Once Aboard the Lugger Part 5

"I know she left him nearly five thousand pounds for my education and all that. I think I may have cost him three thousand, possibly four-- _so_ I think I am ent.i.tled to something, _but_ I shan't get it, _therefore_ I don't worry. My hump is gone; in three months I shall be gone. Forward: I smell bacon!"

Margaret smiled the wan smile of an invalid watching vigorous youth at sport. Firmly she banged the shuttlec.o.c.k out of sight.

"How bright you are!" she told him. "Look, here is a little poem I wrote for you last night. It's about failure and success. Don't read it now."

George was very fond of his cousin. "Oh, but I must!" he cried. "I think this was awfully nice of you. He's not down yet. Let's sit on this seat and read it together."

"Oh, not aloud. It's a silly little thing--really."

"Yes--aloud."

He smoothed the paper. She pressed against him; thrilled as she regarded the written lines. George begged her read. She would not-- well, she would. She paused. Modesty and pride gathered on her cheeks, tuned her voice low. She read:

"So you have tried--So you have known The burning effort for success, The quick belief in your own prowess and your skill, The bitterness of failure, and the joy Of sweet success."

"'Burning effort,'" George said. "That's fine!"

"I'm glad you like that. And 'quick belief'--you know what I mean?"

"Oh, rather."

The poet warmed again over her words.

"So you have tried-- So you have known The blind-eyed groping towards the goal That flickers on the far horizon of Attempt, Gleaming to sudden vividness, anon Fading from sight."

"Sort of blank verse, isn't it?" George asked.

"Well, sort of," the poet allowed. "Not exactly, of course."

"Of course not," George agreed firmly.

Margaret breathed the next fine lines.

"So you have tried-- So you have known The bitter-sweetness of Attempt, The quick determination and the dread despair That grapple and possess you as you strive For imagery."

George questioned: "Imagery...?"

"That verse is more for me than you," the poet explained. "'For imagery'--to get the right word, you know."

"Rather!" said George. "It does for me too--in exams, when one is floored, you know."

"Yes," Margaret admitted doubtfully. "Ye-es. Don't interrupt between the verses, dear."

Now emotion swelled her voice.

"Success be yours!

May you achieve To heights you do not dream you'll ever touch; The power's to your hand, the road before you lies-- Forward! The G.o.ds not always frown; anon They'll kindly smile."

"Why, that's splendid!" George cried. He put a cousinly arm about the poet; squeezed her to him. "Fancy you writing that for me! What a sympathetic little soul you are--and how clever!"

Breathless she disengaged herself: "I'm so glad you like it. It's a silly little thing--but it's _real_, isn't it? Come, there's father."

She paused against denial of the poem's silliness, affirmation of its truth; but George, moody beneath Mr. Marrapit's eye, glinting behind the window, had moved forward.

Margaret thrust the paper in her bosom, tucked in where heart might warm against heart's child. Constantly during breakfast her mind reverted to it, drummed its rare lines.

CHAPTER III.

Upon Modesty In Art: And Should Be Skipped.

Yet Margaret had called her poem silly. Here, then, was mock-modesty by diffidence seeking praise. But this mock-modesty, which horribly abounds to-day, is only natural product of that furious modesty which has come to be expected in all the arts.

Modesty should have no place in true art. The author or the painter, the poet or the composer should be impersonal to his work. That which he creates is not his; it is a piece of the art to which he is servant, and as such (and such alone) he should regard it. His in the making and the moulding, thereafter it becomes the possession of the great whole to which it belongs. If it adorns that whole he may freely admire it; for he is impersonal to it.

Unquestionably (or unconsciously) we accept this principle in regard to human life. The child belongs not to the mother who conceived it but to the race of which it is an atom. It hinders or it betters the race. The race judges it. By the race it is honoured or condemned; and to it the mother becomes impersonal. As it bears itself among its fellows, so she judges it--as the artist's work bears itself in the great art it joins, so should he judge it. And if the mother joins in his fellows' praise of her child, and if she proclaims her pride in it, is she called wanting in modesty?--and if the artist joins in praise of his work, and if he freely names it good, must he then be vain, boastful? The race grants that the mother who gave it this specimen of its kind has a first right to show her pride--to the artist who gives a fair specimen to his art we should allow a like voice.

For in demanding modesty--in naming impersonality conceit--we have produced also mock-modesty; and because, as a people, we have little appreciation of the arts, hence little knowledge, hence no standard by which to judge, we continually mistake the one form of modesty for the other. Modesty we suspect to be mock-modesty, and mock-modesty we take to be pleasing humility.

Coming to literature alone, the author should be impersonal to his work and must not cry that the writer is no judge of his own labour.

Letters is his trade; and just as the mason well knows whether the brick he has laid helps or hinders, beautifies or insults the house, so the writer should be full cognisant whether his work helps make or does mar the edifice called literature. Nor must the term literature be denied to the ruck of modern writing. All that is written to interest or to instruct goes to make the literature of our day. We have introduced new expressions just as we have contrived new expressions in architecture; and as in the latter case so in the former the bulk of these is ephemeral. Nevertheless they are a part of literature, and all efforts in them better or sully the pages which in our day we are adding to the book of literature. From this book the winds of cycles to come will blow all that is unworthy--only the stout leaves will endure; but, no less because you write for the supplement than if you have virtue sufficient for the bound volume, remember that in every form of writing there are standards of good, and that every line printed helps raise or does tarnish the letters of our day.

CHAPTER IV.

Excursions In A Hospital.

I.

By the half-past nine train George went to town; an hour later was at St. Peter's.

From the bar of the Students' Club a throng of young men of his year loudly hailed him. He joined them; took with a laugh the commiserations on his failure; wrung the hands of those who had been successful.

The successful young gentlemen were standing drinks-each man his round. There was much smoke and much laughter. Amusing experiences were narrated. You gathered that all who had pa.s.sed their examination had done so by sheer luck, by astonis.h.i.+ng flukes. Not one had ever worked. Each had been "ragged" on a subject of which he knew absolutely nothing. To the brilliancy with which he had gulled or bluffed his examiner, to the diplomacy with which he had headed him off the matters of which he knew absolutely less than nothing-to these alone were his success due.

Such is ever Youth's account of battle with Age. Youth is a devil of a smart fellow, behind whom Age blunders along in the most ridiculous fas.h.i.+on. Later this young blood takes his place in the blundering ranks and then does learn that indeed he was right--Age knows nothing.

For with years we begin to realise our ignorance, and the lesson is not complete when the grave slams the book. A few plumb the depths of their ignorance before death: these are able to speak--and these are the teachers of men. We get here one reason why giants are fewer in our day: with the growth of man's imaginings and his inventions there is more vanity to be forced through; the truths of life lie deeper hid; more phantasms arise to lure us from the quest of realities; the task of striking truth acc.u.mulates.

II.