The daily exchange. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1858-1861, 1860-08-06
BALTIMORE.
MONDAY, AUGUST C, 1860

surprises u.s. and especially as coming from man
of Mr.. HAwTHoRNE's high susceptibility, keenly
alive, as this last work of his has proven, 10 all
the fascinating influences and lofty inspirations Of
the past and its monuments. 1t may, perhaps,
be said that it is hardly just to summon writer
of romance to the bar, to answer for all the false
doctrine which may have crept into his pages
But nova days, by q strange seeming paradox,
fiction has grown to be The chosen vehicle of what
men teach as truth; and Mr. HAWTHORNE books
are full of doctrines and deductions, intended to
be practical; and whether his moral be pure and
true or morbid and false-for he has lessons OF
both kinds-it is always inculcated with clever
ness and force or insinuated with seductive in
genuity Suggestions, too which glide into the
mind with the smooth current of pleasant story
or graceful dialogue, arc very apt 10 find place
uachallenged, which cur intellectual vigilance
would never have surrendered, had they approach
ell us as naked and formal propositions. Like
the Indians in CooPER's familiar tale, they come
floating down with the tide, unseen, until we find
them in the midst of our camp and, it may be,
in possession of our guns. 1t is not only justif-
able, therefore, but it may be necessary, for the
sentinels to watch them with some care.
KENYON, the American sculptor-who we sup
pose is the hero of the Marble Faun, inasmuch as
he alone is happily married, with benediction, at
the foot-ights in the concluding chapter-is trav-
cling, with his friend the Count of Monte Benz,
on strange love-errand in mmer-time, through
the fairrst rnrtinn of heauliful Tuscany Through
valleys and mountains and old mountain-towns,
they make their way by moonlight and in the
cool hours of eve and morning, journeying on
horseback, at their will; the sculptor studying
and ENJOYING whatever most attracts him in the
Ioveliness of nature and of art, or in the dwell
lings and ways Of the simple and picturesque
people, who have been nursed amid the en-
chantmens of both More charming descrip-
tons than those which are given of their
vayfaring, we do not remember 10 have read
anywhere. They fill the mind of one who has
been a traveller himself with the most vivid and
exquisite remembrances, and furnish to those
who are less fortunate perfect gallery of Ital-
ian landscape architecture, and genre-panting, in
the true bright colors of the sunny land they copy
Travellers Of taste and cultivation will hereafter
take the Marble Faun with them, as they have car
ried Corinne or Childe Harold heretofore-happy
that the genius of their own day should be their
torch-bcarcr through the storied land, where the
genius of the 0lden time went out in such a blaze
of glory. Apropos of an old town, whose pom
derous dwellings impressed our pilgrims with the
idea Of literal indestructiblty not less than indie
finite antiquity, the sory-teller, speaking in his
own person, gives vent to an expression of 'dis-
"tress," that dwellings so old should "never
''crumble away, never be less fit than now for
"human habitation." Gazing at Them he
adds, ''we recognize how undesirable it is to build
the tabernacles of our brief lifetime out of perma-
"nent materials and with a view to their being
occupied by future generations. All towns
SHOULD be made capable ofpurificaton by fire, or
''of decay within each half century, otherwise
"they become the hereditary haunts of vermin and
'noisomeness, besides standing apart from the pos
''sibility of such Improvements as are constantly
introduced into the rest Of mans contrivanccs
"and accommodations. Proceeding then 10 adj
nit the beauty, without abiding to the uses, of
the natural instinct which prompts men TO desire
that their poserty should dwell under the same
rooi-tree with themselves, Mr.. Hawthorne con-
tinues: 1--WE may build almost immortal habita
"tions it is true, but we cannot keep them from
'growing old, musty, unwholesome dreary, full
''of death-scents, ghosts, and murder stains"
Here the sculptor takes up the thread of the argu-
ment. "You should 60 with me to my native
Country observed he to Donateo I'm that
fortunate land each generation has only its own
'sins ard sorrows TO bear Here it seems as if all
'the weary and dreary Past were piled upon the
''bacb of the Present. To invite an Italian no.
bleman from the yine-wreathed castle which had
Graded and buried hundred generations of his
race, from city of his nation which, perchance,
went back beyond the Caesars, and was crowned
with memories as green as the ivy on its towers,
to visit New England town-upon no better in
ducement than that its houses o. brick and pine,
having been built but yesterday, with all the con-
veniences for being burned tomorrow, are free
from the burdens of the past and are likely 10 re
main so-was certainly n grotesque and somewhat
peculiar proposition. If poor Donatello had been
a little more himself, he doubtless would have
that there is commonly something
in the past, besides WEAKNESS and dreariness:
that light and warmth to the mind and the heart
trail cheerngly out of its distance and darkness;
that glory, and gladness, and example are in it,
as well as sorrow and sin. He might have in
CURED of his companion whether in that foru-
nate land of which he spoke, there was no way of
keeping the domestic altar free from death-scents
ghosts and murder-stains, EXCEPT by confagration
II decay. Nay-turning on the sculptor-he
night well have asked him why it was, that he
himself had learned the art of giving immortality
o forms Of beauty, if all the tenements which must
receive them were destined TO be ruins within
three score years, and they were doomed to wan
DER from broken pedestal to pedestal, race of
marble nomads-the shifting household-gods of
generations Which outlived their households. IT.
indeed, the Tuscan had risen to the level of the
spirit which of late has walked the dust of SANTA
JRoCE with its breath, he would have cried aloud
hat the electric fire of freedom and redemption
hen descending upon Italy, came flashing all
llong the chains Of kindred and remembrance
which united generation with generation and the
present with the past-their noblest, irmest links
asst riveed TO the immemorial hearth stones of his
PEOPLE. To preserve these he might have ex-
PRESSED himself content to forego even {" the mod
! ern convenences' and the semi-centennial "pu-
rifcation by fire" But alas poor MONTE BENZ,
'nly little while before, had tossed a man, at
midnight, from the old Tarpeian Rock, merely to
lease his mistress, and be was far too heart-worn
nd remorseful to think of patriotism or philoso-
hy-Tuscany or Massachusetts, "The sky itself
is an old roof now he sighed, I" and no doubt
the sins of mankind have made it goomier than
FUSED to be'-with which sad whisper of sweet
'agic poesy he turned to his own gries
Leaving the actors and the mimic scene it is but |
ir, we think, to ask-whether the sentimental
'phism we have quoted ought to have been thus
# without its antidote. Surely a teacher of our
eope cannot think it wise or kind to loosen or
eaken even the lightest of the ties which bind Us
} our fathers, or unite MS in any way among our
Elves. Surely we have yet no need of counsel or
ersuasion to withdraw us from the past and re- |
lind us of the present. We can hardly be grow |
ng SO conservative, so stable, so old-ashioned |
} welded to tradition, so devoted to our ances |
)rs and their days, so forgetful of ourselves and
ur own times; so far removed from sordid con-
derations and pursuits and given over to unprac-
cal and romantic sentiment; as to require to be
armed against such follies and won back to this
ork-day world. To common eyes, our tenden-
les appear to be the very opposite of these. Day |
ter day we seem 10 be drifting farther and farther
ON the ancient beacons of our history and brother
God; and the feeling of genuine reverence-for |
nything-for men living or dead or for the works |