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 Preschool Appropriate Practices
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Chapter 2 The Teacher’s Role

OBJECTIVES

After studying this chapter the student should be able to:

Determine a child’s developmental levels
Describe the 3-M method for observing children’s development levels:
manipulation, mastery, meaning
Observe and record children’s interactions with materials
Observe and record children’s interactions with one another using Parten’s play
categories
Record on the Child Interaction Form
Discuss recommendations for the appropriate use of technology and media
Respond appropriately to children as they work and play
Serve as a behavior model for children

Teacher
(March in place making motions)

Good morning, teacher

How do you do?
Good morning, teacher,
I’m fine, too!
Good afternoon, teacher,
I want to state:
Good afternoon, teacher,
I feel GREAT!

ESSENTIAL CONTENTS

1. Developmental levels
Determining children’s developmental levels
8
 Children’s spontaneous exploratory interactions with materials

2. The 3-M method for observing

Observing and recording children’s interactions
Making focused observation of specific child in learning centers
Determining at what level child is interacting
Recording child’s interaction level with materials on Child Interaction Form

3. Responding to individual children

Giving child support, encouragement, and direction
Making comments that reflect child’s actions

9
4. Becoming a facilitator of learning
Serving as a behavior model
Letting the environment do the teaching
Show delight in what child is accomplishing

RECOMMENDED ACTIVITIES

1. Small group presentations of end-of-chapter "Try It Yourself" activities. Class

members sign up for one of five small groups and presentation date.

a. Classroom floor plan: Make a large classroom floor plan for your program
showing learning centers arranged according to ideas presented under “Locating
and Spacing Learning Centers.” Present using overhead transparencies.

b. Observe children at mastery level of interaction: Observe three children who

seem to be at the mastery level of interaction with materials. Record on Child
Interaction Forms (Figure 2–1) giving specific details. Also record evidence for
their levels of social interactions. Present with handouts or PowerPoint.

c. Observe children at meaning level of interaction: Observe and record three

different examples of interaction at meaning level. Try to capture on paper or tape
recorder conversations as well as actions. Also record evidence for social
interactions. Present with handouts or Power- Point.

d. Response for manipulative-level children: Report how you responded (or would
respond) to three children at the manipulative level, giving details of your support
for how they were interacting and any new materials you might suggest. Present
with handouts.

e. Response for mastery-level children: Report how you responded (or would
respond) to three children at the mastery level, giving details of your support for
how they were interacting and any new materials you might suggest. Present with
handouts.

2. Field trips to observe two teachers: Observe an early childhood teacher in a self-
directed learning environment and a teacher in a traditional early childhood
classroom. How are their roles different? Refer to tasks of self- directed teachers in
this chapter. Give details of how they handled similar situations. Present using
handouts.

3. Montessori and Piaget: Research information on what Montessori and Piaget had to
say about young children’s repetitive actions. Why did they think these actions were
important in young children’s development? Report on handout giving sources, or
show film.

10
4. Children’s social interactions: Research information on social interactions of
children 3, 4, and 5. Be sure to include information from Parten, Kemple, or Corarso.
How are these social interactions another important indicator of their development?
Report on handout giving sources.

5. Levels of development: Make a chart showing the levels of development of six

children in your classroom. Describe how you were able to determine each of these
levels. Describe how you would set up activities in one or two of the learning centers
to meet the needs of these children. What would your role be in these two centers?
Present using overhead transparencies.

6. Group discussion on media and technology: Members of group should demonstrate

how they would or would not use with children, digital cameras, TVs, cell phones,
CD/cassette recorders, CD-ROMs, CDs, DVDs, whiteboards, and touch tablets, based
on NAEYC recommendations for their appropriate use.

7. View Films: Have teams preview various DVDs or CD-ROMs on observation of

children. Write up critiques. Show films in class and lead class discussion on what
ideas they liked and why.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

1. How is the role of the teacher in a self-directed learning environment different from
that of a teacher in a traditional classroom? Which is better?

2. How can we meet the needs of each of the children in our classroom if they are all at
different levels of development? Give examples.

3. How can our observations of children’s interactions with materials in our classroom
help to determine their developmental levels? Give examples.

4. Why do you think both Montessori and Piaget believed that repetitive actions are
important in a young child’s development? Do you agree?

5. As a behavior model for the children in your classroom, how should you act when
children get out of control? Give examples.

MULTIMEDIA RESOURCES FOR VIEWING AND PRESENTING

Appropriate Curriculum for Young Children: The Role of the Teacher (DVD) from
NAEYC (1-800-424-2460). Shows adults’ important roles in helping young children
learn through play and child-initiated activities. 28 min.

11
Children at the Center (DVD) from Redleaf Press (1-800-423-8309). Reflective teachers
shift their thinking and practice to be more authentically child-centered by reconsidering
their environment, routine, materials, and curriculum. 24 min.

Focused Observations: How to Observe Children for Assessment and Curriculum

Planning (DVD) from Redleaf Press (1-800-423-8309). This film offers classroom-tested
methods for observing that will help you assess children’s development and develop
curriculum that addresses children’s capabilities. 74 min.

Observation I: The Eyes Have It! (DVD) from Redleaf Press. Explores techniques in
preschool settings to document children’s growth. 27 min.

Setting the Stage (DVD) from Redleaf Press. Shows how children can be observed within
the context of their play and culture. 24 min.

Growing through Play (DVD) from Redleaf Press. Shows how Parten’s stages of play
connect to the learning styles of children at different ages. Real footage of children at
play. 30 min.

RECOMMENDED READINGS

Ahola, D. & Kovacik, A. (2007). Observing & Understanding Child Development: A

Child Study Manual (+ CD-ROM). Clifton Park, NY: Thomson/Delmar Learning.

Anderson, G. T. & Robinson, C. C. (2006). “Rethinking the dynamics of young

children’s play.” Dimensions of Early Childhood 34(1), 11–16.

Beaty, J. J. (2010). Observing Development of the Young Child. Columbus, OH: Pearson.

Carter, D. & Curtis, M. (2011). Reflecting children’s lives. St. Paul, MN: Redleaf Press.

Chatin-McNichols, J. (1992). The Montessori Controversy. Clifton Park, NY:

Thomson/Delmar Learning.

Corsaro, W. A. (2003). We’re friends, right? Inside kids’ culture. Washington, DC:
Joseph Henry Press.

Dombro, A. L., Jablon, J. R. & Stetson, C. (2011). Powerful interactions: How to connect
with children to extend their learning. Washington, DC: NAEYC.

Frost, J. L., Wortham, S.C. & Reifel, S. (2012). Play and child development.

Columbus, OH: Pearson. Kemple, K. M. (2004). Let’s be friends: Peer competence and
social inclusion in early childhood programs. New York: Teachers College Press.

12
McManis, L. D. an Gunnewig, S. B. (2012), “Finding the education in educational
technology with early learners.” Young Children 76(3), 14-23.

Parten, M. B. (1932). “Social participation among preschool children.” The Journal of

Abnormal Social Psychology 27, 243–269.

Piaget, J. (1962). Play, Dreams, and Imagination in Children. New York: Norton.

Shifflet, R., Toledo, C., and Mattoon, C. (2012). “Touch tablet surprises.” Young
Children, 76(3), 36-41.

Vygotsky, J. S. (1978). Mind in Society: The Development of Psychological Processes.

Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Self-Evaluation

Fill out form at end of Chapter 1.

13
 CHILD INTERACTION FORM

Child Observer

Center Date

CHILD INTERACTION FORM WITH MATERIALS

Manipulation Level

Actions/Words

(Child moves materials around without using them as intended)

Mastery Level

Actions/Words

(Child uses materials as intended, over and over)

WITH OTHER CHILDREN

Solitary Play

Actions/Words

(Child plays alone with materials)

Parallel Play

Actions/Words

(Child plays next to others with same materials but not involved)

Cooperative Play

Actions/Words

(Child plays together with others with same materials)

14
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
Alice stroked her friend’s hair in silence, waiting till she should
recover from this paroxysm of bliss. At last Mary began to speak.
“It is all over,” she sobbed. “It was more than my strength could
bear. After that sermon—” and she shivered.
“How all over?”
“I have broken off the engagement.”
“How? when? where?”
“I wrote the letter last night.”
“Oh,” said Alice, with a sigh of relief. “Will you just be so kind as to
let me have that letter?” added she, reaching out her hand.
“It is already mailed.”
“Mailed!” shouted Alice, springing to her feet.
“Yes. I took it to the post-office myself before breakfast.”
 CHAPTER LXV.

In those days, before the mail-delivery system had been introduced,

we had to send to the post-office for our letters.
If we were in love, we went in person, of course.
“Where are you going?” called out Alice across the street.
Mary came over to her. “I am going to the post-office,” said she, in a
low voice.
“I will go part of the way with you,” said Alice.
The two girls walked on for a little while in silence.
“Mary,” said Alice, presently, “tell me,—what do you expect him to
say?”
“Don’t ask me that,” she said, with a shiver.
“I think I can tell you. Your letter, as you quoted it to me, severed all
relations between you. But have you not a kind of dim,
unacknowledged hope that he will recant his heresies and bridge the
chasm between you?”
Mary walked on in silence.
“It is natural that you should nourish such a hope. But suppose it
should prove delusive?”
“The die is cast. I must abide the issue. And, Alice,—though you
think I have been hasty,—I feel a profound conviction that it is best
as it is.”
“Well, good-by! Be brave.” And more than once, as she hastened
homeward, Alice passed her hand across her eyes.
Mary stood before the little square window at the post-office.
“Any letters?”
The clerk knew who she was, and the sight of her pretty, pale face
lent a certain alacrity to his calm, official legs. Briskly diving into her
father’s box, he handed her half a dozen letters. As she passed them
nervously between thumb and finger, glancing at the addresses, he
held his steady, postmasterish eye upon her. What else had he to
do? Could not that other woman who stood there, could not she
wait? Was not her nose red; and her chin, was not her chin (by a
mysterious dispensation of Providence) bumpy? Let her stand there,
then, craning her anatomical neck to catch his stony gaze. Let her
wait till pretty little Miss Rolfe sorts her letters. Ah, that’s the one she
hoped to get,—that with the distinct, yet bold and jagged address,
that I have noticed so often. Ah, that’s the one—What name,
madam? Adkins? Miss Elizabeth Ann? One for Miss Elizabeth Adkins.
Beg your pardon,—five cents due, Miss Adkins.
My reader, be pretty. Let me entreat you—be pretty, if you can in
anywise compass it. If not, be good. Even that is better than
nothing. It will be a comfort to you in your declining years.
And your little nephews and nieces will rise up, some day, and call
you blessed.
“Will you be so kind as to put these back in the box?”
The clerk bowed with a gracious smile; and Mary, placing three or
four letters in her pocket, left the building, and turned in the
direction of the Capitol Square. She passed in through the first gate,
and hurried along the gravel path. By the time she had reached the
first seat she had grown so weak that she was glad to throw herself
upon it.
Had Mary had her eyes about her, she would have been struck with
the unwonted aspect of the Square. Our pretty little park, usually the
resort of merry children, wore, on this particular day, a rather
serious look. Men, in earnest conversation, stood about in groups.
Others hurried past, without even giving her pretty face the tribute
of a glance. But she saw nothing, heeded nothing; not even the
dark, gathering throng which crowned the summit of the green slope
in front of the Capitol; though it was not a stone’s throw from where
she sat.
She drew her letters from her pocket, placing the one with the
jagged address quickly beneath the others. She tore open an
envelope and began to read. The letter was from a former
schoolmate,—a bright girl, but its cleverness gave Mary no pleasure
now, but seemed frivolity, rather; and as for the cordial invitation (on
the eighth page), before she got to that she had thrust the letter
back into its cover. She gave but a glance at the contents of the
next. The third made her forget herself, for an instant. It was a
large, business-looking envelope, stamped New York; and she gave
a quick little start, when, upon opening it, a cheque fluttered down
before her feet. As she read the accompanying letter, a sudden flash
of joyful surprise illumined her face when she found that her article
(mailed with many misgivings two months ago, and long since
forgotten) had been accepted. A sudden flash of joyous surprise,
followed by quick gathering clouds; for, as she stooped to pick up
the cheque, a fourth letter slid from her lap and fell upon it. The
characteristic hand in which it was addressed she had often
admired; it was so firm and bold. Was it her imagination that
transformed it now? Was it changed? Was it more than firm now,
and had its boldness become ferocity? A sudden revulsion came over
Mary; and upon the words of the publishers—words of
commendation and encouragement, which, a fortnight since, would
have filled her young heart with exultation,—for would not he be
proud?—more than one big tear fell.
But that fourth letter remained unread. She held it in her hand, as
one does a telegram, sometimes, dreading to open it.
Her own to him had been brief and to the point; giving him to
understand that their engagement was at an end, without betraying
the fact that her heart, too, was broken. She had even dried the
tears that fell upon the paper, you remember. She had begged his
pardon, of course, but had purposely excluded from her language all
traces of feeling. As the thing had to be done, it should be done
effectually.
What would he do? What would he say? A thousand possibilities had
been dancing through Mary’s mind.
First and foremost, would he recant?
Inconceivable! Still, this hope refused to vanish.
Would he be violent? Would his reply be a burst of fierce
indignation? Very likely. Yes, that was just what one might expect
from such a man.
Would he be sarcastic? Will he sneer at a religion which can make
me break my word? That was what she dreaded most of all. Not, oh
male reader (if I shall have any such), not lest his flings and gibes
should wound her. If you think that, sir, you have never penetrated
into the mysteries of the female heart. It was a dread lest he—lest
HE should descend to such weapons,—lest this soaring eagle of her
imagination should stoop to be a mousing owl. A Hero may not use
poisoned arrows; least of all against a woman. She had never known
the Don to use a sarcastic word. He was too earnest, too fearfully
earnest to be satirical. He left that to triflers, male and female. He
was never witty, even. He is above it, Mary used to say, within her
heart, with that blessed alchemy whereby women know how to
convert into virtues the blemishes of those whom they love. No,
thought she; let him upbraid me; let him tell me that I have been
false to my word; let him even say that I have proven myself
unworthy to link my destiny with his (and am I worthy of the
homage of such a heart? Did not even unsentimental Alice say that a
true woman would follow the man she loved to the ends of the
earth?); no; let him cover me with fierce reproaches,—but let him
not be little! It is enough, and more than enough, that I have to give
him up. Let his image remain untarnished in my heart!
Or, would his letter be a broken-hearted wail? She hoped not,—so
she said, at least; and let us try to believe her.
Pressing her hand upon her heart for a moment, to calm its
tumultuous throbbing, she broke the seal of the letter, took in the
first page at one mad, ravenous glance, and the hand that held the
sheet fell upon her lap.
No sarcasms, no fierce reproaches, no wail of a broken heart!—no
anything that she had thought possible.
Brief, yet not curt, he accepted her decree without a murmur; as
though a prisoner bowed in silence under the sentence of the judge.
No commonplace, no rhetoric; no trace of feeling; and yet no
flippant suggestion of the want of it. In a word, his letter was an
absolutely impenetrable veil. As though he had not written. Mary
was stunned.
She had seen, as she drew the letter from the envelope, that the top
of the second page contained little more than the signature. She had
not strength, just yet, to read the dozen concluding words. She
leaned back upon the bench, resting her poor, dizzy head upon her
hand. She heard nothing, saw nothing. Yet there was something to
see and something to hear.
The craunching of many feet upon the gravel walk,—the feet of
strong, earnest men. And every now and then women passed, with
faces pale but resolute. And here, close beside her, a mob of boys,
with eager eyes, sweep across the greensward, unmindful of the
injunction to keep off the grass. Movement everywhere. The very air
of the peaceful little park seemed to palpitate.
Then a sudden hush!
She turned the page and read,—
“It is not probable that we shall ever meet again, and I therefore bid
you an eternal farewell.”
A shiver ran through her frame. A moment afterwards she leaped
from her seat with a piercing shriek; for almost at the very instant
that those cruel words froze her heart a terrific sound smote upon
her ear.
A few feet from where she sat the fierce throats of cannon
proclaimed to the city and the world that old Virginia was no longer
one of the United States of America.
 CHAPTER LXVI.

Four years have passed since our story opened, and the autumn of
1864 is upon us. For more than three years Virginia has been
devastated by war. Most of Leicester’s pleasant homes have been
broken up. My grandfather, however, trusting to his gray hairs, had
remained at Elmington. The Poythresses were refugees in Richmond.
Charley, who was now a major, commanding a battalion of artillery in
the army defending Richmond, had, two months before, been taken
in an ambulance-wagon to Mr. Carter’s. A bullet had passed through
his body, but he was now convalescent. Any bright morning you
might see him sunning himself in the garden. The house was
crowded to overflowing with refugee relatives and friends from the
invaded districts.
And illumined by a baby.
“He was born the very day I was wounded,” said Charley. “I
remember how anxious I was to see him before I died.”
“I knew you wouldn’t die,” said Alice; “and you didn’t!”
“I am here,” said Charley.
So, fair reader, Charley, in the last week of September, 1864, was a
father two months old. As for the baby (and I hereby set the fashion
of introducing one or more into every romance[1]), his mother had
already discovered whom he was like. He was a Carter, every inch of
him, especially his nose. But he had his father’s sense of humor,—
there was not the slightest doubt of that. For when Charley, who, in
speaking to the infant, always alluded to himself in those words,—
when Charley, chucking him gingerly under the chin, would ask him
what he thought of his venerable p-p-p-p-pop, he could be seen to
smile, with the naked eye. To smile that jerky, sudden-spreading,
sudden-shrinking smile of babyhood. You see it,—’tis gone! Ah, can
it be that even then we dimly discern how serious a world this is to
be born into!
Major Frobisher’s battalion was in front of Richmond. The Don and I
were under General Jubal Early, in the lower valley,—he a captain in
command of the skirmishers of the Stonewall Division, I a staff-
officer of the same rank.
I know nothing which makes one’s morning paper more interesting
than the news of a great battle. It’s nice to read, between sips of
coffee, how the grape and canister mowed ’em down; and the
flashing of sabres is most picturesque, and bayonets glitter
delightfully, in the columns of a well-printed journal. Taking a hand
in it—that’s different. Then the bodily discomfort and mental
inanition of camp-life. Thinking is impossible. This, perhaps, does
not bear hard upon professionals, with whom, for the most part,
abstention from all forms of thought is normal and persistent; but to
a civilian, accustomed to give his faculties daily exercise, the routine-
life of a soldier is an artesian bore. So, at least, I found it. No doubt,
with us, the ever-present consciousness that we were enormously
outnumbered made a difference. One boy, attacked by three or four,
may be plucky. It is rather too much to expect him to be gay. I was
not gay.
It was different with our friend, Captain Smith. He was one of the
half-dozen men I knew in those days who actually rejoiced in war.
He longed for death, my lovely and romantic reader is anxious to be
told; but I am sorry I cannot give her any proofs of this. It was
Attila’s gaudium certaminis that inspired him. He was never tired of
talking of war, which, with Hobbes, he held to be the natural state of
man. At any rate, said he, one day, drawing forth his Iliad and
tapping it affectionately, they have been hard at it some time.
This little volume was on its last legs. He had read it to pieces, and
could recite page after page of it in the original. How closely, he
would say, we skirmishers resemble the forefighters of Homer. He
never spoke of his own men save as Myrmidons.
He had become an ardent student, too, of the art of war, and had
Dumont and Jomini at his fingers’ ends. Indeed, I am convinced that
he would have risen to high rank had he not begun, and for two
years remained, a private in the ranks. At the time of which we
speak, his capacity and courage were beginning to attract attention;
and more than one general officer looked upon Captain Smith as a
man destined to rise high.
It remains for me to say that he and Mary have never met since that
farewell letter. What his feelings are towards her I can only
conjecture; for, although he frequently speaks of the old times, her
name never passes his lips. An analytical writer could tell you every
thought that had crossed his mind during all these years, and, in
twenty pages of Insight, work him up, by slow degrees, from a state
of tranquil bliss to one of tumultuous jimjams. But, if you wish to
know what my characters feel and think, you must listen to what
they say, and see what they do; which I find is the only way I have
of judging of people in real life. I should say, therefore (for guessing
is inexpensive), that the captain’s lips were sealed, either by deep,
sorrowing love, or else by implacable resentment. Choose for
yourself, fair reader. I told you, long ago, that this book is but the
record of things seen or heard by Charley, or by Alice, supplemented
occasionally by facts which chanced to fall under my own
observation. Even where I seemed to play analytical, through those
weary chapters touching Mary’s religious misgivings, I was not
swerving from the line I had laid down. Every word therein written
down is from the lips of Mary herself, as reported to me by Alice.
Now, Charley tells me that never once did Captain Smith mention
Mary’s name, even to him. How, then, am I to know what were his
feelings towards her? I remember, indeed, that once a young
lieutenant of his, returning from furlough, greeted him with warmth;
adding, almost with his first breath, that he had met a friend of his—
a lady—in Richmond,—Miss Rolfe—Leigh Street—I spent an evening
there—we talked a great deal of you—
The captain touched the visor of his cap.
Here was a chance of finding out what he thought!
“She said she—she said she—”
The young fellow had met a siren during his furlough, and fallen
horribly in love himself (as he told me, a few moments afterwards, in
a burst of confidence), and would willingly have invented a tender
phrase for the consolation of his captain, whom he adored; but truth
forbade.
“She said she was glad to hear you were well.”
“Miss Rolfe is very kind,” replied the captain, again touching his cap.
The young officer glanced at his chief, and instantly fell back upon
the weather. “I think there is a storm brewing,” he faltered.
“Very likely,” replied the captain of the Myrmidons.

[1] Is this the language of a bachelor?—Ed.

 CHAPTER LXVII.

[LETTER FROM CAPTAIN JOHN SMITH TO MAJOR

CHARLES FROBISHER.]

Fisher’s Hill, September 21, 1864.

My dear Charley:
Many thanks to your dear wife for the frequent bulletins she has
found time to send me in the intervals of nursing you, getting well
herself, and worshipping King Charles II. Have you agreed upon a
name yet? Or, rather, has Alice settled upon one? For I am told
women claim the right of naming the first.
Old boy, when I heard that a bullet had gone clean through you I
thought I had seen the last of you; and here you are on your pins
again! A far slighter wound would have sufficed to make “darkness
veil the eyes” of the stoutest of Homer’s heroes. What pin-scratches
used to send them to Hades!
And now, Patroklus, I will tell you why I refused, at the opening of
the war, to enter the same company of artillery with you. Your
feelings were wounded at the time, and I wanted to tell you why I
was so obstinate, but could not. To confess the honest truth, I had
not the pluck to place myself where I might have to see you die
before my eyes. It would have been different were we warring
around Troy. There, I could have helped you, on a pinch, and you
me. But these winged messengers of death, who can ward them off,
even from the dearest friend!
I had a cruel trial in last week’s battle. When it became necessary to
order Edmund’s company to advance, my heart sank within me.
[Edmund was Mr. Poythress’s youngest child, a lad of barely sixteen
summers, who had chafed and pined till he had wrung from his
mother a tearful consent to his joining the army.] “If I do not come
back,” he whispered in my ear, “tell mother that her ‘baby’ was man
enough to do his duty,—for I am going to do it.” “Your company is
moving,” I replied, in as stern a voice as I could muster; for I felt a
rush of tears coming; and he bounded into his place. I have seen
fair women in my day, and lovely landscapes, and noble chargers;
but never have my eyes beheld anything so surpassingly beautiful as
that ingenuous boy springing forward, under a rain of bullets, with a
farewell to his mother on his lips, and the light of battle on his brow.
I held my breath till he disappeared within the wood. Why is it that
we all shudder at the dangers of those we love, and yet can be calm
when our own lives hang by a thread? Is it not because, while we
know that the loss of a true friend is one never to be repaired, and
which casts a shadow upon our lives that can never be lifted
[Charley keeps this letter, with another little note, which you will
read later on, in a blue satin case, that Alice has embroidered with
forget-me-nots. He showed it to me on the nineteenth of last
October. The satin is all faded (and spotted, here and there) but
time has not dulled the colors of the flowers], there is a profound,
though veiled conviction, deep down in the heart of hearts of all of
us, that, as for ourselves, it were better were we at rest? It seems to
me that it is only the instinctive fear of death, which we share with
the lower animals, and that conscience which makes brave men, not
cowards of us all, that nerves such of us as have the cruel gift of
thought to bear up to the end, against the slings and arrows of the
most favored life, even. But it is a shame that I should write thus to
a man with a brand-new baby!
I cannot picture to myself Alice as a mother; though, thanks to her
graphic pen, I have a very clear conception of you as pater familias.
I have laughed till I cried over her accounts of you sunning the
youngster in the garden while the nurse was at her dinner, and the
way you held him, and the extraordinary observations you see fit to
make to him. I can’t blame him for smiling. The andante in Mozart’s
D minor quartet is very beautiful; but never did I expect to hear of
Charles Frobisher extemporizing words to it as a lullaby, while he
rocked his infant to sleep!
But it is time I gave you some account of our late disastrous battle
at Winchester. In order to understand it, you must have before your
mind a picture of the region in which it was fought.
The valley of Virginia is a narrow ribbon of land, as it were,
stretching diagonally across the State, between the Blue Ridge and
Alleghany Mountains. As its fertility attracted settlers at an early
date, its forests have mostly fallen years ago. This is especially true
of the region around Winchester, which is situated in the midst of a
broad, fertile plain, broken by rolling hills, crowned, here and there,
by the fair remains of singularly noble forests. One would say,
standing upon an eminence, and surveying the smiling landscape,
that this lovely plain was fashioned by the hand of the Creator as the
abode of plenty and eternal peace. Yet a poet, remembering that it
is not peace, but war that man loves, could not, in his dreams,
picture to himself a more beautiful battle-field. And if I have to fall,
may it be on one of thy sunny slopes, valiant little Winchester; and
may the last thing my eyes behold be the handkerchiefs waving from
thy housetops. Such women are worth dying, yes, even worth living
for.
Observe, therefore, that the plains of Winchester are admirably
adapted for the rapid and intelligent manœuvring of large masses of
troops. Artillery, infantry, cavalry,—every arm of the service may
move in any direction with perfect facility. And I need not tell an old
soldier that such a field gives overwhelming advantage to a greatly
superior force. When a general, as his troops advance to the attack,
can see just where the enemy are, and how far they extend,—can
see their reserves hurrying forward, and knows that when they are
all hotly engaged he can push heavy masses of fresh troops around
both flanks, and attack in the rear men who are already
outnumbered in front, what can save the weaker army from
annihilation? And yet, on the nineteenth of this month, Early’s little
army of ten thousand troops withstood, in front of Winchester, in the
open field, without breastworks, from dawn till late in the afternoon,
the assaults of forty thousand of the enemy. [Note.—This is an error
on the part of the captain, but I retain his statement of the numbers
engaged, just as he gives them, simply to show what was the
universal belief of our soldiers at the time,—that they were
outnumbered four to one. The true figures show that Early had
fifteen thousand, Sheridan forty-five thousand men,—or only three
to one. J. B. W.][1] How a solitary man of us escaped I shall never be
able to understand.
Possibly you have not seen in the papers that on the seventeenth
Early sent our division down the valley to Martinsburg (twenty-two
miles) to make a reconnoissance. We did a little skirmishing there,
and on the next day encamped, on our return, at a place called
Bunker’s Hill,—named, I presume, in honor of the Bunker’s Hill on
which Boston, with a magnanimity unparalleled in history, has
erected an imposing monument to commemorate the gallant
storming of Breed’s Hill by the British. Here we lay down to rest. I
will not say to sleep; for never, since the beginning of the war, had I
felt so profoundly anxious. Picture to yourself our situation.
There we were, twelve miles down the valley, twenty-five hundred
men; while, near Berryville, over against our main body of about
eight thousand men at Winchester, lay an army forty thousand
strong. Suppose Sheridan should attack in our absence? True, Early
had marched over to Berryville, a few days before, and offered him
battle in vain. But suppose he did attack? Could he not in an hour’s
time (for forty thousand against eight is rather too much) drive
Early’s force pell-mell across the pike, and, with his immense force of
cavalry, capture the last man he had? And then we would have
nothing to do but march up the valley, like a covey of partridges,
into a net.
Such were the thoughts which flashed across my mind, with painful
intensity, at dawn next morning. Weary with anxious thinking, I had
fallen to sleep at last. The boom of a cannon swept down from
Winchester. We are lost, was my first thought. Our army will be
annihilated. Sheridan will set out on his march to the rear of
Richmond to-morrow morning.
I rose without a word, as did others around me, and completed my
toilet by buckling on my sword and pistols. There, on my blanket, lay
Edmund, sleeping the sweet, deep sleep of boyhood. I could hardly
make up my mind to arouse him. “Get up,” said I, touching his
shoulder; “they are fighting at Winchester.” “They are!” cried he,
leaping to his feet. The gaudium certaminis was in his eyes. The boy
is every inch a soldier.
We hurried up the turnpike without thinking of breakfast, the roar of
the battle growing louder as we advanced. Edmund chattered the
whole way, asking me, again and again, whether I thought it would
be all over before we got there. He had not yet been in a battle, and
was full of eager courage. I told him I thought he would have a
chance at them, though I actually thought that all would be over
before we reached the ground. And what do you suppose we
learned as we neared the field? That Ramseur, with his twelve
hundred men covering our front with hardly more than a skirmish
line, had held in check the heavy masses of the enemy all this time!
They had been attacked at dawn; we had marched twelve miles;
and there they were still, Ramseur and his heroic little band of North
Carolinians. And I single out the North Carolinians by name, not so
much because of their courage, as of their modesty.
Well, we were beaten that day, and badly beaten. That we were not
annihilated is what I cannot comprehend. And why we are allowed
to rest here and recuperate, with a vastly superior army, flushed
with victory, in our front, is equally difficult to understand. Why were
we not attacked at dawn next day? Yet, that he has not done so
does not surprise me, after what I saw of his generalship at the
close of the late battle. Put yourself beside me, and see what I saw
on the afternoon of September 19th.
We are standing on an open hill, just in rear of where our troops
have fought so stubbornly the livelong day. Where is our army? It no
longer exists. It has been hammered to pieces. Here and there you
see a man slowly retiring, and loading his rifle as he falls back. Every
now and then he turns and fires. One here, and one there,—this is
all the army we have.
Now look over there, at that field, to the left of the position lately
held by us. Those are the enemy’s skirmishers, advancing from a
wood. Their long line stretches far away, and is lost to view behind
that rise in the hill. At whom are they firing? Heaven knows, for
there is no enemy in their front. And now the dense masses of their
infantry appear, in rear of the skirmishers, and glide slowly across
the hill, like the shadow of a black cloud. Come, Edmund, cheer up,
and have a crack at them. (The boy is standing apart, his powder-
begrimed face streaked with decorous tears.) Set your sight at six
hundred yards. Come here, and let me give you a rest on my hip.
Yes, the man with the flag. Ah, you have made a stir among them.
The line moves on, but one man lies stretched upon the field, with
two others kneeling beside him. There is the making of a
sharpshooter in the boy!
And what ponderous form is this that comes towards us, limping and
disconsolate? ’Tis our friend Jack. He, I need hardly tell you, ✻ ✻ ✻
✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ But he
lost heart when his powerful charger fell beneath him,
disembowelled by a cannon-ball. Poor Bucephalus! He had carried
him through twenty battles as though he were a feather; and where
was he to find another horse that could carry him at all! (Edmund
tells a good story of Jack. He says that while he stood lamenting the
death of his valiant steed, one of our advancing brigades, first
staggering under the heavy fire, then halting, were beginning to give
way. “Boys,” cried Jack (he will have his joke), “boys, follow me! If
they can’t hit me, they can’t hit anybody!” Edmund says that some
of the soldiers laughed; and that as they followed the burly captain
he heard one of them say to his neighbor, “Mind now; if they do hit
him, I claim his breeches as a winter-quarters tent.”)
Look, now, at those dark masses, halted in full view on that rising
ground to our right. They are as near Winchester as we are. What
are they doing there? Surely they can see that there are no troops
between themselves and the town! Why do they not go and take it?
Can it be their advance has been checked by the stray shots of a
score of retreating sharpshooters?
Now turn and look a mile away, to our left. See that dense cloud of
dust, lit up with the flashing of carbine-shots, the gleaming of
sabres, and the glare of bursting shells! There, along the pike, our
handful of cavalry, struggling bravely with overwhelming odds, is
falling back upon the town. Come, Edmund, there is no use staying
here any longer. Yes, I think they will get there before us. Pluck up
your spirits, my boy; a true soldier shows best in adversity.
I have not tried, my dear Charley, to give you a military account of
this battle. I have striven, instead, to lay before you a picture of the
field as it appeared when Edmund, Jack, and I sadly turned towards
Winchester. It was then the middle of the afternoon. Would you
believe that we reached the town in safety,—entered a house, whose
fair inmates gave us bread (it was all—almost more than all they
had),—retired, afterwards, up the pike, along which our soldiers
straggled in twos and threes,—went into camp,—arose next
morning,—and made our way to Fisher’s Hill? And here we are still,
resting as quietly as though no enemy were in our front!
I have known men to leave the gaming-table, after a big run of luck,
so as to spend their winnings before the tide turned. Perhaps our
friends the enemy wish to enjoy their glory awhile before risking the
loss of it in another battle; but it isn’t war.
✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻
✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻
Yours, ever,
 Dory.

[1] See Geo. A. Pond’s “Shenandoah Valley Campaigns,”

if more minute accuracy is desired.—Ed.
 CHAPTER LXVIII.

“Jack,” said Alice, “every time I read this letter of poor Dory’s, I find
it harder to understand how General Sheridan has so high a
reputation in the North as a soldier. Can you explain it?”
“I cannot,” I replied, thumping the table fiercely with my fist; for
every Whacker molecule in me stood on end.
“I can,” put in Charley, in his dry way.
I turned and fixed my eyes on that philosopher. His were fixed upon
the ceiling. His head rested upon the back of his chair, his legs (they
are stoutish now) were stretched across another.
“The deuse you can!” for my sturdy Saxon atoms were in arms.
Charley removed his solid limbs from the chair in front of him, with
the effort and grunt of incipient obesity [incipient obesity indeed!
and from you! whe-e-ew! Alice], and, walking up to the mantel-
piece, rested both arms upon it at full length; then, tilting his short
pipe at an angle of forty-five degrees, he surveyed me with a smile
of amiable derision. “Yes, I can,” said he, at last. And with each word
the short pipe nodded conviction.
“Do it, then,” said I.
“I will,” said he. And diving down into his pocket, he drew forth a
manuscript; and striking an attitude, and placing his glasses (eheu,
fugaces, Postume, Postume, labuntur anni) upon his oratorical nose,
he unfolded the paper. Clearing his throat:
“HANNIBAL!” began he, in thunder-tones; then, dropping suddenly
into his usual soft voice, and letting fall his right hand containing the
paper to the level of his knee,—“this,” he added, peering gravely at
us over his spectacles, “is my Essay on Military Glory!”
Alice made herself comfortable, and spread out her fan; for laughing
makes her warm nowadays.
Had she any right to look for humor in an essay by her husband?
Look at her own chapter on the loves of Mary and the Don. A more
sentimental performance I never read. Show me a trace therein, if
you can, of witty, sparkling Alice of the merry-glancing hazel eyes!
Look, for the matter of that, at this book of mine. Why, the other
day, glancing over the proofs[1] of a certain chapter, and forgetting
for the moment, as I read the printed page, that I had written it,
would you believe it, my eyes filled with tears? (And a big one rolled
down so softly that I started when it struck the paper.) Is this, cried
I, the jolly book that my friends expect of me? Alas, fair reader,
fellow-pilgrim, through this valley of shadows, I trust full many a
sun-streak may fall across your path. As for me,—I can only sing the
song that is given me.

[1] Mr. Whacker must mean that he intended “glancing

over the proofs.”—Ed.
 CHAPTER LXIX.

[Being an Essay on Military Glory; by Charles Frobisher, Esquire, M.A. (Univ. Va.);
late Major of Artillery C. S. A.
Omnibus, mentis compotibus, SKIPIENDUM, utpote quod TINKERII MOLEM NON VALEAT.]

Charley shifted his manuscript to his left hand, and smoothing down
the leaves with his right, and glancing at the paper, raised his eyes
to mine. The tip of his forefinger, placed lightly against the tip of his
nose, lent to that organ an air of rare subtlety.
“A julep,” he began, “differs from a thought in this: that while—”
“A julep!” cried Alice; “why, just now you began with Hannibal.”
Charley stood for a moment, smiling, as he toyed with the leaves of
his essay with the forefinger of his right hand.
“True; I had turned the thing upside down, and was reading it
backwards. A julep,” he began again, with an authoritative air—
“What connection,” interrupted Alice, “can there be between juleps
and military men?”
“Innocence,” ejaculated Charley, raising his eyes to heaven, “thy
name is Alice!”
“Go on; I shall not interrupt you again.”
“A julep differs from a thought in this: that while an average man
goes to the bottom of the former, of the latter only philosophers can
sound the depths.” With that he sat down.
“Is that the end of your Essay on Military Glory?” I asked.
“No. That is the first round. I call for time. I am exhausted by the
vastness of the generalization.” And leaning back in his chair, he
closed his eyes with a sigh of profound lassitude. “My dear,” said he,
presently, in a feeble whisper,—“my dear, don’t you think this lecture
would go off better were it illustrated?”
Alice looked puzzled for a moment, then rose with a bright laugh,
and, making a pass at Charley (who minds Jack?) which he dodged,
tripped briskly out of the room.
“Charley,” said I, “you are a boundless idiot!”
“Too true; but there is method in my madness.” which I found to be
so when Alice (who could have wished a more charming waitress?)
returned with the illustrations.
Illustrations in the highest form of art; for they appealed to the ear
with the soft music of their jingle, the nostrils by their fragrance, the
touch by their coldness, to the eye by the fascinating contrast of
cracked ice and vivid green; while the imagination, soaring above
the regions of sense, beheld within those frosted goblets, jocund,
blooming summer seated in the lap of rimy winter,—or the triumph
of man over nature.
Ole Virginny nebber tire!
“What kind of an idiot did you say?” said Charley, as we chinked
glasses.
“I couldn’t find any straws,” said Alice.
“I accept your apology,” said Charley. His voice sounded soft,
mellow, and far away; for his nose was plunged beneath a mass of
crushed ice. “Straws,” added he, growing magnanimous, “they are
only fit to show which way the wind blows.” And with a magnificent
sweep of his left hand he indicated his disdain for all possible
atmospheric currents. “Ladies and gentlemen,” added he, as he rose
from his seat; and this time there was an indescribable jumble in the
voice of the orator—(not at all, Mr. Teetotaller! ’twas caused by the
cracked ice),—for as Charley rose to continue the reading of his
Essay on Military Glory, he had pointed the stem of his goblet at the
ceiling; striving, at the same time, by a skilful adjustment of his
features, to prevent its contents from falling on the floor,—such
great store did Alice set by her new carpet. But, of course, when he
opened his mouth to say ladies and gentlemen, a baby avalanche fell
in upon his organs of speech; so that he didn’t manage to say
anything of the kind. “That,” said he, placing the glass upon the
table, “will do as a vignette; the illustrations we shall contrive to
work in farther on.”
One julep gives Charley the swagger of a four-bottle man.
“Where was I?” asked he, drawing the manuscript from his pocket.
“I’ll begin again. HANNIBAL! No, confound it! Ah, here we are: “An
average man has strength to go to the bottom of a julep; only a
philosopher can sound the depth of a thought.”
At these words Alice rose from her seat, and, leaning forward, first
fixed a scrutinizing glance upon her husband, then advanced
towards him with a twinkle in her merry-glancing hazel eye.
“If half the audience,” said Charley, with an imperious wave of the
hand, “will persist in wandering over the floor, the reading is
suspended.”
Alice took her seat, and did nothing but laugh till the end of the
chapter. I laughed, too, but without exactly knowing why. But
laughter (singularly enough,—for it is a blessing) is contagious. And
then the julep had been stiff; so that the very tables and chairs
about the room seemed to beam upon me with a certain twinkling,
kindly Bushwhackerishness.[1]
“Here’s a lot of stuff that I shall skip,” began Charley; and he turned
over, with careless finger, leaf after leaf. As he did so Alice rose
slightly from her seat with a peering look.
“Who is reading this Essay on Military Glory?” asked Charley, with a
severe look at his wife over his glasses (alas, alas, nec pietas
moram?).
“Very well; go on,” said Alice, dropping back into her chair with a
fresh burst of laughter. She had had no julep. What was she
laughing at?
“It consists (my opening) of a series of illustrations, showing how
much nonsense comes to be believed through people’s not going to
the bottom of things. We suppose ourselves to have an opinion
(there is no commoner delusion), but we fail to subject that opinion
to any crucial test; though nothing is easier. The crucial test, for
example, of sulphuretted hydrogen, is a certain odor which we
encounter, when, with incautious toe, we explode an egg in some
outlying nest which no boy could find during the summer—”
“That will do,” said Alice; though why women should turn up their
blessed little noses at such allusions is hard to understand, seeing
what keen and triumphant pleasure they all derive from the
detection of unparliamentary odors at unexpected times and places.
“I have here,” continued Charley, carelessly turning the leaves of his
manuscript, “a nestful of such illustrations.”
“We will excuse you from hatching them in our presence,” said Alice;
and with wrinkled nose she disdainfully sniffed a suppositious egg of
abandoned character.
“I have already passed them over. After all, what is the use of them?
You and Charley can understand what I mean without them; and if
you can, why not the reader, too? Are readers idiots? I’ll plunge in
medias res. Let us begin here:” (reading) “It is the same with
military glory. How many battles have been fought since the world
began? Arithmetic stands pale in the presence of such a question! In
every one of these conflicts one or the other commander had the
advantage. How many of them are famous? Count them. For every
celebrated general that you show me, I will show you a finger—or a
toe—”
“You are too anatomical by half,” protested Alice.
“Why is this? Think for a moment? Why is this victor famous, that
victor not? It is the simplest thing in the world if you will but apply
the crucial test.”
Charley paused in his reading and peered gravely over his glasses.
“What is it, goose?” asked his admiring spouse.
“The crucial test is disparity of numbers. Formulæ: equality, victory,
obscurity,—disparity, victory, glory. There you have it in a nutshell.
Example (from Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire):
imperator of the West and imperator of the East, battling, with the
world as a stake. Innumerable but equal hosts. Days of hacking and
hewing. Victory to him of the East (or West). His name? Have
forgotten it. Equality, victory, obscurity!
“See? By the way, Jack, does not the brevity of my military style
rather smack of Cæsar’s Commentaries?
“Again—scene, Syria. Christians of the Byzantine empire, and
Mahometans. Final struggle. Vast but equal armies. Three days of
carnage. Remnant of Christians decline crown of glory. Name of
victor? I pause?—and so on, and so on, and so on.
“But now, per contra, read, by the light of our hypothesis, the
following:
PARADIGM OF GLORY.

Nominative Napoleon Italy disparity victory glory

Genitive Cæsar Pharsalia ditto ditto ditto
Dative Alexander Persia ditto ditto ditto
Accusative Zengis Khan Asia ditto ditto ditto
Vocative Sheridan Winchester ditto ditto ditto
Ablative Hannibal—”
“Ah, you have gotten to him at last,” said Alice.
“Yes, my dear,” said Charley, raising his eyes from the manuscript;
“but the vignettes grow dim. Let’s have an illustration in honor of the
victor of Cannæ. Let there be lots of ice as a memorial of the
avalanches he defied, piled mountain-high because of the Alps he
overcame. Typify with mint the glorious verdure of Italy as it first
bursts upon his view.”
Alice typified—
✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻
✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻ ✻
“After all,” said Charley, “this is a pretty good old world to live in.”
And he fillipped, gently, the rim of his goblet with his middle finger.
(Ching! ching!) “It was B flat when it was full, and now (ching!
ching!) it is a good C sharp. Listen!” And shutting one eye, he
cocked the other meditatively towards the ceiling. (Ching! ching!)
“Acoustics or something, I suppose. A pretty good old world, I tell
you, boys. (Ching! ching!) H’m! h’m! h’m!” It was a low, contented
chuckle. “Jack-Whack, you ought to have a sweet little darling of a
wife, just like—”
“Mr. Frobisher, you are positively boozy!”
“Well, well, my precious little ducky dumpling, I don’t write Essays
on Military Glory every day. H’m! h’m! h’m! h’m! I left out my very
best illustration, simply because I couldn’t work it into my paradigm.
It is a little poem I heard once,—h’m! h’m! h’m! h’m! (Ching! ching!)
‘Dad and Jamie had a fight,
They fit all day, and they fit all night;
And in the mornin’ Dad was seen
A-punchin’ Jamie on the Bowlin’ Green.’
“One would say, taking the four lines together, that Dad probably got
the better of Jamie in the end. But who thinks of ranking him, for
that reason, with the world’s famed conquerors? Preposterous! They
were obviously too evenly matched. See? No one knows, even, who
Dad was, or Jamie; or what Bowlin’ Green drank their gore. (Ching!
ching!) D natural. Nor even the name of the poet. Some old, old
Aryan myth, I suppose, symbolizing the struggle between Light and
Darkness,—‘in the morning Dad’—the sun—‘was seen a-punchin’
Jamie’—moon, of course—‘on the Bowlin’ Green,’—that is, this
beautiful world. (Ching! ching!) What are you up to?”
Alice had made a dive at Charley, who, mistaking her object,
defended himself vigorously. Meantime, she had darted with her
right hand down into his breast-pocket, drawing out the manuscript.
“If you supposed I wished to kiss your juleppy moustache, you are
much mistaken. This is what I wanted.” And she brandished the
Essay high in the air in triumph. “I knew it! I knew it!” cried she.
“Listen, Jack!”
“‘Baltimore, August 14, 1885.
“‘Charles Frobisher, Esq.:
“‘Dear Sir,—‘The guano will be shipped by to-morrow’s boat, as per
valued order.
“‘Very truly yours,
“‘Bumpkins & Windup.’
“And look here—and look here,—nothing but a lot of business
letters. He has not written one line! His so-called Essay on Military
Glory is a myth!”
“We got the juleps, at any rate. Jack-Whack, you write it up.”
“If Alice will agree to illustrate again.”
“Not I!”
“Q minor!” sighed Charley, thumping his empty goblet. “Jack-Whack,
my poor boy, we dwell in a vale of tears!”

[1] I need hardly say that I decline to be responsible

for such sentiments.—Ed.
 CHAPTER LXX.

It is eight o’clock in the morning, at Harrisonburg, in the leafy month

of June. You board the train from Staunton. As it rushes down the
Valley there lies spread out before you, on either side, a scene of
rare loveliness. Fertile plains, waving with grain; rolling, grass-clad
hills, laughing in the sunshine, dotted here and there with woods of
singular beauty; limpid streams, brawling over glittering, many-hued
pebbles; a pure air filling the lungs with a glad sense of health and
well-being. There are few such lands.
But come, take this seat on the right-hand side of the car, and I will
tell you of some things which happened twenty years ago.
Ah, there it is! Don’t you see that bluish thread, winding along over
there, skirting that hill? That is the Valley Pike. There was no railroad
there then. Take a good look at it. Take a good look, for heroes have
trodden it.
Ah, the train has stopped. Do you see that grizzled farmer, who has
ridden over to the station to get his mail? I know him, for I never
forget a face. He was there at Manassas when Bee said, “Look at
Jackson, standing like a stone wall!” Yes, many of the survivors of
the Stonewall Brigade live along this road.
That is the Massanutten Mountain, a spur of the Blue Ridge. How
beautiful it is! Straight and smooth and even, with a little notch
every now and then; clothed from base to summit with primeval
forests, it looks, crested as it is here and there with snowy clouds,
like a gigantic green wave rolling across the plain.
A wall not unlike this once stood on either hand in the Red Sea; and
Miriam smote her tambourine in triumph, praising the God of Israel.
As we rush along, the mountain bears us company, as though doing
the honors of the Valley.
The train stops at Strasburg. There, too, Massanutten ends.
As though a Titan had cleft it with his sword, so abruptly does it sink
into the plain.
You are on your way to Alexandria, and will have to wait here four
hours; so let us look about us. Run your eye up that sharp acclivity
lying over against the town.
Upon the brink of that steep, twenty years ago, stood Gordon.
Accompanied by a few staff-officers, he had spent the greater part
of the day in the toilsome ascent, tearing his way through dense,
pathless jungles, struggling among untrodden rocks; and now, on
the seventeenth of October, 1864, he stands there sweeping the
plain with his field-glass. What does he see? Why does he forget, in
an instant, his fatigue? What is it that fires with ardor his martial
face?
But before I tell you that, a word with you.
In the South, at the breaking out of the war, there was not to be
found one solitary statesman; nor one throughout the length and
breadth of the North. Not that capacity was lacking to either side.
Great capacity is not required. Chesterfield heard the rumble of the
coming French revolution, to which the ears of Burke were deaf.
After all, statecraft is but the application of temporary expedients to
temporary emergencies; and you might carve a score of Gladstones
and Disraelis out of the brain of Herbert Spencer without in the least
impairing his cerebrum. Pericles shone in Athens for an hour;
Aristotle dominated the world for twenty centuries. Such is the
measure of a statesman; such that of a thinker.
Statesmen, therefore (or the making of such), we had, I must
suppose, by the thousand. I have said they were not to be found.
For years before we came to blows the animosity between North and
South had been deepening, reaching at last this point, that he who