Daily tobacco leaf-chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1890-1895, 1890-06-13
THE WERE WOLF.

dfCduh vi philosophy Juan any mar
OF his generation; but he was totally
destitute Of personal ambition, anG
never could be induced to put his dis
coveries and speculations into literary
form. Hence his name is unknown,
and, save to the private friends with
whom he conversed, not a few oil
whom have acquired great reputation
by the Towering in them of germs
that he planted in their minds, his gil
ant intellectual stature is as though it
had never been. A giant he was,
physically as we'll as mentally; q
brave, we'll balanced nature, sunny
and clear as the day; a great, Jove like
head, with close curling beard and
hair. With ambition added, he would
have stood head and shoulders above
the makers of history-a king OF the
world.
My mother was of another stamp.
She was beautiful, dark and passion
ate; as fierce in her loving as in her
hating. | have seen her throw her.
self upon my fathers herculean
breast, her swarthy cheek against his
fair and ruddy one her jet black hair
upon his yellow beard, her wild black
eyes gazing into the steady blue of his
clinging there like a snake, and kiss
ing him as the adder strikes poison
into its victim. But her hate--that is
scarcely to be described. Had destiny
made her a rulerof nations, like Semi
ramis or Cleopatra, she would have
\ made their Nevenges look pale by con
trast with Mrs; her cruelty towards
those who hay kindled her resentment
was as ragirk and implaeable as fire.
Not the agolk, not the death of her
enemies would satisfy her; she must
annihilate them, body and soul; and
yet would have them exist through an
eternity of torture. But enough; such
were my parents.
was their only child, and ] in
herited from both. My fathers brain
dwelt in the nature of my mother; but
the two influences counteracted each
other had not his careless serenity,
nor her concentration and vividness
of emotional manifestation. | appear
ed cold and ascetic; my passions were
intense, but they were silent and hid
den. The only fire which | permitted
to reveal itself was that which famed
in the furnace of my intellect--the
devouring resolve to know and fathom
all things, And, indeed, | absorbed
knowledge with an ease and swiftness
that astonishcd every one. Before l
was 20 | knew all that the universities
can teach, and could have acted as
professor in any branch of either elias
steal or scientific study. But all this
was TO me but as the lowest rung of
the ladder on which purposed to as
cend beyond the clouds, My ambi-
ton transcribed the limits of human
achievement in the past, and contem
plated conquests of domains which
heretofore the eye of man had not
been opened oven to contemplate,
Eiaster of life and death, of space and
time, of matter and spirit-not less
than this was my aspiration. | be.
heved in my unequaled destiny, and
was deeply determined to fulfill it,
One faculty ! possessed that neither
my father nor my mother ever mani
festcd-that unexplained power of the
Eoul TO be free, at will, from the pref
udice of time and space and the wells
Of physical substance. This endowed
mo with a singular control over the
thoughts and impressions of others,
anu showed me upon how simple a
foundation the magic exploits of the
wizards of all epochs are based. But
magic is only seeming--a specious IL
fusion wrought on sense. My aim was
to make the seeming an actually. l
wished TO create and TO annihilate,
not to trile with phantoms and Jug
gleries.
/ kept a gray Russian wolf in my
gardeu-one OF the most savage of its
species. lie was chained to q tree;
not that | feared him, but that ]
wished his savageness to remain una
batel Daily l visited him, stared into
his mad eyes, and studied his nature.
Tie wolf, the widest and most relent-
less of all savage beasts, is the most
closely allied of all TO the foundations
of human nature. After contempla-
ting him for awhile / would feel my
self entering into his instincts and
cravings, aye, and outdoing him in
ferocity and brutal bloodthirstiness.
My comprehension of him cowed him !;
he would crouch and howl and strive
TO break his chain, lest ! should spring
upon him and rend him. That which
in man we call love is in the wolf
the undeveloped man-fear and ha-
tired. lie feared and hated me, and
/ loved him for his fear and hatred.
The scent of his hot breath and shaggy
fur soothed and pleased me, the glare
of his yellow eyes moved me to laugh
ter. and his snarling and whining
tickled my very heart. From such
communions returned refreshed and
stimulated; they appeased me, and
left me kindly and genial. Man, like
a fool, would ever keep himself within
his own narrow castle. Let him
emerge and invite to himself the wild
forces of nature, which, indeed, is but
his inchoate self, and the springs of
his life will 1ecome rs the eXhaustless
wells of Artesia, which are fed from
the hidden reservoirs of the planet
itself.
1t is affirmed by philosophers that
the love of woman enfeebles the &C
tons of the mind of man and ba1ks
ambition. meditated much upon this
dogma, doubling its soundneSs. Wo-
man is to man as his own self-as that
which is supremely dear and intimate
10 him. We yearn to endow ourselves
with all powers and pleasures; and by
making woman ours, when yet she
wears a separate form and aspect, we
enjoy her pleasure in our gifts, while
not FORGETTING ourown delight therein.
What is woman but the concrete
manifestation OF that metaphysical