Miss Grief and Other Stories (36 page)

4
      
flags
: Wild irises, which possess sword-like leaves.

7
      
Fl
ying Dutchmen:
The Flying Dutchman was a legendary ghost ship that was forced to sail forever and never make port.

10
    
“In the kingdom …”
: Slightly altered lines from the poem “Annabel Lee” (1849) by Edgar Allan Poe.

16
    
Apollyon
: The destroyer or angel of the bottomless pit, from Revelation 9:11.

20
    
shake-downs
: Beds of straw.

21
    
crash towels
: Coarse linen towels.

21
    
if you sing …
: Proverb meaning if you are happy in the morning, your mood will change by the evening.

22
    
“The heavens declare …”
: The chant is adapted from the Psalms: “The heavens declare …,” 19:1; “Joy cometh …,” 30:5; “As a bridegroom …As a strong man …,” 19:5; “The outgoings …,” 65:8; “Like a pelican …Like a sparrow …,” 102:6–7.

23
    
Napoleon on St. Helena
: Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte (1769–1821) was exiled to the remote island of St. Helena in the South Atlantic after his defeat by the British at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815. He died there six years later.

24
    
“The moping bittern …”
: Slightly misquoted lines from “The Haunted House” (1844) by the British poet Thomas Hood (1799–1845). Rather than a “bittern,” Hood writes of a “moping heron.” Woolson seems to have taken her lines from an article on bitterns in
The American Naturalist
in 1870 (vol. 3, p. 177).

26
    
a ramified answer
: This wording was maintained in book and magazine versions, but Woolson may have meant “rarified.”

28
    
Faust
: In a German legend, the scholar Faust makes a bargain with the devil: in exchange for all knowledge and earthly pleasure for a period of twenty-four years, Faust will accept eternal damnation. The most famous adaptation of the legend was the play
Faust
by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe; the first part was published in 1808, the second in 1832. The opera
Faust
by Charles Gounod premiered in 1859.

28
    
the Punic wars
: Wars fought between Rome and Carthage from 264
B.C.
to 146
B.C.

28
    
Belshazzar
: Prince of Babylon in the sixth century
B.C.
, mentioned in Daniel in the Old Testament.

29
    
Te Deum
: A Christian hymn of praise sung to God.

30
    
Mount Tabor
: Located west of the Sea of Galilee, Mount Tabor was believed to be the site of Christ's Transfiguration.

31
    
Jacob Bœhmen
…spiritualism
: Jacob Boehme (1575–1624) was an untutored German mystic who believed in the divinity of humanity; his first book was
Aurora
(1612) or “dawn.” Chiliastic is a Greek word for the belief (also known as millennialism) that Jesus will reign for one thousand years before the day of judgment. Modern spiritualism refers to the popular nineteenth-century belief that communication with the dead was possible, usually through a spiritual medium.

31
    
“Much learning …”
: A twist on “Much learning hath made thee mad” (Acts 26:24); the original refers to Paul.

32
    
Prime
: William Cowper Prime (1825–1905), American journalist and travel writer, wrote
I Go A-Fishing
(1873), a narrative of various fishing expeditions.

33
    
Bret Harte's “Melons”
: In “Melons” (1870), by the American writer Bret Harte (1836–1902), a boy whistles the tune
to “John Brown's Body,” a popular song about the American militant abolitionist who raided Harper's Ferry in 1859. The tune would become the music for Julia Ward Howe's “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” (1862).

35
    
delaine
: A high-quality wool fabric made from delaine sheep.

35
    
chirk
: Cheerful.

37
    
our evening was over
: When Woolson republished “St. Clair Flats” in
Castle Nowhere,
she deleted here a conversation between the narrator and Raymond in which they disagree about the wisdom of Roxanna and Samuel's marriage. Raymond argues that the union of such an “ignorant, commonplace woman” and “a poetical, imaginative man” inevitably leads to misery, while the narrator believes that Samuel would be in a lunatic asylum without Roxanna's “tender care.” He argues, “Her love for him is something sublime: her poor, plain face, her dull eyes, and her rough hands, are transformed into something higher than beauty.”

38
    
“He came flying …”
: Adapted from Psalms 18:10.

38
    
Hebrew poet
: King David, who composed many of the sacred poems in the Psalms.

40
    
“folded their tents …”
: From “The Day Is Done” (1845) by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–1882).

SOLOMON

43
    
g
low-worm lamps
: Lamps made of jars containing fireflies, or glowworms.

44
    
“Western Reserve”
: An area of 3.3 million acres in northeastern Ohio that was reserved by the state of Connecticut when it ceded its claim to the Northwest Territory in 1786. The land was largely settled by Connecticut immigrants,
and was ceded to Ohio in 1800. The names in the next two sentences are various tracts in Ohio. “Moravian Lands” refers to three 4000-acre tracts of land granted to Moravian missionaries by the Continental Congress in 1787.

45
    
Käse-lab
: Woolson probably means Käse-laib, which is German for “wheel of cheese.”

46
    
huts of the Black Forest
: Small huts built by peasants of rough logs were common throughout the mountainous Black Forest in southwestern Germany.

47
    
Mound-Builders
: Ancient indigenous peoples of North America who lived around the Great Lakes and the Mississippi Valley and built ceremonial mounds throughout the region.

47
    
C
—
—
: Cleveland, from which Woolson also hailed; it lies about seventy-five miles north of Zoar.

48
    
linsey-woolsey
: A coarse fabric made of linen or cotton and wool.

48
    
list slippers
: Slippers made from fabric edging, or selvage, which made them very quiet.

50
    
Sandy
: Sandusky, a town on Lake Erie.

50
    
Queen of Sheby
: An Arabian ruler mentioned in the Bible, the Queen of Sheba visited King Solomon in Jerusalem, bearing great gifts and asking him to solve a number of riddles.

51
    
Solomon
: In the Bible, Solomon was the king of Israel and the son of David. He was known for great power and wisdom, but also for idolatry. In Kings, he is described as being influenced by his wives to turn away from God. A later Old Testament book, the “Song of Solomon” or “Song of Songs,” comprises a song sung between two lovers about the joys of sexual love.

51
    
Judy, Ruth, Esthy
: Three women who appear in the Old Testament. The Biblical story of Judith seducing and beheading Holfernes in order to save her people was portrayed many times in Renaissance art. Ruth was the great-grandmother of David. Esther, who was Jewish and known for her great beauty, married a Persian king and persuaded him to rescind an order to execute all Jews.

52
    
chany
: China, or decorated porcelain dishes.

52
    
open-work stockings
: Fancy stockings made of fabric with decorative openings.

52
    
cambric
: A fine linen or cotton cloth that is tightly woven.

53
    
Où la vanité
va-t-elle se nicher?
: In French, Where is the vanity going to hide?

53
    
the Lorelei
: The German legend of a maiden who lures sailors on the Rhine River to their deaths with her beautiful music. It was set to music many times. The opening lines cited just above—translated as, “I don't know what it means / That I am so sad”—come from “Die Lorelei” (1824) by the poet Heinrich Heine (1797–1856).

54
    
“She is quite sure …had her day”
: From “Maud” (1855) by Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809–1892). The lines read in the original: “Before I am quite sure / That there is one to love me; / Then let come what may / To a life that has been so sad, / I shall have had my day.”

54
    
“A man's a man”
: “A Man's a Man for A' That” (1795) by Robert Burns (1759–1796).

59
    
kobold
: A household sprite from German folklore that can appear in the form of an animal.

61
    
my rose of Sharon
: Song of Solomon 2:1: “I am the rose of Sharon, and the lily of the valleys.”

62
    
Tuscarora
: A Native American tribe and member of the Iroquois League. The Tuscarora originally came from the
Great Lakes region, and the tribe now has members in New York, North Carolina, and Canada. The name was used for place-names throughout the upper Midwest.

64
    
Dux nascitur
: Latin for born leader.

RODMAN THE KEEPER

73
    
“The long years …”
: Excerpted from “Spring in New England” by Thomas Bailey Aldrich (1836–1907), published in the
Atlantic Monthly
in June 1875.

76
    
estate with philosophic eyes
: In the magazine version of the story, the following sentence appeared here: “He no longer felt warming within him his early temptations to put in the missing nail or pick up the rusting axe; ‘for if they did these things in a green tree, what will they do in a dry?' he thought.” The quotation is from Luke 23:31.

90
    
Federal
: A Union soldier.

90
    
carpet-baggers
: Northerners who came to the South after the Civil War for political or economic gain, often carrying bags made of carpet; the term was pejorative.

90
    
pagan Chinamen
: Chinese immigrants along the West Coast of the United States, many of whom worked in railroad construction. They were often portrayed negatively in the nineteenth-century press.

92
    
“Toujours femme varie … plume au vent”
: French: “Women always vary, / He who trusts them is quite mad; / Often a woman / is only a feather in the wind.”

96
    
anathema-maranatha
: Cursed or condemned, incurring God's wrath; from 1 Corinthians 16:22: “If any man not love the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be Anathema-Maranatha.”

98
    
The furniture was of dark mahogany
: A pier-table is made to stand against a wall between two windows. Low-down
glass is a mirror that stands against the back side of the table, between the top and a shelf that is close to the ground. Hair-cloth is a stiff fabric woven of horsehair.

100
  
“Tell me not …”
: The opening to the poem “A Psalm of Life” (1838) by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–1882).

110
  
at the South, all went
: The following passage appears here in the magazine version, but was cut from the book version:

“Grief covers our land.”

“Yes; for a mighty wrong brings ever in its train a mighty sorrow.”

Miss Ward turned upon him fiercely. “Do you, who have lived among us, dare to pretend that the state of our servants is not worse this moment than it ever was before?”

“Transition.”

“A horrible transition!”

“Horrible, but inevitable; education will be the savior. Had I fifty millions to spend on the South to-morrow, every cent should go for schools, and for schools alone.”

“For the negroes, I suppose,” said the girl with a bitter scorn.

“For the negroes, and for the whites also,” answered John Rodman gravely. “The lack of general education is painfully apparent everywhere th[r]oughout the South; it is from that cause more than any other that your beautiful country now lies desolate.”

“Desolate,—desolate indeed,” said Miss Ward.

SISTER ST. LUKE

115
  
“She lived shut in …”
: “Sister Saint Luke” by the statesman and poet John Milton Hay (1838–1905), written specifically for this story when it was republished in
Rodman the Keeper: Southern Sketches.

115
  
Minorcan
: The Minorcans are inhabitants of Minorca, one of the Spanish Balearic Islands. A large group of Minorcan indentured servants was brought to Florida in 1767 by a Scottish entrepreneur to work his indigo plantation. After much cruel treatment, they petitioned the British colonial governor in St. Augustine for their freedom, which they won, along with a tract of land on which their descendants lived for generations.