CHAPTER XIII
INTO THE RACING TIDE
“As the vine flourishes, and the grape empurples close up to the very
walls and muzzles of cannoned Ehrenbreitstein; so do the sweetest
joys of life grow in the very jaws of its peril.”--HERMAN MELVILLE:
_Pierre_.
“Until I was twenty-five,” Melville once wrote to Hawthorne, “I had no
development at all.” When the cable and anchor of the _United States_
were all clear, and when he bounded ashore on his native soil, Melville
was in his twenty-fifth year. “From my twenty-fifth year,” he wrote
Hawthorne, “I date my life.”
His three years of wandering, crowded as they were with alienating
experiences, had, of course, worked deep changes in him: changes more
radical than in the dizzy whirl of strangely peopled adventures it was
possible for him to gauge. In memory, the fitful fever of the past,
deceitfully seems to strive not. But we delude ourselves when we fancy
that it sleeps well. During his far driftings, Melville had clung
reverently to thoughts of home, his imagination treacherously caressing
those very scenes whose intimate contact had filled him with revulsion.
“Do men ever hate the thing they love?” he asks in _White-Jacket_,
perplexed at the paradox of this perpetual recoil. He was eternally
looking both before and after, but never with the smug and genial
after-dinner optimism of Rabbi Ben Ezra. The insufficient present was
always poisoned, to him, by bitter margins of pining and regret. In
headlong escape from his household gods he had been landed among South
Sea islands that in retrospect he viewed as “authentic Edens.” Yet even
in Paradise did he feel himself an exile, teaching old Marheyo to say
“Home” and “Mother,” converting into sacred words the countersigns of
a former Hell. He tells in _White-Jacket_, how, with the smell of tar
in his nostrils, out of sight of land, with a stout ship under his
feet, and snuffing the ocean air, in the silence and solitude of the
deep, during the long night watches used to come thronging about his
heart “holy home associations.” And he closes _White-Jacket_ with the
reflection that “Life’s a voyage that’s homeward-bound!” But he sailed
with sealed orders.
Of Melville’s impressions upon his return he has left no record. During
his three years of whaling and captivity among cannibals, and mutiny,
and South Sea driftings, and adventures in the Navy, life at home had
gone along in its regular necessary way; and the scenes of his youth,
despite their transformation in his memory, lived on in solid fact
unchanged. The identical trees in the Boston Common blotted out the
same patterns against the New England stars; none of the streets had
swerved from off their prim and angular respectability. His mother he
found living in Lansingburg, just out from Albany, N. Y. There was the
same starched calico smell to his sister’s dresses, the same clang-tint
to his mother’s voice. Such was the calibre of his imagination, that he
must have found life at Lansingburg unbelievably like he knew it must
be, yet very different from what he was prepared to find.
His brothers must have first appeared intimate strangers to him. His
elder brother, Gansevoort, had given up his hat and fur shop, was
well established in law and had won a creditable name for himself
in politics. His younger brother, Allan, was beginning a successful
legal career, with his name emblazoned on a door at 10 Wall Street.
Maria was, after all, a Gansevoort; she was not too proud to keep her
brothers reminded that she had borne sons. Melville’s youngest brother,
Tom, had sprung from boyhood into the self-conscious maturity of youth.
From vagabondage in Polynesia to the stern yoke of self-supporting
citizenship was a dizzy transition. But Melville did not clear it at
a bound. The very violence of the impact between the two antipodal
types of experience for a time must have stunned Melville to their
incompatibility. Tanned with sea-faring, exuberant in health, rosy
with the after-glow of his proud companionship with Jack Chase, and
the respect and affection he had won from his associates on board the
_United States_, he was effulgent with amazing tales--the enviable
hero of endless incredible adventures. His home-coming may well have
been not only a staggering, but a joyous adventure. For he entered
Lansingburg trailing clouds of glory. He was panoplied in romance; and
though bodily he was in a suburb of Albany, his companion image was
the distant adventurer he saw mirrored in the admiring and jealous
imagination of his friends. With what melancholy--if any--he viewed
this reflected image, and to what degree he was, Narcissus-wise,
conscious of its irony, we do not know. But if _Typee_ and _Omoo_ be
any index of his mood, he returned home happier and wholesomer than at
any other period of his life. Before many years, unsolved problems of
his youth were to reassert themselves, heightened in difficulty and in
pertinacity. Yet for a time, at least, so it would appear, he reaped
very substantial benefits from his escape beyond civilisation.
According to J. E. A. Smith, Melville was soon beset by his enthralled
and wide-eyed friends to put his experiences into a book. Even if such
a challenge had never been made, it is difficult to see how Melville
could have escaped plunging into literature. For the hankering for
letters had earlier stirred in Melville’s blood,--a hankering that
he had before succumbed to, swathing a vacuity of experience in the
grave-wrappings of rhetoric and prolixity. Now he was rich in matter;
because of the very straitened circumstances of his family, he was
faced again by the necessity of earning some money if he stayed at
home; and in so far as we know, he was untempted to venture forth
either as vagabond or efficiency expert.
Soon after his arrival home he must have settled down to composition.
For the manuscript of _Typee_ was bought in London by John Murray, by
an agreement dated December, 1845.
At the time of the completion of _Typee_, Melville’s brother,
Gansevoort, was starting for London as Secretary to the American
Legation under Minister McLane. Gansevoort threw _Typee_ in among his
luggage, to try its luck among British publishers. Whether _Typee_ had
previously been refused in the United States has not yet transpired.
In any event, John Murray bought the English rights to print a
thousand copies of _Typee_--a purchase that cost him £100. Murray did
not close the sale, however, until he was assured that _Typee_ was a
sober account of actual experiences. _Typee_ appeared in two parts in
Murray’s “Colonial and Home Library.” Part I appeared on February 26,
1846; Part II on April 1 of the same year.
Encouraged by the temerity of John Murray, Wiley and Putnam of New
York bought the American rights for _Typee_. And by an agreement made
in England, _Typee_ appeared simultaneously in New York and London:
in America under the title, _Typee, a Peep at Polynesian Life During
Four Months’ Residence in a Valley of the Marquesas_. In 1849, Harper
Brothers took over _Typee_, and issued it shorn of some of the passages
the Missionaries had found most objectionable. Up to January 1, 1849,
Wiley and Putnam had sold 6,392 copies of _Typee_: a sale upon which
Melville gained $655.91. Up to April 29, 1851, 7,437 copies of _Typee_
had been sold in England, netting Melville, if accounts surviving in
Allan’s hand be correct, $708.40.
Under the date of April 3, 1846--two days after the appearance in
England of Part II of _Typee_, Gansevoort wrote Melville the following
letter--the last letter, it appears, he ever wrote:
“MY DEAR HERMAN:
“Herewith you have copy of the arrangement with Wiley & Putnam for
the publication in the U. S. of your work on the Marquesas. The
letter of W. & P. under date of Jan. 13th is the result of a previous
understanding between Mr. Putnam and myself. As the correspondence
speaks for itself, it is quite unnecessary to add any comment. By
the steamer of to-morrow I send to your address several newspaper
comments and critiques of your book. The one in the _Sun_ was written
by a gentleman who is very friendly to myself, and who may possibly
for that reason have made it unusually eulogistic.
“Yours of Feb. 28 was rec’d a few days ago by the daily packet
from Joshua Bates. I am happy to learn by it that the previous
intelligence transmitted by me was ‘gratifying enough.’ I am glad
that you continue busy, and on my next or the after that will
venture to make some suggestions about your next book. In a former
letter you informed me that Allan had sent you $100 home, the fruit
of my collection. (I refer to the money sent at your request). It
appears that this was not so, for Allan informs me that the $100
was part of the £90 s 10--making £100 which I sent out by the
Jan. 2 Steamer. Allan seems to find it entirely too much trouble
to send me the monthly accounts of receipts and disbursements. I
have received no accounts from him later than up to Nov. 30th and
consequently am in a state of almost entire ignorance as to what
is transpiring at No. 10, Wall Street. This is very unthinking in
him, for my thoughts are so much at home that much of my time is
spent in disquieting apprehensions as to matters & things there. I
continue to live within my income, but to do so am forced to live
a life of daily self-denial. I do not find my health improved by
the sedentary life I have to lead here. The climate is too damp &
moist for me. I sometimes fear I am gradually breaking up. If it
be so--let it be--God’s will be done. I have already seen about as
much of London society as I care to see. It is becoming a toil to
me to make the exertion necessary to dress to go out, and I am now
leading a life really as quiet as your own in Lansingburg.--I think I
am growing phlegmatic and cold. Man stirs me not, nor women either.
My circulation is languid. My brain is dull. I neither seek to win
pleasure or avoid pain. A degree of insensibility has been long
stealing over me, & now seems completely established, which, to my
understanding, is more akin to death than life. Selfishly speaking,
I never valued life very much--it were impossible to value it less
than I do now. The only personal desire I now have is to be out
of debt. That desire waxes stronger within me as others fade. In
consideration of the little egotism which my previous letters to you
have contained, I hope that mother, brothers & sister will pardon
this babbling about myself.
“Tom’s matter has not been forgotten. You say there is a subject,
etc., etc., ‘on which I intended to write but will defer it.’ What do
you allude to? I am careful to procure all the critical notices of
_Typee_ which appear & transmit them to you. The steamer which left
Boston on the 1st inst. will bring me tidings from the U. S. as to
the success of _Typee_ there. I am, with love and kisses to all,
“Affectionately, Your brother,
“GANSEVOORT MELVILLE.”
With this letter, Gansevoort enclosed fourteen lines from Act III,
Scene I of _Measure for Measure_, beginning “Ah, but to die.” On
May 12, he was dead. His countrymen celebrated his decease. _The
Wisconsin,_ a newspaper published in Milwaukee, for example, published,
on July 1, a florid tribute to his memory, declaring him “dear
to the people of the West.” “And though he died young in years,”
the _Wisconsin_ goes on to say, “for genius, thrilling eloquence
and enlarged patriotism, he was known to the people from Maine to
Louisiana.”
But already had Melville achieved a wider, if less beatified,
reputation. The notice that _Typee_ attracted extended considerably
beyond either Maine or Louisiana. And its success was none the less
brilliant because it was in part a _succes de scandal_. Christendom has
progressed since 1846, and _Typee_ has, for present-day readers, lost
its charm of indelicacy. Yet, despite the violation of the proprieties
of which Melville was accused, Longfellow records in his journal for
July 29, 1846: “In the evening we finished the first volume of _Typee_,
a curious and interesting book with glowing descriptions of life in
the Marquesas.” There is no indication that even Longfellow found it
discreet to omit any passages as he read _Typee_ to his family before
the fire. It is to be remembered, however, that in 1851 the _Scarlet
Letter_ was attacked as being nothing but a deliberate attempt to
attract readers by pandering to the basest taste: “Is the French era
actually begun in our literature?” a shocked reviewer asked.
The appearance of _Omoo_ on January 30, 1847, augmented Melville’s
notoriety, and contributed to his fame. Both _Typee_ and _Omoo_
stirred up a whole regiment of critics, at home, in England and
in France. France was patronising, of course, after the manner of
the period; but France flattered Melville by the prolixity of her
patronage. The interest of France in Melville was not a merely literary
absorption, however. Melville had arrived at the Marquesas in the wake
of Admiral Du Petit-Thouars; and at Tahiti Melville had been a prisoner
on board the _Reine Blanche_. In England, Melville was flattered not
only by vitriolic evangelistical damnation, and the uncritical flatter
of Gansevoort’s friends, but even _Blackwood’s_, the most anti-American
of British journals, said of _Omoo_: “Musing the other day over our
matutinal hyson, the volume itself was laid before us, and we found
ourselves in the society of Marquesan Melville, the Phœnix of modern
voyages--springing, it would seem, from the mingled ashes of Captain
Cook and Robinson Crusoe.” Writing of _Typee_, the insular _John Bull_
said: “Since the joyous moment when we first read _Robinson Crusoe_ and
believed it, we have not met so bewitching a book as this narrative
of Herman Melville’s.” The _London Times_ descended to amiability and
said: “That Mr. Melville will favour us with his further adventures in
the South Seas, we have no doubt whatever. We shall expect them with
impatience, and receive them with pleasure. He is a companion after our
own hearts. His voice is pleasant, and we are sure that if we could
see his face it would be a pleasant one.” While such pronouncements
were no earnest of fame, they may have contributed somewhat to augment
Melville’s royalties. And in _Mardi_--written before Melville’s secular
critics began to assail him--Melville took a violent fling at his
reviewers. “True critics,” he said, “are more rare than true poets. A
great critic is a sultan among satraps; but pretenders are thick as
ants striving to scale a palm after its aerial sweetness. Oh! that an
eagle should be stabbed by a goose-quill!” Withal, when Melville wrote
_Mardi_ he had spent some reflection on the nature of Fame, and mocked
at those who console themselves for the neglect of their contemporaries
by bethinking themselves of the glorious harvest of bravos their ghosts
will reap. And time, he saw, was an undertaker, not a resurrectionist:
“He who on all hands passes for a cipher to-day, if at all remembered,
will be sure to pass to-morrow for the same. For there is more
likelihood of being overrated while living than of being underrated
when dead.”
Noticed by reviewers, and encouraged by payments from his publishers,
Melville began to look more hopefully at the world. In _Clarel_ he
later wrote: “The dagger-icicle draws blood; but give it sun.” He
seemed at last to have stepped decoratively and profitably into his
assigned niche in the cosmic order. It was delightful to rehearse
outlived pleasures and hardships; and it was a lucrative delight:
by writing, too, some men had achieved fame. And so, undeterred
by the wail of the Preacher of Jerusalem, Melville settled to the
multiplication of books. He would perpetuate his reveries--and he
doubted not that sparkling wines would crown his cup. Then it was that
the beckoning image of an ultimate earthly felicity swam over the
beaded brim.
Melville had dedicated _Typee_ to Chief Justice Lemuel Shaw of
Massachusetts. The Shaws and the Melvilles were friends of years’
standing. When a student at Amherst, Lemuel Shaw had been engaged to
Melville’s aunt, Nancy. “To his death,” says Frederic Hathway Chase in
his _Lemuel Shaw_, “Shaw carefully preserved two tender notes written
in the delicate hand of his first betrothed, timidly referring to
their immature plans for the future and her admiration and love for
him. The untimely death of the young lady, unhappily cut short their
youthful dreams, and not until he was thirty-seven years of age were
Shaw’s affections again engaged. The intimacy between Shaw and the
Melville family, however, continued after the young lady’s death.” Yet
were the demands of Shaw’s affections not satisfied by his intimacy
with the Melvilles or by the two love-letters among his precious
belongings. He married twice; the first time in 1818 to Elizabeth
Knapp; the second time in 1827 to Hope Savage. By each wife he had two
children. By Elizabeth, John Oakes, who died in 1902; and Elizabeth,
who married Melville. By Hope, was born to him Lemuel, who lived till
1884, and Samuel Savage, born in 1833 in the Shaw home at 49 Mount
Vernon Street, Boston, where he lived till his death in 1915. Melville
heartily detested his brothers-in-law.
On March 19, 1846, Melville wrote from Lansingburg to Chief Justice
Shaw:
“MY DEAR SIR:
“Herewith you have one of the first bound copies of _Typee_ I have
been able to procure--the dedication is very simple, for the world
would hardly have sympathised to the full extent of those feelings
with which I regard my father’s friend and the constant friend of all
his family.
“I hope that the perusal of this little narrative of mine will afford
you some entertainment, even if it should not possess much other
merit. Your knowing the author so well, will impart some interest
to it.--I intended to have sent at the same time with this copies
of _Typee_ for each of my aunts, but have been disappointed in
not receiving as many as I expected.--I mention, however, in the
accompanying letter to my Aunt Priscilla that they shall soon be
forthcoming.
“Remember me most warmly to Mrs. Shaw & Miss Elizabeth, and to all
your family, & tell them I shall not soon forget that agreeable visit
to Boston.
“With sincere respect, Judge Shaw, I remain gratefully & truly yours,
“HERMAN MELVILLE.
“CHIEF JUSTICE SHAW,
”Boston.”
The Aunt Priscilla mentioned in this letter was a sister of Melville’s
father--fifth child of Major Thomas Melville. She was born in 1784, and
upon her death in 1862, she showed that her appreciation of Melville’s
earlier solicitude had been substantial, by bequeathing him nine
hundred dollars. The Miss Elizabeth of the letter, the only daughter of
Chief Justice Shaw, and Melville were married on August 4, 1847.
On the evidence of surviving records, Melville’s father had resigned
himself to the institution of marriage as to one of the established
conveniences of Christendom. Allan was a practical man, and he soberly
saw that he gained more than he lost by generously sharing his bed
and the fireside zone with a competent accessory to his domestic
comforts. If he was ever a romantic lover, it was in the folly of his
youth. Though romantic love be a tingling holiday extravagance, he
mistrusted--and Allan never doubted his wisdom--its everyday useability
for a cautious and peace-loving man. And since Dante had married Gemma
Donati, since Petrarch had had children by an unknown concubine, Maria
had reason to congratulate herself that Allan evinced for her no
adoration of the kind lavished upon the sainted Beatrice or upon the
unattainable Laura.
In his approach to marriage, Melville showed none of the prosaic
circumspection of his father. From his idealisation of the proud
cold purity of Maria, Melville built up a haloed image of the wonder
and mystery of sanctified womanhood: without blemish, unclouded,
snow-white, terrible, yet serene. And before this image Melville
poured out the fulness of his most reverential thoughts and beliefs.
The very profundity of his frustrated love for Maria, and the accusing
incompatibility between the image and the fact, made his early life a
futile and desperate attempt to escape from himself. The peace, and at
the same time the stupendous discovery that he craved: that he found
neither at home nor over the rim of the world. When with Maria, he had
craved to put oceans between them; when so estranged, he was parched to
return.
In his wanderings, he had seen sights, and lived through experiences to
disabuse him of his fantastic idealisation of woman. In fact, however,
such experiences may but tend to heighten idealisation. In the Middle
Age, the Blessed Mother was celebrated in a duality of perplexing
incompatibility: she was at once the Virgin Mother of the Son of God,
and the patron of thieves, harlots and cutthroats. She was at once an
object of worship and a subject of farce. She was woman. Protestantism,
restoring woman to her original Hebraic dignity of a discarded rib,
evinced in marriage an essentially biological interest, and regulated
romantic love into uxoriousness. Allan was a good Protestant. But
neither Mrs. Chapone nor Fayaway were able to precipitate Melville
into that form of heresy. Fayaway was Fayaway: and her father was a
cannibal. Civilisation had given her no veils; Christianity had given
her no compunctons. She was neither a mystery nor a sin. Untouched did
she leave the sacred image in his heart.
To Elizabeth Shaw, Melville transferred his idealisation of his
mother. In _Pierre_ he says: “this softened spell which wheeled the
mother and son in one orbit of joy seemed a glimpse of the glorious
possibility, of the divinest of those emotions which are incident to
the sweetest season of love.” In _Pierre_, Melville declared that the
ideal possibilities of the love between mother and son, seemed “almost
to realise here below the sweet dreams of those religious enthusiasts,
who paint to us a Paradise to come, when etherealised from all dross
and stains, the holiest passion of man shall unite all kindreds and
climes in one circle of pure and unimpaired delight.” And in this
“courteous lover-like adoration” of son for mother, Melville saw the
“highest and airiest thing in the whole compass of the experience of
our mortal life.” And “this heavenly evanescence,” Melville declares,
“this nameless and infinitely delicate aroma of inexpressible
tenderness and attentiveness,” is, “in every refined and honourable
attachment, contemporary with courtship.” In _Pierre_, Melville
spends a chapter of dithyramb in celebration of this sentiment which,
inspired by one’s mother, one transfers to all other women honourably
loved. “Love may end in age, and pain and need, and all other modes
of human mournfulness; but love begins in joy. Love’s first sigh is
never breathed, till after love hath laughed. Love has not hands, but
cymbals; Love’s mouth is chambered like a bugle, and the instinctive
breathings of his life breathe jubilee notes of joy.” And during his
courtship of Elizabeth Shaw, it seems that in Melville were “the
audacious immortalities of divinest love.”
None of Melville’s letters of courtship survive. There are more direct
evidences of the fruits of his love, than of its early bloom. There
are, however, two letters of his wife’s, written during the month of
the marriage. The first was written during the wedding trip.
“CENTER HARBOR, Aug. 6th, 1847.
“MY DEAR MOTHER:
“You know I promised to write you whenever we came to a stopping
place, and remained long enough. We are now at Center Harbor, a most
lonely and romantic spot at the extremity of Winnipiscogee Lake,
having arrived last evening from Concord--and we intend to remain
until to-morrow. One object in stopping so long and indeed principal
one was to visit ‘Red Hill’--a mountain (commanding a most beautiful
view of the lake) about four miles distant. But to-day it is so
cloudy and dull, I am afraid we shall not be able to accomplish
it--so you see I have a little spare time, and improve it by writing
to relieve any anxiety you may feel. Though this is but the third day
since our departure, it seems as if a long time had passed, we have
seen so many places of novelty and interest. The stage ride yesterday
from Franklin here, though rather fatiguing, was one of great
attraction from the beautiful scenery. To-morrow we again intend to
take the stage to Conway, and from there to the White Mountains. I
will write again from there, and tell you more of what I have seen,
but now I send this missive more to let you know of our safety and
well-being than anything else.
“I hope by this time you have quite recovered from your
indisposition, and that I shall soon hear from you to be assured
of it--I hardly dare to trust myself to speak of what I felt in
leaving home, but under the influence of such commingling thoughts,
it entirely escaped me to tell you of any place to which you might
address a letter to me so that I should be sure to get it. Now I
am _very_ anxious and impatient to hear from you, and I hope you
will lose no time in writing if it be only a very few lines. Herman
desires to add a postscript to my letter, and he will tell you when
and where to write so that I may get it.
“Remember me with affection to father and ask him to let me have
a letter from him soon, to all members of the family and to Mrs.
Melville and the girls--my mother and sisters--how strangely it
sounds. Accept a great deal of love for yourself, my dear mother,
and believe me as ever, your affectionate daughter, Elizabeth--even
though I add to it--Melville--for the first time.
“Friday morning.
“MY DEAR SIR:
“At my desire Lizzie has left a small space for a word or two.--We
arrived here last evening after a pleasant ride from Franklin, the
present terminus of the Northern Rail Road. The scenery was in many
places very fine, & we caught some glimpses of the mountain region
to which we are going. Center Harbor where we now are is a very
attractive place for a tourist, having the lake for boating and
trouting, and plenty of rides in the vicinity, besides Red-Hill, the
view from which is said to be equal to anything of the kind in New
England. A rainy day, however, has thus far prevented us from taking
our excursion, to enjoy the country.--To-morrow, I think we shall
leave for Conway and thence to Mt. Washington & so to Canada. I trust
in the course of some two weeks to bring Lizzie to Lansingburgh,
quite refreshed and invigourated from her rambles.--Remember me to
Mrs. Shaw & the family, and tell my mother that I will write to her
in a day or two.
“Sincerely yours,
“HERMAN MELVILLE.
“Letters directed within four or five days from now, will probably
reach us at Montreal.”
The second letter explains itself:
“LANSINGBURGH, Aug. 28th, 1847.
“MY DEAR MOTHER:
“We arrived here safe and well yesterday morning, and I intended to
have written a few lines to you then, but I was so tired, and had
so much to do to unpack and put away my things, I deferred it until
to-day.
“We left Montreal on Tuesday evening and the next day in the
afternoon hailed Whitehall, at the foot of Lake Champlain, after
a very pleasant sail on that beautiful piece of water. The next
question was whether we should proceed to Lansingburgh by stage or
take the canal boat. We thought stage riding would be rather tame
after the beautiful scenery of Vermont, and as I had never been in
a canal boat in my life, Herman thought we had better try it for
the novelty. This would expedite our journeying, too, and having
once set our faces homeward, we were not disposed to delay. Being
fully forewarned of the inconvenience we might expect in passing a
night on board a canal boat--a crowded canal boat, too, and fully
determined to meet them bravely, we stepped on board--not without
some misgivings, however, as we saw the crowds of men, women and
children come pouring in, with trunks and handbags to match. Where so
many people were to store themselves at night was a mystery to be yet
unravelled, and what they all _did_ do with themselves is something
I have not yet found out. Well, night drew on--and after sitting on
deck on trunks or anything we could find (and having to bob our heads
down every few minutes when the helmsman sang out ‘Bridge!’ or ‘Low
Bridge!’) it became so damp and chilly that I was finally driven
below.
“Here was a scene entirely passing description. The Ladies’ ‘Saloon!’
they politely termed it so, so we were informed by a red and gilt
sign over it. A space about as large as my room at home, was
separated from the gentlemen’s ‘Saloon’ by a curtain only. About 20
or 25 women were huddled into this. Each one having two children
apiece of all ages, sexes, and sizes, said children, as is usual on
such occasions, lifting up their respective voices, very loud indeed,
in one united chorus of lamentations.
“A narrow row of shelves was hooked up high on each side and on
these some & more fortunate mothers had closely packed their
sleeping babies while they sat by to prevent their rolling out. I
looked round in vain for a place to stretch my limbs, but it was
not to be thought of--but after a while by a fortunate chance I
got a _leaning_ privilege, and fixing my carpet-bag for a pillow,
I made up my mind to pass the night in this manner. One by one the
wailing children dropped off to sleep and I had actually lost myself
in a sort of doze, when a new feature in the case became apparent.
Stepping carefully over the outstretched forms on the floor came
two men, each bearing a pile of boards or little shelves like those
already suspended. These they hooked up against the sides in the
smallest conceivable spaces, using every available inch of room--and
were intended to sleep (!) upon. I immediately pounced upon one of
them which I thought might be accessible, and was just consulting
with myself as to the best means of getting onto it, when I was
politely requested by one of the sufferers to take the shelf above
from which she wished to remove her children to the one I thought to
occupy--of course I complied, and after failing in several awkward
attempts, I managed to climb and crawl into this narrow aperture like
a bug forcing its way through the boards of a fence. Sweltering and
smothering I watched the weary night hours pass away, for to sleep
in such an atmosphere was impossible. I rose at 3 o’clock, thinking
it was five, spent a couple of hours curled up on the floor, and was
right glad when Herman came for me, with the joyful intelligence that
we were actually approaching Whitehall--the place of our destination.
He also passed a weary night, though his sufferings were of the
opposite order--for while I was suffocating with the heat and bad
atmosphere, he was on deck, chilled and half-frozen with the fog and
penetrating dampness, for the gentlemen’s apartment was even more
crowded than the ladies’--so much so that they did not attempt to
hang any shelves for them to lie upon. All they could do was to sit
bolt upright firmly wedged in and if one of them presumed to _lean_
at all or even to _nod_ out of the perpendicular it was thought
a great infringement of rights, and he was immediately called to
order. So Herman preferred to remain on deck all night to being in
this crowd. We left the boat and took the cars about an hour’s ride
from Lansingburgh, and surprised the family at 6 o’clock in the
morning before they were up. We were very warmly welcomed and cared
for and soon forgot our tribulations of the canal boat. I was much
disappointed to miss the boys--they had only left the day before--it
was too bad--I am looking forward with such impatience to see you
and father, and sincerely hope nothing will happen to prevent your
coming.
“I suppose we shall not be long here. Allan is looking out for a
house in N. Y. and will be married next month.
“You know a proposition was made before I came here that I should
furnish my own room, which for good reasons were then set aside--but
if it is not too late now, I should like very much to do it if we go
to N. Y.--but we can talk about that when I see you. I must bring my
scribbling to a close, after I have begged you or somebody to write
me. I have not received a single line since I left home. How did the
dinner party go off? I want to hear about everything and everybody
at home. Please give my warmest love to all and believe me your
affectionate daughter,
“ELIZABETH S. M.
“Herman desires his kindest remembrances to all.”
Soon after the marriage, Melville and his wife moved from Lansingburg
to New York, where they lived with Melville’s brother, Allan, and his
household of sisters. The letters of Mrs. Melville’s are the only
surviving records of the intimate details of this domestic arrangement.
They are interesting, too, as revelation of the character of Mrs.
Melville. The three following are typical:
“NEW YORK, Dec. 23rd, 1847.
“Thank you, dear Mother, for your nice long letter. I was beginning
to be afraid you had forgotten your part of the contract for that
week, but Saturday brought me evidence to the contrary and made us
even. And I should have written you earlier, but the days are so
short, and I have so much to do, that they fly by without giving me
half the time I want. Perhaps you will wonder what on earth I have
to occupy me. Well in fact I hardly know exactly myself, but true
it is little things constantly present themselves and dinner time
comes before I am aware. We breakfast at 8 o’clock, then Herman goes
to walk and I fly up to put his room to rights, so that he can sit
down to his desk immediately on his return. Then I bid him good-bye,
with many charges to be an industrious boy and not upset the inkstand
and then flourish the duster, make the bed, etc., in my own room.
Then I go downstairs and read the papers a little while, and after
that I am ready to sit down to my work whatever it may be--darning
stockings--making or mending for myself or Herman--at all events,
I haven’t seen a day yet, without _some_ sewing or other to do. If
I have letters to write, as is the case to-day, I usually do that
first--but whatever I am about I do not much more than get thoroughly
engaged in it, than ding-dong goes the bell for luncheon. This is
half-past 12 o’clock--by this time we must expect callers, and so
must be dressed immediately after lunch. Then Herman insists upon
taking a walk of an hour’s length at least. So unless I can have rain
or snow for an excuse, I usually sally out and make a pedestrian
tour a mile or two down Broadway. By the time I come home it is two
o’clock and after, and then I must make myself look as bewitchingly
as possible to meet Herman at dinner. This being accomplished, I
have only about an hour of available time left. At four we dine, and
after dinner is over, Herman and I come up to our room and enjoy a
cosy chat for an hour or so--or he reads me some of the chapters he
has been writing in the day. Then he goes down town for a walk, looks
at the papers in the reading room, etc., and returns about half-past
seven or eight. Then my work or my book is laid aside, and as he does
not use his eyes but very little by candle light, I either read to
him, or take a hand at whist for his amusement, or he listens to our
reading or conversation, as best pleases him. For we all collect in
the parlour in the evening, and generally one of us reads aloud for
the benefit of the whole. Then we retire very early--at 10 o’clock
we all disperse. Indeed we think that quite a late hour to be up.
This is the general course of daily events so you see how my time is
occupied; but sometime--dear me! we have to go and make calls! and
then good-bye to everything else for _that_ day! for upon my word,
it takes the whole day, from 1 o’clock till four! and then perhaps
we don’t accomplish more than two or three, if unluckily they chance
to be in--for everybody lives so far from everybody else, and all
Herman’s and Allan’s friends are _so_ polite, to say nothing of Mrs.
M.’s old acquaintances, that I am fairly sick and tired of returning
calls. And no sooner do we do up a few, than they all come again, and
so it has to be gone over again.
“You know ceremonious calls were always my abomination, and where
they are all utter strangers and we have to send in our cards to
show who we are, it is so much the worse. Excepting calls, I have
scarcely visited at all. Herman is not fond of parties, and I don’t
care anything about them here. To-morrow night, for a great treat, we
are going to the opera--Herman & Fanny and I--and this is the first
place of public amusement I have attended since I have been here but
somehow or other I don’t care much about them now.
“I am glad to hear that father and all are so well--except Sam--how
is his cough now? don’t forget to tell us when you write.
“If Susan Haywood and Fanny Clarke are at our house please give my
love to them and ask Susan to answer my letter. How is Mrs. Marcus
Morton and Mrs. Hawes? I hope you will be able to write me this week
though I know _your_ time is very much occupied--but then you know
any letter--even the shortest and most hurried is acceptable and
better than none--though I must confess my prejudice sins in favour
of _long_ ones--but I am glad to hear _anything_ from home. You
addressed my last letter just right and it came very straight--but
Allan’s name is spelt with an ‘a’ instead of an ‘e’--as Allan--not
Allen--different names, you see--I am hoping that sometime or other
father will find time to write to me--though I know he is so much
occupied with other matters.
“Thank you for your kindness about the picture box--as I do not need
any article at present, I will keep the dollar till I do--it will be
the same thing, you know, and I have already got such a New Year’s
present in the big box upstairs--by the way, in about a week more, it
will be time to open it. Oh, what do you think about my calling on
Mrs. Joe Henshaw and Josephine--they are living here and came here
after I did, so perhaps I ought to call first if it is best for me
to visit them--being connected with the Haywoods perhaps it would be
better to renew the acquaintance. What do you think about it? Please
tell me when you write, and get their address from Aunt Haywood, if
you think I had better call. I am afraid you are tired of this long
letter; but I have done now. Good-bye, and love to all.
“Affectionately yours,
“ELIZABETH S. MELVILLE.
“P. S. I have a letter from Mrs. Warpwell a few days since--I didn’t
know she had lost one of her twins before. Why didn’t you tell me? My
love to Mrs. Sullivan. I hope she is quite well again. Tell Lem we
expect him next month in his mention to make us a visit.”
“NEW YORK, Feb. 4th, 1848.
“103 Fourth Avenue.
“MY DEAR MOTHER:
“Every day for the last week I have been trying to write to you,
but have been prevented. I received your letter by Lemuel with much
pleasure and the next time you write I want you to tell me more about
Carrie--how she and the small baby are getting along--and whether she
took ether when she was sick and if so, with what effect. What they
have decided to name the baby and all about it. Your presents were
very acceptable--Herman was much gratified with your remembrance to
him--and intends to make his acknowledgment for himself. You forgot
Kate in the multitude of Melvilles--so I just gave her my share of
the bill you enclosed without saying anything about it--knowing you
would not intentionally leave her out--or rather I gave the bill to
Helen for herself, Fanny and Kate, as she could get what they most
wanted better than I--so it’s all right now, and I will take the will
for the deed and thank you all the same.
“The key of the basket that you wanted me to send--you know--I have
_no bills_ there whatever--you have them all. I only have an account
of the expenditure and a memorandum of the bills that were paid--not
the item of the bills. If you have an opportunity where it will come
safe I should like to have you send me that basket very much.
“You speak of a Mr. Crocker whom you wish me to receive. If he will
call I shall be very happy to see him. You know we are recently
renumbered and our address now is ‘No. 103 Fourth Avenue’, ‘between
11th & 12th Streets’--it is safer to add for a time.
“Lem seems to be enjoying himself highly with the amusements out of
doors, and the society within. Last night he went to a masked ball,
under the auspices of Mrs. Elwell, through Aunt Marat’s kindness,
and a very fine appearance he presented, I can assure you, in an
old French court dress--with a long curled horse-hair wig, chapeau
bras--knee breeches, long stockings, buckles, snuff box and all--it
was a very becoming dress to him, and exactly suited to his carriage
and manners--I wish you could have seen him. We went to a party
ourselves last evening, but we had a deal of fun helping him to
dress--he went masked of course, but being introduced by Mrs. Elwell
was very kindly received--taking Mrs. Dickinson (the hostess) down
to supper, and doing the polite thing to the nine Misses Dickinson.
He enjoyed it much, as you may suppose, and did not get home till
four o’clock in the morning, and even then the ball had not broken
up. At this present moment--11 o’clock--I believe he is dozing on the
parlour sofa--to gain strength to go to the opera this evening.
“We have been very dissipated this week for us, for usually we are
very quiet. Wednesday evening we passed at Mrs. Thurston’s and were
out quite late--last night at a party--a very pleasant one too, where
by the way--I passed off for Miss Melville and as such was quite a
belle!! And to-night in honour of our guest, we go to the Opera. We
have resolved to stop after this though and not go out at all for
while Herman is writing the effect of keeping late hours is very
injurious to him--if he does not get a full night’s rest or indulges
in a late supper, he does not feel right for writing the next day.
And the days are too precious to be thrown away. And to tell the
truth I don’t think he cares _very_ much about parties either, and
when he goes it is more on my account than his own. And it’s no
sacrifice to me, for I am quite as contented, and more--to stay at
home so long as he will stay with me. He has had communications from
London publishers with very liberal offers for the book in hand--and
one from Berlin to translate from the first sheets into German--but
as yet he has closed with none of them, and will not in a hurry.
“I believe I forgot in my last to acknowledge the receipt of a paper
from father--I was very glad of it--please present my thanks--I
have intended to write to father for a good while--but I like to
have answers to my letters--so if father has not time to write in
reply, you must write for him. Give my love to him and to all the
family--and when you see Susan Morton ask her to write to me.
“Tell Aunt Lucretia I was delighted to get her note, and I will write
to her.
“Now I have written you a famous long letter and I hope you will
write me as long a one very soon, for I have not heard from home for
more than a week now--not since Lem came.
“Give my love to Mrs. Sullivan, and believe me as ever truly yours,
“E. S. MELVILLE.”
“NEW YORK, May 5th, 1848.
“MY DEAR MOTHER:
“I am very much occupied to-day but I snatch a few moments to reply
to your letter which though rather tardy in forthcoming was very
acceptable. But you did not tell me what I most wanted to know--about
Sam. And your indefinite allusion to it, when we were all waiting to
hear, was rather tantalising. Does ‘this season’ means _now_ in his
present vacation, or sometime in the course of the year? I suppose
his vacation has already commenced if he is out at Milton, then why
not let him come immediately and make his visit, because if he waits
till warm weather it will not be nearly so pleasant or so beneficial
for him. Maria Percival writes me that she is coming on soon and he
might come with her. Please write me something _definite_ about it,
as soon as you can, and do let him come. We want him to very much,
and the sooner the better.
“You ask about our coming to Boston but I guess the house will be
ready to _clean again_ by that time--for it will not be before
July, perhaps August. Herman of course will stick to his work till
‘the book’ is published and his services are required till the last
moment--correcting proof, etc. The book is done now, in fact (you
need not mention it) and the copy for the press is in progress, but
when it is published on both sides of the water a great deal of delay
is unavoidable and though Herman will have some spare time after
sending the proof sheets to London which will be next month sometime
probably he will not want to leave New York till the book is actually
on the book-sellers’ shelves. And then I don’t care about leaving
home till my cold is over because I could not enjoy my visit so much.
So though I am very impatient for the time to come I must e’en wait
as best I may and enjoy the anticipation.
“We are looking out for Tom to return every day, his ship has been
reported in the papers several times lately as homeward bound and
Herman wrote to the owner at Westport and received answer that he
looked for the ship the first of May. That has already past and we
are daily expecting a letter to announce her actual arrival. Then
Herman will have to go over to Westport for Tom and see that he is
regularly discharged and paid, and bring him home. As yet he, Tom,
is in entire ignorance of the changes that have taken place in his
family and of their removal to New York. So he will be much surprised
I think. As you may suppose, Mother is watching and counting the days
with great anxiety for he is the baby of the family and his mother’s
pet.
“Augusta is going to Albany in a few days to visit the Van
Renssalaers. They have been at her all winter to go up the river but
she would not, and now Mr. Van Renssalaer is in town and will not go
back without her. And in a few weeks Helen is going to Lansingburgh
to visit Mrs. Jones.
“I should write you a longer letter but I am very busy to-day copying
and cannot spare the time so you must excuse it and all mistakes. I
tore my sheet in two by mistake thinking it was my copying (for we
only write on one side of the page) and if there is no punctuation
marks you must make them yourself for when I copy I do not punctuate
at all but leave it for a final revision for Herman. I have got so
used to write without (.) I cannot always think of it.
“Please write me _very soon_ this week--if only a few lines and tell
me about Sam’s coming.
“My love to all, to father when you write and to Sue Morton if she is
at our house, Mrs. Hawes etc. and believe me as ever your affectionate
“E. S. MELVILLE.
“Miss Savage & Miss Lincoln called to see me a day or two ago.
“Please spell Allan’s name with an A, not E. _Allan_, not _Allen_.”
During this period, the household at 103 Fourth Avenue was busy getting
_Redburn_ and _Mardi_ ready for the press. Melville’s sister Augusta
seems to have been exhaustless in copying manuscript. Melville’s
mother-in-law reports “Miss Augusta is all energy, united with much
kindness.” Augusta also evinced a strong religious bent, and during
song services--which she loved to attend--she used to grip her hymnal
athletically, and beat time with an aggressive rhythm. Her Hymn Book
survives, pasted up with dozens of clippings of hymns and prayers, a
“selection” entitled _The Sinner’s Friend_, and the vivacious couplet:
“Jesus, mine’s a pressing case.
Oh, more grace, _more grace, MORE GRACE_!”
[Illustration: ELIZABETH SHAW MELVILLE]
But song-services, and copying manuscript, were not enough to fill
Augusta’s busy days. In January, 1848, she was commissioned to find
a name satisfactory for Melville’s first child. Mrs. Herman Melville
was in Boston to be with her mother and family at the time of the
childbirth. On January 27, 1849, Augusta wrote from New York to “My
dear Lizzie, My sweet Sister,” reporting that she had been “searching
the Genealogical Tree” with designs upon an ancestor with a choice
name: and she spends two very diverting and animated pages recounting
her adventures among the branches. Her search was rewarded to her
satisfaction: “_Malcolm Melville!_ how easily it runs from my pen; how
sweetly it sounds to my ear; how musically it falls upon my heart.
Malcolm Melville! Methinks I see him in his plaided kilts, with his
soft blue eyes, & his long flaxen curls. How I long to press him to my
heart. There! I can write no more. The last proof sheets are through.
_Mardi’s_ a book.” Augusta concludes with a quotation from _Mardi_:
“‘Oh my own Kagtanza, child of my prayers. Oro’s blessing on thee!’”
In her search of the Genealogical Tree, Augusta had contemptuously
brushed by all female branches: she had determined that Melville’s
first child should be a son--and a son with blue eyes and blond
hair--and in her choice of a name for the unborn infant, she
contemptuously ignored the possibility of the child turning out to be
a girl. On February 16, 1849, was born in Boston, to Melville and his
wife, their first child. There was potency in Augusta’s prayers. It was
a boy.
On April 14, 1849, _Mardi_ appeared, published, as was _Omoo_, by
Harper and Brothers in America, by Richard Bentley in London. _Redburn_
appeared on August 18 of the same year. By February 22, 1850 (the date
of Melville’s fifth royalty account from Harper and Brothers), 2,154
copies of _Mardi_, and 4,011 copies of _Redburn_ had been sold. On
February 1, 1848, Melville had overdrawn his account with Harper’s to
the extent of $256.03. On December 5, 1848, Harper’s advanced Melville
$500; on April 28, 1848, $300; on July 2, 1849, $300; on September 14,
1849, $500. Though _Mardi_ and _Redburn_ had had a fairly generous
sale, the deduction of his royalties on February 22, 1850, left him
in debt to Harper’s $733.69. The outlook was not bright for the
responsibilities of fatherhood.
On April 23, Melville sent to his father-in-law a note “conveying
the intelligence of Lizzie’s improving strength, and Malcolm’s
precocious growth. Both are well.” Melville went on to say that
Samuel, the brother-in-law for whom he felt not the most enthusiastic
affection, was expected by all “to honour us with his presence during
the approaching vacation: and I have no doubt he will not find it
difficult to spend his time pleasantly with so many companions.” Does
Melville here imply that for himself, as a sensible man, he would
prefer more solitude? In conclusion, Melville says: “I see that _Mardi_
has been cut into by the _London Atheneum_, and also burnt by the
common hangman by the _Boston Post_. However, the _London Examiner_
& _Literary Gazette_ & other papers this side of the water have done
differently. These attacks are matters of course, and are essential to
the building up of any permanent reputation--if such should ever prove
to be mine--‘There’s nothing in it!’ cried the dunce when he threw
down the 47th problem of the 1st Book of Euclid--‘There’s nothing in
it!’--Thus with the posed critic. But Time, which is the solver of all
riddles, will solve _Mardi_.”
The riddle of _Mardi_ goes near to the heart of the riddle of
Melville’s life. “Not long ago,” Melville says in the preface to
_Mardi_, “having published two narratives of voyages in the Pacific,
which, in many quarters, were received with incredulity, the thought
occurred to me, of indeed writing a romance of Polynesian adventure,
and publishing it as such; to see whether the fiction might not,
possibly, be received for a verity: in some degree the reverse of my
previous experience. This thought was the germ of others, which have
resulted in _Mardi_.”
_Mardi_, as _Moby-Dick_, starts off firmly footed in reality. The
hero, discontented on board a whaler, hits upon the wild scheme of
surreptitiously cutting loose one of the whale boats, and trusting to
the chances of the open Pacific. It is sometimes the case that an old
mariner will conceive a very strong attachment for some young sailor,
his shipmate--a Fidus-Achates-ship, a league of offence and defence, a
copartnership of chests and toilets, a bond of love and good-feeling.
Such a relationship existed between the hero of _Mardi_ and his Viking
shipmate Jarl. Jarl was an old Norseman to behold: his hands as brawny
as the paws of a bear; his voice as hoarse as a storm roaring round the
peak of Mull; his long yellow hair waving about his head like a sunset.
In the crow’s-nest of the ship the project of escape was confided to
Jarl. Jarl advised with elderly prudence, but seeing his chummy’s
resolution immovable, he changed his wrestling to a sympathetic hug,
and bluntly swore he would follow through thick and thin. The escape
was successfully made, and for days the two men drifted at sea: and
it was an eventful if solitary drifting. After sixteen days in their
open boat, “as the expanded sun touched the horizon’s rim, a ship’s
uppermost spars were observed, traced like a spider’s web against
its crimson disk. It looked like a far-off craft on fire.” Bent upon
shunning a meeting--though Jarl “kept looking wistfully over his
shoulder; doubtlessly praying Heaven that we might not escape”--they
lowered sail. As the ship bore down towards them, they saw her to
be no whaler--as they had feared--but a small, two-masted craft in
unaccountable disarray. They lay on their oars, and watched her in
the starlight. They hailed her loudly. No return. Again. But all was
silent. So, armed with a harpoon, they eventually boarded the strange
craft. The ship was in a complete litter; the deserted tiller they
found lashed. Though it was a nervous sort of business, they explored
her interior. Many were the puzzling sights they saw; but except for a
supernatural sneeze from the riggings, there was no evidence of life
aboard. At dawn, however, they discovered, in the maintop, a pair of
South Sea Islanders: Samoa, and Annatoo. “To be short, Annatoo was a
Tartar, a regular Calmuc; and Samoa--Heaven help him--her husband.”
Upon this pair, Melville has lavished chapter after chapter of the most
finished and competent comedy. Annatoo is as perfect, in her way, as is
Zuleika Dobson. And Samoa--well, Samoa, on occasion, thinks it discreet
to amputate his wounded arm.
“Among savages, severe personal injuries are, for the most part,
accounted but trifles. When a European would be taking to his couch in
despair, the savage would disdain to recline.
“More yet. In Polynesia, every man is his own barber and surgeon,
cutting off his beard or arm, as occasion demands. No unusual thing,
for the warriors of Varvoo to saw off their own limbs, desperately
wounded in battle. But owing to the clumsiness of the instrument
employed--a flinty, serrated shell--the operation has been known to
last several days. Nor will they suffer any friend to help them;
maintaining, that a matter so nearly concerning a warrior is far better
attended to by himself. Hence it may be said, that they amputate
themselves at their leisure, and hang up their tools when tired. But,
though thus beholden to no one for aught connected with the practice
of surgery, they never cut off their own heads, that ever I heard; a
species of amputation to which, metaphorically speaking, many would-be
independent sort of people in civilised lands are addicted.
“Samoa’s operation was very summary. A fire was kindled in the little
caboose, or cook-house, and so made as to produce much smoke. He then
placed his arm upon one of the windlass bitts (a short upright timber,
breast-high), and seizing the blunt cook’s axe would have struck the
blow; but for some reason distrusting the precision of his aim, Annatoo
was assigned to the task. Three strokes, and the limb, from just above
the elbow, was no longer Samoa’s; and he saw his own bones; which
many a centenarian can not say. The very clumsiness of the operation
was safety to the subject. The weight and bluntness of the instrument
both deadened the pain and lessened the hemorrhage. The wound was then
scorched, and held over the smoke of the fire, till all signs of blood
vanished. From that day forward it healed, and troubled Samoa but
little.
“But shall the sequel be told? How that, superstitiously averse to
burying in the sea the dead limb of a body yet living; since in that
case Samoa held, that he must very soon drown and follow it; and how,
that equally dreading to keep the thing near him, he at last hung it
aloft from the topmast-stay; where yet it was suspended, bandaged over
and over in cerements. The hand that must have locked many others in
friendly clasp, or smote a foe, was no food, thought Samoa, for fowls
of the air nor fishes of the sea.
“Now, which was Samoa? The dead arm swinging high as Haman? Or the
living trunk below? Was the arm severed from the body, or the body from
the arm? The residual part of Samoa was alive, and therefore we say it
was he. But which of the writhing sections of a ten times severed worm,
is the worm proper?”
There are more cosy pleasures aboard the old ship, however, than
amputation: “Every one knows what a fascination there is in wandering
up and down in a deserted old tenement in some warm, dreamy country;
where the vacant halls seem echoing of silence, and the doors creak
open like the footsteps of strangers; and into every window the old
garden trees thrust their dark boughs, like the arms of night-burglars;
and ever and anon the nails start from the wainscot; while behind it
the mice rattle like dice. Up and down in such old spectre houses one
loves to wander; and so much the more, if the place be haunted by some
marvellous story.
“And during the drowsy stillness of the tropical sea-day, very much
such a fancy had I, for prying about our little brigantine, whose
tragic hull was haunted by the memory of the massacre, of which it
still bore innumerable traces.”
After delightful and exciting, and irresponsible days spent sailing
without chart, they find the vessel unseaworthy, leaking in every pore;
so again they take to their whale boat soon to fall in with strangers.
With this meeting, _Mardi_ swings into allegory,--and then it is that
Melville first tries his hand at the orphic style.
This second part of _Mardi_ in its manner defies simple
characterisation, though its purpose is simple enough. It is a quest
after Yillah, a maiden from Oroolia, the Island of Delight. A voyage is
made through the civilised world for her: and though they find occasion
for much discourse on international politics, and an array of other
topics, Yillah is not found. And in an astonishing variety of fantastic
and symbolic scenes--many conceived in the manner of the last three
books of Rabelais--they go on in futile search for her. They search
among the Islands of “those Scamps the Plujii,” where all evil which
the inhabitants could impute neither to the gods nor to themselves were
blamed upon the Plujii. There they meet an “old woman almost doubled
together, both hands upon her abdomen; in that manner running about
distracted.” When asked of the occasion of her distraction she screamed
“The Plujii! The Plujii!” affectionately caressing the field of their
operations.
“And why do they torment you?” she was soothingly asked.
“How should I know? and what good would it do me if I did?”
And on she ran.
“Hearing that an hour or two previous she had been partaking of some
twenty unripe bananas, I rather fancied that that circumstance might
have had something to do with her suffering. But whatever it was, all
the herb-leeches on the island would not have been able to alter her
own opinions on the subject.”
They visit jolly old Borabolla, and discuss the hereafter of fish. “As
for the possible hereafter of the whale,” says Melville, “a creature
eighty feet long without stockings, and thirty feet round the waist
after dinner is not inconsiderably to be consigned to annihilation.”
They are entertained by the gentry of Pimminee, and their host, being
told they were strolling divinities, demigods from the sun “manifested
not the slightest surprise, observing incidentally, however, that the
eclipses there must be a sad bore to endure.” They are entertained
by the pallid and beautiful youth Donjalolo, with wives thirty in
number, corresponding in name to the nights of the moon: wives “blithe
as larks, more playful than kittens,” though “but supplied with
the thirtieth part of all that Aspasia could desire.” Over flowing
calabashes they discourse of super-men, and vitalism, and toad-stools,
and fame, and thieves, and teeth, and democracy, and an interminable
variety of other irrelevant and diverting matters. Incredible is the
rich variety of _Mardi_.
There is infinite laughter in the book--but the laughter is at bottom
the laughter of despair. “It is more pleasing to laugh, than to weep,”
Montaigne has said. But Montaigne preferred laughter not for that
reason, but because “it is more distainfull, and doth more condemne us
than the other. And me thinkes we can never bee sufficiently despised
according to our merit.” Melville’s laughter, however, grew out of a
desolation less emancipated than Montaigne’s. “Let us laugh: let us
roar: let us yell.” Melville makes the philosopher in _Mardi_ say:
“Weeds are torn off at a fair; no heart bursts but in secret; it is
good to laugh though the laugh be hollow. Women sob, and are rid of
their grief; men laugh and retain it. Ha! ha! how demoniacs shout; how
all skeletons grin; we all die with a rattle. Humour, thy laugh is
divine; hence mirth-making idiots have been revered; and so may I.”
And one of the ultimate discoveries of the book is: “Beatitude there
is none. And your only Mardian happiness is but exemption from great
woes--no more. Great Love is sad; and heaven is Love. Sadness makes
the silence throughout the realms of space; sadness is universal and
eternal.”
For _Mardi_, in its intention to show the vanity of human wishes, is
a kind of _Rasselas_; but because of its “dangerous predominance of
imagination,” it is a _Rasselas_ Dr. Johnson would have despised.
And the happiness sought in _Mardi_ is of a brand of felicity unlike
anything the Prince of Abyssinia ever had any itching to enjoy. _Mardi_
is a quest after some total and undivined possession of that holy
and mysterious joy that touched Melville during the period of his
courtship: a joy he had felt in the crucifixion of his love for his
mother; a joy that had dazzled him in his love for Elizabeth Shaw.
When he wrote _Mardi_ he was married, and his wife was with child. And
_Mardi_ is a pilgrimage for a lost glamour.
In these wanderings in search of Yillah, the symbol of this faded
ecstasy, the hero of _Mardi_ is pursued by three shadowy messengers
from the temptress Hautia; she who was descended from the queen who had
first incited Mardi to wage war against beings with wings. Despairing
of ever achieving Yillah, Melville in the end turned towards the island
of Hautia, called Flozella-a-Nina, or “The Last-Verse-of-the-Song.”
“Yillah was all beauty, and innocence; my crown of felicity; my heaven
below:--and Hautia, my whole heart abhorred. Yillah I sought; Hautia
sought me. Yet now I was wildly dreaming to find them together. In some
mysterious way seemed Hautia and Yillah connected.”
They land on the shore of Hautia’s bower of bliss, when “all the sea,
like a harvest plain, was stacked with glittering sheaves of spray. And
far down, fathoms on fathoms, flitted rainbow hues:--as seines-full of
mermaids; half-screening the bower of the drowned.” Hautia lavished
him with flowers, and with wine, that like a blood-freshet ran through
his veins, she the vortex that draws all in. “But as my hand touched
Hautia’s, down dropped a dead bird from the clouds.” And at the end
of the madness into which Hautia had betrayed him, he and she stood
together--“snake and victim: life ebbing from out me, to her.”
In _Pierre_, Melville sadly reflects upon “the inevitable evanescence
of all earthly loveliness: which makes the sweetest things of life only
food for ever-devouring and omnivorous melancholy.” And the nuptial
embrace, he says, breaks love’s airy zone. The etherealisations of the
filial breast, he wrote, while contemporary with courtship, _preceding_
the final banns and the rites, “like the bouquet of the costliest
German wines, too often evaporate upon pouring love out to drink in the
disenchanting glasses of the matrimonial days and nights.” “I am Pluto
stealing Proserpine,” says Pierre; “and every accepted lover is. I am
of heavy earth, and she of airy light. By heaven, but marriage is an
impious thing!”
Yillah was to Melville lost for ever; and in Hautia was a final
disillusionment. And on the shore, awaiting to destroy, “stood the
three pale sons of him I had slain to gain the lost maiden, sworn to
hunt me round eternity.”
“‘Hail! realm of shades!’”--so _Mardi_ concludes--“and turning my
prow into the racing tide, which seized me like a hand omnipotent, I
darted through. Churned in foam, that outer ocean lashed the clouds;
and straight in my white wake, headlong dashed a shallop, three fixed
spectres leaning o’er its prow: three arrows poising. And thus,
pursuers and pursued fled on, over an endless sea.”
Within a week of the completion of _Mardi_, Melville’s wife wrote to
her mother:
“I suppose by this time that you have received Sam’s letter and are
relieved of anxiety concerning his safe arrival. I was very glad to
see him at last & hope he will enjoy his vacation. You need not fear
his getting too much excited--he will not take too much exercise,
for he can always get in an omnibus when he feels tired of walking.
Yesterday he went down town with Tom--to the Battery--and to a gallery
of paintings--and in the afternoon took a short walk with the girls. We
should have gone to Brooklyn, but it was very cloudy and looked like
rain--but we are going to-day as soon as I get done my copying (by
the way we are nearly through--shall finish this week). Sam is very
well and finds much amusement, especially in the ‘ad-i-s-h-e-e-e-s!’
(radishes) screamed continually under our window in every variety of
cracked voices.
“I was very much pleased with my presents especially the ‘boots’ which
fit me admirably--but I meant that to be a business transaction--else
I should not have sent. ‘Tapes’ are _always_ useful, especially if one
has a husband who is continually breaking strings off of drawers as
mine is--the cuffs were very pretty also--Herman was very much pleased
with his pocket-book & says ‘he has long needed such an article, for
his bank bills accumulate to such an extent he can find no place to put
them.’
“Mother feels very uneasy because Tom wants to go to sea again--he has
been trying for a place in some store ever since he came home but not
succeeding, is discouraged and says he must go to sea immediately.
Herman has written Mr. Parker (Daniel P.) to see if he can send him out
in one of his ships. I hope he will, if Tom must go, for Mr. Parker
would be likely to take an interest in him and promote him.
“And now for something which I hardly know whether to write you or not
I feel so undecided about it. My cold is very bad indeed, perhaps worse
than it has ever been so early, and I attribute it entirely to the warm
dry atmosphere so different from the salt air I have been accustomed
to. And Herman thinks I had better go back to Boston with Sam to see
if the change of air will not benefit me. And he will come on for me
in two or three weeks, if he can--and then in August when he takes his
vacation he will take me there again. But I don’t know as I can make
up my mind to go and leave him here--and besides I’m afraid to trust
him to finish up the book without me! That is, taking all things into
consideration I’m afraid I should not feel at ease enough to enjoy my
visit without him with me. But there is time enough to consider about
it before Sam goes--and if my cold continues so bad I think I shall go.
But I must go to my writing else I shall not get done in time to go to
Brooklyn.”