CHAPTER XII

LAVENGRO--THE LAST OF THE MOHICANS--TOM SAWYER--HUCKLEBERRY FINN--KIM--SARD HARKER--THE LIVING FOREST

We occasionally meet an odd person, someone out of the common, who is not like other people. Books can be odd too, not like other books, but strikingly individual, and interesting for the very reason that they are odd. _Lavengro_, written by a man with out-of-the-way knowledge of many things, whose name was George Borrow, is a book of this description.

Possibly not everyone who tries to read _Lavengro_ will care for it very much. As people say, it is not a book that belongs to everybody. Yet _Lavengro_ is a great book, or at least a remarkable one, and numbers of people find much enjoyment in it. What those who read _Lavengro_ value in it most is a sense which it possesses of life under the open sky. In _Lavengro_ we have as our companions the winds and the stars. Its characters have no fixed place of abode, but are always ready to travel on the high road which winds away into the distance inviting us to follow it. There is something in almost all of us which answers to the call of the open sky and the winding road. Even if we have no intention of living that kind of life, a gypsy's life, we like to read about it.

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_Lavengro_ is a book about the gypsies. The word Lavengro is romany, or gypsy, and it means word-master. George Borrow had the gift of learning languages easily and knew many different languages. The gypsies therefore called him _Lavengro_.

There is a famous passage in the book, which you will find at the very end of chapter twenty-five, that gathers up the charm of the narrative, or story, in a few words. Here it is:

"Life is sweet, brother."

"Do you think so?"

"Think so!--There's night and day, brother, both sweet things; sun, moon, and stars, brother, all sweet things; there's likewise a wind on the heath. Life is very sweet, brother; who would wish to die?"

"I would wish to die--"

"You talk like a gorgio--which is the same as talking like a fool--were you a Romany Chal you would talk wiser. Wish to die, indeed!--A Romany Chal would wish to live for ever!"

"In sickness, Jasper?"

"There's the sun and the stars, brother."

"In blindness, Jasper?"

"There's the wind on the heath, brother; if I could only feel that, I would gladly live forever. Dosta, we'll now go to the tents and put on the gloves; and I'll try to make you feel what a sweet thing it is to be alive, brother!"

Jasper Petulengro, the chief of the Smith tribe of gypsies, and Lavengro, who are the two men speaking, were skilled boxers and liked to box with each other.

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Notice how sharply we can distinguish the difference between the points of view of the two men. Lavengro, or Borrow, wants in the future something better and more perfect than he has in his present life, but Jasper loves everything as it is, and wants to live the same kind of life always. There is truth in both points of view. We all long for perfection. But, certainly, Jasper is right when he sees and feels the deep, intense beauty and ecstasy which live in nature and which we feel in the wind on the heath, the sky, the stars, the sun and the moon.

This brief quotation will give you an idea of Borrow's story at its best. Even if you have read no more than the ending of chapter twenty-five, you will know something of _Lavengro_, which is a book of adventure, and yet has a very distinct character of its own.

_The Last of the Mohicans_, by James Fenimore Cooper, is judged to be one of the most successful and enjoyable stories ever written about North American Indians. You know how we can form in our minds a picture of the great skill of the Indian as a hunter. We can imagine an Indian hunter stealing through the woods, treading so lightly and carefully that he makes no noise, bending his head to listen, able to hear sounds that to the rest of us are inaudible, his quick eyes noting tiny signs of broken twigs or crushed grass which are to us invisible. This picture, which, if we could look into other people's minds, we would find hidden away in the thoughts of almost everyone, the world owes largely to the author of _The Last of the Mohicans_.

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Cooper was born in the State of New Jersey in 1789, but, while he was still an infant, he was taken to the State of New York. His father had bought a large tract of land there, and in the wild forest and on the shores of Otsego Lake, young James Cooper learned to watch and know the Indians. He was sent to college, but was not very successful as a student, and before long shipped as a sailor before the mast. For a number of years, he had many experiences on the Great Lakes and at sea. Finally, he gave up being a sailor, and lived near Cooperstown. _The Last of the Mohicans_ is one of a series of five stories known as the Leatherstocking Tales. Cooper wrote many stories, but this series is the most interesting. Leatherstocking himself is the white man who has gained Indian skill and cunning as a hunter. He is known by many names, Leatherstocking, Natty Bumppo, Hawk-eye, and La Longue Carabine. Part of the enjoyment we have in reading Cooper's stories arises from the circumstance that these stirring and exciting days of which he writes have already almost completely vanished and his books contain a record which is of value historically. Read the following description of the scout Leatherstocking.

"His person, though muscular, was rather attenuated than full; but every nerve and muscle appeared strong and indurated by unremitting exposure and toil. He wore a hunting-shirt of forest-green, fringed with faded yellow, and a summer cap of skins, which had been shorn of their fur. He also bore a knife in a girdle of wampum, like that which confined the scanty {80} garments of the Indian, but no tomahawk. His moccasins were ornamented after the gay fashion of the natives, while the only part of his under dress which appeared below the hunting-frock, was a pair of buckskin leggings, that laced at the sides, and were gartered above the knees with the sinews of a deer. A pouch and horn completed his personal accoutrements, though a rifle of a great length, which the theory of the more ingenious whites had taught them was the most dangerous of all fire-arms, leaned against a neighbouring sapling."

There is something honest, strong and dependable about Hawk-eye, besides his bravery and skill, which makes us like and respect him greatly. But the most heroic and romantic figure in the book is young Uncas, who is the last of the Mohicans. This story of danger, attack, slaughter and peril, centering round Hawk-eye, Uncas, his father Chingachgook, and two beautiful English girls attempting to escape through the woods with a young English officer, Heyward, is almost the perfection of a story of adventure in its own class. As an example of how thrilling the story can be, read the account of the shooting contest in chapter twenty-nine.

Several generations of boys and girls have already enjoyed _Tom Sawyer_ and _Huckleberry Finn_. Perhaps no other writer has ever succeeded as well as Mark Twain in putting a real boy between the covers of a book in a story. Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn are not fanciful portraits. They are exactly such boys as anyone to-day can watch playing in a vacant lot, or down {81} by a river on a raft, or up in a hay-mow, or playing at being robbers in an old deserted shed or house, or reading books, or telling stories, or teasing but loving mothers and aunties, and learning about grown-up men and life in general. _Tom Sawyer_ is the first of Mark Twain's famous books about boys, and _Huckleberry Finn_ is a continuation of the same story.

Tom lived with his Aunt Polly in the village of St. Petersburg on the Mississippi. He was the leading spirit among the boys of the place, largely because he had an active imagination and could devise many exciting games which often led to real adventures. Huckleberry Finn was a boy without a home; he had a father who was a source of danger rather than a loving protector. In _Huckleberry Finn_, there is the splendid story of Jim who was a slave and ran away with Huckleberry. As we read of their adventures, while they floated down the Mississippi on a raft, we learn to know and love Jim for his devotion, loyalty and child-like nature. Huck, too, plays as fine a part as many a hero who may appear more romantic than this runaway boy. But you must read _Huckleberry Finn_ yourself, and find out what happened. The great Mississippi river, mysterious, picturesque, flowing always past their village into the unknown south, exercised a powerful fascination on the minds of the boys. Many of their adventures had to do with the river, and some of the happenings were terrifying as well as exciting. But Tom and Huck actually did find hidden treasure and each boy's share was put in the bank, so that the boys had a small yearly income at the end of the {82} first story. These two books, when we read them, give us a curious, lasting feeling of real life and actual happenings, probably in part because Mark Twain, whose everyday name was Samuel Clemens, must have been writing about his own boyhood. When he was a boy, nothing would satisfy him but learning to be a pilot on a Mississippi steamboat; he was on the river for four years.

There are many other romantic and adventurous stories for us to read. Make sure that the author knows and understands what he is writing about, otherwise it is seldom worth while to spend much time in reading his book. Stories of romance and adventure ought always to be brave and fearless, kind and generous, pure and light-hearted. They ought to make us feel that it is worth while to go on an adventure. When these things are true of a book, we can spend many happy hours with its hero, no matter where he rides, or sails, or flies.

There are three books, the work of authors who belong to our own time, that we should not miss reading. First comes Rudyard Kipling's glorious story of a boy in India called _Kim_; then the poet Masefield's story of _Sard Harker_ and of the sea and South America; and, last of the three, a fine story of the woods and rivers of the far north, called _The Living Forest_, written by a Canadian artist, Arthur Heming.

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PART III

SONGS OF HEROES, MYTHS, FAIRY TALES AND MARVELS

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