Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. September, 1863, No. LXXI.

In every person's memory there are niches fixed, and in those niches are sacred persons. These are such as never obtruded themselves upon you, staining the pane through which their light shone with their own images, but who became perfectly transparent to the word they uttered, the song they sang, or the work they did. Such a sacred person to me is the gifted woman who first interpreted for me Schumann's Albums.

Many years ago it was, as she told me, that she one day stood unperceived in the half-open door of her master, near the lesson-hour, and heard him softly rendering a theme which stole far into places of her heart, which had been awaiting its spell unconsciously. Presently he felt that there was a listener, and, hastily brushing away a tear, he placed the music in a far corner of the room, away from his répertoire. She confessed, that, afterward, when he was not present, she had looked on that which he evidently desired to conceal; she saw written, in pencil, upon it, "Sternenkranz." Thenceforth shops and catalogues were ransacked, but no "Sternenkranz" was found,-the word was evidently her master's own fancy; so she summoned all her heroism, one day, when Herr Otto complained of her indifference to the pieces he set before her, and informed him that she should perish at his feet, unless he would give her "Sternenkranz." Of course her guilt was manifest, and Herr Otto, in a spasm of anger at "prying women," as he called them, brought out the treasure, and with it others of a very rare album of Schumann's, to which he had given no names, leaving them to whisper their own names to each soul that could receive them: Star-Wreath it might be to one, Bower of Lilies to another. It was the same as with that white stone which the Seer of Patmos saw,-within it "a name written which no man knoweth, saving he that receiveth it."

This piece was to the lady a touch of consecration. Thenceforth she was known among us as "the Schumannite woman." I verily believe that to-day, next to the divine Clara herself, she is the best interpreter of Robert Schumann's works living; and if the love she has obtained for him is not as universal, it is just as fervent. Many silent and holy hours have I sat communing, through her, with him whom the Germans love to call their Tone-Poet; and the music remained to clothe with the full vesture of romance the meagre paragraphs of the journals which hinted his love, his sorrow, and at length his insanity and death. More, however, I longed to know of him,-of the wedlock of these Brownings of music; and more I came to know, in the way which, with this preface, I now proceed to relate.

A bitter December evening found me tumbling through snow and ice to accommodate a certain lyceum in one of our Northwestern cities. Cold winds from over the Lakes made me wish that the Modern Athens had kept its lecture-system at home; for it has always seemed to me, that, wherever this has gone, her eastern storms have gone with it. Such ugly thoughts were shamed, however, by the beaming welcome which shone from the face of the kindest of landladies, and at length completely thawed out of me by the glowing fire to which she introduced me, and which animated the coziest of rooms. Why has not some poet celebrated the experience of thawing? How deliciously each fibre of the thawee responds to the informing ray, evolving its own sweet sensation of release until all unite in a soft choral reverie! Carried thus, in a few moments, from the Arctic to the Tropic, I thought, as dear Heine says, my "sweet nothing-at-all thoughts," until a subtile breath of music won me back to life.

Heavens! what is that? A strain, strong and tender, pressed its way into the room, soothed my temples, then broke over me in a shower of pearls. Confused, I started up; and it was some moments before I understood that the music proceeded from the room adjoining mine in the hotel. Not altogether unfamiliar was the theme; the priestess of whom I have spoken had once brought it from the Holy of Holies, when she was appointed to stand; and now, remembering, I broke out with the word, "Florestan!"

As I uttered it, the music ceased with the dreary fall of an octave. Whether the musician had heard the exclamation, or whether such a terrible termination was in the music, I knew not: the latter was quite probable, for, alas! such fearful Icarus-falls are not rare in poor Schumann's music. However, I did not consider long, but, rising quickly, passed into the hall, and knocked gently at the door of the next room.

"Enter," replied a voice, eagerly, but softly.

Enter I did, and stood before a man of about forty winters. His face was so swart that I could see only the German in the blue eye, and at once imagined that a stream of Plutonic fire had streamed into his veins from some more Oriental race. I stammered out an apology for my intrusion, but told him how irresistible were such subtile threads as Schumann's "Carnival" had projected through the walls which separated our rooms.

"Florestan," I said, "was too much for me."

Then his eye lighted up as might that of some Arctic voyager, which, having for bleak months rested only on the glittering scales of the ice-dragon coiled about him, is suddenly filled with the warm spread of the Polar Sea. Taking my hand, he said,-

"In me, wanderer that I am,-in me, with the Heimweh in my heart never to be stilled but in that home where Schumann has already gone,-you see Florestan."

"Louis Boehner!"

Filled with wonder, and scarcely knowing what I did, I took a little piece of paper which he unwrapped from many folds and placed in my hand. On it these words were written:-

"Peace and joy attend thee, Louis Boehner! and mayst thou never want for such a friend as thou hast been to

ROBERT SCHUMANN."

I could say no word; never have I felt a profounder emotion than when, at this moment, I drew so near one whose brow Art had crowned with a living halo.

Students of German music and composers will need no word to bring before them the fulness of this incident. But to others I may briefly mention some facts connected with Schumann's "Carnival, or Scènes Mignonnes, on Four Notes." Not by any means representing the pure depths of Schumann's soul, this strange medley is yet pregnant with historic associations. The composer wrote it in his young days, stringing twenty-two little pieces on four letters composing the name of Asch, a town of Saxony, "whither," according to Sobolewski, "Schumann's thoughts frequently strayed, because at that time there was an object there interesting to his sensitive soul." In the letters A, S, C, H, it must be remembered that the H in German stands for our B natural, and S or es for E flat. The Leipsic "Neue Zeitschrift für Musik" was begun and for ten years edited by Schumann,-in what spirit we may gather from his own words:-"The musical state of Germany, at that time, was not very encouraging. On the stage Rossini yet reigned, and on the piano Herz and Hünten excluded all others. And yet how few years had passed since Beethoven, Weber, and Schubert lived among us! True, Mendelssohn's star was ascending, and there were wonderful whispers of a certain Pole, Chopin; but it was later that these gained their lasting influence. One day the idea took possession of our young and hot heads,-Let us not idly look on; take hold, and reform it; take hold, and the Poetry of Art shall be again enthroned!" Then gathered together a Protestant-league of music, whose Luther and Melancthon in one was Schumann. The Devil at which they threw their inkstands and semi-breves was the Philistines, which is the general term amongst German students, artists, poets, etc., for prosaic, narrow, hard, ungenial, commonplace respectabilities. "Young Germany" was making itself felt in all co?rdinate directions: forming new schools of plastic Art in Munich and Dresden,-a sharp and spirited Bohemian literature at Frankfort, under the lead of Heine and Boerne; and now, music being the last to yield in Germany, because most revered, as it is with religion in other countries, a new vitality brought together in Kühne's cellar in Leipsic the revolutionists, "who talked of Callot, Hoffmann, and Jean Paul, of Beethoven and Franz Schubert, and of the three foreign Romanticists beyond the Rhine, the friends of the new phenomenon in French poetry, Victor Hugo." This was the Davidsbund, or League of David (the last of the "Scènes Mignonnes" is named "Marche des Davidsbündler contre les Philistines"). An agreeable writer in the "Weimarer Somitagsblatt" has given us a fine sketch of this company, which we will quote.

"The head of the table was occupied by a lively, flexible man of middle age, intellectual in conversation, and overflowing with sharp and witty remarks. He was the instructor of more than one of the young musicians around him, who all listened to his observations with profound attention. He was very fond of monopolizing the conversation and suffering himself to be admired. For he called many a young, highly promising musician his pupil, and had, besides, the certain consciousness of having moulded his daughter Clara, at that time a girl of fourteen, into a prodigy, whose first appearance delighted the whole world, and whose subsequent artist-activity became the pride of her native city, Leipsic. By his side sat a quiet, thoughtful young man of twenty-three, with melancholy eyes. But lately a student in Heidelberg, he had now devoted himself entirely to music, had removed to Leipsic and was now a pupil of the 'old schoolmaster,' as the father of Clara Wieck liked to be called. Young Robert Schumann had good reason to be melancholy. After long struggles, he had only been able to devote himself entirely to music comparatively late in life, and had been obliged to pass a part of his precious youth in studies which were as uncongenial as possible to his artist-spirit. He had finally decided for the career of a virtuoso, and was pursuing the study of the piano with an almost morbid zeal, when the disabling of one of his fingers, a consequence of his over-exertions, obliged him to give up this career forever. He did not yet suspect that this accident would prove fortunate for him in the end, by directing him to his true vocation, composition. Perhaps, too, it was the first germ of love, in the garb of admiration for the wondrous talent of Clara, which made young Robert so quiet and dreamy. His companions were all the more lively. There sat the eccentric Louis Boehner,1 who long ago had served as the model for E.T.A. Hoffmann's fantastic pictures. Here J.P. Lyser, a painter by profession, but a poet as well, and a musician besides. Here Carl Bauck, the indefatigable, yet unsuccessful composer of songs,-now, in his capacity of critic, the paper bugbear of the Dresden artists. He had just returned from Italy, and believed himself in possession of the true secret of the art of singing, the monopoly of which every singing-master is wont to claim for himself. C.F. Becker, too, the eminent organist and industrious collector, belonged to this circle, as well as many more young and old artists of more or less merit and talent."2

Florestan then stood before me; and with him, although invisible, stood that sacred circle, which had unconsciously borne within it the germs of so many future sorrows and glories.

"With him," said Louis Boehner, "I began life, when we were boys together at Heidelberg; with him I stood when the dawn of a better day, which since has blessed hill and vale, was glowing for his eye alone; this breast held his sorrows and his hopes, when he was struggling to reach his Clara; these hands saved him when in his madness he cast himself into the Rhine; these eyes dropped their hot tears on his eyelids when they were closed in death."

Overcome by his emotion, he sat down and sobbed aloud.

At that moment, hearing my name called loudly in the hall, I went out, and was informed that my audience was waiting at the Lyceum, and had been waiting nearly fifteen minutes!

Next morning, bright and early, I was in the artist-pilgrim's room, listening to that which it thrilled him to tell and me to hear. And first he told me the story of Schumann's love.

The "old schoolmaster," Wieck, trained his daughter more ambitiously than judiciously; and, indeed, none but one of the elect would ever have survived the tasks imposed on her childhood. Indeed, she had no childhood: at the piano she was kept through all the bright days, roving only from scale to scale, when she should have been roving from flower to flower. At length her genius asserted itself, and she entered into her destiny; thenceforth flowers bloomed for her out of exercise-books, and she could touch the notes which were sun-bursts, and those which were mosses beneath them. From this training she came before the best audience in Germany, and stood a sad-eyed, beautiful child of fourteen summers, and by acclamation was crowned the Queen of the Piano. Franz Liszt remembered his enthusiasm of that period, and many years afterward wrote in his extravagant way,-"When we heard Clara Wieck in Vienna, fifteen years ago, she drew her hearers after her into her poetic world, to which she floated upward in a magical car drawn by electric sparks and lifted by delicately prismatic, but nervously throbbing winglets." At her performance of Beethoven's F Minor Sonata, Grillparzer was inspired to write the following verses:-

"A weird magician, weary of the world,

In sullen humor locked his charms all up

Within a diamond casket, firmly clasped,

And threw the key into the sea, and died.

The manikins here tried with all their might;

In vain! no tool can pick the flinty lock;

His magic arts still slumber, like their master.

A shepherd's child, along the sea-shore playing,

Watches the waves, in hurrying, idle chase.

Dreaming and thoughtless, as young maidens are,

She dippeth her white fingers in the flood,

And grasps, and lifts, and holds it! 'Tis the key.

Up springs she, up, her heart still beating higher.

The casket glances, as with eyes, before her.

The key fits well, up flies the lid. The spirits

All mount aloft, then bow themselves submissive

To this their gracious, innocent, sweet mistress,

Who with white fingers guides them in her play."

The first, perhaps, to recognize the surpassing ability of that child was the young editor of the "Zeitschrift." Robert Schumann. On her first appearance, he wrote,-"Others make poetry,-she is a poem." And soon afterward,-"She early lifted the veil of Isis. The child looks calmly up,-the man would, perhaps, be dazzled by the brilliancy."

From this moment there was an elasticity and purpose about the young composer, the secret of which no one knew, not even himself. Like one caught in the whorls of some happy dream, who will not pause to ask, "Whither?" he poured out before this child the half-revealed hopes striving within him; an equal spell was woven about her ingenuous and earnest heart, and their souls were joined in that purple morning; in due time they were to be rather clenched, through pain. It was under this baptismal touch of Love that Schumann wrote his first sonata,-"Florestan and Eusebius." It gained him at once a fame with all from whom fame was graceful.

In the light of this period of his life must be interpreted those wonderful little "pieces" which mystify whilst they fascinate; without it their meaning is as strange as their names. Often did he say,-"I can write only where my life is in unison with my works." "Listen now to these," said Florestan, as he opened an album and struck the piano; "these are the voices of a new life." The "Alternatives," with song, "My peace is o'er"; "Evening Thoughts"; "Impromptus," (whose first theme was written by Clara): these; seemed like the emotion of some newly winged aspirant released from its chrysalis, resting on its first flower. But faster than planets through the abysses Love moves on. Florestan ceased, and there was a long silence; and then he told the unspeakable portion of his story by performing these two: "Sternenkranz," "Warum." Who has ever scaled the rapture of the former, or fathomed the pathos of the latter? Every summit implies its precipice; and the star-wreath that crowned Love was snatched at by the Fate which soon burdened two hearts with the terrible questioning, Wherefore?

Thus: before these two were fully conscious of the love they bore each other, the shrewd eye of old Wieck had caught a glimpse of what was coming to pass. He had educated this girl to be an artist to bring him fame; alas, it must be confessed that he thought also of certain prospective thalers. Willing as he was that all Leipsic should admire his daughter, he did not like the enthusiasm of the "Zeitschrift." He then began to warn Clara against "this Faust in modern garb, who, when he had gained one finger, would soon have the whole hand, and finally the poor soul into the bargain!" Stupid old schoolmaster, thou shouldst have known that it is Mephistopheles, and not Faust, that women hate!

The old man, finding that his warnings were of no avail, forbade all acquaintance, forbade Robert's visits to his house. Then, inaugurating at once Clara's career as a virtuoso, he took her to Vienna.

No wonder, that, when she appeared there, it was to be as the priestess of Beethoven. It takes something besides an academy to train artists up to Beethoven. Robert was forbidden to write to her; but the "Schw?rmibriefe of Eusebius to Chiara," utterly unintelligible to the general reader of the "Zeitschrift," who, doubtless, fancied that its editor had gone mad, were quite clear to a certain little lady in Vienna, who consequently pined less than her father had anticipated.

"Amid all our musical soul-feasts," he writes, "there always peeps out an angel-face, which more than resembles a certain Clara. Why art thou not with us? (Warum!) And how thou wilt have thought of us last night, from the 'Meeresstille' to the flaming close of the A major symphony! I also thought of thee then, Chiara, pure one, bright one, whose hands are stretched towards Italy, whither thy longing draws thee, but thy dreamy eye still turned to us."

At length a sun-burst. In 1840 appeared the first number of Schumann's "Myrthen," whose dedication, Seiner geliebten Braut, breaks forth in the passionate and beautiful song,-"Thou my soul, O thou my heart!"

But this word Braut means Bride in the German sense of "affianced"; and although the joy of this relation passed over Schumann like the breath of a Tropic, bringing forth, amongst other gorgeous fruits, his glorious First Symphony, which some one has well called the Symphony of Bliss, yet, ere this bliss was more than an elusive vision, the two passed through fierce wildernesses, and drank together of bitter Marahs. "But of all this," said Florestan, "you will know, if you have the right to know, from these,"-his "Voice from afar," and his "Night-Pieces."

Neither of us dared break the silence claimed by these exquisite pieces when they ceased; we shook hands and parted without a word.

The service I was able to render an official personage connected with -- College in New England procured me access to the library belonging to that institution. In common with many of my fellow-citizens, I had previously enjoyed the pleasure of responding to circulars petitioning for money to buy books for interment in this choice literary catacomb; nay, I was even allowed the satisfaction of an annual stare at them through an iron grating, and of reading a placard to the effect that nobody was allowed to enter an alcove or take down a volume.

As it occurred to me that the generous donors could not object to add one more to the select half-dozen or so, who, by having the privilege of the shelves, could really use the library, I demanded this favor of the gentleman who desired to recompense me for what I had done for him. The Librarian, who valued books as things capable of being locked up in cells like criminals, there to figure numerically to the confusion of rival institutions, was manifestly disturbed when I presented my credentials. The authority, however, was not to be questioned;-I was to be admitted to the library at any hour of the day; and I took care to drop a civil expression to imply my estimation of the privilege and my purpose of enjoying it.

Wanting the leisure to attempt that ponderous undertaking known as "a course of reading," it became my habit to browse about the building upon Saturday afternoons, and finally to establish myself, with whatever authors I had selected, in a certain retired alcove devoted to the metaphysicians. This comfortable nook opens just behind Crawford's bust of the late President T--, and is nearly opposite the famous Mather Safe. As it is possible that I am addressing some who are not graduates of -- College, nor familiar with its library, it may be well to say a word of the history of the spacious and ancient coffer to which allusion is made.

The Mather Safe-which, by the way, is not of iron, but of oak heavily bound with that metal-is said to have been among the possessions of the author of the "Magnalia." Its last private proprietor was a collateral descendant of the Mathers, an eccentric character, popularly known as Miser Farrel. As Farrel was a bachelor, and had the reputation of being enormously rich, the College authorities of his day were accustomed to treat him with distinguished consideration, and went so far, I believe, as to vote him some minor degree. What effect these academic blandishments may have had upon their object cannot at present be determined. For when the day came for the long-expected will to be opened, it was found that the old gentleman had bequeathed to the College only his Mather Safe, with certain papers carefully let into the wood-work in one corner of the same,-which papers were not to be removed or opened for a hundred years.

It may be conceived that this bulky benefaction was not accepted with the best grace, particularly as the testator made no provision for considerable expense necessarily incurred in moving and setting it up in the library. Yet, not satisfied with this culpable negligence, Mr. Farrel had affixed still other conditions to the acceptance of his gift. He had caused two massive locks to be put upon the Mather Safe, of which he enjoined that the respective keys should be forever held by the President and Treasurer of the College, to the end that neither could have access to its contents except in the presence of the other. Moreover, he required that the Safe should be used only as a receptacle for packages which the depositors desired to keep from the world for at least fifty years. Of course no right-minded corporation would have endured this posthumous fussiness, were it not for the mysterious papers left in the Safe,-these being considered instruments whereby immense possessions would finally come to the College. But, as their worthy friend, however niggardly in other respects, had taken care to save nothing in lawyers, there were really no means of disregarding his wishes, except by relinquishing all claims under the will. And so, many years ago, the Mather Safe came to be opened to the public on the conditions already declared. At first, it was matter of surprise that so many persons appeared to claim the privilege of Farrel's singular legacy. Carefully enveloped packages had been consigned to various periods of oblivion by all conditions of men and women. These were numbered and registered in a volume kept for the purpose; they were severally addressed, perhaps to a specified descendant of some living person, perhaps to the future occupant of some professor's chair or metropolitan pulpit.

It was near the Mather Safe, as I have already said, that my favorite alcove opened. In the short winter afternoon, when the twilight thickened without the building, and the type began to blur within, I would lay aside my book and muse over wild rumors of secrets borne by this messenger between the generations. Journals and letters, it was said, were there concealed, which should change the current gossip of history, and explode many bubble-reputations that had glittered on the world. There were hints of deadly sins, committed by men high in Church and State, which their perpetrators lacked the courage to confess before their fellows, but which, in the bitterness of remorse, they had recorded in the Mather Safe, to blacken their fame to future times,-thus taking a ghastly satisfaction from the knowledge that they should not always appear as whited sepulchres before men. There was vague talk, also, of funds which had been deposited to found some professorship in the College, to furnish some instruction which the age was not advanced enough to accept. Then, too, there were intimations of endowments to establish scholarships for women, who,-so it was argued,-after the increasing enlightenment of a few score of years, would be admitted to every privilege of culture offered to men. In short, there was matter enough to send a curdling tingle through the blood, as this tough old ark, buffeting slowly through the years, entered its familiar night. If there was deficiency in the testimony which consigned any special wonder to its keeping, there was, doubtless, sufficient truth in common reports to justify the imagination in interpreting misty hieroglyphics of its own device.

During the latter part of a certain August-my family being established at the seaside-I determined to devote a long day to the College Library. The fact was, that a trifling domestic incident-no other than the smoking of a kitchen-chimney-had turned my attention to the conditions of atmospheric changes. Certain phenomena I had observed seemed inconsistent with the law assumed in popular text-books. Indeed, as it appeared to me, modifications of a received theory-which might be determined by a diligent comparison of existing authorities-would suggest a household economy of great practical importance. Certain facts, which must have been noted by all the great voyagers of the world, might give me data from which to establish the suspected conclusion. I accordingly repaired to the library at a very early hour, and labored through the day in collecting and committing to writing what had been observed by many eminent navigators upon the point in question. Four o'clock in the afternoon found me too tired to apply any process of analysis to the observations obtained. I therefore retired to my accustomed seat, took down almost the first book which came to hand, and resigned myself to the impressions of a favorite author. I had passed about an hour in a delicious state of dreamy tranquillity, sometimes reading, sometimes pausing to color the faded page with the brilliant hues of more modern thought, when my attention was attracted by a familiar voice proceeding from the neighborhood of the Mather Safe.

"The President and Treasurer were to have been here at five o'clock."

"I have heard nothing of it," said the Librarian. "I am sure that the President is out of town for the day."

"Strange! strange!" exclaimed the Reverend Mr. Clifton, in a very excited tone. "I wish to make a deposit of great importance in the Mather Safe. I had the assurance that the Safe should be opened at five this afternoon. Here, read the solemn promise upon which I have come from Foxden!"

The Librarian glanced at an open letter which Clifton held out to him, and said, in a quiet manner,-

"The President promises to meet you in the College Library on the afternoon of Thursday, the twenty-fourth instant; to-day is Wednesday, the twenty-third."

"Is it possible?" muttered the clergyman, with a look of startled despair. "Pardon my disturbance. I have been hardly myself for these last weeks. Yet I can wait."

I spoke to Mr. Clifton as he was about to leave the library. He blenched at hearing my voice, and strove to conceal the package beneath his arm.

"How do my good friends in Foxden?" said I, inviting him into my alcove. "Is it true that Dr. Dastick has presented his cabinet of curiosities to the town?"

"What are you reading?" said the clergyman, in a tone of curt authority very foreign to the mild persuasiveness of his usual professional accents.

I exhibited the title of the book: it was the "Meditations of Descartes."

"And do you follow those who vainly seek for truth through the inner world of man, not conforming themselves to the necessities of the outward world and the teachings of Revelation?"

I defended the usefulness of some acquaintance with the original and powerful thinker, whose apologies are certainly profuse enough to satisfy the most orthodox.

"Yes; I suppose you read Spinoza, Hegel, Fichte, the Atheism of D'Holbach, Utilitarianism Systematized by Auguste Comte! Did you ever go fishing in a dory when the wind was off shore?"

There was an alarm in the eye and manner of Mr. Clifton, a tremulous restlessness in his speech, which warned me to avoid discussion, and endeavor to soothe his agitation. It was only to the last interrogatory, therefore, that I made some light reply.

"The sea sparkles gayly," pursued the clergyman, in the manner of an extemporaneous preacher who strives to catch in a net of decorations some illustration which presents itself,-"the boat tosses on from wave to wave, for dories will sail before the wind. Soon we are miles from shore, and throw the anchor. What auspicious expansion of soul and body! How we slide up and down the backs of great billows, and cast our lines with ever-varying success! But the night comes, and with it the necessity of rowing back against wind and tide. Ah, then how long the lonely ocean-leagues! How distant the time when we may hope to stand confused and giddy upon solid earth! Some never see the land again, but are swept out into the storm and darkness, and are lost,-lost!"

"I presume I understand the significance of your similitude," I replied, a little annoyed at this inopportune indulgence of the pastoral privilege. "You would imply the dangerous tendency of a certain sort of philosophical speculation; and so far we doubtless agree. Yet I ought to say, that, in cases where personal investigation is possible, I would take neither popular clamor nor learned dogmatism as conclusive evidence against any writer's honesty and usefulness. With the vulgar, genius has always seemed a sort of madness; and should a man rise preeminent above the teachers of his generation, his wisdom would appear to them as foolishness."

A change came over the face of Clifton as I said these words. It was as if a mask had fallen. Perchance he had wished to appear to me in that character of instructor which he desired some competent person to assume to him. Now, the relaxed muscles and averted eye only asked the sympathy of an equal. He spoke with forced, and almost grating, utterance.

"Then you have used experience well enough to know that some minds may bear into the world a light, a knowledge too fine for general perception, too pure for even exceptional recognition."

"I fully believe it possible," I said. "Yonder old Safe, if rumor says true, holds many mystic signals which the past and present could address only to the future,-signs meaningless, no doubt, to you or me, but which the freemasonry of higher intelligence shall render plain in the time hereafter."

"And what if I had come," exclaimed Clifton, eagerly,-"what if I had come to add to those deposits which are not for this time, but which may be for other times? What blame to me, if I am here to do this? Should we common men, who find a life full of active duties presented to our acceptance,-should such as we, I say, receive this world as a pageant before which we must sit down and evolve a doctrine? The conceit of external education is at present too strong to acknowledge a divine element radiating from the depths of the soul, and finding in the mind only an awkward and imperfect instrument. Any extravagance is now tolerated, but an extravagance of spirituality; and we find altogether wanting the perception, that, rising from the gross symbols of language, can know the subtile and precious emotion which in a more advanced state of being those symbols might suggest."

As it was evident that Mr. Clifton was laboring under great nervous excitability, I judged it prudent not to question the sequence of what he said, or even demand that it be made intelligible by further explanation. Indeed, I was sufficiently occupied in striving to identify this incomprehensible person with my familiar acquaintance, the pastor of the First Church in Foxden. It occurred to me that something had once been said of Clifton's connection with that topsy-turvy sodality popularly known as "The Transcendentalists." But this was many years ago; and the world always supposed that he had outgrown his early errors, and found, in the liberal theology of New England, a more genuine inspiration. In meeting him in his pastoral relation, I had only remarked that he was one of those men who find it very difficult to resist the social influences into which they may be thrown. This was probably the case even where that influence tended to degrade him from the plane he would have occupied, if left to himself. His spiritual life seemed to lack that vigor and buoyancy so infinitely important to contemplative men. He appeared to be ever yearning for something which should add robustness to his convictions. After a pause of some moments, Clifton again addressed me.

"Recollections of moments, months of excitement, of intense power, have returned! They may not fade again unspoken. You shall know my long-cherished secret. Younger in years, you may scarcely advise; but, at least, you may give sympathy that shall confirm my decision. I have engaged rooms at the neighboring hotel. Come and pass the evening-nay, the night-with me; for much must be read and thought and spoken before the black veil of personality can be lifted between us."

It has already been observed that my family were at the seaside. This circumstance left me sole disposer of my time and localities. How, then, resist the inclination to see out the adventure upon which I had stumbled? Let me credit myself also with a worthier motive: I saw that my companion was in no state to be left to himself,-and, really, there was no mutual friend to whom I could consign him. Accordingly I offered my arm in a manner to imply acquiescence in his proposal.

We soon reached the hotel, and ascended to a room in the remote corner of a spacious wing. Clifton at once turned the key, placed his package upon the table, and proceeded to employ a stray bit of carpet in stopping a ventilator which communicated with the entry. Having satisfied himself that this passage was rendered impervious to sound, he drew two chairs up to the table, motioned me into one, and planted himself in the other with the air of a man, in popular phrase, about to make a night of it.

"Did you ever hear of Herbert Vannelle?" he asked, abruptly.

It can hardly be necessary to say that a substitute is here placed for the name really mentioned.

I replied in the negative, and asked where the gentleman lived.

"He lives nowhere on earth; he is dead,-just dead."

"A friend of yours?"

"A master once; now a presence eluding, haunting, torturing. He left me this manuscript; it is a 'Philosophy of the Absolute.'" (Here Clifton drew from a curiously contrived case of parchment a cluster of pages.) "It has now twenty-two hours to appear in the present century. You shall devote the night to reading it, and tell me that I have acted well."

A sultry August evening, a smoky boarding-house lamp, much skirmishing of mosquitoes, and-a manuscript system of philosophy! The prospect was not inviting. The reading of other people's manuscripts is surely the crucial test of a devoted benevolence. There are few ways in which I am so little ready to oblige my fellow-men. I had, indeed, at times, been induced to inspect sundry romances in blotted embryo; but, as yet, nobody had called upon me with a system of philosophy. Printed philosophy is none too easy reading. But to sit there, under the guardianship of Clifton, and spell out the dim dogmatism of some nebulous fanatic,-of course it was not to be thought of for a moment. With a suave periphrasis of speech I questioned the expediency of the proposition.

"I shall ring for candles that will burn during the night," said Mr. Clifton, heedless of my expostulation. "Also some refreshment. You take tea, I suppose? You shall read the first ten pages of Vannelle's writing. It is possible you may exercise self-control enough to abandon it unfinished. But you will not sleep tonight."

There was a confidence in the minister's tone which gave rather unpleasant emphasis to this final prophecy. Still, I believed myself capable of the ten pages without establishing a hopelessly wakeful condition,-indeed, it was something to be guarantied against the opposite infirmity. The tea, accompanied by a few thin shavings of toast, presently arrived. The means of procuring light were also furnished us. Clifton's hand lay heavily upon the manuscript until the attendant had disappeared for the last time, and the door was locked behind him. He then opened the papers before me, and signified that the time had come. I braced myself as for a serious undertaking.

Thus I accepted the task. How give words to the singular emotions which soon possessed me? As if some charm, some spell of magnetism, had been given to the paper, my whole consciousness was riveted upon it. I know not how to represent this bold, this startling attempt to establish a positive basis for metaphysical philosophy, an exact science of all things human and divine. Here was a man, perchance of more courage and conscience, perchance of more devilish recklessness, than any of his contemporaries. But how deal with what came to me from that wondrous writing in the ambiguities of common language? All thought-even supposing it embodied in a perfect form of speech-is subject to the limitations of the recipient mind. My own glimpses of the writer's meaning were necessarily most indistinct. I cannot attempt to transfer them. I was controlled by a force not my own. The shadow of a mysterious power was over me. The mists of sentimental pantheism were left far below the clear-cut summits whither the reader was invited to ascend. There was an interpretation of Revelation far more removed from the apparent letter than that of Swedenborg. Here was reaffirmed (though for a widely different purpose) what the Romish Church has ever declared,-that the Scriptures, recording spiritual truth, cannot be comprehensible to the natural understanding,-that, while the Sacred Writings contain a natural letter, it can be translated into spiritual verity only by a few exceptional men. If this scheme of philosophy was an idealism, it nevertheless manifested itself through the plainest realities. The solution of the problem seemed to come not from one point, but from all points. Certainly there was a tendency towards the supersensible; but this direction was taken through stern grappling with the actual. At one time I struggled against the august spirit that was borne in upon me; at another, I was utterly subdued by the lofty enthusiasm of the writer,-something within me capable of absolute cognition seemed responding to his appeals. But the pith and vitality of this marvel could be recognized only by long experience. And here the student was required to stake his soul upon a perilous cast. For, if not pursued and fathomed to full satisfaction, this view of things would be disturbing, paralyzing. With any half-acceptance a man might scarcely live. It must fashion the mind as an artist fashions the passive metals into a musical instrument, and then every event in time might touch it to exquisite harmony. But the more ravishing the beauty which seemed offered through perfect realization of this knowledge, the more blighting would be its effects, if entertained in the spirit of a selfish dilettanteism. For in certain passages were breathed faint suggestions, that moral codes held sacred by the people could not bind the initiated,-nay, that what seemed most evil might be so explained as to become wholly legitimate to the elect.

It was far into the night. I had gone over about a third of the manuscript. Sharp questions assailed my ears. Was I bound to jeopard all the common good of life for the chance of-just failing to know existence from a higher plane? Could I ascend so far above the frailties of average men as to receive in purity and innocence the license which acceptance of this strange scheme would surely give? Dim-sighted as I was, it was necessary to rise and dispel this splendid phantasm. I shuddered in sudden alarm at the danger which threatened me. By a spasmodic movement, in which I failed to recognize any presence of my will, the manuscript was closed and handed to Clifton. Welcome existence under coarsest and harshest terms, rather than tamper with such fearful possibilities!

For hours the minister had gazed into my face, partaking the excitement to which he had subjected me. He had lighted and trimmed the candles, as was necessary, but had never broken silence. And now there came from him the deep sigh of relief from an absorbing interest; he sighed as a little child when the fairytale is ended and the tense strain of attention may be relaxed.

"What was this man?" I demanded, hurriedly.

"What he was is to be discovered through these writings, if it may be found out at all. What he was is not for me nor for you to know. It is possible that he may meet with competent judges hereafter, even among men. Look at this address."

Clifton handed me a little memorandum relating to the ultimate disposition of the manuscript. It was to remain for eighty years in the Mather Safe, and was then to be consigned to the occupant of the Chair of Moral Philosophy in the College.

"Say rather to the last minority-candidate for the professorship!" I exclaimed. "I doubt if the actual winner of that comfortable possession will feel disposed to abandon the market-worth of conventional acquirements, and set forth as a humble student of unpopular truth."

The minister seemed struck with the suggestion, and made the alteration I had indicated.

The darkest hour of the night had come. Every sound of human activity had long ago ceased. It was the quiet time when one may most easily probe an intense experience. I felt that more was to be known,-something which the minister longed to tell,-something to which what he had caused me to read was to serve as a prelude. I suspected how powerless must have been this sensitive man in the presence of the Idea which he had carried. Doubtless, in one of his peculiar tendencies, it might prevent all harmonious action,-it might ever goad the intellect, and crush the heart. As the confession trembled upon the lips of Clifton, I signified my profound sympathy. It is an awful moment, when a mature man tries to put off the solitariness of his life.

What was then communicated I can repeat only in the first person. The pathetic earnestness of the speaker imprinted on my memory the very phrases that he used; there can be few verbal changes as they now flow from the pen.