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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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How much more important is the way in which we take events , Jhan the inherent effect of the events themselves ! Edwardes had rejoined Yseult , who kept her room that night ; and it was from Margaret that I learned what had passed . She was leaning against a tree in the park , wrapped up in a shawl , for it is stilj cold , hut with head uncovered ; and the wind dashed as wildly amid her black hair , as it did amid the black boughs above , or . the black specks of cloud that swept across the moon like the locks that beat against Margaret ' s pure forehead . Could I but paint that stedfast
countenance , as she pursued her story , I might tell you what she is ; for not the moon that shone steadily through the transparent storm , not the dark wood , not the heavy curve of the sea horizon , was more simply true to itself , to nature , and to life , than she whose voice sustained its strong low music against the jarring wind . I cannot tell you all I learned , nor need I ; for much you may know already ; much might be told in the reverent tones of a loving voice which cannot be trusted to cold wandering paper , which strays into strange hands ; and the rest was not said at all , by either of us .
I told you how Yseult , not for the first time , had given utterance to a doctrine which you , Elena bella , have sustained—and which you , Giorgio mio , would defend as you would Elena ' s beauty against all comers—that woman should never yield herself save to a real love . The question had more than once started , as it might do between people in the full bloom of life , not forgetful of such questions . Edwardes , as you know , is a practical Englishman ; opposed to the romantic ; uncertain of reality until it becomes homely , stripped of some of its beauty , and rather impatient to hasten to the indisputable—that unattainable residuum of human analysis
which gratifies the English love of " realizing . " He rejects "love" as a youthful delusion ; and prefers to regard matrimony as a utility— -reciprocally a convenience and a duty . Yseult maintained her own doctrine . I verily believe that in this controversy , Edwardes > as many a " practical " Englishman does , sacrificed the real "reality" to an imaginary one , the fruit of his own preconceived doctrine of necessity . Be that as it may , he is the man to act according to a conscious principle . It was evident that
1 seult felt irritated beyond repression whenever the controversy arose through the blindness of others—how blind people are to the effects of their own tongues ! - —and that Edwardes also was irritated at the" estrangement which evidently existed on Yseult ' s part . The controversy was a practical one . Preferring to be "the friend , " Edwardes was accepted only in that light ; and his chagrin refuted the genuineness of his theory . He had " right" on his side ; but authority itself is humbled by an absolute submissiveness which is unequivocally that and nothing else .
There is a power in strong , sincere minds , and in them alone , which makes them value even the truths that are forced upon them , and prize even the enforcer of the resisted truth . The coward who has injured another follows that other with dislike ; but to the generous an unhealing wound in a sweet nature , like the best fruit , is but a way through which its sweetness is the more keenly tasted . To the manly mind , embarrassment , hazard , trouble , danger , are but so many claims . Although harder
on the surface , and slower to apprehend a truth than Yseult , Edwardes could thoroughly solve the problem upon which his path of life had stumbled so unexpectedly ; his manly courage was not of a stuff to yield to the difficult y ; as soon as he recognised the insuperable and the inevitable , his plain , kindly intellect threw aside his own interest , and busied jtselt solel y to shield Yseult from all pain that his faithful skill could save to lei- 1 believe none so eagerly watched over her as he ; none valued him so much as she did .
Alter their angry words—for in theory the controversy survived , chiefly r <> ugh an intellectual mauvaise Jionte in Edwardes , which often makes um yieltl in act what he will not admit in argument—he followed Yseult , o ask pardon for pursuing her with the question , and she met him by '' vlng pardon , and by explaining that her irritation had been increased bv ot' » er causes . hat those causes were surprised me as much as it can you ; but you will understand Edwardcs ' s absence if I do not tell you . For all his hardy - puns 1 O n of shirt front , that fellow , King , took seriously to heart my outrageous behaviour" in telling Mrs . Hartnell a truth which it so much
Dr ' lfr ? * * U ! 1 < to know ; and he sought revenge . I am surprised that his pur ° , £ llt ** worth while to circumvent the paltry retaliation , which he tlu > *' at ^ cost ° ^ great pains . He followed my movements ; he was niul 1 ^ . ntlonmu" wll ° camc t ( > Seven Hills , and who bad seen Yseult before ; him I rou K a talc—which his malicious and suspecting instinct taught n l ? i * ° £ C wnere ^ could do most harm—how the man who had to hj [ , '" "i— -but he never told that part of the story—had appropriated VatM *' *"" * ^ wnom he . pretended to rescue ; aiul how that- same i « ui ! l > OU ( 1 llU ( l rcHCIMJ < l > l ) y sltil ( ul suborning of evidence , the mother-< ntoll < * CSS ° f * " 3 ( WU cl"ld- Ytu - ul <; disbelieved with her heart and her with he ' ( JUUl S"nt Kin £ away witJl snft "l c on his brow ; but she believed alie \ 'I * UVS < lu < * ' l ) llH 9 " » niu * when King came again he . saw that numh'hT * atron # «»« "gh to rtihnt his tale , and he taunted her with hi . s > ss - Tins she told to Edwardes—so much , neither more nor less . ' » iun ' lj , E < lvvfmloH do—the " practical" Englishman , the unroiiuuitie I | t , ' '" ''Ims WMwoner , the unimpulsive philosopher ' I What did he do ? » eaiuT | lllt P oste » "o « l I ""! tormented by a lower aniinal ; a creature with ll" 4 a cowardly advantage of convention in hit * ' hand ; he mm Yseult
downcast , and without defence . And he , the man of common sense , bidding her good night , as if he merely made friends after a pardonable misunderstanding , set off there and then , with a big heart , pursued King through some of his holiday wanderings , made him cross the Channel , &n < i broke the fellow ' s arm with a pistol bullet . "But how did he defend that illogical escapade , Margaret ? " I asked . "I do not think that Yseult required him to make any defence , or that any of us can taunt him with his reason , when he has served truth , sp well in making meanness know its responsibility and its place . " Did t avow a certain meanness , which made me uneasy that Edwardes should have snatched more than one vengeance into his own hand ? Yes , I did avow it .
'' Come , " said Margaret , " I have told you all ; it is getting colder ; and if you are capable of unworthy thoughts at such a time , where shall we leave off ? Walter may be the next—getting jealous perhaps . " " Forgive me , as you would forgive him ; for appearances would excuse him . " "Appearances ! Yes , the appearances of an hour , a day , a month , are taken to undo all that we know of a truthful nature , and to belie our own
capacity for knowing what is true : even acts , indisputable acts , are not evidence against a better knowledge . Appearances , Tristan ! If a man can never know more , can never know anything better , than that which can be contradicted by appearances , he will carry his ignorance to his tomb . If Walter—— -But see how I am yielding to the phantom I rail at ; appearances make me take the idle words which the baffled mind utters after being stupefied , as real expressions of a feeling in your heart ; and in scolding you I show how I want teaching myself . "
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THE THEATRES . I have little to say this week ; the only event being a small one , though announced magnificently , —I mean the commencement of the Deuet Lane season with G . V . Brooke as star . He has recovered his splendid voice , consequently he has regained something of his lost empire over audiences , and his success on Monday night was uproarious . There is a grace and power about Brooke which must always carryby storm an audience not very critical as to intelligence and poetry . He has great ; physical qualities , and they make half the greatness of an actor .
My dear friend Charles ICean has closed his long successful season , and a cruelly kind critic in the Times heaped coals of fire on his head by a long laudation of his sagacity in converting himself into a showman , and his Theatre into a Gallery of Illustration . Fancy a man bearing the name of ICean , and devoutly believing himself to be an actor , a tragic actor , a Shaksperian actor , and to be told by his friendly critic that he owes his success not to acting , but to spectacle ! Mr . llobson still draws audiences to the formerly forlorn , and now prosperous Olympic . In a few days the season will be over , and then tho theatre passes into the hands of the accomplished Wigan , who reopens it on the 10 th of October , with Mrs . Stirling , Miss P . Horton , Emery , JRobson , &c . Vivian .
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A SIGHT TO BE SEEN ! ( Dr Kahn ' s Museum . ) Titeej ? is in London at this moment an exhibition which of all others ia best worth its shilling entrance fee , and we are doing the reader a good turn by directing his attention to it . Tho name is not attractive , therefore let us be a little explicit . It is called Dr . Kahn ' s Anatomical Museum , and its locale is the Portland Gallery in llegent-atreot . The word " anatomical" makes sensitive persons shudder ; to tho uninatructed it presents no definite attraction . Anatomy , tho noblest of sciences , has still to conquer tho ancient prejudice , which was briefly expressed in our hearing tho other day by a very clever man— " Thank God , I know " nothing whatever of my own body ! " Yet surely a moment ' s reflection would suffice to show . that nothing could bo so well worth knowing , itsj dominant importance , and its wondrous complexify of mechanism taken into consideration .
Be that as it may , lot anatomy be regardod as a superior Icind of butcher ' s work , the objection will not apply to Dr . Kahn ' s Museum . That in an exhibition wltyro scientific minds will lind curious material , whore ordinary minds may bo brought to consider most extraordinary facts . There is also an Anatomical Museum now open in Leicester-square to which we can adviso no one to pay a visit ; it is a vulgar ad rapkinduni aflhir , containing very little of interest to any one , JNot ho Dr . Kalui ' 8 . Tho most dolicato susceptibility will Bee nothing there to alarm it—a separate room being provided for certain pathological and obstetric spoolmetis , infcowhich only medical visitors need enter . Every Friday a- time in set
apart , for the visit of ladiea , the wife of Dr . Leach being prenent to locturo and oxplain . There they may learn pleasantly much of what must bo intensely interesting to them all , — the progress and development of the child in tho womb . There they may nee the process of digestion ilma-Irated , and the dangers of tight lacing demonstrated . There they may turn their reading of popular worku on physiology to account , by seeing tho Htrueturo and relations of organh . There- they may gain Home doiimt 0 idea of the brain and nervous nyHtom . And this they can learn ploaeantty , if superficially , without the drudgery and disagreeables attendingdi . snooiioiiH : nuroly a very deHirablo royulfcP Wo oarnoHtly reeommon « ql both our malo and female readora to avail themHulvosof this opportunity . It is worth coining up to London to ppcxid two day& in that Museum ,
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September 10 , 1853 . ] "FffE LEADER , 885
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Leader (1850-1860), Sept. 10, 1853, page 885, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2003/page/21/
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