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  You ask of my companions. Hills, sir, and the sundown, and a dog large as myself, that my father bought me. They are better than beings because they know, but do not tell; and the noise in the pool at noon excels my piano.

  I have a brother and sister; my mother does not care for thought, and father, too busy with his briefs to notice what we do. He buys me many books, but begs me not to read them, because he fears they joggle the mind. They are religious, except me, and address an eclipse, every morning, whom they call their “Father.”

  But I fear my story fatigues you. I would like to learn. Could you tell me how to grow, or is it unconveyed, like melody or witchcraft?

  You speak of Mr. Whitman. I never read his book, but was told that it was disgraceful.

  I read Miss Prescott’s Circumstance, but it followed me in the dark, so I avoided her.

  Two editors of journals came to my father’s house this winter, and asked me for my mind, and when I asked them “why” they said I was penurious, and they would use it for the world.

  I could not weigh myself, myself. My size felt small to me. I read your chapters in the Atlantic, and experienced honor for you. I was sure you would not reject a confiding question.

  Is this, sir, what you asked me to tell you?

  Your friend,

  E. DICKINSON.

  [June 7, 1862]

  Dear Friend,

  Your letter gave no drunkenness, because I tasted rum before. Domingo comes but once; yet I have had few pleasures so deep as your opinion, and if I tried to thank you, my tears would block my tongue.

  My dying tutor told me that he would like to live till I had been a poet, but Death was much of mob as I could master, then. And when, far afterward, a sudden light on orchards, or a new fashion in the wind troubled my attention, I felt a palsy, here, the verses just relieve.

  Your second letter surprised me, and for a moment, swung. I had not supposed it. Your first gave no dishonor, because the true are not ashamed. I thanked you for your justice, but could not drop the bells whose jingling cooled my tramp. Perhaps the balm seemed better, because you bled me first. I smile when you suggest that I delay “to publish,” that being foreign to my thought as firmament to fin.

  If fame belonged to me, I could not escape her; if she did not, the longest day would pass me on the chase, and the approbation of my dog would forsake me then. My barefoot rank is better.

  You think my gait “spasmodic.” I am in danger, sir. You think me “uncontrolled.” I have no tribunal.

  Would you have time to be the “friend” you should think I need? I have a little shape: it would not crowd your desk, nor make much racket as the mouse that dents your galleries.

  If I might bring you what I do—not so frequent to trouble you—and ask you if I told it clear, ’t would be control to me. The sailor cannot see the North, but knows the needle can. The “hand you stretch me in the dark” I put mine in, and turn away. I have no Saxon now:—

  As if I asked a common alms,

  And in my wondering hand

  A stranger pressed a kingdom,

  And I, bewildered, stand;

  As if I asked the Orient

  Had it for me a morn,

  And it should lift its purple dikes

  And shatter me with dawn!

  But, will you be my preceptor, Mr Higginson?

  Your friend,

  E. DICKINSON.

  [July 1862]

  Could you believe me without? I had no portrait, now, but am small, like the wren; and my hair is bold, like the chestnut bur; and my eyes, like the sherry in the glass, that the guest leaves. Would this do just as well?

  It often alarms father. He says death might occur, and he has moulds of all the rest, but has no mould of me; but I noticed the quick wore off those things in a few days, and forestall the dishonor. You will think no caprice of me.

  You said “Dark.” I know the butterfly, and the lizard, and the orchis. Are not those your countrymen?

  I am happy to be your scholar, and will deserve the kindness I cannot repay.

  If you truly consent, I recite now. Will you tell me my fault, frankly as to yourself, for I had rather wince than die. Men do not call the surgeon to commend the bone, but to set it, sir, and fracture within is more critical. And for this, preceptor, I shall bring you obedience, the blossom from my garden, and every gratitude I know.

  Perhaps you smile at me. I could not stop for that. My business is circumference. An ignorance, not of customs, but if caught with the dawn, or the sunset see me, myself the only kangaroo among the beauty, sir, if you please, it afflicts me, and I thought that instruction would take it away.

  Because you have much business, beside the growth of me, you will appoint, yourself, how often I shall come, without your inconvenience.

  And if at any time you regret you received me, or I prove a different fabric to that you supposed, you must banish me.

  When I state myself, as the representative of the verse, it does not mean me, but a supposed person.

  You are true about the “perfection.” To-day makes Yesterday mean.

  You spoke of Pippa Passes. I never heard anybody speak of Pippa Passes before. You see my posture is benighted.

  To thank you baffles me. Are you perfectly powerful? Had I a pleasure you had not, I could delight to bring it.

  Your Scholar.

  [August 1862]

  Dear Friend,

  Are these more orderly? I thank you for the truth.

  I had no monarch in my life, and cannot rule myself; and when I try to organize, my little force explodes and leaves me bare and charred.

  I think you called me “wayward.” Will you help me improve?

  I suppose the pride that stops the breath, in the core of woods, is not of ourself.

  You say I confess the little mistake, and omit the large. Because I can see orthography; but the ignorance out of sight is my preceptor’s charge.

  Of “shunning men and women,” they talk of hallowed things, aloud, and embarrass my dog. He and I don’t object to them, if they’ll exist their side. I think Carlo [her dog] would please you. He is dumb, and brave. I think you would like the chestnut tree I met in my walk. It hit my notice suddenly, and I thought the skies were in blossom.

  Then there’s a noiseless noise in the orchard that I let persons hear.

  You told me in one letter you could not come to see me “now,” and I made no answer; not because I had none, but did not think myself the price that you should come so far.

  I do not ask so large a pleasure, lest you might deny me.

  You say, “Beyond your knowledge.” You would not jest with me, because I believe you; but, preceptor, you cannot mean it?

  All men say “What” to me, but I thought it a fashion.

  When much in the woods, as a little girl, I was told that the snake would bite me, that I might pick a poisonous flower, or goblins kidnap me; but I went along and met no one but angels, who were far shyer of me than I could be of them, so I have n’t that confidence in fraud which many exercise.

  I shall observe your precept, though I don’t understand it, always.

  I marked a line in one verse, because I met it after I made it, and never consciously touch a paint mixed by another person.

  I do not let go it, because it is mine. Have you the portrait of Mrs. Browning?

  Persons sent me three. If you had none, will you have mine?

  Your Scholar.

  [February 1863]

  Dear Friend,

  I did not deem that planetary forces annulled, but suffered an exchange of territory, or world.

  I should have liked to see you before you became improbable. War feels to me an oblique place. Should there be other summers, would you perhaps come?

  I found you were gone, by accident, as I find systems are, or seasons of the year, and obtain no cause, but suppose it a treason of progress that dissolves as it goes. Carlo still remained, and I told him

  Best
gains must have the losses’ test,

  To constitute them gains.

  My shaggy ally assented.

  Perhaps death gave me awe for friends, striking sharp and early, for I held them since in a brittle love, of more alarm than peace. I trust you may pass the limit of war; and though not reared to prayer, when service is had in church for our arms, I include yourself. . . . I was thinking to-day, as I noticed, that the “Supernatural” was only the Natural disclosed.

  Not “Revelation” ’t is that waits,

  But our unfurnished eyes.

  But I fear I detain you. Should you, before this reaches you, experience immortality, who will inform me of the exchange? Could you, with honor, avoid death, I entreat you, sir. It would bereave

  Your Gnome.

  I trust the “Procession of Flowers” was not a premonition.

  [June 1869]

  Dear Friend,

  A letter always feels to me like immortality because it is the mind alone without corporeal friend. Indebted in our talk to attitude and accent, there seems a spectral power in thought that walks alone. I would like to thank you for your great kindness, but never try to lift the words which I cannot hold.

  Should you come to Amherst, I might then succeed, though gratitude is the timid wealth of those who have nothing. I am sure that you speak the truth, because the noble do, but your letters always surprise me.

  My life has been too simple and stern to embarrass any. “Seen of Angels,” scarcely my responsibility.

  It is difficult not to be fictitious in so fair a place, but tests’ severe repairs are permitted all.

  When a little girl I remember hearing that remarkable passage and preferring the “Power,” not knowing at the time that “Kingdom” and “Glory” were included.

  You noticed my dwelling alone. To an emigrant, country is idle except it be his own. You speak kindly of seeing me; could it please your convenience to come so far as Amherst, I should be very glad, but I do not cross my father’s ground to any house or town.

  Of our greatest acts we are ignorant. You were not aware that you saved my life. To thank you in person has been since then one of my few requests. . . . You will excuse each that I say, because no one taught me.

  SOURCE: Thomas Wentworth Higginson. “Emily Dickinson’s Letters,” The Atlantic Monthly (October 1891).

  MARK TWAIN

  Mark Twain (1835–1910), the pen name of Samuel Clemens, is American literature’s most prominent and important author. For more than forty years he was popular and great, writing almost invariably humorously and always in a conversational, unmistakably American voice. He started as a journalist and never lost his easy immediacy, even when, at the end of his life, he was reeling from the deaths of two of his children and his wife.

  Roughing It (1872)

  We readers and editors have become accustomed to divvying up prose literature into the categories of fiction or nonfiction. This makes Roughing It hard to describe: it is certainly a travel book as well as a memoir, but what to call the marvelous tall tales that hilariously emerge here and there? Chapter 42 contains an account of his start in newspaper work in Virginia City, Nevada. In Chapter 53 he remembers, from those days in Nevada, an endless tale.

  Chapter 42

  What to do next?

  It was a momentous question. I had gone out into the world to shift for myself, at the age of thirteen (for my father had endorsed for friends; and although he left us a sumptuous legacy of pride in his fine Virginian stock and its national distinction, I presently found that I could not live on that alone without occasional bread to wash it down with). I had gained a livelihood in various vocations, but had not dazzled anybody with my successes; still the list was before me, and the amplest liberty in the matter of choosing, provided I wanted to work—which I did not, after being so wealthy. I had once been a grocery clerk, for one day, but had consumed so much sugar in that time that I was relieved from further duty by the proprietor; said he wanted me outside, so that he could have my custom. I had studied law an entire week, and then given it up because it was so prosy and tiresome. I had engaged briefly in the study of blacksmithing, but wasted so much time trying to fix the bellows so that it would blow itself, that the master turned me adrift in disgrace, and told me I would come to no good. I had been a bookseller’s clerk for awhile, but the customers bothered me so much I could not read with any comfort, and so the proprietor gave me a furlough and forgot to put a limit to it. I had clerked in a drug store part of a summer, but my prescriptions were unlucky, and we appeared to sell more stomach pumps than soda water. So I had to go. I had made of myself a tolerable printer, under the impression that I would be another Franklin some day, but somehow had missed the connection thus far. There was no berth open in the Esmeralda Union, and besides I had always been such a slow compositor that I looked with envy upon the achievements of apprentices of two years’ standing; and when I took a “take,” foremen were in the habit of suggesting that it would be wanted “some time during the year.” I was a good average St. Louis and New Orleans pilot and by no means ashamed of my abilities in that line; wages were two hundred and fifty dollars a month and no board to pay, and I did long to stand behind a wheel again and never roam any more—but I had been making such an ass of myself lately in grandiloquent letters home about my blind lead and my European excursion that I did what many and many a poor disappointed miner had done before; said “It is all over with me now, and I will never go back home to be pitied—and snubbed.” I had been a private secretary, a silver miner and a silver mill operative, and amounted to less than nothing in each, and now—

  What to do next?

  I yielded to Higbie’s appeals and consented to try the mining once more. We climbed far up on the mountain side and went to work on a little rubbishy claim of ours that had a shaft on it eight feet deep. Higbie descended into it and worked bravely with his pick till he had loosened up a deal of rock and dirt and then I went down with a long-handled shovel (the most awkward invention yet contrived by man) to throw it out. You must brace the shovel forward with the side of your knee till it is full, and then, with a skillful toss, throw it backward over your left shoulder. I made the toss, and landed the mess just on the edge of the shaft and it all came back on my head and down the back of my neck. I never said a word, but climbed out and walked home. I inwardly resolved that I would starve before I would make a target of myself and shoot rubbish at it with a long-handled shovel. I sat down, in the cabin, and gave myself up to solid misery—so to speak. Now in pleasanter days I had amused myself with writing letters to the chief paper of the Territory, the Virginia Daily Territorial Enterprise, and had always been surprised when they appeared in print. My good opinion of the editors had steadily declined; for it seemed to me that they might have found something better to fill up with than my literature. I had found a letter in the post office as I came home from the hillside, and finally I opened it. Eureka! (I never did know what Eureka meant, but it seems to be as proper a word to heave in as any when no other that sounds pretty offers.) It was a deliberate offer to me of Twenty-Five Dollars a week to come up to Virginia and be city editor of the Enterprise.

  I would have challenged the publisher in the “blind lead” days—I wanted to fall down and worship him, now. Twenty-five Dollars a week—it looked like bloated luxury—a fortune, a sinful and lavish waste of money. But my transports cooled when I thought of my inexperience and consequent unfitness for the position—and straightway, on top of this, my long array of failures rose up before me. Yet if I refused this place I must presently become dependent upon somebody for my bread, a thing necessarily distasteful to a man who had never experienced such a humiliation since he was thirteen years old. Not much to be proud of, since it is so common—but then it was all I had to be proud of. So I was scared into being a city editor. I would have declined, otherwise. Necessity is the mother of “taking chances.” I do not doubt that if, at that time, I had been offered a salary to t
ranslate the Talmud from the original Hebrew, I would have accepted—albeit with diffidence and some misgivings—and thrown as much variety into it as I could for the money.

  I went up to Virginia and entered upon my new vocation. I was a rusty-looking city editor, I am free to confess—coatless, slouch hat, blue woolen shirt, pantaloons stuffed into boot-tops, whiskered half down to the waist, and the universal navy revolver slung to my belt. But I secured a more Christian costume and discarded the revolver. I had never had occasion to kill anybody, nor ever felt a desire to do so, but had worn the thing in deference to popular sentiment, and in order that I might not, by its absence, be offensively conspicuous, and a subject of remark. But the other editors, and all the printers, carried revolvers. I asked the chief editor and proprietor (Mr. Goodman, I will call him, since it describes him as well as any name could do) for some instructions with regard to my duties, and he told me to go all over town and ask all sorts of people all sorts of questions, make notes of the information gained, and write them out for publication. And he added:

  “Never say ‘We learn’ so-and-so, or ‘It is reported,’ or ‘It is rumored,’ or ‘We understand’ so-and-so, but go to headquarters and get the absolute facts, and then speak out and say ‘It is so-and-so.’ Otherwise, people will not put confidence in your news. Unassailable certainty is the thing that gives a newspaper the firmest and most valuable reputation.”

  It was the whole thing in a nutshell; and to this day when I find a reporter commencing his article with “We understand,” I gather a suspicion that he has not taken as much pains to inform himself as he ought to have done. I moralize well, but I did not always practice well when I was a city editor; I let fancy get the upper hand of fact too often when there was a dearth of news. I can never forget my first day’s experience as a reporter. I wandered about town questioning everybody, boring everybody, and finding out that nobody knew anything. At the end of five hours my notebook was still barren. I spoke to Mr. Goodman. He said: