one of the best criticisms he ever wrote. He scores a good point when. he says he wishes Dante had made more of the mind as a means of suffering, instead of dealing almost exclusively with physical horrors. Prescott entered heart and soul into Dante's sublime poem. "Every canto," he said, "blazes with a new and increased effulgence. The very reading it by another pained my poor eyes." As a trial of his powers Prescott now began the writing of some critical articles for the "North American Review;" the writing of these extended over a number of years. His estimates of Molière, Scott, Cervantes, show poetic sympathy, wise judgment, discrim

inating insight. We cannot say that his originality is striking, nor does he often show brilliancy of coloring. But he has none of the poisoned arrows with which critics often fill their quivers. He is calm and impartial, always genial, and most suggestive. Stirling thought that Prescott would have attained great eminence as a critic and essayist had he pursued that path of letters.

It is always of interest to know to what particular influence is due a great man's decision to devote himself to that particular work in which ultimately he excels. Prescott listened with rapt attention to the reading of Mably's "Étude de l'Histoire." This, more than any other one book, tended to give the final direction to his already strong feeling for history. A half-indefinite plan of writing a history of Italian literature led him gradually to narrow his thoughts to that "untried ground," and, in his opinion, "a rich one," the age of Ferdinand. The plans for the study of his materials for "Ferdinand and Isabella" were stupendous, enough to test the courage of any student, much more one hampered as he was. During these studies he spoke of traveling at a very lame gait, and yet even he miscalculated his strength. It took twice as long as he anticipated to bring his labors to a brilliant close. At first it seemed utterly impossible to get a reader who understood Spanish. He therefore had a secretary who read volume after volume without knowing a word of the language, and the awkwardness and constraint can well be imagined. Later, however, his work progressed more happily. A sad bereavement in the winter of 1828 delayed his work. He lost the elder of his two children, a dear little daughter of four, to whom he had been devoted. Unlike many literary men, to whom their work is so important as to shut out from them some of the dearest and sweetest pleasures of life, Prescott had allowed this little child to come into the study and interrupt whatever work was going on there. Many years after, when Prescott was writing to a friend who had just suffered the loss of a child, he referred to his own unforgotten sorrow in simple but pathetic words.

With even tenderer words Prescott spoke of his father, when the loving tie of years was finally broken by death. He had the joy of keeping his mother with him to within five

years of his own death. Seldom has there been a happier household than this of the Prescotts in their different homes, especially in the old ancestral house at Pepperell.

"Ferdinand and Isabella" was published in 1837. It met with instantaneous success. The reviews of the book were able and discriminating, and in every case most gratifying.

The history of the composition, the publication and public reception of "Ferdinand and

Isabella" is very much like that of "The Conquest of Mexico," of "The Conquest of Peru," of the "Sketch of Charles V.," and of the unfinished "Philip II." The condition of Prescott's eye varied, so that he was en

abled to use it sometimes more frequently, but towards the latter part of his life he had to give up even this moderate indulgence. He so cultivated his memory that he could compose sixty pages of printed text and hold it in his mind till he came to write it out on his noctograph. When, in writing "Philip II.," he found that he could remember perfectly only about forty pages, he felt discouraged at the failure of his memory! His style grew continually more flexible, freer, more sustained and beautiful. He never grew careless in his search for truth, never relaxed his vigilance, never made a statement with

PRESCOTT'S NOCTOGRAPH

Now in the archives of the Massachusetts Historical Society. Drawn by H. S. Howland

out being sure that, as far as he was able to weigh evidence, that statement was right and just. What this devotion to a high ideal really meant can be understood only by remembering his natural temperament. There was no cant about William H. Prescott. He seldom spoke the word duty, but after he had decided on his literary course his whole life was molded according to the dictates of what he conceived to be the obligations imposed by his worldly advantages and the intellectual gifts bestowed upon him. He often worked when he did not want to; indeed, there was a constant struggle with a natural tendency to desultory pursuits-to, as it were, drift with the tide rather than stem the current. Prescott was a man of genius, for without that inspired and magnetic quality his

work could not have its perennial vitality, but his genius largely showed itself in what George Eliot called an infinite capacity for taking pains.

Prescott's home life during these busy years when he was working for this immortal fame was most beautiful and noteworthy. There was perfect concord and sympathy between him and his wife, between him and his father and mother, and all the others who made up this joyful household. Prescott's win

conversa

someness of character endeared him to all his friends, while his social attractions, his vivacious tion, made him much sought by the world. A man of wealth and of intellectual eminence who has a town. house in Beacon Street, and a country house at Pepperell, and a house by the sea at Nahant or Lynn, is not apt to be neglected by the world! Prescott saw these things clearly; he took the good the gods provided with hearty thanks, but no success had power to spoil the lovely sincerity of his nature. He showed his friendship and his hospitality the most freely to those who lived obscure lives or to whom fortune had not been kind. His acts of charity were frequent, unostentatious, munificent; sometimes to perform them he gave up some of his cherished plans. Prescott's social instincts were strong, and therein lay one of his temptations. His infirmities and his literary purposes changed his life greatly, but he never allowed them to "shut him from his kind." He dined out frequently, he made many friendships with men of rank and literary eminence, he was the charming playmate of children, the boon companion of young men and maidens.

A visit to England in 1850 was most congenial to one of his temperament. It was, says Ticknor, the most brilliant visit ever made to England by an American citizen not clothed with the prestige of official station. Prescott was the literary lion of the hour, fêted by men of letters, flattered by the nobility, made much of by the Queen and Prince Albert. The letters he wrote home show most delightfully his vivacity, his descriptive powers, and his keen. zest of life.

As for Prescott's religion, it lay deep at the very root of his character. "To do well and act justly," he wrote once after he had been passing through some intellectual conflicts, "to fear and to love God, and to love our neighbor as ourselves in these is the essence of religion. . . . For what we can believe we are not responsible, supposing we examine candidly and patiently. For what we do we shall indeed be accountable. The doctrines of the Saviour unfold the whole code of morals by which our conduct should be regulated. Who, then, whatever difficulties he may meet in particular incidents and opinions recorded in the Gospels, can hesitate to receive the great religious and moral truths inculcated by the Saviour as the words of inspiration? I cannot, certainly. On these, then, I will rest, and for all else

"Wait the great teacher Death, and God adore."

The great Unfolder of mysteries came to Prescott suddenly and mercifully on the 28th of January, 1859. But it came as a blow to friends on two continents. Not only the friends who loved him, but the different societies of America and Europe which had distinguished him with their highest honors, the faculty and students of Harvard College, all who cherished Prescott's work even when they had never seen his face, bore their part in the common mourn

ing. "There was no division of opinion. There was no dissentient, no hesitating voice on either side of the Atlantic. All sorrowfully felt that a great loss had been sustained, that a brilliant and beneficent light had been extinguished."

In an article like this no justice can be done to a man like Prescott. But I have purposely dwelt more upon his character than upon his work, because at this centennial time it seems as if our tributes should be paid more to what Prescott was than to what he did. His work is imperishable; but as the years pass we are perhaps too apt to lose sight of the man in his work, to forget in the splendor of the fame he has won the peculiar value of the message which his beautiful life has for us. That message could be summed up in Carlyle's significant words, "Work, and despair not." Prescott's spirit was indomitable. It gave him power over suffering, it made him the conqueror of his fate. He had that grace of genius which transmuted a lifelong misfortune into a bright and beautiful blessing.

T

HERE are four critics before whom woman's dress must pass-fashion, fitness, health, and artistic beauty. The first is at odds with all the rest. As for art in personal adornment, it cannot be said to exist in a nation tolerating our masculine evening dress, or the deformed woman of our fashion journals. Yet the principle at the foundation of the dress question seems simple. Is it not-shaped clothes for work, draped dress for leisure? For muscle-play, freedom is the first requisite, whether in skating or in scrubbing a floor. It would seem that the principles said by Veblen to govern modern dress, conspicuous expensiveness, novelty, and ineptitude

FIG. 1

Skirt smooth over hips; pleats front and back.. Tam, with brim.

waste

the prescription for outdoor exercise for woman; for her chances for physical development outside her household duties are limited to a degree that would be ridiculous if it were not pitiable. For instance, in the Greater New York there is no opportunity for a woman to swim in the cooler months except in a poor little tank of very cold water in the cellar of a Turkish bath. House habits, dress habits, and resignation have brought it about that the demand for bodybuilding facilities is small. It is supposed to be sufficient exertion for the sister to wave her handkerchief from the grand stand. With growth comes weakness instead of strength. The physical director tells us that the girls of fourteen can jump one foot higher than the girls of eighteen. The gymnasium, with all its games, is voted dull; the bowling-alley means broken corset-bones under one-sided, sudden strain; dancing is done in a close atmosphere, in wrong dress, during sleep-hours; and horseback riding, especially at a trot or with the close seat, involves a certain jouncing within the snug corset that the tailor-made

FIG. 3

who is too thin, for the leisurely rider on level roads in fair weather, and for the woman shy of comment, it gives a suitable garb, together with that comfort which conformity brings. Its convenience at present is that the cyclist can step off her wheel into the shop or house and be clad as her uniformed sisters are.

the eye.

Even though the skirts measure no more than two and one-half to three yards about the bottom, there is some danger of catching in the rear sprocket; there is always the discomfort of the knee that must tug to lift forward and upward one-half of the garment; and whether there is wind or not, there is with all skirts a certain flop or swing hardly pleasing to All these difficulties are overcome in some measure by the cut of the skirt falling in two equal pleats, box or folded, on each side of the rear wheel (Fig. 1), by the satin or silk knickerbocker underneath, or by a slippery lining, and by certain recent improvements in the hang of the skirt and the fit in front. Moreover, a broad band of leather or rows of stitching help to keep the skirt down, and lessen the chance of accident.

FIG. 4

The stout rider em

wide sleeves and horizontal lines.

The skirt, the separate jacket, and the shirt-waist form the best combination for comfort. The body-covering that can be taken off on hot rides is hygienically desirable. Here the stout rider, who must shun the horizontal lines phasizing her defects by that emphasize breadth, and whose success in all costume lies in lines carrying the eye from shoulder to heel, encounters difficulty. For cooler weather it may be overcome by the princesse idea, with the long perpendiculars behind, where breadth most shows, and by a false jacket in front to conceal abdominal prominence (Fig. 5). With these riders it is especially important that no fullness of the skirt should be placed over the hips, but that it should lie in pleats front and rear. The low position of the waist-line of usual street dress has resulted in a figure that is disproportionally short from hip to heel, as shown by the impossible length of leg and skirt in every fashion-plate (Fig. 9). Now, if the skirt is curtailed, the result is a squareness of effect disastrous to the stout woman. The root of the difficulty is that nature ran no horizontal division across the body, and all our attempts to do it result in cutting the dress into parts that cannot be fitted together or designed

FIG. 5

The gown in one piece, with false jacket for stout

woman.

FIG. 6

The long bloomers. (By permission of the Metropolitan Magazine")

alike. For the thin woman, however, the skirt stitching and the cross-line of a longish jacket make a broader appearance, and the baggy shoulders are allowable.

Many devices are pictured in the cycling columns of the papers and "The Wheelwoman" for changing the long into the short skirt, and for converting the skirt into bloomers by means of tapes or cords running through eyes. In