鍾玲《輪迴》台北：時報文化，1983/2刷 胡菊人序 介紹短篇小說〈灰濛濛的愛河〉
2018年10月28日 星期日
2018年10月25日 星期四
On The Many Lives of Hu Shih. 不做無益事，一日當三日，人活五十年，我活百五十
胡先生寫過，在網路看過
"不做無益事，一日當三日，人活五十年，我活百五十。" 究竟是胡適說的，還是林語堂說的？
胡適在上世紀40年代，曾寫過一首詩：「不做無益事，一日當三日，人活五十歲，我活百五十。」 胡適的詩脫胎於明代的徐文長，徐詩云：「無事此遊戲，一日當三日，我活七十歲，便是二百一。」
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(周質平{ 胡適與林語堂} )：林語堂極重視生活的情趣，暢銷一時的英文名著The Importance of Living（《生活的藝術》）就是一本專論生活情趣的作品。在他看來，沈復的《浮生六記》描述了接近理想的一種生活方式，而書中的芸娘則是中國文學裏一 個最知情識趣的女人。他明確地指出：“生活的目的是真正地享受生活。”胡適幾乎不談生活的情趣，他所樂道的是生命的意義或生活的內容這些極嚴肅的話題。他自作的白話詩“不做無益事，一日當三日，人活五十年，我活百五十”最能體現他的生活態度，他在1919年寫了一篇為大眾說法的《新生活》短文，他給“新生 活”所下的定義是“新生活就是有意思的生活”。此處“有意思”三個字，絕不意味著林語堂所說的“有趣味”（interesting, fun, or enjoyable），而是“有意義”（meaningful），胡適要我們每做一件事，都問一個“為什麼”， 要是回答不出“為什麼”，就不是“有意思”的生活。在林語堂看來，這樣的生活態度很認真，也很嚴肅，但卻未必有趣味。
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"放也放不下" 句是胡適的。
*****
Hanching Chung 分享了 1 則貼文。
2017年10月25日下午8:31 ·
The whole secret of life is to be interested in one thing profoundly and in a thousand things well. --Horace Walpole
Yale University Library
2017年10月24日下午10:15 ·
To mark the tercentenary of the birth of Horace Walpole (1717–1797), English author, antiquarian, collector, and politician, the Lewis Walpole Library is sponsoring programs throughout the year to commemorate the occasion.
On Thursday, October 26th at 5:30pm, George Haggerty, Distinguished Professor and Chair, Department of English, University of California, Riverside, will present a public lecture at the Yale Center for British Art on The Many Lives of Horace Walpole.
http://walpole.library.yale.edu/programs/lectures
董橋：好字、胡適的字
2012.5.27
老一輩人肯用功，學問修養根柢好。徐調孚中學畢業考進上海商務印書館，參加文學研究會，主編《文學周刊》，助編《小說月報》，為開明書店翻譯《世界文學少年叢刊》，幫着鄭振鐸修補增訂《文學大綱》，抗戰勝利後校印《聞一多全集》，籌組「朱自清全集編輯委員會」。徐先生編校審訂的這些老書我少年時代大半讀過，還讀過他校注的《人間詞話》。
他的翻譯只記得《木偶奇遇記》，譯得好不好沒印象。一九八○年徐訏先生咖啡座上我見過徐調孚寫的一封信，字很瀟灑，練過的，翌年他辭世。柯靈編《萬象》每期登一幅作家手迹，徐先生給柯先生寫信閑話作家書法，說周作人、老舍、趙景深、茅盾的稿子排字人歡迎。老舍顏碑打底，端正樸厚。趙景深是大胖子，愛用青蓮墨色寫字，多姿像閨秀，字和人不相襯。茅盾書法好，寫稿雖然清楚，字並不好，瘦削瑣小，筆劃常不齊全，排字一走神會排錯。鄭振鐸文稿字形極大，藏不進格子，添注塗改又厲害，讀來費神。鄭先生的毛筆字倒是大佳，顏魯公體外加寫經體，鐵劃銀鈎，儘管不如錢玄同精美，功力畢竟不淺。錢玄同真迹英國亞非學院圖書館老書裏見過他的題識，棱角都磨圓了的金冬心，秀潤富泰得要命。聽說他替人家題的字很多，坊間竟少見，都捨不得放走。他的學生魏建功也練寫經體，我有一本舊書魏先生題識，端莊漂亮。劉半農書法也渾厚。沈尹默不必說，行楷聖教序加蘇東坡，楹帖大字藏着魏碑，是大書法家。
徐調孚說胡適的字庸俗，學東坡而乏東坡筆力，雖也挺拔，一瀉無遺，不堪回味，跟文章一樣少了文采。我不覺得。胡先生的字正直仁厚，小字尤其開朗爽利，在台灣讀遍他的著述見過他的晚年我從來偏心偏愛他的書法。周作人小行書真是徐先生說的秀澹閑雅，不沾人間烟火，看了幾十年看不厭。徐調孚說女作家手筆個個不脫女子纖細筆勢，謝冰心謝冰瑩沉櫻蘇雪林陳學昭都相像。蘇老師寫字很快，字體稍扁，有點像寫快了的胡適之。林海音先生的字才是書法家的字，毛筆小行楷寫信裱起來掛都很漂亮：字怕掛，林先生的字不怕掛。盧隱女士毛筆也用得多，徐先生說草率特甚，標點也亂，「她的不能永年，我們在她的書法裏可以看到一些端倪」。丁玲、胡也頻、沈從文三位字都好，沈先生倒是書法家了，章草大有成就，字字靈動，二王底子深，鋼筆字也見功力。徐先生說作家正楷俞平伯、葉紹鈞、王統照最擅長，俞平伯有顏真卿之剛兼鍾元常之麗，筆筆正派。俞先生書法一九四○、五○年代我最愛收，是顛峯，連信都是藝術品，太迷人了。王統照我無緣一藏，扇面冊頁友朋家中見過，不輸俞平伯，聽說蘭亭臨得熟。葉紹鈞早年開明書店小學課本請他寫了影印，老穆藏了一冊，真端麗。前輩王念青先生家有一幅葉先生的小條幅，朱絲欄裏字字光彩照人，絕品。王先生還有一件夏丏尊斗方，很古雅，魏碑影子歷歷可見，他和弘一法師共過事，受弘一張猛龍體影響也深。
徐調孚說俞平伯好友朱自清的字拘謹樸素一如其人，寫格子字偏側在格子的半邊，俞先生詩集《憶》的跋文是朱先生親筆手稿，字字細弱，並不好看。新近北京拍賣會上一幅朱先生的詩箋倒是上品，詩好，字好，給唐弢唐風子寫的：「詩愛蘇髯書愛黃，不妨嫵媚是清剛。攤頭蹀躞涎三尺，了願終慳幣一囊」，底下記「市肆見三希堂山谷尺牘，愛不忍釋，而力不能致之。三十三年昆明作書似風子先生雅屬。朱自清」。估價八萬至十二萬人民幣，一開拍台下從五十萬一路叫到一百四十萬落槌，一分鐘裏匆匆飛上青天，一眾書生囊楮羞澀連朱先生的背影都見不到了。朱自清原籍浙江紹興，生於江蘇東海，長於揚州，成揚州人。原名自華，號秋實，投考北大改名自清，字佩弦。一九二○年北大哲學系畢業，參加五四運動，教中學教了五、六年，一九二五年任清華中文系教授，做過系主任。一九三一年留學英倫，漫遊歐陸，次年回國，回清華。抗戰爆發隨校南遷，任西南聯大教授，勝利後回北平清華，一九四八年病逝。我這一代人少小時候熟讀朱自清，白話文受他啟蒙很深，老了重讀認出一些沙石，不要緊，通篇還是好的。朱先生做人認真，為文認真，筆底情趣偏淡，理路偏濃，初學多讀可醫浮泛。
英國友人戴立克試過英譯朱自清幾篇散文，譯完一讀顯得單薄，遠遠不如原文流利。他不服氣，改用稍微古奧的英文重譯，好多了：「那是說，朱先生外圓內方，文字儘管淺白，心思卻很深沉，譯筆只好朝深處經營。」朱自清五十一歲死於嚴重胃潰瘍，不奇怪，心結糾葛得厲害。那年元旦的日記說：「學生兩次來請我們參加大飯廳的學生集會，他們還請我們在臨時搭起的台上扭秧歌。大家的壓力確實不得了，使我整晚感到不安。」毛澤東寫〈別了，司徒雷登〉說「朱自清一身重病，寧可餓死，不領美國的救濟糧」。重病是真的，拒領麵粉也是真的，是氣節，說朱先生窮得餓死倒誇張了。國家多難，文士清寒，古今常事，遺體裝殮，夫人找不出一件沒有補過的衣服給朱先生穿，一眾學生失聲悲哭，那是做老師一生乾乾淨淨的光榮和驕傲。戴立克說難怪朱自清文章裏暗藏那麼多無奈的壓力和瑣碎的不安，越難譯得好他越想譯。他說他試譯過林徽因，下筆輕便順暢，譯完一讀大有 Bloomsbury文化氣息。林徽因英文極佳，我看過她整理的一堆四合院草圖，注文都用英文寫，簡淡精準，字也漂亮，像 Bloomsbury那些名士的書體。
她寫中文也許偶爾也用英文打腹稿。這一層西學淵源朱自清沒有她深。徐志摩深些，跟陳西瀅、凌叔華有點像，戴立克說這幾位中國作家的作品譯成英文老一輩英國人讀了不難會心。畢竟是老民國洋派才子才女，都跟 Bloomsbury一起隱進歷史烟水中了，吳魯芹先生說那是舊時北平倫敦的月色，飄着薄霧，飄着花影，蒼茫，荒寒，新一代讀書人大半陌生了。吳先生說書法藝術步步凋零，上一輩人的好字更可貴，更要珍存。兩個月前英時大兄執意請鄭培凱教授給我帶來錢穆先生墨寶，說朱子〈齋居感興〉二十首之一錢先生六十年代尾給他寫了一幅，逝世後師母又撿出另一幅同樣的字，大概是寫了不滿意又另寫一幅，命我收下，留以為念。賓四先生的書法真是舊時月色，不愧鴻儒格調，用筆嫻靜，真氣彌滿，情采深蘊，太高雅了：「吾觀陰陽化。升降八肱中。前瞻既無始。後際那有終。至理諒斯存。萬世與今同。誰言混沌死。幻語驚盲聾。」底下小字說「朱子〈齋居感興〉詩二十首，探索微眇，為之平實，詩心哲理，超出漆園、康節之上。漫錄其一，遠寄英時老弟補壁留念。丙午歲盡錢穆」。丙午是一九六六，錢先生在香港，英時兄在美國，秦賢次〈錢穆先生的生平與著述〉說大陸文革爆發，錢先生不能自安，決計遷台灣，一九六七年十月成行，先住台北市金山街，翌年七月遷居士林外雙溪素書樓，一九九○年九十五歲謝世，骨灰由夫人護送到蘇州太湖西山湖濱安葬。是緣份，老師錢賓四寫給學生余英時的墨寶掛在我家了，先賢清芬，故人雅貺，不敢忘昧。 
余英時回憶錄
廖志峰
剛出爐的第一本余英時回憶錄
先呈老闆
老闆說八十八歲的余教授字還是這麼有力
我之所以可以做到這本金匱石室之書
其實有很長遠的淵源
允晨叢刊一號就是余教授的方以智晚節考
而當年余教授也為老董事長 吳火獅先生寫了墓誌銘
我在1990年進來允晨時趕上了半世紀的奮鬥出版
而允晨叢刊則從30號開始編起
余英時回憶錄是叢刊159號
我預留了160號給續編
先呈老闆
老闆說八十八歲的余教授字還是這麼有力
我之所以可以做到這本金匱石室之書
其實有很長遠的淵源
允晨叢刊一號就是余教授的方以智晚節考
而當年余教授也為老董事長 吳火獅先生寫了墓誌銘
我在1990年進來允晨時趕上了半世紀的奮鬥出版
而允晨叢刊則從30號開始編起
余英時回憶錄是叢刊159號
我預留了160號給續編
這本書的出版有許多人牽成
我只是躬逢其盛
我最近經常想
如果我的職場生涯有個終點
我會希望停留在這裡
原因無它
我不知何能如何超越
當然
我還是會繼續努力
直到再也編不動為止
我只是躬逢其盛
我最近經常想
如果我的職場生涯有個終點
我會希望停留在這裡
原因無它
我不知何能如何超越
當然
我還是會繼續努力
直到再也編不動為止
這本書已入選11月誠品書店和博客來書店選書
我很高興
這樣至少曝光的機率更高了
我很高興
這樣至少曝光的機率更高了
封面封底文字照片都經余教授過目確認
封底簡介則改正一個錯字
封底簡介則改正一個錯字
還有一週
讀者就可在書店買到書了
首印3000本
限量精裝
台灣讀者是幸福的
更多海外讀者引領期待多年
卻很難在第一時間買到
讀者就可在書店買到書了
首印3000本
限量精裝
台灣讀者是幸福的
更多海外讀者引領期待多年
卻很難在第一時間買到
余英時回憶錄
花了這麼久的時間才作出
值得精裝典藏
花了這麼久的時間才作出
值得精裝典藏
敬請期待
感謝支持
感謝支持
謝謝所有幫我走到今天的朋友
胡適思想の研究 山口 栄
胡適思想の研究 単行本 – 2000/2
胡適思想の研究
登録情報
- 単行本: 478ページ
- 出版社: 言叢社 (2000/02)
- 言語: 日本語
- ISBN-10: 4905913705
- ISBN-13: 978-4905913702
- 発売日： 2000/02
- 刊別：本
- 級別：普遍級
- 出版社：言叢社
- 出刊日：2000/2/1
- ISBN：9784905913702
- 金石碼：2070730177325
- 出版地：日本
- 語言：日文
- 定價：6292 元
- 特價：95 折 5977 元 (
20500│ 遠東圖書│正版2018年10月24日 星期三
非其道也，一介 不以與人，一介不以取諸人
孟子．萬章上》
萬章問曰：「人有言伊尹以割烹要湯，有諸？」孟子曰：「否。不然。伊尹耕於
有莘之野，而樂堯舜之道焉。非其義也，非其道也，祿之以天下，弗顧也。繫馬
千駟，弗視也。非其義也，非其道也，一介 不以與人，一介不以取諸人。…
…」
胡適說一介是一個貝.
名稱】：一介不取. 【釋義】：一介：一粒芥菜
子，形容微小
。一點兒小東西也不拿。形容廉潔、守法，不是自己應該得到的一點都不要。 .
2018年10月14日 星期日
2018年10月12日 星期五
撲克坦趕出的人 胡適譯： The Outcasts of Poker Flat By Bret Harte
《短篇小說第一集》
譯者自序
最後一課（La Derniére Chasse）〔法國〕都德
柏林之圍（Le Siege de Berlin）〔法國〕都德
百愁門（The Gate of the Hundred Sorrows）〔英國〕吉百齡
決鬥 〔俄國〕泰來夏甫
梅呂哀 〔法國〕莫泊三
二漁夫 〔法國〕莫泊三
殺父母的兒子 〔法國〕莫泊三
一件美術品 〔俄國〕契訶夫
愛情與麵包 〔瑞〕史特林堡
一封未寄的信〔義〕卡德奴勿 ；她的情人（Her Lover） 〔俄國〕Maxim Gorky
譯者自序 米格兒 〔美國〕哈特
撲克坦趕出的人 〔美國〕哈特
戒 酒 〔美國〕哦亨利
By Bret Harte
AS MR. JOHN Oakhurst, gambler, stepped into the main street of Poker Flat on the morning of the twenty-third of November, 1850, he was conscious of a change in its moral atmosphere since the preceding night. Two or three men, conversing earnestly together, ceased as he approached, and exchanged significant glances. There was a Sabbath lull in the air which, in a settlement unused to Sabbath influences, looked ominous.
Mr. Oakhurst's calm, handsome face betrayed small concern in these indications. Whether he was conscious of any predisposing cause was another question. “I reckon they're after somebody,” he reflected; “likely it's me.” He returned to his pocket the handkerchief with which he had been whipping away the red dust of Poker Flat from his neat boots, and quietly discharged his mind of any further conjecture.
In point of fact, Poker Flat was “after somebody.” It had lately suffered the loss of several thousand dollars, two valuable horses, and a prominent citizen. It was experiencing a spasm of virtuous reaction, quite as lawless and ungovernable as any of the acts that had provoked it. A secret committee had determined to rid the town of all improper persons. This was done permanently in regard of two men who were then hanging from the boughs of a sycamore in the gulch, and temporarily in the banishment of certain other objectionable characters. I regret to say that some of these were ladies. It is but due to the sex, however, to state that their impropriety was professional, and it was only in such easily established standards of evil that Poker Flat ventured to sit in judgment.
Mr. Oakhurst was right in supposing that he was included in this category. A few of the committee had urged hanging him as a possible example, and a sure method of reimbursing themselves from his pockets of the sums he had won from them. “It's agin justice,” said Jim Wheeler, “to let this yer young man from Roaring Camp—an entire stranger—carry away our money.” But a crude sentiment of equity residing in the breasts of those who had been fortunate enough to win from Mr. Oakhurst overruled this narrower local prejudice.
Mr. Oakhurst received his sentence with philosophic calmness, none the less coolly that he was aware of the hesitation of his judges. He was too much of a gambler not to accept Fate. With him life was at best an uncertain game, and he recognized the usual percentage in favor of the dealer.
A body of armed men accompanied the deported wickedness of Poker Flat to the outskirts of the settlement. Besides Mr. Oakhurst, who was known to be a coolly desperate man, and for whose intimidation the armed escort was intended, the expatriated party consisted of a young woman familiarly known as the “Duchess”; another, who had won the title of “Mother Shipton”; and “Uncle Billy,” a suspected sluice-robberand confirmed drunkard. The cavalcade provoked no comments from the spectators, nor was any word uttered by the escort. Only, when the gulch which marked the uttermost limit of Poker Flat was reached, the leader spoke briefly and to the point. The exiles were forbidden to return at the peril of their lives.
As the escort disappeared, their pent-up feelings found vent in a few hysterical tears from the Duchess, some bad language from Mother Shipton, and a Parthian volley of expletives from Uncle Billy. The philosophic Oakhurst alone remained silent. He listened calmly to Mother Shipton's desire to cut somebody's heart out, to the repeated statements of the Duchess that she would die in the road, and to the alarming oaths that seemed to be bumped out of Uncle Billy as he rode forward. With the easy good humor characteristic of his class, he insisted upon exchanging his own riding horse, “Five Spot,” for the sorry mule which the Duchess rode. But even this act did not draw the party into any closer sympathy. The young woman readjusted her somewhat draggled plumes with a feeble, faded coquetry; Mother Shipton eyed the possessor of “Five Spot” with malevolence, and Uncle Billy included the whole party in one sweeping anathema.
The road to Sandy Bar—a camp that, not having as yet experienced the regenerating influences of Poker Flat, consequently seemed to offer some invitation to the emigrants—lay over a steep mountain range. It was distant a day's severe travel. In that advanced season, the party soon passed out of the moist, temperate regions of the foothills into the dry, cold, bracing air of the Sierras. The trail was narrow and difficult. At noon the Duchess, rolling out of her saddle upon the ground, declared her intention of going no farther, and the party halted.
The spot was singularly wild and impressive. A wooded amphitheater, surrounded on three sides by precipitous cliffs of naked granite, sloped gently toward the crest of another precipice that overlooked the valley. It was, undoubtedly, the most suitable spot for a camp, had camping been advisable. But Mr. Oakhurst knew that scarcely half the journey to Sandy Bar was accomplished, and the party were not equipped or provisioned for delay. This fact he pointed out to his companions curtly, with a philosophic commentary on the folly of “throwing up their hand before the game was played out.” But they were furnished with liquor, which in this emergency stood them in place of food, fuel, rest, and prescience. In spite of his remonstrances, it was not long before they were more or less under its influence. Uncle Billy passed rapidly from a bellicose state into one of stupor, the Duchess became maudlin, and Mother Shipton snored. Mr. Oakhurst alone remained erect, leaning against a rock, calmly surveying them.
Mr. Oakhurst did not drink. It interfered with a profession which required coolness, impassiveness, and presence of mind, and, in his own language, he “couldn't afford it.” As he gazed at his recumbent fellow exiles, the loneliness begotten of his pariah trade, his habits of life, his very vices, for the first time seriously oppressed him. He bestirred himself in dusting his black clothes, washing his hands and face, and other acts characteristic of his studiously neat habits, and for a moment forgot his annoyance. The thought of deserting his weaker and more pitiable companions never perhaps occurred to him. Yet he could not help feeling the want of that excitement which, singularly enough, was most conducive to that calm equanimity for which he was notorious. He looked at the gloomy walls that rose a thousand feet sheer above the circling pines around him; at the sky, ominously clouded; at the valley below, already deepening into shadow. And, doing so, suddenly he heard his own name called.
A horseman slowly ascended the trail. In the fresh, open face of the newcomer Mr. Oakhurst recognized Tom Simson, otherwise known as the “Innocent” of Sandy Bar. He had met him some months before over a “little game,” and had, with perfect equanimity, won the entire fortune—amounting to some forty dollars—of that guileless youth. After the game was finished, Mr. Oakhurst drew the youthful speculator behind the door and thus addressed him: “Tommy, you're a good little man, but you can't gamble worth a cent. Don't try it over again.” He then handed him his money back, pushed him gently from the room, and so made a devoted slave of Tom Simson.
There was a remembrance of this in his boyish and enthusiastic greeting of Mr. Oakhurst. He had started, he said, to go to Poker Flat to seek his fortune. “Alone?” No, not exactly alone; in fact (a giggle), he had run away with Piney Woods. Didn't Mr. Oakhurst remember Piney? She that used to wait on the table at the Temperance House? They had been engaged a long time, but old Jake Woods had objected, and so they had run away, and were going to Poker Flat to be married, and here they were. And they were tired out, and how lucky it was they had found a place to camp and company. All this the Innocent delivered rapidly, while Piney, a stout, comely damsel of fifteen, emerged from behind the pine tree, where she had been blushing unseen, and rode to the side of her lover.
Mr. Oakhurst seldom troubled himself with sentiment, still less with propriety; but he had a vague idea that the situation was not fortunate. He retained, however, his presence of mind sufficiently to kick Uncle Billy, who was about to say something, and Uncle Billy was sober enough to recognize in Mr. Oakhurst's kick a superior power that would not bear trifling. He then endeavored to dissuade Tom Simson from delaying further, but in vain. He even pointed out the fact that there was no provision, nor means of making a camp. But, unluckily, the Innocent met this objection by assuring the party that he was provided with an extra mule loaded with provisions and by the discovery of a rude attempt at a log house near the trail. “Piney can stay with Mrs. Oakhurst,” said the Innocent, pointing to the Duchess, “and I can shift for myself.”
Nothing but Mr. Oakhurst's admonishing foot saved Uncle Billy from bursting into a roar of laughter. As it was, he felt compelled to retire up the canyon until he could recover his gravity. There he confided the joke to the tall pine trees, with many slaps of his leg, contortions of his face, and the usual profanity. But when he returned to the party, he found them seated by a fire—for the air had grown strangely chill and the sky overcast—in apparently amicable conversation. Piney was actually talking in an impulsive, girlish fashion to the Duchess, who was listening with an interest and animation she had not shown for many days. The Innocent was holding forth, apparently with equal effect, to Mr. Oakhurst and Mother Shipton, who was actually relaxing into amiability. “Is this yer a damned picnic?” said Uncle Billy with inward scorn as he surveyed the sylvan group, the glancing firelight, and the tethered animals in the foreground. Suddenly an idea mingled with the alcoholic fumes that disturbed his brain. It was apparently of a jocular nature, for he felt impelled to slap his leg again and cram his fist into his mouth.
As the shadows crept slowly up the mountain, a slight breeze rocked the tops of the pine trees, and moaned through their long and gloomy aisles. The ruined cabin, patched and covered with pine boughs, was set apart for the ladies. As the lovers parted, they unaffectedly exchanged a kiss, so honest and sincere that it might have been heard above the swaying pines. The frail Duchess and the malevolent Mother Shipton were probably too stunned to remark upon this last evidence of simplicity, and so turned without a word to the hut. The fire was replenished, the men lay down before the door, and in a few minutes were asleep.
Mr. Oakhurst was a light sleeper. Toward morning he awoke benumbed and cold. As he stirred the dying fire, the wind, which was now blowing strongly, brought to his cheek that which caused the blood to leave it—snow!
He started to his feet with the intention of awakening the sleepers, for there was no time to lose. But turning to where Uncle Billy had been lying, he found him gone. A suspicion leaped to his brain and a curse to his lips. He ran to the spot where the mules had been tethered; they were no longer there. The tracks were already rapidly disappearing in the snow.
The momentary excitement brought Mr. Oakhurst back to the fire with his usual calm. He did not waken the sleepers. The Innocent slumbered peacefully, with a smile on his good-humored, freckled face; the virgin Piney slept beside her frailer sisters as sweetly as though attended by celestial guardians; and Mr. Oakhurst, drawing his blanket over his shoulders, stroked his mustaches and waited for the dawn. It came slowly in a whirling mist of snowflakes that dazzled and confused the eye. What could be seen of the landscape appeared magically changed. He looked over the valley, and summed up the present and future in two words—“snowed in!”
A careful inventory of the provisions, which, fortunately for the party, had been stored within the hut and so escaped the felonious fingers of Uncle Billy, disclosed the fact that with care and prudence they might last ten days longer. “That is,” said Mr. Oakhurst, sotto voce to the Innocent, “if you're willing to board us. If you ain't—and perhaps you'd better not—you can wait till Uncle Billy gets back with provisions.” For some occult reason, Mr. Oakhurst could not bring himself to disclose Uncle Billy's rascality, and so offered the hypothesis that he had wandered from the camp and had accidentally stampeded the animals. He dropped a warning to the Duchess and Mother Shipton, who of course knew the facts of their associate's defection. “They'll find out the truth about us all when they find out anything,” he added, significantly, “and there's no good frightening them now.”
Tom Simson not only put all his worldly store at the disposal of Mr. Oakhurst, but seemed to enjoy the prospect of their enforced seclusion. “We'll have a good camp for a week, and then the snow'll melt, and we'll all go back together.” The cheerful gaiety of the young man, and Mr. Oakhurst's calm, infected the others. The Innocent with the aid of pine boughs extemporized a thatch for the roofless cabin, and the Duchess directed Piney in the rearrangement of the interior with a taste and tact that opened the blue eyes of that provincial maiden to their fullest extent. “I reckon now you're used to fine things at Poker Flat,” said Piney. The Duchess turned away sharply to conceal something that reddened her cheeks through its professional tint, and Mother Shipton requested Piney not to “chatter.” But when Mr. Oakhurst returned from a weary search for the trail, he heard the sound of happy laughter echoed from the rocks. He stopped in some alarm, and his thoughts first naturally reverted to the whisky, which he had prudently cached. “And yet it don't somehow sound like whisky,” said the gambler. It was not until he caught sight of the blazing fire through the still-blinding storm and the group around it that he settled to the conviction that it was “square fun.”
Whether Mr. Oakhurst had cached his cards with the whisky as something debarred the free access of the community, I cannot say. It was certain that, in Mother Shipton's words, he “didn't say cards once” during that evening. Haply the time was beguiled by an accordion, produced somewhat ostentatiously by Tom Simson from his pack. Notwithstanding some difficulties attending the manipulation of this instrument, Piney Woods managed to pluck several reluctant melodies from its keys, to an accompaniment by the Innocent on a pair of bone castanets. But the crowning festivity of the evening was reached in a rude camp-meeting hymn, which the lovers, joining hands, sang with great earnestness and vociferation. I fear that a certain defiant tone and Covenanter's swing to its chorus, rather than any devotional quality, caused it speedily to infect the others, who at last joined in the refrain:
“I'm proud to live in the service of the Lord,
And I'm bound to die in His army.”
The pines rocked, the storm eddied and whirled above the miserable group, and the flames of their altar leaped heavenward as if in token of the vow.
At midnight the storm abated, the rolling clouds parted, and the stars glittered keenly above the sleeping camp. Mr. Oakhurst, whose professional habits had enabled him to live on the smallest possible amount of sleep, in dividing the watch with Tom Simson somehow managed to take upon himself the greater part of that duty. He excused himself to the Innocent by saying that he had “often been a week without sleep.” “Doing what?” asked Tom. “Poker!” replied Oakhurst, sententiously; “when a man gets a streak of luck,—nigger luck—he don't get tired. The luck gives in first. Luck,” continued the gambler, reflectively, “is a mighty queer thing. All you know about it for certain is that it's bound to change. And it's finding out when it's going to change that makes you. We've had a streak of bad luck since we left Poker Flat—you come along, and slap you get into it, too. If you can hold your cards right along you're all right. For,” added the gambler, with cheerful irrelevance,
“ I'm proud to live in the service of the Lord,
And I'm bound to die in His army.”
The third day came, and the sun, looking through the white-curtained valley, saw the outcasts divide their slowly decreasing store of provisions for the morning meal. It was one of the peculiarities of that mountain climate that its rays diffused a kindly warmth over the wintry landscape, as if in regretful commiseration of the past. But it revealed drift on drift of snow piled high around the hut—a hopeless, uncharted, trackless sea of white lying below the rocky shores to which the castaways still clung. Through the marvelously clear air the smoke of the pastoral village of Poker Flat rose miles away. Mother Shipton saw it, and from a remote pinnacle of her rocky fastness hurled in that direction a final malediction. It was her last vituperative attempt, and perhaps for that reason was invested with a certain degree of sublimity. It did her good, she privately informed the Duchess. “Just you go out there and cuss, and see.” She then set herself to the task of amusing “the child,” as she and the Duchess were pleased to call Piney. Piney was no chicken, but it was a soothing and original theory of the pair thus to account for the fact that she didn't swear and wasn't improper.
When night crept up again through the gorges, the reedy notes of the accordion rose and fell in fitful spasms and long-drawn gasps by the flickering campfire. But music failed to fill entirely the aching void left by insufficient food, and a new diversion was proposed by Piney—storytelling. Neither Mr. Oakhurst nor his female companions caring to relate their personal experiences, this plan would have failed too but for the Innocent. Some months before he had chanced upon a stray copy of Mr. Pope's ingenious translation of the Iliad. He now proposed to narrate the principal incidents of that poem—having thoroughly mastered the argument and fairly forgotten the words—in the current vernacular of Sandy Bar. And so for the rest of that night the Homeric demigods again walked the earth. Trojan bully and wily Greek wrestled in the winds, and the great pines in the canyon seemed to bow to the wrath of the son of Peleus. Mr. Oakhurst listened with quiet satisfaction. Most especially was he interested in the fate of “Ash-heels,” as the Innocent persisted in denominating the “swift-footed Achilles.”
So with small food and much of Homer and the accordion, a week passed over the heads of the outcasts. The sun again forsook them, and again from leaden skies the snowflakes were sifted over the land. Day by day closer around them drew the snowy circle, until at last they looked from their prison over drifted walls of dazzling white that towered twenty feet above their heads. It became more and more difficult to replenish their fires, even from the fallen trees beside them, now half-hidden in the drifts. And yet no one complained. The lovers turned from the dreary prospect and looked into each other's eyes, and were happy. Mr. Oakhurst settled himself coolly to the losing game before him. The Duchess, more cheerful than she had been, assumed the care of Piney. Only Mother Shipton—once the strongest of the party—seemed to sicken and fade. At midnight on the tenth day she called Oakhurst to her side. “I'm going,” she said, in a voice of querulous weakness, “but don't say anything about it. Don't waken the kids. Take the bundle from under my head and open it.” Mr. Oakhurst did so. It contained Mother Shipton's rations for the last week, untouched. “Give 'em to the child,” she said, pointing to the sleeping Piney. “You've starved yourself,” said the gambler. “That's what they call it,” said the woman, querulously, as she lay down again and, turning her face to the wall, passed quietly away.
The accordion and the bones were put aside that day, and Homer was forgotten. When the body of Mother Shipton had been committed to the snow, Mr. Oakhurst took the Innocent aside, and showed him a pair of snowshoes, which he had fashioned from the old pack saddle. “There's one chance in a hundred to save her yet,” he said, pointing to Piney; “but it's there,” he added, pointing toward Poker Flat. “If you can reach there in two days she's safe.” “And you?” asked Tom Simson. “I'll stay here,” was the curt reply.
The lovers parted with a long embrace. “You are not going, too?” said the Duchess as she saw Mr. Oakhurst apparently waiting to accompany him. “As far as the canyon,” he replied. He turned suddenly, and kissed the Duchess, leaving her pallid face aflame and her trembling limbs rigid with amazement.
Night came, but not Mr. Oakhurst. It brought the storm again and the whirling snow. Then the Duchess, feeding the fire, found that someone had quietly piled beside the hut enough fuel to last a few days longer. The tears rose to her eyes, but she hid them from Piney.
The women slept but little. In the morning, looking into each other's faces, they read their fate. Neither spoke; but Piney, accepting the position of the stronger, drew near and placed her arm around the Duchess's waist. They kept this attitude for the rest of the day. That night the storm reached its greatest fury, and, rending asunder the protecting pines, invaded the very hut.
Toward morning they found themselves unable to feed the fire, which gradually died away. As the embers slowly blackened, the Duchess crept closer to Piney, and broke the silence of many hours: “Piney, can you pray?” “No, dear,” said Piney, simply. The Duchess, without knowing exactly why, felt relieved, and, putting her head upon Piney's shoulder, spoke no more. And so reclining, the younger and purer pillowing the head of her soiled sister upon her virgin breast, they fell asleep.
The wind lulled as if it feared to waken them. Feathery drifts of snow, shaken from the long pine boughs, flew like white-winged birds, and settled about them as they slept. The moon through the rifted clouds looked down upon what had been the camp. But all human stain, all trace of earthly travail, was hidden beneath the spotless mantle mercifully flung from above.
They slept all that day and the next, nor did they waken when voices and footsteps broke the silence of the camp. And when pitying fingers brushed the snow from their wan faces, you could scarcely have told from the equal peace that dwelt upon them which was she that had sinned. Even the law of Poker Flat recognized this, and turned away, leaving them still locked in each other's arms.
But at the head of the gulch, on one of the largest pine trees, they found the deuce of clubs pinned to the bark with a bowie knife. It bore the following, written in pencil, in a firm hand:
Beneath This Tree
Lies The Body Of
JOHN OAKHURST,
Who Struck A Streak Of Bad Luck
On The 23rd Of November, 1850,
And
Handed In His Checks
On The 7th December, 1850.
Lies The Body Of
JOHN OAKHURST,
Who Struck A Streak Of Bad Luck
On The 23rd Of November, 1850,
And
Handed In His Checks
On The 7th December, 1850.
And pulseless and cold, with a Derringer by his side and a bullet in his heart, though still calm as in life, beneath the snow lay he who was at once the strongest and yet the weakest of the outcasts of Poker Flat.
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