Mockingbird

“ For, as Eleanor, who to Margaret's relief had now quite emerged from the dreamy mood into which the thought of her future fame had led her, remarked, that if their plans were not to topple ignominously about their ears at the very outset, it was absolutely essential that each should know as much about the other as possible. ”

“ But I don't believe he was cross with her, for he was a dear old man, and didn't look as though he could be angry with any one. Of course, I began by apologising for having ventured to come, and said I was afraid he must be very much astonished at my having dared to do such a thing as to force my way into his house. He looked at me quite gravely, and said, did I think, then, that I was the first young lady who had conceived the idea of coming to him to be told whether her voice was most like Patti's or Melba's. ”

“ Is there no happy spot Where mortals may be blessed, Where grief may find a balm And weariness a rest? Faith, Hope, and Love, best boon to mortals given, Waved their bright wings and whispered, Yes, in Heaven."* * Persons familiar with literature will recognize this as a poem written by Charles Mackay, an English writer who represented a London newspaper in the United States during the Rebellion as its war correspondent. It was set to music as a chant, and as such was frequently rendered in public by the famous Hutchinson family of singers. I doubt if Mr. Lincoln ever knew who wrote it. ”

“ When we recovered our powers of vision, this was what Flora and I saw. That beast Moppen, the very vulgarest dog in the House of Commons, was there in that innermost sanctum of the Forward-Backwards Party surrounded by Duchesses, and Lady M. was poisoning his ear with delicious flattery. She was telling him that such nature’s gentlemen as he were the real representatives of the people of England, and if she had a regret, it was that she foresaw that the inevitable tendency of his public career was towards the House of Peers. What would the people do without him? ”

“ I feel as if I had been Margaret Anstruther all my life!"
"And do you like it?" Margaret asked. The question slipped almost unawares from her lips, but she could not recall it, and she waited with a good deal of anxiety for the answer. She hoped it would not be in the affirmative, for if it were it would make what she had to say so very much harder for Eleanor to hear.
"Like it?" said Eleanor ecstatically. "Liking is not the word! And, oh! I have such news, such glorious, glorious news to give you! ”

“ Eleanor answered.
"Earning your own living. But are you not too young to do that? In what manner do you earn it?"
"As a governess. I have been an instructor of the young for the last four years," Eleanor said, laughing a little at the expression of boundless amazement which this statement brought to Margaret's face. Indeed, for a moment the latter suspected her new acquaintance of joking. She found it hard to believe that a girl of her own age should actually be a governess. She had thought that all governesses were of Miss Bidwell's age, and like her, too, in appearance. ”

“ BY COLONEL ALEXANDER K. McCLURE.
While Lincoln would have been great among the greatest of the land as a statesman and politician if like Washington, Jefferson and Jackson, he had never told a humorous story, his sense of humor was the most fascinating feature of his personal qualities.
He was the most exquisite humorist I have ever known in my life. His humor was always spontaneous, and that gave it a zest and elegance that the professional humorist never attains.
As a rule, the men who have become conspicuous in the country as humorists have excelled in nothing else. ”

“ It was like the pedal bass of an organ, steadily giving the ground tone of a requiem—the vanity and evanescence of all things earthly. There had I seen, in the midst of their jubilant supporters, Pierce, Lincoln, Grant, Hayes, Garfield, Cleveland, Harrison, and, finally, so short a time before, McKinley. It seemed all a dream. In his conversations the new President showed the same qualities that I had before known in him—earnestness, vigor, integrity, fearlessness, and, at times, a sense of humor, blending playfully with his greater qualities. ”

“ By sitting and dreaming away your time in nonsense and folly and in making up silly, idle conversations with idiotic creatures of your own imagination. I gave even you, Margaret, credit for more sense. Aren't you ashamed of yourself?"
Now, if Margaret had murmured the meek affirmative reply that was obviously expected of her, the whole course of her life might have been different. Her grandfather would probably have delivered himself of a few more harsh strictures, and then Margaret would have been dismissed to the house, with orders to double her morrow's lessons. ”

“ Comic imitations of various characters were given, among others that of a stammering man, which appeared greatly to amuse Mr. Lincoln. I could only now and then catch a word of the burlesque, but the voice and ringing laugh of the President were perfectly distinguishable. When the "lecture" ceased, Mr. Lincoln said, "I want to offer a suggestion. I once knew a man who invariably ' whistled ' with his stammering," and be then gave an imitation. "Now," he continued, "if you could get in a touch of nature like that it would be irresistibly ludicrous." ”

“ Then I come, then Hilary—she's a year younger than me. Then come Jack and Noel—they're fifteen and sixteen respectively, and one's at Osborne and one's at Dartmouth; all they seem to care about at present is sailing and fishing, and so we don't see much of them. Then there's Edward, he's about fourteen, I think; he's mad keen on cricket—besides, he's got all the brains of the family. Then two cousins of ours, Nancy and Joan Green, are staying with us. They're not half bad girls, and Nancy would play quite a decent game of tennis if she wasn't so lazy. ”

“ At that, Margaret, I really don't know what came over me, for supposing Signor Vanucci had been wrong, and I had no voice, she would have thought me mad, but truth to say, I simply did not feel I was risking anything when I turned, and looking at her across the big grand piano that fills up her little drawing-room, and said, "No, it is not true, I have not a nice little drawing-room voice." ”

“ At the end of another week, during which the donor had settled his affairs and departed, as she heard, she engaged a music-teacher, herself displayed the crabbed manuscript, opened the piano, and placed him before it.
'You have my leave, dear,' she said, and with a sigh perhaps, resigned the laudable intention which all American mothers are supposed to entertain, of making him on one day President of the Republic; for the fine arts, as we all know, are not the road to that distinction. ”

“ One ought therefore to be gratified to see how large a place politics occupies in the public mind, which is otherwise so little inclined to serious matters, and in the public press, which so faithfully mirrors the thought of the nation: to see how the prominent or eloquent politician surpasses in public esteem the greatest artist or scientist, and even rivals in popularity the prettiest actress of the hour: to see that four-fifths of our public honours are reserved for politicians and statesmen, and for those less gifted but more wealthy men who give them practical support. ”

“ Sometimes it happens that the biggest crop of laugh is produced by a man who ranks among the greatest and wisest. Such a man was Abraham Lincoln whose wholesome fun mixed with true philosophy made thousands laugh and think at the same time. He was a firm believer in the saying, “Laugh and the world laughs with you.”
Whenever Abraham Lincoln wanted to make a strong point he usually began by saying, “Now, that reminds me of a story.” And when he had told a story every one saw the point and was put into a good humor.
The ancients had Aesop and his fables. ”

“ I tell you, Margaret, I feel sometimes as if it simply did not bear thinking about. A splendid, interesting career, bringing fame and fortune with it, lies waiting for me on the other side, as it were, of a deep gulf. The gulf can only be crossed by the bridge of training, and I haven't the money to pay the toll."
She flung herself with an air of gloomy impatience on the nearest chair, and, putting her elbows on the table, propped her chin on her palms and stared with a frown at the empty fireplace opposite to her. ”

“ Nothing that can be written about Lincoln can show his character in such a true light as the yarns and stories he was so fond of telling, and at which he would laugh as heartily as anyone.
For a man whose life was so full of great responsibilities, Lincoln had many hours of laughter when the humorous, fun-loving side of his great nature asserted itself. ”

“ Every person to keep healthy ought to have one good hearty laugh every day. Lincoln did, and the author hopes that the stories at which he laughed will continue to furnish laughter to all who appreciate good humor, with a moral point and spiced with that true philosophy bred in those who live close to nature and to the people around them. ”

“ I have heard him tell at one time or another almost or quite all of the stories he told during his Presidential term, and there were very few of them which might not have been repeated in a parlor and none descended to obscene, vulgar or profane expressions. I have never known a man of purer instincts than Abraham Lincoln, and his appreciation of all that was beautiful and good was of the highest order. ”

“ HASTINGS. And so swear I. [They embrace]
KING EDWARD. Now, princely Buckingham, seal thou this
league
With thy embracements to my wife's allies,
And make me happy in your unity.
BUCKINGHAM. [To the QUEEN] Whenever Buckingham
doth turn his hate
Upon your Grace, but with all duteous love
Doth cherish you and yours, God punish me
With hate in those where I expect most love!
When I have most need to employ a friend
And most assured that he is a friend,
Deep, hollow, treacherous, and full of guile,
Be he unto me! This do I beg of God
When I am cold in love to you or yours. ”

“ Had he entered public life at Washington, and any one had told me that he was guilty of a dishonest act, I should have replied, "You might as well tell me that he picked up the Capitol last night and carried it off on his back." The fact that one could say so much of any man, I have always looked upon as illustrating one of the greatest advantages of having a youth go through college. ”

“ The sun was shining out of a cloudless blue sky, the air was so still and so overpoweringly hot that it seemed to have sent every living creature, save the owner of the voice that was calling upon Margaret Anstruther, to sleep, for no answer was returned to the thrice repeated call, and the silence which the summons had broken settled once more over the garden. ”

“ Then they make their way over the smooth lawns, and past the glowing flower-beds, and past Sir John Lincoln, [Pg 231] too, who is standing in an impossible attitude, that makes him all elbows and knees, talking to a very splendid young man—all bone and muscle and good humor—who is plainly delighted with him. To the splendid young man he is nothing but one vast joke. ”

“ Your long ears and nose will remind you daily of little Mouk.’
“As he spoke he wheeled round quickly upon his heel and at the third turn he wished himself far [Pg 86] away, and before the king had time to call for help Mouk had disappeared.
“Since then the little man has lived here in our town, but he keeps himself aloof from his fellow-men, because he has learnt to despise mankind. Experience has made him a wise man, and his wisdom calls for your respect and admiration, even though his appearance may happen to be somewhat extraordinary.” ”

“ Because it is. We should be found out in a day, or a week."
"But who is to find us out?" persisted Margaret. "Mrs. Murray has never seen me, and Mrs. Danvers has never seen you. Why, if they were here now they could not tell which was which. Oh, Eleanor, do go to Windy Gap instead of me, and let me go to your house. Think of the Italian lessons, and the singing lessons. Why, Eleanor, it is the opportunity of your lifetime, it is really. This is probably the turning-point of your whole life? ”

“ This is a new Lincoln, and far more attractive, in a sense, than anything the public has possessed. This is the portrait of a remarkably handsome man.... The head is magnificent, the eyes deep and generous, the mouth sensitive, the whole expression something delicate, tender, pathetic, poetic. This was the young man with whom the phantoms of romance dallied, the young man who recited poems and was fanciful and speculative, and in love and despair, but upon whose brow there already gleamed the illumination of intellect, the inspiration of patriotism. ”

“ In these high-class outline pictures the artists have caught the true spirit of Lincoln’s humor, and while showing the laughable side of many incidents in his career, they are true to life in the scenes and characters they portray. ”

“ Though he took no pains to render them inaudible, his footsteps made no sound on the grass, and as he approached the same voice spoke again, unconscious of his near presence.
"Margaret Anstruther," it went on, "do you not then wish to do any of the nice things I have told you about? Do you like sitting here by yourself, when outside in the world real things are happening, and there are real people to whom you might be talking, and whom you might know? Are you happy? ”

“ But as soon as the feeling of loneliness and the sense of almost oppressive silence that now surrounded her wore off Margaret grew to like her hours of solitary study. The hours that she found most irksome were those that she was compelled to spend taking exercise in the grounds. For though she liked being out in the open air, she soon grew heartily tired of walking about under the shade of the densely growing elms, and she missed the long country walks with Miss Bidwell to which she had been accustomed. ”