The Delta independent., 1893-11-15
THE HEROES OF ROMANCE
They Are Seldom Taken from tho
Middle Glasses.

Middle Glasses.
strictly Speaking. There Arc But Two
Normal Heroes OF Fiction, and Thoy
Are the Warrior and the
Fairy Prince.
It Is lamentable, indeed, when you
come to reflect on it, how large pro-
portion of useful and respectable call
ings falls under the ban of romance.
What poet or romancer ever made his
first lover, for example, baliff or
beadle? Yet bailiffs and beadles are
men and brothers. They may do their
oftcntimes dangerous duty with the
dash of Rupert, or the cool courage
of Cromwell, says Macmillnn's Maga-
zine, yet they are frankly impossible
as heroes of romance. De Quincy
makes n remark somewhere to the ef-
feet that one would not be inclined TO
think highly Of man who, in the ab-
scncc of predisposing circumstances,
deliberately and for the love of the
business decided to be butcher. Yet
butchers are husbands and fathers,
and have blood in their veins as well
as on their aprons As matter of
htotlbtlCs, OcleNe uhTuiy ady pAsSSS
but some solicitor falls in love; yet no
court of love or literatura will give
him audience as n lover, nor take cog
nizance of his pleadings. The breast
of the stockbrokcr is swayed by the
bears and bulls Of passion no less than
by the subtler influences of financial
speculation. Yet his name is not hon.
ored in the more than royal exchange
of romance. Then, with one stroke of
the pen. romance rules out the whole
nmorous mob of retail traders They
are not altogether absent from the
pages of romance, these worthy -citi-
zens. Only they have to forego the
heroic parts and put up with being
supcrnumcraries or villains or comic
characters About the butcher l am
doubtful. Not even Dickens, think,
found room for q butcher amid his
Babylon of trades. Nor with Shakes
pearc is 1t any better. Ounce the car
penter. Snug the Joiner, Bottom the
weaver, Flute the bellows-me nder,
Snout the tinker, and Starveling the
tailor, are very well to play the fool,
to divert the duke and ladies, but none
Of them, not even Bottom translated,
is a fit object for lady's love. As the
democratic Whitman has complained,
in n Shakcspcarcan play the mass of
industrious citizens is just q mob to
throw up its sweaty night-caps in some
Cesar's honor at the bidding of an An
tony. What is there about q trade
thus to incapacitate . man for ro-
nance?
Strictly speaking there arc but two
4. -
and the fairy prince. II there is no
fairy prince at hand. an ordinary prince
will do. The English duke is, rs the
American mornlist rightly enough di-
rined. only n modern variety of fairy
prince. To be mistaken for fairy
prince the English duke no doubt needs
to be looked ut from the other side of
the Atlantic. Seen at close quarters,
In the house of lords. on the race
course or In the law courts, he is apt to
appear hcshy. But he has the essen
tinl attribute OF the fairy prince, which
is rarity. There are but two dozen or
so of him all told, and most of these
have been bcspokcn or used up. He
has besides, for the American girl, an
other of the essential secrets of ro-
mnncc-he Is exotic. 1t is the good
fortune and fascinating fashion of the
fairy prince to descend always from
some unknown upper and divincr mir.
That II is which makes the Prince
Charming of the fairy tale so irresisti-
bic. SO II was that Cupid came to
Psyche, to cherish her with his secret
and invisible godhend. So Pcrseus
loatcd on winged sandals through the
welcoming mir to Andromeda's feet to
slay the monster. So Lohcngrin came
flashing in a swan-drawn skiff from
the mysterious halls of the Holy Grail.
to champion maiden innocence against
trcachcry and slnndcr. The fairy
prince. you sec, commonly includes the
warriors part, and is doubly rcsistlcss
coming in the nick of time to fight n
distressed damscl's battles and to slay
her dragons You may depend upon it
tina. what tells chiefly with the girls
against the cmincpuy respectable race
OF bankers and brewers and doctors
and lawyers II their appalling common
ness. their frequency, mean. and ia
milinrncss. What should there be in
one brass plate out of dozen in the
same street to throw q romantic girl
off her emotional balance? When the
modern novelist would surmount the
profcs =al high hat with the aurcolc
of roma CO, he tricks out his tame hero
to mimic the traditional advantages
of prince or champion.
Men Couldn't do lt.