Hyle

“ So thro' this arching rock thou 'lt pass alone,
Safe from the perils of th' incumbent stone:
Embark undaunted!—on the farther side
Thou 'lt surely find me, thy unfailing guide.
Nor let this pilot raise thy groundless dread,
This sullen Charon of the froward dead,
A phantom, never blest with human life,
Tho' oft on earth his noxious power is rife;
And in that region, ne'er from error free,
The words he dictates are assign'd to me.
Observe this fiend, that Nature scorn'd to frame,
Offspring of Pride, and Apathy his name! ”

“ Hail, matchless, free, eternal grace,
That gave my soul a Hiding Place!
Against the God who built the sky,
I fought with hands uplifted high,
Despised the mention of His grace,
Too proud to seek a Hiding Place. ”

“ One of them he could distinguish—scarcely more than a trawler, slender and over-delicate, which to-morrow with its handful of a crew was to set out for the frozen ends of the earth, seeking knowledge, but most of all the old glory of living—danger, suffering, and perhaps death. ”

“ Amen, have taken their place among them; the heavenly gale will reach some of the old backsliders, and they are brought, with weeping, to seek their forfeited privilege; by this time the sound of Almighty God will be heard in the outer court, beginning to move the hearers like a mighty wind shaking the forest; and as the gale blows upon the outer court, upon the hearers, and the young people, and afterwards making its way through the outer court, to rouse the inner court, until a great concern is awakened for the state of the soul. ”

“ As the twilight, often hastened by the soft blur of falling snow, encroaches more and more upon the brief day, we gather closely about our firesides, and there, heart to heart, are wont to listen as at no other period of this prosaic nineteenth century life, to tales of olden time. More than ever are we drawn together at the season of our Saviour’s birth, when the yule log glows amain and the sweet spirit of Christmas kindles within us a warmth and gladness that responds to the cheerful blaze upon the hearth. ”

“ He drifted where the rapids play,
His eyes still on that awful glow;
Ah, God! my life seemed snatched away!
I saw a gleam far up the sky
And heard the echo of a cry.
There's a spirit in the rapid, calling, calling through the night,
There's a gleam upon the water, burning pale and burning bright.
Woe to him who hears the calling! Woe to him who sees the light! ”

“ It seemed to advance and to recede as the hail drove before it denser or thinner. At last I tore my eyes from it for a moment, and saw that the hail curtain had worn threadbare, and that the sky was lightening with the promise of the sun.
"I looked up again at the crouching white shape, and the full temerity of my voyage came suddenly upon me. What might appear when that hazy curtain was altogether withdrawn? What might not have happened to men? What if cruelty had grown into a common passion? ”

“ Do you know, Henley, as I know, the strange, subtle influence of certain kinds of weather? There are days on which I could do great deeds merely because of the way the sun is shining. There are days, there are evenings, when I could commit crimes merely because of the way the wind is whispering, the river is sighing, the dingy night is clustering around me. There can be an angel in the weather, or there can be a devil. On this evening I am describing there is a devil in the night! ”

“ A dead, oppressive calm had settled on the sea; not a breeze rustled, not a ripple broke the glassy surface of the water, and from the town, instead of the loud babel of cries, came only a low murmur like a distant waterfall. A strange calm indeed, the calm that serves as precursor to the unseen storm. ”

“ Forc'd from their station by her heaving heart,
From the strain'd girdle thrice three spangles start:
Thro' her disorder'd dress a pass they've found,
And fallen, see, they glitter on the ground!—
O blessed chance! with life-recalling light
The glittering monitors attract her sight!
Like stars emerging from the darken'd pole,
They sparkle safety to her harass'd soul. ”

“ With the instinct of the weaker toward the stronger, she grasped and clung to him; and the fierce exultation that thrilled through his veins with actual contact, made him strong as a giant. And then, close on the gale, came the rain, beating down the waves with its heavy pour. In the thunder and tramp of the storm no human voice could have made itself audible, if speech had been needed. ”

“ The first wind bears over it the fiery cloud, which is the glory of angels burning with love of God, willing only what He wills; the wind bearing over it the storm-cloud represents the works of men, stormy and various, done in straits and tribulations; the third way of righteousness, through the Incarnation of our Lord, bears above it a white and untouched virginity, as a cloud of light. [17] Then Hildegard sees the punishments of those who die in their sins impenitent. ”

“ When, too, I think of the sound, a mere rattle and jingle at first, but growing in strength and volume with every step, until it came upon us with a thunderous rush and roar which gave the impression of irresistible power, I feel that that too is beyond the power of my feeble words to express. ”

“ Hail, Red Cloud, the first man!
Hail, Red Cloud, the Acorn-Planter!
Who showed us the way of our feet in the world!
Who showed us the way of our food in the world!
Who showed us the way of our hearts in the world!
Who gave us the law of family,
The law of tribe,
The law of totem,
And made us strong in the world among men!
(While the People sing the hillside slowly
grows dark.) ”

“ Sometimes, with laughing eyes, she would whirl round like a boolee, or whirlwind. Then suddenly she would change to a stately measure. Then for variety's sake perform a series of swift gyrations, as if, indeed, a whirlwind devil had her in his grip. ”

“ And there they ran the ship ashore upon the yellow sand, and furled the sail, and took the mast down, and lashed it in its crutch. And next they let down the ladder, and went ashore to sport and rest.
And there Heracles went away into the woods, bow in hand, to hunt wild deer; and Hylas the fair boy slipt away after him, and followed him by stealth, until he lost himself among the glens, and sat down weary to rest himself by the side of a lake; and there the water nymphs came up to look at him, and loved him, and carried him down under the lake to be their playfellow, for ever happy and young. ”

“ The voice of the Teacher is mute. The fountain, which was ever flowing and ever full, is stopped. The lips, on which the bees of Hybla might have rested, will no more distil their honeyed sweets. The manly form, warm with all the affections of life, with love for family and friends, for truth and virtue, is now cold in death. ”

“ For, after all, a gale of wind, the thing of mighty sound, is inarticulate. It is man who, in a chance phrase, interprets the elemental passion of his enemy. Thus there is another gale in my memory, a thing of endless, deep, humming roar, moonlight, and a spoken sentence. ”

“ Where Hugli flows,
Where Hugli flows, our English eyes are weary
Our hearts are sometimes very far away.
Needs must, that exile should be long and dreary
How slow the hours, how lagging long the day,
Where Hugli flows.
Yet, years hence, when the steamer’s screw shall beat
The homeward track, for us without return,
Our bitter bread, by custom almost sweet,
We shall look back, perhaps through tears that burn,
Where Hugli flows. ”

“ At times, on the returning Eve of Yule, those who have been belated in the forest suddenly find themselves in the midst of an invisible company of roisterers, whose laughter, shouts, imprecations, and impious songs, fill the poor loiterers with affright; for though the voices seem close to the ear, no one in visible: and these unearthly bacchanalians are supposed to be the spirits of the doomed captain and his companions. ”

“ For the wind spread her skirts to the bigness of three of her,
“Who sent these ships to the rescue of those,
Who have perilled their lives in these Northern snows?
Did he spring from the mob, the benevolent ‘masses,’
Or from the detestable ‘upper classes’?” ”

“ He crouched behind a bush for some time, till he felt that midnight could not be far off, when suddenly there arose in the middle of the moor a brilliant glow, as if a star was shining over one of the hillocks. At the same moment all the hillocks began to writhe and to crawl, and from each one came hundreds of serpents and made straight for the glow, where they knew they should find their king. ”

“ If the cloud that hangs over the engine were the perspiration of heroic deeds, or as beneficent as that which floats over the farmer’s fields, then the elements and Nature herself would cheerfully accompany men on their errands and be their escort. ”

“ The storm broke in all its power, discharging thunder and hail, and I felt inexpressibly well, full of strength and élan, and I realised with a wonderful clearness that to understand Nature one must, as I had just done, go to her to be saved, far from all worries and all our heavy constraints. ”

“ Hail is of the size of a very small grain, yet when it falls on a man’s head how much annoyance it gives him! Or, again, take the drop which falls from a pitcher to the ground, and yet it hollows a stone. ”

“ From moment to moment the deserted, helpless band grows more fearstricken. The slightest sound becomes the carrier of evil forebodings: the rustling of the foliage, the flapping of a bird's wings, the swelling roar of the nearby sea in its dash against the shore. ”

“ No wind murmurs pleasantly through their dead and shrunken branches, the howling tempest alone can make them speak, and then with wild straining shriek and harsh rattle, they do battle with the whirlwind. ”

“ A lull of a few seconds follows, and then the broad, mighty torrent of the wind bursts upon them in its uninterrupted fury, and for a while it seems as if they must be swept away by its persistent, tremendous force. ”

“ If I were about to be hanged it would be little comfort to me to be told that in a few hours I would be playing on harps, walking streets of gold and wearing wings. I didn't want to go away—that was the plain truth. ”

“ Already the Earth pants thick and fast! the darkened Cross trembles! the winds are dropt—the air is stagnant—a muttering rumble growls underneath their feet, and some of that miserable crowd begin to fly down the hill. The horses snuff the coming terror, and become unmanageable through fear. ”

“ Anyhow, she came up to his mouth, and stood there while you would be counting about four score; and when she saw nothing, and nothing frightened her, she gave a jump down into the water, like her clutch before her; and the plop of her into the water was seven times heavier than theirs. ”

“ The indecision he evidently felt involved too little flattery to me to bear imitation on my side, unless I meant to risk the unsatisfactory bail two heels sometimes put in to suits like ours. Foregoing, therefore, the pleasure of playing with my captive, I was not above avowing my honest calling, and making him the subject of her Majesty’s process, by a gentle touch on the shoulder, backed by the production of the warrant.
Wonderful surely that touch! More wonderful than the subtle breath which reaches the landscape to-night that—bud, blossom, and fruit,—is to-morrow all a canker! ”

“ Chapter II The Marches had no longer the gross appetite for novelty which urges youth to a surfeit of strange scenes, experiences, ideas; and makes travel, with all its annoyances and fatigues, an inexhaustible delight. ”

“ In spite of your efforts we are drifting farther and farther out, and from the look of the sky I fear that we are going to have a great gale, and there is nothing to do but to set a little sail and to run before it. ”

“ Hyrel laughed, too. It had happened many times before—a costume suddenly left empty as its owner, due to a threat of discovery at home, had had to press the switch in haste to bring his shadowy self—and complete consciousness—back to his outer self in a hurry. ”

“ The voice, breathing out the harsh accents of the trader,—the refugee, the man to capture whom she had launched so boldly among the billows of stratagem, and almost of war,—froze the blood of the maiden, and the sight of his grim features, revealed in the glare of distant lamps, completed the overthrow of a courage which had supported her in a struggle with one so little to be feared as Hyland. ”

“ Yet, if we have a fair gale of wind, I forbid not the steering out of our sail, so the favour of the gale deceive us not. For all that we invent doth please us in the conception or birth, else we would never set it down. ”

“ He hummed a song as he swung the flail,
Swung the flail in the afternoon:
“When the idle fields are a wrecker’s tale,
That the Autumn tells to the twilight pale,
As the Year turns seaward a crimson sail,
Halloo and oh!
Hallo for the fields and the hunter’s-moon!” ”

“ Then they all went forward together—the son of the king of Ireland, the short green man, the gunman, the earman, the footman, the blowman, and the man that broke stones with the side of his thigh, and they would overtake the March wind that was before them, and the March wind that was behind them would not overtake them, until the evening came and the end of the day. ”

“ Is not the whirlwind active when it tears up the forest?”130 Not at all, in any sense pertaining to the present controversy. The tremendous power, whatever it may be, which sets the whirlwind in motion, is active; the wind itself is perfectly passive. ”