So Runs the World | Page 2

after many years.
There are three periods in Sienkiewicz's literary life. In the first he
wrote short stories, which are masterpieces of grace and ingenuity--at
least some of them. In those stories the reader will meet frequent
thoughts about general problems, deep observations of life--and
notwithstanding his idealism, very truthful about spiritual moods,
expressed with an easy and sincere hand. Speaking about Sienkiewicz's
works, no matter how small it may be, one has always the feeling that
one speaks about a known, living in general memory work. Almost
every one of his stories is like a stone thrown in the midst of a flock of
sparrows gathering in the winter time around barns: one throw arouses
at once a flock of winged reminiscences.
The other characteristics of his stories are uncommonness of his
conceptions, masterly compositions, ofttimes artificial. It happens also
that a story has no plot ("From the Diary of a Tutor in Pozman,"
"Bartek the Victor"), no action, almost no matter ("Yamyol"), but the
reader is rewarded by simplicity, rural theme, humoristic pictures
("Comedy of Errors: A Sketch of American Life"), pity for the little
and poor ("Yanko the Musician"), and those qualities make the reader
remember his stories well. It is almost impossible to forget--under the
general impressions--about his striking and standing-out figures ("The
Lighthouse Keeper of Aspinwall"), about the individual impression
they leave on our minds. Apparently they are commonplace, every-day
people, but the author's talent puts on them an original individuality, a
particular stamp, which makes one remember them forever and
afterward apply them to the individuals which one meets in life. No
matter how insignificant socially is the figure chosen by Sienkiewicz
for his story, the great talent of the author magnifies its striking features,

not seen by common people, and makes of it a masterpiece of literary
art.
Although we have a popular saying: Comparaison n'est pas raison, one
cannot refrain from stating here that this love for the poor, the little,
and the oppressed, brought out so powerfully in Sienkiewicz's short
stories, constitutes a link between him and François Coppée, who is so
great a friend of the friendless and the oppressed, those who, without
noise, bear the heaviest chains, the pariahs of our happy and smiling
society. The only difference between the short stories of these two
writers is this, that notwithstanding all the mastercraft of Coppée's
work, one forgets the impressions produced by the reading of his
work--while it is almost impossible to forget "The Lighthouse Keeper"
looking on any lighthouse, or "Yanko the Musician" listening to a poor
wandering boy playing on the street, or "Bartek the Victor" seeing
soldiers of which military discipline have made machines rather than
thinking beings, or "The Diary of a Tutor" contemplating the pale face
of children overloaded with studies. Another difference between those
two writers--the comparison is always between their short stories--is
this, that while Sienkiewicz's figures and characters are universal,
international--if one can use this adjective here--and can be applied to
the students of any country, to the soldiers of any nation, to any
wandering musician and to the light-keeper on any sea, the figures of
François Coppée are mostly Parisian and could be hardly displaced
from their Parisian surroundings and conditions.
Sometimes the whole short story is written for the sake of that which
the French call pointe. When one has finished the reading of "Zeus's
Sentence," for a moment the charming description of the evening and
Athenian night is lost. And what a beautiful description it is! If the art
of reading were cultivated in America as it is in France and Germany, I
would not be surprised if some American Legouvé or Strakosch were to
add to his répertoire such productions of prose as this humorously
poetic "Zeus's Sentence," or that mystic madrigal, "Be Blessed."
"But the dusk did not last long," writes Sienkiewicz. "Soon from the
Archipelago appeared the pale Selene and began to sail like a silvery

boat in the heavenly space. And the walls of the Acropolis lighted
again, but they beamed now with a pale green light, and looked more
than ever like the vision of a dream."
But all these, and other equally charming pictures, disappear for a
moment from the memory of the reader. There remains only the final
joke--only Zeus's sentence. "A virtuous woman--especially when she
loves another man--can resist Apollo. But surely and always a stupid
woman will resist him."
Only when one thinks of the story does one see that the ending--that
"immoral conclusion" I should say if I were not able to understand the
joke--does not constitute the essence of the story. Only then we find a
delight in the description of the city for which the wagons cater the
divine barley, and the water is carried by the girls,