Tanglewood Tales
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Nathaniel Hawthorne >> Tanglewood Tales
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15 Tanglewood Tales by Nathaniel Hawthorne
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TANGLEWOOD TALES by NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE
THE WAYSIDE. INTRODUCTORY.
A short time ago, I was favored with a flying visit from my
young friend Eustace Bright, whom I had not before met with
since quitting the breezy mountains of Berkshire. It being the
winter vacation at his college, Eustace was allowing himself a
little relaxation, in the hope, he told me, of repairing the
inroads which severe application to study had made upon his
health; and I was happy to conclude, from the excellent
physical condition in which I saw him, that the remedy had
already been attended with very desirable success. He had now
run up from Boston by the noon train, partly impelled by the
friendly regard with which he is pleased to honor me, and
partly, as I soon found, on a matter of literary business.
It delighted me to receive Mr. Bright, for the first time,
under a roof, though a very humble one, which I could really
call my own. Nor did I fail (as is the custom of landed
proprietors all about the world) to parade the poor fellow up
and down over my half a dozen acres; secretly rejoicing,
nevertheless, that the disarray of the inclement season, and
particularly the six inches of snow then upon the ground,
prevented him from observing the ragged neglect of soil and
shrubbery into which the place had lapsed. It was idle,
however, to imagine that an airy guest from Monument Mountain,
Bald Summit, and old Graylock, shaggy with primeval forests,
could see anything to admire in my poor little hillside, with
its growth of frail and insect-eaten locust trees. Eustace very
frankly called the view from my hill top tame; and so, no
doubt, it was, after rough, broken, rugged, headlong Berkshire,
and especially the northern parts of the county, with which his
college residence had made him familiar. But to me there is a
peculiar, quiet charm in these broad meadows and gentle
eminences. They are better than mountains, because they do not
stamp and stereotype themselves into the brain, and thus grow
wearisome with the same strong impression, repeated day after
day. A few summer weeks among mountains, a lifetime among green
meadows and placid slopes, with outlines forever new, because
continually fading out of the memory--such would be my sober
choice.
I doubt whether Eustace did not internally pronounce the whole
thing a bore, until I led him to my predecessor's little
ruined, rustic summer house, midway on the hillside. It is a
mere skeleton of slender, decaying tree trunks, with neither
walls nor a roof; nothing but a tracery of branches and twigs,
which the next wintry blast will be very likely to scatter in
fragments along the terrace. It looks, and is, as evanescent as
a dream; and yet, in its rustic network of boughs, it has
somehow enclosed a hint of spiritual beauty, and has become a
true emblem of the subtile and ethereal mind that planned it. I
made Eustace Bright sit down on a snow bank, which had heaped
itself over the mossy seat, and gazing through the arched
windows opposite, he acknowledged that the scene at once grew
picturesque.
"Simple as it looks," said he, "this little edifice seems to be
the work of magic. It is full of suggestiveness, and, in its
way, is as good as a cathedral. Ah, it would be just the spot
for one to sit in, of a summer afternoon, and tell the children
some more of those wild stories from the classic myths!"
"It would, indeed," answered I. "The summer house itself, so
airy and so broken, is like one of those old tales, imperfectly
remembered; and these living branches of the Baldwin apple
tree, thrusting so rudely in, are like your unwarrantable
interpolations. But, by the by, have you added any more legends
to the series, since the publication of the 'Wonder-Book'?"
"Many more," said Eustace; "Primrose, Periwinkle, and the rest
of them, allow me no comfort of my life unless I tell them a
story every day or two. I have run away from home partly to
escape the importunity of these little wretches! But I have
written out six of the new stories, and have brought them for
you to look over."
"Are they as good as the first?" I inquired.
"Better chosen, and better handled," replied Eustace Bright.
"You will say so when you read them."
"Possibly not," I remarked. "I know from my own experience,
that an author's last work is always his best one, in his own
estimate, until it quite loses the red heat of composition.
After that, it falls into its true place, quietly enough. But
let us adjourn to my study, and examine these new stories. It
would hardly be doing yourself justice, were you to bring me
acquainted with them, sitting here on this snow bank!"
So we descended the hill to my small, old cottage, and shut
ourselves up in the south-eastern room, where the sunshine
comes in, warmly and brightly, through the better half of a
winter's day. Eustace put his bundle of manuscript into my
hands; and I skimmed through it pretty rapidly, trying to find
out its merits and demerits by the touch of my fingers, as a
veteran story-teller ought to know how to do.
It will be remembered that Mr. Bright condescended to avail
himself of my literary experience by constituting me editor of
the "Wonder-Book." As he had no reason to complain of the
reception of that erudite work by the public, he was now
disposed to retain me in a similar position with respect to the
present volume, which he entitled TANGLEWOOD TALES. Not, as
Eustace hinted, that there was any real necessity for my
services as introducer, inasmuch as his own name had become
established in some good degree of favor with the literary
world. But the connection with myself, he was kind enough to
say, had been highly agreeable; nor was he by any means
desirous, as most people are, of kicking away the ladder that
had perhaps helped him to reach his present elevation. My young
friend was willing, in short, that the fresh verdure of his
growing reputation should spread over my straggling and
half-naked boughs; even as I have sometimes thought of training
a vine, with its broad leafiness, and purple fruitage, over the
worm-eaten posts and rafters of the rustic summer house. I was
not insensible to the advantages of his proposal, and gladly
assured him of my acceptance.
Merely from the title of the stories I saw at once that the
subjects were not less rich than those of the former volume;
nor did I at all doubt that Mr. Bright's audacity (so far as
that endowment might avail) had enabled him to take full
advantage of whatever capabilities they offered. Yet, in spite
of my experience of his free way of handling them, I did not
quite see, I confess, how he could have obviated all the
difficulties in the way of rendering them presentable to
children. These old legends, so brimming over with everything
that is most abhorrent to our Christianized moral sense some of
them so hideous, others so melancholy and miserable, amid which
the Greek tragedians sought their themes, and moulded them into
the sternest forms of grief that ever the world saw; was such
material the stuff that children's playthings should be made
of! How were they to be purified? How was the blessed sunshine
to be thrown into them?
But Eustace told me that these myths were the most singular
things in the world, and that he was invariably astonished,
whenever he began to relate one, by the readiness with which it
adapted itself to the childish purity of his auditors. The
objectionable characteristics seem to be a parasitical growth,
having no essential connection with the original fable. They
fall away, and are thought of no more, the instant he puts his
imagination in sympathy with the innocent little circle, whose
wide-open eyes are fixed so eagerly upon him. Thus the stories
(not by any strained effort of the narrator's, but in harmony
with their inherent germ) transform themselves, and re-assume
the shapes which they might be supposed to possess in the pure
childhood of the world. When the first poet or romancer told
these marvellous legends (such is Eustace Bright's opinion), it
was still the Golden Age. Evil had never yet existed; and
sorrow, misfortune, crime, were mere shadows which the mind
fancifully created for itself, as a shelter against too sunny
realities; or, at most, but prophetic dreams to which the
dreamer himself did not yield a waking credence. Children are
now the only representatives of the men and women of that happy
era; and therefore it is that we must raise the intellect and
fancy to the level of childhood, in order to re-create the
original myths.
I let the youthful author talk as much and as extravagantly as
he pleased, and was glad to see him commencing life with such
confidence in himself and his performances. A few years will do
all that is necessary towards showing him the truth in both
respects. Meanwhile, it is but right to say, he does really
appear to have overcome the moral objections against these
fables, although at the expense of such liberties with their
structure as must be left to plead their own excuse, without
any help from me. Indeed, except that there was a necessity for
it--and that the inner life of the legends cannot be come at
save by making them entirely one's own property--there is no
defense to be made.
Eustace informed me that he had told his stories to the
children in various situations--in the woods, on the shore of
the lake, in the dell of Shadow Brook, in the playroom, at
Tanglewood fireside, and in a magnificent palace of snow, with
ice windows, which he helped his little friends to build. His
auditors were even more delighted with the contents of the
present volume than with the specimens which have already been
given to the world. The classically learned Mr. Pringle, too,
had listened to two or three of the tales, and censured them
even more bitterly than he did THE THREE GOLDEN APPLES; so
that, what with praise, and what with criticism, Eustace Bright
thinks that there is good hope of at least as much success with
the public as in the case of the "WonderBook."
I made all sorts of inquiries about the children, not doubting
that there would be great eagerness to hear of their welfare,
among some good little folks who have written to me, to ask for
another volume of myths. They are all, I am happy to say
(unless we except Clover), in excellent health and spirits.
Primrose is now almost a young lady, and, Eustace tells me, is
just as saucy as ever. She pretends to consider herself quite
beyond the age to be interested by such idle stories as these;
but, for all that, whenever a story is to be told, Primrose
never fails to be one of the listeners, and to make fun of it
when finished. Periwinkle is very much grown, and is expected
to shut up her baby house and throw away her doll in a month or
two more. Sweet Fern has learned to read and write, and has put
on a jacket and pair of pantaloons--all of which improvements I
am sorry for. Squash Blossom, Blue Eye, Plantain, and Buttercup
have had the scarlet fever, but came easily through it.
Huckleberry, Milkweed, and Dandelion were attacked with the
whooping cough, but bore it bravely, and kept out of doors
whenever the sun shone. Cowslip, during the autumn, had either
the measles, or some eruption that looked very much like it,
but was hardly sick a day. Poor Clover has been a good deal
troubled with her second teeth, which have made her meagre in
aspect and rather fractious in temper; nor, even when she
smiles, is the matter much mended, since it discloses a gap
just within her lips, almost as wide as the barn door. But all
this will pass over, and it is predicted that she will turn out
a very pretty girl.
As for Mr. Bright himself, he is now in his senior year at
Williams College, and has a prospect of graduating with some
degree of honorable distinction at the next Commencement. In
his oration for the bachelor's degree, he gives me to
understand, he will treat of the classical myths, viewed in the
aspect of baby stories, and has a great mind to discuss the
expediency of using up the whole of ancient history, for the
same purpose. I do not know what he means to do with himself
after leaving college, but trust that, by dabbling so early
with the dangerous and seductive business of authorship, he
will not bc tempted to become an author by profession. If so I
shall be very sorry for the little that I have had to do with
the matter, in encouraging these first beginnings.
I wish there were any likelihood of my soon seeing Primrose,
Periwinkle, Dandelion, Sweet Fern, Clover Plantain,
Huckleberry, Milkweed, Cowslip, Buttercup, Blue Eye, and Squash
Blossom again. But as I do not know when I shall re-visit
Tanglewood, and as Eustace Bright probably will not ask me to
edit a third "WonderBook," the public of little folks must not
expect to hear any more about those dear children from me.
Heaven bless them, and everybody else, whether grown people or
children!
THE MINOTAUR.
In the old city of Troezene, at the foot of a lofty mountain,
there lived, a very long time ago, a little boy named Theseus.
His grandfather, King Pittheus, was the sovereign of that
country, and was reckoned a very wise man; so that Theseus,
being brought up in the royal palace, and being naturally a
bright lad, could hardly fail of profiting by the old king's
instructions. His mother's name was Aethra. As for his father,
the boy had never seen him. But, from his earliest remembrance,
Aethra used to go with little Theseus into a wood, and sit down
upon a moss-grown rock, which was deeply sunken into the earth.
Here she often talked with her son about his father, and said
that he was called Aegeus, and that he was a great king, and
ruled over Attica, and dwelt at Athens, which was as famous a
city as any in the world. Theseus was very fond of hearing
about King Aegeus, and often asked his good mother Aethra why
he did not come and live with them at Troezene.
"Ah, my dear son," answered Aethra, with a sigh, "a monarch has
his people to take care of. The men and women over whom he
rules are in the place of children to him; and he can seldom
spare time to love his own children as other parents do. Your
father will never be able to leave his kingdom for the sake of
seeing his little boy."
"Well, but, dear mother," asked the boy, "why cannot I go to
this famous city of Athens, and tell King Aegeus that I am his
son?"
"That may happen by and by," said Aethra. "Be patient, and we
shall see. You are not yet big and strong enough to set out on
such an errand."
"And how soon shall I be strong enough?" Theseus persisted in
inquiring.
"You are but a tiny boy as yet," replied his mother. "See if
you can lift this rock on which we are sitting?"
The little fellow had a great opinion of his own strength. So,
grasping the rough protuberances of the rock, he tugged and
toiled amain, and got himself quite out of breath, without
being able to stir the heavy stone. It seemed to be rooted into
the ground. No wonder he could not move it; for it would have
taken all the force of a very strong man to lift it out of its
earthy bed.
His mother stood looking on, with a sad kind of a smile on her
lips and in her eyes, to see the zealous and yet puny efforts
of her little boy. She could not help being sorrowful at
finding him already so impatient to begin his adventures in the
world.
"You see how it is, my dear Theseus," said she. "You must
possess far more strength than now before I can trust you to go
to Athens, and tell King Aegeus that you are his son. But when
you can lift this rock, and show me what is hidden beneath it,
I promise you my permission to depart."
Often and often, after this, did Theseus ask his mother whether
it was yet time for him to go to Athens; and still his mother
pointed to the rock, and told him that, for years to come, he
could not be strong enough to move it. And again and again the
rosy-checked and curly-headed boy would tug and strain at the
huge mass of stone, striving, child as he was, to do what a
giant could hardly have done without taking both of his great
hands to the task. Meanwhile the rock seemed to be sinking
farther and farther into the ground. The moss grew over it
thicker and thicker, until at last it looked almost like a soft
green seat, with only a few gray knobs of granite peeping out.
The overhanging trees, also, shed their brown leaves upon It,
as often as the autumn came; and at its base grew ferns and
wild flowers, some of which crept quite over its surface. To
all appearance, the rock was as firmly fastened as any other
portion of the earth's substance.
But, difficult as the matter looked, Theseus was now growing up
to be such a vigorous youth, that, in his own opinion, the time
would quickly come when he might hope to get the upper hand of
this ponderous lump of stone.
"Mother, I do believe it has started!" cried he, after one of
his attempts. "The earth around it is certainly a little
cracked!"
"No, no, child!" his mother hastily answered. "It is not
possible you can have moved it, such a boy as you still are!"
Nor would she be convinced, although Theseus showed her the
place where he fancied that the stem of a flower had been
partly uprooted by the movement of the rock. But Aethra sighed,
and looked disquieted; for, no doubt, she began to be conscious
that her son was no longer a child, and that, in a little while
hence, she must send him forth among the perils and troubles of
the world.
It was not more than a year afterwards when they were again
sitting on the moss-covered stone. Aethra had once more told
him the oft-repeated story of his father, and how gladly he
would receive Theseus at his stately palace, and how he would
present him to his courtiers and the people, and tell them that
here was the heir of his dominions. The eyes of Theseus glowed
with enthusiasm, and he would hardly sit still to hear his
mother speak.
"Dear mother Aethra," he exclaimed, "I never felt half so
strong as now! I am no longer a child, nor a boy, nor a mere
youth! I feel myself a man! It is now time to make one earnest
trial to remove the stone."
"Ah, my dearest Theseus," replied his mother "not yet! not
yet!"
"Yes, mother," said he, resolutely, "the time has come!"
Then Theseus bent himself in good earnest to the task, and
strained every sinew, with manly strength and resolution. He
put his whole brave heart into the effort. He wrestled with the
big and sluggish stone, as if it had been a living enemy. He
heaved, he lifted, he resolved now to succeed, or else to
perish there, and let the rock be his monument forever! Aethra
stood gazing at him, and clasped her hands, partly with a
mother's pride, and partly with a mother's sorrow. The great
rock stirred! Yes, it was raised slowly from the bedded moss
and earth, uprooting the shrubs and flowers along with it, and
was turned upon its side. Theseus had conquered!
While taking breath, he looked joyfully at his mother, and she
smiled upon him through her tears.
"Yes, Theseus," she said, "the time has come, and you must stay
no longer at my side! See what King Aegeus, your royal father,
left for you beneath the stone, when he lifted it in his mighty
arms, and laid it on the spot whence you have now removed it."
Theseus looked, and saw that the rock had been placed over
another slab of stone, containing a cavity within it; so that
it somewhat resembled a roughly-made chest or coffer, of which
the upper mass had served as the lid. Within the cavity lay a
sword, with a golden hilt, and a pair of sandals.
"That was your father's sword," said Aethra, "and those were
his sandals. When he went to be king of Athens, he bade me
treat you as a child until you should prove yourself a man by
lifting this heavy stone. That task being accomplished, you are
to put on his sandals, in order to follow in your father's
footsteps, and to gird on his sword, so that you may fight
giants and dragons, as King Aegeus did in his youth."
"I will set out for Athens this very day!" cried Theseus.
But his mother persuaded him to stay a day or two longer, while
she got ready some necessary articles for his journey. When his
grandfather, the wise King Pittheus, heard that Theseus
intended to present himself at his father's palace, he
earnestly advised him to get on board of a vessel, and go by
sea; because he might thus arrive within fifteen miles of
Athens, without either fatigue or danger.
"The roads are very bad by land," quoth the venerable king;
"and they are terribly infested with robbers and monsters. A
mere lad, like Theseus, is not fit to be trusted on such a
perilous journey, all by himself. No, no; let him go by sea."
But when Theseus heard of robbers and monsters, he pricked up
his ears, and was so much the more eager to take the road along
which they were to be met with. On the third day, therefore, he
bade a respectful farewell to his grandfather, thanking him for
all his kindness; and, after affectionately embracing his
mother, he set forth with a good many of her tears glistening
on his cheeks, and some, if the truth must be told, that had
gushed out of his own eyes. But he let the sun and wind dry
them, and walked stoutly on, playing with the golden hilt of
his sword, and taking very manly strides in his father's
sandals.
I cannot stop to tell you hardly any of the adventures that
befell Theseus on the road to Athens. It is enough to say, that
he quite cleared that part of the country of the robbers about
whom King Pittheus had been so much alarmed. One of these bad
people was named Procrustes; and he was indeed a terrible
fellow, and had an ugly way of making fun of the poor travelers
who happened to fall into his clutches. In his cavern he had a
bed, on which, with great pretense of hospitality, he invited
his guests to lie down; but, if they happened to be shorter
than the bed, this wicked villain stretched them out by main
force; or, if they were too tall, he lopped off their heads or
feet, and laughed at what he had done, as an excellent joke.
Thus, however weary a man might be, he never liked to lie in
the bed of Procrustes. Another of these robbers, named Scinis,
must likewise have been a very great scoundrel. He was in the
habit of flinging his victims off a high cliff into the sea;
and, in order to give him exactly his deserts, Theseus tossed
him off the very same place. But if you will believe me, the
sea would not pollute itself by receiving such a bad person
into its bosom; neither would the earth, having once got rid of
him, consent to take him back; so that, between the cliff and
the sea, Scinis stuck fast in the air, which was forced to bear
the burden of his naughtiness.
After these memorable deeds, Theseus heard of an enormous sow,
which ran wild, and was the terror of all the farmers round
about; and, as he did not consider himself above doing any good
thing that came in his way, he killed this monstrous creature,
and gave the carcass to the poor people for bacon. The great
sow had been an awful beast, while ramping about the woods and
fields, but was a pleasant object enough when cut up into
joints, and smoking on I know not how many dinner tables.
Thus, by the time he reached his journey's end, Theseus had
done many valiant feats with his father's golden-hilted sword,
and had gained the renown of being one of the bravest young men
of the day. His fame traveled faster than he did, and reached
Athens before him. As he entered the city, he heard the
inhabitants talking at the street corners, and saying that
Hercules was brave, and Jason too, and Castor and Pollux
likewise, but that Theseus, the son of their own king, would
turn out as great a hero as the best of them. Theseus took
longer strides on hearing this, and fancied himself sure of a
magnificent reception at his father's court, since he came
thither with Fame to blow her trumpet before him, and cry to
King Aegeus, "Behold your son!"
He little suspected, innocent youth that he was, that here, in
this very Athens, where his father reigned, a greater danger
awaited him than any which he had encountered on the road. Yet
this was the truth. You must understand that the father of
Theseus, though not very old in years, was almost worn out with
the cares of government, and had thus grown aged before his
time. His nephews, not expecting him to live a very great
while, intended to get all the power of the kingdom into their
own hands. But when they heard that Theseus had arrived in
Athens, and learned what a gallant young man he was, they saw
that he would not be at all the kind of a person to let them
steal away his father's crown and scepter, which ought to be
his own by right of inheritance. Thus these bad-hearted nephews
of King Aegeus, who were the own cousins of Theseus, at once
became his enemies. A still more dangerous enemy was Medea, the
wicked enchantress; for she was now the king's wife, and wanted
to give the kingdom to her son Medus, instead of letting it be
given to the son of Aethra, whom she hated.
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