Studying the short-story E-Book

J. Berg Esenwein

• Herausgeber: Books on Demand
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Seitenzahl: 496

Beschreibung

But the great majority of novels and plays represent human life in nothing more faithfully than in their insistence upon deeds. It is through action-tangible, visible action upon the stage, or, in the novel, action suggested by the medium of words-that the characters of the play and the novel are ordinarily revealed. In proportion as high art is attained in either medium of expression this action is marked by adequacy of motive, by conformity to the character, by progression and unity.

Leseprobe

Studying the short-story

Studying the short-storyAN INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY OF THE SHORT-STORY I STORIES OF ACTION AND ADVENTURE II STORIES OF MYSTERY AND FANTASYIII STORIES OF EMOTION IV HUMOROUS STORIESV STORIES OF SETTINGVI IMPRESSIONISTIC STORIES VII CHARACTER STUDIESVIII PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDIESCopyright

Studying the short-story

J. Berg Esenwein

AN INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY OF THE SHORT-STORY

Fiction as an art has made more progress during the last hundred years than any other literary type. The first half of the nineteenth century especially developed a consciousness of subject matter and form in both the novel and the short-story which has created an epoch as notable in the history of fiction as was the age of Shakespeare in the progress of the drama. In Great Britain, France, Russia, Germany, and America arose fictional artists of distinguished ability, while in other nations writers of scarcely less merit soon followed.The novel demands a special study, so even for its relation to our theme—the short-story—the reader must be referred to such works as specialize on the longer form. [1]A comprehensive treatment of the short-story would include an inquiry into the origins of all short fictional forms, for every story that is short is popularly knownas a short story. The fullest and best guide for such a study is Henry Seidel Canby’s historical and critical treatise,The Short Story in English.Naturally, an inquiry into origins would prove to be measurably profitless and certainly dry for the general student were it not supplemented by the reading of a great many stories—preferably in the original—which illustrate the steps in short-story development from earliest times. [2]A further field for a comprehensive survey would be a critical comparison of the modern form with its several ancestral and contributory forms, from original sources.A third examen would be devoted to the characteristics and tendencies of the present-day short-story as presented in volume form and, particularly, in the modern magazine.A fourth, would undertake to study the rhetoric of the form. [3]None of these sorts of study can be exhaustively presented in this volume, yet all are touched upon so suggestively and with such full references that the reader may himself pursue the themes with what fullness he elects. The special field herein covered will be, I believe, sufficiently apparent as the reader proceeds.Let it be understood from the outstart that throughout this volume the term short-story is used rather loosely to cover a wide variety of short fiction; yet presently it will be necessary to show precisely how the modern form differs from its fictive ancestors, and that distinction will assume some importance to those who care about recognizing the several short fictional forms and who enjoy calling things by their exact names.The first story-teller was that primitive man who in his wanderings afield met some strange adventure and returned to his fellows to narrate it. His narration was a true story. The first fictionist—perhaps it was the same hairy savage—was he who, having chosen to tell his adventure, also resolved to add to it some details wrought of his own fancy. That was fiction, because while the story was compounded of truth it was worked out by the aid of imagination, and so was close kin to the story born entirely of fancy which merely uses true-seeming things, or veritable contributory facts, to make the story “real.”Egyptian tales, recorded on papyrus sheets, date back six thousand years. Adventure was their theme, while gods and heroes, beasts and wonders, furnished their incidents. When love was introduced, obscenities often followed, so that the ancient tales of pure adventure are best suited to present-day reading.What is true of Egypt 4000 B. C. is equally true of Greece many centuries later. The Homeric storieswill serve as specimens of adventure narrative; and the Milesian tales furnish the erotic type.As for the literary art of these early fictions, we need only refer to ancient poetry to see how perfect was its development two thousand and more years ago; therefore—for the poets were story-tellers—we need not marvel at the majestic diction, poetic ideas, and dramatic simplicity of such short-stories as the Egyptian “Tales of the Magicians,” [4]fully six thousand years old; the Homeric legends, told possibly twenty-five hundred years ago; [5] “ The Book of Esther,” [6]written more than twenty-one hundred years ago; and the stories by Lucius Apuleius, inThe Golden Ass, [7]quite two thousand years old.In form these ancient stories were of three types: the anecdote (often expanded beyond the normal limits of anecdote); the scenario, or outline of what might well have been told as a longer story; and the tale, or straightforward chain of incidents with no real complicating plot.Story-telling maintained much the same pace until the early middle ages, when the sway of religious ideas was felt in every department of life. Superstition had always vested the forces of nature with more than natural attributes, so that the wonder tale was normally the companion of the war or adventure story. But now the power of the Christian religion was laying hold upon all minds, and the Frenchconte dévot, or miracle story, recitedthe wonderful doings of the saints in human behalf, or told how some pious mystic had encountered heavenly forces, triumphed over demons and monsters of evil, and performed prodigies of piety.These tales were loosely hung together, and exhibited none of the compression and sense of orderly climax characteristic of the short-story to-day. In style the early medieval stories fell far below classic models, naturally enough, for language was feeling the corrupting influences of that inrush of barbarian peoples which at length brought Rome to the dust, while culture was conserved only in out-of-the-way places. In form these narratives were chiefly the tale, the anecdote, and the episode, by which I mean a fragmentary part of a longer tale with which it had little or no organic connection.Theconte dévotin England was even more crude, for Old English was less polished than the speech of France and its people more heroic than literary.When we come to the middle of the fourteenth century we find in two great writers a marked advancement: Chaucer’sCanterbury Talesand Boccaccio’sDecameron—the former superior to the latter in story-telling art—opened up rich mines of legend, adventure, humor, and human interest. All subsequent narrators modeled their tales after these patterns. Chaucer’s “The Pardoner’s Tale” has many points in common with the modern short-story, and so has Boccaccio’snovella, “Rinaldo,” but these approaches to what we now recognize as the short-story type were not so much by conscious intention as by a groping after an ideal which was only dimlyexistent in their minds—so dimly, indeed, that even when once attained it seems not to have been pursued. For the most part thefabliaux [8]of Chaucer and thenovelle [9]of Boccaccio were rambling, loosely knit, anecdotal, lacking in the firmly fleshed contours of the modern short-story. Even theGesta Romanorum, orDeeds of the Romans—181 short legends and stories first printed about 1473—show the same ear marks.About the middle of the sixteenth century appearedThe Arabian Nights, that magic carpet which has carried us all to the regions of breathless delight. The story of “Ali Baba and The Forty Thieves,” for one, is as near an approach to our present-day short-story as was Irving’s “Rip Van Winkle,” and quite unsurpassed in all the literature of wonder-tales.Thus for two thousand years—yes, for six thousand years—the essentials of short story narration were unchanged. What progress had been made was toward truth-seeming, clearer characterization, and a finer human interest, yet so surpassing in these very respects are some of the ancient stories that they remain models to-day. Chiefly, then, the short fiction of the eighteenth century showed progress over that of earlier centuries in that it was much more consistently produced by amuch greater number of writers—so far as our records show.Separately interesting studies of the eighteenth-century essay-stories of Addison, Steele, Johnson and others in the English periodicals, theSpectator,Tatler,Rambler,Idler, andGuardianmight well be made, for these forms lead us directly to Hawthorne and Irving in America. Of almost equal value would be a study of Defoe’s ghost stories (1727) and Voltaire’s development of the protean French detective-story, in his “Zadig,” twenty years later.With the opening of the nineteenth century the marks of progress are more decided. The first thirty years brought out a score of the most brilliant story-tellers imaginable, who differ from Poe and his followers only in this particular—they were still perfecting the tale, the sketch, the expanded anecdote, the episode, and the scenario, for they had neither for themselves nor for their literary posterity set up a new standard, as Poe was to do so very soon.Of this fecund era were born the German weird tales of Ernst Amadeus Hoffmann and J. L. Tieck; theMoral Talesof Maria Edgeworth, and the fictional episodes of Sir Walter Scott in Scotland; the anecdotal tales and the novelettes of Prosper Mérimée and Charles Nodier in France; the tales of Pushkin, the father of Russian literature; and the tale-short-stories of Washington Irving and Nathaniel Hawthorne in America. Here too lies a fascinating field of study, over which to trace the approach towards that final form, so to call it, whichwas both demonstrated and expounded by Poe. It must suffice here to observe that Irving preferred the easy-flowing essay-sketch, and the delightful, leisurely tale (with certain well-marked tendencies toward a compact plot), rather than the closely organized plot which we nowadays recognize as the special possession of the short-story.In France, from 1830 to 1832, Honoré de Balzac produced a series of notable short-stories which, while marvels of narration, tend to be condensed novels in plot, novelettes in length, or expanded anecdotes. However, together with the stories of Prosper Mérimée, they furnish evidence for a tolerably strong claim that the modern short-story was developed as a fixed form in France before it was discovered in America—a claim, however, which lacks the elements of entire solidity, as a more critical study would show.From 1830 on, it would require a catalogue to name, and volumes to discuss, the array of European and American writers who have produced fictional narratives which have more or less closely approached the short-story form. Until 1835, when Edgar Allan Poe wrote “Berenice” and “The Assignation,” the approaches to the present form were sporadic and unsustained and even unconscious, so far as we may argue from the absence of any critical standard. After that year both Poe and others seemed to strive more definitely for the close plot, the repression of detail, the measurable unity of action, and the singleness of effect which Poe clearly defined and expounded in 1842.Since Poe’s notable pronouncement, the place of the short-story as a distinctive literary form has been attested by the rise and growth of a body of criticism, in the form of newspaper and magazine articles, volumes given broadly to the consideration of fiction, and books devoted entirely to the short-story. Many of these contributions to the literature of criticism are particularly important because their authors were the first to announce conclusions regarding the form which have since been accepted as standard; others have traced with a nice sense of comparison the origin and development of those earlier forms of story-telling which marked the more or less definite stages of progress toward the short-story type as at present recognized; while still others are valuable as characterizing effectively the stories of well-known writers and comparing the progress which each showed as the short-story moved on toward its present high place.Some detailed mention of these writings, among other critical and historical productions, may be of value here, without at all attempting a bibliography, but merely naming chronologically the work of those critics who have developed one or more phases of the subject with particular effectiveness. [10]Interesting and informing as all such historical and comparative research work certainly is, it must proveto be of greater value to the student than to the fiction writer. True, the latter may profit by a profound knowledge of critical distinctions, but he is more likely, for a time at least, to find his freedom embarrassed by attempting to adhere too closely to form, whereas in fiction a chief virtue is that spontaneity which expressesitself.But there would seem to be some safe middle-ground between a flouting of all canons of art, arising from an utter ignorance and contempt of the history of any artistic form, and a timid and tied-up unwillingness to do anything in fiction without first inquiring, “Am I obeying the laws as set forth by the critics?” The short-story writer should be no less unhampered because he has learned the origin and traced the growth of the ancient fiction-forms and learned to say of his own work, or that of others, “Here is a fictional sketch, here a tale, and here a short-story”—if, indeed, he does not recognize in it a delightful hybrid.By far the most important contribution to the subject of short-story criticism was made by Edgar Allan Poe, when in May, 1842, he published inGraham’s Magazinea review of Hawthorne’sTales, in which he announced his theory of the short-story—a theory which is regarded to-day as the soundest of any yet laid down.In 1876, Friedrich Spielhagen pointed out in hisNovelle oder Romanthe essential distinction between the novel and the short-story. [11]In 1884, Professor Brander Matthews published in theSaturday Review, London, and in 1885 published inLippincott’s Magazine, “The Philosophy of the Short-story,” in which, independently of Spielhagen, he announced the essential distinction between the novel and the short-story, and pointed out its peculiarly individual characteristics. In a later book-edition, he added greatly to the original essay by a series of quotations from other critics and essayists, and many original comparisons between the writings of master short-story tellers.In March 11, 1892, T. W. Higginson contributed toThe Independentan article on “The Local Short-Story,” which was the first known discussion of that important type.In 1895, Sherwin Cody published anonymously in London the first technical treatise on the rhetoric of the short-story, “The Art of Story Writing.”In 1896, Professor E. H. Lewis instituted in Chicago University the first course of instruction in the art of story-writing.In 1898, Charles Raymond Barrett published the first large work onShort Story Writing, with a complete analysis of Hawthorne’s “The Ambitious Guest,” and many important suggestions for writers.In the same year Charity Dye first applied pedagogical principles to the study of the short story, inThe Story-Teller’s Art.In 1902, Professor Lewis W. Smith published a brochure,The Writing of the Short Story, in which psychologicalprinciples were for the first time applied to the study and the writing of the short-story.In 1902, Professor H. S. Canby issuedThe Short Story, in which the theory of impressionism was for the first time developed. In 1903, this essay was included inThe Book of the Short Story, Alexander Jessup collaborating, together with specimens of stories from the earliest times and lists of tales and short-stories arranged by periods.In 1904, Professor Charles S. Baldwin developed a criticism ofAmerican Short Storieswhich has been largely followed by later writers.In 1909, Professor H. S. Canby producedThe Short Story in English, the first voluminous historical and critical study of the origins, forms, and content of the short-story.I have dwelt upon the history of the short-story thus in outline because we often meet the inquiry—sometimes put ignorantly, sometimes skeptically—What is a short-story? Is it anything more than a story that is short?The passion for naming and classifying all classes of literature may easily run to extreme, and yet there are some very great values to be secured by both the reader and the writer in arriving at some understanding of what literary terms mean. To establish distinctions among short fictive forms is by no means to assert that types which differ from the technical short-story are therefore of a lower order of merit. Many specimens of cognate forms possess an interest which surpasses that of short-stories typically perfect.Ever since Poe differentiated the short-story from the mere short narrative we have come to a clearer apprehension of what this form really means. I suppose that no one would insist upon the standards of the short-story as being the criterion of merit for short fiction—certainly I should commit no such folly in attempting to establish an understanding, not to say a definition, of the form. More than that: some short-stories which in one or more points come short oftechnicalperfection doubtless possess a human interest and a charm quite lacking in others which are technically perfect—just as may be the case with pictures.Some things, however, the little fiction must contain to come technically within the class of perfect short-stories. It must be centralized about one predominating incident—which may be supported by various minor incidents. This incident must intimately concern one central character—and other supporting characters, it may be. The story must move with a certain degree of directness—that is, there must be a thorough exclusion of such detail as is needless. This central situation or episode or incident constitutes, in its working out, the plot; for the plot must not only have a crisis growing out of a tie-up or crossroads or complication, but the very essence of the plot will consist in the resolution or untying or denouement of the complication.Naturally, the word plot will suggest to many a high degree of complexity; but this is by no means necessary in order to establish the claims of a fictitious narrative to being a short-story. Indeed, some of the best short-storiesare based upon a very slender complication; in other words, their plots are not complex.Elsewhere [12]I have defined the short-story, and this statement may serve to crystallize the foregoing. “A short-story is a brief, imaginative narrative, unfolding a single predominating incident and a single chief character; it contains a plot, the details of which are so compressed, and the whole treatment so organized, as to produce a single impression.”But some of these points need to be amplified.A short-story is brief not merely from the fact that it contains comparatively few words, but in that it is so compressed as to omit non-essential elements. It must be the narration of a single incident, supported, it may be, by other incidents, but none of these minor incidents must rival the central incident in the interest of the reader. A single character must be preëminent, but a pair of characters coördinate in importance may enjoy this single preëminence in the story, yet no minor characters must come to overshadow the central figure. The story will be imaginative, not in the sense that it must be imaginary, or that the facts in the story may not be real facts, but they must be handled and organized in an imaginative way, else it would be plain fact and not fiction. The story must contain a plot; that is to say, it must exhibit a character or several characters in crisis—for in plot the important word is crisis—and the denouement is the resolution of this crisis. Finally, the whole must be so organized as to leave a unified impressionupon the mind of the reader—it must concentrate and not diffuse attention and interest.All of the same qualities that inhere in the short-story may also be found in the novelette, except that the novelette lacks the compression, unity and simplicity of the short-story and is therefore really a short novel. Both the novel and the novelette admit of sub-plots, a large number of minor incidents, and even of digressions, whereas these are denied to the short-story, which throws a white light on a single crucial instance of life, some character in its hour of crisis, some soul at the crossroads of destiny.There is a tendency nowadays to give a mere outline of a story—so to condense it, so to make it swift, that the narration amounts to merely an outline without the flesh and blood of the true short-story. In other words, there is a tendency to call a scenario of a much longer story—for instance the outline of a novelette—a short-story. This extreme is as remote from the well-rounded short-story form as the leisurely novelette, padded out with infinite attention to detail.The tale differs from the short-story in that it is merely a succession of incidents without any real sense of climax other, for example, than might be given by the close of a man’s life, the ending of a journey, or the closing of the day. The tale is a chain; the short-story is a tree. The links of the chain may be extended indefinitely, but there comes a time when the tree can grow no longer and still remain a perfect tree. The tale is practically without organization and without plot—there [Pg xxviii] is little crisis, and the result of the crisis, if any there be, would be of no vital importance to the characters, for no special change in their relations to each other grows out of the crisis in the tale.A sketch is a lighter, shorter, and more simple form of fiction than the short-story. It exhibits character in a certain stationary situation, but has no plot, nor does it disclose anything like a crisis from which a resolution or denouement is demanded. It might almost be called a picture in still life were it not that the characters are likely to live and to move.In these introductory pages I have emphasized and reëmphasized these distinctions in various ways, because to me they seem to be important. But after all they are merely historical and technical. A man may be a charming fellow and altogether admirable even if his complexion quarrels with his hair and his hands do not match his feet in relative size.The present tendency of the British and American short-story is a matter of moment because no other literary form commands the interest of so many writers and readers. All literature is feeling the hand of commerce, but the short-story is chiefly threatened. The magazine is its forum, and the magazine must make money or suspend. Hence the chief inquiry of the editor is, What stories will make my magazine sell? And this is his attitude because his publisher will no longer pay a salary to an editor whose magazine must be endowed, having no visible means of support.These conditions force new standards to be set up. The story must have literary merit, it must be true to life, it must deal sincerely with great principles—up to the limit of popularity. Beyond that it must not be literary, truthful, or sincere. Popularity first, then the rest—if possible.All this is a serious indictment of the average magazine, but it is true. Only a few magazines regard their fiction as literature and not as merely so much merchandise, to be cut to suit the length of pages, furnish situations for pictures, and create subscriptions by readers. Yet somehow this very commercialized standard is working much good in spite of itself. It is demanding the best workmanship, and is paying bright men and women to abandon other pursuits in order to master a good story-telling method. It is directing the attention of our ablest literators to a teeming life all about them when otherwise they might lose themselves in abstractions “up in the air.” It is, for business reasons, insisting upon that very compression to which Maupassant attained in the pursuit of art. It is building up a standard of precise English which has already advanced beyond the best work of seventy years ago—though it has lost much of its elegance and dignity.In a word, the commercialized short-story is a mirror of the times—it compasses movement, often at the expense of fineness, crowds incidents so rapidly that the skeleton has no space in which to wear its flesh, and prints stories mediocre and worse because better ones will not be received with sufficient applause.But while the journalized short-story adopts the hasty standards of the newspaper because the public is too busy to be critical, in some other respects it mirrors the times more happily. The lessons of seriousness it utters with the lips of fun. Its favorite implement is a rake, but it does uncover evils that ought not to remain hidden. Finally, it concerns itself with human things, and tosses speculations aside; it carefully records our myriad-form local life as the novel cannot; and it has wonderfully developed in all classes the sense of what is a good story, and that is a question more fundamental to all literature than some critics might admit.Here then is a new-old form abundantly worth study, for its understanding, its appreciation, and its practise. If there is on one side a danger that form may become too prominent and spirit too little, there are balancing forces to hold things to a level. The problems, projects and sports of the day are, after all, the life of the day, and as such they furnish rightful themes. Really, signs are not wanting that point to the truth of this optimistic assertion: The mass of the people will eventually do the right, and they will at length bring out of the commercialized short-story a vital literary form too human to be dull and too artistic to be bad.SUGGESTIVE QUESTIONS AND EXERCISES FOR CLASSOR INDIVIDUAL STUDY OF A SHORT-STORY1. Estimating from an average page, how many words has this story?2. What type of story is it chiefly?3. Does it subordinately illustrate any other types also? If so, which?4. Is the title adequate?5. What is its theme?6. Write out a brief scenario of the plot.7. Are the incidents arranged in effective order?8. How many characters (a) speak, (b) are present but do not speak, (c) are referred to but are not present?9. Are the characters idealized, or are they quite true to life?10. Are the characters individualized? Point out how the author accomplishes this result.11. What is the author’s attitude toward his characters?12. What is the proportion of dialogue to description and comment?13. What do you think of the dialogue?14. Do you regard this story as being realistic, romantic, idealistic, or composite?15. Is the author’s purpose apparent? If so, what is it?16. Are there any weak points in the plot?17. Is the introduction interesting and clear?18. Does the story end satisfactorily?19. Is the conclusion either too long or too short?20. Would any parts of the story be improved either by shortening or by expanding? Be specific.21. Does the story arouse in you any particular feeling, or mood?22. What are the especially strong points of the story?23. Write a general appreciation, using about two hundred words.24. What is the final impression the story makes upon you?NOTENine distinct methods for the study of a novel are outlined in the appendix toThe Study of a Novel, by Selden L. Whitcomb. Some of these may be applied to the short-story. Some excellent study methods and questions are given inThe Writing of the Short Story, by Lewis Worthington Smith.FOOTNOTES:[1]Excellent and comprehensive works, dealing more especially with the English novel, are:The English Novel, Sidney Lanier (Scribners, 1883, 1897);The Development of the English Novel, Wilbur L. Cross (Macmillan, 1899);The Evolution of the English Novel, Francis Hovey Stoddard (Macmillan, 1900);A Study of Prose Fiction, Bliss Perry (Houghton-Mifflin, 1902);The Study of A Novel, Selden L. Whitcomb (Heath, 1905);The Technique of the Novel, Charles F. Horne (Harpers, 1908);Materials and Methods of Fiction, Clayton Hamilton (Baker-Taylor, 1908).[2]Good collections arranged historically are,The Book of the Short Story, Alexander Jessup and Henry Seidel Canby; andThe Short-story, Brander Matthews. The former contains lists of stories short and long grouped by periods.[3]A full study of this character has been attempted in the present author’sWriting The Short-Story, Hinds, Hayden and Eldredge. New York, 1909.[4]Egyptian Tales, W. M. Flinders Petrie.[5]Stories from Homer, Church.[6]The Bible as English Literature, J. H. Gardiner.[7]A History of Latin Literature, George A. Simcox.[8]Thefabliau, a French form adopted by the English, is an amusing story told in verse, generally of eight-syllable line. Another poetic form of the period is thelai, a short metrical romance.[9]The Italiannovellawas popular in England down to the late Elizabethan period. It is a diverting little story of human interest but told with no moral purpose, even when it is reflective. In purpose it is the direct opposite of theexemplum, which is a moral tale told to teach a lesson, and may be compared to the “illustration” which the exhorter repeats in the pulpit to-day.[10]For a fuller examination of the bibliography of the subject refer to the bibliographical notes in the books by Matthews, Baldwin, Perry, Jessup and Canby, Canby, Dye, C. A. Smith, and the editor of this volume—all referred to in detail elsewhere herein. A supplementary bibliographical note will also be found on p. 433.[11]For this important record of the discriminations of a critic little known in America, we are indebted to Professor C. Alphonso Smith’s work onThe American Short Story.[12]Writing the Short-Story, p. 30.

I STORIES OF ACTION AND ADVENTURE

But the great majority of novels and plays represent human life in nothing more faithfully than in their insistence upon deeds. It is through action—tangible, visible action upon the stage, or, in the novel, action suggested by the medium of words—that the characters of the play and the novel are ordinarily revealed. In proportion as high art is attained in either medium of expression this action is marked by adequacy of motive, by conformity to the character, by progression and unity.—Bliss Perry,A Study of Prose Fiction.Studying The Short-StorySTORIES OF ACTION AND ADVENTUREFew words are needed to set forth the meaning of this caption, for the designation is sufficiently explicit. One point, however, it will be well to emphasize: In fiction all action worthy of the name is the outward manifestation of an inward condition. There is a sense, therefore, in which all stories that are not mere pictures of internal states are stories of action; just as it may be said that all stories are stories of thought, feeling, and resolve. The point of distinction lies here: in which direction does the story tend?In one class, outward action is seen to work profoundly upon the inward life, and the story shows us the workings of this influence in its final effect upon the inward man and his character. In another, an inward state is the basis, the premise, the initial force, in the story, and from that beginning the story goes on to show by a series of outward movements just how this great inward force operates in and upon conduct. In a third class, outward and inward action balance.Now when the outward or visible action, prominently displaying physical movement, becomes paramount, whether shown as cause or as effect, we have the action-story, and sometimes the adventure-story. And in proportion as the interest of the reader centers in what the charactersdoinstead of in what theyare, the story departs from the subtler forms, such as the character-study and the psychological-study, and action or adventure becomes the type. Reverse these conditions, and another sort is the result.Naturally, many variations are possible with these two chief ingredients ready for use. One story may begin with soul action, then proceed to show us bodily action with great vividness, and end by taking us back into the man’s inner life. Another may progress on contrary lines; and so on, in wide variety. The final test as to what is the predominating type lies in the appeal to the interest of the reader: is it based chiefly on what the characters are or on what they do? Is it the why, or the how, the motive or the happening, that is most absorbing? The best stories, even the best action and adventure yarns, are likely to show a fair proportion of both.MÉRIMÉE AND HIS WRITINGSProsper Mérimée was born in Paris, September 28, 1803. His father, a Norman, was a professor in theÉcole des Beaux-Arts, and his mother, Anne Moreau, who had English blood in her veins, was also an artist. Prosper attended theCollège Henri IV, and in the homeof his parents met theliteratiof the day. He undertook the study of law, but soon abandoned it, and spent some years in observing life while journeying abroad. He made much of ancient and modern languages, becoming especially proficient in Spanish. Upon his return to Paris he served in public office, and held the post of Inspector General of Public Monuments until declining health compelled him to retire. He was elected to several learned societies and became a commander of the Legion of Honor, and, in 1844, a member of the French Academy. Nine years later he was made a Senator of France, an honor he owed to the friendship of the Empress Eugénie. He died at Cannes on the 23rd of September, 1870, at the age of sixty-seven.Prosper Mérimée was a successful poet, translator, novelist, and short-story writer. His translations of the Russian novelists have been pronounced excellent. “Colomba” is a romantic novelette of singular power and charm. His most famous short-stories are “The Taking of the Redoubt,” “Tamango,” “Federigo,” “The Etruscan Vase,” “The Vision of Charles XI,” “The Venus of Ille,” “The Pearl of Toledo,” “Carmen” (on which Bizet’s opera is founded), “Arsène Guillot,” and “Mateo Falcone”; which follows, in a translation by the editor of this volume. It was first published in theRevue de Paris, May, 1829.Among French masters of the short-story, Mérimée easily holds place in the first rank. Both personality and genius are his, and both well repay careful study. Hewas an alert student of history, to whom its anecdotal side made strongest appeal. The detached, impersonal, unprejudiced attitude of the historian is seen in his short-stories, for he tells his narrative impartially, with a sort of take-it-or-leave-it air, allowing the story to make its own appeal without any special pleading on his part. His story-telling manner is, therefore, one of ironical coldness. He delighted to tell his tales in the matter-of-fact manner of the casual traveller who has picked up a good yarn and passes it on just as it was told him. And this literary attitude was a reflex of his personality. To him, to love deeply was to endure pain, to follow impulse was to court trouble, to cherish enthusiasms was to delude the mind, so he schooled himself to appear impassive. Yet now and then in his lucid and clear-cut stories, as in his urbane life, a certain sweetness is revealed which speaks alluringly of the tender spirit within.All my life I have sought to free myself from prejudices, to be a citizen of the world before being a Frenchman, but now all these garments of philosophy are nothing to me. To-day I bleed for the wounds of the foolish French, I mourn for their humiliations, and, however ungrateful and absurd they may be, I love them still.—Prosper Mérimée,letter to Madame de Beaulaincourt(Marquise de Castellane), written, ten days before his death, on hearing from his friend Thiers that the disaster of Sedan was irreparable and that the Empire was a thing of the past.A gallant man and a gentleman, he has had the reward he would have wished. He has been discreetly and intimately enjoyed by delicate tastes.... It was his rare talent to give us those limpid, rapid, full tales, that one reads in an hour, re-reads in a day, which fill the memory and occupy the thoughts forever.—Émile Faguet, quoted by Grace King, in C. D. Warner’sLibrary of the World’s Best Literature.Colomba,Mateo Falcone,La Double Méprise,La Vénus d’Ille,L’Enlèvement de la Redoute,Lokis, have equals, but no superiors, either in French prose fiction or in French prose. Grasp of human character, reserved but masterly description of scenery, delicate analysis of motive, ability to represent the supernatural, pathos, grandeur, simple narrative excellence, appear turn by turn in these wonderful pieces, as they appear hardly anywhere else.—George Saintsbury,A Short History of French Literature.While inferior to Stendhal as a psychologist, notwithstanding the keenness of his analysis, he excels him in opening out and developing action, and in composing a work whose parts hang well together. In addition he possesses a “literary” style,—not the style of an algebraist, but that of an exact, self-sustained writer. He attains the perfection of form in his particular line. Nearly all his stories are masterpieces of that rather dry and hard, though forceful, nervous, and pressing style, which constitutes him one of the most original and most characteristic novelists of the century.—Georges Pellissier,The Literary Movement in France.I do not scruple to apply the wordgreatto Mérimée, a word which is not to be used lightly, but of which he is thoroughly deserving. His style is the purest and clearest of our century; no better model could possibly be found for our present generation. His prose, to my mind, together with that of Musset, Fromentin, and Renan, is the most beautiful modern prose which has ever been written in the French language. Like the great classics of the 17th century, he never wrote a passage merely to please the eye or the ear; his sole aim was to express thought, and the colour of his language, which is so pre-eminently true to nature, is of a rare sobriety; he never studies effect, and, nevertheless, invariably attains it.—Edouard Grenier,Literary Reminiscences.FURTHER REFERENCES FOR READING ON MÉRIMÉEMiscellaneous Studies, Walter Pater (1895);Modern French Literature, Benjamin W. Wells (1896);Contes et Nouvelles, by Prosper Mérimée, edited by J. E. Michell (1907);A Century of French Fiction, Benjamin W. Wells (1898);Prosper Mérimée, Arthur Symonds, inA Century of French Romance, edited by Edmund W. Gosse (1901);Six Masters in Disillusion, Algar Therold (1909).MATEO FALCONEBY PROSPER MÉRIMÉETranslation by The EditorNote: The technical terms used in the marginal notes explanatory of the short-stories throughout this work follow the terminology used and treated fully in the present author’sWriting the Short-Story.A story of local-color because the Corsican customs determine the destinies of the characters. It is equally a character-study and a psychological study. Note how characters harmonize with setting, throughout.As one comes out of Porto-Vecchio, and turns northwest toward the center of the island, the ground is seen to rise quite rapidly, and after three hours’ walk by tortuous paths, blocked by large masses of rocks, and sometimes cut by ravines, the traveler finds himself on the edge of a very extensivemaquis. This bush is the home of the Corsican shepherds, and of whomsoever has come into conflict with the law. It is well known that the Corsican laborer, to spare himself the trouble of fertilizing his lands, sets fire to a certain stretch of forest; so much the worse if the flames spread further than is needed;Setting is minutely given, yet not diffusely.whatever happens, he is sure to have a good harvest by sowing upon this ground, enriched by the ashes of the very trees which it grows. When the corn is plucked, he leaves the straw, because it is too much trouble to gather it. The roots, which have remained in the ground without being harmed, sprout in the following spring into very thick shoots, which in a few years attain a height of seven or eight feet. This sort of underwood it is that they callmaquis. It is composed of different kinds of trees and shrubs, all mixed and tangled, just as they were planted by God. Only with the hatchet in hand can a man open a passage, and there aremaquisso dense and so tufted that even the wild sheep can not penetrate them.One of Mérimée’s deft personal touches, as though he were telling the story to Corsicans.2. If you have killed a man, go into themaquisof Porto-Vecchio, and with a good gun and powder and ball, you will live there in safety. Do not forget a brown cloak with aWhy “brown”?hood, which serves as a coverlet and a mattress. The shepherds will give you milk,The vendetta. See Mérimée’s novelette Colomba.cheese, and chestnuts, and you will have nothing to fear from justice, nor from the relatives of the dead man, unless it be when you have to go down into the town to renew your munitions.Sense of reality. Setting becomes specific. Begins with social characterization.3. The house of Mateo Falcone, when I was in Corsica in 18—, was half a league from thismaquis. He was a comparatively rich man forthat country, living nobly,Note force of “nobly.”that is to say, without doing anything, on the products of his herds, which the shepherds, a species of nomads, led to pasture here and there on the mountains. When I saw him, two years after the event which I am about to relate, he seemed to me about fifty years of age at the most.Proceeds to physical characterization.Picture a small, but robust man, with curly hair black as jet, and aquiline nose, lips thin, large and animated eyes, and a deeply tanned complexion.Hint of climax.His skill in shooting was considered extraordinary, even in his country, where there were so many good shots.Illustrative anecdotes.For example, Mateo would never fire on a sheep with buckshot, but at a hundred and twenty paces he would bring it down with a bullet in its head, or in the shoulder, as he chose. At night he could use his gun as easily as by day, and they told me the following example of his skill, which will perhaps seem incredible to those who have not traveled in Corsica. At eighty paces, a lighted candle was placed behind a transparent piece of paper as large as a plate. He took aim, then the candle was extinguished, and after a moment in the most complete darkness, he shot and pierced the transparency three times out of four.Advances to moral characterization.4. With a talent so surpassing, Mateo Falcone had gained a great reputation. He was said to be as loyal a friend as he was dangerous an enemy. Otherwise obliging andcharitable, he lived at peace with everyone in the district of Porto-Vecchio. But they tell of him that when at Corte, where he had gotten a wife, he had very vigorously freed himself of a rival who was reputed to be as redoubtable in war as in love;Further anecdote.at all events, people attributed to Mateo a certain gunshot which surprised this rival as he was shaving before a small mirror hung in his window.Primitive ideals.5. The affair having been hushed up, Mateo married. His wife Giuseppa had first presented him with three daughters (which enraged him), but finally a son came,Central character introduced unobtrusively.whom he named Fortunato: he was the hope of the family, the inheritor of the name.Vendetta and clan spirit.The girls were well married; their father could reckon, in case of need, upon the poniards and rifles of his sons-in-law.Introduction ends.The son was only ten years old, but he was already showing signs of a promising disposition.Action Begins. Foundation for crisis.First Plot Incident.(A plot incident is essential to a plot; to change it would be to alter the plot materially.)An old-style literary device.6. On a certain day in autumn, Mateo and his wife set out early to visit one of their flocks in a clearing ofmaquis. Little Fortunato wished to accompany them, but the clearing was too far away; besides, someone must stay to guard the house; so the father refused: we shall soon see if he had no occasion to repent.Setting in contrast with crisis about to appear.7. He had been gone for some hours, and little Fortunato was tranquilly stretched out in the sunshine, looking at the blue mountains, andthinking that on the next Sunday he would be going to town to dine with his uncle the corporal,[13]All the footnotes are by Mérimée.when he was suddenly interrupted in his meditations by the firing of a gun. He got up and turned toward that side of the plain from which the sound hadAction now supersedes setting.come. Other gunshots followed, fired at irregular intervals, and each time they came nearer and nearer.Note force of “irregular.”At last on the path which led from the plain to Mateo’s house, appeared a man wearing a cap pointed like those worn by the mountaineers.Dramatic introduction of a leading character, and preparation for first crisis.He was bearded and covered with rags, and dragged himself along with difficulty by leaning on his gun.Second Plot Incident.He had just received a gunshot wound in the thigh.8. This man was a bandit,[14]who having set out at night to get some powder from the town, had fallen on the way into an ambush of Corsican soldiers.[15]After a vigorous defense he had succeeded in making his retreat, hotly pursued and skirmishing from rock to rock. But he had gained only a little on the soldiers, and his wound made it hopeless forhim to reach themaquisbefore being overtaken.9. He approached Fortunato and said to him:Crisp dialogue gives feeling of intensity.10. “You are the son of Mateo Falcone?”11. “Yes.”12. “I am Gianetto Sanpiero. I am pursued by the yellow collars.[16]Hide me, for I can go no further.”13. “And what will my father say if I hide you without his permission?”14. “He will say that you have done right.”15. “How do you know?”16. “Hide me quickly; they are coming.”17. “Wait till my father comes.”18. “How can I wait! A curse upon it! They will be here in five minutes. Come, hide me, or I will kill you.”Note the lad’s constant coolness, and sly calculation.19. Fortunato answered him with the utmost coolness:20. “Your gun is empty, and there are no more cartridges in yourcarchera.”[17]21. “I have my stiletto.”22. “But could you run as fast as I can?”23. He gave a leap, and put himself out of reach.The right of asylum to kin is sacred to primitive peoples.24. “You are no son of Mateo Falcone! Will you then allow me to be taken in front of your home?”25. The child seemed to be touched.Note force of “seemed.”26. “What will you give me if I hide you?” he asked him, drawing nearer.Crisis particularized.Plot Incident Particularized.27. The fugitive felt in the leather pouch that hung at his belt, and took out a five-franc piece, which he had reserved, no doubt, for powder. Fortunato smiled at sight of the pieceShows value of the reward.of money, and seizing hold of it, he said to Gianetto:28. “Fear nothing!”Revelation of character.Resolution of first crisis.29. He quickly made a large hole in a haystack which stood near by the house, Gianetto crouched down in it, and the child covered him up in such a way as to leave a little space for breathing, without making it possible for any one to suspect that the hay concealed a man. He acted, still further, with the cunning of a tricky savage.Author’s real estimate of the boy.He went and brought a cat and her kittens, and set them on top of the haystack to make believe that it had not been recently touched. Then noticing the blood-stains on the path near the house, he carefully covered them with dust. This done, he lay down again in the sun with the utmost calmness.Third Plot Incident. See¶12.30. Some minutes later six men in brown uniforms with yellow collars, commanded by an adjutant, stood before Mateo’s door. This adjutant was a distant relative of Falcone—for in Corsica more remote degreesA deputy in command.of relationship are recognized thanelsewhere.Note complication by this relationship.His name was Tidora Gamba; he was an energetic man, greatly feared by the banditti, many of whom he had already hunted down.Crisis recurs.31. “Good day, little cousin,” he said, coming up to Fortunato. “How you have grown! Have you seen a man passing just now?”Cunning in character further revealed.32. “Oh, I am not so tall as you, Cousin,” the child replied with a foolish look.33. “That time’s coming. But have you not seen a man pass by?—Tell me.”34. “If I have seen a man pass by?”35. “Yes, a man with a pointed cap and a waistcoat embroidered in red and yellow?”36. “A man with a pointed cap and a waistcoat embroidered in red and yellow?”37. “Yes; answer quickly, and don’t repeat my questions.”38. “This morning Monsieur le Curé passed our door on his horse Piero. He asked me how papa was, and I told him—”Suspense.39. “Ah, you little rascal, you are making game of me! Tell me at once which way Gianetto went, for it is he that we are after, and I am certain he took this path.”40. “How do you know that?”41. “How do I know that? I know you have seen him.”Child’s crafty nature increasingly disclosed.42. “Does one see passers-by when one is asleep?”43. “You were not asleep, you little demon; the gunshots would have waked you.”44. “You think, then, Cousin, that your guns make a great noise? My father’s rifle makes much more.”45. “May the devil confound you, you young scamp! I am sure enough that you have seen Gianetto. Perhaps you have even hidden him. Here, comrades, go into this house, and see if our man is not there. He could walk only on one foot, and he has too much good sense, the rascal, to have tried to reach themaquislimping. Besides, the marks of blood stop here.”Sly appeal to the fear inspired by Mateo’s reputation.46. “Whatever will papa say!” asked Fortunato, with a chuckle; “what will he say when he finds out that his house has been entered while he was away!”Note use of suspense throughout. The story is one long crisis.47. “Good-for-nothing!” cried the adjutant Gamba, taking him by the ear, “do you know that I am able to make you change your tune? Perhaps when I have given you a score or more thwacks with the flat of a sword, you will speak at last!”48. But Fortunato still laughed derisively.49. “My father is Mateo Falcone!” he said with energy.50. “Do you know, you little rogue, that I can carry you off to Corte, or to Bastia? I’ll make you sleep in a dungeon, on a pallet of straw, your feet in irons, and I’ll have you guillotined,if you don’t tell me where Gianetto Sanpiero is.”51. The child burst out laughing at this foolish threat. He only repeated:52. “My father is Mateo Falcone!”Compare with¶4and¶49.53. “Adjutant,” whispered one of thevoltigeurs, “we’d better not embroil ourselves with Mateo.”Setting is thus interwoven with the story, though slightly.54. Gamba seemed evidently embarrassed. He talked in a low voice with his soldiers, who had already been through the house. It was not a lengthy operation, for the cabin of a Corsican consists of only a single square room. The furniture comprises a table, some benches, a few boxes, and utensils for hunting and housekeeping. Meanwhile, little Fortunato caressed his cat,Character revelation.and seemed maliciously to enjoy the embarrassment of thevoltigeursand his cousin.Suspense augmented.55. One soldier came up to the haystack. He looked at the cat and carelessly gave a dig at the hay with his bayonet, shrugging his shoulders as if he thought the precaution were ridiculous. Nothing stirred, and the face of the child did not betray the least emotion.More crafty coolness.56. The adjutant and his troop were in despair; they were looking seriously toward the edge of the plain, as though disposed to return the way they had come;The turn in the plot.when their chief—convinced that threats would produce no effect upon the son of Falcone—thought he would makeFoundation for main crisis.one last effort by trying the power of cajoleries and presents.57. “Little Cousin,” he said, “you seem to be a wide-awake young fellow enough. You will get on! But you play a mean trick with me; and, if I did not fear to give pain to my cousin Mateo, devil take me, I’d carry you off with me!”58. “Bah!”59. “But, when my cousin returns I shall relate to him the whole affair, and for your having gone to the trouble to tell me a lie, he will give you the whip till he draws blood.”60. “Do you know that?”61. “You’ll find out! But, see here—be a good lad, and I’ll give you something.”62. “I, my Cousin, will give you some advice—it is, that if you delay any more Gianetto will reach themaquis, then it will take a cleverer fellow to go and hunt for him.”Main crisis augmented.63. The adjutant drew from his pocket a silver watch worth quite ten crowns; and seeing how the little Fortunato’s eyes sparkled when hePlot Incident Particularized.looked at it, he said, as he held the watch suspended at the end of its steel chain:Character appeal.64. “You rogue! you would like very well to have such a watch as this hung round your neck, and to go and promenade the streets of Porto-Vecchio, proud as a peacock; people would ask you, ‘What time is it?’ and you would reply, ‘Look at my watch!’”65. “When I am grown up, my uncle the corporal will give me a watch.”66. “Yes; but your uncle’s son has one already—not such a fine one as this, it is true—of course, he is younger than you.”67. The child sighed.68. “Well, would you like this watch, little Cousin?”Suspense.69. Fortunato, ogling the watch out of the corner of his eyes, looked just as a cat does when they suddenly offer it a chicken. Because it is afraid a joke is being played on it, it dares not pounce upon its prey, and from time to time it turns away its eyes so as not to succumb to the temptation;Illustration.but it constantly licks its chops, as if to say to its master, “But your joke is a cruel one!”70. However, the adjutant Gamba seemed to be offering the watch in good faith. Fortunato did not hold out his hand, but he said to him with a bitter smile:71. “Why do you jest with me?”72. “By Heaven, I am not joking! Only tell me where Gianetto is and this watch is yours.”Compare with¶67.73. Fortunato allowed an incredulous sigh to escape him; and, fixing his black eyes on those of the adjutant, he sought to find in them the faith he wished to have in his words.A typical Latin protest.74. “May I lose my epaulets,” cried the adjutant, “if I do not give you the watch on these terms! My comradesare witnesses, and I cannot go back on my word!”75. So speaking, he held the watch nearer and nearer until it almost touched the pale cheeks of the child, whose face showed plainly the combat going on in his heart between covetousness and his respect for the laws of hospitality.A key to the plot.His bare breast heaved violently, and he seemed to be almost stifling. All the time the watch dangled and turned, and sometimes grazed the tip of his nose.Main Crisis.At length, little by little, his right hand lifted toward the watch, the ends of his fingers touched it, and it rested wholly on his palm, except that the adjutant still loosely held the end of the chain. The face was blue, the case was newly polished—in the sunshine it seemed to be all afire. The temptation was too strong.Crisis resolved and Downward Action Begins. Henceforward we see the Results of crisis, leading to the Climax.76. So Fortunato raised his left hand and with his thumb pointed over his shoulder to the haystack against which he was standing. The adjutant understood him immediately. He let go the end of the chain; Fortunato felt himself sole possessor of the watch.Still sly.He jumped up with the agility of a deer, and moved ten paces away from the stack, which thevoltigeursat once began to overturn.77. It was not long before they saw the hay move, and a bleeding man, poniard in hand, came forth. But when he tried to rise to his feet, his stiffening wound would not permit him to stand. He fell down. Theadjutant threw himself upon him and snatched away his stiletto. Speedily, he was securely bound, in spite of his resistance.78. Gianetto, laid on the ground and tied like a bundle of fagots, turned his head toward Fortunato, who had drawn nearer.First Contributory Incident. (A contributory incident might be changed or even omitted without vitally changing the plot.)79. “Son of—,” he said to him with more contempt than anger.Tardy attempt to appear sincere. His contempt is all for Fortunato.80. The boy threw to him the silver-piece that he had received from him, feeling conscious that he no longer merited it; but the outlaw seemed not to notice this action. He said to the adjutant in a perfectly cool voice:Second Contributory Incident.81. “My dear Gamba, I am not able to walk; you will be obliged to carry me to the town.”82. “You could run as fast as a kid just now,” retorted his cruel captor. “But be easy, I am so glad to have caught you that I could carry you for a league on my own back without being tired. All the same, my friend, we are going to make a litter for you out of some branches and your cloak, and at the farm at Crespoli we shall find some horses.”Character revelation.Let-down in tension.83. “Good!” said the prisoner. “You had better also put a little straw on your litter that I may travel more easily.”New and resultant crisis. Fourth Plot Incident.84. While thevoltigeurswere occupied, some making a sort of stretcher out of chestnut boughs, and others dressing Gianetto’s wound, Mateo Falcone and his wife suddenly appearedin a bend of the path which led from themaquis.Contrast to tragic spirit of the story.The wife advanced, bending laboriously under an enormous bag of chestnuts, while her husband came up jauntily, carrying in his hand only a gun, while another was slung over his shoulder,Local color.for it is unworthy of a man to carry any other burden than his weapons.85. At sight of the soldiers, Mateo’s first thought was that they had come to arrest him. But why that idea? Had he any quarrel with the law? No. He bore a good reputation. He was, as they say, particularly well thought of; but he was a Corsican, a mountaineer, and there are but few Corsican mountaineers who, if they scrutinize their memories well, cannot find some pecadillo—some gunshot, some dagger thrust, or some similar bagatelle.“Bagatelle” discloses the Corsican attitude.Mateo, more than most, had a clear conscience, for it was fully ten years since he had pointed his gun against a man; but all the same he was prudent, and he put himself in position to make a good defense, if need be.To reload his weapons, as appears in¶87.86. “Wife,” said he to Giuseppa, “put down your sack and keep yourself in readiness.”87. She obeyed on the instant. He gave her the gun that was slung over his shoulder, and which would likely cause him inconvenience.Suspense.He cocked the one he had in his hand and advanced slowly toward the house, skirting the trees which bordered the path, and ready at the least hostiledemonstration to throw himself behind the largest trunk, whence he could fire from cover. His wife walked close behind him, holding his spare gun and his cartridge box.Local color.The duty of a good housewife, in case of conflict, is to reload her husband’s weapons.Development of fourth incident.88. On the other side, the adjutant was very uneasy at sight of Mateo advancing thus upon them with measured steps, his gun forward and his finger on the trigger.Key.89. “If it should chance,” thought he, “that Gianetto is related to Mateo, or that he is his friend, and he intends to protect him, the bullets of his two guns will come to two of usA fight would ensue.as sure as a letter to the post, and if he should aim at me, good-bye to our kinship!”Note force of “alone.”90. In this perplexity, he put on a courageous front and went forward alone toward Mateo to tell him of the matter, while greeting him like an old acquaintance; but the brief space that separated him from Mateo seemed to him terribly long.Note constraint.91. “Hello! Ah! my old comrade,” he called out. “How are you, old fellow? It’s I, Gamba, your cousin.”Resolution of suspense.92. Mateo, without replying a word, stopped, and while the other was speaking he imperceptibly raised the muzzle of his rifle in such a manner that it was pointing heavenward by the time the adjutant came up to him.93. “Good day, brother,”[18]said theadjutant, holding out his hand. “It’s a very long time since I’ve seen you.”94. “Good day, brother.”Diminutive for Giuseppa.95. “I just came in, while passing, to say ‘good day’ to you and my cousin Pepa. We have had a long journey to-day; but we must not complain of fatigue,There is something manlike in most of Mérimée’s female characters.for we have taken a famous prize. We have just got hold of Gianetto Sanpiero.”96. “God be praised!” exclaimed Giuseppa. “He stole one of our milch goats last week.”Character contrast.97. These words rejoiced Gamba.98. “Poor devil!” said Mateo. “He was hungry.”New crisis. Preparation for climax.99. “The fellow defended himself like a lion,” pursued the adjutant, slightly mortified. “He killed one of the men, and, not content with that, he broke Corporal Chardon’s arm; but that is not such a great disaster, for he is nothing but a Frenchman.... Then he hid himself so cleverly that the devil would not have been able to find him. Without my little cousin Fortunato, I should never have discovered him.”100. “Fortunato!” cried Mateo.101. “Fortunato!” repeated Giuseppa.102. “Yes, Gianetto was hidden way down in your haystack; but my little cousin showed me his trick. So I will speak of him to his uncle the corporal, that he may send him a fine present for his trouble. And his name and yours will be in thereport which I shall send toMonsieur l’avocat général.”103. “Malediction!” said Mateo under his breath.Misunderstanding adds to complication.104. They had now rejoined the detachment. Gianetto was already laid on the litter and they were ready to leave. When he saw Mateo in the company of Gamba, he smiled a strange smile; then, turning himself toward the door of the house, he spat on the threshold as he cried out:105. “House of a traitor!”106. No one but a man who had made up his mind to die would have dared to utter the word “traitor” as applying to Falcone.Key to plot. Fifth Plot Incident.One good stroke of the dagger, which would not need to be repeated, would have immediately repaid the insult. But Mateo made no other gesture than that of putting his hand to his head like a dazed man.Third Contributory Incident.107. Fortunato had gone into the house upon seeing his father come up. He reappeared shortly with a jug of milk, which he offered withIs this repentance, fear, hypocrisy, or an attempt to placate his father?