all,' respectable. He was not; he rolled on the carpet of the world like a grownup naked baby. But what is decency? It is a vague and fugitive quality, affected not merely by tradition but by geography, and 'those who piddle and patter here in collars and tailed coats' must hardly be permitted to define it for the ages.

In one of his conversations, Whitman has said that he received great encouragement out of the gift which reached him, in 1876, after his stroke of paralysis, from his admirers in England. He was grateful, I am afraid, for small mercies, since the collection was rather a poor affair, and the entire subscription did not approach one hundred pounds. But we meant it ardently and kindly, and none of the subscribers were wealthy; among them the list is before me were the

The Sunday Times

Rossettis, Swinburne, Leicester Warren (Lord De Tabley), Edward Dowden, Roden Noel, and John Addington Symonds.

Whitman wished the gifts to be considered purchase money for books, and each subscriber received two rather gaudily-bound gilt-edged volumes Leaves of Grass and a new miscellany, called Two Rivulets, each book, when it ultimately reached London, containing an inscription in the author's hand. Into my Two Rivulets he had also stuck a signed photograph, in which he looked quite The Great Camerado, and wherever there was a blank space there had been gummed in fresh printed pieces. There is something extraordinarily naïve and cordial about these queer volumes; they are what Leigh Hunt would call 'to-the-heart-ish.'

CANON LAYNE had finished his sermon for Sunday. He sat in the library, leaning back in his armchair, tired out with writing, listening with the drowsy inattention of old age to the sounds of a summer afternoon in the country in June.

Outside in the garden the jobbing gardener was leisurely mowing the grass on the lawn. There was the buzzing of insects, the murmur of bees, the whispering rustling of flowers fanned by the soft summer breeze.

An adventurous butterfly flew in through the open French windows and

disturbed the sleeping Rapunzel. Rapunzel ran round and round the room barking in shrill fury, exhausting her energy in a futile chase.

The Canon looked on in contented amusement, casting his mind back over past years in idle reverie. Lately he had felt rather anxious about Rapunzel's health. She had seemed tired and languid. He had feared lest perchance she was beginning to grow feeble in old age, just as he was. For he had passed his seventieth birthday and Rapunzel was ten years old.

Rapunzel had been given to the

Canon by a veterinary surgeon whose métier in life was the breeding of Skyeterriers. He gave Rapunzel away because he did not want her himself. She was useless for sale or show purposes. For though she had a lovely coat, pale gray, reaching to the ground, she was, unfortunately, blind in one eye. Moreover, she was both lop- and prickeared. One ear stood up the other hung down. The veterinary surgeon was glad to be able to give the Canon a present. He was fond of him. He thought that he did his job so well, not making any fuss about it, but spending much time in church, praying quietly and sensibly for those who are too busy to do this for themselves - for veterinary surgeons, for instance. Of course, for everyone, personal rather than vicarious devotion is appropriate at times for example, at the time of death. It would be ridiculous then to think about dogs, ridiculous but very hard not to. One must think then of psalms and things like that: and use antique and solemn phraseology. That was so was it not?

The Canon had shaken his head in amused dissent. But he had refused argument.

"Two of a trade can never agree, and we are both Skye-pilots,' he had said with a smile, as he carried Rapunzel away in his arms.

Rapunzel had settled down at once to the Rectory ways. At night she lay curled up on the Canon's bed. She woke him every morning by the simple expedient of licking his face. She was always punctual to the minute, impatient of sleepy delay. The Canon, who in his spare time wrote popular articles for the monthly magazines, sometimes found himself wishing on cold wintry mornings that Rapunzel was not quite such a strict follower of modern philosophers.

'Could you not, Rapunzel,' he said,

'be content with the older school of thought and agree that there is no such thing as time?'

In the daytime Rapunzel accompanied the Canon on his parochial visits or helped as much as she could in the garden by digging up bulbs with her paws. She was sorry when the Canon gave up the planting of bulbs as a pursuit doomed to failure.

As Rapunzel grew older and the fringe over her eyes grew longer her blindness was not noticeable to casual passers-by, and these often wondered sorrowfully at the extraordinary extravagance of a parson in keeping such a beautiful specimen. But her visual defect had one real drawback. tortoiseshell cat, her chief foe in the village, often walked comfortably in undisturbed serenity on Rapunzel's blind side. The Canon consoled her

A

In the country of the blind,' he said, 'the one-eyed man is king.'

Before Rapunzel came the Canon had been rather a rising man in the diocese, but of late years he had slipped out of diocesan life. It had been difficult to stay away for a night in order to preach in other churches. He had tried it once, in response to a pressing invitation from the Bishop to preach in the Cathedral. He had stayed for the night at the Palace. But the experiment had not been a success. had felt distrait and anxious. To himself his sermon had seemed futile, almost grotesque, wholly inadequate.

He

When he got home he found that Rapunzel had howled all day in his absence; she had refused food; she had run all over the village, looking hopelessly for him, getting wet in the pouring rain. She had caught cold. She developed bronchitis. The Canon sat up with her all night in the library in order to make up the fire at intervals. During his lonely vigil he went on with a little monograph he was writing con

cerning Henry VIII. The Canon belonged to the Evangelical school of thought. He was glad that the Church in England was no longer associated with the Western Patriarchate.

The room was very quiet. The Canon wrote apace. Rapunzel struggled in a paroxysm of coughing. The Canon paused in his strictures on ecclesiastical abuses. He knelt and made up the fire. He hesitated. Rapunzel coughed again, struggling to draw uneven breaths. She gazed at him in mute appeal with wistful eyes. He looked guiltily round the room, though he knew that there was nobody there. Of course, he was not kneeling on purpose: he just happened to be kneeling. He was not speaking in any special way, only just as a man may speak to a friend.

'Francis of Assisi'- he whispered. Rapunzel breathed more easily; she closed her eyes; she slept till the sun came streaming in through the long French windows. When she woke the Canon was sitting in the armchair by the fire. He had not moved all night lest he should wake her. He was too tired to finish his essay on the preReformation abuses. He wrote and told the publishers that he could not now complete it.

Since that time Rapunzel had never been ill. He had never felt worried about her, not until this June afternoon. And now her energetic chase after the errant butterfly reassured him. She could not be really ill. They might safely walk through the village up to the church to say Evensong. He rose from his chair and Rapunzel flew at his feet, barking furiously in shrill delight. Together they sauntered slowly through the village on their way to the church. Time was of no particular value, for after forty years' experience the Canon knew very well that there would be nobody in church

on a weekday. But such neglect, he thought, is not unnatural. Tragic mystery is the common environment of man, and great indeed is the debt owed by the Creator to His creatures.

The Canon was glad it was not a Sunday, for on Sundays Rapunzel waited in the vestry lest her presence should prove to any a stumbling block, but on weekdays she sat at his feet in the chancel.

The sexton's wife stood at her garden gate watching the Canon with anxious eyes as he came slowly up the

village.

'He grows old, like the rest of us,' she thought. Dying and rising again were familiar enough thoughts to her. She had lived so long amidst the fields.

'I shall soon be under the daisies myself,' she thought smiling.

She waited every day to chat to the Canon on his way up to church.

'Miss Rapunzel is as lively as ever,' she said as Rapunzel flew into the garden on her daily chase after her tortoiseshell foe. 'She don't grow older,' she said, 'like the rest of us.'

She knew that the oft-repeated inexactitude never failed to please Rapunzel's friend.

The Canon was surprised to find a motor-cyclist looking round the church, examining the old brasses, the quaint monuments, the quiet effigies of Crusaders. The Canon looked at him with some anxiety. Must Rapunzel sit in the vestry as on Sundays? On the whole he thought not. Rapunzel took up her weekly place in the chancel. The tourist for his part was surprised to find himself taking part in a service. But he had a powerful bass voice. He played his unaccustomed part well.

'All the beasts of the forest are mine,' chanted the feeble voice of the old minister.

'I know all the fowls upon the mountains,' responded powerful youth.

But the Canon could not go on. He stopped, laying down his book with trembling hands. What was that? Rapunzel gave a little sigh and let her head fall against his foot.

The tourist came forward and helped to carry the little dead terrier back to the Rectory.

'You must forgive me my distraction,' the Canon said afterwards. 'My little dog was all I had to love on earth.'

'All?' said the young man, surprised into a sudden self-revelation. But if you have love, that is everything.'

He went on his way. He was always looking for something to love, but he had never been able to find it.

The Canon spent the evening alone in his library. He left his supper untasted. He wanted nobody near him. He was glad when he heard his old housekeeper go slowly upstairs to bed. He did not want sympathy. He wanted Rapunzel. There was really little else in the world that he cared about. 'Life is so ugly,' he thought, 'ugly with loneliness, ugly with misery. The whole world is full of bitterness. and strife, and from it there is no escape.'

He sat huddled up in the armchair by the fire. The fire was blazing up the chimney, yet it seemed to give out

The English Review

no heat. The dancing flames only served to show up the dark background of the garden outside seen through the unshuttered windows. He glanced out at the night and shivered a little with fear; then, remembering his calling, he muttered to himself

"The darkness is no darkness with Thee

He held out his trembling hands a little closer to the blaze. But he felt no warmth. Perhaps then this was death, the chill of death? No matter. Death comes as a stranger to some, but to others just as a friend. He leaned back in his armchair. He felt so very tired. The darkness gathered closely round him. He wished Rapunzel had been with him in his hour of weakness. He heard a scratching at the window. He strained his eyes trying to see into the outside gloom. He heard a little whine, an impatient bark.

'I am coming,' he said feebly: the death-rattle was already sounding in his throat. He struggled and rose from his chair. He groped his way to the window through impenetrable blackness. He felt for the latch with trembling fingers. He pushed open the window and looked out into the night. He slipped and fell.

"The night was as clear as the day.' 'Rapunzel, Rapunzel,' he cried.

were

THE Russian Intellectuals given a great opportunity of leading their fellow countrymen along the highway of intelligent progress at the outbreak of the revolution in 1917. We have seen how utterly they failed to make use of this opportunity and how great was their collapse, brought about by political inexperience and fantastic dreamings. Yet it cannot be denied that they, above all others, were instrumental in bringing about the downfall of autocracy, of which they had always been the principal victims. It is all the more astonishing, therefore, to notice that the Bolshevik rulers of Russia seem to single out the Intellectuals for special persecution and to treat them as though they were the most dangerous enemies of democracy. There is no need here to differentiate between Democracy and Bolshevism. What is happening in Russia proves beyond a doubt that the two terms terms are incompatable. Are Lenine and Trotzky really so ignorant of the part played by the Russian Intellectuals in the earlier revolutionary movements in Russia and of the countless numbers of them who were hanged, tortured, or exiled since the early years of the nineteenth century, when they started that great movement toward the emancipation of the serfs which culminated in the ukase of 1861? To whom, if not to the Intellectuals, does the Russian peasant owe the freedom from bondage which that ukase gave him? Even earlier than 1814 the Intellectuals were engaged in a desperate struggle against arbitrary

power and bondage, and one can easily distinguish in the character of Pierre-as traced by Tolstoy in War and Peace and Peace those special traits of humanitarianism which were to distinguish the Decemberites in 1824-1825.

The organized attempt of these latter to overthrow autocracy was the outcome of the impact of Western European liberalizing tendencies upon the minds of the younger nobles in Russia, especially officers who had become acquainted with the currents of political thought in France during the occupation of Paris by the Allies in 1814-1815. It was, perhaps, an aristocratic movement rather than a popular one, but it could not well have been otherwise considering the position of the Russian peasantry at that epoch and the scanty numbers of the urban proletariat. Yet we find these young nobles, inspired as they were by humanitarian aims, clamoring even then for the abolition of serfdom (seemingly against their own class interests), the education of the people, political equality and constitutional guaranties, and some of them even for a return to the federal system of city republics such as existed in Russia in the fourteenth century.

This political movement was crushed with the greatest severity by Nicolas I, and the Bead House of Bostoevsky gives us some idea of what those Intellectuals endured who escaped the hangman and were sent to a life-long exile in Siberia. For although that great writer underwent the same punishment many years later, yet the life