The Birmingham age-herald., 1909-11-14

causes of its dissolution lay deep in the very nature of things, a nature which the most carefully constructed philosophy seems powerless to discover. This is the idea which permeates "The Blithedale Romance" In Zenobia Hawthorne is supposed to have drawn Margaret Fuller her general character only, not her his- tory. Like Zenobia, Margaret Fuller was drowned, not self-drowned for unrequited love, however-for after the Brook Farm experiment she lived to achieve increased fame and to become a countess-but drowned with her husband and child in a wild winters shipwreck off Fire Island. Into 'The Blithedale Romance flaw thorne put much of himself. It is full of introspection, phllosophic speculation, psychology and that lowering shade of the occult from which, inherited as it was from his ancestor. the stern old judge who hanged witches in Salem. Hawthorne was never wholly able. or perhaps de- sired, to separate himself.
 ;" USTY winds of an April night Y blew blea1ly through the streets O of Boston as Miles Coverdale, the rising young poet, hurried through the winterlike weather toward his bachelor apartments from a performance of the Yelled Lady" Shabby old Mir Noodle, lurking at street corner, accounted him with: MT. Coverdale, Mir Coyerdale; can I speak with you, sir?" Coverdale knew the old man well-that Is as well as any man could know such a person Noodle sold various small articles of mer- chandise about the streets, especially small silk purses knitted by a person whose identity he refused to disclose, through many asked 1t of him. He had furtive, shrinking way with him. a way of suddenly appearing at ones elbow and offering his wares and then fading away again, as if he were undertaking and de-materializing, man of few words who never looked one in the face and never urged prospective customer to buy.
 T hear you are going to.Blithedale to- morrow" said MT. Noodle, would you do me favor. sir very great favorg' What is it, MT. Moodie?" returned Gov erdale. my time is brief, as I have many things to arrange before my departure" Old Noodle gazed meditatively at the speaker and said hesitatingly, You are
 
 like to trouble you" If you desire an older man from whom to ask your favor. whatever 1t is. there is Ir. Hollingsworth. who is also going to Blithedale. Perhaps he would do."
 'Yes, thank you, MT Coverdale: pardon my having troubled you. Do you happen to know a lady called Zenobia?' Not personally" replied Coverdale. but hope to have the pleasure tomorrow" Thank you. sir, good night" And old Noodle faded away, as was his wont, into the windy night.
 The Yelled Lady. from a demonstra- ton of whose occult powers Coverdale had been returning when he was accosted by Noodle, was just then a fleeting sen saton of the town. Nowadays she would not have been considered very wonderful, but hers was one of the first of those mesmeric performances now so common, and was then considered very wonderful. The Yelled Lady sat on the stage under a veil of soft, shimmering white and silver, which completely hid both her face and form, and answered questions put to her in the true Sibylline manner. Her man. ager, control" or whatever he . / with snakelike eyes, who looked the part of a personal Mephistopheles and was skillful in adding the effect of appropriate stage setting to the performance. Varl- ous were the rumors regarding the iden tity of the lady within the veil. Some said she was a high-born damsel impris- oned there by enchantment and young men made bets regarding her.
 As to MT. Hollingsworth. to whom Coverdale had alluded he was a man with an idea-a sort of patent system for re- generating the world, which, he was pro- foundly convinced, could be regenerated in no other way. The Yelled Lady was popular, MT. Hollingsworth was we'll known and people even read MT. Cover dale's poems.
 But Blithedale loomed larger than all three for there at Blithedale were col lected men and women who had made names for themselves in literature and many lines of phiosophic thought to es- tablish a community where beatific wis ions should become beautiful practices; where, living close to nature and in the harmony of a brotherly and sisterly transcendentalism, they might furnish the world with a living and successful ex- pertinent. which should be a beacon to
 followed by the nations and the ages Among the women was Zenobia, tall dark, splendid creature, who had taken the name of the Palmyran Queen as her pen name Her history was more or less buried in obscurity She was known to be very rich and there were rumors of ar early entanglement-some said secret marriage-with a man of great persona attraction but of no principle. She hat apparently no relatives, admitted few frfends-and the world took her at hel own valuation and never thought of ap plying to her the strict rule which bound other women to conventionalities.
 Although the month was April. 1t wa. sbrouded a dreary landscape that Mile Coverdale made his way next day towart Blithdale and a better life. All the mor' welcome, therefore, was the roaring fir which greeted him and three companion when the ancient farmhouse was reached at last. A fire such as a family of Pil grims might have swung their crane, over and which, by contrast with the lit tle eats which heated the poets bachelo apartments in the city. made him fee that he had, indeed. transported himself n world wide distance from the system O society which shackled him at breakfas time
 And there, glowing and splendid hy thu