DUST OF THE PAST

Taranaki Daily News, 11 February 1933, Page 1 (Supplement)

DUST OF THE PAST

LITERATURE . AND SCIENCE

(By

“Historicus.”)

W. Harrison Ainsworth was born on February 4, "1805. Is the writing of a best-seller a matter of luck or discernment? Perhaps there is a little of both. Many a lesser author has earned both fame and money by an innate sense, of the particular literary food for which his generation hungers. As an instance of this W. Harrison Ainsworth might be cited.

Although by no means on the same literary level, his name is definitely associated with the greatest writers of the early part of the 19th century. Now, a peculiar feature of the early 30 s was the fact that as law and order became stronger and more settled in the land the viewpoint of the public so far as lawbreakers were concerned tended towards the romantic. Along with Lytton, Ainsworth would appear to have sensed this inclination and provided for its entertainment. He produced “Rookwood and “Jack Sheppard,” both novels making robbery a matter of romance, and gained immediate success. Ainsworth’s early training was in .the direction of the law, but drifting through marriage into the publishing business, which he found unprofitable, he essayed fiction. “The Tower of London,” “Guy Fawkes” and “Old St. Paul s will always be popular stories. For his historical fiction he probably owes much to Scott. While he was no genius, he possessed a talent for plot, and could weave a fabric of fiction around historical happenings to a degree of reality that will retain a fascination for the fiction-loving public.

Thomas Carlyle died on February 5, 1881. It is the little things of life that are often the'most interesting. History records a great many things that John Stuart Mill did, and hides many other things that members of his household did for him. For instance, he was the fortunate possessor of a very industrious .servant girl. She was probably the type of girl who sings at her work. One day she dashed all over the house, probably singing blithely, laying the household fires. Possibly, John Stuart Mill, if he had noticed her at all, would have complimented her upon her industry. Anyway, she was laying the fires of her life. There is no record that they did not bum well, because it was not until after they were all blazing bright and cheerfully that it was discovered she’ had made them with the manuscript of the first volume of Carlyle’s French Revolution that he had sent to Mill for him to read.

The production of that first volume had been a tremendous task to Carlyle, who was never an easy writer. It must have been almost as hard for Mill to break the news to him as it was for Carlyle to re-write the volume. He set himself to the task, however, and was rewarded by a success that assured his financial position. It was as well that hb.had a character of iron. Born at Ecclefechan, the son of a Scottish stonemason, his early intention had been, to become a minister. He discarded this idea and became a schoolmaster private tutor. It was not until he was nearly 30 years of sige that he seriously turned his attentions to literature. Sartor Resartus made his fame in literary, circles, although it had to appear in magazine form, as no publisher could be found to print it Until the French Revolution appeared the inspiring intensity of his style had not made much appeal to the general public: it certainly had not appealed to the assiduous servant girl.

To-day we work on scientific principles, or art, least we pride ourselves that such is the case. We have our' schools of everything, and to become a literary man it is only necessary to take a course of correspondence. And yet there are people who still query the best training’for a literary career. Certain it is that many who have attained eminence-in that particular, world have either had quite the wrong training, or none at all. Cervantes’ life was not at all in accordance with a proper literary training.’ Yet he produced a work that may be praised as even slightly better than some of the greatest of our modern novels. Charles Dickens who was born on this day, February 7, 1812, had no training at all, outside the school of childhood adversity, and the educative qualities of the slums. His early days are only too well known; The part they played in the great books that were to be produced in later years '■ is expressed in those works. The blacking factory; the wanderings round the shabby shops of his ill-conditioned neighbourhood, gazing into weirdly assorted windows speculating how best to lay out the shilling a day he -saved to keep body and soul together; the visit to his father,, poor, hopeful Micawber, in prison at Marshalsea, were all experiences in the building of his literary life. It was a training that probably did more to produce the great novelist than half a dozen Universities could ever have done; it was a training which remained with him for the rest of his life. It is extremely doubtful whether a comfortable fireside, a correspondence course, or a school of journalism would have helped him half as' much in the production of “David Copperfield.” Wilhelm Konrad Rontgen died on February 9, 1923. It is an interesting point to consider just what part chance has played in the great discoveries of. , the world. Certainly that fickle goddess smiled benignly upon the human race one day in 1895, when Rontgen was experimenting with a Crookes tube. The tube was encased in a black cardboard box so that no light reached it. To Rontgen’s great surprise he noticed that a paper screen covered with barium platino cyanide which happened to be lying near it was glowing brilliantly. Were some rays from the Crookes tube penetrating the cardboard box and affecting the crystals? . • To the physicist explanation was but a matter of . investigation. The world soon learnt that Rontgen had discovered a wonderful ray, which in view of the existing uncertainty as to its nature, he called the X-ray. The news flashed across the hemispheres.. Recognition of its possibilities was immediate. A new branch of science had opened that was to be of as incalculable benefit to humanity as any previously discovered. Only days had elapsed before scientific men had photographed, for the first time, the bones of the human body. Wonderful advance has been made since that day. It was some time, however, before the pioneers discovered its destructive effects upon the flesh if used too freely. To those early martyrs must go the blessing of the human race. It was at Wurzburg that Ronten made his great discovery. He was bom at Lennep in 1845, receiving his early education in Holland. His ray added fame to an already distinguished career, and brought him the Rumford medal of the Royal Society.