--I should like to see any man's biography with corrections and emendations by his ghost.We don't know each other's secrets quite so well as we flatter ourselves we do.We don't always know our own secrets as well as we might.You have seen a tree with different grafts upon it, an apple or a pear tree we will say.In the late summer months the fruit on one bough will ripen; I remember just such a tree, and the early ripening fruit was the Jargonelle.By and by the fruit of another bough will begin to come into condition; the lovely Saint Michael, as I remember, grew on the same stock as the Jargonelle in the tree I am thinking of; and then, when these have all fallen or been gathered, another, we will say the Winter Nelis, has its turn, and so out of the same juices have come in succession fruits of the most varied aspects and flavors.It is the same thing with ourselves, but it takes us a long while to find it out.The various inherited instincts ripen in succession.You may be nine tenths paternal at one period of your life, and nine tenths maternal at another.All at once the traits of some immediate ancestor may come to maturity unexpectedly on one of the branches of your character, just as your features at different periods of your life betray different resemblances to your nearer or more remote relatives.
But I want you to let me go back to the Bunker Hill Monument and the dynasty of twenty or thirty centuries whose successive representatives are to sit in the gate, like the Jewish monarchs, while the people shall come by hundreds and by thousands to visit the memorial shaft until the story of Bunker's Hill is as old as that of Marathon.
Would not one like to attend twenty consecutive soirees, at each one of which the lion of the party should be the Man of the Monument, at the beginning of each century, all the way, we will say, from Anno Domini 2000 to Ann.Dom.4000,--or, if you think the style of dating will be changed, say to Ann.Darwinii (we can keep A.D.you see)1872? Will the Man be of the Indian type, as President Samuel Stanhope Smith and others have supposed the transplanted European will become by and by? Will he have shortened down to four feet and a little more, like the Esquimaux, or will he have been bred up to seven feet by the use of new chemical diets, ozonized and otherwise improved atmospheres, and animal fertilizers? Let us summon him in imagination and ask him a few questions.
Is n't it like splitting a toad out of a rock to think of this man of nineteen or twenty centuries hence coming out from his stony dwelling-place and speaking with us? What are the questions we should ask him? He has but a few minutes to stay.Make out your own list; I will set down a few that come up to me as I write.
--What is the prevalent religious creed of civilization ?
--Has the planet met with any accident of importance?
--How general is the republican form of government ?
--Do men fly yet?
--Has the universal language come into use?
--Is there a new fuel since the English coal-mines have given out?
--Is the euthanasia a recognized branch of medical science?
--Is the oldest inhabitant still living?
--Is the Daily Advertiser still published?
--And the Evening Transcript?
--Is there much inquiry for the works of a writer of the nineteenth century (Old Style) by--the name of--of--My tongue cleaves to the roof of my mouth.I cannot imagine the putting of that question without feeling the tremors which shake a wooer as he falters out the words the answer to which will make him happy or wretched.
Whose works was I going to question him about, do you ask me?
Oh, the writings of a friend of mine, much esteemed by his relatives and others.But it's of no consequence, after all; I think he says he does not care much for posthumous reputation.
I find something of the same interest in thinking about one of the boarders at our table that I find in my waking dreams concerning the Man of the Monument.This personage is the Register of Deeds.He is an unemotional character, living in his business almost as exclusively as the Scarabee, but without any of that eagerness and enthusiasm which belong to our scientific specialist.His work is largely, principally, I may say, mechanical.He has developed, however, a certain amount of taste for the antiquities of his department, and once in a while brings out some curious result of his investigations into ancient documents.He too belongs to a dynasty which will last as long as there is such a thing as property in land and dwellings.When that is done away with, and we return to the state of villanage, holding our tenement-houses, all to be of the same pattern, of the State, that is to say, of the Tammany Ring which is to take the place of the feudal lord,--the office of Register of Deeds will, I presume, become useless, and the dynasty will be deposed.
