LETTER XVII.

Florence, 1st May, 1872.

My Friends,

Have you thought, as I prayed you to think, during the days of April, what things they are that will hinder you from being happy on this first of May? Be assured of it, you are meant, to-day, to be as happy as the birds, at least. If you are not, you, or somebody else, or something that you are one or other responsible for, is wrong; and your first business is to set yourself, them, or it, to rights. Of late you have made that your last business; you have thought things would right themselves, or that it was God’s business to right them, not yours. Peremptorily it is yours. Not, observe, to get your rights, but to put things to rights. Some eleven in the dozen of the population of the world are occupied earnestly in putting things to wrongs, thinking to benefit themselves thereby. Is it any wonder, then, you are uncomfortable, when already the world, in our part of it, is over-populated, and eleven in the dozen of the over-population doing diligently wrong; and the remaining dozenth expecting God to do their work for them; and consoling themselves with buying two-shilling publications for eighteenpence?

To put things to rights! Do you not know how refreshing it is, even to put one’s room to rights, when it has got dusty and decomposed? If no other happiness is to be had, the mere war with decomposition is a kind of happiness. But the war with the Lord of Decomposition, the old Dragon himself,—St. George’s war, with a princess to save, and win—are none of you, my poor friends, proud enough to hope for any part in that battle? Do you conceive no figure of any princess for May Queen; or is the definite dragon turned into indefinite cuttlefish, vomiting black venom into the waters of your life; or has he multiplied himself into an host of pulicarious dragons—bug-dragons, insatiable as unclean,—whose food you are, daily?

St. George’s war! Here, since last May, when I engraved Giotto’s Hope for you, have I been asking whether any one would volunteer for such battle? Not one human creature, except a personal friend or two, for mere love of me, has answered.

Now, it is true, that my writing may be obscure, or seem only half in earnest. But it is the best I can do: it expresses the thoughts that come to me as they come; and I have no time just now to put them into more intelligible words. And, whether you believe them or not, they are entirely faithful words: I have no interest at all to serve by writing, but yours.

And, literally, no one answers. Nay, even those who read, read so carelessly that they don’t notice whether the book is to go on or not.

Heaven knows; but it shall, if I am able, and what I undertook last May, be fulfilled, so far as the poor faculty or time left me may serve.

Read over, now, the end of that letter for May last, from “To talk at a distance,” in page 10.

I have given you the tenth of all I have, as I promised. I cannot, because of those lawyers I was talking of last month, get it given you in a permanent and accumulative form; besides that, among the various blockheadisms and rascalities of the day, the perversion of old endowments from their appointed purposes being now practised with applause, gives one little encouragement to think of the future. However, the seven thousand pounds are given, and wholly now out of my own power; and, as I said, only two or three friends, for love of me, and one for true love of justice also, have, in the course of the year, joined with me.

However, this is partly my own fault, for not saying more clearly what I want; and for expecting people to be moved by writing, instead of by personal effort. The more I see of writing the less I care for it; one may do more with a man by getting ten words spoken with him face to face, than by the black lettering of a whole life’s thought.

In parenthesis, just read this little bit of Plato; and take it to heart. If the last sentence of it does not fit some people I know of, there is no prophecy on lip of man.

Socrates is speaking. “I have heard indeed—but no one can say now if it is true or not—that near Nancratis, in Egypt, there was born one of the old gods, the one to whom the bird is sacred which they call the ibis; and this god or demigod’s name was Theuth.” Second parenthesis—(Theuth, or Thoth: he always has the head of an ibis with a beautiful long bill, in Egyptian sculpture; and you may see him at the British Museum on stone and papyrus infinite,—especially attending at judgments after death, when people’s sins are to be weighed in scales; for he is the Egyptian account-keeper, and adds up, and takes note of, things, as you will hear presently from Plato. He became the god of merchants, and a rogue, among the Romans, and is one now among us). “And this demigod found out first, they say, arithmetic, and logic, and geometry, and astronomy, and gambling, and the art of writing.

So much for cheap literature; not that I like cheap talk better, mind you; but I wish I could get a word or two with a few honest people, now, face to face. For I have called the fund I have established The St. George’s Fund, because I hope to find, here and there, some one who will join in a White Company, like Sir John Hawkwood’s, to be called the Company of St. George; which shall have for its end the wise creating and bestowing, instead of the wise stealing, of money. Now it literally happened that before the White Company went into Italy, there was an Italian Company called ‘of St. George,’ which was afterwards incorporated with Sir John’s of the burnished armour; and another company, called ‘of the Rose,’ which was a very wicked and destructive one. And within my St. George’s Company,—which shall be of persons still following their own business, wherever they are, but who will give the tenth of what they have, or make, for the purchase of land in England, to be cultivated by hand, as aforesaid, in my last May number,—shall be another company, not destructive, called of “Monte Rosa,” or “Mont Rose,” because Monte Rosa is the central mountain of the range between north and south Europe, which keeps the gift of the rain of heaven. And the motto, or watchword of this company is to be the old French “Mont-joie.” And they are to be entirely devoted, according to their power, first to the manual labour of cultivating pure land, and guiding of pure streams and rain to the places where they are needed: and secondly, together with this manual labour, and much by its means, they are to carry on the thoughtful labour of true education, in themselves, and of others. And they are not to be monks nor nuns; but are to learn, and teach all fair arts, and sweet order and obedience of life; and to educate the children entrusted to their schools in such practical arts and patient obedience; but not at all, necessarily, in either arithmetic, writing, or reading.

That is my design, romantic enough, and at this day difficult enough; yet not so romantic, nor so difficult as your now widely and openly proclaimed design, of making the words “obedience” and “loyalty” to cease from the English tongue.

So he stands, leaning on his long sword—a man desirous of setting the world to rights, if it might be; but not knowing the way of it, nor recognizing that the steel with which it can be done, must take another shape than that double-edged one.

And from the eleventh century to this dull nineteenth, less and less the rulers of men have known their weapon. So far, yet, are we from beating sword into ploughshare, that now the sword is set to undo the plough’s work when it has been done; and at this hour the ghastliest ruin of all that moulder from the fire, pierced through black rents by the unnatural sunlight above the ashamed streets of Paris, is the long, skeleton, and roofless hollow of the “Grenier d’Abondance.”

Such Agriculture have we contrived here, in Europe, and ploughing of new furrows for graves. Will you hear how Agriculture is now contrived in America?—where, since you spend your time here in burning corn, you must send to buy it; trusting, however, still to your serviceable friend the Fire, as here to consume, so there, to sow and reap, for repairing of consumption. I have just received a letter from California, which I trust the writer will not blame me for printing:—

“March 1st, 1872.

“Sir,

“You have so strongly urged ‘agriculture by the hand’ that it may be of some interest to you to know the result thus far of agriculture by machinery, in California. I am the more willing to address you on this subject from the fact that I may have to do with a new Colony in this State, which will, I trust, adopt, as far as practicable, your ideas as to agriculture by the hand. Such thoughts as you might choose to give regarding the conduct of such a Colony here would be particularly acceptable; and should you deem it expedient to comply with this earnest and sincere request, the following facts may be of service to you in forming just conclusions.

“We have a genial climate and a productive soil. Our farms (‘ranches’) frequently embrace many thousands of acres, while the rule is, scarcely ever less than hundreds of acres. Wheat-fields of 5,000 acres are by no means uncommon, and not a few of above 40,000 acres are known. To cultivate these extensive tracts much machinery is used, such as steam-ploughs, gang-ploughs, reaping, mowing, sowing, and thrashing machines; and seemingly to the utter extermination of the spirit of home, and rural life. Gangs of labourers are hired during the emergency of harvesting; and they are left for the most part unhoused, and are also fed more like animals than men. Harvesting over, they are discharged, and thus are left near the beginning of our long and rainy winters to shift for themselves. Consequently the larger towns and cities are invested for months with idle men and boys. Housebreaking and highway robbery are of almost daily occurrence. As to the farmers themselves, they live in a dreamy, comfortless way, and are mostly without education or refinement. To show them how to live better and cleaner; to give them nobler aims than merely to raise wheat for the English market; to teach them the history of those five cities, and ‘their girls to cook exquisitely,’ etc., is surely a mission for earnest men in this country, no less than in England, to say nothing of the various accomplishments to which you have alluded. I have caused to be published in some of our farming districts many of the more important of your thoughts bearing on these subjects, and I trust with beneficial results.

“Your most thankful servant, ——”

With the account given in the first part of this letter of the results of mechanical agriculture in California, you shall now compare a little sketch by Marmontel of the peasant life, not mechanical, in his own province. It is given, altering only the name of the river, in the “Contes Moraux,” in the story, professing to continue that of Moliére’s ‘Misanthrope’:

“Alceste, discontented as you know, both with his mistress and with his judges, decided upon flying from men, and retired very far from Paris to the banks of the Vologne; this river, in which the shells enclose pearl, is yet more precious by the fertility which it causes to spring on its borders; the valley that it waters is one beautiful meadow. On one side of it rise smiling hills, scattered all over with woods and villages, on the other extends a vast level of fields covered with corn. It was there that Alceste went to live, forgotten by all, free from cares, and from irksome duties; entirely his own, and finally delivered from the odious spectacle of the world, he breathed freely, and praised heaven for having broken all his chains. A little study, much exercise, pleasures not vivid, but untroubled; in a word, a life peacefully active, preserved him from the ennui of solitude: he desired nothing, and regretted nothing. One of the pleasures of his retreat was to see the cultivated and fertile ground all about him nourishing a peasantry, which appeared to him happy. For a misanthrope who has become so by his virtue, only thinks that he hates men, because he loves them. Alceste felt a strange softening of the heart mingled with joy at the sight of his fellow-creatures rich by the labour of their hand. ‘Those people,’ said he, ‘are very happy to be still half savage. They would soon be corrupted if they were more civilized.’ As he was walking in the country, he chanced upon a labourer who was ploughing, and singing as he ploughed. ‘God have a care of you, my good man!’ said he; ‘you are very gay?’ ‘I mostly am,’ replied the peasant. ‘I am happy to hear it: that proves that you are content with your condition.’ ‘Until now, I have good cause to be.’ ‘Are you married?’ ‘Yes, thank heaven.’ ‘Have you any children?’ ‘I had five. I have lost one, but that is a mischief that may be mended.’ ‘Is your wife young?’ ‘She is twenty-five years old.’ ‘Is she pretty?’ ‘She is, for me, but she is better than pretty, she is good.’ ‘And you love her?’ ‘If I love her! Who would not love her! I wonder?’ ‘And she loves you also, without doubt.’ ‘Oh! for that matter, with all her heart—just the same as before marriage.’ ‘Then you loved each other before marriage?’ ‘Without that, should we have let ourselves be caught?’ ‘And your children—are they healthy?’ ‘Ah! it’s a pleasure to see them! The eldest is only five years old, and he’s already a great deal cleverer than his father, and for my two girls, never was anything so charming! It’ll be ill-luck indeed if they don’t get husbands. The youngest is sucking yet, but the little fellow will be stout and strong. Would you believe it?—he beats his sisters when they want to kiss their mother!—he’s always afraid of anybody’s taking him from the breast.’ ‘All that is, then, very happy?’ ‘Happy! I should think so—you should see the joy there is when I come back from my work! You would say they hadn’t seen me for a year. I don’t know which to attend to first. My wife is round my neck—my girls in my arms—my boy gets hold of my legs—little Jeannot is like to roll himself off the bed to get to me—and I, I laugh, and cry, and kiss all at once—for all that makes me cry!’ ‘I believe it, indeed,’ said Alceste. ‘You know it, sir, I suppose, for you are doubtless a father?’ ‘I have not that happiness.’ ‘So much the worse for you! There’s nothing in the world worth having, but that.’ ‘And how do you live?’ ‘Very well: we have excellent bread, good milk, and the fruit of our orchard. My wife, with a little bacon, makes a cabbage soup that the King would be glad to eat! Then we have eggs from the poultry-yard; and on Sunday we have a feast, and drink a little cup of wine’ ‘Yes, but when the year is bad?’ ‘Well, one expects the year to be bad, sometimes, and one lives on what one has saved from the good years.’ ‘Then there’s the rigour of the weather—the cold and the rain, and the heat—that you have to bear.’ ‘Well! one gets used to it; and if you only knew the pleasure that one has in the evening, in getting the cool breeze after a day of summer; or, in winter, warming one’s hands at the blaze of a good faggot, between one’s wife and children; and then one sups with good appetite, and one goes to bed; and think you, that one remembers the bad weather? Sometimes my wife says to me,—“My good man, do you hear the wind and the storm? Ah, suppose you were in the fields?” “But I’m not in the fields, I’m here,” I say to her. Ah, sir! there are many people in the fine world, who don’t live as content as we.’ ‘Well! but the taxes?’ ‘We pay them merrily—and well we should—all the country can’t be noble, our squires and judges can’t come to work in the fields with us—they do for us what we can’t—we do for them what they can’t—and every business, as one says, has its pains.’ ‘What equity!’ said the misanthrope; ‘there, in two words, is all the economy of primitive society. Ah, Nature! there is nothing just but thee! and the healthiest reason is in thy untaught simplicity. But, in paying the taxes so willingly, don’t you run some risk of getting more put on you?’ ‘We used to be afraid of that; but, thank God, the lord of the place has relieved us from this anxiety. He plays the part of our good king to us. He imposes and receives himself, and, in case of need, makes advances for us. He is as careful of us as if we were his own children.’ ‘And who is this gallant man?’ ‘The Viscount Laval—he is known enough, all the country respects him.’ ‘Does he live in his château?’ ‘He passes eight months of the year there.’ ‘And the rest?’ ‘At Paris, I believe.’ ‘Does he see any company?’ ‘The townspeople of Bruyeres, and now and then, some of our old men go to taste his soup and chat with him.’ ‘And from Paris does he bring nobody?’ ‘Nobody but his daughter.’ ‘He is much in the right. And how does he employ himself?’ ‘In judging between us—in making up our quarrels—in marrying our children—in maintaining peace in our families—in helping them when the times are bad.’ ‘You must take me to see his village,’ said Alceste, ‘that must be interesting.’

“He was surprised to find the roads, even the cross-roads, bordered with hedges, and kept with care; but, coming on a party of men occupied in mending them, ‘Ah!’ he said, ‘so you’ve got forced labour here?’ ‘Forced?’ answered an old man who presided over the work. ‘We know nothing of that here, sir; all these men are paid, we constrain nobody; only, if there comes to the village a vagrant, or a do-nothing, they send him to me, and if he wants bread he can gain it; or, he must go to seek it elsewhere.’ ‘And who has established this happy police?’ ‘Our good lord—our father—the father to all of us.’ ‘And where do the funds come from?’ ‘From the commonalty; and, as it imposes the tax on itself, it does not happen here, as too often elsewhere, that the rich are exempted at the expense of the poor.’

“The esteem of Alceste increased every moment for the wise and benevolent master who governed all this little country. ‘How powerful would a king be!’ he said to himself—‘and how happy a state! if all the great proprietors followed the example of this one; but Paris absorbs both property and men, it robs all, and swallows up everything.’

“The first glance at the village showed him the image of confidence and comfort. He entered a building which had the appearance of a public edifice, and found there a crowd of children, women, and old men occupied in useful labour;—idleness was only permitted to the extremely feeble. Childhood, almost at its first steps out of the cradle, caught the habit and the taste for work; and old age, at the borders of the tomb, still exercised its trembling hands; the season in which the earth rests brought every vigorous arm to the workshops—and then the lathe, the saw, and the hatchet gave new value to products of nature.

“ ‘I am not surprised,’ said Alceste, ‘that this people is pure from vice, and relieved from discontent. It is laborious, and occupied without ceasing.’ He asked how the workshop had been established. ‘Our good lord,’ was the reply, ‘advanced the first funds for it. It was a very little place at first, and all that was done was at his expense, at his risk, and to his profit; but, once convinced that there was solid advantage to be gained, he yielded the enterprise to us, and now interferes only to protect; and every year he gives to the village the instruments of some one of our arts. It is the present that he makes at the first wedding which is celebrated in the year.’ ”

Thus wrote, and taught, a Frenchman of the old school, before the Revolution. But worldly-wise Paris went on her own way absorbing property and men; and has attained, this first of May, what means and manner of festival you see in her Grenier d’Abondance.

Glance back now to my proposal for the keeping of the first of May, in the letter on “Rose Gardens” in ‘Time and Tide,’ and discern which state is best for you—modern “civilization,” or Marmontel’s rusticity, and mine.

Ever faithfully yours,

JOHN RUSKIN.