Part 6 (1/2)

In those days I saw Marathon for the first time, and learned the truth of Lord Byron's lines:--

The mountains look on Marathon, And Marathon looks on the sea.

This expedition occupied the whole of a winter day. We started from the hotel after early breakfast, and did not regain it until long after dark. Our carriages were accompanied by an escort of dragoons, which the Greek government supplies, not in view of any real danger from brigands, but in order to afford strangers every possible security. A drive of some three hours brought us to the spot.

A level plain, between the mountains and the sea; a mound, raised at its centre, marking the burial-place of those who fell in the famous battle; a sea-beach, washed by blue waves, and basking in the golden Attic sunlight--this is what we saw at Marathon.

Here we gathered pebbles, and I preserved for some days a knot of daisies growing in a gra.s.sy clod of earth. But my mind saw in Marathon an earnest of the patriotic spirit which has lifted Greece from such ruin as the Persians were never able to inflict upon her. Worthy descendants of those ancient heroes were the patriots who fought, in our own century, the war of Greek independence. I am glad to think that all heroic deeds have a fatherhood of their own, whose line never becomes extinct.

Those who would inst.i.tute a comparison between ancient and modern art should first compare the office of art in ancient times with the function a.s.signed it in our own.

The sculptures of cla.s.sic Greece were primarily the embodiment of its popular theology and the record of its patriotic heroism. They are not, as we might think them, fancy-free. The marble G.o.ds of h.e.l.las characterize for us the _morale_ of that ancient community. They expressed the religious conviction of the artist, and corresponded to the faith of the mult.i.tude. If we recognize the freedom of imagination in their conception, we also feel the reverence which guided the sculptor in their execution. As Emerson has said:--

Himself from G.o.d he could not free.

How necessary these marbles were to the devotion of the time, we may infer from the complaint reported in one of Cicero's orations,--that a certain Greek city had been so stripped of its marbles that its people had no G.o.d left to pray to.

In the city of the Caesars, this Greek art became the minister of luxury.

The ethics of the Roman people chiefly concerned their relation to the state, to which their church was in great measure subservient. The statues stolen from the wors.h.i.+p of the Greeks adorned the baths and palaces of the Emperors. This we must think providential for us, since it is in this way that they have escaped the barbarous destruction which for ages swept over the whole of Greece, and to whose rude force, column, monument, and statue were only raw material for the lime-kiln.

Still more secondary is the position of sculpture in the civilization of to-day. Here and there a monument or statue commemorates some great name or some great event. But these are still outside the current of our daily life. Marble is to us a gospel of death, and we grow less and less fond of its cold abstraction. The glitter of _bric-a-brac_, bits of color, an unexpected s.h.i.+mmer here and there--such are the favorite aspects of art with us.

In saying this, I remember that many beautiful works of art have been purchased by wealthy Americans, and that a surprising number of our people know what is worth purchasing in this line. And yet I think that in the houses of these very people, art is rather the servant of luxury than the embodiment of any strong and sincere affection.

We cannot turn back the tide of progress. We cannot make our religion sculpturesque and picturesque. G.o.d forbid that we should! But we can look upon the sculptures of ancient Greece with reverent appreciation, and behold in them a record of the nave and simple faith of a great people.

If we must speak thus of plastic art, what shall we say of the drama?

Sit down with me before this palace of dipus, whose facade is the only scenic aid brought to help the illusion of the play. See how the whole secret and story of the hero's fate is wrought out before its doors, which open upon his youthful strength and glory, and close upon his desolate shame and blindness. Follow the majestic tread of the verse, the perfect progress of the action, and learn the deep reverence for the unseen powers which lifts and spiritualizes the agony of the plot.

Where shall we find a parallel to this in the drama of our day? The most striking contrast to it will be furnished by what we call a ”realistic”

play, which is a play devised upon the supposition that those who will attend its representation are not possessed of any imagination, but must be dazzled through their eyes and deafened through their ears, until the fatigue of the senses shall take the place of intellectual pleasure. The _denouement_ will, no doubt, present, as it can, the familiar moral that virtue is in the end rewarded, and vice punished. But such virtue! and such vice! How shall we be sure which is which?

During this visit, I had an interview which brought me face to face with some of the Cretan chiefs, who were exiles in Athens at the time of my visit, in consequence of their partic.i.p.ation in the more recent efforts of the Islanders to free themselves from the Turkish rule.

I received, one day, official notice that a committee, appointed by a number of the Cretan exiles, desired permission to wait upon me, with the view of presenting an address which should recognize the efforts made by Dr. Howe in behalf of their unfortunate country. In accordance with this request, I named an hour on the following day, and at the appointed time my guests made their appearance. The Cretan chiefs were five in number. All of them, but one, were dressed in the picturesque costume of their country. This one was Katzi Michaelis, the youngest of the party, and somewhat more like the world's people than the others.

Two of these were very old men, one of them numbering eighty-four years, and bearing a calm and serene front, like one of Homer's heroes. This was old Korakas, who had only laid down his arms within two years. The chiefs were accompanied by several gentlemen, residents of Athens. One of these, Mr. Rainieri, opened proceedings by a few remarks in French, setting forth the object of the visit, and introducing the address of the Cretan committee, which he read in their own tongue:--

MADAM,--

We, the undersigned, emigrants from Crete, who await in free Greece the complete emanc.i.p.ation of our country, have learned with pleasure the fact of your presence in Athens. We feel a.s.sured that we shall faithfully interpret the sentiments of our fellow-countrymen by saluting your return to this city, and by a.s.suring you, at the same time, that the remembrance of the benefits conferred by your late ill.u.s.trious husband is always living in our hearts. When the sun of liberty shall arise upon the Island of Crete, the Cretans will, no doubt, decree the erection of a monument which will attest to succeeding generations the grat.i.tude of our country toward her n.o.ble benefactor. For the moment, Madam, deign to accept the simple expression of our sentiments, and our prayers for the prosperity of your family and your nation, to which we and our children shall ever be bound by the ties of grat.i.tude.

The substance of my reply to Mr. Rainieri was as follows:--

MY DEAR SIR,--

I beg that you will express to these gentlemen my grat.i.tude for their visit, and for the sentiments communicated in the address to which I have just listened. I am much moved by the mention made of the services which my late ill.u.s.trious husband was able to render to the cause of Greece in his youth, and to that of Crete in his later life. It is true that his earliest efforts, outside of his native country, were for Greek independence, and that his latest endeavors in Europe were made in aid of the Cretans, who have struggled with so much courage and perseverance to deliver their country from the yoke of Turkish oppression. Pray a.s.sure these gentlemen that my children and I will never cease to pray for the welfare of Greece, and especially for the emanc.i.p.ation of Crete.

Though myself already in the decline of life, I yet hope that I shall live long enough to see the deliverance of your island, t?? ??e??e??a? t?? ???t??.