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was brought to him from the Polizei to be filled up; how he had to inform the Government not only of his own Christian name and age, but of the Christian names and ages of each of his revered parents, of his religious profession, of his means of living, of his reasons for coming there, whether he had ever been there before, how long he proposed staying there, with sundry other particulars, dear to the mind of a German official, but hateful to the independence of a freeborn Briton. The way in which a German carries about with him under all circumstances, and probably keeps under his pillow at night, his "Legitimations-Schein," and all those precious documents attesting his identity, without which he would consider that he had lost his right to exist, is a standing marvel to those who believe that formalities were made for man, and not man for formalities. It must, however, be admitted that there are occasions when this bondage to formalities has its compensating advantages. This present writer set out one hot summer day to walk to the colossal statue of Bavaria, outside Munich. The road led round the outermost boundaries of a meadow; but as the said road was hot and dusty and the meadow was soft and cool, he naturally took the shorter cut across the grass. He was accosted on the farther side by an official, red with anger, who informed him that the way across the meadow was "am strengsten verboten," and that he was liable to a fine of three gulden, which would assuredly have been inflicted, but unfortunately the official whose duty it was to enforce it was gone to his dinner, and therefore the majesty of the law could not for the moment be vindicated.

It is obvious that a nation which has been accustomed to accept as part of the natural order of things a pedantic and minute system of interference in the small details of life, is exposed to a great danger. When the work of government is in the hands of a bureaucracy, men who under a more popular government would find a healthy outlet for their activity in political and municipal action will be thrown back upon themselves, and will brood over theories while they leave others to do the practical work. And in this way a dangerous separation is produced between theoretical and practical politicians, and the Government has to reckon, not with a party in opposition, who, if they should succeed to their places, would carry on the administration of affairs pretty much on the same lines, though with more of reforming energy or more of conservative caution, but with an irreconcilable faction, whose object is to blow up the existing building in order to clear the ground for an entirely new departure. The present spread of socialism in Germany, which has evidently alarmed the ruling classes, and

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which is a distinct danger for society in Europe, may probably be attributed partly to the excessive development of militarism, and partly to the perilously wide division of classes. Whether Germany, which has for so long been the prolific mother of new ideas in theology, in history, in metaphysics, in philology, is in the coming age to be the source of a new political propaganda, is a question which time only can decide. It is at least certain that antagonistic forces of unknown power are at work in the heart of German society; that their antagonism, instead of being mitigated, is becoming intensified, and that the materials for an explosion, though differently compounded, are almost as plentiful in Germany now as they were in France a century ago.

How far the religious element contributes to the danger it is impossible for one merely looking on the surface to pronounce an opinion. That the Falk laws must have produced great irritation in the Catholic part of Germany, and must have created considerable disaffection against the Imperial Government, can not be doubted. It is, of course, a very difficult thing for a Protestant Government to deal with an empire of which some of the constituent parts, formerly independent, are strongly Catholic; but in such a case it would at least have been safer to err on the side of laxity, and to bear in mind that, while repression irritates, liberty often disarms opposition. It is not without some grounds that German Catholics have raised a cry of persecution; and to persecute an adversary is to give him an unfair advantage. The penal laws in Ireland might have served for a salutary warning to Germany. It seems likely that the Catholics and Protestants would have found it possible to be Germans first and Catholics or Protestants afterward, if the state had abstained from "rattling up sleeping lions"; but, unhappily, it is the fact that on the Continent rulers, whether professing liberal or conservative principles, have not yet attained to the statesmanlike wisdom of Gallio,* of whom it is recorded, to his infinite credit, that he "cared for none of those things." Not only in conservative Prussia, but also in democratic and radical Geneva, the Church of Rome has been treated with exceptional harshness. At Geneva, indeed, by a misapplication of the principle of universal suffrage, a large and costly church recently built by the Catholics has been handed over to a very small body of "Old Catholics," while the very people who built the church are driven to worship where they can; and the prohibition to appear in public in any ecclesiastical costume,

* When will our preachers learn that Gallio, instead

of an awful example of a careless Christian, is, in fact, an admirable instance of a magistrate "indifferently ministering justice"?

intended to annoy the Roman ecclesiastics, by the grotesque literalness of a gendarme, led to the arrest of a Protestant pastor one Sunday morning on his way from his house to the church. In Geneva, indeed, it is certain that this rough handling of the Catholics is the work, not of Protestants, but of persons hostile to Christianity altogether. In Germany, however, the recent effusive confession of faith on the part of the Chancellor, and the well-known religious sentiments of the Emperor, forbid us to interpret so. Yet it might have been supposed that the present state of religion in Germany would have been a sufficient reason against attempting to depress or persecute any form of Christian belief. Indeed, so far as outward indications go, Catholicism is the only form of religion that has any real hold upon the people. In the Rhineland and in South Germany the churches are still crowded with devout worshipers, whereas in Protestant Prussia* the very profession of Christianity has well-nigh died out. And this appears to constitute a far more serious and more threatening religious difficulty than the supposed intrigues of the Jesuits or the claim of universal allegiance on the part of the Roman Pontiff. For when a great nation is divided into two sections, the one without any religion or wish for religion, the other holding to the most rigidly dogmatic and authoritative form of Christianity, and when these two sections are not closely connected with each other by a thousand ties of daily intercourse, of neighborhood, of business, of kindred, as, for instance, the various religious denominations of Englishmen are connected, but are separated by almost as sharp a line as were formerly the slaveowning and the free States of America, it needs no political foresight to perceive that a time may come when religious questions will bring an intolerable strain upon German unity. And, further than this, it is a very grave and difficult problem, what is likely to be the effect on the national character of that absence of religion which is so striking a feature in the cultured classes of Germany. For a time the restraints of a public opinion formed under the influence of Christianity, and the sense of responsibility in the first generation of those who have abandoned dogmatic beliefs, may probably serve to maintain the standard of morality; but it is a thing hardly to be hoped for that in a second generation an equally high standard should be preserved, either by the abstract idea of virtue or the positive law of the state. Assuredly the motives to right conduct

* "Who that knows modern Germany will call it a Christian land, either in the sense Rome gives to the term, or in the meaning Luther attached to it?" ("Let ters on the State of Religion in Germany," reprinted from the "Times," 1870.)

which Christianity has to offer-hope for the individual, hope for the race, a great act of selfsacrifice requiring self-sacrifice in return, selfreverence springing from a sense of a high and divine calling, the consciousness of the divine Fatherhood resulting in a claim of universal brotherhood, an unswerving faith in the final and complete victory of good over evil, and, above all, love to God and to our fellow-men as the mainspring of life-these motives are considerably superior to any mere "honesty is the best policy" principle. Nor are indications wanting among the upper class in Germany of that sense of hopelessness and vacancy in life which comes of mere negation. "Ach, ich bin lebensmüde" was the exclamation of a young man of apparently good social position, who in England might probably have been doing good service to his fellow-men in some of those positions which with us are open to men who have time and money to bestow on public objects, but who seemed utterly without an object or a motive in life. "Positivism" has at least this recommendation, that if it denies Christianity it asserts the religion of humanity; whereas the mere blank negation of all religion which seems to be the present mental attitude of the cultivated classes in Germany can result in no high or noble activity, no moral heroism, nothing but the old story, "Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die." And among the working classes, it is certain that no system has yet been discovered capable of raising the tone of society, of promoting temperance, self-respect, domestic purity, thrift, and unselfishness, except Christianity. It may be very well admitted by the most earnest apologists of the Christian faith, that it has been weighted with much adventitious matter that does not belong to its essence; that Catholics and Protestants have been too apt to "make the word of God of none effect through their traditions"; that religion has been made too much a matter of the intellect and of the imagination, too little of the heart and the life; that people have been too much in the habit of inquiring about a man's religious "persuasion" rather than about his religious life; and it is possible that the decay of Christian profession in Germany and in France, and in a far less degree in England, has been owing to the form under which the advocates of religion have insisted on presenting it. But, if so, it would be well if all religious teachers would imitate the courageous wisdom of an English bishop, who is reported lately to have said, “If you can not join us with the miracles, join us without the miracles"; for if they insist on an acceptance of the supernatural as a condition of adopting Christianity as a rule of life, assuredly a return of the mass of the people in Germany to religious profession is a

thing not to be hoped for. To accept the supernatural, indeed, in the highest sense, is an essential condition of any religious faith, for Christian morality is, in the strictest sense of the word, supernatural; but it is probable that the Founder of Christianity would not have rejected any who were weary and heavy-laden, and were willing to learn duty and conduct of him.

Unhappily, however, there is much reason to fear that, although this estrangement from Christianity may have originated in a recoil from overdogmatism, there is now a strong element of revolt against its ethical requirements. And if this is so, if either avowedly or unconsciously large masses of men reject the Christian code as setting before them an ideal which they can not bring themselves to aim at, then it remains for the Christian Church to put forth a new power, to develop some resource which shall be to the

nineteenth century what the prophets and the Baptist were to the Jews, and the preaching friars to the middle ages. Evils sooner or later bring about their own remedy; and if the future is for Christianity, under whatever change of form, it is certain that sooner or later her beneficent influence will go forth with renewed force, conquering and to conquer. Meanwhile, for Germany and for every other civilized land, the main thing is to aim at the highest; that all men should ask as though Christianity were true, and should resolutely and perseveringly cultivate "whatso, ever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report," in the firm faith that right thinking must come of right doing, and that to him that orders his conversation aright will ultimately be shown the highest truth.

R. E. B., in Fraser's Magazine.

CAPTA

OUT OF THE DEPTHS.

`APTAIN ABIJAH BAKER had been to sea ever since his fourteenth year. He was born on the Cape; there he found his wife; there his children were born; there stood the house he had built, to which he always returned for a few days at the end of each voyage; and thither he had come at last after forty years of wandering on the ocean to pass the remainder of his days, on a moderate but snug competence wrenched from the mad sea-waves, until he should once more launch his bark on the voyage from which no traveler returns. His boy had also taken early to the water, and was now skipper of the fishing schooner Gentle Annie. He was engaged to Lucy May, the lady who taught the district school, and after one or two more successful trips to the Banks the wedding was to come off.

years of wedded life, to have her "old man” with her, and with him to share the remaining years of life. When they were first married she made several voyages with her husband, but the invariable sea-sickness which persecuted her on shipboard, and the growing demands of her children, obliged her to remain at home to worry for him on stormy nights, and realize the truth of the French proverb, "Femme de marin, femme de chagrin."

Her daughter Mary, now a girl of twenty, had tended to assuage her solitude while husband and son were battling with winds and waves thousands of miles away. Mrs. Baker was one of those women of tact and character who, while not at all lacking in independence and spirit, had the penetration to perceive that in the family as on the quarter-deck, there can be only one captain, even when the mate knows more than the captain about navigation, and that even for her own comfort merely, and to retain her influence over him, it was better to yield to and coöperate in the life-plans of her husband than to thwart them by direct opposition. A thoroughly practical New England woman, generally undemonstrative but faithful in her affections, portly and warm-hearted, Mrs. Baker accepted with serene content the prospect of having Abijah with her as never before during all their married years, with their son and daughter-in-law settled near Mrs. Baker still survived, after twenty-six them, and possibly divers grandchildren toddling

Captain Baker was a noble specimen of the mariners they used to turn out on Cape Cod. Nearly six feet tall, broad-chested and broadshouldered, he still walked erect as in his youth; and the keen, honest, fearless look of his blue eyes from under their roofing of shaggy gray eyebrows was as undimmed as when he first trod the quarter-deck. But if sometimes their glance was stern and uncompromising, there lurked in them also unfathomed possibilities of good-natured mirth, and not rarely an expression which showed that under a bluff exterior he carried a warm, true heart.

in the spring sunshine before the grandparental and leave ye, but then what's a man to do here door. if he hain't got no trade ashore to keep him busy? And I feel just as spry as when I first took command of the Wild Rover. I don't mean to go to sea again for good, but let me just go one more v'yge, and I'll get over this hankering for it. Anyway, I didn't really mean to go again, but when I went into Clark & Allen's office t'other day they said to me: 'Captain, you are just the man for us. Captain Tressle has just fallen and broken a leg and two ribs; 'tain't no kind of use for him to try to go this v'yge, and the Jennie Lane will be ready to go to sea next week. You are part owner, and now you've had a long vacation on shore, here's a good chance for you to get your sea-legs on again.' It did seem kind o' providential like, and, after turning the matter over, I told them that I would go."

But Fate seemed to have otherwise determined, or at least awhile longer deferred good Mrs. Baker's entrance into possession of these castles in Spain. It is a hard thing for a man still in active possession of his powers suddenly to abdicate the throne and retire into peaceful inaction. When he is oppressed by the storms of life he looks longingly forward to a tranquil rest under his own vine and fig-tree. But the strongest muscles condemned to inaction become flabby and weak, the keenest blade hanging unused on a wall is eaten with rust, and the brain, ceasing its wonted habits of action, softens and decays, and senility comes on apace. Many men, instinctively conscious of this tendency after they have tried rest for a time, chafe once more for a field whereon to exercise their powers, and spring back to the arena to begin life anew, but so heavily handicapped by age or the more recent habits of lethargy, that they learn when it is too late the mistake they made in so soon quitting their life-pursuits.

It was not long before Captain Baker began to realize the truth of these observations. To spend the remainder of his days hoeing potatohills and turning his melons and squashes to the sun on the sere soil of the Cape, or oscillating between his house and the village store, with an occasional trip to Boston, was rather too placid and monotonous a change for a man who had listened all his days to the creaking of tackleblocks and the thunderous and frantic flapping of topsails in Atlantic squalls—a man, too, in whose veins still leaped a manly vigor, in whose heart still throbbed an honest ambition. The growing uneasiness of her husband, the restlessness and annoyed discontent so unusual in his frank and generous nature, were not unperceived by Mrs. Baker; she foresaw the inevitable result, but kept her own counsels. But when he returned one day from Boston with a sober but brisk and determined air, she was prepared to hear him say: "Well, mother "-he always called her mother "I don't s'pose you'll like it very well, and it comes kind of hard for me to tell ye, but I'm going on a v'yge to Smyrny; I sail next week."

"I mistrusted somethin' of the sort when you went to Boston; I knew 'twan't for nothin' you were going up there so often. But what on airth possesses ye to go to sea again, Abijah? Here you are, everything just as cozy as can be, and I ain't seen much of ye since we stood up afore the minister twenty-seven years ago come next October; and here's Johnnie going to be married maybe next Thanksgiving.”

"I am afraid you are making a mistake, Abijah. I won't say nothing for myself," and the poor woman put the corner of her apron to her eye-it was only a momentary weakness—“ but I mistrust things won't go all right."

"So you've said before when I've been a-goin' to sail, but nothin' ever came of it. So, cheer up, mother; and, if you've got a good cup of that last tea I brought, 'twon't come amiss.”

"The Lord knows! We don't always know our own minds, or what's good for us. But if you must go, Abijah—and now you've given your word, it can't be helped-I must look over your things, and, if there's anything you need, I'll send for Mehitabel Wheeler to come right over and help me do the sewing."

The Captain, relieved that he had got over the difficulty of breaking unpleasant news to his wife so easily, and that she took it so kindly, had to give her a kiss, while she, between smiles and tears, said: “Oh, yes; that's just the way; you are always ready enough with your kiss if I'll only let you have your own way," but she was proud enough of the old sea-captain for all that.

And so the matter was settled. In a fortnight Captain Baker was once more crossing the Atlantic, the topsails of the Jennie Lane swelling with the exuberant force of a westerly gale which rapidly bore him away from his quiet home and disconsolate wife. In ten days they sighted Fayal, and, after a splendid run of thirty-six days, the Jennie Lane had passed from the New World into the Old World, from the nineteenth century into the past ages, from the orthodox tones of the bell of Park Street Church to the theistic chant of the muezzin of Islam, and discharged the rum of Medford and the prints of Manchester upon the wharves of Smyrna.

In another month she was ready to turn her bowsprit again toward Long Wharf and the land "Well, you see it's just here: I hate to go of the setting sun. Her hold was packed with

bales of wool and rags. The hatches were battened down, the topsails were hoisted and sheeted home and back to the mast; the crew, with a long song, had got the anchor a-trip; the passengers, a missionary with his wife and four children, were busy arranging their quarters in the small cabin; the Greek pilot was on board; and the setting sun was tingeing the mountain-crags of Anatolia with roseate hues, and gilding the red roofs, crescent-tipped minarets, and crumbling Roman ramparts of Smyrna, when Captain Baker and the consignee came off to the ship, having paid their last visit to the consul and the health officers of the port.

"Mr. Partridge, you can make sail on her and cast off; let me know when all is ready," said the Captain to the mate as he went below for the last consultation with the consignee. As the breeze was light, the top-gallant sails and royals were sheeted home, and when she was adrift Mr. Partridge called the Captain.

As the bark fell off gracefully on the starboard tack, the two brass pieces were fired; Captain Baker was a strict disciplinarian; he kept his vessel trim as a yacht, and in entering or leaving port aimed at a man-of-war style as far as is possible in a merchant-ship.

"Good - by, Captain Baker," said the consignee, as he stepped into his boat; "a pleasant and quick voyage to you! When shall we look for you again?"

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rounded. Most fortunately, the weather continued clear, and they had a leading wind, and thus escaped the ice unharmed. And now, ho for the Grand Banks and for home! Captain Baker had been impatient all the voyage to reach the Banks, hoping to see his son there; the Gentle Annie was generally on fishing-grounds about that time, and the Captain was especially anxious for clear weather, so that he might not only see his boy's schooner, but might also thus avoid the danger of running her down in the fog, a peril of the Banks which neither fog-horns nor whistles nor the utmost vigilance can altogether dispel. It was a great relief, therefore, when on a fine, clear morning, with a good offing, Captain Baker saw a fleet of fishermen at anchor ahead or dodging about after fish. With eagerness he scanned them all, recognizing one and another in turn; but it was with ill-concealed disappointment that he failed to see the Gentle Annie anywhere in sight. Hailing one of the schooners which was from the Cape, he inquired for her whereabout, and was informed that she had started for home some days previous, having got a full fare of fish.

"Well," said Captain Baker, "I'm right glad to hear John's got a full fare so early in the season; he'll be coming out again afore long, and, if he gets another good catch, then there'll be a wedding, and you can count me in as one of those present. I don't know anybody who deserves a good wife more than our John, and that's just what he's a-going to have."

After the Grand Banks are passed, going to

So you said the last time you were here. the westward, it always seems as if one could We'll see you back again before long."

"No, I say good-by to Smyrny now, for good and all. But I expect to see you in Boston some time."

Everything looked propitious for a prosperous voyage home; but, being the summer season, the occasional gales and squalls they encountered were alternated by light, baffling winds and long calms, always more or less irritating to the ruling mind which paces the quarter-deck, but affording a good opportunity for scraping the masts, setting up and slushing the rigging, and painting the ship from truck to water-line. In this way the Jennie Lane was made to look as if she were "intended to be put under a glass case," while Captain Baker talked theology with the missionary, and kept an eye on the barometer or the offing for a breeze. On the 4th of July the bark was suddenly surrounded by field-ice and bergs of enormous size; the air, from almost tropical heat, became wintry cold, and the gleam of the sun and the moon on the glittering masses, while it displayed their splendor also revealed the extent of the perils by which they were sur

almost see the ridge-pole of the old homestead and the well-sweep rising by it, especially if a driving northeaster makes the lads in the forecastle sing, "The girls at home have got hold of the tow-rope." And that was just the wind which now swept the Jennie Lane along like a mad race-horse, scudding over the foaming crests on a bee-line for Boston Light. Captain Baker always carried sail hard, and he could do this safely because he never lost his head, and could take in canvas in a squall with perfect coolness. The bark now staggered under a press of sail rarely seen in such weather except on Yankee ships, and when commanded by such men as Captain Abijah Baker. When the canvas blew away, all hands were sent aloft to bend and set on another sail on the yard.

"By George! but if this isn't glorious!" exclaimed the hale old sea-dog. "If Johnnie don't look out, we'll get into Boston Bay before he sights the Highland Light!"

But the nearer they came to the coast the thicker the weather became-not exactly a fog, but a dripping Scotch mist and rain that effectu

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