Vilas County news. [volume] (Eagle River, Vilas County, Wis.) 1896-1927, 1899-09-11


lands,
Is this the handiwork you give to God,
This monstrous thing distorted and
soul-quenched?
How will you ever straighten up this
shape;
Give back the upward looking and the
light;
Rebuild in it the music and the dream:
Touch it again with Immortality;
Make right the immemorIal infamies,
Perf1dious wrongs, immedicable woes?
o, masters, lords and rulers in all
lands.
How will the Future reckon with this
Man?
How answer his brute questions in that
hour
When whirlwinds of rebellion shake
the world?
How will it be with kingdoms and
with kings
When this dumb Terror shall reply to
God
After the silence of the centuries?
together unfamiliar to readers of the
Century and Scribner's Magazine, but
never before has he aroused so much
enthusiasm. Some of the western pa
pers are particularly jealous in praise,
one of them, the San Jose Mercury,
going so far as to term it "the strong
est, most meaningful and most strik-
ing poem, with the single exception,
perhaps, of Kip1ing's Recessional, that
has been written in any country in the
last quarter of a century"
Millet and Markham.
Does Markham correctly read the
mind of Millet, or is not a picture of
simple faith distorted under the gaze
of one who has neither poetry in his
soul nor faith in his heart? To be-
lieve Markham, the world has gone
from bad to worse; revelation has been
a failure, and the agencies supposed
to have been of heaven have been in
reality of the regions below. The sug-
gestion is so at variance with history
that it cannot be accepted, and viewed
in the light of Millet's other works,
cannot stand as an Interpretation of
his genius.
Millet is the painter of nature. His
Man with the Hoe, caught in a mo-
ment of rest from labor, is not cheru-
bic in countenance, but it is strong in
| the sense of duty. Ever since the day
upon which Adam was driven out Of
Paradise, his descendants have rested
under the obligation to earn their
bread by the sweat of their brow. The
normal condition of man is not that
of golf playing, nor of disporting him
self in the tennis court To Work-to
work to the point of sweating by the
broW-is the plain requirement, and
work of that kind leaves but little
| time for the ethical Developments by
which the idle man plumes himself as
a gentleman This world is primarily
that of the fields, where, in commu-
MON with nature, taking lessons from
the various growths to which God
gives life, there is built up a sense
of superiority over nature and of de-
pendence upon God. Such a laborer
pauses for an instant while resting
upon his hoe. Because he is not
clothed in fine linen; because his hair
is not parted in the middle because,
perhaps, he is not versed in Arabic and
Greek, Markham sees in him the
brother to the OK" But in the eyes
of Millet the man undergoes a trans
fguration. Born with a heart and
soul, this man performs the labor
which is his heritage. Simple in man.
ner, he is trustful and unsuspecting.
Doing his plain duty by all those who
are dependent upon him, he expects
the same good faith in return. He
sees God in the dawn of the day; he
sees Him as nature yields return for
labor; he sees Him as he commits him.
self to the sable mantle Of night. The
backbone of his country's citizenship,
it is upon his arm that it rests in time
of danger. During periods of peace
it is his work in the fields which main
tains the nation. To catch an inter
probation of what Millet meant by The
Man with the Hoe, take his companion
picture, The Angelus. 1t is just sun
down as the two workers in the field
catch the first sound of the Angelus
bell from the HARDLY village. They
stand up in prayerful response to the
summons and thank God for what they
are, for His benefcence and for the
good which is to come. Millet's Man
with the Hoe is man with duty;
Markham's representation is an UNI
speakable parody Constitu-
ton.