English Literature For Boys And Girls by H.E. Marshall

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"He [Chaucer] must have been a man of a most wonderful
comprehensive nature, because as it has been truly observed of
him, he has taken into the compass of his Canterbury Tales the
various manners and humours (as we now call them) of the whole
English nation, in his age. Not a single character has escaped
him. All his pilgrims are severally distinguished from each
other; and not only in their inclinations, but in their very
physiognomies persons. . . . The matter and manner of their
tales, and of their telling are so suited to their different
educations, humours, and callings, that each of them would be
improper in any other mouth. Even the grave and serious
characters are distinguished by their several sorts of gravity.
Their discourses are such as belong to their age, their calling,
and their breeding; such as are becoming to them and to them
only. Some of his persons are vicious, and some virtuous; some
are unlearned, or (as Chaucer calls them) lewd, and some are
learned. Even the ribaldry of the low characters is different:
the Reeve, the Miller, and the Cook are several men, and
distinguished from each other as much as the mincing Lady-
Prioress and the broad-speaking, gap-toothed Wife of Bath. . . .
It is sufficient to say, according to the proverb, that here is
God's plenty. We have our forefathers and great-grand-dames all
before us, as they were in Chaucer's days. Their general
characters are still remaining in mankind, and even in England,
though they are called by other names than those of monks, and
friars, and canons, and lady abbesses, and nuns; for mankind is
ever the same, and nothing lost out of nature though everything
is altered."

The Fables was the last book Dryden wrote. He was growing to be
an old man, and a few months after it was published he became
very ill. "John Dryden, Esq., the famous poet, lies a-dying,"
said the newspapers on the 30th April, 1700. One May morning he
closed his eyes for ever, just as

"Aurora had but newly chased the night,
And purpled o'er the sky with blushing light."

Chapter LXI DEFOE--THE FIRST NEWSPAPERS

TO almost every house in the land, as regular as the milk man,
more regular than the postman, there comes each morning the
newspaper boy. To most of us breakfast means, as well as things
to eat, mother pouring out the tea and father reading the
newspaper. As mother passes father's tea she says, "Anything in
the paper, John?" And how often he answers, "Nothing, nothing
whatever."

Although father says there is nothing in the paper there is a
great deal of reading in it, that we can see. And now comes the
question, Who writes it all? Who writes this thin, flat book of
six or eight great pages which every morning we buy for a penny
or a halfpenny? But perhaps you think it does not matter who
writes the newspapers, for the newspaper is not literature.
Literature means real books with covers--dear possessions to be
loved and taken care of, to be read and read again. But a
newspaper is hardly read at all when it is crumpled up and used
to light the fire. And no one minds, for who could love a
newspaper, who cares to treasure it, and read it again and yet
again?

We do not want even to read yesterday's newspapers, for
newspapers seem to hold for us only the interest of the day. The
very name by which they used to be called, journal, seems to tell
us that, for it comes from the French word "jour," meaning "a
day." Newspapers give us the news of the day for the day. Yet
in them we find the history of our own times, and we are
constantly kept in mind of how important they are in our everyday
life by such phrases as "the freedom of the Press," "the opinion
of the Press," the Press meaning all the newspapers, journals and
magazines and the people who write for them.

So we come back again to our question, Who writes for the
newspapers? The answer is, the journalists. A newspaper is not
all the work of one man, but of many whose names we seldom know,
but who work together so that each morning we may have our paper.
And in this chapter I want to tell you about one of our first
real journalists, Daniel Defoe. Of course you know of him
already, for he wrote Robinson Crusoe, and he is perhaps your
favorite author. But before he was an author he was a
journalist, and as I say one of our first.

For there was a time when there were no newspapers, nothing for
father to read at breakfast-time, and no old newspapers to
crumple up and light fires with. The first real printed English
newspaper was called the Weekly News. It was published in 1622,
while King Charles I was still upon the throne.

But this first paper and others that came after it were very
small. The whole paper was not so large as a page of one of our
present halfpenny papers. The news was told baldly without any
remarks upon it, and when there was not enough news it was the
fashion to fill up the space with chapters from the Bible.
Sometimes, too, a space was left blank on purpose, so that those
who bought the paper in town might write in their own little bit
of news before sending it off to country friends.

Defoe was one of the first to change this, to write articles and
comments upon the news. Gradually newspapers became plentiful.
And when Government by party became the settled form of our
Government, each party had its own newspaper and used it to help
on its own side and abuse the other.

Milton and Dryden were really journalists; Milton when he wrote
his political pamphlets, and Dryden when he wrote Absalom and
Achitophel and other poems of that kind. But they were poets
first, journalists by accident. Defoe was a journalist first,
though by nature ever a story-teller.

Daniel Defoe, born in 1661, was the son of a London butcher names
James Foe. Why Daniel, who prided himself on being a true-born
Englishman, Frenchified his name by adding a "De" to it we do not
know, and he was over forty before he changed plain Foe into
Defoe.

Daniel's father and mother were Puritans, and he was sent to
school with the idea that he should become a Nonconformist
minister. But Defoe did not become a minister; perhaps he felt
he was unsuited for such solemn duty. "The pulpit," he says
later, "is none of my office. It was my disaster first to be set
apart for, and then to be set apart from the honor of that sacred
employ."

Defoe never went to college, and because of this many a time in
later days his enemies taunted him with being ignorant and
unlearned. He felt these taunts bitterly, and again and again
answered them in his writings. "I have been in my time pretty
well master of five languages," he says in one place. "I have
also, illiterate though I am, made a little progress in science.
I have read Euclid's Elements. . . . I have read logic. . . . I
went some length in physics. . . . I thought myself master of
geography and to possess sufficient skill in astronomy." Yet he
says I am "no scholar."

When Defoe left school he went into the office of a merchant
hosier. It was while he was in this office that King Charles II
died and King James II came to the throne. Almost at once there
followed the Duke of Monmouth's rebellion. The Duke was a
Protestant and James was a Catholic. There were many in the land
who feared a Catholic King, and who believed too that the Duke
had more right to the throne than James, so they joined the
rebellion. Among them was Daniel. But the Rebellion came to
nothing. In a few weeks the Duke's army was scattered in flight,
and he himself a wretched prisoner in the Tower.

Happier than many of his comrades, Defoe succeeded in escaping
death or even punishment. Secretly and safely he returned to
London and there quietly again took up his trade of merchant
hosier. But he did not lose his interest in the affairs of his
country. And when the glorious Revolution came he was one of
those who rode out to meet and welcome William the Deliverer.

But perhaps he allowed politics to take up too much of his time
and thought, for although he was a good business man he failed
and had to hide from those to whom he owed money. But soon we
find him setting to work again to mend his fortunes. He became
first secretary to and then part owner of a tile and brick
factory, and in a few years made enough money to pay off all his
old debts.

By this time Defoe had begun to write, and was already known as a
clever author. Now some one wrote a book accusing William among
many other "crimes" of being a foreigner. Defoe says, "this
filled me with a kind of rage"; and he replied with a poem called
The True-born Englishman. It became popular at once, thousands
of copies being sold in the first few months. Every one read it
from the King in his palace to the workman in his hut, and long
afterwards Defoe was content to sign his books "By the author of
'The True-born Englishman.'" It made Defoe known to the King.
"This poem," he said, "was the occasion of my being known to his
Majesty." He was received and employed by him and "above the
capacity of my deserving, rewarded." He was given a small
appointment in the Civil Service. All his life after Defoe loved
King William and was his staunch friend, using all the power of
his clever pen to make the unloved Dutch King better understood
of his people. But when King William died and Queen Anne ruled
in his stead Defoe fell on evil times.

In those days the quarrels about religion were not yet over.
There was a party in the Church which would very willingly have
seen the Nonconformists or Dissenters persecuted. Dissenters
were like to have an evil time. To show how wrong persecution
was, Defoe wrote a little pamphlet which he called The Shortest
Way with the Dissenters. He wrote as if he were very angry
indeed with the Dissenters. He said they had been far too kindly
treated and that if he had his way he would make a law that
"whoever was found at a conventicle should be banished the nation
and the preacher be hanged. We should soon see an end of the
tale--they would all come to Church, and one age would make us
all one again."

Defoe meant this for satire. A satire is, you remember, a work
which holds up folly or wickedness to ridicule. He meant to show
the High Churchmen how absurd and wicked was their desire to
punish the Dissenters for worshiping God in their own way. He
meant to make the world laugh at them. But at first the High
Churchmen did not see that it was meant to ridicule them. They
greeted the author of this pamphlet as a friend and ally. The
Dissenters did not see the satire either, and found in the writer
a new and most bitter enemy.

But when at last Defoe's meaning became plain the High Church
party was very angry, and resolved to punish him. Defoe fled
into hiding. But a reward of fifty pounds was offered for his
discovery, and, "rather than others should be ruined by his
mistake," Defoe gave himself up.

For having written "a scandalous and seditious pamphlet" Defoe
was condemned to pay a large fine, to stand three times in the
pillory, and to be imprisoned during the Queen's pleasure. Thus
quickly did Fortune's wheel turn round. "I have seen the rough
side of the world as well as the smooth," he said long after. "I
have, in less than half a year, tasted the difference between the
closet of a King, and the dungeon of Newgate."

The pillory was a terrible punishment. In a public place, raised
on a platform, in full view of the passing crowd, the victim
stood. Round his neck was a heavy collar of wood, and in this
collar his hands were also confined. Thus he stood helpless,
unable to protect himself either from the sun or rain or from the
insults of the crowd. For a man in the pillory was a fitting
object for laughter and rude jests. To be jeered at, to have mud
thrown at him, was part of his punishment.

But for Defoe it was a triumph rather than a punishment. To the
common people he was already a hero. So they formed a guard
round him to protect him from the mud and rotten eggs his enemies
would now thrown. They themselves threw flowers, they wreathed
the pillory with roses and with laurel till it seemed a place of
honor rather than of disgrace. They sang songs in his praise and
drank to his health and wished those who had sent him there stood
in his place. Thus through all the long, hot July hours Defoe
was upheld and comforted in his disgrace. And to show that his
spirit was untouched by his sentence he wrote A Hymn to the
Pillory. This was bought and read and shouted in the ears of his
enemies by thousands of the people. It was a more daring satire
than even The Shortest Way. In the end of it Defoe calls upon
the Pillory, "Thou Bugbear of the Law," to speak and say why he
stands there:--

"Tell them, it was, because he was too bold,
And told those truths which should not have been told!
Extol the justice of the land,
Who punish what they will not understand!

Tell them, he stands exalted there
For speaking what we would not hear:
And yet he might have been secure,
Had he said less, or would he have said more!

Tell them the men that placed him here
Are scandals to the Times!
Are at a loss to find his guilt,
And can't commit his crimes!"

But although Defoe's friends could take the sting out of the
terrible hours during which he stood as an object for mockery
they could do little else for him. So he went back to prison to
remain there during the Queen's pleasure.

This, of course, meant ruin to him. For himself he could bear
it, but he had a wife and children, and to know that they were in
poverty and bitter want was his hardest punishment.

From prison Defoe could not manage his factory. He had to let
that go, losing with it thousands of pounds. For the second time
he saw himself ruined. But he had still left to him his pen and
his undaunted courage. So, besides writing many pamphlets in
prison, Defoe started a paper called the Review. It appeared at
first once, then twice, and at last three times a week. Unlike
our papers of to-day, which are written by many hands, Defoe
wrote the whole of the Review himself, and continued to do so for
years. It contained very little news and many articles, and when
we turn these worn and yellowing pages we find much that,
interesting in those days, has lost interest for us. But we also
find articles which, worded in clear, strong, truly English
English, seem to us as fresh and full of life as when they were
written more than two hundred years ago. We find as well much
that is of keen historical interest, and we gain some idea of the
undaunted courage of the author when we remember that the first
numbers of the Review at least were penned in a loathsome prison
where highwaymen, pirates, cut-throats, and common thieves were
his chief companions.

Chapter LXII DEFOE--"ROBINSON CRUSOE"

FOR more than a year and a half Defoe remained in prison; then he
was set free.

A new Government had come into power. It was pointed out to the
Queen that it was a mistake to make an enemy of so clever an
author as Defoe. Then he was set at liberty, but on condition
that he should use his pen to support the Government. So
although Defoe was now free to all seeming, this was really the
beginning of bondage. He was no longer free in mind, and by
degrees he became a mere hanger-on of Government, selling the
support of his pen to whichever party was in power.

We cannot follow him through all the twists and turns of his
politics, nor through all his ups and downs in life, nor mention
all the two hundred and fifty books and pamphlets that he wrote.
It was an adventurous life he led, full of dark and shadowy
passages which we cannot understand and so perhaps cannot pardon.
But whether he sold his pen or no we are bound to confess that
Defoe's desire was towards the good, towards peace, union, and
justice.

One thing he fought for with all his buoyant strength was the
Union between England and Scotland. It had been the desire of
William III ere he died, it had now become the still stronger
desire of Queen Anne and her ministers. So Defoe took "a long
winter, a chargeable, and, as it proved, hazardous journey" to
Scotland. There he threw himself into the struggle, doing all he
could for the Union. He has left for us a history of that
struggle,* which perhaps better than any other makes us realize
the unrest of the Scottish people, the anger, the fear, the
indecision, with which they were filled. "People went up and
down wondering and amazed, expecting every day strange events,
afraid of peace, afraid of war. Many knew not which way to fix
their resolution. They could not be clear for the Union, yet
they saw death at the door in its breaking off--death to their
liberty, to their religion, and to their country." Better than
any other he gives a picture of the "infinite struggles, clamor,
railing, and tumult of party." Let me give, in his own words, a
description of a riot in the streets of Edinburgh:--

*History of the Union of Great Britain.

"The rabble by shouting and noise having increased their numbers
to several thousands, they began with Sir Patrick Johnston, who
was one of the treaters, and the year before had been Lord
Provost. First they assaulted his lodging with stones and
sticks, and curses not a few. But his windows being too high
they came up the stairs to his door, and fell to work at it with
sledges or great hammers. And had they broke it open in their
first fury, he had, without doubt, been torn to pieces without
mercy; and this only because he was a treater in the Commission
to England, for, before that, no man was so well beloved as he,
over the whole city.

"His lady, in the utmost despair with this fright, came to the
window, with two candles in her hand, that she might be known;
and cried out, for God's sake to call the guards. An honest
Apothecary in the town, who knew her voice, and saw the distress
she was in, and to whom the family, under God, is obliged for
their deliverance, ran immediately down to the town guard. But
they would not stir without the Lord Provost's order. But that
being soon obtained, one Captain Richardson, who commanded,
taking about thirty men with him, marched bravely up to them; and
making his way with great resolution through the crowd, they
flying, but throwing stones and hallooing at him, and his men.
He seized the foot of the stair case; and then boldly went up,
cleared the stair, and took six of the rabble in the very act,
and so delivered the gentleman and his family.

"But this did not put a stop to the general tumult, though it
delivered this particular family. For the rabble, by this time,
were prodigiously increased, and went roving up and down the
town, breaking the windows of the Members of Parliament and
insulting them in their coaches in the streets. They put out all
the lights that they might not be discovered. And the author of
this had one great stone thrown at him for but looking out of a
window. For they suffered nobody to look out, especially with
any lights, lest they should know faces, and inform against them
afterwards.

"By this time it was about eight or nine o'clock at night, and
now they were absolute masters of the city. And it was reported
they were going to shut up all the ports.* The Lord Commissioner
being informed of that, sent a party of the foot guards, and took
possession of the Netherbow, which is a gate in the middle of the
High Street, as Temple Bar between the City of London and the
Court.

*Gates in the City Wall.

"The city was now in a terrible fright, and everybody was under
concern for their friends. The rabble went raving about the
streets till midnight, frequently beating drums, raising more
people. When my Lord Commissioner being informed, there were a
thousand of the seamen and rabble come up from Leith; and
apprehending if it were suffered to go on, it might come to a
dangerous head, and be out of his power to suppress, he sent for
the Lord Provost, and demanded that the guards should march into
the city.

"The Lord Provost, after some difficulty, yielded; though it was
alleged, that it was what never was known in Edinburgh before.
About one o'clock in the morning a battalion of the guards
entered the town, marched up to the Parliament Close, and took
post in all the avenues of the city, which prevented the
resolutions taken to insult the houses of the rest of the
treaters. The rabble were entirely reduced by this, and
gradually dispersed, and so the tumult ended."

Although Defoe did all he could to bring the Union about he felt
for and with the poor distracted people. He saw that amid the
strife of parties, proud, ignorant, mistaken, it may be, the
people were still swayed by love of country, love of freedom.

Even after the Union was accomplished Defoe remained in Scotland.
He still wrote his Review every week, and filled it so full of
Union matters that his readers began to think he could speak of
nothing else and that he was grown dull. In his Review he
wrote:--

"Nothing but Union, Union, says one now that wants diversion; I
am quite tired of it, and we hope, 'tis as good as over now.
Prithee, good Mr. Review, let's have now and then a touch of
something else to make us merry." But Defoe assures his readers
he means to go on writing about the Union until he can see some
prospect of calm among the men who are trying to make dispeace.
"Then I shall be the first that shall cease calling upon them to
Peace."

The years went on, Defoe always living a stormy life amid the
clash of party politics, always writing, writing. More than once
his noisy, journalistic pen brought him to prison. But he was
never a prisoner long, never long silenced. Yet although Defoe
wrote so much and lived at a time when England was full of witty
writers he was outside the charmed circle of wits who pretended
not to know of his existence. "One of these authors," says
another writer, "(the fellow that was pilloried, I have forgotten
his name), is indeed so grave, sententious, dogmatical a rogue
that there is no enduring him."*

*Johnathan Swift.

At length when Defoe was nearly sixty years old he wrote the book
which has brought him world-wide and enduring fame. Need I tell
you of that book? Surely not. For who does not know Robinson
Crusoe, or, as the first title ran, "The Life and Strange
Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York, Mariner, who
lived eight-and-twenty years all alone in an uninhabited Island
on the Coast of America near the Mouth of the great River
Oroonoque, having been cast on shore by shipwreck, wherein all
the men perished but himself. With an account how he was at last
strangely delivered by Pirates. Written by himself." In those
days, you see, they were not afraid of long titles. The book,
too, is long. "Yet," as another great writer says,* "was there
ever anything written by mere man that was wished longer by its
readers, except Don Quixote, Robinson Crusoe, and the Pilgrim's
Progress?"

*Samuel Johnson.

The book was a tremendous success. It pleased the men and women
and children of two hundred years ago as much as it pleases them
to-day. Within a few months four editions had been sold. Since
then, till now, there has never been a time when Robinson Crusoe
has not been read. The editions of it have been countless. It
has been edited and re-edited, it has been translated and
abridged, turned into shorthand and into poetry, and published in
every form imaginable, and at every price, from one penny to many
pounds.

Defoe got the idea of his story from the adventures of a Scots
sailor named Alexander Selkirk. This sailor quarreled with his
captain, and was set ashore upon an uninhabited island where he
remained alone for more than four years. At the end of that time
he was rescued by a passing ship and brought home to England.
Out of this slender tale Defoe made his fascinating story so full
of adventure.

What holds us in the story is its seeming truth. As we read it
we forget altogether that it is only a story, we feel sure that
Crusoe really lived, that all his adventures really happened.
And if you ever read any more of Defoe's books you will find that
this feeling runs through them all. Defoe was, in fact, a born
story-teller--like Sir John Mandeville. With an amazing show of
truth he was continually deceiving people. "He was a great, a
truly great liar, perhaps the greatest liar that ever lived."*

*William Minto.

Finding that Robinson Crusoe was such a success, Defoe began to
write other stories. He wrote of thieves, pirates and rogues.
These stories have the same show of truth as Robinson Crusoe.
Defoe, no doubt, got the ideas for them from the stories of the
rogues with whom he mixed in prison. But they have nearly all
been forgotten, for although they are clever the heroes and
heroines are coarse and the story of their adventures is
unpleasant reading. Yet as history, showing us the state of the
people in the days of Queen Anne and of George I, they are
useful.