Whiting

“ When we again got wind, every man was a fearful yet comical sight, face and hands swollen from the bites of the insects beyond recognition, eyes nearly closed, fingers and hands looking like small pumpkins with sticks in them. ”

“ Hence the war, to the Entente Allies, became a struggle to destroy a fabric of imperial domination, supported by the menace of a great military machine. Shortness of sight, narrowness of vision; failure to understand the unconquerable forces that would be raised up among other nations in opposition; failure to see the effects produced on other minds, even on neutral minds not trained by German methods, multiplied from month to month, until the new imperialism found itself face to face with a world in arms. ”

“ The Empire State, as you love to call it, was once laced by our trails from Albany to Buffalo – trails that we had trod for centuries – trails worn so deep by the feet of the Iroquois that they became your roads of travel, as your possessions gradually eat into those of my people. Your roads still traverse those same lines of communication which bound one part of the Long House to the other. ”

“ Again, the Peak enfolds itself in clouds and, secure in this drapery, retires altogether from sight, as if weary of being the object of public view. It is as if the inmates of a house, feeling an invasion of public interest, should turn off the lights, draw the curtains, and close the shutters as a forcible intimation of their preference for privacy and their decision to exclude the madding crowd. ”

“ The Iroquois, in their best days, were the noblest and most interesting of all Indians who have lived on this continent north of Mexico. They were truly the men whom a name they bore described, a word signifying men who surpassed all others. They alone founded political institutions and gained political supremacy. With European civilization unknown to them, they had given birth to self-government in America. ”

“ But even in gentle and cultured persons, an insult, a disappointment, a blow will provoke the tell-tale signs of pugnacity and anger, the flushing of the cheeks, the flash of the eye, the incipient clenching of the fists, the compressing of the teeth and lips, and the trembling of the voice. We substitute sarcasm for punching, and find subtly civilized, and, in the long run, more terrible, ways than bruises of punishing those who oppose us in our play, our passions, our professions. ”

“ One day is less like another in Venice than anywhere else. The revolution of the seasons will repeat certain effects; spring will chill the waters to a cold, hard green; summer will spread its breadth of golden light on palace front and water way; autumn will come with its pearly-gray sirocco days, and sunsets flaming a sombre death; the stars of a cloudless winter night, the whole vast dome of heaven, will be reflected in the mirror of the still lagoon. But in spite of this general order of the seasons, one day is less like another in Venice than anywhere else ”

“ And then I said to the warden this: 'You've struck me with a whip, in cold blood. You've tied me up hand and foot, to whip me like a dog. Well, whip me, then, till you fill your belly with it. You are a coward. You are lower, and meaner, and cowardlier than the lowest and meanest dog that ever yelped when his master kicked him. You were born a coward. Cowards will lie and steal, and you are the same as a thief and liar. No hound would own you for a friend. Whip me hard and long, you coward. Whip me, I say. See how good a coward feels when he ties up a man and whips him like a dog. ”

“ In retrospective glance over a very midsummer night's dream of the ineffable glory and beauty of wanderings from Pike's Peak to the Pacific there stands out to the mental vision one treasured possession whose loveliness exceeds that of all scenic landscape; which is more luminous and crystal clear than the luminous atmosphere of beautiful Colorado or glowing Arizona; which is more enduring in its changelessness than even the Petrified Forests or the mighty precipices of the Grand Cañon ”

“ Germany's conduct of the war was “the chief factor in creating the new war spirit of 1917.” It was that spirit which brought the United States into the war and which, by November, 1918, had landed nearly 2,000,000 American soldiers in France, with as many more preparing to sail. The idea of popular government—of government with the consent of the governed—was part and parcel of the political spirit of the age, and the German government, in opposing itself to that spirit, had become “an enemy of mankind.” ”

“ Do you think I will suffer a man, who can be guilty of so dirty and so filthy a negligence, to approach and stifle me with his embraces. Lay him on the ground,’ she added, speaking to the women, ‘and bring me a whip.’—They immediately threw me down ”

“ Without intending in the least to detract from the fame of our own beautiful sisters of the north, I must in truth say that the handsomest, most queenly and dignified woman I ever saw was a full blooded Spanish lady, who entered the cathedral at Panama one morning, at early mass, followed by her female servant carrying a handsome piece of carpeting for her mistress to kneel upon during her devotional service. ”

“ Then suddenly, and as if it had been so all the time, every hole, far and near, and there were hundreds of them, seemed to possess its face, coming and going rapidly, all fixing on him glances of malice and hatred: all hard-eyed and evil and sharp. ”

“ In the present case, the unfortunate little wretch has received a cuff which sends him reeling to this door; and the donor of the blow is immediately the object of general indignation.
‘What do you strike the boy for, you brute?’ exclaims a slipshod woman, with two flat irons in a little basket. ‘Do you think he’s your wife, you willin?’ ‘Go and hang yourself!’ replies the gentleman addressed, with a drunken look of savage stupidity, aiming at the same time a blow at the woman which fortunately misses its object. ‘Go and hang yourself ”

“ Oh, sisters, where is the social conscience of those among us who of malice aforethought attend the theatre with all-impeding and obstructive headgear? A knowledge of the sentiments we excite in the bosoms of those behind us might help some of us to be a little unselfish in the matter. Positive, if temporary, detestation is the principal emotion entertained towards the wearer of a matinée hat, and the hatred is not unmingled with contempt; for who can help despising a girl or woman who is openly and avowedly careless of the inconvenience and disappointment she is causing? ”

“ A look of profoundest disgust overspread his handsome young face, a face which undoubtedly lent itself to very clear expression of such feelings as contempt, disgust and scorn, an unusual face, with the thin high-bridged nose of an English aristocrat, the large eyes and pencilled black brows of an Indian noble, the sallow yet cheek-flushed complexion of an Italian peasant-girl, and the firm lips, square jaw, and prominent chin of a fighting-man. ”

“ Love and reverence, not fear and hate, are the principles to inculcate. Are the rod and rawhide calculated in their nature to inspire love and reverence? Parents should rather make companions of children, reason with them, let them see and know there are two sides to all pictures, good and bad ”

“ They were not the eyes of a coward, but of some one much too clever to take risks; and my gorge rose at their look of base astuteness. Yet even that wasn’t the worst; for as we continued to scan each other I saw in them a tinge of faint derision, and felt myself to be its object.
“At that I was seized by an impulse of rage that jerked me out of bed and pitched me straight on the unseen figure at its foot. But of course there wasn’t any figure there, and my fists struck at emptiness. Ashamed and cold, I groped about for a match and lit the candles. ”

“ What he wants most is not peace, but a chance to pit his force against the force of some one else, or against some new thing. Man was not originally a working animal; it was civilization that imposed work upon him. But when you work a man too hard he will quit work, and go to war or to a football game. Man emerged from his primeval state through work and pain; he struggled up, fought his way and went through a never-ceasing experience of pain and battle. He was still what he always had been, not so much a mere working animal as an animal given to fighting. ”

“ Wars such as this world-war, from this point of view, were constitutional diseases, evil in themselves, but inevitable in human society as phases of growth. But wars, whether inevitable or not, when once entered upon, had to be pursued to their ends, and no medicine could change the general character of their courses. ”

“ All night he rode, with rage in his heart toward all men, a rage that found vent in wild raving and cursing and gradually fixed itself into a sullen hate—a smouldering savage hatred that included all mankind and womankind, but centred with abysmal brutishness upon the Texan, the pilgrim, the pilgrim's girl, and strangely enough, upon the bartender who had warned him to flee. ”

“ I said, “if I whistle out of tune, and am clothed in white, do not punish my poor mother. Is it her fault that nature has not tuned my ear like yours? Is it her fault that I have not your yellow beak and glossy black coat, which recall a sleek parson swallowing an omelette? If Heaven has made me a monster, and if some one must bear the punishment, let me be the only sufferer.”
“That is not the question,” said my father. “Who taught you to whistle against rule?”
“Alas! sir,” I said humbly, “I whistled as best I could, because my breast was full of sunshine and stomach full of grubs.” ”

“ The despicable wretches, who thus revelled in acts of lawless oppression, would often, to indulge the whim of a moment, fling a roller at a boy’s head, and inflict deep wounds, and this, frequently, without even a shadow of a fault to allege, or even a plausible reason to assign in justification! At another time, if the apprentices stood fair for the infliction of a stripe, with a twig or the whip, the overlookers would apply it, with the utmost vigour, and then, bursting into laughter, call it a —— good hit! ”

“ We are insulted—some one slaps our face—the fierce emotion of anger arises and through us surge waves of feeling manifested on the motor side by tensed muscles, rapid heart, harsh breathing, perhaps a general reddening of face and eyes. Instinctively our fists are clenched, a part of the reaction of fight, and it needs but the slightest increase of anger to send us leaping on the aggressor, to fight him perhaps to the death. ”

“ Thus militarism, in itself a costly instrument, was regarded as a necessity in the work of giving to national economic forces their full effects, since a pushing and grasping policy was likely to excite jealousy and provoke enmity, and if it should fail to succeed by intimidation, might produce actual war, in which case there would be need for a great military power. ”

“ In this distorted posture the monster flies at them, sometimes in great rage, with his implements of torture, and cuts on with all his might, over the shoulders, under the arms, and sometimes over the head and ears, or on parts of the body where he can inflict the greatest torment. Occasionally the whipper, especially if his victim does not beg enough to suit him, while under the lash, will fly into a passion, uttering the most horrid oaths ”

“ Fancy, then, in lieu of the conversation, a scoundrel, disappointed and in a fury, wreaking his brutal revenge upon an amiable woman, who sits trembling and pale, and wondering at this sudden exhibition of wrath. Fancy how he clenches his fists and stands over her, and stamps and screams out curses with a livid face, growing wilder and wilder in his rage ”

“ Chained by the neck to a wall—scantily clothed—barefoot, and with but straw to lie on, was hardly the usage by which the alienated intellect could be restored to its proper tone—yet so it was, in too many cases, that mad people were treated: the whip, and even harsher punishment following, should they show any signs of rebellion. ”

“ You would kill a poor cat, you infernal coward. You would fly at a starving beggar, you infernal coward. Anything that you can surprise unawares—anything that is afraid of your big body, and your wicked white teeth, and your slobbering, bloodthirsty mouth, is the thing you like to fly at. You could throttle me at this moment, you mean, miserable bully, and you daren't so much as look me in the face, because I'm not afraid of you. ”

“ How could that nation, which we have been told was the bulwark for that religion taught by the Prince of Peace, authorize such barbarity? How could that nation, which still wishes to lord itself over our minds and style itself the pattern of refinement, assist in those acts so revolting to human feelings? ”

“ This drew upon him the execration of the enraged multitude; but no one attempted either to disarm or to seize him. A second blow, inflicted upon a decent looking female, roused my indignation at the cowardice of the bye-standers, and I hastily left the room, crossed the street, and having walked deliberately up to him, pretending to inquire what was the matter, before he was at all aware of my intentions, and just as he was about to relate his story, I, with a well-directed blow, with my fist under the ear, laid him sprawling upon the pavement ”

“ Asking to be forgiven after slamming a door is like touching off a Rodman gun, and then calling out to the fort in front to 'look out' 'take care!' 'do get out of the way.' A first class slam is cumulative long after the noise has ceased—the nerves go on slamming—the valves of the heart flap to and from—the tympanum roils a revelrie to all the shattered senses, the offender slammed at, at once subsides from rage to fear ”