Читать книгу Dealings with the Dead (Vol. 1&2) - Lucius M. Sargent - Страница 51

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A few days ago, I saw, in the hands of the artist, Mr. Alvan Clarke, a sketch, nearly completed, from Stuart’s painting of John Adams, in his very old age. This sketch is to be engraved, as an accompaniment of the works of Mr. Adams, about to be published, by Little & Brown. I scarcely know what to say of this sketch of Mr. Adams. His fine old face, such as it was in the flesh, and at the very last of his long and illustrious career, is fixed in my memory—rivetted there—as firmly as his name is bolted, upon the loftiest column of our national history. Never have I seen a more perfect fac simile of man, without the aid of relief—it is the resurrection and the life. If I am at a loss what to say of the sketch, I am still farther at fault, what to say of the artist. Like some of those heavenly bodies, whose contemplation occupies no little portion of his time, it is not always the easiest thing in the world, to know in what part of his orbit he may be found; if I desire to obtain a portrait, or a miniature, or a sketch, he can scarcely devote his time to it, he is so very busy, in contriving some new improvement, for his already celebrated rifle; or if it is a patent muzzled rifle that I want, he is quite likely to be occupied, in the manufacture of a telescope. Be all these matters as they may, I can vouch for it, after years of experience, Alvan Clarke is a very clever fellow, Anglice et Americanice; and this sketch of Mr. Adams does him honor, as an artist.

It was in the year 1822, I believe, that a young lady sent me her album, with a request, that I, of all people in the world, would occupy one of its pages. Well, I felt, that after all, it was quite in my line, for I had always looked upon a young lady’s album, as a kind of cemetery, for the burial of anybody’s bantlings, and I began to read the inscriptions, upon such as reposed in this place, appointed for the still-born. I was a little startled, I confess, at my first glance, upon the autograph of the late Bishop Griswold, appended to some very respectable verses. My attention was next drawn to some lines, over the name of Daniel Webster, manu propria. I forget them now, but I remember, that the American Eagle was invoked for the occasion, and flapped its wings, through one or more of the stanzas. Next came an article in strong, sensible prose, from John Adams, written by an amanuensis, but signed with his own hand. Such a hand—the “manu deficiente” of Tibullus. The letters, formed by the failing, trembling fingers, resembled the forked lightning. A solemnizing and impressive autograph it was: and, under the impulse of the moment, I had the audacity to spoil three pages of this consecrated album, by appending to this venerable name the following lines:—

High over Alps, in Dauphine,

There lies a lonely spot,

So wild, that ages rolled away,

And man had claimed it not:

For ages there, the tiger’s yell

Bay’d the hoarse torrent as it fell.

Amid the dark, sequestered glade,

No more the brute shall roam;

For man, unsocial man, hath made

That wilderness his home:

And convent bell, with notes forlorn,

Is heard, at midnight, eve, and morn.

For now, amid the Grand Chartreuse,

Carthusian monks reside;

Whose lives are passed, from man recluse,

In scourging human pride;

In matins, vespers, aves, creeds,

With crosses, masses, prayers, and beads.

When hither men of curious mood,

Or pilgrims, bend their way,

To view this Alpine solitude,

Or, heav’nward bent, to pray,

Saint Bruno’s monks their album bring,

Inscrib’d by poet, priest, and king.

Since pilgrim first, with holy tears,

Inscrib’d the tablet fair,

On time’s dark flood, some thousand years,

Have pass’d like billows there.

What countless names its pages blot,

By country, kindred, long forgot!

Here chaste conceits and thoughts divine

Unclaim’d, and nameless, stand;

Which, like the Grecian’s waving line,

Betray some master’s hand.

And here Saint Bruno’s monks display,

With pride, the classic lines of Gray.

While pilgrim ponders o’er the name,

He feels his bosom glow;

And counts it nothing less than fame,

To write his own below.

So, in this Album, fain would I,

Beneath a name, that cannot die.

Thrice happy book! no tablet bears

A nobler name than thine;

Still followed by a nation’s pray’rs,

Through ling’ring life’s decline.

The wav’ring stylus scarce obey’d

The hand, that once an empire sway’d!

Not thus, among the patriot band,

That name enroll’d we see—

No falt’ring tongue, no trembling hand

Proclaim’d an empire free!—

Lady, retrace those lines, and tell,

If, in thy heart, no sadness dwell?

And, in those fainting, struggling lines,

Oh, see’st thou naught sublime!

No tott’ring pile, that half inclines!

No mighty wreck of time!

Sighs not thy gentle heart to save

The sage, the patriot, from the grave!

If thus, oh then recall that sigh,

Unholy ’tis, and vain;

For saints and sages never die,

But sleep, to rise again.

Life is a lengthened day, at best,

And in the grave tir’d trav’llers rest;

Till, with his trump, to wake the dead,

Th’ appointed angel flies;

Then Heav’n’s bright album shall be spread,

And all who sleep, shall rise;

The blest to Zion’s Hill repair,

And write their names immortal there.

I had as much pleasure, in composing these lines, as I ever had, in composing the limbs or the features of a corpse; and now that they are fairly laid out, the reader may bury them in oblivion, as soon as he pleases. The lines of Gray, referred to, in the sixth stanza, may be found in the collections of his works, and were written in the album of the Chartreuse, in 1741.

My recollections of John Adams, are very perfect, and preëminently pleasant. I knew nothing of him personally, of course, in the days of his power. I had nothing to ask at his hands, but the permission to sit and listen. How vast and how various his learning!—“Qui sermo! quæ præcepta! quanta notitia antiquitatis! … Omnia memoria tenebat, non domestica solum, sed etiam externa bella: cujus sermone ita tum cupide fruebar, quasi jam divinarem id, quod evenit, illo extincto, fore, unde discerem, neminem.” Surpassingly delightful were the outpourings, till some thoughtless wight, by an ill-timed allusion, opened the fountain of bitter waters—then, history, literature, the arts, all were buried in gurgite vasto, giving place to Jefferson’s injustice, the Mazzei letters, and Callender’s prospect before us—quantum mutatus ab illo!

How forcibly the dead are quickened, upon the retina of memory, by the exhibition of some well known and personally associated article—the little hat of Napoleon—the mantle of Cæsar—“you all do know this mantle!” I have just now drawn, from my treasury, an autograph of John Adams, bearing date, Jan. 31, 1824, and a lock of strong hair, cut from his venerable brow, the day before. In October of that year, he was eighty-nine years of age; and that lock of hair is a dark iron gray. I have also taken from its casket a silver pen, and small portable inkstand attached, which also were his. The contemplation of these things—I came honestly by them—seems almost to raise that venerable form before me. I can almost hear him repeat those memorable words—“The Union is our Rock of Safety as well as our Pledge of Grandeur.”