The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume I

by William James Stillman

CHAPTER XVI

ENGLAND AGAIN

I have generally been happy at sea; and when not so, it has been from reasons apart from the sea itself,—preoccupations which kept me insensible to the old charm, or mental troubles which made me insensible to everything beside them. On this voyage I had the company of an old friend of the days of "The Crayon," one of our most thoughtful and successful portrait painters, George Fuller, and a young friend of his, a Mr. Ames. We sailed just before Christmas, in an old sailing ship of about eight hundred tons burthen; for, unless time is of importance, I prefer a sailing ship to a steamer, and one pleasant companion is worth a shipload of commonplace fellow-voyagers. A stiff westerly blow caught us off Sandy Hook, and never left us till we were halfway across the Atlantic, increasing in violence every day, until it gave me, what I had always longed for, but never seen, a first-class gale on the open ocean.

I had said to the captain (one of the old sort of Cape Cod sailors, still a young man, however) that I wanted to see a real gale; and one day, after we had been out nearly a week, he called me up on deck, saying, "You wanted to see a gale, and now you may see it; for unless you get into a tornado you will never see anything worse than this." I went on deck, obliged to hold firmly to the rails or some part of the rigging, for the wind was such as to have carried me overboard if I had attempted to stand alone on the quarter-deck. We were running with the wind dead abaft, under a reefed fore-topsail and a storm jib, everything else having been taken in the night before. The studding-sail boom of the foreyard, which had been carelessly left out, had been broken off short in the earing, from the pressure of the wind on the bare spar. The roaring of the wind through the rigging was such as only one who has heard it can conceive.

I gripped close the quarter-deck railing, and drew myself aft to the shelter of the wheelhouse, where, securing myself from being blown away like a piece of paper, I watched the sea. It rose behind us in huge mountains, the summits of which were always combing over and sliding down the weltering flanks of the wave,—not like the surf on a shore, but pushed over like snow; and as a wave overtook us lying in the bottom of the valley, it so overhung that it seemed impossible that when it broke it should not bury us; but the stern was always caught by the forefoot of it, and the old ship began to rise, and went up, up, up, until I was dizzy. Then we hovered on the summit a moment, looking out on such an expanse of gigantic waves as I had never pictured to myself, the distance lost in the driving spray; and, while I looked, the wave passed from under us, and we went down and down with a rapidity of descent which was almost like falling from a balloon. Then, after another moment's rest in the valley, came the shuddering half apprehension of the next wave as it rose above us, threatening again, and then, after again soaring aloft, down again into the driving of the spray; the old ship rolling, plunging, and now and then quivering, as some side wave struck her, with a complication of motions, sidelong and headlong, the huge waves flying before us and yet carrying us on,—wild motions, rolling, pitching, sinking down the long green slope into the valley, to be flung up into the tumult of wind and wave again. In all this complexity of forces we were as helpless as feathers in the wind, cut off from mother earth as much as if we were carried away on the clouds; the feeling of absolute insignificance growing on one as the ship drove on, the creaking of the ship and the hissing rush of the waters hardly audible for the shrieking of the gale through the rigging. In all my life I have never so understood the utter impotence and triviality of humanity as I felt it then.

The ship, though not in measure with the colossi of later times, was yet a huge mass as measured by the man, and she was no more than a cork on the tide. Up and down she went, like a child's swing,—wallowing and rolling, with the sea breaking over the side till the channels were full, and pouring over the bows in green torrents, and then in blinding deluges of spray and water over the stern; tearing along ten knots an hour, and yet always seeming to be left behind by the waves that tore by us,—the great waves, that obeyed the wind only to be crushed down again by it, spurting up here and there fitfully in pinnacles which were instantly driven off in foam and froth; no combing waves, such as the land dweller sees, for no wave could rise enough to comb,—only great hills of water, crystalline with wavelets, streaked with spun foam, heaving as if from a blind impulse, and leaving us, in a contemptuous toleration, to keep afloat if we could. And now and then two great waves raced each other, as they will at long intervals, till they ran close to each other and united, and we were thrown aloft a little higher, to see nothing more than a wild waste of foam, spray, and watery chaos which defies human language to express it.

This was the sea as I had wanted to see it, and as no painter has ever painted, or probably ever will paint it, and as very few could ever have seen it; for in seventy thousand miles of sea travel I have seen it only once. For three days and nights our captain never left the bridge to rest. Of two other ships that left New York the same day that we did, one was dismasted to the south of us, and the other had her quarters stove in and barely escaped foundering just to the north of us. The gale blew out and left us in a dead calm, which lasted a couple of days, when another gale of three days drove us in the direction we wanted to go, and dropped us off Torquay in the morning of what seemed a delicious spring day, all sunshine and south wind. We hailed a fishing boat and went ashore. We had left a land buried in snow and ice, and we reached one in early spring, though it was still January, the gorse in odorous blossoming, and in the hedgerows the early wild flowers in profusion. But we learned, on landing, that the recent gales had strewn the shores of England with wrecks, with great loss of life. It had been one of those terrible winters which have helped make the British sailor the sea dog he is.

I took lodgings in Charles Street, Middlesex Hospital, near Wehnert, and worked hard. I had brought my "Bed of Ferns," a large study from nature on Saranac Lake, and one or two smaller studies. I had visits from Dante Rossetti, Leighton (then in all the glory of his Cimabue picture, and in the promise of even a greater career than he finally attained), Millais, Val Prinsep, and Boyce. I had brought letters from Lowell to Tom Hughes, from Norton to Arthur Hugh Clough, from Agassiz to Professor Owen. Hughes introduced me to the Cosmopolitan Club, where I made the acquaintance, amongst others whom I do not remember, of Millais and Monckton Milnes.

The artists who came seemed to be interested in my work, especially in the "Bed of Ferns," of which Rossetti—whose opinion I valued more than any other, for he was very honest and blunt in his criticisms, and not at all inclined to flattery—expressed himself in strong terms of praise. As it was the first thing in which I had attempted to introduce a human interest in the landscape, I was naturally inclined to consider it my most important work, and I was dismayed when Ruskin came to see me, and, in a tone of extreme disgust, said, pointing to the dead deer and man: "What do you put that stuff in for? Take it out; it stinks!" My reverence for Ruskin's opinion was such that I made no hesitation in painting out the central motive of the picture, for which both subject and effect of light had been selected. Unfortunately, I habitually used copal varnish as a medium. When Rossetti called again, he asked me, with a look of dismay, what I had done to my picture. I explained to him that on Ruskin's advice I had painted out the figures, and exclaiming, "You have spoiled your picture!" he walked out of the room in a rage. However, I sent it to the Academy as it was, and had it back, "Not hung, for want of room," or something equivalent. I then tried to remove the pigment which hid my figures; but the varnish was refractory, and, after a vain attempt, I finally cut the picture up and stuck it in the fire.

The incident, though it cost me the work of three months, and was in fact the only important outcome of the summer's study, did not diminish my confidence in Ruskin's judgment and correct feeling for art. It required a still more severe experience. As all the world knows, that knows anything of Ruskin's ways with artists, he was blunt and outspoken in his criticisms, and not in the least tender of their feelings, unless indeed they happened to be women. Knowing this, I took his praise for certain studies and drawings I had brought with me as a patent of ability; and though I was never extravagant in my opinion of my own capacities for art, his approbation of some things that I had done, and his assurance of a respectable attainment if I followed the best methods of study, encouraged me, and I took it without question that the methods were his, and it was a costly experience which undeceived me.

Of the people with whom I made acquaintance in London at this visit, those who most interested me were Clough and Owen. Of the artists I saw little, as they and myself had other things to do than to frequent one another's studios; but by the Rossetti family I profited largely, as I had been more or less in intimate relations with William since he undertook the correspondence of "The Crayon" from England. Of Dante, indeed, I saw little at that time, as he lived by himself; but with William my relations were constant and cordial, and he was for many years my most valued English friend. Through his extreme honesty and liberality, and his extensive knowledge of and wide feeling for art, there was great community of appreciation between us, and our friendship lasted long beyond the direct interest I had in English art matters.

Of Christina I saw a good deal, for the hospitality of the Rossetti family was informal and cordial. She was then in excellent health, and, though she was never what would be, by the generality of tastes, considered a beautiful woman, there was a noble serenity and dignity of expression in her face which was, as is often said of women of the higher type of character, "better than beauty," and in which one saw the spiritual exaltation that, without the least trace of the dévote, dominated in her and made her, before all other women of whom I know anything, the poetess of the divine life. The faith in the divine flamed out in her with a mild radiance which had in it no earthly warmth. She attracted me very strongly, but I should as soon have thought of falling in love with the Madonna del Gran Duca as with her. Being myself in the regions of dogmatic faith, I was in a position to judge sympathetically her religion, and, though we differed in tenets as far as two sincere believers in Christianity could, I found in our discussions of the dogmas a broad and affectionate charity in her towards all differences from the ideal of credence she had formed for herself. I do not remember ever meeting any one who held such exalted and unquestioning faith in the true spiritual life as was hers. From my mother, who was in most respects the most purely spiritual woman I have ever known, Christina differed by this serenity, which in my mother was often disturbed by the doubts that had their seeds in the old and superstitious Calvinism mingled with the ground of her creed, and from which she never could liberate herself.

Christina believed in God, in heaven, in the eternal life, with an unfaltering constancy and fullness which left no questionings except, it might be, concerning her fulfillment of her religious obligations. And while I thought her belief in certain dogmas, such as transubstantiation, and in the fasting and ritual of her High Church observances, to be too trivial for such a really exalted intellect, so near the perception of the essential truth, she held them with such a childlike and tranquil faith that I would sooner have worshiped with her than have disturbed her tranquillity in it. She gave me a demonstration of doctrinal charity which was to me a novelty, and showed me that tenets which are to me, and those trained like me, idle formalities were in reality the steps of a ladder by which she must climb to the realization of the abstract good. Dogmas and observances apart, I felt that her religion was so much loftier than my own that, though it would have been impossible for me to profess acceptance of it, it was equally impossible to argue with her about it,—that it was so woven into the fibre of her existence that to move it in the least would be impossible, or, if possible, only at the cost of mental and spiritual dislocation. But, with all this, there was not in her a trace of the assumption of a religious superiority which I have so often found in the driest non-conformist, or the putting me apart with the creatures that perish and are doomed which I have oftener found in Catholic friends, with whom I have felt that they regarded me with a sort of pitiful friendship, as one certain to be damned, and so only worth a limited regard, lest love should be wasted. In after years I saw her not infrequently, and when illness and grief had touched her, and I saw always the same serenity and the same wide personal charity.

Much of Christina's character one could see in her mother, a noble and worshipful woman, in whom the domestic virtues mingled with the spiritual in a way that set off the singleness of life of Christina singularly, as if it were the same light in an earthen vessel. Mrs. Rossetti was what one often hears spoken of as "a dear, good woman," whose motherly life had absorbed her existence,—one of the witnesses (martyrs) of the practical Christianity, who go, unseen and unknown, to build the universal church of humanity, and whom we reverence without naming them. Of Maria, the elder sister of Christina, I saw less, but enough to know that the same ardent, beautiful religious spirit burned in her, mute. In the years when I, later, saw most of the family, Maria lived in a sisterhood. She had none of the genius or the personal charm of her sister, but possessed the same elevation and serene religious sentiment.

Of Clough I saw a good deal, though his occupation in a government office left him not much leisure; and it seemed to me that, of all public officials I ever knew, he was the most misplaced at an office desk. Of fragile health and with the temperament of a poet, gentle as a woman can be, he often reminded me of Pegasus in harness. I had a commission from Norton to paint a small full-length portrait of him, and had several sittings; but it did not get on to suit me, and his being compelled to go to Italy for his health before I had finished with it, for well or ill, put an end to it. He left me in occupation of his house while they were away. Of all the people of the poet's temper I ever knew, Clough was the least inclined to talk of poetry, and but for the sensitive mouth and the dreamy eye, with a reflective way he had when talking, as if an undercurrent of thought were going on while he spoke, one might have taken him for a well-educated man of business, a poet-banker, or publisher. Perhaps it is in the memory more than it was in the life, but as I recall him there seemed to be in him an arcanum of thought, something beyond what came into every-day existence,—a life beyond the actual life, into which he withdrew, and out of which he came to speak. I should have liked to live beside him and know him always, for in that phase of him was infinite study. What I did see, however, left on me the impression of a man who was able only to sketch out the life he would have lived,—a life of far greater capabilities than anything accomplished could indicate.

In giving me the letter to Tom Hughes, Lowell had remarked that, though he had never seen him, yet, as Hughes had edited his "Biglow Papers," he thought he might assume an acquaintance sufficient to warrant a letter of introduction. He was not mistaken, for Hughes did the fullest honor to his letter; and as long as I was in London, and indeed for many years after, our relations were of the most cordial, and not long before his death he made me a visit at Rome. Very much of the enjoyment of that winter in London was due to the hospitable and companionable welcome of the author of "Tom Brown," and one of the most enjoyable items was the introduction to the evenings at Macmillan's, where the contributors to the magazine used to meet on Thursday evenings, if I remember rightly, and where I saw the Kingsleys,—Charles only once, but Henry often enough to contract with him a pleasant friendship. Hughes was one of the largest and most genial English natures I knew,—robust, all alive to all his human obligations; and in those troublesome days when the American question was coming to the crisis of our Civil War he was a consistent friend of the North, when the dominant feeling in English society was hostile to it, and this was a strong bond between us.

Owen I saw frequently, and, though my scientific education was, and is, superficial, he interested me greatly; for he had, like Agassiz, the gift of making his knowledge accessible to those who only understood the philosophy and not the facts of science, and I knew enough of the former to profit by his knowledge. Then he was a warm friend of Agassiz, and we used to talk of his theories and studies, of which I knew more than of any other scientific subject. Like Agassiz, he had at first resisted the theory of natural selection, but had, unlike Agassiz, come to recognize the necessity of admitting the idea of evolution in some form, like Asa Gray and Jeffries Wyman. How far he finally went in recognizing the agency of natural selection as the sufficient element in this I do not know, for at that time the battle waged over that phase of the question; but that he did not accept the solution proposed by Darwin as final I have reason to believe, from the fact that, the last time I saw him, he assured me that he was confident that if he could have seen Agassiz again before he died he could have persuaded him that evolution was the solution of the problem of creation, though knowing that Agassiz could never have accepted the doctrine of natural selection in its bareness, absolutely convinced as he was of the agency of Conscious Mind in creation. And I had the further declaration of Owen himself in his expressed conviction that the process of evolution was directed by the Divine Intelligence. One statement he made struck me forcibly in this connection, viz.: that he believed that the evolution of the horse reached its culmination synchronously with the evolution of man, and that the agreement was a part of the divine plan, while Darwin refuses to admit a plan in creation. I have heard amongst evolutionists much bitterness expressed concerning Owen for what they considered his yielding to the pressure of public opinion, and adopting the theory of evolution in contradiction to his real convictions; but I saw enough of him to be certain that he really believed in evolution subject to the dominance of the Divine Intelligence, nor did any of the accusations I heard against him persuade me of the least insincerity in his acceptance of the theory with that qualification,—a position, I am convinced, held by many, even then, who did not openly support it, not caring to go counter to the very general advocacy of natural selection.

The teaching of Owen completed my conversion to the theory of evolution as a general law, not on grounds of physical science, the demonstration by which is and must remain forever incomplete, but on the philosophical ground, which I was more capable of measuring; and with the acceptance of evolution disappeared, logically and, in the subsequent years, completely, the influence of the old anthropomorphic religion, with its terrible dogmas of the inheritance of Adam's transgression and an angry God with His vicarious punishment of His only son, with all the puzzles of miraculous intervention and the perplexities of an infallible revealed word which continually contradicts itself. The conception of Deity thus liberated from the fetters of a materialistic faith rose to a dignity I had never before comprehended, and brought me the new perception of a spiritual religion and life, which was more consoling and vivifying by far than the old belief.

It is possible that the impressions of that time have been modified by my subsequent intercourse with scientific men in England; but they are that the very wide and rapid acceptance of the theory of evolution by natural selection was largely due to the relief it offered from the incubus of the old theological conception of the Deity as a personal agency, always interfering with the course of events,—an infinite, omnipotent, and omniscient stage manager,—a conception under which the Christian world at large lay when Darwin announced his solution of the problem. The religious world had been, up to that time, chained to the anthropomorphic conception of Deity, and it was even less due to the purely scientific faculty than to the philosophic that Darwin came as a liberator from a depressing superstition,—the belief in the terrible Hebrew God, ingrained in the conscience of every reverently educated boy, and become in his growth inseparable from the maturer beliefs. The evolution of the human mind itself had finally reached the point at which this anthropomorphism became a thing impossible to maintain reasonably any longer, and the magic word was spoken by Darwin which broke the spell and set us free—who wished to be free—from a mental servitude grown dangerously dear to our deepest faculties, those of reverence and devotion. That evolution took hold slowly with some who finally adopted it was owing to the fact that, with them, that servitude had never been slavish, but always held less sway than pure reason. And contemporaneously with this evolution of the human mind had come the liberation from religious persecution, either inquisitorial, legal, or social; and, perhaps for the first time in the history of the religious dogma, a man might openly dispute the fundamental ideas of a dominant religion and suffer no penalty for his skepticism.