An American tree, however, if it could grow in fair competition with an English one of similar species, would probably be the more picturesque20 object of the two. The Warwickshire elm has not so beautiful a shape as those that overhang our village street; and as for the redoubtable21 English oak, there is a certain John Bullism in its figure, a compact rotundity of foliage22, a lack of irregular and various outline, that make it look wonderfully like a gigantic cauliflower. Its leaf, too, is much smaller than that of most varieties of American oak; nor do I mean to doubt that the latter, with free leave to grow, reverent23 care and cultivation, and immunity24 from the axe25, would live out its centuries as sturdily as its English brother, and prove far the nobler and more majestic26 specimen27 of a tree at the end of them. Still, however one's Yankee patriotism28 may struggle against the admission, it must be owned that the trees and other objects of an English landscape take hold of the observer by numberless minute tendrils, as it were, which, look as closely as we choose, we never find in an American scene. The parasitic29 growth is so luxuriant, that the trunk of the tree, so gray and dry in our climate, is better worth observing than the boughs30 and foliage; a verdant31 messiness coats it all over; so that it looks almost as green as the leaves; and often, moreover, the stately stem is clustered about, high upward, with creeping and twining shrubs32, the ivy34, and sometimes the mistletoe, close-clinging friends, nurtured35 by the moisture and never too fervid36 sunshine, and supporting themselves by the old tree's abundant strength. We call it a parasitical37 vegetation; but, if the phrase imply any reproach, it is unkind to bestow38 it on this beautiful affection and relationship which exist in England between one order of plants and another: the strong tree being always ready to give support to the trailing shrub33, lift it to the sun, and feed it out of its own heart, if it crave39 such food; and the shrub, on its part, repaying its foster-father with an ample luxuriance of beauty, and adding Corinthian grace to the tree's lofty strength. No bitter winter nips these tender little sympathies, no hot sun burns the life out of them; and therefore they outlast40 the longevity41 of the oak, and, if the woodman permitted, would bury it in a green grave, when all is over.
Should there be nothing else along the road to look at, an English hedge might well suffice to occupy the eyes, and, to a depth beyond what he would suppose, the heart of an American. We often set out hedges in our own soil, but might as well set out figs42 or pineapples and expect to gather fruit of them. Something grows, to be sure, which we choose to call a hedge; but it lacks the dense43, luxuriant variety of vegetation that is accumulated into the English original, in which a botanist44 would find a thousand shrubs and gracious herbs that the hedgemaker never thought of planting there. Among them, growing wild, are many of the kindred blossoms of the very flowers which our pilgrim fathers brought from England, for the sake of their simple beauty and homelike associations, and which we have ever since been cultivating in gardens. There is not a softer trait to be found in the character of those stern men than that they should have been sensible of these flower-roots clinging among the fibres of their rugged45 hearts, and have felt the necessity of bringing them over sea and making them hereditary47 in the new land, instead of trusting to what rarer beauty the wilderness48 might have in store for them.
Or, if the roadside has no hedge, the ugliest stone fence (such as, in America, would keep itself bare and unsympathizing till the end of time) is sure to be covered with the small handiwork of Nature; that careful mother lets nothing go naked there, and if she cannot provide clothing, gives at least embroidery49. No sooner is the fence built than she adopts and adorns50 it as a part of her original plan, treating the hard, uncomely construction as if it had all along been a favorite idea of her own. A little sprig of ivy may be seen creeping up the side of the low wall and clinging fast with its many feet to the rough surface; a tuft of grass roots itself between two of the stones, where a pinch or two of wayside dust has been moistened into nutritious51 soil for it; a small bunch of fern grows in another crevice52; a deep, soft, verdant moss53 spreads itself along the top and over all the available inequalities of the fence; and where nothing else will grow, lichens54 stick tenaciously55 to the bare stones and variegate the monotonous56 gray with hues57 of yellow and red. Finally, a great deal of shrubbery clusters along the base of the stone wall, and takes away the hardness of its outline; and in due time, as the upshot of these apparently58 aimless or sportive touches, we recognize that the beneficent Creator of all things, working through his handmaiden whom we call Nature, has deigned59 to mingle60 a charm of divine gracefulness61 even with so earthly an institution as a boundary fence. The clown who wrought63 at it little dreamed what fellow-laborer he had.
The English should send us photographs of portions of the trunks of trees, the tangled65 and various products of a hedge, and a square foot of an old wall. They can hardly send anything else so characteristic. Their artists, especially of the later school, sometimes toil to depict67 such subjects, but are apt to stiffen68 the lithe69 tendrils in the process. The poets succeed better, with Tennyson at their head, and often produce ravishing effects by dint70 of a tender minuteness of touch, to which the genius of the soil and climate artfully impels71 them: for, as regards grandeur72, there are loftier scenes in many countries than the best that England can show; but, for the picturesqueness73 of the smallest object that lies under its gentle gloom and sunshine, there is no scenery like it anywhere.
In the foregoing paragraphs I have strayed away to a long distance from the road to Stratford-on-Avon; for I remember no such stone fences as I have been speaking of in Warwickshire, nor elsewhere in England, except among the Lakes, or in Yorkshire, and the rough and hilly countries to the north of it. Hedges there were along my road, however, and broad, level fields, rustic74 hamlets, and cottages of ancient date,—from the roof of one of which the occupant was tearing away the thatch75, and showing what an accumulation of dust, dirt, mouldiness, roots of weeds, families of mice, swallows' nests, and hordes76 of insects had been deposited there since that old straw was new. Estimating its antiquity77 from these tokens, Shakespeare himself, in one of his morning rambles78 out of his native town, might have seen the thatch laid on; at all events, the cottage-walls were old enough to have known him as a guest. A few modern villas79 were also to be seen, and perhaps there were mansions81 of old gentility at no great distance, but hidden among trees; for it is a point of English pride that such houses seldom allow themselves to be visible from the high-road. In short, I recollect82 nothing specially66 remarkable83 along the way, nor in the immediate84 approach to Stratford; and yet the picture of that June morning has a glory in my memory, owing chiefly, I believe, to the charm of the English summer-weather, the really good days of which are the most delightful85 that mortal man can ever hope to be favored with. Such a genial86 warmth! A little too warm, it might be, yet only to such a degree as to assure an American (a certainty to which he seldom attains87 till attempered to the customary austerity of an English summer-day) that he was quite warm enough. And after all, there was an unconquerable freshness in the atmosphere, which every little movement of a breeze shook over me like a dash of the ocean-spray. Such days need bring us no other happiness than their own light and temperature. No doubt, I could not have enjoyed it so exquisitely88, except that there must be still latent in us Western wanderers (even after an absence of two centuries and more), an adaptation to the English climate which makes us sensible of a motherly kindness in its scantiest89 sunshine, and overflows90 us with delight at its more lavish91 smiles.
The spire92 of Shakespeare's church—the Church of the Holy Trinity—begins to show itself among the trees at a little distance from Stratford. Next we see the shabby old dwellings93, intermixed with mean-looking houses of modern date; and the streets being quite level, you are struck and surprised by nothing so much as the tameness of the general scene, as if Shakespeare's genius were vivid enough to have wrought pictorial95 splendors96 in the town where he was born. Here and there, however, a queer edifice97 meets your eye, endowed with the individuality that belongs only to the domestic architecture of times gone by; the house seems to have grown out of some odd quality in its inhabitant, as a sea-shell is moulded from within by the character of its innate98; and having been built in a strange fashion, generations ago, it has ever since been growing stranger and quainter99, as old humorists are apt to do. Here, too (as so often impressed me in decayed English towns), there appeared to be a greater abundance of aged100 people wearing small-clothes and leaning on sticks than you could assemble on our side of the water by sounding a trumpet101 and proclaiming a reward for the most venerable. I tried to account for this phenomenon by several theories: as, for example, that our new towns are unwholesome for age and kill it off unseasonably; or that our old men have a subtile sense of fitness, and die of their own accord rather than live in an unseemly contrast with youth and novelty but the secret may be, after all, that hair-dyes, false teeth, modern arts of dress, and other contrivances of a skin-deep youthfulness, have not crept into these antiquated102 English towns, and so people grow old without the weary necessity of seeming younger than they are.
After wandering through two or three streets, I found my way to Shakespeare's birthplace, which is almost a smaller and humbler house than any description can prepare the visitor to expect; so inevitably104 does an august inhabitant make his abode105 palatial106 to our imaginations, receiving his guests, indeed, in a castle in the air, until we unwisely insist on meeting him among the sordid107 lanes and alleys108 of lower earth. The portion of the edifice with which Shakespeare had anything to do is hardly large enough, in the basement, to contain the butcher's stall that one of his descendants kept, and that still remains109 there, windowless, with the cleaver-cuts in its hacked110 counter, which projects into the street under a little penthouse-roof, as if waiting for a new occupant.
The upper half of the door was open, and, on my rapping at it, a young person in black made her appearance and admitted me; she was not a menial, but remarkably112 genteel (an American characteristic) for an English girl, and was probably the daughter of the old gentlewoman who takes care of the house. This lower room has a pavement of gray slabs114 of stone, which may have been rudely squared when the house was new, but are now all cracked, broken, and disarranged in a most unaccountable way. One does not see how any ordinary usage, for whatever length of time, should have so smashed these heavy stones; it is as if an earthquake had burst up through the floor, which afterwards had been imperfectly trodden down again. The room is whitewashed116 and very clean, but wofully shabby and dingy117, coarsely built, and such as the most poetical118 imagination would find it difficult to idealize. In the rear of this apartment is the kitchen, a still smaller room, of a similar rude aspect; it has a great, rough fireplace, with space for a large family under the blackened opening of the chimney, and an immense passageway for the smoke, through which Shakespeare may have seen the blue sky by day and the stars glimmering119 down at him by night. It is now a dreary120 spot where the long-extinguished embers used to be. A glowing fire, even if it covered only a quarter part of the hearth121, might still do much towards making the old kitchen cheerful. But we get a depressing idea of the stifled122, poor, sombre kind of life that could have been lived in such a dwelling94, where this room seems to have been the gathering123-place of the family, with no breadth or scope, no good retirement124, but old and young huddling125 together cheek by jowl. What a hardy126 plant was Shakespeare's genius, how fatal its development, since it could not be blighted127 in such an atmosphere! It only brought human nature the closer to him, and put more unctuous128 earth about his roots.
Thence I was ushered129 up stairs to the room in which Shakespeare is supposed to have been born: though, if you peep too curiously130 into the matter, you may find the shadow of an ugly doubt on this, as well as most other points of his mysterious life. It is the chamber131 over the butcher's shop, and is lighted by one broad window containing a great many small, irregular panes132 of glass. The floor is made of planks133, very rudely hewn, and fitting together with little neatness; the naked beams and rafters, at the sides of the room and overhead, bear the original marks of the builder's broad-axe, with no evidence of an attempt to smooth off the job. Again we have to reconcile ourselves to the smallness of the space enclosed by these illustrious walls,—a circumstance more difficult to accept, as regards places that we have heard, read, thought, and dreamed much about, than any other disenchanting particular of a mistaken ideal. A few paces—perhaps seven or eight—take us from end to end of it. So low it is, that I could easily touch the ceiling, and might have done so without a tiptoe-stretch, had it been a good deal higher; and this humility134 of the chamber has tempted135 a vast multitude of people to write their names overhead in pencil. Every inch of the sidewalls, even into the obscurest nooks and corners, is covered with a similar record; all the window-panes, moreover, are scrawled136 with diamond signatures, among which is said to be that of Walter Scott; but so many persons have sought to immortalize themselves in close vicinity to his name, that I really could not trace him out. Methinks it is strange that people do not strive to forget their forlorn little identities, in such situations, instead of thrusting them forward into the dazzle of a great renown138, where, if noticed, they cannot but be deemed impertinent.
This room, and the entire house, so far as I saw it, are whitewashed and exceedingly clean; nor is there the aged, musty smell with which old Chester first made me acquainted, and which goes far to cure an American of his excessive predilection139 for antique residences. An old lady, who took charge of me up stairs, had the manners and aspect of a gentlewoman, and talked with somewhat formidable knowledge and appreciative140 intelligence about Shakespeare. Arranged on a table and in chairs were various prints, views of houses and scenes connected with Shakespeare's memory, together with editions of his works and local publications about his home and haunts, from the sale of which this respectable lady perhaps realizes a handsome profit. At any rate, I bought a good many of them, conceiving that it might be the civillest way of requiting141 her for her instructive conversation and the trouble she took in showing me the house. It cost me a pang142 (not a curmudgeonly143, but a gentlemanly one) to offer a downright fee to the lady-like girl who had admitted me; but I swallowed my delicate scruples145 with some little difficulty, and she digested hers, so far as I could observe, with no difficulty at all. In fact, nobody need fear to hold out half a crown to any person with whom he has occasion to speak a word in England.
I should consider it unfair to quit Shakespeare's house without the frank acknowledgment that I was conscious of not the slightest emotion while viewing it, nor any quickening of the imagination. This has often happened to me in my visits to memorable places. Whatever pretty and apposite reflections I may have made upon the subject had either occurred to me before I ever saw Stratford, or have been elaborated since. It is pleasant, nevertheless, to think that I have seen the place; and I believe that I can form a more sensible and vivid idea of Shakespeare as a flesh-and-blood individual now that I have stood on the kitchen-hearth and in the birth-chamber; but I am not quite certain that this power of realization146 is altogether desirable in reference to a great poet. The Shakespeare whom I met there took various guises147, but had not his laurel on. He was successively the roguish boy,—the youthful deer-stealer,— the comrade of players,—the too familiar friend of Davenant's mother,— the careful, thrifty148, thriven man of property who came back from London to lend money on bond, and occupy the best house in Stratford,—the mellow149, red-nosed, autumnal boon150-companion of John a' Combe,—and finally (or else the Stratford gossips belied151 him), the victim of convivial152 habits, who met his death by tumbling into a ditch on his way home from a drinking-bout, and left his second-best bed to his poor wife.
I feel, as sensibly as the reader can, what horrible impiety153 it is to remember these things, be they true or false. In either case, they ought to vanish out of sight on the distant ocean-line of the past, leaving a pure, white memory, even as a sail, though perhaps darkened with many stains, looks snowy white on the far horizon. But I draw a moral from these unworthy reminiscences and this embodiment of the poet, as suggested by some of the grimy actualities of his life. It is for the high interests of the world not to insist upon finding out that its greatest men are, in a certain lower sense, very much the same kind of men as the rest of us, and often a little worse; because a common mind cannot properly digest such a discovery, nor ever know the true proportion of the great man's good and evil, nor how small a part of him it was that touched our muddy or dusty earth. Thence comes moral bewilderment, and even intellectual loss, in regard to what is best of him. When Shakespeare invoked155 a curse on the man who should stir his bones, he perhaps meant the larger share of it for him or them who should pry156 into his perishing earthliness, the defects or even the merits of the character that he wore in Stratford, when he had left mankind so much to muse157 upon that was imperishable and divine. Heaven keep me from incurring158 any part of the anathema159 in requital160 for the irreverent sentences above written!
From Shakespeare's house, the next step, of course, is to visit his burial-place. The appearance of the church is most venerable and beautiful, standing161 amid a great green shadow of lime-trees, above which rises the spire, while the Gothic battlements and buttresses162 and vast arched windows are obscurely seen through the boughs. The Avon loiters past the churchyard, an exceedingly sluggish163 river, which might seem to have been considering which way it should flow ever since Shakespeare left off paddling in it and gathering the large forget-me-nots that grow among its flags and water-weeds.
An old man in small-clothes was waiting at the gate; and inquiring whether I wished to go in, he preceded me to the church-porch, and rapped. I could have done it quite as effectually for myself; but it seems, the old people of the neighborhood haunt about the churchyard, in spite of the frowns and remonstrances164 of the sexton, who grudges165 them the half-eleemosynary sixpence which they sometimes get from visitors. I was admitted into the church by a respectable-looking and intelligent man in black, the parish-clerk, I suppose, and probably holding a richer incumbency166 than his vicar, if all the fees which he handles remain in his own pocket. He was already exhibiting the Shakespeare monuments to two or three visitors, and several other parties came in while I was there.
The poet and his family are in possession of what may be considered the very best burial-places that the church affords. They lie in a row, right across the breadth of the chancel, the foot of each gravestone being close to the elevated floor on which the altar stands. Nearest to the side-wall, beneath Shakespeare's bust167, is a slab113 bearing a Latin inscription168 addressed to his wife, and covering her remains; then his own slab, with the old anathematizing stanza169 upon it; then that of Thomas Nash, who married his granddaughter; then that of Dr. Hall, the husband of his daughter Susannah; and, lastly, Susannah's own. Shakespeare's is the commonest-looking slab of all, being just such a flag-stone as Essex Street in Salem used to be paved with, when I was a boy. Moreover, unless my eyes or recollection deceive me, there is a crack across it, as if it had already undergone some such violence as the inscription deprecates. Unlike the other monuments of the family, it bears no name, nor am I acquainted with the grounds or authority on which it is absolutely determined170 to be Shakespeare's; although, being in a range with those of his wife and children, it might naturally be attributed to him. But, then, why does his wife, who died afterwards, take precedence of him and occupy the place next his bust? And where are the graves of another daughter and a son, who have a better right in the family row than Thomas Nash, his grandson-in-law? Might not one or both of them have been laid under the nameless stone? But it is dangerous trifling171 with Shakespeare's dust; so I forbear to meddle172 further with the grave (though the prohibition173 makes it tempting), and shall let whatever bones be in it rest in peace. Yet I must needs add that the inscription on the bust seems to imply that Shakespeare's grave was directly underneath174 it.
The poet's bust is affixed175 to the northern wall of the church, the base of it being about a man's height, or rather more, above the floor of the chancel. The features of this piece of sculpture are entirely176 unlike any portrait of Shakespeare that I have ever seen, and compel me to take down the beautiful, lofty-browed, and noble picture of him which has hitherto hung in my mental portrait-gallery. The bust cannot be said to represent a beautiful face or an eminently177 noble head; but it clutches firmly hold of one's sense of reality and insists upon your accepting it, if not as Shakespeare the poet, yet as the wealthy burgher of Stratford, the friend of John a' Combe, who lies yonder in the corner. I know not what the phrenologists say to the bust. The forehead is but moderately developed, and retreats somewhat, the upper part of the skull179 rising pyramidally; the eyes are prominent almost beyond the penthouse of the brow; the upper lip is so long that it must have been almost a deformity, unless the sculptor180 artistically181 exaggerated its length, in consideration, that, on the pedestal, it must be foreshortened by being looked at from below. On the whole, Shakespeare must have had a singular rather than a prepossessing face; and it is wonderful how, with this bust before its eyes, the world has persisted in maintaining an erroneous notion of his appearance, allowing painters and sculptors182 to foist183 their idealized nonsense on its all, instead of the genuine man. For my part, the Shakespeare of my mind's eye is henceforth to be a personage of a ruddy English complexion185, with a reasonably capacious brow, intelligent and quickly observant eyes, a nose curved slightly outward, a long, queer upper lip, with the mouth a little unclosed beneath it, and cheeks considerably186 developed in the lower part and beneath the chin. But when Shakespeare was himself (for nine tenths of the time, according to all appearances, he was but the burgher of Stratford), he doubtless shone through this dull mask and transfigured it into the face of an angel.
Fifteen or twenty feet behind the row of Shakespeare gravestones is the great east-window of the church, now brilliant with stained glass of recent manufacture. On one side of this window, under a sculptured arch of marble, lies a full-length marble figure of John a' Combe, clad in what I take to be a robe of municipal dignity, and holding its hands devoutly187 clasped. It is a sturdy English figure, with coarse features, a type of ordinary man whom we smile to see immortalized in the sculpturesque material of poets and heroes; but the prayerful attitude encourages us to believe that the old usurer may not, after all, have had that grim reception in the other world which Shakespeare's squib foreboded for him. By the by, till I grew somewhat familiar with Warwickshire pronunciation, I never understood that the point of those ill-natured lines was a pun. "'Oho!' quoth the Devil, ''t is my John a' Combe'"—that is, "My John has come!"
Close to the poet's bust is a nameless, oblong, cubic tomb, supposed to be that of a clerical dignitary of the fourteenth century. The church has other mural monuments and altar-tombs, one or two of the latter upholding the recumbent figures of knights189 in armor and their dames190, very eminent178 and worshipful personages in their day, no doubt, but doomed191 to appear forever intrusive192 and impertinent within the precincts which Shakespeare has made his own. His renown is tyrannous, and suffers nothing else to be recognized within the scope of its material presence, unless illuminated193 by some side-ray from himself. The clerk informed me that interments no longer take place in any part of the church. And it is better so; for methinks a person of delicate individuality, curious about his burial-place, and desirous of six feet of earth for himself alone, could never endure to be buried near Shakespeare, but would rise up at midnight and grope his way out of the church-door, rather than sleep in the shadow of so stupendous a memory.
I should hardly have dared to add another to the innumerable descriptions of Stratford-on-Avon, if it had not seemed to me that this would form a fitting framework to some reminiscences of a very remarkable woman. Her labor64, while she lived, was of a nature and purpose outwardly irreverent to the name of Shakespeare, yet, by its actual tendency, entitling her to the distinction of being that one of all his worshippers who sought, though she knew it not, to place the richest and stateliest diadem194 upon his brow. We Americans, at least, in the scanty195 annals of our literature, cannot afford to forget her high and conscientious196 exercise of noble faculties197, which, indeed, if you look at the matter in one way, evolved only a miserable198 error, but, more fairly considered, produced a result worth almost what it cost her. Her faith in her own ideas was so genuine, that, erroneous as they were, it transmuted199 them to gold, or, at all events, interfused a large proportion of that precious and indestructible substance among the waste material from which it can readily be sifted200.
The only time I ever saw Miss Bacon was in London, where she had lodgings201 in Spring Street, Sussex Gardens, at the house of a grocer, a portly, middle-aged203, civil, and friendly man, who, as well as his wife, appeared to feel a personal kindness towards their lodger204. I was ushered up two (and I rather believe three) pair of stairs into a parlor206 somewhat humbly207 furnished, and told that Miss Bacon would come soon. There were a number of books on the table, and, looking into them, I found that every one had some reference, more or less immediate, to her Shakespearian theory,—a volume of Raleigh's "History of the World," a volume of Montaigne, a volume of Lord Bacon's letters, a volume of Shakespeare's plays; and on another table lay a large roll of manuscript, which I presume to have been a portion of her work. To be sure, there was a pocket-Bible among the books, but everything else referred to the one despotic idea that had got possession of her mind; and as it had engrossed208 her whole soul as well as her intellect, I have no doubt that she had established subtile connections between it and the Bible likewise. As is apt to be the case with solitary209 students, Miss Bacon probably read late and rose late; for I took up Montaigne (it was Hazlitt's translation) and had been reading his journey to Italy a good while before she appeared.
I had expected (the more shame for me, having no other ground of such expectation than that she was a literary woman) to see a very homely210, uncouth211, elderly personage, and was quite agreeably disappointed by her aspect. She was rather uncommonly212 tall, and had a striking and expressive213 face, dark hair, dark eyes, which shone with an inward light as soon as she began to speak, and by and by a color came into her cheeks and made her look almost young. Not that she really was so; she must have been beyond middle age: and there was no unkindness in coming to that conclusion, because, making allowance for years and ill-health, I could suppose her to have been handsome and exceedingly attractive once. Though wholly estranged214 from society, there was little or no restraint or embarrassment215 in her manner: lonely people are generally glad to give utterance216 to their pent-up ideas, and often bubble over with them as freely as children with their new-found syllables217. I cannot tell how it came about, but we immediately found ourselves taking a friendly and familiar tone together, and began to talk as if we had known one another a very long while. A little preliminary correspondence had indeed smoothed the way, and we had a definite topic in the contemplated218 publication of her book.
She was very communicative about her theory, and would have been much more so had I desired it; but, being conscious within myself of a sturdy unbelief, I deemed it fair and honest rather to repress than draw her out upon the subject. Unquestionably, she was a monomaniac; these overmastering ideas about the authorship of Shakespeare's plays, and the deep political philosophy concealed219 beneath the surface of them, had completely thrown her off her balance; but at the same time they had wonderfully developed her intellect, and made her what she could not otherwise have become. It was a very singular phenomenon: a system of philosophy growing up in thus woman's mind without her volition,— contrary, in fact, to the determined resistance of her volition,—and substituting itself in the place of everything that originally grew there. To have based such a system on fancy, and unconsciously elaborated it for herself, was almost as wonderful as really to have found it in the plays. But, in a certain sense, she did actually find it there. Shakespeare has surface beneath surface, to an immeasurable depth, adapted to the plummet-line of every reader; his works present many phases of truth, each with scope large enough to fill a contemplative mind. Whatever you seek in him you will surely discover, provided you seek truth. There is no exhausting the various interpretation220 of his symbols; and a thousand years hence, a world of new readers will possess a whole library of new books, as we ourselves do, in these volumes old already. I had half a mind to suggest to Miss Bacon this explanation of her theory, but forbore, because (as I could readily perceive) she had as princely a spirit as Queen Elizabeth herself, and would at once have motioned me from the room.
I had heard, long ago, that she believed that the material evidences of her dogma as to the authorship, together with the key of the new philosophy, would be found buried in Shakespeare's grave. Recently, as I understood her, this notion had been somewhat modified, and was now accurately221 defined and fully7 developed in her mind, with a result of perfect certainty. In Lord Bacon's letters, on which she laid her finger as she spoke222, she had discovered the key and clew to the whole mystery. There were definite and minute instructions how to find a will and other documents relating to the conclave223 of Elizabethan philosophers, which were concealed (when and by whom she did not inform me) in a hollow space in the under surface of Shakespeare's gravestone. Thus the terrible prohibition to remove the stone was accounted for. The directions, she intimated, went completely and precisely224 to the point, obviating225 all difficulties in the way of coming at the treasure, and even, if I remember right, were so contrived226 as to ward18 off any troublesome consequences likely to ensue from the interference of the parish-officers. All that Miss Bacon now remained in England for— indeed, the object for which she had come hither, and which had kept her here for three years past—was to obtain possession of these material and unquestionable proofs of the authenticity227 of her theory.
She communicated all this strange matter in a low, quiet tone; while, on my part, I listened as quietly, and without any expression of dissent228. Controversy229 against a faith so settled would have shut her up at once, and that, too, without in the least weakening her belief in the existence of those treasures of the tomb; and had it been possible to convince her of their intangible nature, I apprehend230 that there would have been nothing left for the poor enthusiast231 save to collapse232 and die. She frankly233 confessed that she could no longer bear the society of those who did not at least lend a certain sympathy to her views, if not fully share in them; and meeting little sympathy or none, she had now entirely secluded234 herself from the world. In all these years, she had seen Mrs. Farrar a few times, but had long ago given her up,—Carlyle once or twice, but not of late, although he had received her kindly235; Mr. Buchanan, while Minister in England, had once called on her, and General Campbell, our Consul236 in London, had met her two or three times on business. With these exceptions, which she marked so scrupulously237 that it was perceptible what epochs they were in the monotonous passage of her days, she had lived in the profoundest solitude238. She never walked out; she suffered much from ill-health; and yet, she assured me, she was perfectly115 happy.
I could well conceive it; for Miss Bacon imagined herself to have received (what is certainly the greatest boon ever assigned to mortals) a high mission in the world, with adequate powers for its accomplishment239; and lest even these should prove insufficient240, she had faith that special interpositions of Providence241 were forwarding her human efforts. This idea was continually coming to the surface, during our interview. She believed, for example, that she had been providentially led to her lodging202-house and put in relations with the good-natured grocer and his family; and, to say the truth, considering what a savage13 and stealthy tribe the London lodging-house keepers usually are, the honest kindness of this man and his household appeared to have been little less than miraculous242. Evidently, too, she thought that Providence had brought me forward—a man somewhat connected with literature—at the critical juncture243 when she needed a negotiator with the booksellers; and, on my part, though little accustomed to regard myself as a divine minister, and though I might even have preferred that Providence should select some other instrument, I had no scruple144 in undertaking244 to do what I could for her. Her book, as I could see by turning it over, was a very remarkable one, and worthy154 of being offered to the public, which, if wise enough to appreciate it, would be thankful for what was good in it and merciful to its faults. It was founded on a prodigious245 error, but was built up from that foundation with a good many prodigious truths. And, at all events, whether I could aid her literary views or no, it would have been both rash and impertinent in me to attempt drawing poor Miss Bacon out of her delusions246, which were the condition on which she lived in comfort and joy, and in the exercise of great intellectual power. So I left her to dream as she pleased about the treasures of Shakespeare's tombstone, and to form whatever designs might seem good to herself for obtaining possession of them. I was sensible of a ladylike feeling of propriety247 in Miss Bacon, and a New England orderliness in her character, and, in spite of her bewilderment, a sturdy common-sense, which I trusted would begin to operate at the right time, and keep her from any actual extravagance. And as regarded this matter of the tombstone, so it proved.
The interview lasted above an hour, during which she flowed out freely, as to the sole auditor248, capable of any degree of intelligent sympathy, whom she had met with in a very long while. Her conversation was remarkably suggestive, alluring249 forth184 one's own ideas and fantasies from the shy places where they usually haunt. She was indeed an admirable talker, considering how long she had held her tongue for lack of a listener,—pleasant, sunny and shadowy, often piquant250, and giving glimpses of all a woman's various and readily changeable moods and humors; and beneath them all there ran a deep and powerful under-current of earnestness, which did not fail to produce in the listener's mind something like a temporary faith in what she herself believed so fervently251. But the streets of London are not favorable to enthusiasms of this kind, nor, in fact, are they likely to flourish anywhere in the English atmosphere; so that, long before reaching Paternoster Row, I felt that it would be a difficult and doubtful matter to advocate the publication of Miss Bacon's book. Nevertheless, it did finally get published.
Months before that happened, however, Miss Bacon had taken up her residence at Stratford-on-Avon, drawn252 thither253 by the magnetism254 of those rich secrets which she supposed to have been hidden by Raleigh, or Bacon, or I know not whom, in Shakespeare's grave, and protected there by a curse, as pirates used to bury their gold in the guardianship255 of a fiend. She took a humble103 lodging and began to haunt the church like a ghost. But she did not condescend256 to any stratagem257 or underhand attempt to violate the grave, which, had she been capable of admitting such an idea, might possibly have been accomplished258 by the aid of a resurrection-man. As her first step, she made acquaintance with the clerk, and began to sound him as to the feasibility of her enterprise and his own willingness to engage in it. The clerk apparently listened with not unfavorable ears; but, as his situation (which the fees of pilgrims, more numerous than at any Catholic shrine259, render lucrative) would have been forfeited260 by any malfeasance in office, he stipulated261 for liberty to consult the vicar. Miss Bacon requested to tell her own story to the reverend gentleman, and seems to have been received by him with the utmost kindness, and even to have succeeded in making a certain impression on his mind as to the desirability of the search. As their interview had been under the seal of secrecy262, he asked permission to consult a friend, who, as Miss Bacon either found out or surmised263, was a practitioner264 of the law. What the legal friend advised she did not learn; but the negotiation265 continued, and certainly was never broken off by an absolute refusal on the vicar's part. He, perhaps, was kindly temporizing266 with our poor countrywoman, whom an Englishman of ordinary mould would have sent to a lunatic asylum267 at once. I cannot help fancying, however, that her familiarity with the events of Shakespeare's life, and of his death and burial (of which she would speak as if she had been present at the edge of the grave), and all the history, literature, and personalities268 of the Elizabethan age, together with the prevailing269 power of her own belief, and the eloquence270 with which she knew how to enforce it, had really gone some little way toward making a convert of the good clergyman. If so, I honor him above all the hierarchy271 of England.
The affair certainly looked very hopeful. However erroneously, Miss Bacon had understood from the vicar that no obstacles would be interposed to the investigation272, and that he himself would sanction it with his presence. It was to take place after nightfall; and all preliminary arrangements being made, the vicar and clerk professed273 to wait only her word in order to set about lifting the awful stone from the sepulchre. So, at least, Miss Bacon believed; and as her bewilderment was entirely in her own thoughts, and never disturbed her perception or accurate remembrance of external things, I see no reason to doubt it, except it be the tinge274 of absurdity275 in the fact. But, in this apparently prosperous state of things, her own convictions began to falter276. A doubt stole into her mind whether she might not have mistaken the depository and mode of concealment277 of those historic treasures; and after once admitting the doubt, she was afraid to hazard the shock of uplifting the stone and finding nothing. She examined the surface of the gravestone, and endeavored, without stirring it, to estimate whether it were of such thickness as to be capable of containing the archives of the Elizabethan club. She went over anew the proofs, the clews, the enigmas278, the pregnant sentences, which she had discovered in Bacon's letters and elsewhere, and now was frightened to perceive that they did not point so definitely to Shakespeare's tomb as she had heretofore supposed. There was an unmistakably distinct reference to a tomb, but it might be Bacon's, or Raleigh's, or Spenser's; and instead of the "Old Player," as she profanely279 called him, it might be either of those three illustrious dead, poet, warrior280, or statesman, whose ashes, in Westminster Abbey, or the Tower burial-ground, or wherever they sleep, it was her mission to disturb. It is very possible, moreover, that her acute mind may always have had a lurking281 and deeply latent distrust of its own fantasies, and that this now became strong enough to restrain her from a decisive step.
But she continued to hover282 around the church, and seems to have had full freedom of entrance in the daytime, and special license283, on one occasion at least, at a late hour of the night. She went thither with a dark-lantern, which could but twinkle like a glow-worm through the volume of obscurity that filled the great dusky edifice. Groping her way up the aisle284 and towards the chancel, she sat down on the elevated part of the pavement above Shakespeare's grave. If the divine poet really wrote the inscription there, and cared as much about the quiet of his bones as its deprecatory earnestness would imply, it was time for those crumbling285 relics286 to bestir themselves under her sacrilegious feet. But they were safe. She made no attempt to disturb them; though, I believe, she looked narrowly into the crevices287 between Shakespeare's and the two adjacent stones, and in some way satisfied herself that her single strength would suffice to lift the former, in case of need. She threw the feeble ray of her lantern up towards the bust, but could not make it visible beneath the darkness of the vaulted288 roof. Had she been subject to superstitious289 terrors, it is impossible to conceive of a situation that could better entitle her to feel them, for, if Shakespeare's ghost would rise at any provocation290, it must have shown itself then; but it is my sincere belief, that, if his figure had appeared within the scope of her dark-lantern, in his slashed291 doublet and gown, and with his eyes bent188 on her beneath the high, bald forehead, just as we see him in the bust, she would have met him fearlessly and controverted292 his claims to the authorship of the plays, to his very face. She had taught herself to contemn293 "Lord Leicester's groom294" (it was one of her disdainful epithets295 for the world's incomparable poet) so thoroughly296, that even his disembodied spirit would hardly have found civil treatment at Miss Bacon's hands.
Her vigil, though it appears to have had no definite object, continued far into the night. Several times she heard a low movement in the aisles297: a stealthy, dubious298 footfall prowling about in the darkness, now here, now there, among the pillars and ancient tombs, as if some restless inhabitant of the latter had crept forth to peep at the intruder. By and by the clerk made his appearance, and confessed that he had been watching her ever since she entered the church.
About this time it was that a strange sort of weariness seems to have fallen upon her: her toil was all but done, her great purpose, as she believed, on the very point of accomplishment, when she began to regret that so stupendous a mission had been imposed on the fragility of a woman. Her faith in the new philosophy was as mighty299 as ever, and so was her confidence in her own adequate development of it, now about to be given to the world; yet she wished, or fancied so, that it might never have been her duty to achieve this unparalleled task, and to stagger feebly forward under her immense burden of responsibility and renown. So far as her personal concern in the matter went, she would gladly have forfeited the reward of her patient study and labor for so many years, her exile from her country and estrangement300 from her family and friends, her sacrifice of health and all other interests to this one pursuit, if she could only find herself free to dwell in Stratford and be forgotten. She liked the old slumberous301 town, and awarded the only praise that ever I knew her to bestow on Shakespeare, the individual man, by acknowledging that his taste in a residence was good, and that he knew how to choose a suitable retirement for a person of shy, but genial temperament302. And at this point, I cease to possess the means of tracing her vicissitudes303 of feeling any further. In consequence of some advice which I fancied it my duty to tender, as being the only confidant whom she now had in the world, I fell under Miss Bacon's most severe and passionate304 displeasure, and was cast off by her in the twinkling of an eye. It was a misfortune to which her friends were always particularly liable; but I think that none of them ever loved, or even respected, her most ingenuous305 and noble, but likewise most sensitive and tumultuous, character the less for it.
At that time her book was passing through the press. Without prejudice to her literary ability, it must be allowed that Miss Bacon was wholly unfit to prepare her own work for publication, because, among many other reasons, she was too thoroughly in earnest to know what to leave out. Every leaf and line was sacred, for all had been written under so deep a conviction of truth as to assume, in her eyes, the aspect of inspiration. A practised book-maker, with entire control of her materials, would have shaped out a duodecimo volume full of eloquent306 and ingenious dissertation,—criticisms which quite take the color and pungency307 out of other people's critical remarks on Shakespeare,—philosophic truths which she imagined herself to have found at the roots of his conceptions, and which certainly come from no inconsiderable depth somewhere. There was a great amount of rubbish, which any competent editor would have shovelled308 out of the way. But Miss Bacon thrust the whole bulk of inspiration and nonsense into the press in a lump, and there tumbled out a ponderous309 octavo volume, which fell with a dead thump310 at the feet of the public, and has never been picked up. A few persons turned over one or two of the leaves, as it lay there, and essayed to kick the volume deeper into the mud; for they were the hack111 critics of the minor311 periodical press in London, than whom, I suppose, though excellent fellows in their way, there are no gentlemen in the world less sensible of any sanctity in a book, or less likely to recognize an author's heart in it, or more utterly careless about bruising312, if they do recognize it. It is their trade. They could not do otherwise. I never thought of blaming them. It was not for such an Englishman as one of these to get beyond the idea that an assault was meditated313 on England's greatest poet. From the scholars and critics of her own country, indeed, Miss Bacon might have looked for a worthier314 appreciation315, because many of the best of them have higher cultivation, and finer and deeper literary sensibilities than all but the very profoundest and brightest of Englishmen. But they are not a courageous316 body of men; they dare not think a truth that has an odor of absurdity, lest they should feel themselves bound to speak it out. If any American ever wrote a word in her behalf, Miss Bacon never knew it, nor did I. Our journalists at once republished some of the most brutal317 vituperations of the English press, thus pelting318 their poor countrywoman with stolen mud, without even waiting to know whether the ignominy was deserved. And they never have known it, to this day, nor ever will.
The next intelligence that I had of Miss Bacon was by a letter from the mayor of Stratford-on-Avon. He was a medical man, and wrote both in his official and professional character, telling me that an American lady, who had recently published what the mayor called a "Shakespeare book," was afflicted319 with insanity320. In a lucid321 interval322 she had referred to me, as a person who had some knowledge of her family and affairs. What she may have suffered before her intellect gave way, we had better not try to imagine. No author had ever hoped so confidently as she; none ever failed more utterly. A superstitious fancy might suggest that the anathema on Shakespeare's tombstone had fallen heavily on her head in requital of even the unaccomplished purpose of disturbing the dust beneath, and that the "Old Player" had kept so quietly in his grave, on the night of her vigil, because he foresaw how soon and terribly he would be avenged323. But if that benign324 spirit takes any care or cognizance of such things now, he has surely requited325 the injustice326 that she sought to do him—the high justice that she really did—by a tenderness of love and pity of which only he could be capable. What matters it though she called him by some other name? He had wrought a greater miracle on her than on all the world besides. This bewildered enthusiast had recognized a depth in the man whom she decried327, which scholars, critics, and learned societies, devoted328 to the elucidation329 of his unrivalled scenes, had never imagined to exist there. She had paid him the loftiest honor that all these ages of renown have been able to accumulate upon his memory. And when, not many months after the outward failure of her lifelong object, she passed into the better world, I know not why we should hesitate to believe that the immortal137 poet may have met her on the threshold and led her in, reassuring330 her with friendly and comfortable words, and thanking her (yet with a smile of gentle humor in his eyes at the thought of certain mistaken speculations) for having interpreted him to mankind so well.
I believe that it has been the fate of this remarkable book never to have had more than a single reader. I myself am acquainted with it only in insulated chapters and scattered331 pages and paragraphs. But, since my return to America, a young man of genius and enthusiasm has assured me that he has positively332 read the book from beginning to end, and is completely a convert to its doctrines333. It belongs to him, therefore, and not to me, whom, in almost the last letter that I received from her, she declared unworthy to meddle with her work,—it belongs surely to this one individual, who has done her so much justice as to know what she wrote, to place Miss Bacon in her due position before the public and posterity334.
This has been too sad a story. To lighten the recollection of it, I will think of my stroll homeward past Charlecote Park, where I beheld335 the most stately elms, singly, in clumps336, and in groves337, scattered all about in the sunniest, shadiest, sleepiest fashion; so that I could not but believe in a lengthened338, loitering, drowsy339 enjoyment340 which these trees must have in their existence. Diffused341 over slow-paced centuries, it need not be keen nor bubble into thrills and ecstasies342, like the momentary343 delights of short-lived human beings. They were civilized trees, known to man and befriended by him for ages past. There is an indescribable difference—as I believe I have heretofore endeavored to express—between the tamed, but by no means effete344 (on the contrary, the richer and more luxuriant) nature of England, and the rude, shaggy, barbarous nature which offers as its racier companionship in America. No less a change has been wrought among the wildest creatures that inhabit what the English call their forests. By and by, among those refined and venerable trees, I saw a large herd345 of deer, mostly reclining, but some standing in picturesque groups, while the stags threw their large antlers aloft, as if they had been taught to make themselves tributary346 to the scenic347 effect. Some were running fleetly about, vanishing from light into shadow and glancing forth again, with here and there a little fawn348 careering at its mother's heels. These deer are almost in the same relation to the wild, natural state of their kind that the trees of an English park hold to the rugged growth of an American forest. They have held a certain intercourse349 with man for immemorial years; and, most probably, the stag that Shakespeare killed was one of the progenitors350 of this very herd, and may himself have been a partly civilized and humanized deer, though in a less degree than these remote posterity. They are a little wilder than sheep, but they do not snuff the air at the approach of human beings, nor evince much alarm at their pretty close proximity351; although if you continue to advance, they toss their heads and take to their heels in a kind of mimic352 terror, or something akin46 to feminine skittishness353, with a dim remembrance or tradition, as it were, of their having come of a wild stock. They have so long been fed and protected by man, that they must have lost many of their native instincts, and, I suppose, could not live comfortably through, even an English winter without human help. One is sensible of a gentle scorn at them for such dependency, but feels none the less kindly disposed towards the half-domesticated race; and it may have been his observation of these tamer characteristics in the Charlecote herd that suggested to Shakespeare the tender and pitiful description of a wounded stag, in "As You Like It."
At a distance of some hundreds of yards from Charlecote Hall, and almost hidden by the trees between it and the roadside, is an old brick archway and porter's lodge205. In connection with this entrance there appears to have been a wall and an ancient moat, the latter of which is still visible, a shallow, grassy354 scoop355 along the base of an embankment of the lawn. About fifty yards within the gateway356 stands the house, forming three sides of a square, with three gables in a row on the front, and on each of the two wings; and there are several towers and turrets357 at the angles, together with projecting windows, antique balconies, and other quaint15 ornaments358 suitable to the half-Gothic taste in which the edifice was built. Over the gateway is the Lucy coat-of-arms, emblazoned in its proper colors. The mansion80 dates from the early days of Elizabeth, and probably looked very much the same as now when Shakespeare was brought before Sir Thomas Lucy for outrages359 among his deer. The impression is not that of gray antiquity, but of stable and time-honored gentility, still as vital as ever.
It is a most delightful place. All about the house and domain360 there is a perfection of comfort and domestic taste, an amplitude361 of convenience, which could have been brought about only by the slow ingenuity362 and labor of many successive generations, intent upon adding all possible improvement to the home where years gone by and years to come give a sort of permanence to the intangible present. An American is sometimes tempted to fancy that only by this long process can real homes be produced. One man's lifetime is not enough for the accomplishment of such a work of art and nature, almost the greatest merely temporary one that is confided363 to him; too little, at any rate,—yet perhaps too long when he is discouraged by the idea that he must make his house warm and delightful for a miscellaneous race of successors, of whom the one thing certain is, that his own grandchildren will not be among them. Such repinings as are here suggested, however, come only from the fact, that, bred in English habits of thought, as most of us are, we have not yet modified our instincts to the necessities of our new forms of life. A lodging in a wigwam or under a tent has really as many advantages, when we come to know them, as a home beneath the roof-tree of Charlecote Hall. But, alas364! our philosophers have not yet taught us what is best, nor have our poets sung us what is beautifulest, in the kind of life that we must lead; and therefore we still read the old English wisdom, and harp365 upon the ancient strings366. And thence it happens, that, when we look at a time-honored hall, it seems more possible for men who inherit such a home, than for ourselves, to lead noble and graceful62 lives, quietly doing good and lovely things as their daily work, and achieving deeds of simple greatness when circumstances require them. I sometimes apprehend that our institutions may perish before we shall have discovered the most precious of the possibilities which they involve.
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memorable
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| adj.值得回忆的，难忘的，特别的，显著的 | |
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peculiarities
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| n. 特质, 特性, 怪癖, 古怪 | |
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swells
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| 增强( swell的第三人称单数 )； 肿胀； （使）凸出； 充满（激情） | |
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utterly
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| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
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destitute
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| adj.缺乏的；穷困的 | |
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brooks
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| n.小溪( brook的名词复数 ) | |
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fully
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| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
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plantations
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| n.种植园，大农场( plantation的名词复数 ) | |
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cultivation
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| n.耕作，培养，栽培（法），养成 | |
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mingling
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| adj.混合的 | |
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toil
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| vi.辛劳工作，艰难地行动；n.苦工，难事 | |
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redeemed
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| adj. 可赎回的，可救赎的 动词redeem的过去式和过去分词形式 | |
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savage
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| adj.野蛮的；凶恶的，残暴的；n.未开化的人 | |
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savagery
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| n.野性 | |
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quaint
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| adj.古雅的，离奇有趣的，奇怪的 | |
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civilized
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| a.有教养的，文雅的 | |
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ragged
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| adj.衣衫褴褛的，粗糙的，刺耳的 | |
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ward
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| n.守卫，监护，病房，行政区，由监护人或法院保护的人（尤指儿童）；vt.守护，躲开 | |
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babble
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| v.含糊不清地说，胡言乱语地说，儿语 | |
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picturesque
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| adj.美丽如画的，（语言）生动的，绘声绘色的 | |
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redoubtable
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| adj.可敬的；可怕的 | |
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foliage
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| n.叶子，树叶，簇叶 | |
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reverent
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| adj.恭敬的，虔诚的 | |
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immunity
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| n.优惠；免除；豁免，豁免权 | |
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axe
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| n.斧子；v.用斧头砍，削减 | |
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majestic
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| adj.雄伟的，壮丽的，庄严的，威严的，崇高的 | |
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specimen
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| n.样本，标本 | |
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patriotism
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| n.爱国精神，爱国心，爱国主义 | |
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parasitic
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| adj.寄生的 | |
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boughs
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| 大树枝( bough的名词复数 ) | |
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verdant
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| adj.翠绿的，青翠的，生疏的，不老练的 | |
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shrubs
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| 灌木( shrub的名词复数 ) | |
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shrub
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| n.灌木，灌木丛 | |
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ivy
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| n.常青藤，常春藤 | |
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nurtured
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| 养育( nurture的过去式和过去分词 )； 培育； 滋长； 助长 | |
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fervid
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| adj.热情的；炽热的 | |
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parasitical
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| adj. 寄生的(符加的) | |
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bestow
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| v.把…赠与，把…授予；花费 | |
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crave
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| vt.渴望得到，迫切需要，恳求，请求 | |
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40
outlast
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| v.较…耐久 | |
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41
longevity
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| n.长命；长寿 | |
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42
figs
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| figures 数字，图形，外形 | |
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43
dense
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| a.密集的，稠密的，浓密的；密度大的 | |
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44
botanist
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| n.植物学家 | |
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45
rugged
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| adj.高低不平的，粗糙的，粗壮的，强健的 | |
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46
akin
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| adj.同族的，类似的 | |
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47
hereditary
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| adj.遗传的，遗传性的，可继承的，世袭的 | |
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48
wilderness
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| n.杳无人烟的一片陆地、水等，荒漠 | |
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49
embroidery
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| n.绣花，刺绣；绣制品 | |
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50
adorns
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| 装饰，佩带( adorn的第三人称单数 ) | |
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51
nutritious
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| adj.有营养的，营养价值高的 | |
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52
crevice
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| n.(岩石、墙等)裂缝；缺口 | |
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53
moss
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| n.苔，藓，地衣 | |
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54
lichens
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| n.地衣( lichen的名词复数 ) | |
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55
tenaciously
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| 坚持地 | |
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56
monotonous
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| adj.单调的，一成不变的，使人厌倦的 | |
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57
hues
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| 色彩( hue的名词复数 )； 色调； 信仰； 观点 | |
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58
apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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59
deigned
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| v.屈尊，俯就( deign的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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60
mingle
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| vt.使混合，使相混；vi.混合起来；相交往 | |
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61
gracefulness
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62
graceful
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| adj.优美的，优雅的；得体的 | |
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63
wrought
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| v.引起；以…原料制作；运转；adj.制造的 | |
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64
labor
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| n.劳动，努力，工作，劳工；分娩；vi.劳动，努力，苦干；vt.详细分析；麻烦 | |
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65
tangled
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| adj. 纠缠的，紊乱的 动词tangle的过去式和过去分词 | |
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66
specially
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| adv.特定地；特殊地；明确地 | |
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67
depict
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| vt.描画，描绘；描写，描述 | |
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68
stiffen
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| v.(使)硬，(使)变挺，(使)变僵硬 | |
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69
lithe
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| adj.(指人、身体)柔软的，易弯的 | |
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70
dint
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| n.由于，靠；凹坑 | |
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71
impels
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| v.推动、推进或敦促某人做某事( impel的第三人称单数 ) | |
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72
grandeur
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| n.伟大，崇高，宏伟，庄严，豪华 | |
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73
picturesqueness
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74
rustic
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| adj.乡村的，有乡村特色的；n.乡下人，乡巴佬 | |
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75
thatch
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| vt.用茅草覆盖…的顶部；n.茅草(屋) | |
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76
hordes
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| n.移动着的一大群( horde的名词复数 )；部落 | |
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77
antiquity
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| n.古老；高龄；古物，古迹 | |
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78
rambles
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|
| （无目的地）漫游( ramble的第三人称单数 )； （喻）漫谈； 扯淡； 长篇大论 | |
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79
villas
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| 别墅，公馆( villa的名词复数 )； （城郊）住宅 | |
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80
mansion
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| n.大厦，大楼；宅第 | |
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81
mansions
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| n.宅第，公馆，大厦( mansion的名词复数 ) | |
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82
recollect
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| v.回忆，想起，记起，忆起，记得 | |
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83
remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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84
immediate
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| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
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85
delightful
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| adj.令人高兴的，使人快乐的 | |
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86
genial
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| adj.亲切的，和蔼的，愉快的，脾气好的 | |
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87
attains
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| （通常经过努力）实现( attain的第三人称单数 )； 达到； 获得； 达到（某年龄、水平、状况） | |
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88
exquisitely
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| adv.精致地；强烈地；剧烈地；异常地 | |
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89
scantiest
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| adj.（大小或数量）不足的，勉强够的( scanty的最高级 ) | |
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90
overflows
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|
| v.溢出，淹没( overflow的第三人称单数 )；充满；挤满了人；扩展出界，过度延伸 | |
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91
lavish
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| adj.无节制的；浪费的；vt.慷慨地给予，挥霍 | |
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92
spire
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|
| n.(教堂)尖顶，尖塔，高点 | |
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93
dwellings
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|
| n.住处，处所( dwelling的名词复数 ) | |
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94
dwelling
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| n.住宅，住所，寓所 | |
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95
pictorial
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|
| adj.绘画的；图片的；n．画报 | |
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96
splendors
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| n.华丽( splendor的名词复数 )；壮丽；光辉；显赫 | |
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97
edifice
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|
| n.宏伟的建筑物(如宫殿，教室) | |
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98
innate
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|
| adj.天生的，固有的，天赋的 | |
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99
quainter
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| adj.古色古香的( quaint的比较级 )；少见的，古怪的 | |
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100
aged
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|
| adj.年老的，陈年的 | |
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101
trumpet
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|
| n.喇叭，喇叭声；v.吹喇叭，吹嘘 | |
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102
antiquated
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|
| adj.陈旧的，过时的 | |
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103
humble
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|
| adj.谦卑的，恭顺的；地位低下的；v.降低，贬低 | |
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104
inevitably
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|
| adv.不可避免地；必然发生地 | |
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105
abode
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| n.住处，住所 | |
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106
palatial
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|
| adj.宫殿般的，宏伟的 | |
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107
sordid
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| adj.肮脏的，不干净的，卑鄙的，暗淡的 | |
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108
alleys
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| 胡同，小巷( alley的名词复数 )； 小径 | |
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109
remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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110
hacked
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| 生气 | |
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111
hack
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|
| n.劈，砍，出租马车；v.劈，砍，干咳 | |
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112
remarkably
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| ad.不同寻常地，相当地 | |
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113
slab
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| n.平板，厚的切片；v.切成厚板，以平板盖上 | |
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114
slabs
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| n.厚板，平板，厚片( slab的名词复数 )；厚胶片 | |
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115
perfectly
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|
| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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116
whitewashed
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| 粉饰，美化，掩饰( whitewash的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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117
dingy
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| adj.昏暗的，肮脏的 | |
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118
poetical
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| adj.似诗人的；诗一般的；韵文的；富有诗意的 | |
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119
glimmering
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|
| n.微光，隐约的一瞥adj.薄弱地发光的v.发闪光，发微光( glimmer的现在分词 ) | |
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120
dreary
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| adj.令人沮丧的，沉闷的，单调乏味的 | |
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121
hearth
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| n.壁炉炉床，壁炉地面 | |
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122
stifled
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| （使）窒息， （使）窒闷( stifle的过去式和过去分词 )； 镇压，遏制； 堵 | |
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123
gathering
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| n.集会，聚会，聚集 | |
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124
retirement
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| n.退休，退职 | |
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125
huddling
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| n. 杂乱一团, 混乱, 拥挤 v. 推挤, 乱堆, 草率了事 | |
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126
hardy
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|
| adj.勇敢的，果断的，吃苦的；耐寒的 | |
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127
blighted
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|
| adj.枯萎的，摧毁的 | |
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128
unctuous
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| adj.油腔滑调的，大胆的 | |
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129
ushered
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| v.引，领，陪同( usher的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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130
curiously
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| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
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131
chamber
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| n.房间，寝室；会议厅；议院；会所 | |
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132
panes
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| 窗玻璃( pane的名词复数 ) | |
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133
planks
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| （厚）木板( plank的名词复数 )； 政纲条目，政策要点 | |
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134
humility
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| n.谦逊，谦恭 | |
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135
tempted
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| v.怂恿（某人）干不正当的事；冒…的险（tempt的过去分词） | |
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136
scrawled
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| 乱涂，潦草地写( scrawl的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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137
immortal
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| adj.不朽的；永生的，不死的；神的 | |
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138
renown
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| n.声誉，名望 | |
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139
predilection
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| n.偏好 | |
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140
appreciative
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| adj.有鉴赏力的，有眼力的；感激的 | |
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141
requiting
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| v.报答( requite的现在分词 )；酬谢；回报；报复 | |
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142
pang
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| n.剧痛，悲痛，苦闷 | |
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143
curmudgeonly
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|
| adj.小气的，不和悦的 | |
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144
scruple
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| n./v.顾忌，迟疑 | |
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145
scruples
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|
| n.良心上的不安( scruple的名词复数 )；顾虑，顾忌v.感到于心不安，有顾忌( scruple的第三人称单数 ) | |
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146
realization
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| n.实现；认识到，深刻了解 | |
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147
guises
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| n.外观，伪装( guise的名词复数 )v.外观，伪装( guise的第三人称单数 ) | |
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148
thrifty
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|
| adj.节俭的；兴旺的；健壮的 | |
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149
mellow
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| adj.柔和的；熟透的；v.变柔和；(使)成熟 | |
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150
boon
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| n.恩赐，恩物，恩惠 | |
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151
belied
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|
| v.掩饰( belie的过去式和过去分词 )；证明（或显示）…为虚假；辜负；就…扯谎 | |
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152
convivial
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|
| adj.狂欢的，欢乐的 | |
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153
impiety
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| n.不敬；不孝 | |
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154
worthy
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| adj.(of)值得的，配得上的；有价值的 | |
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155
invoked
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| v.援引( invoke的过去式和过去分词 )；行使（权利等）；祈求救助；恳求 | |
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156
pry
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| vi.窥(刺)探，打听；vt.撬动(开，起) | |
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157
muse
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| n.缪斯（希腊神话中的女神），创作灵感 | |
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158
incurring
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| 遭受，招致，引起( incur的现在分词 ) | |
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159
anathema
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| n.诅咒；被诅咒的人(物)，十分讨厌的人(物) | |
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160
requital
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| n.酬劳；报复 | |
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161
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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162
buttresses
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| n.扶壁，扶垛( buttress的名词复数 )v.用扶壁支撑，加固( buttress的第三人称单数 ) | |
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163
sluggish
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|
| adj.懒惰的，迟钝的，无精打采的 | |
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164
remonstrances
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| n.抱怨，抗议( remonstrance的名词复数 ) | |
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165
grudges
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| 不满，怨恨，妒忌( grudge的名词复数 ) | |
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166
incumbency
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| n.职责，义务 | |
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167
bust
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|
| vt.打破；vi.爆裂；n.半身像；胸部 | |
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168
inscription
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| n.（尤指石块上的）刻印文字，铭文，碑文 | |
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169
stanza
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| n.（诗）节，段 | |
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170
determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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171
trifling
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| adj.微不足道的；没什么价值的 | |
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172
meddle
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| v.干预，干涉，插手 | |
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173
prohibition
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| n.禁止；禁令，禁律 | |
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174
underneath
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| adj.在...下面，在...底下；adv.在下面 | |
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175
affixed
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| adj.[医]附着的，附着的v.附加( affix的过去式和过去分词 )；粘贴；加以；盖（印章） | |
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176
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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177
eminently
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| adv.突出地；显著地；不寻常地 | |
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178
eminent
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| adj.显赫的，杰出的，有名的，优良的 | |
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179
skull
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| n.头骨；颅骨 | |
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180
sculptor
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| n.雕刻家，雕刻家 | |
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181
artistically
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| adv.艺术性地 | |
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182
sculptors
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| 雕刻家，雕塑家( sculptor的名词复数 )； [天]玉夫座 | |
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183
foist
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| vt.把…强塞给，骗卖给 | |
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184
forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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185
complexion
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| n.肤色；情况，局面；气质，性格 | |
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186
considerably
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| adv.极大地；相当大地；在很大程度上 | |
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187
devoutly
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| adv.虔诚地，虔敬地，衷心地 | |
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188
bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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189
knights
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| 骑士； （中古时代的）武士( knight的名词复数 )； 骑士； 爵士； （国际象棋中）马 | |
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190
dames
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| n.（在英国）夫人（一种封号），夫人（爵士妻子的称号）( dame的名词复数 )；女人 | |
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191
doomed
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| 命定的 | |
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192
intrusive
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| adj.打搅的；侵扰的 | |
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193
illuminated
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| adj.被照明的；受启迪的 | |
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194
diadem
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| n.王冠，冕 | |
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195
scanty
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| adj.缺乏的，仅有的，节省的，狭小的，不够的 | |
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196
conscientious
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| adj.审慎正直的，认真的，本着良心的 | |
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197
faculties
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| n.能力( faculty的名词复数 )；全体教职员；技巧；院 | |
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198
miserable
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| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
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199
transmuted
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| v.使变形，使变质，把…变成…( transmute的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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200
sifted
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| v.筛( sift的过去式和过去分词 )；筛滤；细查；详审 | |
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201
lodgings
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| n. 出租的房舍, 寄宿舍 | |
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202
lodging
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| n.寄宿，住所；(大学生的)校外宿舍 | |
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203
middle-aged
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| adj.中年的 | |
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204
lodger
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| n.寄宿人，房客 | |
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205
lodge
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| v.临时住宿，寄宿，寄存，容纳；n.传达室，小旅馆 | |
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206
parlor
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| n.店铺，营业室；会客室，客厅 | |
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207
humbly
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| adv. 恭顺地，谦卑地 | |
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208
engrossed
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| adj.全神贯注的 | |
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209
solitary
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| adj.孤独的，独立的，荒凉的；n.隐士 | |
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210
homely
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| adj.家常的，简朴的；不漂亮的 | |
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211
uncouth
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| adj.无教养的，粗鲁的 | |
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212
uncommonly
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| adv. 稀罕(极，非常) | |
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213
expressive
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| adj.表现的，表达…的，富于表情的 | |
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214
estranged
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| adj.疏远的，分离的 | |
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215
embarrassment
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| n.尴尬；使人为难的人(事物)；障碍；窘迫 | |
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216
utterance
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| n.用言语表达，话语，言语 | |
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217
syllables
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| n.音节( syllable的名词复数 ) | |
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218
contemplated
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| adj. 预期的 动词contemplate的过去分词形式 | |
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219
concealed
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| a.隐藏的，隐蔽的 | |
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220
interpretation
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| n.解释，说明，描述；艺术处理 | |
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221
accurately
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| adv.准确地，精确地 | |
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222
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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223
conclave
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| n.秘密会议，红衣主教团 | |
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224
precisely
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| adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地 | |
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225
obviating
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| v.避免，消除（贫困、不方便等）( obviate的现在分词 ) | |
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226
contrived
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| adj.不自然的，做作的；虚构的 | |
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227
authenticity
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| n.真实性 | |
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228
dissent
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| n./v.不同意，持异议 | |
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229
controversy
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| n.争论，辩论，争吵 | |
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230
apprehend
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| vt.理解，领悟，逮捕，拘捕，忧虑 | |
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231
enthusiast
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| n.热心人，热衷者 | |
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232
collapse
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| vi.累倒；昏倒；倒塌；塌陷 | |
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233
frankly
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| adv.坦白地，直率地；坦率地说 | |
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234
secluded
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|
| adj.与世隔绝的；隐退的；偏僻的v.使隔开，使隐退( seclude的过去式和过去分词) | |
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235
kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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236
consul
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| n.领事；执政官 | |
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237
scrupulously
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|
| adv.一丝不苟地；小心翼翼地，多顾虑地 | |
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238
solitude
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| n. 孤独; 独居,荒僻之地,幽静的地方 | |
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239
accomplishment
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|
| n.完成，成就，（pl.）造诣，技能 | |
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240
insufficient
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|
| adj.(for，of)不足的，不够的 | |
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241
providence
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| n.深谋远虑，天道，天意；远见；节约；上帝 | |
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242
miraculous
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|
| adj.像奇迹一样的，不可思议的 | |
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243
juncture
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| n.时刻，关键时刻，紧要关头 | |
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244
undertaking
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| n.保证，许诺，事业 | |
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245
prodigious
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| adj.惊人的，奇妙的；异常的；巨大的；庞大的 | |
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246
delusions
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| n.欺骗( delusion的名词复数 )；谬见；错觉；妄想 | |
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247
propriety
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| n.正当行为；正当；适当 | |
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248
auditor
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| n.审计员，旁听着 | |
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249
alluring
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| adj.吸引人的，迷人的 | |
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250
piquant
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| adj.辛辣的，开胃的，令人兴奋的 | |
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251
fervently
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| adv.热烈地，热情地，强烈地 | |
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252
drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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253
thither
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| adv.向那里；adj.在那边的，对岸的 | |
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254
magnetism
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| n.磁性，吸引力，磁学 | |
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255
guardianship
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| n. 监护, 保护, 守护 | |
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256
condescend
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| v.俯就，屈尊；堕落，丢丑 | |
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257
stratagem
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| n.诡计，计谋 | |
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258
accomplished
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| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
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259
shrine
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| n.圣地，神龛，庙；v.将...置于神龛内，把...奉为神圣 | |
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260
forfeited
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| （因违反协议、犯规、受罚等）丧失，失去( forfeit的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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261
stipulated
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| vt.& vi.规定；约定adj.[法]合同规定的 | |
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262
secrecy
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| n.秘密，保密，隐蔽 | |
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263
surmised
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| v.臆测，推断( surmise的过去式和过去分词 )；揣测；猜想 | |
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264
practitioner
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| n.实践者，从事者；(医生或律师等)开业者 | |
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265
negotiation
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| n.谈判，协商 | |
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266
temporizing
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| v.敷衍( temporize的现在分词 )；拖延；顺应时势；暂时同意 | |
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267
asylum
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| n.避难所，庇护所，避难 | |
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268
personalities
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| n. 诽谤，（对某人容貌、性格等所进行的）人身攻击； 人身攻击；人格, 个性, 名人( personality的名词复数 ) | |
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269
prevailing
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| adj.盛行的；占优势的；主要的 | |
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270
eloquence
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| n.雄辩；口才，修辞 | |
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271
hierarchy
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| n.等级制度；统治集团，领导层 | |
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272
investigation
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| n.调查，调查研究 | |
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273
professed
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| 公开声称的，伪称的，已立誓信教的 | |
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274
tinge
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| vt.(较淡)着色于，染色；使带有…气息；n.淡淡色彩，些微的气息 | |
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275
absurdity
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| n.荒谬，愚蠢；谬论 | |
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276
falter
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| vi.(嗓音)颤抖，结巴地说；犹豫；蹒跚 | |
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277
concealment
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| n.隐藏, 掩盖，隐瞒 | |
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278
enigmas
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| n.难于理解的问题、人、物、情况等，奥秘( enigma的名词复数 ) | |
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279
profanely
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| adv.渎神地，凡俗地 | |
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280
warrior
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| n.勇士，武士，斗士 | |
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281
lurking
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| 潜在 | |
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282
hover
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| vi.翱翔，盘旋；徘徊；彷徨，犹豫 | |
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283
license
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| n.执照，许可证，特许；v.许可，特许 | |
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284
aisle
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| n.（教堂、教室、戏院等里的）过道，通道 | |
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285
crumbling
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| adj.摇摇欲坠的 | |
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286
relics
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| [pl.］n.遗物，遗迹，遗产；遗体，尸骸 | |
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287
crevices
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| n.（尤指岩石的）裂缝，缺口( crevice的名词复数 ) | |
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288
vaulted
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| adj.拱状的 | |
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289
superstitious
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| adj.迷信的 | |
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290
provocation
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| n.激怒，刺激，挑拨，挑衅的事物，激怒的原因 | |
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291
slashed
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| v.挥砍( slash的过去式和过去分词 )；鞭打；割破；削减 | |
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292
controverted
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| v.争论，反驳，否定( controvert的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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293
contemn
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| v.蔑视 | |
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294
groom
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| vt.给（马、狗等）梳毛，照料，使...整洁 | |
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295
epithets
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| n.（表示性质、特征等的）词语( epithet的名词复数 ) | |
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296
thoroughly
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| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
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297
aisles
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| n. (席位间的)通道, 侧廊 | |
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298
dubious
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|
| adj.怀疑的，无把握的；有问题的，靠不住的 | |
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299
mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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300
estrangement
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| n.疏远，失和，不和 | |
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301
slumberous
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| a.昏昏欲睡的 | |
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302
temperament
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| n.气质，性格，性情 | |
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303
vicissitudes
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| n.变迁，世事变化；变迁兴衰( vicissitude的名词复数 )；盛衰兴废 | |
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304
passionate
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| adj.热情的，热烈的，激昂的，易动情的，易怒的，性情暴躁的 | |
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305
ingenuous
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| adj.纯朴的，单纯的；天真的；坦率的 | |
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306
eloquent
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| adj.雄辩的，口才流利的；明白显示出的 | |
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307
pungency
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| n.（气味等的）刺激性；辣；（言语等的）辛辣；尖刻 | |
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308
shovelled
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| v.铲子( shovel的过去式和过去分词 )；锹；推土机、挖土机等的)铲；铲形部份 | |
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309
ponderous
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| adj.沉重的，笨重的，(文章)冗长的 | |
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310
thump
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| v.重击，砰然地响；n.重击，重击声 | |
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311
minor
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| adj.较小(少)的，较次要的；n.辅修学科；vi.辅修 | |
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312
bruising
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| adj.殊死的；十分激烈的v.擦伤(bruise的现在分词形式) | |
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313
meditated
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| 深思，沉思，冥想( meditate的过去式和过去分词 )； 内心策划，考虑 | |
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314
worthier
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| 应得某事物( worthy的比较级 )； 值得做某事； 可尊敬的； 有（某人或事物）的典型特征 | |
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315
appreciation
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| n.评价；欣赏；感谢；领会，理解；价格上涨 | |
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316
courageous
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| adj.勇敢的，有胆量的 | |
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317
brutal
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| adj.残忍的，野蛮的，不讲理的 | |
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318
pelting
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| 微不足道的，无价值的，盛怒的 | |
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319
afflicted
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| 使受痛苦，折磨( afflict的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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320
insanity
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| n.疯狂，精神错乱；极端的愚蠢，荒唐 | |
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321
lucid
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| adj.明白易懂的，清晰的，头脑清楚的 | |
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322
interval
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| n.间隔，间距；幕间休息，中场休息 | |
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323
avenged
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| v.为…复仇，报…之仇( avenge的过去式和过去分词 )；为…报复 | |
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324
benign
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| adj.善良的，慈祥的；良性的，无危险的 | |
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325
requited
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| v.报答( requite的过去式和过去分词 )；酬谢；回报；报复 | |
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326
injustice
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| n.非正义，不公正，不公平，侵犯（别人的）权利 | |
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327
decried
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| v.公开反对，谴责( decry的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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328
devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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329
elucidation
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| n.说明，阐明 | |
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330
reassuring
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| a.使人消除恐惧和疑虑的，使人放心的 | |
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331
scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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332
positively
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| adv.明确地，断然，坚决地；实在，确实 | |
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333
doctrines
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| n.教条( doctrine的名词复数 )；教义；学说；（政府政策的）正式声明 | |
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334
posterity
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| n.后裔，子孙，后代 | |
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335
beheld
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| v.看，注视( behold的过去式和过去分词 )；瞧；看呀；（叙述中用于引出某人意外的出现）哎哟 | |
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336
clumps
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| n.（树、灌木、植物等的）丛、簇( clump的名词复数 )；（土、泥等）团；块；笨重的脚步声v.（树、灌木、植物等的）丛、簇( clump的第三人称单数 )；（土、泥等）团；块；笨重的脚步声 | |
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337
groves
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| 树丛，小树林( grove的名词复数 ) | |
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338
lengthened
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| （时间或空间）延长，伸长( lengthen的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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339
drowsy
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| adj.昏昏欲睡的，令人发困的 | |
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340
enjoyment
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| n.乐趣；享有；享用 | |
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341
diffused
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| 散布的，普及的，扩散的 | |
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342
ecstasies
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| 狂喜( ecstasy的名词复数 )； 出神； 入迷； 迷幻药 | |
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343
momentary
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| adj.片刻的，瞬息的；短暂的 | |
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344
effete
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| adj.无生产力的，虚弱的 | |
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345
herd
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| n.兽群，牧群；vt.使集中，把…赶在一起 | |
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346
tributary
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| n.支流；纳贡国；adj.附庸的；辅助的；支流的 | |
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347
scenic
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| adj.自然景色的，景色优美的 | |
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348
fawn
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| n.未满周岁的小鹿；v.巴结，奉承 | |
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349
intercourse
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| n.性交；交流，交往，交际 | |
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350
progenitors
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| n.祖先( progenitor的名词复数 )；先驱；前辈；原本 | |
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351
proximity
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| n.接近，邻近 | |
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352
mimic
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| v.模仿，戏弄；n.模仿他人言行的人 | |
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353
skittishness
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| n.活泼好动；难以驾驭 | |
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354
grassy
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| adj.盖满草的；长满草的 | |
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355
scoop
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| n.铲子，舀取，独家新闻；v.汲取，舀取，抢先登出 | |
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356
gateway
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| n.大门口，出入口，途径，方法 | |
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357
turrets
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| （六角）转台( turret的名词复数 )； （战舰和坦克等上的）转动炮塔； （摄影机等上的）镜头转台； （旧时攻城用的）塔车 | |
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358
ornaments
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| n.装饰( ornament的名词复数 )；点缀；装饰品；首饰v.装饰，点缀，美化( ornament的第三人称单数 ) | |
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359
outrages
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| 引起…的义愤，激怒( outrage的第三人称单数 ) | |
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360
domain
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| n.(活动等)领域，范围；领地，势力范围 | |
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361
amplitude
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| n.广大；充足；振幅 | |
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362
ingenuity
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| n.别出心裁；善于发明创造 | |
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363
confided
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| v.吐露（秘密，心事等）( confide的过去式和过去分词 )；（向某人）吐露（隐私、秘密等） | |
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364
alas
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| int.唉(表示悲伤、忧愁、恐惧等) | |
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365
harp
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| n.竖琴；天琴座 | |
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366
strings
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| n.弦 | |
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