Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine Vol. 56, No. 346, August, 1844 by Various

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And the man cried aloud, sprang from his seat, and wrung his hands and
wept like an infant. Even his wife had not shown such utter agony of
grief.

"When I go to work," continued he after a pause, "my little Dougal seems
to stand before me, and my hands fall by my sides, as stiff and heavy as
though they were lead. I look round, but no Dougal is there. When I go
to bed, I put his bed beside mine, and call him, but no one answers.
Sleeping or waking, my poor boy is always before me. Would to God I were
dead! I have cursed and sworn, prayed and supplicated, wept and groaned,
but all--all in vain!"

I have seen many persons suffering from distress of mind, but never did
I meet with one whose sorrow was so violent and overpowering as that of
this backwoodsman. We did our utmost to console him, and to inspire him
with new hope, but he was inconsolable; his eyes were fixed, he had
fallen into a sort of apathy, and I doubt if he even heard what was said
to him. We ourselves were so affected that our words seemed almost to
choke us. Time pressed, however; it was impossible for us to remain any
longer, nor could we have done any good by so doing. We shook the
unfortunate couple by the hand, promised to do all in our power to learn
something of their child's fate, and took our departure.

It was six weeks after the time above referred to, that I found myself
compelled by business to make a journey to Natchez. I had often thought
of poor Clarke's misfortune, and, in conjunction with my friends, had
done all in my power to discover the villain who had robbed him of his
child. Hitherto all our endeavours had been fruitless. The facts were
circulated in every newspaper, were matter of conversation at every
teatable in the country; rewards were offered, researches made, but not
the smallest trace of the boy or his stealer was to be found.

It was a bright January afternoon when I landed at Natchez. In company
with some acquaintances, I was ascending the little hill between the
lower and upper town, when we heard an unusual noise and bustle; and on
reaching the summit, we saw a crowd assembled before the door of Justice
Bonner's house. Upon going to see what was the matter, we found that the
mob consisted of the better class of people in Natchez, both women and
men, but especially the former. Every face wore an expression of
interest and anxiety; and upon making enquiry, we learned that the
child-stealer had been at length discovered--or rather, that a man had
been taken up on strong suspicion of his having stolen Mr Clarke's son,
of Hampstead county. I was heartily rejoiced at the news and endeavoured
to press forward through the throng, in hopes of hearing some
particulars; but the crowd was so dense that it was impossible to get
through. I stood there for nearly two hours, the concourse all the while
increasing, none stirring from the places they occupied, while every
adjacent window was filled with eager, anxious faces.

At last the door opened, and the prisoner, guarded by two constables,
and followed by the sheriff, came out of the house, and took the
direction of the town prison. "That is he!" whispered the women to one
another, with pale faces and trembling voices, clasping their children
tighter, as though fearful they would be snatched from them. The
countenance of the culprit was the most repulsive I had ever seen--a
mixture of brutal obstinacy and low cunning, with a sort of sneering,
grinning, expression. His small green-grey eyes were fixed upon the
ground; but as he passed through the lane opened by the crowd, he from
time to time partially raised them, and threw sidelong and malicious
glances at the bystanders. He was rather above the middle height, his
complexion of a dirty greyish colour, his cheeks hollow, his lips
remarkably thick and coarse, his whole appearance in the highest degree
wild and disgusting. His dress consisted of an old worn-out blue frock,
trousers of the same colour, a high-crowned shabby hat, and tattered
shoes. The impression which his appearance made might be read in the
pale faces of the spectators. They gazed after him with a sort of
hopeless look as he walked away. "If that is the man who stole the
child," murmured several, "there is no hope. The boy is lost!" I
extricated myself from the throng, and hastened to Justice Bonner, with
whom I was acquainted, and who gave me the following particulars.

About four weeks after our excursion in the neighbourhood of Hopefield,
Clarke had received a letter, signed Thomas Tully, and stamped with the
Natchez postmark. The contents were to the effect that his child was
still living, that the writer of the letter knew where he was, and that,
if Mr Clarke would enclose a fifty-dollar bank-note in his answer, he
should receive further information. On receipt of the said sum, the
writer said he would indicate a place to which Mrs Clarke might repair,
unaccompanied, and there, upon payment of two hundred dollars more, the
child should be delivered up.

Upon receiving this letter, the unfortunate father consulted with his
friends and neighbours; and, by their advice, he wrote immediately to
the postmaster at Natchez, informing him of the circumstances, and
requesting that the person who applied for his answer might be detained.
Four days afterwards, a man came to the window of the post-office, and
enquired if there was any letter to the address of Thomas Tully. The
postmaster pretended to be searching for the letter amongst a pile of
others, and meanwhile a constable, who was in attendance, went round and
captured the applicant. Upon the examination of the letter, it appeared
that he was an Irishman, who had some time previously been hanging about
Natchez, and had endeavoured to establish a school there. As he,
however, had been unable to give any satisfactory account of himself, of
where he came from, or what he had been doing up to that time, and as
his manner and appearance were moreover in the highest degree suspicious
and repulsive, he had not succeeded in his plan, and the few parents who
sent their children to him had speedily withdrawn them. He was known at
Natchez by the name of Thomas Tully, nor did he now deny that that was
his name, or that he had sent the letter, which was written in a
practised schoolmasterlike hand. It was further elicited that he was
perfectly acquainted with the paths and roads between Natchez and
Hopefield, and in the neighbourhood of those two places, as well as with
the swamps, creeks, and rivers there adjacent. He was fully committed,
till such time as the father of the stolen child should be made
acquainted with the result of the examination.

In five days Clarke arrived with the negro boy Caesar. The whole town
showed the greatest sympathy with the poor man's misfortune, the lawyers
offered him their services free of charge, and a second examination of
the prisoner took place. Every thing possible was done to induce the
latter to confess what had become of the child; but to all questions he
opposed an obstinate silence. The negro boy did not recognize him. At
last he declared that he knew nothing of the stolen child, and that he
had only written the letter in the hope of extorting money from the
father. Hardly, however, had this been written down, when he turned to
Clarke, with an infernal grin upon his countenance, and said, "You have
persecuted and hunted me like a wild beast, but I will make you yet more
wretched than you are able to make me." He then proceeded to inform him
of a certain place where he would find his child's clothes.

Clarke immediately set out with a constable to the indicated spot, found
the clothes, as he had been told he would do, and returned to Natchez.
The accused was again put at the bar, and said, after frequently
contradicting himself, that the child was still alive, but that, if they
kept him longer in prison, it would inevitably die of hunger. Nothing
could persuade him to say where the boy was, or to give one syllable of
further explanation.

Meantime the quarter-sessions commenced, and the prisoner was brought up
for trial. An immense concourse of persons had assembled to witness the
proceedings in this remarkable case. Every thing was done to induce the
accused to confess, but all in vain. Promises of free pardon, and even
of reward, were made to him, if he told where the child was; but the man
maintained an obstinate silence. He at last again changed his story,
retracted his previous declaration as to his knowledge of where the boy
was, said he had found the clothes, which he had recognised by the
descriptions that had been every where advertised, and that it was that
which had put it into his head to write to the father, in hopes of
making his profit by so doing. In the absence of witnesses, although
there was strong suspicion, there could be no proof of his having
committed the crime in question. In America, circumstantial evidence is
always received with extreme caution and reluctance; and even the fact
of the child's clothes having been found in the place the prisoner had
pointed out, was insufficient to induce the jury to find the latter
guilty of the capital charge brought against him. Many of the lawyers,
indeed, were of opinion, that the man's last story was true, that he had
found the clothes, and, being a desperate character and in needy
circumstances, had written the letter for purposes of extortion. Of this
offence only was he found guilty, and condemned, as a vagrant and
impostor, to a few months' imprisonment. By the American laws no severer
punishment could be awarded. The one, however, was far from satisfying
the public. There was something so infernal in the malignant sneer of
the culprit, in the joy with which he contemplated the sufferings of the
bereaved father, and the anxiety of the numerous friends of the latter,
that a shudder of horror and disgust had frequently run through the
court during the trial. Even the coolest and most practised lawyers had
not been free from this emotion, and they declared that they had never
witnessed such obduracy.

The inhabitants of Natchez, especially of the upper town, are, generally
speaking, a highly intelligent and respectable class of people; but upon
this occasion they lost all patience and self-control, and proceeded to
an extreme measure, which only the peculiar circumstances of the case
could in any degree justify. Without previous notice, they assembled in
large numbers upon the night of the 31st of January, with a firm
determination to correct for once the mildness of the laws, and to take
the punishment o the criminal into their own hands. They opened the
prison, brought out the culprit, and after tying him up, a number of
stout negroes proceeded to flog him severely with whips of bullock's
hide.

For a long time the man bore his punishment with extraordinary
fortitude, and remained obstinately silent when questions were put to
him concerning the stolen child. At last, however, he could bear the
pain no longer, and promised a full confession. He named a house on the
banks of the Mississippi, some fifty miles from Natchez, the owner of
which, he said, knew where the child was to be found.

The sheriff had, of course, not been present at these Lynch-law
proceedings, of which he was not aware till they were over, but of which
he probably in secret did not entirely disapprove. No sooner, however,
was he told of the confession that had been extorted from the prisoner,
than he set off at once in the middle of the night, accompanied by
Clarke, for the house that had been pointed out. They arrived there at
noon on the following day, and found it inhabited by a respectable
family, who had heard of the child having been stolen, but, beyond that,
knew nothing of the matter. The mere suspicion of participation in such
a crime, seemed in the highest degree painful and offensive to them. It
was soon made evident that the prisoner had invented the story, in order
to procure a cessation of his punishment of the previous night.

The fatigues and constant disappointments that poor Clarke had endured,
had worn him out, and at last again stretched him on a bed of sickness.
His life was for a long time despaired of, but he finally recovered, and
shortly afterwards the term of imprisonment to which the child-stealer
(for such the public persisted in considering Tully) had been condemned,
expired. There was no pretext for detaining him, and he was set at
liberty. Clarke was advised to endeavour to obtain from him, by money
and good treatment, some information concerning the child. Both father
and mother threw themselves at the man's feet, implored him to name his
own reward, but to tell them what had become of their son.

"You have flogged and imprisoned me," replied the man, with one of his
malicious grins; "you would have hung me if you could; you have done all
in your power to make me miserable. It is now my turn."

And he obstinately refused to say a word on the subject of the lost
child. He left town, accompanied by Clarke, who clung to him like his
shadow, in the constant hope that he would at last make a revelation
They crossed the Mississippi together, and on arriving behind Concordia,
the bereaved father once more besought Tully to tell him what had become
of his son, swearing that, if he did not do so, he would dog him day and
night, but that he should never escape alive out of his hands. The man
asked how long he would give him. "Six-and-thirty hours" was the reply
Tully walked on for some time beside Clarke and his wife, apparently
deep in thought. On a sudden he sprang upon the backwoodsman, snatched a
pistol from his belt, and fired it at his head. The weapon missed fire.
Tully saw that his murderous attempt had failed, and apprehensive
doubtless of the punishment that it would entail, he leaped, without an
instant's hesitation, into the deepest part of a creek by which they
were walking. He sank immediately, the water closed over his head, and
he did not once reappear. His body was found a couple of hours
afterwards, but no trace was ever discovered of the Stolen Child.[1]

[1] Various particulars of the above incident may be found in the
Mississippi newspapers, of the years 1825-6.

M. GIRARDIN.

A word, before we speak of the lectures of M. Saint-Marc Girardin, on a
topic which stands at the threshold of dramatic criticism. What is the
nature of that _imitation_ of life at which the drama aims, and of that
_illusion_ which it creates?

Before the time of Dr Johnson, the learned world were accustomed to
insist upon the observance of the _unities_, on the ground that they
were necessary to uphold the illusion of the theatre. The doctor, in his
preface to Shakspeare, demolished this argument, by showing that the
illusion they were declared so necessary to support, does not, in fact,
exist. No man really believes that the stage before him is Rome, or that
he is a contemporary of the Caesars. To insist, therefore, upon the
unities of time and place, is to sacrifice to a grave _make-belief_ the
nobler ends of the drama--the development of character and passion. "The
objection," says Dr Johnson, "arising from the impossibility of passing
the first hour at Alexandria, and the next at Rome, supposes that, when
the play opens, the spectator really imagines himself at Alexandria, and
believes that his walk to the theatre has been a voyage to Egypt, and
that he lives in the days of Antony and Cleopatra. _Surely he that
imagines this may imagine more._ He that can take the stage at one time
for the palace of the Ptolemies, may take it in half an hour for the
promontory of Actium."

If the delusion of the theatre, we will add, should, at certain moments,
reach such a point that we may be said to believe ourselves transported
to the place represented on the stage, this, not being a _continuous_
delusion, cannot be disturbed by the mere changing of the scene; it will
not the less take place at the promontory of Actium, because we had felt
it, five minutes before, in the city of Alexandria.

Since the appearance of the celebrated preface to Shakspeare, it has
been the habit of critics to speak, not of a delusion, but of an
imitation, which is _felt to be_ an imitation, and which pleases us in
great part by this perceived resemblance to an original. "It will be
asked," continues Dr Johnson, "how the drama moves, if it is not
credited? It is credited with all the credit due to a drama. It is
credited wherever it moves, _as a just picture of a real original_--as
representing to the auditor what he would himself feel if he were to do
or suffer what is there feigned to be suffered or to be done. The
reflection that strikes the heart is not that the evils before us are
real evils, but that they are evils to which we ourselves may be
exposed."[1] * * * _The delight of tragedy proceeds from our
consciousness of fiction_; if we thought murders and treasons real,
they would please no more. Imitations produce pain or pleasure, not
because they are mistaken for realities, but because they bring
realities to mind.

[1] _Cours de Litterature Dramatique; ou de l'Usage des Passions dans le
Drame_. Par M. SAINT-MARC GIRARDIN, Professeur a la Faculte des Lettres
de Paris, &c. &c.

This appears to us a very indifferent account of the matter. In the far
greater number of instances, we can never have formed any conception of
an _original_ of which the actor and the scene are supposed to present
us a _picture_. Who that witnesses the play of _Venice Preserved_, has
formed any other image of Jaffier or Pierre than what the actors are
presenting to him, or may already, on some previous occasion, have
presented to him? Even when the characters are strictly historical, the
imagination is little better provided. The spectator does not refer to
any faint conception in his own mind of a Brutus, or a Mark Antony, and
then derive his pleasure from watching how closely the mimic
representation imitates the original. Very often the scene must present
something entirely new to the imagination, and yet the pleasure is not
diminished on this account. A simple man, who has never seen the
interior of a palace, never looked on royalty, never beheld even a
veritable courtier, feels no embarrassment when he is suddenly called to
witness the pomps and miseries of "imperial tragedy."

The imitation of the drama is not that of any specific original; it is a
mimic scene, having human nature for its type. It has a life of its own,
constructed from the materials which the records and observations of
real life have supplied. In order to move us, it needs no reference to
any recognised original. It is there in virtue of the vesture of
humanity in which it is clothed, and makes its appeal at once and
directly.

It is usual to speak of all the fine arts as _imitative arts_. The term
is not always applicable, and, when most applicable, requires
explanation. What does the poetry of sentiment imitate? What does a song
imitate? How can the term be applied to all that class of poetry where
the writer pours out his own reflections and feelings? The poetry of
Wordsworth or of Burns can no more be said to be imitative, than the
conversation of the same men, when, in their hours of intimate
intercourse, the one may have given expression to his philanthropy, and
the other to his friendship. But where the term is most applicable, it
requires to be used guardedly. Even in painting and sculpture, the
artist does not imitate the object in its totality--does not strive to
make an approximation to a _fac-simile_--but he selects certain
_qualities_ of the object for his imitation. The painter confines
himself to colour and outline; the sculptor abstracts the form, and give
it us in the marble.

Accordingly, when we stand before a statue, we do not think of a man,
and then of the statue as the imitation of this original; but the statue
is itself clothed with some of the qualities of the human being, which
give to the cold marble that _half-life_ which we feel the moment we
look upon it. In the same manner, when the dramatist puts his characters
on the stage, they are not imitations of any definite originals, but
they are invested with certain accidents and attributes of humanity,
which give them at once the interest we feel in them, and set them
living and moving in their own mimic world.

And this mimic world is capable of creating an illusion--not such as Dr
Johnson combated--but of a kind he does not appear to have taken into
account. The doctor is triumphant when he denies the existence of that
theatrical delusion presupposed as a ground for the unities. We do not,
as soon as the curtain rises, believe ourselves transported to Rome, nor
do we take the actor upon his word, and believe him to be Caesar the
moment he proclaims his imperial dignity. The illusion of the theatre
springs directly from the _passion_ with which we are infected, not from
the outward pomp and circumstance of the stage. These, even on the most
ignorant of spectators, produce barely the sentiment of wonder and
surprise, never a belief in their reality. The real illusion of the
drama begins, so to speak, not at the beginning, but at the end; it is
the last result, the result of the last vivid word which sprung from the
lips of the actor; and it diffuses a momentary reality over all that
stage apparatus, animate and inanimate, which was there only as a
preparation for that vivid word of the poet.

When the curtain rises, we see very plainly--quite unmistakeably--the
boarded stage before us. It may fill with men and women most gorgeously
attired, and these may proceed to declare their rank and condition, and
the peculiar dangers which environ them, and still there is nothing
better before us than the boarded stage and the talking actor. But, by
and by, the word of passion is uttered, and the heart beats, and the
wooden stage is seen no more, and the actor is forgotten in his griefs
or his anger, and the fictitious position is a real life, and the pomp
and circumstance of the scene, if not believed in, are no longer
questioned. We are not perhaps at Rome, nor is that Mark Antony--for we
never knew Mark Antony to recognise him--but this mimic world has
assumed an independent life and reality of its own. When, indeed, the
passion subsides, and the eloquence of the poet is mute, things revert
to their matter-of-fact condition, the actor is again there, and the
boards of the stage again become visible.

To the passage we last quoted from Dr Johnson, some other objections
suggest themselves; but, as we have not quoted it in a polemical spirit,
but merely to illustrate our own position, we have no wish to enter upon
them. One remark only we will make, and that because it admits of a
general application. Dr Johnson describes the sympathy we feel at the
theatre, as the result of a reference to what our own _personal_
feelings would be in the situation we see represented on the stage. The
auditor represents to himself "what he would himself feel, if he were to
do or suffer what is there feigned to be suffered or to be done. The
reflection that strikes the heart is not, that the evils before us are
real evils, but that they are evils to which we ourselves may be
exposed." We do not think that, in order to sympathize with what takes
place on the stage, or in real life, there is any necessity for this
circuitous proceeding. We do not detect in ourselves this constant
reference to our own personality, and, least of all, in those moments
when we are most moved. It is enough that there be a vivid conception of
any passion, for this passion to become for a moment our own. If this
reference to our probable feelings, in such or such a position, were
necessary, how is it that we men sympathize so promptly and so keenly in
the distresses of the heroine? We certainly do not, for instance, set to
work to imagine ourselves women and mothers--which would be a difficult
exercise of the imagination--before we feel the grief of Constance for
the loss of her child. In short, we at once assume to ourselves the
passions of another; we do not wait, as it were, to try them on; to make
experiment how we, with all our dispositions, natural and acquired,
should feel in the supposed predicament.

It is far from our intention to give a full and methodical account of
the lectures of M. Saint-Marc Girardin, the perusal of which led us to a
reconsideration of some of our critical principles. They are far above
mediocrity, distinguished by strong sense and vivid expression. Their
principal feature is the just and animated protest they contain against
the literary taste of the present day in France; a taste for the
perverted, the horrible, the monstrous; a taste that welcomes Victor
Hugo with outstretched arms, and retains but a frigid recollection of
Racine. With this literary taste is intimately connected an unhealthy
and feverish condition of the moral sentiments, against which the
lecturer directs his most eloquent attacks; so that his book may be
commended for its sound ethical as well as critical instruction. The
circumstance that the lectures were delivered before the University of
Paris, renders this strain of remark still more appropriate and useful.

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