<SPAN name="startofbook"></SPAN>
<div id="all">
<div id="tnotes_mini">
<h2>TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES</h2>
<p>The original punctuation and spelling were retained, with the
exception of a few printer's mistakes. The text contains also
inconsistently spelled words. The full list of both changes to the
text and the inconsistencies in spelling can be found
<SPAN href="#tnotes_full">at the end of this file</SPAN>. All the corrections
are marked with a dashed line and the
original text should appear on <ins class="ins" title="like this">hovering
the mouse over it</ins>.</p>
</div>
<p> </p>
<p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_i" id="Page_i">[i]</SPAN></span></p>
<h1>BOOKS BY JAMES HUNEKER<br/> <span class="subh1"><span class="smcap">Published by CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS</span></span></h1>
<div id="books" class="other_books">
<div><span class="smcap">UNICORNS.</span> 12mo, <span class="price"><i>net</i>, $1.75</span></div>
<div><span class="smcap">IVORY APES AND PEACOCKS.</span> 12mo, <span class="price"><i>net</i>, $1.50</span></div>
<div><span class="smcap">NEW COSMOPOLIS.</span> 12mo, <span class="price"><i>net</i>, $1.50</span></div>
<div><span class="smcap">THE PATHOS OF DISTANCE.</span> 12mo, <span class="price"><i>net</i>, $2.00</span></div>
<div><span class="smcap">FRANZ LISZT.</span> Illustrated. 12mo, <span class="price"><i>net</i>, $2.00</span></div>
<div><span class="smcap">PROMENADES OF AN IMPRESSIONIST.</span> 12mo, <span class="price"><i>net</i>, $1.50</span></div>
<div><span class="smcap">EGOISTS: A BOOK OF SUPERMEN.</span> 12mo, <span class="price"><i>net</i>, $1.50</span></div>
<div><span class="smcap">ICONOCLASTS: A BOOK OF DRAMATISTS.</span> 12mo, <span class="price"><i>net</i>, $1.50</span></div>
<div><span class="smcap">OVERTONES: A BOOK OF TEMPERAMENTS.</span> 12mo, <span class="price"><i>net</i>, $1.50</span></div>
<div><span class="smcap">MEZZOTINTS IN MODERN MUSIC.</span> 12mo, <span class="price"><i>net</i>, $1.50</span></div>
<div><span class="smcap">CHOPIN: THE MAN AND HIS MUSIC.</span> With Portrait. 12mo, <span class="price"><i>net</i>, $2.00</span></div>
<div><span class="smcap">VISIONARIES.</span> 12mo, <span class="price"><i>net</i>, $1.50</span></div>
<div><span class="smcap">MELOMANIACS.</span> 12mo, <span class="price"><i>net</i>, $1.50</span></div>
</div>
<hr style="width: 65%;" />
<p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_ii" id="Page_ii">[ii]</SPAN></span></p>
<h1 class="paddinghugeB paddinghugeT"><SPAN name="title" id="title"></SPAN>UNICORNS</h1>
<hr style="width: 65%;" />
<p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_iii" id="Page_iii">[iii]</SPAN></span></p>
<h1 class="center paddinMedT">UNICORNS</h1>
<h4 class="paddingMedT">BY</h4>
<h3 class="paddingMedB">JAMES HUNEKER</h3>
<p class="quote center block">
“I would write on the lintels<br/>
<span class="i2">of the door-post, ‘Whim.’”</span><br/>
<span class="indent">—<i>Emerson</i><span/></span></p>
<p class="center paddinMedT">NEW YORK</p>
<p class="center">CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS</p>
<p class="center paddinMedB">1917</p>
<hr style="width: 65%;" />
<p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_iv" id="Page_iv">[iv]</SPAN></span></p>
<p class="center">
COPYRIGHT, 1917, BY<br/>
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS</p>
<hr class="m" />
<p class="center">Published September, 1917</p>
<hr class="m" />
<p class="center">
<span class="smcap">Copyright, 1906, by THE NEW YORK HERALD COMPANY</span><br/>
<span class="smcap">Copyright, 1907, by THE RIDGEWAY COMPANY</span><br/>
<span class="smcap">Copyright, 1909, 1911, 1916, 1917, by THE SUN PRINTING AND PUBLISHING CO.</span><br/>
<span class="smcap">Copyright, 1914, 1915, 1916, 1917, by THE NEW YORK TIMES COMPANY</span><br/>
<span class="smcap">Copyright, 1915, 1916, by PUCK PUBLISHING CO.</span><br/>
<span class="smcap">Copyright, 1917, by NORTH AMERICAN</span><br/>
<span class="smcap">Copyright, 1917, by THE NEW YORK EVENING MAIL</span><br/></p>
<hr style="width: 65%;" />
<div class="pagewidth1">
<p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_v" id="Page_v">[v]</SPAN></span></p>
<div align="center" class="center withpadded" id="ded">THIS BOOK<br/>
<span class="smaller">OF SPLEEN AND GOSSIP IS INSCRIBED</span><br/>
TO MY FRIEND<br/>
<span class="bigger">EDWARD ZIEGLER</span></div>
<div class="motto" id="mainmotto">
<div class="blockquot"><p>
“Come! let us lay a crazy lance in rest<br/>
And tilt at windmills under a wild sky.”</p>
</div>
<p style='text-align: right'>
—<i>John Galsworthy</i>.<br/></p>
<div class="blockquot"><p>“He is a fribble, a sonsy faddle, whose
conceits veer with the breeze like a creaking
weather-vane. As the sterile moon
hath her librations, so must he boast of
his oscillations, thinking them eternal
verities. A very cockatoo in his perched-up
vanity and prodigious clatter....”</p>
</div>
<p style='padding-left: 10em;'>
[<i>From “The Velvet Cactus.” Anonymous.
Printed at the Sign of the
Cat and Cameo, Threadneedle Street,
London. A.D. 1723. Rare.</i>]</p>
</div>
</div>
<p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_vi" id="Page_vi">[vi]</SPAN></span></p>
<hr style="width: 65%;" />
<p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[vii]</SPAN></span></p>
<h2><SPAN name="CONTENTS" id="CONTENTS"></SPAN>CONTENTS</h2>
<div id="cont_wrapper">
<div id="cont">
<div class="r">
<div class="lc">CHAPTER</div>
<div class="mc"> </div>
<div class="rc">PAGE</div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_I">I.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">In Praise of Unicorns</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_1">1</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_II">II.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">An American Composer: The Passing of Edward MacDowell</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_6">6</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_III">III.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">Remy de Gourmont: His Ideas. The Colour of His Mind</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_18">18</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_IV">IV.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">Artzibashef</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_33">33</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_V">V.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">A Note on Henry James</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_53">53</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_VI">VI.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">George Sand</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_67">67</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_VII">VII.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">The Great American Novel</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_82">82</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_VIII">VIII.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">The Case of Paul Cézanne</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_96">96</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_IX">IX.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">Brahmsody</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_106">106</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_X">X.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">The Opinions of J.-K. Huysmans</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_111">111</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_XI">XI.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">Style and Rhythm in English Prose </span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_121">121</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_XII">XII.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">The Queerest Yarn in the World</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_139">139</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_XIII">XIII.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">On Rereading Mallock</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_151">151</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_XIV">XIV.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">The Lost Master</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_161">161</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_XV">XV.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">The Grand Manner in Pianoforte Playing</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_171">171</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_XVI">XVI.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">James Joyce</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_187">187</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_XVII">XVII.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">Creative Involution</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_195">195</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r"><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_vii" id="Page_viii">[viii]</SPAN></span>
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_XVIII">XVIII.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">Four Dimensional Vistas</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_203">203</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_XIX">XIX.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">O. W.</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_212">212</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_XX">XX.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">A Synthesis of the Seven Arts</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_218">218</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_XXI">XXI.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">The Classic Chopin</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_228">228</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_XXII">XXII.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">Little Mirrors of Sincerity</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_241">241</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_XXIII">XXIII.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">The Reformation of George Moore</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_261">261</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_XXIV">XXIV.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">Pillowland</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_277">277</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_XXV">XXV.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">Cross-Currents in Modern French Literature</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_283">283</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_XXVI">XXVI.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">More About Richard Wagner</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_300">300</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_XXVII">XXVII.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">My First Musical Adventure</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_317">317</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_XXVIII">XXVIII.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">Violinists Now and Yesteryear</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_323">323</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_XXIX">XXIX.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">Riding the Whirlwind</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_339">339</SPAN></div>
</div>
<div class="r">
<div class="lc"><SPAN href="#CHAPTER_XXX">XXX.</SPAN></div>
<div class="mc"><span class="smcap">Prayers for the Living</span></div>
<div class="rc"><SPAN href="#Page_353">353</SPAN></div>
</div></div>
</div>
<hr style="width: 65%;" />
<p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">[ix]</SPAN></span></p>
<h1 class="paddinghugeT paddinghugeB"><SPAN name="UNICORNS_beginning" id="UNICORNS_beginning"></SPAN>UNICORNS</h1>
<hr style="width: 65%;" />
<p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</SPAN></span></p>
<h1 class="paddinghugeT paddingMedB"><SPAN name="UNICORNS" id="UNICORNS"></SPAN>UNICORNS</h1>
<h2><SPAN name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></SPAN>CHAPTER I</h2>
<h2>IN PRAISE OF UNICORNS</h2>
<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
<span class="i0">"The Lion and the Unicorn were fighting for the crown:<br/></span>
<span class="i0">The Lion beat the Unicorn all round the town." ...<br/></span></div>
</div>
<p>In the golden book of wit and wisdom,
Through the Looking-Glass, the Unicorn rather
disdainfully remarks that he had believed children
to be fabulous monsters. Alice smilingly
retorts: "Do you know, I always thought Unicorns
were fabulous monsters, too? I never
saw one alive before!" "Well, now that we
<i>have</i> seen each other," said the Unicorn, "if
you'll believe in me, I'll believe in you. Is
that a bargain?" "Yes, if you like," said
Alice. No such ambiguous bargains are needed
to demonstrate the existence of Unicorns.
That is, not for imaginative people. A mythical
monster, a heraldic animal, he figures in the
dictionary as the Monoceros, habitat, India;
and he is the biblical Urus, sporting one horn,
a goat beard and a lion's tail. He may be all
these things for practical persons; no man is a
genius to his wife. But maugre that he is something
more for dreamers of dreams; though <span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</SPAN></span>
not the Hippogriff, with its liberating wings,
volplaning through the Fourth Dimension of
Space; nor yet is he tender Undine, spirit of
fountains, of whom the Unicorn asked: "By
the waters of what valley has jealous mankind
hidden the source of your secrets?" (Cousin
german to the Centaur of Maurice de Guérin,
he can speak in like cadence.)</p>
<p>Alice with her "dreaming eyes of wonder"
was, after the manner of little girls, somewhat
pragmatic. She believed in Unicorns only
when she saw one. Yet we must believe without
such proof. Has not the Book of Job put
this question: "Canst thou bind the Unicorn
with his band in the furrow?" As if a harnessed
Unicorn would be credible. We prefer placing
the charming monster, with the prancing tiny
hoofs of ivory (surely Chopin set him to musical
notation in his capricious second Etude in
F; Chopin who, if man were soulless, would
have endowed him with one) in the same category
as the Chimera of "The Temptation of
St. Antony," which thus taunted the Sphinx:
"I am light and joyous! I offer to the eyes of
men dazzling perspectives with Paradise in
the clouds above.... I seek for new perfumes,
for vaster flowers, for pleasures never
felt before...."</p>
<p>With Unicorns we feel the nostalgia of the
infinite, the sorcery of dolls, the salt of sex,
the vertigo of them that skirt the edge of perilous
ravines, or straddle the rim of finer issues. He
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</SPAN></span>
dwells in equivocal twilights; and he can stare
the sun out of countenance. The enchanting
Unicorn boasts no favoured zone. He runs
around the globe. He is of all ages and climes.
He knows that fantastic land of Gautier, which
contains all the divine lost landscapes ever
painted, and whose inhabitants are the lovely
figures created by art in granite, marble, or
wood, on walls, canvas, or crystal. Betimes
he flashes by the nymph in the brake, and
dazzled, she sighs with desire. Mallarmé set
him to cryptic harmonies, and placed him in
a dim rich forest (though he called him a faun;
a faun in retorsion). Like the apocryphal
Sadhuzag in Flaubert's cosmical drama of
dreams, which bore seventy-four hollow antlers
from which issued music of ineffable sweetness,
our Unicorn sings ravishing melodies for those
who possess the inner ear of mystics and poets.
When angered he echoes the Seven Thunders
of the Apocalypse, and we hear of desperate
rumours of fire, flood, and disaster. And he
haunts those ivory gates of sleep whence come
ineffable dreams to mortals.</p>
<p>He has always fought with the Lion for the
crown, and he is always defeated, but invariably
claims the victory. The crown is Art, and the
Lion, being a realist born, is only attracted by
its glitter, not the symbol. The Unicorn, an
idealist, divines the inner meaning of this precious
fillet of gold. Art is the modern philosopher's
stone, and the most brilliant jewel
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</SPAN></span>
in this much-contested crown. Eternal is the
conflict of the Real and the Ideal; Aristotle
and Plato; Alice and the Unicorn; the practical
and the poetic; butterflies and geese; and
rare roast-beef versus the impossible blue rose.
And neither the Lion nor the Unicorn has yet
fought the battle decisive. Perhaps the day
may come when, weariness invading their
very bones, they may realise that they are as
different sides of the same coveted shield;
matter and spirit, the multitude and the individual.
Then unlock the ivory tower, abolish
the tyrannies of superannuated superstitions,
and give the people vision, without which they
perish. The divine rights of humanity, no
longer of kingly cabbages.</p>
<p>The dusk of the future is washed with the
silver of hope. The Lion and the Unicorn in
single yoke. Strength and Beauty should
represent the fusion of the Ideal and the Real.
There should be no anarchy, no socialism, no
Brotherhood or Sisterhood of mankind, just
the millennium of sense and sentiment. What
title shall we give that far-away time, that
longed-for Utopia? With Alice and the Faun
we forget names, so let us follow her method
when in doubt, and exclaim: "Here then!
Here then!" Morose and disillusioned souls
may cry aloud: "Ah! to see behind us no longer,
on the Lake of Eternity, the implacable Wake
of Time!" nevertheless, we must believe in
the reality of our Unicorn. He is Pan. He is
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</SPAN></span>
Puck. He is Shelley. He is Ariel. He is Whim.
He is Irony. And he can boast with Emerson:</p>
<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
<span class="i0">"I am owner of the sphere,<br/></span>
<span class="i0">Of the seven stars and the solar year,<br/></span>
<span class="i0">Of Cæsar's hand and Plato's brain,<br/></span>
<span class="i0">Of Lord Christ's heart and Shakespeare's strain."<br/></span></div>
</div>
<hr style="width: 65%;" />
<p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</SPAN></span></p>
<div style="break-after:column;"></div><br />
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