第30章 THE PANSOPHIAN SOCIETY(1)

The Secretary of this association was getting somewhat tired of the office,and the office was getting somewhat tired of him.It occurred to the members of the Society that a little fresh blood infused into it might stir up the general vitality of the organization.The woman suffragists saw no reason why the place of Secretary need as a matter of course be filled by a person of the male sex.They agitated,they made domiciliary visits,they wrote notes to influential citizens,and finally announced as their candidate the young lady who had won and worn the school name of "The Terror,"who was elected.She was just the person for the place:

wide awake,with all her wits about her,full of every kind of knowledge,and,above all,strong on points of order and details of management,so that she could prompt the presiding officer,to do which is often the most essential duty of a Secretary.The President,the worthy rector,was good at plain sailing in the track of the common moralities and proprieties,but was liable to get muddled if anything came up requiring swift decision and off-hand speech.The Terror had schooled herself in the debating societies of the Institute,and would set up the President,when he was floored by an awkward question,as easily as if he were a ninepin which had been bowled over.

It has been already mentioned that the Pansophian Society received communications from time to time from writers outside of its own organization.Of late these had been becoming more frequent.Many of them were sent in anonymously,and as there were numerous visitors to the village,and two institutions not far removed from it,both full of ambitious and intelligent young persons,it was often impossible to trace the papers to their authors.The new Secretary was alive with curiosity,and as sagacious a little body as one might find if in want of a detective.She could make a pretty shrewd guess whether a paper was written by a young or old person,by one of her own sex or the other,by an experienced hand or a novice.

Among the anonymous papers she received was one which exercised her curiosity to an extraordinary degree.She felt a strong suspicion that "the Sachem,"as the boat-crews used to call him,"the Recluse,""the Night-Hawk,""the Sphinx,"as others named him,must be the author of it.It appeared to her the production of a young person of a reflective,poetical turn of mind.It was not a woman's way of writing;at least,so thought the Secretary.The writer had travelled much;had resided in Italy,among other places.But so had many of the summer visitors and residents of Arrowhead Village.The handwriting was not decisive;it had some points of resemblance with the pencilled orders for books which Maurice sent to the Library,but there were certain differences,intentional or accidental,which weakened this evidence.There was an undertone in the essay which was in keeping with the mode of life of the solitary stranger.It might be disappointment,melancholy,or only the dreamy sadness of a young person who sees the future he is to climb,not as a smooth ascent,but as overhanging him like a cliff,ready to crush him,with all his hopes and prospects.This interpretation may have been too imaginative,but here is the paper,and the reader can form his own opinion:

MY THREE COMPANIONS.

"I have been from my youth upwards a wanderer.I do not mean constantly flitting from one place to another,for my residence has often been fixed for considerable periods.From time to time I have put down in a notebook the impressions made upon me by the scenes through which I have passed.I have long hesitated whether to let any of my notes appear before the public.My fear has been that they were too subjective,to use the metaphysician's term,--that I have seen myself reflected in Nature,and not the true aspects of Nature as she was meant to be understood.One who should visit the Harz Mountains would see--might see,rather his own colossal image shape itself on the morning mist.But if in every mist that rises from the meadows,in every cloud that hangs upon the mountain,he always finds his own reflection,we cannot accept him as an interpreter of the landscape.

"There must be many persons present at the meetings of the Society to which this paper is offered who have had experiences like that of its author.They have visited the same localities,they have had many of the same thoughts and feelings.Many,I have no doubt.Not all,--no,not all.Others have sought the companionship of Nature;I have been driven to it.Much of my life has been passed in that communion.These pages record some of the intimacies I have formed with her under some of her various manifestations.

"I have lived on the shore of the great ocean,where its waves broke wildest and its voice rose loudest.

"I have passed whole seasons on the banks of mighty and famous rivers.

"I have dwelt on the margin of a tranquil lake,and floated through many a long,long summer day on its clear waters.

"I have learned the 'various language'of Nature,of which poetry has spoken,--at least,I have learned some words and phrases of it.Iwill translate some of these as I best may into common speech.

"The OCEAN says to the dweller on its shores:--You are neither welcome nor unwelcome.I do not trouble myself with the living tribes that come down to my waters.I have my own people,of an older race than yours,that grow to mightier dimensions than your mastodons and elephants;more numerous than all the swarms that fill the air or move over the thin crust of the earth.Who are you that build your palaces on my margin?I see your white faces as I saw the dark faces of the tribes that came before you,as I shall look upon the unknown family of mankind that will come after you.