Julian Hawthorne

“ A worshipper of the beautiful he might have been, who had aimed to recreate in forms of enduring art the essential secret of its charm, who had lived in the delight of the eyes, forever darkened now. A creature exquisitely endowed for æsthetic perceptions and sensuous enjoyments, who had thought to be happy and prosperous through the revelation to others of the visions which made him happy, but who had stumbled against the rough side of the world, which bruised and crippled him. ”

“ When the others have gone, he shall have a meal—shall he not? But what does he purpose with the bird? If it had been a gay parrot, now, like the one we lost last year, which could say smart things and make amusement, we might have bought it; but a little brown bird....”
“Why should the good God make a man blind?” murmured Marie, letting her eyes rest upon the stranger with a transient compassion. “If a man is wicked—yes; but this poor fellow, one can see that he would never harm anybody.”
“But the eyes are not everything,” answered Prevost. ”

“ Then he slowly raises the wooden cage to his face, and whistles low to the brown bird, which had hitherto sat silent on its perch.
The bird extends its slender body, lifts its head, and emits two or three penetrating chirps, which make themselves audible amidst the murmur and stir of the room. Then it fills its little lungs, its soft chest expands, and it bursts into song.
Ah, what a song was that! But who can describe the singing of a bird? The voice of nature's heart, thrillingly pure and passionate as in the dawn of time, before man sinned ”

“ His Marie—wifely, motherly, cheerful, faithful—sits there at her pay-desk making change, tossing back and forth friendly little speeches with the customers who come and go, and ever and anon meeting his conjugal signals across the room. Between them is perfect sympathy and understanding; he knows her as he knows himself. Her soul is wholly transparent to him; or, at all events, he has never found any cloud between her and himself in their long intercourse of twenty years. As for her soul, or his, it must be admitted that the good and simple Prevost has never given much thought to such things. ”

“ His own soul has never obtruded itself upon his notice, and he has never seen the soul of any one else, even of Marie. He would be puzzled to tell you what a soul is, in fact. He knows what good cookery is, and hungry and satisfied guests, and business, and his wife, and his children; and he believes in a good God, who will make things comfortable for them hereafter; but the soul—that is a sort of figure of speech; not anything with which one concerns himself in this world. It is a very simple, solid, and sufficient thing, this world of Prevost's. ”

“ What it is to be an artist!”
The artist laughs. And with that comes along Prevost on his rounds. For it has always been his custom from the first to go from table to table, to satisfy himself that his guests are being well served. He has a word for each. “Is the dish cooked to suit you, sir?” or (to a waiter) , “Take back that potato and bring a mealier one”; or, “Madame, your shopping has a little tired you—a glass of my Bordeaux wine will make you your good self again”; or, “Permit me to present your little boy with this red apple—red apples make little boys into great men.” ”

“ Beyond doubt she is a happy woman—happy in her husband, happy in her three healthy children, who are always sweet and clean as fresh milk; and happy, too, in her position, sitting there at her pay-desk day after day, in the midst of the broad, cheerful room, with some fourscore good-humored, effervescent guests eating good dinners all around her, chattering light-heartedly as they sip their good claret, laying down their good money on the desk, and getting back their change from her plump, pretty fingers, and pausing to exchange a few compliments and witticisms with her ”

“ None whatever that honest Prevost can see. For him, because he is happy, each day contains all the past and all the future; there is no time in happiness. His eating-room, his guests, his wife—they are all here, just as they have always been and always will be, until the good God gathers them all together once more in the next world. ”

“ He gave good food, most of which he cooked admirably himself; he furnished excellent Bordeaux wine, imported by himself from Bordeaux, where he was born. His voice was pleasant and hearty; his broad, ruddy cheeks dimpled when he smiled, and the smile itself disclosed white, even teeth. ”

“ But the hint is hardly needed; for beauty, if it be genuine, makes good its sway over every human heart and commands its homage. The busy waiters tiptoe to their places and remain motionless; the guests lean back in their chairs, or turn in their seats to gaze and listen; and the worthy Prevost, still standing beside his wife at one corner of the desk, while the artist takes his station at the other, allows a foolish smile of surprise and pleasure to widen his rosy countenance. The my
The Vision Passes Before Her But in Marie's soul there is a strange tumult. ”

“ Where is the life that seemed so full and substantial? The phantom of that hour of long ago declares itself still the sole reality, and shames the long substantial years into a phantom.
Such moods soon pass, however. The weight of actual things presses them down into the depths whence they arose. They remain, at most, but hints doubtfully prophetic of changes and developments to come, or that might have been. The wide room, with the afternoon sunshine sending its latest glance across the white tables and busy eaters ”

“ Can anything trouble the thoughts of a faithful wife, an affectionate mother, of twenty years' standing? Nothing in the shape of remorse, we may be sure; but there may be times in the life of a woman when something done or felt or dreamed of long ago may advance from its most remote retreat in the memory, as the mirage advances over the material landscape ”

“ The Blind Man Through the swinging doors of the eating-house, which, as they opened, let in a momentary din from the stony street of clattering carts and hurrying pedestrians, entered a poorly clad figure, with a thick cane in his right hand, and in his left a small wooden cage containing a bird. ”

“ One occasionally meets such human ruins tapping their blind way along the streets of the city. They commonly have pencils or matches for sale; but this fellow had nothing but a brown bird in a wooden cage, which was hardly large enough for it to turn round in. It could not be considered a prudent business investment. Who would want to buy a brown bird? The man, however, was evidently an unpractical creature, whose ill success in life had been due to his failure to grasp life's solid realities. ”