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    Studies and Essays: Concerning Letters
    Studies and Essays: Concerning Letters
    Studies and Essays: Concerning Letters
    Ebook73 pages1 hour

    Studies and Essays: Concerning Letters

    By John Galsworthy

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    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherArchive Classics
    Release dateNov 27, 2013
    Studies and Essays: Concerning Letters
    Author

    John Galsworthy

    John Galsworthy was a Nobel-Prize (1932) winning English dramatist, novelist, and poet born to an upper-middle class family in Surrey, England. He attended Harrow and trained as a barrister at New College, Oxford. Although called to the bar in 1890, rather than practise law, Galsworthy travelled extensively and began to write. It was as a playwright Galsworthy had his first success. His plays—like his most famous work, the series of novels comprising The Forsyte Saga—dealt primarily with class and the social issues of the day, and he was especially harsh on the class from which he himself came.

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      Book preview

      Studies and Essays - John Galsworthy

      The Project Gutenberg EBook of Essays Concerning Letters, by John Galsworthy

      This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net

      Title: Essays Concerning Letters

      Author: John Galsworthy

      Release Date: October 27, 2006 [EBook #2902]

      Language: English

      *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ESSAYS CONCERNING LETTERS ***

      Produced by David Widger

      STUDIES AND ESSAYS

      By John Galsworthy

                Je vous dirai que l'exces est toujours un mal.

                                            —ANATOLE FRANCE

      CONCERNING LETTERS

      TABLE OF CONTENTS: A NOVELIST'S ALLEGORY SOME PLATITUDES CONCERNING DRAMA MEDITATION ON FINALITY WANTED—SCHOOLING ON OUR DISLIKE OF THINGS AS THEY ARE THE WINDLESTRAW

      A NOVELIST'S ALLEGORY

      Once upon a time the Prince of Felicitas had occasion to set forth on a journey. It was a late autumn evening with few pale stars and a moon no larger than the paring of a finger-nail. And as he rode through the purlieus of his city, the white mane of his amber-coloured steed was all that he could clearly see in the dusk of the high streets. His way led through a quarter but little known to him, and he was surprised to find that his horse, instead of ambling forward with his customary gentle vigour, stepped carefully from side to side, stopping now and then to curve his neck and prick his ears—as though at some thing of fear unseen in the darkness; while on either hand creatures could be heard rustling and scuttling, and little cold draughts as of wings fanned the rider's cheeks.

      The Prince at last turned in his saddle, but so great was the darkness that he could not even see his escort.

      What is the name of this street? he said.

      Sire, it is called the Vita Publica.

      It is very dark. Even as he spoke his horse staggered, but, recovering its foothold with an effort, stood trembling violently. Nor could all the incitements of its master induce the beast again to move forward.

      Is there no one with a lanthorn in this street? asked the Prince.

      His attendants began forthwith to call out loudly for any one who had a lanthorn. Now, it chanced that an old man sleeping in a hovel on a pallet of straw was, awakened by these cries. When he heard that it was the Prince of Felicitas himself, he came hastily, carrying his lanthorn, and stood trembling beside the Prince's horse. It was so dark that the Prince could not see him.

      Light your lanthorn, old man, he said.

      The old man laboriously lit his lanthorn. Its pale rays fled out on either hand; beautiful but grim was the vision they disclosed. Tall houses, fair court-yards, and a palm grown garden; in front of the Prince's horse a deep cesspool, on whose jagged edges the good beast's hoofs were planted; and, as far as the glimmer of the lanthorn stretched, both ways down the rutted street, paving stones displaced, and smooth tesselated marble; pools of mud, the hanging fruit of an orange tree, and dark, scurrying shapes of monstrous rats bolting across from house to house. The old man held the lanthorn higher; and instantly bats flying against it would have beaten out the light but for the thin protection of its horn sides.

      The Prince sat still upon his horse, looking first at the rutted space that he had traversed and then at the rutted space before him.

      Without a light, he said, this thoroughfare is dangerous. What is your name, old man?

      My name is Cethru, replied the aged churl.

      Cethru! said the Prince. Let it be your duty henceforth to walk with your lanthorn up and down this street all night and every night,—and he looked at Cethru: Do you understand, old man, what it is you have to do?

      The old man answered in a voice that trembled like a rusty flute:

      Aye, aye!—to walk up and down and hold my lanthorn so that folk can see where they be going.

      The Prince gathered up his reins; but the old man, lurching forward, touched his stirrup.

      How long be I to go on wi' thiccy job?

      Until you die!

      Cethru held up his lanthorn, and they could see his long, thin face, like a sandwich of dried leather, jerk and quiver, and his thin grey hairs flutter in the draught of the bats' wings circling round the light.

      'Twill be main hard! he groaned; an' my lanthorn's nowt but a poor thing.

      With a high look, the Prince of Felicitas bent and touched the old man's forehead.

      Until you die, old man, he repeated; and bidding his followers to light torches from Cethru's lanthorn, he rode on down the twisting street. The clatter of the horses' hoofs died out in the night, and the scuttling and the rustling of the rats and the whispers of the bats' wings were heard again.

      Cethru, left alone in the dark thoroughfare, sighed heavily; then, spitting on

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