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to redeem the last half of the nine years; but as the time was not yet come, I executed a bond, binding myself and my executors to pay the man to whom he was sold what to candid men might appear equitable for the last four and a half years of his time, in case the said youth should be living, and in a condition likely to provide comfortably for himself.

If the last selection from Franklin might be called mental biography, this should be named the biography of a soul. The tenderness of conscience revealed is joined with a careful accuracy in planning to make exactly the restitution due, no more and no less, which is very characteristic. He shows that, unlike some reformers, he is as concerned for his own misdeeds as for those of others. The Quaker habit of thought appears in almost every line, though as it happens there is scarcely any occasion in this selection for the use of the Quaker speech.

Brockden Brown, born in Philadel phia, 1771; died, 1810.

In this period belongs our first important writer of fiction. Charles Brockden Brown lived and wrote Charles in Philadelphia. He studied law, but abandoned it for Literature. He is the first American to make Literature actually the chief occupation of his life. His works of fiction belong to the class of Romances. They are generally stories of improbable adventures and extraordinary characters. He had a powerful imagination; and his leading characters are strongly and impressively drawn. He wrote, however, too rapidly for the best results. His stories are rather clumsily constructed and he lacks delicacy of touch and fineness of finish. His principal works are:

Arthur
Mervyn.

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The dates show the rapidity with which Brown produced his romances. Six books within four years; and the last three issued in the same year. "Arthur Mervyn" has special historical interest, as it has for the background of its pictures of life the terrible yellow fever plague at Philadelphia in 1793. It has scenes of great power and shows some dramatic force; but like the other writings of Brown, it is hurriedly and loosely constructed. It lacks logical connection between its events. The actions are improbable; which, in a romance, they may properly be. But they also seem improbable, which is a fatal defect; that is, Brown does not succeed in throwing around the strange events he records that atmosphere of reality which characterizes the work of the great romancers.

As Brown stands at the head of our long line of excellent writers of fiction, a short extract from one of his books is given, if only that we may which to compare the better work of later times. The following paragraphs are from the description of the plague-stricken city, in Chapter XV of "Arthur Mervyn":

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In proportion as I drew near the city, the tokens of its calamitous condition became more apparent. Every farm

house was filled with supernumerary tenants, fugitives from home, and haunting the skirts of the road, eager to detain every passenger with inquiries after news. The passengers were numerous; for the tide of emigration was by no means exhausted. Some were on foot, bearing in their countenances the tokens of their recent terror, and filled with mournful reflections on the forlornness of their state. Few had secured to themselves an asylum; some were without the means of paying for victuals or lodging for the coming night; others, who were not thus destitute, yet knew not whither to apply for entertainment, every house being already overstocked with inhabitants, or barring its inhospitable doors at their approach.

Families of weeping mothers and dismayed children, attended with a few pieces of indispensable furniture, were carried in vehicles of every form. The parent or husband had perished; and the price of some movable, or the pittance handed forth by public charity, had been expended to purchase the means of retiring from this theatre of disasters, though uncertain and hopeless of accommodation in the neighboring districts.

Between these and the fugitives whom curiosity had led to the road, dialogues frequently took place, to which I was suffered to listen. From every mouth the tale of sorrow was repeated with new aggravations. Pictures of their own distress, or of that of their neighbors, were exhibited in all the hues which imagination can annex to pestilence and poverty.

*

The sun had nearly set before I reached the precincts of the city. I pursued the track which I had formerly taken, and entered High Street after nightfall. Instead of equipages and a throng of passengers, the voice of levity and glee, which I had formerly observed, and which the mildness of the season would, at other times, have produced, I found nothing but a dreary solitude.

The market-place, and each side of this magnificent avenue, were illuminated, as before, by lamps; but between the verge of SCHUYLKILL and the heart of the city, I met not more than a dozen figures; and these were ghostlike, wrapped in cloaks, from behind which they cast upon me glances of wonder and suspicion, and, as I approached, changed their course, to avoid touching me. Their clothes were sprinkled with vinegar, and their nostrils defended from contagion by some powerful perfume.

I cast a look upon the houses, which I recollected to have formerly been, at this hour, brilliant with lights, resounding with lively voices, and thronged with busy faces. Now they were closed, above and below; dark, and without tokens of being inhabited. From the upper windows of some, a gleam sometimes fell upon the pavement I was traversing, and showed that their tenants had not fled, but were secluded or disabled.

These tokens were new, and awakened all my panics. Death seemed to hover over this scene, and I dreaded that the floating pestilence had already lighted on my frame. I had scarcely overcome these tremors, when I approached a house the door of which was opened, and before which stood a vehicle, which I presently recognized to be a hearse.

The driver was seated on it. I stood still to mark his visage, and to observe the course which he proposed to take. Presently a coffin, borne by two men, issued from the house. The driver was a negro; but his companions were white. Their features were marked by ferocious indifference to danger or pity. One of them, as he assisted in thrusting the coffin into the cavity provided for it, said, "I'll be d-d if I think the poor dog was quite dead. It wasn't the fever that ailed him, but the sight of the girl and her mother on the floor. I wonder how they all got into that room. What carried them there?"

The other surlily muttered, "Their legs, to-be-sure." "But what should they hug together in one room for?"

"To save us trouble, to-be-sure."

"And I thank them with all my heart; but d— it, it wasn't right to put him in his coffin before the breath was fairly gone. I thought the last look he gave me told me to stay a few minutes."

"Pshaw! he could not live. The sooner dead the better for him; as well as for us. Did you mark how he eyed us when we carried away his wife and daughter? I never cried in my life, since I was knee high, but curse me if I ever felt in better tune for the business than just then. Hey!" continued he, looking up, and observing me standing a few paces distant, and listening to their discourse; "what's wanted? Anybody dead?"

I stayed not to answer or parley, but hurried forward. My joints trembled, and cold drops stood on my forehead. I was ashamed of my own infirmity; and, by vigorous efforts of my reason, regained some degree of composure. The evening had now advanced, and it behoved me to procure accommodation at some of the inns.

Notice, in the plan of this description, three main elements. First it is skilfully introduced, by the approach to the city, gradually preparing the reader for the terrible scenes to be related later. Then contrast is effectively employed, by reminding the reader of the former visit, when everything was cheerful and prosperous; and finally the most terrible features of the situation, especially the brutalizing effect upon character, are very vividly brought out by the conversation of the men who are removing the bodies. The chief defect of the style, as compared with De Foe's "Description of the Plague in London," for example, is a rather turgid diction in some places; such phrases as "magnificent avenue

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