No More Learning

The girl did not watch him. She was thinking of Young
Aleck, and of Christmas Day, now near. The sergeant did not
look back.
Meantime the party at Windsor's store was broken up. Pretty
Pierre and Young Aleck had talked together, and the old man
had heard his son say:
"Remember, Pierre, it is for the last time. "
Then they talked after this fashion:-
"Ah, I know, mon ami; for the last time! Eh, bien! You
will spend Christmas Day with us too—
No! You surely will
not leave us on the day of good fortune? Where better can you
take your pleasure-for the last time? One day is not enough
for farewell. Two, three; that is the magic number. You will,
eh? no? Well, well, you will come to-morrow-and- eh, mon
ami, where do you go the next day? Oh, pardon, I forgot, you
spend the Christmas Day-I know. And the day of the New
Year? Ah, Young Aleck, that is what they say,-the Devil for
the Devil's luck. So! "
"Stop that, Pierre. There was fierceness in the tone. « I
spend the Christmas Day where you don't, and as I like, and the
rest doesn't concern you. I drink with you, I play with you-
bien! As you say yourself, bien! isn't that enough? »


## p. 11060 (#272) ##########################################

11060
GILBERT PARKER
"Pardon! We will not quarrel. No: we spend not the
Christmas Day after the same fashion, quite; then, to-morrow at
Pardon's Drive! Adieu! "
Pretty Pierre went out of one door, a malediction between
his white teeth, and Aleck went out of another door with a male-
diction upon his gloomy lips. But both maledictions were leveled
at the same person. Poor Aleck!
«< Poor Aleck! " That is the way we sometimes think of a
good nature gone awry; one that has learned to say cruel male-
dictions to itself, and against which demons hurl their maledic-
tions too. Alas for the ne'er-do-weel!
That night a stalwart figure passed from David Humphrey's
door, carrying with him the warm atmosphere of a good woman's
love. The chilly outer air of the world seemed not to touch
him, Love's curtains were drawn so close. Had one stood within
"the Hunter's Room," as it was called, a little while before, one
would have seen a man's head bowed before a woman, and her
hand smoothing back the hair from the handsome brow where
dissipation had drawn some deep lines. Presently the hand
raised the head until the eyes of the woman looked full into the
eyes of the man.
"You will not go to Pardon's Drive again, will you, Aleck? "
"Never again after Christmas Day, Mab. But I must go
to-morrow. I have given my word. "
"I know. To meet Pretty Pierre and all the rest, and for
what? O Aleck, isn't the suspicion about your father enough,
but you must put this on me as well? "
"My father must suffer for his wrong-doing if he does wrong,
and I for mine. "
There was a moment's silence. He bowed his head again.
"And I have done wrong to us both. Forgive me, Mab. "
She leaned over and fondled his hair. "I forgive you, Aleck. "
A thousand new thoughts were thrilling through him. Yet
this man had given his word to do that for which he must ask
forgiveness of the woman he loved. But to Pretty Pierre, for-
given or unforgiven, he would keep his word. She understood
it better than most of those who read this brief record can.
Every sphere has its code of honor and duty peculiar to itself.
"You will come to me on Christmas morning, Aleck? "
"I will come on Christmas morning. "
"And no more after that of Pretty Pierre ? »
"And no more of Pretty Pierre. "


## p. 11061 (#273) ##########################################

GILBERT PARKER
11061
She trusted him; but neither could reckon with unknown
forces.
Sergeant Fones, sitting in the barracks in talk with Private
Gellatly, said at that moment in a swift silence:--
"Exactly. "
Pretty Pierre, at Pardon's Drive, drinking a glass of brandy
at that moment, said to the ceiling:-
"No more of Pretty Pierre after to-morrow night, monsieur!
Bien! If it is for the last time, then it is for the last time.
So . . . so! "
He smiled. His teeth were amazingly white.
The stalwart figure strode on under the stars, the white night.
a lens for visions of days of rejoicing to come. All evil was far
from him. The dolorous tide rolled back in this hour from his
life, and he reveled in the light of a new day.
"When I've played my last card to-morrow night with Pretty
Pierre, I'll begin the world again," he whispered.
And Sergeant Fones in the barracks said just then, in response
to a further remark of Private Gellatly:-
"Exactly. "
Young Aleck is singing now:—
"Out from your vineland come
Into the prairies wild;
Here will we make our home,-
Father, mother, and child;
Come, my love, to our home,—
Father, mother, and child,
Father, mother, and
He fell to thinking again-"and child—and child,”—it was in
his ears and in his heart.
But Pretty Pierre was singing softly to himself in the room
at Pardon's Drive:-
"Three good friends with the wine at night —
Vive la compagnie!
Two good friends when the sun grows bright—
Vive la compagnie!
Vive la, vive la, vive la mort!
Vive la, vive la, vive la mort!
Three good friends, two good friends—
Vive la compagnie! "


## p. 11062 (#274) ##########################################

11062
GILBERT PARKER
What did it mean?
Private Gellatly was cousin to Idaho Jack, and Idaho Jack
disliked Pretty Pierre, though he had been one of the gang.
The cousins had seen each other lately, and Private Gellatly had
had a talk with the man who was ha'sh. It may be that others
besides Pierre had an idea of what it meant.
In the house at Pardon's Drive the next night sat eight men,
of whom three were Pretty Pierre, Young Aleck, and Idaho
Jack. Young Aleck's face was flushed with bad liquor and
the worse excitement of play. This was one of the unreckoned
forces. Was this the man that sang the tender song under the
stars last night? Pretty Pierre's face was less pretty than usual:
the cheeks were pallid, the eyes were hard and cold. Once he
looked at his partner as if to say, "Not yet. " Idaho Jack saw
the look: he glanced at his watch; it was eleven o'clock. At that
moment the door opened, and Sergeant Fones entered. All started
to their feet, most with curses on their lips; but Sergeant Fones
never seemed to hear anything that could make a feature of his
face alter. Pierre's hand was on his hip, as if feeling for some-
thing. Sergeant Fones saw that; but he walked to where Aleck
stood, with his unplayed cards still in his hand, and laying a
hand on his shoulder, said, "Come with me. "
"Why should I go with you? " this with a drunken man's
bravado.
"You are my prisoner. "
Pierre stepped forward. "What is his crime? " he exclaimed.
"How does that concern you, Pretty Pierre ? »
――――
"He is my friend. "
"Is he your friend, Aleck? "
What was there in the eyes of Sergeant Fones that forced
the reply, "To-night, yes; to-morrow, no"?
"Exactly.
It is near to-morrow; come. "
Aleck was led towards the door. Once more Pierre's hand
went to his hip; but he was looking at the prisoner, not at the
sergeant. The sergeant saw, and his fingers were at his belt.
He opened the door. Aleck passed out. He followed. Two
horses were tied to a post. With difficulty Aleck was mounted.
Once on the way, his brain began slowly to clear; but he grew
painfully cold. It was a bitter night.
It was a bitter night. How bitter it might have
been for the ne'er-do-weel let the words of Idaho Jack, spoken
in a long hour's talk next day with Old Brown Windsor, show.


## p. 11063 (#275) ##########################################

GILBERT PARKER
11063
Pretty Pierre, after the two were gone, said, with a shiver of
curses, 'Another hour and it would have been done and no one
to blame. He was ready for trouble. His money was nearly
finished. A little quarrel easily made, the door would open, and
he would pass out. His horse would be gone, he could not come
back; he would walk. The air is cold, quite, quite cold; and the
snow is a soft bed. He would sleep well and sound, having seen.
Pretty Pierre for the last time. And now! " The rest was
French and furtive.
From that hour Idaho Jack and Pretty Pierre parted com-
pany.
Riding from Pardon's Drive, Young Aleck noticed at last that
they were not going toward the barracks.
He said, "Why do you arrest me? "
The sergeant replied: "You will know that soon enough.
You are now going to your own home. To-morrow you will
keep your word and go to David Humphrey's place; the next
day I will come for you. Which do you choose: to ride with
me to-night to the barracks and know why you are arrested,
or go unknowing, as I bid you, and keep your word with the
girl? "
«<
-
―――
Through Aleck's fevered brain there ran the words of the
song he sang before:
"Out from your vineland come
Into the prairies wild;
Here will we make our home,-
Father, mother, and child. "
He could have but one answer.
At the door of his home the sergeant left him with the words,
"Remember you are on parole. "
Aleck noticed, as the sergeant rode away, that the face of the
sky had changed, and slight gusts of wind had come up.
At any
other time his mind would have dwelt upon the fact. It did not
do so now.
Christmas Day came. People said that the fiercest night since
the blizzard day of 1863 had been passed. But the morning
was clear and beautiful. The sun came up like a great flower
expanding. First the yellow, then the purple, then the red, and
then a mighty shield of roses. The world was a blanket of drift,
and down, and glistening silver.


## p. 11064 (#276) ##########################################

11064
GILBERT PARKER
·
Mab Humphrey greeted her lover with such a smile as only
springs to a thankful woman's lips. He had given his word and
had kept it; and the path of the future seemed surer.
He was a prisoner on parole; still that did not depress him.
Plans for coming days were talked of, and the laughter of many
voices filled the house. The ne'er-do-weel was clothed and in his
right mind. In the Hunter's Room the noblest trophy was the
heart of a repentant prodigal.
In the barracks that morning a gazetted notice was posted,
announcing, with such technical language as is the custom, that
Sergeant Fones was promoted to be a lieutenant in the Mounted
Police Force of the Northwest Territory. When the officer in
command sent for him he could not be found. But he was
found that morning; and when Private Gellatly, with a warm
hand, touching the glove of "iron and ice," that, indeed, now,-
said, "Sergeant Fones, you are promoted, God help you! " he
gave no sign. Motionless, stern, erect, he sat there upon his
horse, beside a stunted larch-tree. The broncho seemed to un-
derstand, for he did not stir, and had not done so for hours;
they could tell that. The bridle rein was still in the frigid fin-
gers, and a smile was upon the face.
A smile upon the face of Sergeant Fones.
Perhaps he smiled because he was going to the Barracks of
the Free.
"Free among the Dead, like unto them that are wounded and
lie in the grave, that are out of remembrance. "
In the wild night he had lost his way, though but a few
miles from the barracks.
He had done his duty rigidly in that sphere of life where he
had lived so much alone among his many comrades. Had he
exceeded his duty once in arresting Young Aleck?
When, the next day, Sergeant Fones lay in the barracks, over
him the flag for which he had sworn to do honest service, and
his promotion papers in his quiet hand, the two who loved each
other stood beside him for many a throbbing minute. And one
said to herself silently, "I felt sometimes-" but no more words
did she say even to herself.
Old Aleck came in, and walked to where the sergeant slept,
wrapped close in that white frosted coverlet which man wears
but once. He stood for a moment silent, his fingers numbly
clasped.


## p. 11065 (#277) ##########################################

GILBERT PARKER
11065
Private Gellatly spoke softly: "Angels betide me, it's little
we knew the great of him till he wint away; the pride, and the
law-and the love of him. "
In the tragedy that faced them this Christmas morning, one
at least had seen "the love of him. " Perhaps the broncho had
known it before.
Old Aleck laid a palm upon the hand he had never touched
when it had life. "He's-too-ha'sh," he said, slowly.
Private Gellatly looked up wonderingly.
But the old man's eyes were wet.
VALMOND
From When Valmond Came to Pontiac. ' Copyright 1895, by Stone &
Kimball
ON
N ONE Corner stood the house of Monsieur Garon the avocat;
on another, the shop of the Little Chemist; on another,
the office of Medallion the auctioneer; and on the last,
the Hotel Louis Quinze. The chief characteristics of Monsieur
Garon's house were its brass door-knobs, and the verdant luxuri-
ance of the vines that climbed its sides; of the Little Chemist's
shop, the perfect whiteness of the building, the rolls of sober
wall-paper, and the bottles of colored water in the shop windows;
of Medallion's, the stoop that surrounded three sides of the build-
ing, and the notices of sales tacked up, pasted up, on the front;
of the Hotel Louis Quinze, the deep dormer windows, its solid
timbers, and the veranda that gave its front distinction;- for this
veranda had been the pride of several generations of landlords,
and its heavy carving and bulky grace were worth even more
admiration than Pontiac gave to it.
The square which the two roads and the four corners made
was on week-days the rendezvous of Pontiac and the whole par-
ish; on Sunday mornings the rendezvous was shifted to the
large church on the hillside, beside which was the house of the
curé, Monsieur Fabre. Traveling towards the south, out of
the silken haze of a midsummer day, you would come in time
to the hills of Maine; north, to the city of Quebec and the River
St. Lawrence; east, to the ocean; and west, to the Great Lakes
and the land of the English. Over this bright province Britain


## p. 11066 (#278) ##########################################

11066
GILBERT PARKER
raised her flag; but only Medallion and a few others loved it for
its own sake, or saluted it in the English tongue.
In the drab velvet dust of these four corners were gathered,
one night of July a generation ago, the children of the village
and many of their elders. All the events of that epoch were
dated from the evening of this day. Another day of note the
parish cherished, but it was merely a grave fulfillment of the
first.
Upon the veranda stoop of the Louis Quinze stood a man
of apparently about twenty-eight years of age. When you came
to study him closely, some sense of time and experience in his
look told you that he might be thirty-eight, though his few gray
hairs seemed but to emphasize a certain youthfulness in him.
His eye was full, singularly clear, almost benign; at one mo-
ment it gave the impression of resolution, at another it suggested
the wayward abstraction of the dreamer. He was well figured,
with a hand of peculiar whiteness, suggesting in its breadth more
the man of action than of meditation. But it was a contradic-
tion, for as you saw it rise and fall, you were struck by its
dramatic delicacy; as it rested on the railing of the veranda, by
its latent power.
You faced incongruity everywhere. His dress
was bizarre, his face almost classical, the brow clear and strong,
the profile good to the mouth, where there showed a combina-
tion of sensuousness and adventure. Yet in the face there was
an elusive sadness, strangely out of keeping with the long linen
coat, frilled shirt, the flowered waistcoat, lavender trousers, boots
of enameled leather, and straw hat with white linen streamers.
It was a whimsical picture.
At the moment that the curé and Medallion the auctioneer
came down the street together towards the Louis Quinze, talking
amiably, this singular gentleman was throwing out hot pennies
with a large spoon from a tray in his hand, calling on the child-
ren to gather them, in French which was not the French of
Pontiac-or Quebec; and this fact the curé was quick to detect,
as Monsieur Garon the avocat, standing on the outskirts of the
crowd, had done some moments before. The stranger seemed
only conscious of his act of liberality and the children before
him. There was a naturalness in his enjoyment which was almost
boy-like; a naïve sort of exultation seemed to possess him.
He laughed softly to see the children toss the pennies from
hand to hand, blowing to cool them; the riotous yet half timorous


## p. 11067 (#279) ##########################################

GILBERT PARKER
11067
scramble for them, and burnt fingers thrust into hot blithe
mouths. And when he saw a fat little lad of five crowded out
of the way by his elders, he stepped down with a quick word of
sympathy, put a half-dozen pennies in the child's pocket, snatched
him up and kissed him, and then returned to the veranda, where
were gathered the landlord, the miller, and Monsieur De la Ri-
vière the young Seigneur. But the most intent spectator of the
scene was Parpon the dwarf, who sat grotesquely crouched upon
the wide ledge of a window.
Tray after tray of pennies was brought out and emptied, till
at last the stranger paused, handed the spoon to the landlord,
drew out a fine white handkerchief, dusted his fingers, standing
silent for a moment and smiling upon the crowd.
It was at this point that some young villager called, in pro-
fuse compliment, "Three cheers for the Prince! "
The stranger threw an accent of pose into his manner, his
eye lighted, his chin came up, he dropped one hand negligently
on his hip, and waved the other in acknowledgment. Presently
he beckoned, and from the hotel were brought out four great
pitchers of wine and a dozen tin cups; and sending the garçon
around with one, the landlord with another, he motioned Parpon
the dwarf to bear a hand. Parpon shot out a quick, half resent-
ful look at him; but meeting a warm, friendly eye, he took the
pitcher and went among the elders, while the stranger himself
courteously drank with the young men of the village, who, like
many wiser folk, thus yielded to the charm of mystery. To
every one he said a hearty thing, and sometimes touched his
greeting off with a bit of poetry or a rhetorical phrase. These
dramatic extravagances served him well, for he was among a
race of story-tellers and crude poets.
Parpon, uncouth and furtive, moved through the crowd, dis-
pensing as much irony as wine:-
―
"Three bucks we come to a pretty inn:
'Hostess,' say we, 'have you red wine? '
Brave! Brave!
'Hostess,' say we, have you red wine ? >
Bravement!
Our feet are sore and our crops are dry,
Bravement! »
This he hummed to Monsieur Garon the avocat, in a tone all
silver; for he had that one gift of Heaven as recompense for his


## p. 11068 (#280) ##########################################

11068
GILBERT PARKER
It
deformity, his long arms, big head, and short stature, - a voice
which gave you a shiver of delight and pain all at once.
had in it mystery and the incomprehensible. This drinking song,
lilted just above his breath, touched some antique memory in the
avocat; and he nodded kindly at the dwarf, though he refused.
the wine.
"Ah, M'sieu' le Curé," said Parpon, ducking his head to avoid
the hand that Medallion would have laid on it, "we're going to
be somebody now in Pontiac, bless the Lord! We're simple folk,
but we're not neglected. He wears a king's ribbon on his breast,
M'sieu' le Curé! »
This was true. Fastened by a gold bar to the stranger's
breast was the crimson ribbon of an order.
The Curé smiled at Parpon's words, and looked curiously and
gravely at the stranger. Tall Medallion, the auctioneer, took a
glass of the wine, and lifting it, said, "Who shall I drink to,
Parpon, my dear? What is he? "
"Ten to one, a dauphin or a fool," answered Parpon with a
laugh like the note of an organ.
"Drink to both, long legs. "
Then he trotted away to the Little Chemist.
"Hush, my brother," said he, and he drew the other's ear
down to his mouth. "Now there'll be plenty of work for you.
We're going to be gay in Pontiac, We'll come to you with our
spoiled stomachs. "
He edged round the circle, and back to where the miller his
master, and the young Seigneur stood.
"Make more fine flour, old man," said he to the miller:
pâtés are the thing now. " Then, to Monsieur De la Rivière,
"There's nothing like hot pennies and wine to make the world
love you.
But it's too late, too late for my young Seigneur! "
he added in mockery, and again he began to hum in a sort of
amiable derision:
"My little tender heart,
O gai, vive le roi!
My little tender heart,
O gai, vive le roi!
'Tis for a grand baron,
Vive le roi, la reine;
'Tis for a grand baron,
Vive Napoléon! »
With the last two lines the words swelled out far louder than
was the dwarf's intention; for few save Medallion and Monsieur


## p. 11069 (#281) ##########################################

GILBERT PARKER
11069
De la Rivière had ever heard him sing. His concert house was
the Rock of Red Pigeons, his favorite haunt, his other home,
where, it was said, he met the Little Good Folk of the Scarlet
Hills, and had gay hours with them. And this was a matter of
awe to the timid habitants.
At the words "Vive Napoléon! " a hand touched him on the
shoulder. He turned and saw the stranger looking at him in-
tently, his eyes alight.
"Sing it," he said softly, yet with an air of command.
pon hesitated, shrank back.
_
ear.
"Sing it," he persisted; and the request was taken up by
others, til Parpon's face flushed with a sort of pleasurable de-
fiance. The stranger stooped and whispered something in his
There was a moment's pause, in which the dwarf looked
into the other's eyes with an intense curiosity, or incredulity,-
and then Medallion lifted the little man onto the railing of the
veranda, and over the heads and into the hearts of the people
there passed, in a divine voice, a song known to many, yet com-
ing as a new revelation to them all.
1
"My mother promised it,
O gai, vive le roi!
My mother promised it,
O gai, vive le roi!
To a gentleman of the king,
Vive le roi, la reine;
To a gentleman of the king,
Vive Napoléon! »
This was chanted lightly, airily, with a sweetness almost
absurd, coming as it did from so uncouth a musician.
verses had a touch of pathos, droll yet searching:-
The last
"Oh, say, where goes your love.
O gai, vive le roi?
Par-
Oh, say, where goes your love,
O gai, vive le roi?
He rides on a white horse,
Vive le roi, la reine;
He wears a silver sword,
Vive Napoléon!
"Oh, grand to the war he goes,
O gai, vive le roi!


## p. 11070 (#282) ##########################################

11070
GILBERT PARKER
Oh, grand to the war he goes,
O gai, vive le roi!
Gold and silver he will bring,
Vive le roi, la reine;
And eke the daughter of a king-
Vive Napoléon! »
The crowd, women and men, youths and maidens, enthusias-
tically repeated again and again the last line and the refrain,
"Vive le roi, la reine! Vive Napoléon ! »
Meanwhile the stranger stood, now looking at the singer with
eager eyes, now searching the faces of the people, keen to see
the effect upon them. His glance found the curé, the avocat,
and the auctioneer, and his eyes steadied successively to Medal-
lion's humorous look, to the curé's puzzled questioning, to the
avocat's birdlike curiosity. It was plain they were not antago-
nistic; (why should they be? ) and he was there any reason
why he should care whether or no they were for him or against
him?
True, he had entered the village in the dead of night, with
much luggage and many packages; had aroused the people at
the Louis Quinze; the driver who had brought him departing
gayly, before daybreak, because of the gifts of gold given him
above his wage. True, this singular gentleman had taken three
rooms in the little hotel, had paid the landlord in advance, and
had then gone to bed, leaving word that he was not to be
waked till three o'clock the next afternoon. True, the landlord
could not by any hint or indirection discover from whence this
midnight visitor came. But if a gentleman paid his way, and
was generous and polite, and minded his own business, wherefore
should people busy themselves about him? When he appeared
on the veranda of the inn with the hot pennies, not a half-dozen
people in the village had known aught of his presence in Pon-
tiac. The children came first to scorch their fingers and fill their
pockets; and after them the idle young men, and the habitants
in general.
The song done, the stranger, having shaken Parpon by the
hand, and again whispered in his ear, stepped forward. The
last light of the setting sun was reflected from the red roof of
the Little Chemist's shop, upon the quaint figure and eloquent
face, which had in it something of the gentleman, something of
the comedian. The alert Medallion himself did not realize the


## p. 11071 (#283) ##########################################

GILBERT PARKER
11071
comedian in it till the white hand was waved grandiloquently
over the heads of the crowd. Then something in the gesture
corresponded with something in the face, and the auctioneer
had a nut which he could not crack for many a day. The voice
was musical,-as fine in speaking almost as the dwarf's in sing-
ing, and the attention of the children was caught by the warm,
vibrating tones. He addressed himself to them.
"My children," he said, "my name is-Valmond!
begun well; let us be better friends. I have come from far off
to be one of you, to stay with you for a while-who knows how
long-how long? " He placed a finger meditatively on his lips,
sending a sort of mystery into his look and bearing. "You are
French, and so am I. You are playing on the shores of life, and
so am I. You are beginning to think and dream, and so am I.
We are only children till we begin to make our dreams our life.
So I am one with you; for only now do I step from dream to
action. My children, you shall be my brothers, and together we
will sow the seed of action and reap the grain; we will make a
happy garden of flowers, and violets shall bloom everywhere out
of our dream,- everywhere. Violets, my children; pluck the
wild violets and bring them to me, and I will give you silver
for them, and I will love you. Never forget," he added with a
swelling voice, "that you owe your first duty to your mothers,
and afterward to your country, and to the spirit of France.
see afar" he looked toward the setting sun, and stretched
out his arm dramatically, yet such was the impressiveness of his
voice and person that not even the young Seigneur or Medallion
smiled "I see afar," he repeated, "the glory of our dreams
fulfilled, after toil, and struggle, and loss; and I call upon you
now to unfurl the white banner of justice, and liberty, and the
restoration! "
་་
The good women who listened guessed little of what he
meant by the fantastic sermon; but they wiped their eyes in
sympathy, and gathered their children to them, and said, "Poor
gentleman, poor gentleman! " and took him instantly to their
hearts. The men were mystified; but wine and rhetoric had
fired them, and they cheered him- no one knew why. The curé,
as he turned to leave with Monsieur Garon, shook his head in
bewilderment; but even he did not smile, for the man's eloquence.
had impressed him. And more than once he looked back at
the dispersing crowd and the picturesque figure posing on the


## p. 11072 (#284) ##########################################

11072
GILBERT PARKER
veranda. The avocat was thinking deeply, and as in the dusk he
left the curé at his own door, all that he ventured was: "Singu-
lar, a most singular person! "
"We shall see, we shall see," said the curé abstractedly, and
they said good-night. Medallion joined the Little Chemist in his
shop door, and watched the habitants scatter, till only Parpon and
the stranger were left. Presently these two faced each other,
and without a word passed into the hotel together.
"H'm, h'm," said Medallion into space, drumming the door-
jamb with his fingers, "which is it, my Parpona dauphin, or a
fool? »
He and the Little Chemist talked long, their eyes upon the
window opposite, inside which Monsieur Valmond and the dwarf
were talking. Up the dusty street wandered fitfully the refrain:
"To a gentleman of the king,
Vive Napoléon! »
And once they dimly saw Monsieur Valmond come to the
open window and stretch out his hand, as if in greeting to the
song and the singer.


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11073
THEODORE PARKER
(1810-1860)
BY JOHN WHITE CHADWICK
HEODORE PARKER was born in Lexington, Massachusetts, Au-
gust 24th, 1810; the eleventh and youngest child of John
and Hannah (Stearns) Parker. His grandfather, John Parker,
commanded the company of militia on Lexington Green, April 19th,
1775; and said to his men as the British soldiers were approaching,
"Don't fire unless fired upon; but if they mean to have a war, let it
begin here. " A certain fighting temper in
Parker rooted back into this family tradi-
tion, and was nourished by the circumstance
that his father's carpenter-shop was the bel-
fry from which the summons to the farmer
folk rang out on that eventful day. From
his father, who was both carpenter and
farmer, he inherited a strong and active
mind, and a disposition "not to take things
for granted"; from his mother his finer
and more sympathetic qualities. Speaking
of Daniel Webster's mother, and thinking
of his own, he wrote: "When virtue leaps
high in the public fountain, you seek for
the lofty spring of nobleness, and find it far
off in the dear breast of some mother who melted the snows of win-
ter and condensed the summer's sun into fair sweet humanity, which
now gladdens the face of man in all the city streets. "
THEODORE PARKER
He was still a mere boy when he resolved upon a life of study
and the work of a minister. His first book-ultimately one of some
twenty thousand volumes and pamphlets-was a Latin dictionary,
which he earned by picking berries in the Lexington pastures. One
of his rarest books had long eluded him, when he finally got upon its
scent in a Southern paper sent to him that he might have the ben-
efit of some abusive article upon his antislavery course. In 1830 he
entered Harvard College, and for four years kept pace with the studies
there, while still working on the farm or engaged in teaching school.
Harvard might well give him the degree A. M. in 1840; for by that
XIX-693



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11074
THEODORE PARKER
time he was master of a dozen languages, with a good smattering of
half a dozen more. He entered the Divinity School in 1834, midway
of the course, and was graduated in 1836. His first settlement was in
West Roxbury, Massachusetts; which, though a suburb of Boston, was
then so much of a farming village that the young preacher, always
soundly practical, found in 'The Temptations of Milkmen' an appro-
priate subject for a sermon. During his Roxbury ministry he was
translating De Wette's 'Introduction to the Old Testament; but his
great acquisitions in the way of learning never burdened him in
his pulpit work. Even when he waxed philosophical, he translated
his philosophy into the vernacular speech.
Whatever the natural tendencies of Parker's mind, it is unques-
tionable that they were much affected by the Transcendental move-
ment of which Emerson was the New England coryphæus, and which
found its inspirations from abroad in Coleridge and Carlyle rather
than in the great German idealists. So far as Parker's Transcend-
entalism had any German stamp on it, it was that of Jacobi. It
was certainly not that of Kant, whose God and immortality were not
even inferences of the moral law, but good working hypotheses.
Parker proclaimed the soul's direct consciousness of all three of these
great objects of belief. But it may well be questioned whether he
was not a philosopher more by accident than by any natural bent,
and whether his Transcendentalism was not rather a crude expression
of the robust and joyous faith of his own believing soul than any
doctrine of universals, carefully thought out. It is impossible to read
him widely and not feel that in what is inductive and scientific in
his thinking, much more than in what is deductive and metaphysical,
we have the natural gesture of his mind. No one ever reveled in
facts more joyously than he, or had more of a stomach for statistics
which his digestion of them could not match.
When Emerson gave his famous Divinity School address in July
1838, Parker was there to hear it with a quick-beating heart; and
walking home that night, he resolved to keep silence no longer on
the matters which that address made a subject of general discus-
sion in the Unitarian churches. When, in 1839, Professor Andrews
Norton animadverted on Emerson's address as The Latest Form
of Infidelity,' and George Ripley, of Brook Farm distinction, took
Norton in hand, Parker also took part in the controversy, but, with
becoming modesty, in an anonymous pamphlet. Anonymity was not,
however, the habit of his life; though frequently resorted to when, as
a notorious heretic, he feared to injure some good cause by having
his connection with it known. On May 19th, 1841, he was engaged
to preach the ordination sermon of Mr. Charles Shackford, in South
Boston. He took for his subject The Transient and Permanent in


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THEODORE PARKER
11075
Christianity,' and the sermon proved to be one of three of the most
epoch-making in the history of American Unitarianism; Emerson's
address a second, Channing's "Baltimore sermon" of 1819 the third.
The doctrine preached was, that the moral and religious teachings of
Jesus were permanent elements in Christianity, and that the miracu-
lous element was transient. There was no denial that miracles had
been associated with the origin of Christianity; only that they are
necessary to its modern acceptance and support. But the conservative
Unitarians contended that Christianity must be accepted because of
the New Testament miracles, or it was no Christianity at all. Where-
upon a controversy arose of great violence and bitterness. Without
being formally excluded from the Unitarian body, Parker was shut
out from all the prominent Unitarian pulpits; the ministers ventur-
ing to exchange with him being punished for their temerity by the
secession from their societies of many "gentlemen of property and
standing," or by the entire loss of their positions. Thereupon cer-
tain persons came together, and voted "that Theodore Parker have a
chance to be heard in Boston"; and he had it, giving in the form of
lectures his 'Discourse of Matters pertaining to Religion,' — the book
which is at once the best expression of his theological mind and of
his literary methods. In 1845 he began preaching every Sunday in
Boston, without surrendering his Roxbury parish; but in 1846, finding
this double work too arduous, he concentrated his energies on his
Boston pulpit; first at the Melodeon and afterward at the Music Hall,
preaching to a congregation much larger than any other in the city.
This continued until 1859, when his health broke down. He went to
the West Indies, and there wrote an elaborate account of his minis-
try, which is one of the most impressive and affecting of his many
publications. From the West Indies he went to Europe, and died
in Florence, May 10th, 1860. His body is buried there in the English
cemetery.
It was much easier for Parker to give up the traditional supports
of religion, because he was naturally a believer of uncommon spon-
taneity. For all his denials, his piety was so warm and glad that
it put to shame the colder temper of the Unitarians who could not
endure his heresies. These were more pronounced as he went on.
From denying the permanent necessity for the miraculous, he passed
to a denial of its historical evidence, anticipating the position of
Huxley and Matthew Arnold: in proportion to the divergence from
our habitual experience, alleged facts must have more evidence to
establish them, and the New Testament miracles do not meet this
requisition. His published sermons do not in their aggregation give
a just impression of his preaching in its proportionate character.
They represent it as more controversial and occasional than it was.


## p. 11076 (#288) ##########################################

11076
THEODORE PARKER
His Ten Sermons on Religion' is the volume most representative of
his average strain; while for the tenderness of his piety one must see
his 'Prayers,' caught as they sped to heaven by some loving friend,
and the meditations of his Journal' as they appear in the ill-made
but invaluable 'Life and Correspondence,' written and edited by John
Weiss. The 'Life' by Frothingham is much better written, but far
less rich as an expression of Parker's wonderful range of knowledge,
thought, religious sentiment, and passionate engrossment in political
affairs.
It is in the last of these particulars that a great many persons
who conceive of Parker as believing quite too little or too much, find
ample justification for the warmest eulogy. Think as they may of
his theological opinions, or of the invectives which he launched at
those of the traditional stripe, they cannot but perceive that he was
one of the greatest leaders in the antislavery conflict, intimately
associated with Garrison, Phillips, Sumner, Chase, John Brown, and
others who were profoundly engaged in that conflict. On the best of
terms with the abolitionists, and always welcome and willing to speak
on their platform, he could not withhold himself from the political
organization which, avowedly powerless for the destruction of slavery,
sternly resolved upon its territorial limitation. This antislavery
work was of itself sufficient to exhaust the energy of a much stronger
man than Parker ever was. He was in constant correspondence with
the great party leaders, advising them with an authority which they
could not resent, such were its mass and weight. His lyceum lect-
ures tended to the slavery question with an irresistible gravitation.
He was moreover one of the principal managers of the "under-
ground railroad," among the first to know of any fugitive slave newly
arrived in Boston, and one of the most active in such measures as
were necessary to put him out of reach of harm. In Faneuil Hall
he openly demanded armed resistance to the Fugitive Slave Law
in behalf of Anthony Burns, and put to vote the question when it
should begin. For this offense he was indicted; but greatly to his
disappointment, was not brought to trial. He had, however, the satis-
faction of publishing the Defense he had prepared. He did not
wait till great men died to prepare his sermon on their characters.
His sermon on Daniel Webster was from three to four hours long,
and it drew its waters from the whole area of our political history.
He promised his hearers that they should not sit uneasily in their
chairs; and except for the unqualified admirers of Webster, his
promise was made good.
Parker was much more an orator than a writer; and his published
writings, with few exceptions, reflect two lights that flare upon the
public stage. They are diffuse in matter, and loosely articulated in


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THEODORE PARKER
11077
their form, in spite of the mechanical arrangement of their parts.
What gives to them their greatest charm is a certain vivid home-
liness of phrase, shaping itself upon the facts of nature and of our
human life. Luther nor Latimer excelled him here. He wrote some
beautiful hymns and other poems; but the best of his poetry will not
be found in these, but in passages of his sermons, that go very near
the tenderest joys and simplest tragedies of our experience. Not only
was he so human that nothing human was foreign to him, but his
sympathy was as keen as Wordsworth's with all natural things, and
something of nature's wide inclusiveness and generous toleration was
characteristic of his sympathy with universal life. It is suggestive of
the homeliness of his affections that ninety-one of his words out of
every hundred were Saxon, to eighty-five of Webster's, and seventy-
four of Sumner's; though in the range of his reading and scholarship
he was incomparably inferior to either of these men.
In praising
another for “words so deep that a child could understand them," he
was unconsciously giving a most apt description of his own.
John White Chadurch.