for a third degree. Those who secure this are admitted to the highest literary class, from which the government makes all its appointments. Our author was eager to see the "little feet" of a Chinese lady, who was just recovering from the torturing process of their compress on. "At my request the doctor politely asked one of his fair friends to show me one of her feet! He gravely explained to her that the modest exhibition would be a great novelty to me. She kindly handed me her shoe, which was about two and a half inches in length and neatly embroidered. After removing her very ornamental, but peculiarly-shaped stocking, she proceeded slowly to unwind the long, black bandage with which her foot (or what remained of it) was tightly wound. The bandage was several yards in length, and under this were other colored strips. When all were removed, the foot had a wedge or stump-like appearance that almost destroyed its identity. The heel was elongated, the instep highly arched," and the great toe was very prominent. The other toes were drawn in under the foot, and so tightly and perseveringly compressed that the bones were absorbed, and no vestige of the toes remained, but four flat pieces of skin. Although the foot was so small that one's hand could easily cover it, the ankle was proportionally thickened, and the whole had an appearance far from beautiful. This strange custom of "little feet" has pre-his is not a one-sided enthusiasm of advailed in China for centuries. The miration for the character and poetry of painful process of binding the feet com- Milton. In this respect this book differs mences at six or seven years of age, much from Macaulay's celebrated essay when the child's foot is fully formed. on the same subject. The latter sees no The little girls present a pitiable sight defects, and can hardly find terms of as they are sometimes seen on the street, praise strong enough. But the English richly dressed and attended by a servant, Professor displays considerable coolness but hobbling slowly along, crippled for of judgment, and consequently is modlife by this unnatural and cruel fashion. erate and reserved. Sometimes, indeed, When the feet have been bound for he strikes us as being too cool; and several years the young woman is forced here and there we find traces of a rationto continue the habit, for the under side alism, which unfits him to put the propof the foot is rendered so sensitive and er estimate upon Milton's poetry, as pinched that she cannot stand up when well as upon his religious views. it is left unbound." following passage tells us why he was not among the number of those Englishmen who came across the waters to attend the recent Pan-Presbyterian-Council:-" His dogmatic Calvinism, from the effects of which his mind never recovered a system which easily disposes

The

John Milton.

If mercies humble you, and an increasing knowledge of the truth makes you zealous and active, your soul is in a healthy state pride and inactivity are the worst of diseases.

BY WILMER.

We

LET not the reader of the GUARDIAN expect a learned critical dissertation, or a formal chapter of a history of English Literature, because we ve placed the name of the second greatest poet of England at the head of our article. just finished reading a brief biography of him, by Professor Pattison of Oxford; and we concluded that a statement of a few facts, and a selection of some passages, together with a few suggestions furnished by the volume, would be worthy a place in these pages.

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Before proceeding to Milton, we have a word or two to say of his biographer. As Prof. Pattison is rector of Lincoln College, it is natural to suppose that he is a very learned man. But his learning does not interfere much with the interest of his narrative It is true he uses a good many big words, such aa subjectivity," "epideictic," "diathesis." perfunctory," and some others which could hardly be found in Webster. He also uses some Latin quotations, but upon the whole, most persons can understand him. Moreover, his style is sprightly and attractive; and he knows how to select those circumstances, and bring out those points which awaken and retain the attention of the reader. Another observation to be made is that

to a cynical abasement of our fellow-men girl. Love has blinded, and will con-counted for something ".. " in produ- tinue to blind, the wisest men to calcucing this repellent or unsympathetic at-lations as easy and certain as these.”. titude in Milton." "He was too soon undeceived. His The great poet's first employment dream of married happiness barely lastwas that of a school-teacher. He estab-ed out the honey-moon. He found lished an institution in his own house, that he had mated himself to a clod of did his own work, and threw his whole earth, who not only was not now, but soul into it. This is evident from his had not the capacity of becoming, a help"Tractate" on Education, which as a meet for him. With Milton, as with contribution to pedagogical literature is the whole Calvinistic and Puritan Euof great value at the present day. But rope, woman was a creature of an inmore than this; he was not satisfied with ferior and subordinate class. Man was the geographies of that day. He went the first cause of God's creation, and to work to write one. He labored hard, woman was there to minister to this noand his biographer says if his undertak- ble being." . . . . "But however keenly ing had been completed it would have he felt and regretted the precipitancy proved to be one "of overwhelming which had yoked him for life to a mute magnitude." Further, his boys did not and spiritless mate, the breach did not have the right kind of dictionaries. This come from his side. The girl herself want must be likewise supplied. The conceived an equal repugnance to the following is the language of Prof. Pat- husband she had thoughtlessly accepted, tison on this subject :-"The acknow- probably on the strength of his good ledged metaphor of Pegasus harnessed looks, which was all of Milton she was to a luggage trolley wil recur to us capable of appreciating. A young bride, when we think of the author of L'Alle- taken suddenly from the freedom of a gro setting himself to compile a Latin jovial and undisciplined home, rendered lexicon. If there is any literary drud- more lax by civil confusion and easy ingery more mechanical than another, it tercourse with the officers of the royalis generally supposed to be that of ist garrison, and committed to the sole making a dictionary. Nor bad he ta- society of a stranger, and that stranger ken to this industry as a resource in age, possessing the rights of a husband, and when the genial flow of invention had expecting much from all who lived with dried up, and original composition had him, may not unnaturally have been ceased to be in his power. The three seized with panic terror, and wished herfolio volumes of MS. which Milton left self home again."... Mary Milton were the work of his youth; it was a went to Forest Hill (her parents' home) work which the loss of eyesight of ne- in July, but on the understanding that cessity put an end to." she was to come back at Michaelmas. When the appointed time came she did not appear. Milton wrote for her to come. No answer. Several other letters met the same fate. At last he dispatched a foot-messenger to Forest Hill desiring her return. The messenger came back only to report that he had been dismissed with some sort of contempt." ... "If Milton had hasted too eagerly to light the nuptial torch, he had been equally ardent in his calculations of the domestic happiness upon which he was to enter. His poet's imagination had invested a dull and common girl with rare attributes, moral and intellectual, and had pictured for him the state of matrimony as an earthly Paradise, in which he was to be secure of a response of affection showing itself

66

Milton had three wives. Between himself and the first there was no congeniality. Domestic misery was the result. And as it would seem from what our author says, the woman was not alone to blame. "The biographer, acquainted with the event, has no difficulty in predicting it, and in saying at this point in his story that Milton might have known better than, with his puritanical connections, to have taken to wife a daughter of a cavalier bouse, to have brought her from a roystering home, frequented by the dissolute officers of the Oxford garrison, to the spare diet and philosophical retirement of a recluse student, and to have looked for sympathy and response for his speculations from an uneducated and frivolous

in a communion of intelligent interests
In proportion to the brilliancy of his
ideal anticipation was the fury of de-
spair which came upon him when he
found out his mistake." But misfor-
tunes in various forms fell upon his
father-in-law's family. At all events a
reconciliation was found desirable. "A
conspiracy of the friends of both parties
contrived to introduce Mary Powell
(her maiden name) into a house where
Milton often visited in St. Martin's-le-
Grand. She was secreted in an adjoining
room, on an occasion when Milton was
known to be coming, and he was sur-
prised by seeing her suddenly brought
in, throw herself on her knees and ask
to be forgiven. The poor young thing,
now two years older and wiser, but still
only nineteen, pleaded, truly or falsely,
that her mother had been all along the
chief promoter of her frowardness. Mil-As
ton with a noble leonine clemency which
became him, cared not for excuses for
the past. It was enough that she was
come back, and was willing to live with
him as his wife. He received her at
once, and not only her, but on the sur-
render of Oxford, in June, 1646, and
the sequestration of Forest Hill, took
the whole family of Powells, including
the mother-in-law, whose influence with
her daughter might even again trouble
h's peace."... Milton probably abated
bis exactions on the point of companion-
ship, and learned to be content with her
acquiescence in the duties of a wife. In
July, 1646, she became a mother, and
bore in all four children. Of these,
three, all daughters, lived to grow up.
Mary Milton herself died in giving birth
to her fourth child in the summer of
1652. She was only twenty six, and had
been married to Milton nine years."

Four years after the death of his first
wife, Milton married Catherine Wood-
stock, of whom very little is known.
She died fifteen months after their
riage.

and capable woman.
... There is no
evidence that his wife rendered him any
literary assistance. Perhaps as she
looked so thoroughly to his material
comfort, her function was held, by tacit
agreement, to end there."

Five years later, after he had lost his sight, he consulted his "judicious friend and medical adviser, Dr. Paget," on the subject of a third marriage. Paget recommended a relative of his own, Elizabeth Minshull. Milton called her Betty. During the remaining eleven years of his life the poet was surrounded by the thoughtful at entions of an active

:

Notwithstanding Milton's ups and downs in matrimonial life, certain it is that English literature, much less any other literature, furnishes no conception of woman as exalted as the one presented in the following passage to be found at the end of the eighth Book of Paradise Lost:When I approach Her loveliness, so absolute she seems And in herself complete, so well to know Her own, that what she wills to do or say Seems wisest, virtuousest, discreetest, best. All higher knowledge in her presence falls Degraded; wisdom in discourse with her Loses discountenanced, and like folly shows. Authority and reason on her wait,

one intended first, not after made Occasionally and to consummate all, Greatness of mind, and nobleness, their seat Build in her loveliest, and create an awe About her, as a guard angelic placed.

Professor Pattison remarks, however, that "in the bringing up of his daughters, he puts his own typical woman entirely on one side." "He did not allow them to learn any language, saying with a gibe that one tongue was enough for a woman. They were not sent to any school, but had some sort of teaching at home from a mistress. But in order to make them useful in reading to him, their father was at the pains to train them to read aloud in five or six languages, of none of which they understood one word. When we think of the time and labor which must have been expended to teach then to do this, it must occur to us that a little more labor would have sufficed to teach them so much of one or two of the languages as would have made their reading a source of interest and improvement to themmar-selves. This Milton refused to do. The consequence was, as might have been expected, the occupation became so irksome to them that they rebelled against it. In the case of one of them, Mary, who was like her mother in person, and took after her in other respects, this restiveness passed into open revolt. She first resisted, then neglected, and finally came to hate her father. When some one spoke in her presence of her father's

approaching marriage she said, 'that Professor Pattison has very little to was no news to hear of his wedding; but say in regard to the piety of Milton. if she could hear of his death, that was He informs us, however, that "there something.' She combined with Anne, grew up in him, in the last period of his the eldest daughter to counsel his maid-life, a secret sympathy with the mode of servant to cheat him in his marketings. thinking, which came to characterize They sold his books without his know- the Quaker sect." Whatever may have ledge. They made nothing of de- been the external form which it assumed, serting him,' he was often heard to there can be no doubt as to his religious complain. They continued to live with earnestness and sincerity. In his celehim five or six years after his marriage brated "Tractate" or Theory of EducaBut at last the situation became intoler- tion he gives as a definition of the true able to both parties, and they were sent end of learning "to repair the ruin of out to learn embroidery in gold or silver, our first parents by regaining to know as a means of obtaining their livelihood." God aright." The rector of Lincoln Most of what has hitherto been said College says that "here we have the has to do with Milton's external sur- theological Milton, and what he took on roundings. A man's babits tell much in from the current language of his age." regard to his inner life and character. Not only has this definition never been Much is contained in the following par- improved upon, in spite of libraries of agraph from the biography :treatises on education which have appeared since Milton's day; but all defini

"

"On cold days he would walk for hours-three or four hours at a time-tions of the legitimate aim of culture are in his garden. A garden was a sine qua false in proportion as they differ from it. non, and he took care to have one to every house he lived in. His babit. in early life, had been to study late into the night. After he lost his sight he changed his hours, and retired to rest at nine. In summer he rose at four, in winter at five, and began the day with having the Hebrew Scriptures read to him. Then he contemplated. At seven his man came to him again, and then read to him and wrote till dinner. The writing was as much as the reading.' Then he took exercise, either walking in the garden, or swinging in a machine. His only recreation, besides conversation, was music. He played the organ, and the bass viol; the organ most. Sometimes he would sing himself or get his wife to sing, though she had, he said, no ear, yet a good voice. Then he went up to his study to be read to till six. After six his friends were admitted to visit him, and would sit with him till eight. At eight he went down to supper, usually olives or some light thing. He was very abstemious in his diet, having to contend with a gouty diathesis. He was not fastidious in his choice of meats, but content with anything that was in season, or easy to be procured After supping thus sparingly, he smoked a pipe of tobacco, drank a glass of water, and then retired to bed. He was sparing in his use of wine."

Milton as a poet was fully conscious of the solemnity and diguity of his calling. Witness the following extracts from his writings in reference to this point. And long it was not after, when I was confirmed in this opinion, that he who would not be frustrate of his hope to write well hereafter in laudable things, ought himself to be a true poem, that is a composition and pattern of the best and honorablest things, not presuming to sing high praises of heroic men or famous cities, unless he have in himself the experience and the practice of all that which is praiseworthy." "Neither do I think it shame to covenant with any knowing reader that for some few years yet I may go on trust toward the payment of what I am now indebted, as being not a work to be raised from the best of youth, or the vapors of wine, like that which flows at waste from the pen of some vulgar amorist, or the trencher fury of some rhyming parasite, nor to be obtained by the invocation of Dame Memory and her Siren daughters, but by devout prayer to that Eternal Spirit who can enrich with all utterance and all knowledge, and sends out His seraphim with the hallowed fire of his altar to touch and purify the life of whom He pleases.' "Poetical powers are the inspired gift of God rarely bestowed... in every nation, and are

""

Still according to the Rector's view Milton is, next to Shakespeare, England's greatest poet, and it behooves a representative of Oxford to vindicate a writer whom England has always point-verted ed to with pride. "The style of Paradise Lost is then only the natural expression of a soul thus exquisitely nourished upon