Pell

“ Pell's beginnes at p. 79 and so continues to FINIS—this I had from his owne mouth.—Desire Mr. A. Wood to take some paines to enquire for Mr. Turner, M.A. at Oxon (I thinke of Exon. Coll.) , who tooke some paines about Branker's Algebra.
Dr. Pell haz often sayd to me that when he solves a question he straines every nerve [550] about him, and that now in his old age it brings him to a loosenesse. ”

“ Gilbert W. Pell was a brother of Dick Pelham, one of the original minstrels of 1843.
As a member of the Ethiopian Serenaders, he went to England in 1846. The success of the company was so great in London that morning performances had to be given, and in addition they appeared at private residences of the rich. Mr. Pell, who played the bone end, and the company, whose portraits adorn another page, played an engagement at Palmo’s Opera House, New York, September 15, 1845. ”

“ There he demanded to know what the eldest Rover knew of the snake incident.
"Captain Putnam, I will tell you everything from beginning to end," answered Dick. "If I am to suffer I'll take my punishment, and Tom and Sam say they stand ready to do the same." And thereupon Dick related the particulars of the trouble with the bully and Pell, and of how he and his brothers and Songbird and Hans had seen Sobber and Pell at the museum where the snakes had been. Then he told of the feast, and how the snake had been discovered in the box. ”

“ Pell thankd his lordship, saying he was not capacitate for that, as being no divine and having made the mathematics his main studie, for the great publick need and usefullnesse therof, which he had in a manner devoted himself to improve and advance to the uttmost of his reach and abilities. Which answer pleased my lord so well that he replyed, 'Alasse! what a sad case it is that in this great and opulent kingdome there is no publick encouragement for the excelling in any profession but that of the law and divinity. ”

“ PELL, JOHN (1611–1685) , mathematician, was born at Southwick in Sussex on 1 March 1611. His father, John Pell, was incumbent of that place, whither his grandfather, another John Pell, had migrated from Lincolnshire. He came of a good old family, one of his ancestors having been lord of a manor in Lincolnshire in 1368. He married Mary Holland of Halden, Kent, and died at Southwick in 1616, one year before his wife. His daughter, Bathsua Makin [q. v.] ”

“ Walking through the maze of Chinatown, with a night of glowing violet vaulting above the sad drab of roof top and the crude palette of impromptu, bird's-nest balcony and a nostalgic, Western moon growing fainter and fainter and slowly fading into the vast cosmos of dawn as if trying to escape the reek of sewer and opium and sweat that rose from the packed, greasy wilderness of Pell Street, with Miss Rutter's hectic, guileless, silk-gloved hand pointing out the sluttish sights, he felt his heart muscles contract with a certain nameless dread. ”

“ Will you send word by the man that both of us are at home and shall be pleased to see her ladyship. I will follow you downstairs in a couple of minutes.”
When, three minutes later, Lady Pell entered the little sitting-room the sisters saw before them a woman considerably taller than either of themselves; thin, but not unusually so, and carrying herself with an uprightness that would have done credit to a grenadier. In age she might be anything between sixty and seventy. ”

“ Welcome back again, Pelle!
How wide and fair the world looks when you’ve spent years within four bare walls! Down in the south the clouds were like the breast of a great bright bird, one of those that come a long way every year with summer in the beat of their strong wings; and on all sides lay the open, white roads, pointing onward with bright assurances. ”

“ It was so good to be here, and the feeling sank gently over Pelle every time a cow licked herself, or the warm vapor rose from freshly- falling dung. Every sound was like a mother’s caress, and every thing was a familiar toy, with which a bright world could be built. ”

“ A peculiar sense of energy was exhaled by this dense crowd of men, this thinking and feeling crowd. It produced a singular feeling of strength. Pelle was no longer the poor journeyman shoemaker, who found it difficult enough to make his way. He became one, as he stood there, with that vast being; he felt its strength swelling within him; the little finger shares in the strength of the whole body. ”

“ Fris turned quickly toward the corner where Pelle sat blushing to the tips of his ears.
“Look at that little man!” said Fris, impressed. “And I declare if he isn’t right and all the rest of us wrong! God helps those that help themselves!” ”

“ During most of the winter Pelle drove the horse for the threshing- machine. All day he trotted round upon the horse-way outside the farm, over his wooden shoes in trodden-down snow and manure. It was the most intolerable occupation that life had yet offered him. He could not even carve, it was too cold for his fingers; and he felt lonely. As a herd-boy he was his own master, and a thousand things called to him ”

“ Pelle went. His mind was oppressed; all that day fresh responsibilities had heaped themselves upon him; a burden heavy for one man to bear. Was he to accept the responsibility for all that the Movement destroyed as it progressed, simply because he had placed all his energies and his whole fortune at its disposal? And now Father Lasse was going about as a scavenger. He blushed for shame—yet how could he have prevented it? Was he to be made responsible for the situation? And now they were spitting upon Ellen—that was the thanks he got! ”

“ His gray, restless eyes, which reminded Pelle of Anker, the crazy clockmaker, had a cold, piercing expression.
“Yes, yes,” said Pelle, laying his hand soothingly on the other’s; “but it’s no use to do anything stupid. We shall only do what we want to do if we all stand together.” ”

“ The sudden flame of energy that Pelle’s youth had called to life within him had died down, leaving a pathetic old man, who had been out in the cold all his life, and was now luxuriating in a few late rays of evening sun. ”

“ For a time no one spoke in the workshop—the journeyman was silent, so the others had to hold their tongues. Each bent over his work, and Pelle pulled the pitch out to as great a length as possible, kneaded some grease into it, and pulled again. Outside, in the sunshine, some street urchins were playing, running to and fro. When they saw Pelle, they held their clenched fist under their noses, nodded to him in a provocative manner, and sang—
“The cobbler has a pitchy nose,
The more he wipes it the blacker it grows!” ”

“ It makes me want to say something to you, Pelle, for my day was like this before I knew you—endlessly long and gray! When you are the last member of a dying family, you have to bear the gray existence of the others too. ”

“ And Pelle had many points of contact with this leisurely life in the open air; he had his whole childhood to draw upon. He could lie for hours, chewing a grass-stem, patient as a convalescent, while sun and air did their work upon him.
“Why do you never preach to me?” he said suddenly, and he peeped mischievously from tinder his cap.
“Why should I preach to you? Because I am religious? Well, so are you; every one who rejoices and is content is religious.” ”

“ The hot blood is seething in Pelle’s ears. He must go away, far away from here, and live the wandering life, like Garibaldi, who hid himself in the vineyards from the gendarmes, and stole the bacon from the chimneys while the people were in the fields. A spirit is working in him and the others ”

“ Pelle marches in the front rank beside the standard-bearer. He sees and hears nothing, but his luminous gaze sweeps over the heads of the crowd. His skin is still blackened by the smoke of the fire; it is peeling off his hands; his hair and moustache seem to have been cropped very strangely; and the skin is drawn round the burn on his cheek. He is conscious of one thing only: the rhythmic tread of fifty thousand men! ”

“ This work down at the harbor was the hardest and lowest kind of labor; any one could get taken on for it without previous qualifications. Most of Pelle’s comrades were men who had done with the world, who now let themselves go as the stream carried them, and he felt at ease among them. He stood on the solid ground, and no words had power to call the dead past to life; it had power to haunt only an empty brain. ”

“ Pelle found himself between a double fire, although he accepted the disdain and the insult of those above him, as Lasse had taught him, as something that was inherent in the nature of things. “Some are born to command and some to obey,” as Lasse said. ”

“ No one could hit out like Pelle, and yet at the same time make them feel that they were decent fellows after all. The foreign workers stood round about them, eagerly listening, in order that they, too, might catch a little of what was said. ”

“ Amid the confusion, the chaotic hubbub, definite lines became visible; a common consciousness came into being and assumed a direction; the thousands of workers controlled themselves in a remarkable way, and were now progressing, slowly and prudently, with the ideal of closing up the ranks. One whose hearing was a little dull might have received the impression that nothing was happening—that they were reconciled with their lot; but Pelle knew what was going on. ”

“ It would be droll indeed if he were to have nothing more to do with the Cause, but were to belong to the other side—he, Pelle, who had been a flaming torch! No, he would never leave them in the lurch, that he knew; even if he were to climb ever so high— and he entertained no doubts as to that—he would always feel for his old comrades and show them the way to obtain good relations between worker and employer. ”

“ On that windy May-day morning when Pelle tumbled out of the nest, it so happened that old Klaus Hermann was clattering into town with his manure-cart, in order to fetch a load of dung. And this trifling circumstance decided the boy’s position in life. There was no more pother than this about the question: What was Pelle to be? ”

“ She lay and played with the rattling sound, making the cellar-man speak sometimes with a deep voice, sometimes with a high one. She seemed quite familiar with this dangerous chatter, which had already cost her many hours of illness and sounded so painful to Pelle’s ear. ”

“ The greatest miracles were in himself—Pelle, who resembled hundreds of millions of other workmen, and had never yet had more than just enough for his food. Man was really the most wonderful of all. Was he not himself, in all his commonplace naturalness, like a luminous spark, sprung from the huge anvil of divine thought? ”

“ One day Brun brought him a book. “This book,” he said with a peculiar smile, “has satisfied many who were seeking for the truth. Let’s see whether it can satisfy you too!” It was Darwin’s “Origin of Species.”
Pelle read as in a mist. The point lay here—the whole thing powerfully put into one sentence! His brain was in a ferment, he could not lay the book down, but went on reading all night, bewitched and horrified at this merciless view. When Ellen in surprise came down with his morning coffee, he had finished the book. ”

“ I shall feel as if I’d lost a son. But of course you’ve got other things to think of than to remember a poor hunchback! The world is open to you. Once you’ve feathered your nest, you’ll think no more of little Sort!”
“I shall think of you, right enough,” replied Pelle. “And as soon as I’m doing well I shall come back and look out for you—not before. Father will be sure to object to my idea of travelling—he would so like me to take over Heath Farm from him ”

“ For you poor are the chosen people of God, who must wander and wander until they come into the Kingdom. Now the sea has stayed you here, and you can go no farther; so you think the Kingdom must lie here. God has sent me to tell you that you are mistaken. And you, Pelle, will you join us now? God is waiting and longing for you; he wants to use you for the good of all these little ones.” And he held Pelle’s hand in his, gazing at him compellingly; perhaps he thought Pelle had come in order to seek the shelter of his “Kingdom.” ”

“ This could not of course be the farm Pelle was looking for—Father Lasse had a proper farmhouse with four wings! But he went forward.
Out in the country people do not lock everything up as carefully as they do in town; so Pelle could walk right in. Directly he opened the door of the sitting-room he was filled with an uplifting joy. The most comfortable odor he had ever known struck upon his senses —the foundation of everything fragrant—the scent of Father Lasse! ”

“ The world had no limits, but neither had his powers; the force that could throw him out of his course did not exist. In his own footfall he heard the whole future; the Movement would soon be concluded when it had taken in the fact that the whole thing must be included. There was still a little difficulty; from that side they still made it a condition for their cooperation that Pelle should demand a public recognition of his good character. Pelle laughed and raised his face to the morning breeze which came like a cold shiver before the sunrise. Outsider! ”

“ Pelle began, in an easy tone, “I have been sent here to you with greetings from those outside there—from the comrades who used to stand next to you at work, from your friends and fellow-unionists. Where are our old comrades?—they are asking. We have fought so many battles by their side, we have shared good and evil with them—are we to enter into the new conditions without them? And your wives and children are asking after you! Outside there it is the spring! They don’t understand why they can’t pack the picnic basket and go out into the forest with father!” ”