Chapter V: The Instructive Group (1)

The Instructive Group is composed of those narratives whose chief purpose is to inform the reader of certain conditions and problems of which he ought to take intelligent account. The writer may offer a solution, as in the moral story; or a theory, as in the pedagogical narrative; or he may simply present the picture, as in a realistic sketch, and leave knowledge to bring reform by the sheer natural law by which daylight scatters the evils of darkness.

I. The Moral Story

[Distinguished from symbolic-didactic group]

The moral story must not be confused with the fable, parable, or allegory. It is like them in that its chief purpose is to teach, but it differs from them in not being figurative or symbolic. It is always particular and professedly literal. Its boast is that it sticks close to facts--the facts of "life," people's needs, if not their history. In other words, though fictitious, it pretends to be entirely worth while because of the concrete lesson it teaches. It sets out to show you the evil consequences of some vice or folly or the good result of a pious act.

The critics have never had a very cordial word for this type of narrative: the usual smugness of it is offensive. Many old legends are moral tales. The "Gesta Romanorum" was largely meant to instruct in pious ways. Boccaccio, even, cares for ethical effect, when he writes such stories as "Griselda." A modern reader is entirely out of patience with the complacent self-righteousness of Gualtieri. Chaucer's easy and captivating style and his true pathos and appreciation of dramatic moments can not altogether keep down our irritation at an egregious monster parading under the guise of a beneficent lord and a loving husband. Our irritation, of course, is really directed not toward Chaucer or Boccaccio, but toward the Middle Ages, that could take such a character as this and feel no umbrage--no shadowing of the brute over man.

[Hawthorne]

There have been a number of examples of moral tales in modern literature. Hawthorne's "Ambitious Guest" is one. "Lady Eleanor's Mantle" is another, though it is also a legend; for a moral narrative, just as an occasional narrative, may be of any type the author chooses. "Murad the Unlucky" by Maria Edgeworth is the Oriental wonder tale turned didactic. What makes this or that a story with a moral is the author's obvious concern about the lesson he means to teach. His narrative is nothing in itself: it is what it is because of the author's purpose. [Stowe] Doubtless the most widely influential moral story ever written is "Uncle Tom's Cabin." It is a striking example of how much more powerful is concrete narrative than abstract argument. The Americans were ready for the sermon, but they never would have listened to it from the pages of a controversial tract. A story, they took to their heads and their hearts. It is the fate of moral narratives of this sort, however, to be for the time only; and seldom do any rise to the plane of real literature. "Rasselas" has endured partly because of the fame of its great author, and partly because of its high and true pessimism. Readers naturally like pessimism, and when it is of this good, philosophic sort, they feel justified in their taste. [Johnson and Voltaire] The theme is Johnson's favorite topic--the vanity of human wishes, the futility of the quest for happiness. Voltaire's "Candide," which came out in France two weeks before "Rasselas," is on the same topic with practically the same moral. But Voltaire was an agnostic and a cynic, while Johnson was a most conventional pietist. Addison and Steele as well as Johnson included didactic stories in their periodicals. [Tolstoy, Cervantes] Count Tolstoy, in his desire to help his countrymen, has written many parables, allegories, and moral tales. They are read by foreigners because of the pictures of Russian life. So are Cervantes's "Novelas Ejemplares" read for their fresh and spritely character-pictures of Andalusia. They are instructive moral tales, as their name indicates and as their author very definitely asserted. So idiomatic, spirited, and graceful are they that, though the oldest stories of their class in Spanish literature, they are without successful rivals.

An exercise in this kind of narrative surely will not hurt you, and you may get some benefit from it, even if the chance reader should not like your preaching. Try, however, to make the story interesting in itself and to have the moral seem to grow naturally out of the action, rather than the action out of the moral. Avoid platitudes, and reveal the customs and manners of your people so faithfully that the student of social science might use your narrative for data.

=Jeannot and Colin=

Many trustworthy persons can vouch for having seen Jeannot and Colin when they went to school at Issoire in Auvergne, a town famous all over the world for its college and its kettles. Jeannot was the son of a dealer in mules, a man of considerable reputation; Colin owed his existence to a worthy husbandman who dwelt on the outskirts of the town, and cultivated his farm with the help of four mules, and who, after paying tolls and tallage, scutage and salt duty, poundage, poll-tax, and tithes, did not find himself particularly well off at the end of the year.

Jeannot and Colin were very handsome lads for natives of Auvergne; they were much attached to each other, and had little secrets together and private understandings, such as old comrades always recall with pleasure when they afterward meet in a wider world.

Their school days were drawing near their end, when a tailor one day brought Jeannot a velvet coat of three colors, with a waistcoat of Lyons silk in excellent taste to match. This suit of clothes was accompanied by a letter addressed to Monsieur de La Jeannotiere. Colin admired the coat, and was not at all jealous; but Jeannot assumed an air of superiority which distressed Colin. From that moment Jeannot paid no more heed to his lessons, but was always looking at his reflection in the glass, and despised everybody but himself. Some time afterward a footman arrived post-haste bringing a second letter, addressed this time to His Lordship the Marquis de La Jeannotiere; it contained an order from his father for the young nobleman, his son, to be sent to Paris. As Jeannot mounted the chaise to drive off, he stretched out his hand to Colin with a patronizing smile befitting his rank. Colin felt his own insignificance, and wept. So Jeannot departed in all his glory.

Readers who like to know all about things may be informed that Monsieur Jeannot, the father, had rapidly gained immense wealth in business. You ask how those great fortunes are made? It all depends upon luck. Monsieur Jeannot had a comely person, and so had his wife; moreover, her complexion was fresh and blooming. They had gone to Paris to prosecute a lawsuit which was ruining them, when Fortune, who lifts up and casts down human beings at her pleasure, presented them with an introduction to the wife of an army hospital contractor, a man of great talent, who could boast of having killed more soldiers in one year than the cannon had destroyed in ten. Jeannot took the lady's fancy, and Jeannot's wife captivated the gentleman. Jeannot soon became a partner in business, and entered into other speculations. When one is in the current of the stream, one need only let one's self drift, and thus an immense fortune may sometimes be made without any trouble. The beggars watch you from the bank, as you glide along in full sail, open their eyes in astonishment; they wonder how you have managed to get on; they envy you, at all events, and write pamphlets against you which you never read. That was what happened to Jeannot senior, who was soon styled Monsieur de La Jeannotiere, and, after buying a marquisate, at the end of six months he took the young nobleman, his son, away from school, to launch him into the fashionable world of Paris.

Colin, always affectionately disposed, wrote a kind letter to his old schoolfellow, offering his congratulations. The little marquis sent him no answer, which grieved Colin sorely.

The first thing that his father and mother did for the young gentleman was to get him a tutor. This tutor, who was a man of distinguished manners and profound ignorance, could teach his pupil nothing. The marquis wished his son to learn Latin, but the marchioness would not hear of it. They consulted the opinion of a certain author who had obtained considerable celebrity at that time from some popular works which he had written. He was invited to dinner, and the master of the house began by saying:

"Sir, as you know Latin, and are conversant with the manners of the court--"

"I, sir! Latin! I don't know a word of it," answered the man of learning; "and it is just as well for me that I don't, for one can speak one's own language better when the attention is not divided between it and foreign tongues. Look at all our ladies; they are far more charming in conversation than men; their letters are written with a hundred times more grace of expression. They owe that superiority over us to nothing else but their ignorance of Latin."

"There, now! Was I not right?" said the lady. "I want my son to be a man of wit, and to make his way in the world. You see that if he were to learn Latin it would be his ruin. Tell me, if you please, are plays and operas performed in Latin? Are the proceedings in court conducted in Latin, when one has a lawsuit on hand? Do people make love in Latin?"

The marquis, confounded by these arguments, passed sentence, and it was decided that the young nobleman should not waste his time in studying Cicero, Horace, and Virgil.

"But what is he to learn, then? For, I suppose, he will have to know something. Might he not be taught a little geography?"

"What good will that do him?" answered the tutor. "When my lord marquis goes to visit his country-seat, will not his postillions know the roads? There will be no fear of their going astray. One does not want a sextant in order to travel, and it is quite possible to make a journey between Paris and Auvergne without knowing anything about the latitude and longitude of either."

"Very true," replied the father; "but I have heard people speak of a noble science, which is, I think, called _astronomy_."

"Bless my soul!" rejoined the tutor. "Do we regulate our behavior in this world by the stars? Why should my lord Marquis wear himself out in calculating an eclipse, when he will find it predicted correctly to a second in the almanac, which will moreover inform him of all the movable feasts, the age of the moon, and that of all the princesses in Europe?"

The marchioness was quite of the tutor's opinion, the little marquis was in a state of highest delight, and his father was very undecided.

"What is my son to be taught, then?" said he.

"To make himself agreeable," answered the friend whom they had consulted; "for, if he knows the way to please, he will know everything worth knowing. It is an art which he will learn from her Ladyship, his mother, without the least trouble to either of them."

The marchioness, at these words, smiled graciously upon the courtly ignoramus, and said:

"It is easy to see, sir, that you are a most accomplished gentleman; my son will owe all his education to you. I imagine, however, that it will not be a bad thing for him to know a little history."

"Nay, madam, what good would that do him?" he answered. "Assuredly, the only entertaining and useful history is that of the passing hour. All ancient history, as one of our clever writers has observed, is admitted to consist of nothing but fables, and for us moderns it is an inextricable chaos. What does it matter to the young gentleman, your son, if Charlemagne instituted the twelve Paladins of France, or if his successor had an impediment in his speech?"

"Nothing was ever more wisely said!" exclaimed the tutor. "The minds of children are smothered under a mass of useless knowledge, but of all sciences, that which seems to me the most absurd, and the one best adapted to extinguish every spark of genius, is geometry. That ridiculous science concerns itself with surfaces, lines, and points which have no existence in nature. In imagination a hundred thousand curved lines may be made to pass between a circle and a straight line which touches it, although in reality you could not insert as much as a straw. Geometry, indeed, is nothing more than a bad joke."

The marquis and his lady did not understand much of the meaning of what the tutor was saying, but they quite agreed with him. "A nobleman like his Lordship," he continued, "should not dry up his brain with such unprofitable studies. If, some day, he should want one of those sublime geometricians to draw a plan of his estates, he can have them measured for money. If he should wish to trace out the antiquity of his lineage, which goes back to the most remote ages, all he will have to do will be to send for some learned Benedictine. It is the same with all the other arts. A young lord born under a lucky star is neither a painter, nor a musician, nor an architect, nor a sculptor, but he may make all these arts flourish by encouraging them with his generous approval. Doubtless it is much better to patronize than to practice them. It will be quite enough if my lord the young Marquis has taste; it is the part of artists to work for him, and thus there is a great deal of truth in the remark that people of quality (that is, if they are very rich), know everything without learning anything, because, in point of fact and in the long run, they are masters of all the knowledge they can order and pay for."

The agreeable ignoramus then resumed his part in the conversation, and said:

"You have well remarked, madam, that the great end of man's existence is to succeed in society. Is it, forsooth, any aid to the attainment of this success to have devoted one's self to the sciences? Does any one ever think in select company of talking about geometry? Is a gentleman ever asked what star rises to-day with the sun? Does any one at the supper-table ever want to know if Clodion, the Long-Haired, crossed the Rhîne?"

"No, indeed!" exclaimed the marchioness de la Jeannotiere, whose charms had been her passport into the world of fashion, "and my son must not stifle his genius by studying all that trash. But, after all, what is he to be taught? For it is a good thing that a young lord should be able to shine when occasion offers, as my noble husband has said. I remember once hearing an abbé remark that the most entertaining science was something the name of which I have forgotten--it begins with a B."

"With a B, madam? It was not botany, was it?"

"No, it certainly was not botany that he mentioned; it began, as I tell you, with a B, and ended in onry."

"Ah, madam, I understand! It was blazonry, or heraldry. That is indeed a most profound science. But it has ceased to be fashionable since the custom has died out of having one's coat of arms painted on one's carriage doors; it was the most useful thing imaginable in a well-ordered state. Besides, that line of study would be endless, for at the present day there is not a barber who is without his armorial bearings, and you know that whatever becomes common loses its attraction."

Finally, after all the pros and cons of the different sciences had been examined and discussed, it was decided that the young marquis should learn dancing.

Dame Nature, who arranges everything according to her own will and pleasure, had given him a talent which soon developed, securing him prodigious success; it was that of singing street ballads in a charming style. His youthful grace accompanying this superlative gift caused him to be regarded as a young man of the highest promise. He was a favorite with the ladies, and, having his head crammed with songs, he had no lack of mistresses to whom to address his verses. He stole the line "Bacchus with the Loves at play" from one ballad, and made it rhyme with "night and day" taken from another, while a third furnished him with "charms" and "alarms." But inasmuch as there were always a few feet more or less than were wanted in his verses, he had them corrected at the rate of twenty sovereigns a song. And "The Literary Year" placed him in the same rank with such sonneteers as La Fare, Chaulieu, Hamilton, Sarrasin, and Voiture.

Her ladyship the marchioness then believed that she was indeed the mother of a genius, and gave a supper to all the wits of Paris. The young man's head was soon turned; he acquired the art of talking without knowing the meaning of what he said, and perfected himself in the attainment of being fit for nothing. When his father saw him so eloquent, he keenly regretted that he had not had him taught Latin, or he would have purchased some high legal appointment for him. His mother, who was of more heroic sentiments took upon herself to solicit a regiment for her son; in the meantime he made love--and love is sometimes more expensive than a regiment. He squandered his money freely, while his parents drained their purses and credit to a lower and lower ebb by living in the grandest style.

A young widow of good position in their neighborhood, who had only a moderate income, was kind enough to make some effort to prevent the great wealth of the Marquis and Marchioness de La Jeannotiere from going altogether, by consenting to marry the young marquis with a view to appropriating what remained. She enticed him to her house, let him make love to her, allowed him to see that she was not quite indifferent to him, and made him her devoted slave without the least difficulty. At one time she would give him commendation, and at another time counsel; she became his father's and mother's best friend. An old neighbor suggested marriage. The parents, dazzled with the splendor of the alliance, joyfully fell in with the scheme, and promised their only son to their most intimate lady friend. The young marquis was thus about to wed the woman he adored, and by whom he was loved in return. The friends of the family congratulated him; the marriage settlement was ready to be signed; the bridal dress and the nuptial hymn were both well under way.

One morning our young gentleman was on his knees before the charmer whom fond affection and esteem were so soon to make his own. They were tasting in animated and tender converse the first fruits of future happiness, settling how they should lead a life of perfect bliss, when one of his mother's footmen presented himself, scared out of his wits.

"Here's fine news which may surprise you!" said he; "the bailiffs are in the house of my lord and lady, removing the furniture. Everything has been seized by the creditors. There is talk of arresting people, and I am going to do what I can to get my wages paid."

"Let us see what has happened," said the marquis, "and discover the meaning of all this."

"Yes," said the widow, "go and punish those rascals--go, at once!"

He hurried homeward. When he arrived at the house his father was already in prison, and all the servants had fled, each in a different direction, carrying off whatever they had been able to lay their hands on. His mother was alone, helpless, forlorn, and bathed in tears; she had nothing left her but the remembrance of her former prosperity, her beauty, her faults, and her foolish extravagance.

After the son had condoled with his mother for a long time, he said at last:

"Let us not despair. This young widow loves me to distraction; she is even more generous than she is wealthy, I can assure you. I will fly to her for help, and bring her to you."

So he returned to his mistress, and found her engaged in private conversation with a fascinating young officer.

"What! Is that you, my Lord de La Jeannotiere? What business have you with me? How can you leave your mother by herself in this way? Go, and stay with the poor woman, and tell her that she shall always have my good wishes. I am in want of a waiting woman now, and will gladly give her the preference."

"My lad," said the officer, "you seem pretty tall and straight; if you would like to enter my company, I will make it worth your while to enlist."

The marquis, utterly astounded and inwardly furious, went off in search of his former tutor, confided all his troubles to him, and asked his advice. He proposed that he should become like himself, a tutor of the young.

"Alas! I know nothing; you have taught me nothing whatever, and you are the primary cause of all my unhappiness!" And as he spoke he began to sob.

"Write novels," said a wit who was present; "it is an excellent resource to fall back upon in Paris."

The young man, in more desperate straits than ever, hastened to the house of his mother's father-confessor. He was a Theatine monk of the very highest reputation, who had charge of the souls of none but ladies of the first rank in society. As soon as he saw him, the reverend gentleman rushed to meet him.

"Good gracious! My lord Marquis, where is your carriage? How is your honored mother, the Marchioness?"

The unfortunate young fellow related the disaster that had befallen his family. As he explained the matter further the Theatine assumed a graver air, one of less concern and more self-importance.

"My son, herein you may see the hand of Providence; riches serve only to corrupt the heart. The Almighty has shown special favor to your mother in reducing her to beggary. Yes, sir, so much the better! She is now sure of her salvation."

"But, father, in the meantime are there no means of finding some help in this world?"

"Farewell, my son! A lady of the court is waiting for me."

The marquis almost fainted. He was treated after much the same manner by all his friends, and learned to know the world better in half a day than he had in all the rest of his life.

While thus plunged in overwhelming despair, he saw an old-fashioned traveling chaise, more like a covered tumbril than anything else, and furnished with leather curtains, followed by four enormous wagons, all heavily laden. In the chaise was a young man in rustic attire; his round and rubicund face had an air of kindness and good temper. His little wife, whose sunburnt countenance had a pleasing if not refined expression, was jolted about as she sat beside him; and since the vehicle did not go quite so fast as a dandy's chariot, the traveler had plenty of time to look at the marquis as he stood motionless, absorbed in his grief.

"Oh, good heavens!" he exclaimed, "I believe that is Jeannot there!"

Hearing that name, the marquis raised his eyes, and the chaise stopped.

"'Tis Jeannot himself! Yes, it is Jeannot!"

The fat little man sprang to the ground with a single leap, and ran to embrace his companion. Jeannot recognized Colin, shame showing in his face.

"You have forsaken your old friend," said Colin, "but be you as grand a lord as you like, I shall never cease to love you."

Jeannot, confounded and cut to the heart, amid sobs, told him something of his history.

"Come into the inn where I am lodging, and tell me the rest," said Colin; "kiss my little wife, and let us go and dine together."

They went, all three of them, on foot, and the baggage followed.

"What in the world is all this paraphernalia? Does it belong to you!" inquired Jeannot.

"Yes, it is all mine and my wife's; we are just come from the country. I am at the head of a large tin, iron, and copper factory, and have married the daughter of a rich tradesman and general provider of all useful commodities for great folks and small. We work hard, and God gives us His blessing. We are satisfied with our condition in life, and are quite happy. We will help our friend Jeannot. Give up being a marquis; all the splendor in the world is not worth a good friend. Return with me into the country. I will teach you my trade, which is not a difficult one to learn; I will give you a share in the business, and we will live together with light hearts in the little place where we were born."

Jeannot, overcome by this kindness, struggled between sorrow and joy, tenderness and shame. He said to himself:

"All my fashionable friends have proved false to me, and Colin, whom I despised, is the only one who comes to my rescue. What a lesson!"

Colin's example in generosity revived in Jeannot's heart the germ of goodness that the world had never quite choked. He felt that he could not desert his father and mother.

"We will take care of your mother," said Colin, "and as for your good father, who is in prison--I know something of business matters--his creditors, when they see that he has nothing more, will agree to an easy settlement. I will see to all that myself."

Colin was as good as his word, and succeeded in effecting the father's release from prison. Jeannot returned to his old home with his parents, who resumed their former occupation. He married Colin's sister, who, being like her brother in disposition, rendered her husband very happy. And so Jeannot the father, and Jeannotte the mother, and Jeannot the son, came to see that vanity is no true source of happiness.

--Francois Marie Arouet de Voltaire.

From "Little Masterpieces of Fiction," Vol. VII (Doubleday, Page &
Co).

II. The Pedagogical Narrative

[Some famous pedagogical books]

The pedagogical narrative can hardly be called "story," not only because of the intent of the writer to instruct, but also because of the specialness of the subject-matter itself. "Leonard and Gertrude," however, has continued to be read as story in an interpreted form for many years. "Interpreted" connotes what the modern versions of "Leonard and Gertrude" really are, redactions. When the cumbersome and somewhat eccentric sentences of the original were made over, the plot was found to be of a good deal of interest, the character-sketching peculiarly fine, and the lessons taught high and noble and practical as well. Pestalozzi himself had gradually learned how to teach children, and he not only told, but showed others. For that is what a pedagogical story is--a working theory of instruction set up in scenes and actions: it is exposition made narrative. Do you want to know how to teach Jimmy and Margaret? This good old Swiss pedagogue will show you how Gertrude taught her children, mother and school mistress, priest and village reformer as she was. If you had lived in Queen Elizabeth's day and wanted to know how and what to teach your boy or girl, you could have asked the gentle Roger, the queen's own schoolmaster. You can ask him now how he taught; for he put his thoughts down in a volume which bears the name of his professional office--quaintly spelled "Scholemaster"--and shows you his methods of work in forming the mind of the perfect gentleman. This sober pedagogical treatise, which is not narrative, not story, was published only after Ascham's death; but many years before, when he was a very young man and much gayer but hardly less wise, he set forth in "Toxophilus," the archer, a picture of how amusement and learning can be combined. The exposition proceeds in the form of a dialogue (the old fashioned literary type called _débat_) between a lover of books and a lover of exercise. "Toxophilus" is not exactly story either, but it approaches story, and is important to our type because of the intense and far-reaching influence it has had on modern pedagogy in inspiring a looking-out for the development of the body as well as the mind, and in emphasizing the giving of instruction in an interesting form.

From Ascham's "Schoolmaster" John Lyly got the suggestion for his two famous romances of Euphues, the "well-formed" one. A young man should be euphues in all things, said Ascham, and Lyly undertook to show a Briton thus as he moved about in society, at home, abroad, in friendship and love. So popular did Euphues become that all the ladies and gentlemen of Elizabeth's court modelled their speech on his.

Charming old Sir Isaac Walton joined the pedagogues and gave us a set of delightful walks and talks on angling. He teaches one to be a "complete" angler--an artist at his pastime.

A sort of hand-book of etiquette for the golden youths of the Renaissance was Castiglione's "Courtier," "a sketch of a cultivated nobleman in those most cultivated days." The author shows by what precepts and practice a fine gentleman is made. So well did he write that his own name ever since has been a synonym for nobility and manliness. He gives us a picture of the purest and most elevated court in Italy, that of Guidobaldo da Montefeltra, duke of Urbino. A discussion is held in the duchess's drawing-room to settle the question, what constitutes a perfect courtier. The type selected differs in no material way from the ideal gentleman of the present day.

All of these books are the work of persons who set out seriously to teach--except perhaps the gentle Isaac, who probably wrote what he wrote for sheer pleasure and taught by the way. And they all include what the modern pedagogical narrative includes--disguised exposition. For the most part the modern species is short. A publisher now-a-days, I suppose, could hardly be induced to present an educational system thinly disguised in a long romance. Consequently most of such stories come out in our educational periodicals as better or poorer literature, better or poorer teaching.

Rousseau's "The New Héloise" and "Emile" might be mentioned here were they not more nearly harangues than stories. Their effect in renovating France domestically, though, will forever connect them with the word pedagogy. They are surely a pedagogue's "fiction," since their author took no care of his real children.

These treatises were almost immediately influential in England, but now the theories began to be set forth in more truly narrative form. In "The Fool of Quality" (by Henry Brooke), the hero goes about spreading benevolence and cash and displaying his physical strength and an educational theory as well, as to how an English Christian young gentleman should be brought up. The later development of such teaching was naturally books addressed directly to children. Thomas Day's "Sandford and Merton" had in it stories and dialogues for young people to read for themselves, in which they were taught the value of the sciences and the virtues. Maria Edgeworth's "Frank" and "Rosamond" and Jacob Abbott's "Rollo Books" are for still more juvenile audiences, and in Froebel's "Mother Plays" the baby, even, comes into its own.

[Froebel]

This work necessarily, however, was addressed to the parent. A tiny cyclopedia of story, song, game, and theory, it is great pedagogy, and in the original, at least, acceptable literature. The object of all teaching-narratives should be that which Froebel expresses in his comment on one of his own little games taught in a dialogue between a mother and her son. You recall that his double purpose is to teach the mother what and how to teach the child. He says, "The deep import of The Light-Bird is hinted in the song and motto. Beware, however, of the only one contained in the play. Not only The Light-Bird but all the plays which precede and follow it have many meanings. Neither must it be supposed that the meaning suggested by me is, if not the sole, at least the highest one. My songs, mottoes, and commentaries are offered simply with the hope that they may aid you to recognize and hold fast some part of what you yourself feel while playing these games and to suggest to you how you may awaken corresponding feelings in your child."

If you want to write a pedagogical narrative that will startle the world, adopt the motto of Froebel, the charm of Ascham and Walton, the graciousness of Castiglione, and the hard common sense of Pestalozzi, and then proceed. But hold! You will need to have something to teach. Perhaps you would better not try romance as a vehicle, but would better stick to our briefer types. Suppose you put into narrative form, as others have done since the days of the great kindergartner, a simple game for children, or your favorite and most helpful method of study.

=Gertrude's Method of Instruction=

It was quite early in the morning when Arner (the people's father), Glulhi (his lieutenant), and the pastor went to the mason's cottage. The room was not in order when they entered, for the family had just finished breakfast, and the dirty plates and spoons still lay upon the table. Gertrude was at first somewhat disconcerted, but the visitors reassured her, saying kindly: "This is as it should be; it is impossible to clear the table before breakfast is eaten!"

The children all helped wash the dishes, and then seated themselves in their customary places before their work. The gentlemen begged Gertrude to let everything go on as usual, and after the first half hour, during which she was a little embarrassed, all proceeded as if no stranger were present. First the children sang their morning hymns, and then Gertrude read a chapter of the Bible aloud, which they repeated after her while they were spinning, rehearsing the most instructive passages until they knew them by heart. In the mean time, the oldest girl had been making the children's beds in the adjoining room, and the visitors noticed through the open door that she silently repeated what the others were reciting. When this task was completed, she went into the garden and returned with vegetables for dinner, which she cleaned while repeating Bible-verses with the rest.

It was something new for the children to see three gentlemen in the room, and they often looked up from their spinning toward the corner where the strangers sat. Gertrude noticed this, and said to them: "Seems to me you look more at these gentlemen than at your yarn." But Harry answered: "No, indeed! We are working hard, and you'll have finer yarn to-day than usual."

Whenever Gertrude saw that anything was amiss with the wheels or cotton, she rose from her work, and put it in order. The smallest children, who were not old enough to spin, picked over the cotton for carding, with a skill which excited the admiration of the visitors.

Although Gertrude thus exerted herself to develop very early the manual dexterity of her children, she was in no haste for them to learn to read and write. But she took pains to teach them early how to speak; for, as she said, "of what use is it for a person to be able to read and write, if he cannot speak?--since reading and writing are only an artificial sort of speech." To this end she used to make the children pronounce syllables after her in regular succession, taking them from an old A-B-C book she had. This exercise in correct and distinct articulation was, however, only a subordinate object in her whole scheme of education, which embraced a true comprehension of life itself. Yet she never adopted the tone of instructor toward her children; she did not say to them: "Child, this is your head, your nose, your hand, your finger;" or: "Where is your eye, your ear?"--but instead, she would say: "Come here, child, I will wash your little hands," "I will comb your hair," or: "I will cut your finger-nails." Her verbal instruction seemed to vanish in the spirit of her real activity, in which it always had its source. The result of her system was that each child was skillful, intelligent and active to the full extent that its age and development allowed.

The instruction she gave them in the rudiments of arithmetic was intimately connected with the realities of life. She taught them to count the number of steps from one end of the room to the other; and two of the rows of five panes each, in one of the windows, gave her an opportunity to unfold the decimal relations of numbers. She also made them count their threads while spinning, and the number of turns on the reel, when they wound the yarn into skeins. Above all, in every occupation of life she taught them an accurate and intelligent observation of common objects and the forces of nature.

All that Gertrude's children knew, they knew so thoroughly that they were able to teach it to the younger ones; and this they often begged permission to do. On this day, while the visitors were present, Jones sat with each arm around the neck of a smaller child, and made the little ones pronounce the syllables of the A-B-C book after him; while Lizzie placed herself with her wheel between two of the others, and while all three spun, taught them the words of a hymn with the utmost patience.

When the guests took their departure, they told Gertrude they would come again on the morrow. "Why?" she returned. "You will only see the same thing over again." But Glulphi said: "That is the best praise you could possibly give yourself." Gertrude blushed at this compliment, and stood confused when the gentlemen kindly pressed her hand in taking leave.

The three could not sufficiently admire what they had seen at the mason's house, and Glulphi was so overcome by the powerful impression made upon him, that he longed to be alone and seek counsel of his own thoughts. He hastened to his room, and as he crossed the threshold, the words broke from his lips: "I must be schoolmaster in Bonnal!" All night visions of Gertrude's schoolroom floated through his mind, and he only fell asleep toward morning. Before his eyes were fairly open, he murmured: "I will be schoolmaster!"--and hastened to Arner to acquaint him with his resolution.

--Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi.

"Leonard and Gertrude" (D. C. Heath & Co.).

=Lawin-Lawinan=

In the beautiful town of Santa Maria, children were very fond of playing many curious games. Not a single day or moonlight evening could pass without one's seeing some children playing along the wide streets.

One bright evening in the month of July, after the angelus bell rang, Mapacla, in company with some playmates, went to Zandoval Street, where many children were romping. When they reached the place, they agreed to play _Lawin-lawinan_. Mapacla was chosen by all to be the _sisiw_ (chicken), and a playmate, Malacas by name, to be the _lawin_ (hawk). The chicken and the hawk were the principal characters of the game. The rest of the children formed a circle: each one with outstretched arms held the hand of the one next him till the circle was formed. The space between each two children was called the door, the owners of which were the children by whom it was formed. The chicken stood inside the circle, and the hawk stood outside.

The game was then begun. The hawk went to the first door, asking, "What door is this?"

"To your honorable stomach," answered the owner of the door.

"And this?" asked the hawk, after approaching another door.

"To your long throat," answered the owner.

The hawk repeated the same question, as he went around from door to door, till he reached the last one.

"Have you anything to sell me?" asked the hawk of the door owner.

"A good fat red chicken!" answered the owner.

"Let me see its scales," remarked the hawk, as he grasped the feet of the chicken. "This is a fine quality of wild bird," he added; "will you have him crow?"

"Crow!" said the owner to the chicken.

"Tic--to--la--la--oe," cried the chicken.

"Fine!" said the hawk. "How much will you sell him for?"

"For one peso," answered the owner.

After the bargain had been made and the hawk was about to catch the chicken, the circle began to whirl around, allowing no space for the hawk to enter. By chance, however, the hawk, thrusting himself through a space, reached the interior of the circle. Every owner was then afraid that the chicken might be caught by the hawk. The whirling of the circle was immediately stopped, and every door was left wide open. The chicken with all his might ran swiftly out of the circle. The hawk was so slow in following that he was captured inside. The circle began to whirl again, till, accidentally, the hawk, struggling for his escape, made his way out. Sometimes the chicken, pursued by the hawk, entered the circle, but immediately ran out whenever there was danger of being caught. At last when the chicken became tired, the hawk caught him.

The punishment was then inflicted. The hawk ordered himself to be carried on the shoulders of the chicken. The order was obeyed without delay. After the chicken had walked a few paces with the heavy load on him, he stopped and started another game, choosing another chicken to be chased by the hawk.

--Leopoldo Uichanco.

III. The Story of Present Day Realism

[Realism]

"Realism," says Mr. Howells, "is nothing more and nothing less than the truthful treatment of material." The business of the narrator is to observe and record, he says; all that enters into fiction should be simple, natural and honest. The material must be plain, average, everyday humanity. There is no need of a hero or heroine. There is no need of a plot. The love of the passionate and heroic is a crude and unwholesome thing.

Following these tenets there has grown up a school of writers who undertake to present the world just as it is with no heightening and no lowering of color. They select bits of life and reproduce them exactly. The process is "not so much photographic as microscopic." Nothing is too inane or commonplace. All that a workman needs is a seeing eye, honesty, and a vocabulary, say they. Many of the sketches, of course, seem extremely flat, and the reader involuntarily asks, Why and wherefore? The answer is laconic--life: these are the actual problems of humanity rather than abstract moral truths or highflown idealism; the Scab and Trusty No. 49 are with us in the street; these are the Children of the Public, the Children of the Ghetto; this is the modern Jungle; these are Vignettes of Manhattan; these are the feelings of a maiden lady in a Massachusetts village; these are the happenings of a real Wedding Journey; thus the new-rich build houses in the Back Bay district and attempt to get into society; this is a Modern Instance.

For source of realistic method we shall need to notice again the audacious intimacy of the picaresque romance and the extraordinary minuteness of detail that marked the illustrations and pretended anecdotes of the controversial pamphleteers of the early eighteenth century. Take for illustration the verisimilitude of the repetitions and digressions in the "True Relation of the Apparition of Mrs. Veal," by which Defoe hoodwinked the public--so completely, in fact, that critics are even now divided on the question as to whether he was or was not reporting a real interview. Most of his contemporaries took the matter as _bona fide_ news; their successors took it as invention; and now Mr. George Aitken comes forward with proof of its occurrence; that is, he maintains that Defoe got--in just the way he says he got it--the written report of the actual interview with the person who saw the ghost. The contention only goes to demonstrate that Defoe was a great captain of the pen who could sail extremely close to life. That he could make romance truer than fact we well know.

Added to the patient minuteness of the controversialists and the boldness of the rogue narrators who dared to take us to the back-doors and bed-rooms of the nobility and to the haunts of criminals, came later as an element of realistic method, Jane Austen's home subjects, non-partizanship, and gentle raillery.

[Some realistic writers]

When "Daisy Miller" was written a few decades ago, the Americans were incensed. Henry James did not care, however. Just so we appear abroad, he said, among the more restrained and more cultivated peoples. Howells's "Lady of the Aroostook" seemed a kinder if similar and no less true picture. These brief narratives are hardly novels; and though they are more than tales, they yet are not what we technically call the artistic short-story; they are surely, however, studies in realism.

It is upon this distinction,--namely, that absolute realism would naturally preclude even the slight artificiality that there must be about the truly technical short-story--that we make two divisions in our study of such work as that of Howells, James, and Mary E. Wilkins Freeman. The point is, realism may be as long-drawn out or as brief as life. The technical short-story, however, has a limit on both sides. So has the novel. Each of our great realists has attempted novels; all have written exquisite short stories.

[Suggestions on characters to treat]

To write a present-day realistic sketch you will not need to look far for a subject. Just divest yourself of preconceived ideas of the romantic in fiction, and begin anywhere. Everything is of interest to the realist. A butcher's boy; an octogenarian millionaire; a petty thief; a plodding, respectable, humdrum government clerk; an ordinary mother with her ordinary baby on an ordinary day; a flighty society belle, and a society belle who is not flighty; a sensible matron; an idiot child,--all are his. The interest of your sketch will be in the particularity and niceness of details. You will need to be more truthful than a camera, which always makes people and surroundings look either better or worse than they are. Color and sound and smell and atmosphere and temperature, and temperament, gesture and thought, passing impression and settled purpose, you can record. If any of your characters succeeds, it must be as in life--with half defeat; if any one is defeated, it must be as in life--with half success and a conflicting sense of shame and of relief. You must have something happening, however slight, and thus avoid a mere enumeration of characteristics. You are to show us the person in action. A mere analysis of his vices and virtues, his general mental attitude, would be pure exposition, when you want narrative.

Your diction should be as good as you can make it by care and revision. Howells and James are both stylists of the most polished kind; though Tolstoy, whom Howells recognizes as master, thirty years ago left off any concern for sentence effect. He repeats or reiterates at will. You, however, cannot afford to disregard the rules of the rhetoricians--not until you have become as famous as the Russian count or have a message as distinct as his.

Remember, then, that a good realistic sketch demands on your part an honest, and truthful purpose, a mind freed from the glamor of romance or climax, a sure eye, and exquisite workmanship, in the relation of an ordinary, every-day event.

=The Piece of String=

On all the roads leading to Goderville the peasants and their wives were coming to town for market day. The men shambled along at an easy-going gait, with bodies bent forward. Their long legs were deformed and twisted through hard work--from the weight of the plough, which at the same time throws the left shoulder too high and ruins the figure; from mowing the grain, which effort causes the knees to spread too far apart; and from all the other slow and painful labours of country life. Their blue blouses, starched to a sheenlike varnish and finished at collar and waistbands with little designs in white stitching, stood from their bony bodies like balloons ready for flight, with a head, two arms and two feet protruding.

Some of the men had a cow or calf in tow at the end of a rope, while their wives followed close behind the animal, switching it over the haunches with a leafy branch to hasten its pace.

The women carried large baskets, out of which stuck the heads of chickens and ducks. They took much shorter and quicker steps than the man. Their lanky, spare figures were decorated with mean little shawls pinned across their flat breasts. Each head bore a white linen cover, bound close to the hair and surmounted by a cap.

Now and then there went by a waggonette drawn by a pony on a jerky trot, which jostled the two men on the seat in a ludicrous manner and made the woman at the end of the cart hold the sides firmly for ease from the rough jolting.

In the Goderville market-place was a great crowd of men and animals. The horns of the cattle, the high, long-napped hats of the well-to-do peasants, and the head-dresses of women bobbed above the level of that crowd. Noisy voices, sharp and shrill, kept up a wild and ceaseless clamour, only outdone now and then by a great guffaw of laughter from the strong lungs of a jolly bumpkin, or a prolonged moo from a cow tied to the wall of some house.

Everywhere it smelled of stables, of milk and manure, of hay and sweat. The air was redolent with that sourish, disagreeable odour savouring of man and beast which is peculiar to the labourers of the fields.

Master Hauchecorne, of Bréauté, had just arrived at Goderville and was directing his steps to the square when he observed on the ground a little bit of string. Economical like all true Normans, Master Hauchecorne considered that anything useful was worth picking up, and he bent down painfully, for he suffered from rheumatism. He picked up the scrap of twine from the ground, and was preparing to wind it up carefully when he noticed Master Malandain, the harness-maker, looking at him from his doorway. Once they had a quarrel over a halter and had kept angry ever since, both of them holding spite. Master Hauchecorne was smitten with a certain sense of shame at being seen thus by his enemy searching in the dirt for a mere bit of string. He hastily hid his find under his blouse, then in the pocket of his breeches--after which he pretended to be still looking at his feet for something which he had not yet found. At length, he started toward the market-place, his body almost bent double by his chronic pains.

He lost himself at once in the slow, clamorous throng, which was agitated by perpetual bickerings. The prospective buyers, after looking the cows over, would go away only to return perplexed; always fearing to be taken in; never reaching a decision, but narrowly watching the seller's eyes, seeking in the end to detect the deceit of the man and the defect in his animal.

The women, having put their big baskets at their feet, had pulled out the poultry, which lay upon the ground with legs tied, with frightened eyes and scarlet combs.

They listened to offers, maintaining their prices with a sharp air and impressive face, or else at a sweep accepting a reduced price, crying after the customer who left reluctantly, "It's settled, Anthime; I'll let you have them!"

Then, by degrees, the square emptied, and, as the Angelus struck noon, those living at a distance flocked to the inns.

At Jourdain's, the dining-room was filled with guests, as full as the great courtyard was with vehicles of every description--carts, gigs, waggonettes, tilburies, nondescript jaunting cars, yellow with mud, misshapen, patched up, lifting their shafts to heaven like two arms, or else in a sorry plight with nose in the mud and back in the air.

Right opposite to where the diners were at table, the immense fireplace, all brightly aflame, imparted a genial warmth to the backs of the people ranged on the right. Three spits were turning, loaded with chickens, with pigeons, and with legs of mutton; and a delicious odour of roast meat and of gravy gushing over roast brown skin took wing from the hearth, kindled good humour, and made mouths water.

All the aristocracy of the plough were eating there at Jourdain's, the innkeeper who dealt in horses--a shrewd fellow, who had a goodish penny put by.