Ma.s.sachusetts Bay Colony. BERNARD: Sir Thomas Bernard, another royal governor.

98. STEELED KNIGHTS OF THE CONQUEST: persons dressed as cavalrymen in steel armor of 1066, when William the Conqueror became King of England.