for facts and advocacy of their importance, he was not always quite willing to descend to some little spot of earth and there to examine them in patient detail. If I remember rightly, Bishop Colenso did not abandon at all the Christian faith that the Bible is the revelation of God to man, but only asserted that it had a human element which required human criticism to aid in its proper understanding, just as the language in which it was written required to be read by the help of grammars and dictionaries. Maurice had no sympathy with the orthodoxy which denied the duty or even the right of such criticism; he once said to me, "If Christianity were not true, I should hate it." And I never knew him to refuse to discuss with me these questions of criticism which so stirred his indignation when published by Colenso. Later researches are every day showing how often this so-called "higher criticism" is only the substitution of fancies and fictions for the old facts, and so far Maurice was in the right. He knew that the Bible was worth defending; he had to kindle a great fire, to burn up all sorts of rubbish, old and new, which had been heaped round it, and if there was sometimes a little smoke, we know that smoke is but the too eager impatience of the fire to convert itself into flame.

When Maurice said to me that if Christianity were not true he should hate it, his words, like his whole life, implied the converse that Christianity was true, and that therefore he loved it. And if he had been further asked what he meant by Christianity, he would have answered by rehearsing the Apostles' Creed; and he would have quoted the Catechism in the Prayer Book in proof that in this and not in the Thirty-nine Articles was to be found the declaration of faith of a Christian man, woman, and child. He believed that he was sent into the world to bear witness to the truth of this faith in the form in which such witness was needed in our own day. How and with what success he did bear this witness will be better seen and understood in

another generation than it can yet be. but I will attempt to say what seems to me to be suggested by my own reminiscences of the man.

Maurice always spoke of Coleridge with the respect and esteem due to one whom he held to be the great teacher of his generation; but he was no servile follower, nor did he care much for Coleridge's favorite formulas of Thesis and Antithesis, Reason and Understanding and the like. While fully recognizing the worth of Coleridge's ideas, he used to say that it was required of our own generation to look at and investigate facts, where Coleridge had dealt only with ideas. To study and help others to study facts in the light of ideas was the business of Maurice's life. It was hard work to lead men into a region of thought hitherto unknown to them. He once said to me, in a tone that made me feel that he was conscious of a like thought for himself, that it was not given to Coleridge to beget spiritual children in his own image. And that thought will be found in more than one of his letters where he says that nothing had disappointed him more than the finding himself to be utterly misunderstood by those whom he had expected to be most ready to hear him with sympathy and approval. And then he added (I give his meaning. if not his exact words) that he would be content if he could sow in the hearts of three or four seed which would grow up and multiply for coming generations. It was in this spirit that he once said to me that a man did himself more honor by writing a book, like those of Clarendon or Gibbon-I think these were his instances-but that in our generation, at least, a more useful work for the service of men was to be done by taking part in the controversies of the day. I believe that his genius over-mastered him in this matter, and that his "Kingdom of Christ" and "History of Moral and Metaphysical Philosophy" will always hold a place among the standard works of our English literature; but, as I have already said, the greater part of his life was spent in those controversies of

the day, of which the real importance was in the seed which was sown by their means, to grow up and multiply for the future harvests after the controversies themselves had been long forgotten. Maurice was content that it should be so. His prayer was always that of Ajax-that he might fall fighting in and for the light. To know and declare the truth in all that concerned the higher life of man was the work which he did faithfully. He faced and laid, and taught others how to face and lay, those spectres of the mind which continually beset the path of every man who makes truth and reason, and not authority, however sacred, the guide of his life. He would not make his judgments blind-though, like other Christian men, he knew that there was a blind obedience which freed the mind from many doubts and difficulties. Though he admitted that the love of Truth for its own sake had, or seemed to have, a coldness when compared with the love of Goodnesshe believed that Truth was the higher object of man's faith, and that he could not love Goodness so much if he did not love Truth more. But this was not all. Maurice was a philosopher, a lover of truth, and a seeker after it in all its relations with human life which we call wisdom, but he taught that Truth was revealed from above as well as sought after from below; and that this Truth was to be found, not in abstractions or ideas, but in the very being of God in his relations with man. It is the revelation of a Light which is the life of every man, and made known to us through the institutions of the family, the nation, and the Church, and in the ultimate fact of the personal relation to God. This is the Fatherhood of God, the belief in which is the faith which Maurice held, and taught to all who would hear him. It is the Fatherhood of the All-perfect Being, infinite in wisdom, love and power. His ways are indeed past finding out; but this because they transcend, not because LIVING AGE. VOL. XIV. 734

they come short of, our finite ideals: not a God made and re-made, age after age, in the image of the man of that age, and with the passions and other imperfections and shortcomings which belong to even the best men of the age. The distinction and the difference are real, though there is an element of indefiniteness when they pass from one to another. The life of nature is a reality, though we know not where it begins nor where it ends. When Dr. Pusey declared that he and Maurice did not worship the same God, I suppose he meant he was content to worship the God whose attributes and laws had been set forth by the traditions of the Church and its interpretation of Scripture; while Maurice would have said that he would not hear an angel from Heaven who should tell him of a God morally inferior to whatever a man might conceive of.

There are men who believe, and show their belief in their lives, that we need no help from a Higher Power to enable us to walk in the ways of morality, virtue, and duty; and there are others who are conscious that they reed something more than this natural virtue, but yet cannot find it, nor see any possibility of finding it, in these orthodox teachings of which I have just spoken. It is with these that the future progress of the world lies. It is not by the evidence of a Plato or an Erasmus, but of a Paul and a Luther, that we are where we are. In every age and generation there have been men called to carry forward the work of these last named; and Maurice was, and is, such a leader and teacher for his own and our time. Maurice addresses those who know and feel that the demand of their spirit is for a faith in a personal God which shall satisfy their reason and their heart, and lead them into light and life together. Time will show how, and how far, he has been doing that work to which he was called.

EDWARD STRACHEY.

From The Nineteenth Century. AMONG THE LIARS. Although the names of Canea and the surrounding villages have become household words, and are now important factors in contemporary history, it is only during the last few months that they have sprung into such prominence. At the time I visited the country, about two years ago, very few people knew anything about Crete at ali, except that St. Paul suffered shipwreck there or thereabouts, and that the population were liars and otherwise undesirable acquaintances. Accounts of revolutions in the island were occasionally given in the newspapers, but they excited little interest.

Canea is not an easy spot for the ordinary traveller to reach. The writer was away from England a little over a month, and during that time travelled on no less than seven different steamers and passed through thirteen custom houses. Boats run twice a week from Athens via Candia and Retimo, on uncertain days and at a very moderate speed, and this is the only way of reaching the island.

My companion was one well known in the world of sport and a frequent contributor to these pages; yet with all his experience to assist us we were doomed to return empty-handed-indeed, without firing a shot. The attraction for us in the island lay in the reputed existence of the Cretan ibex (Capra ægagrus) or "agrimia" in the precipitous mountains on the south coast. We were unable to get any information with reference to the animal except from the pages of Pliny and vague references by other travellers of less antiquity. We were unable to find that any European had ever shot them, and it was not until we landed at Candia and found the horns and hide of a young buck hanging on the back of an old "fakir" that we felt really sure of the existence of our quarry. On our arrival two days later at Canea, however, Mr. (now Sir Alfred) Biliotti, H. B. B. Consul, gave us a most encouraging account: the agrimia were said to be fairly plentiful in

a certain locality and were frequently shot by shepherds; there was a mule track right across the island, and there would be no difficulty in keeping ourselves supplied with provisions.

Thanks to Sir Alfred's courtesy and assistance, we were able to leave for the interior on the day following that of our arrival. Some little difficulty was experienced in clearing our baggage at the custom house, ostensibly because it was Friday and Turks could not work on that day; but the timehonored remedy of baksheesh salved the consciences of the douane, and we got our boxes and men on the road by eleven, we ourselves following three hours later, mounted on a sorry-looking trio of mules.

As we passed through the high street of Canea we were struck by the number of shops which sold nothing but long yellow Wellington boots, and could not understand why this particula: industry should hold such a prominent position. After two or three days in the mountains this feeling of surprise was entirely supplanted, as we inspected our own footgear, by one of wonder that there were anything but boot shops in the country. A pair of thick new tennis shoes (the only shoes suitable to these hills) were in pieces within the week, and our servants' thick native boots were torn to ribbons. Next to the boot trade, the most flourishing industry appeared to be that of the green grocer-endless varieties of salad being exposed for sale throughout the town. A great number of skins of light-colored gennet or pinemarten were hanging in one doorway, but we never ran across the animal himself. A Frenchman, living in the town, told us that he had shot hares, quail, woodcock, snipe, and partridges; but, with the exception of a few partridges and rock-doves, we saw neither fur nor feather during our visit.

Riding out of the gates of the town, we passed through the inevitable "leper farm," the poor creatures being under the care of Dr. Joannitis, a Cretan gentleman educated in England and holding a British medical diploma,

who has devoted his life to the study of leprosy. He was much pleased to meet Englishmen and to have the opportunity of talking English, a luxury he only enjoys when the fleet is at Suda Bay.

A rough road running between aloe hedges and olive groves led up to the valley of the Platanos River towards Lakhos, about twelve miles distant. The hillsides were studded with small villages of from fifteen to forty white houses, a small minaret or tiny church tower proclaiming the prevailing religion. They looked very bright and smiling as they nestled in the sun among their olive and orange groves, and it was only on looking higher that one saw the ridges studded at intervals with "pyrgi," or blockhouses, and could realize that this peaceful agricultural country was not always so placid, and that civil war had devastated and would again devastate this most productive district. The tracts of land on the north coast which have been thrown out of cultivation also tell their tale of Turkish tax-farming; the more inaccessible interior being the only portion of the island where agricultural produce can be grown at a profit, owing to the disinclination of the taxcollectors to visit these out-of-the-way localities!

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Twelve miles from the coast the path left the river-bed and wound in a steep ascent up the hillside. As mounted this acclivity a more extended view was afforded, and we were able to observe the ingenuity of the natives in utilizing every corner of ground, the most inaccessible-looking patches being planted with vines or olives. We reached Lakhos, two thousand feet above the sea, long after dark, and with difficulty found the house where the cook had prepared dinner. To reach it was a feat of no small danger as the village is pitched at an inclination of about forty-five degrees; the houses standing out, one above the other, like steps. Conversation with the next-door neighbor is carried on up or down the chimney, as the case may be. The first object encountered on

going out of a door is the open chimney of the house below, and it was a marvel to us why these good people did not sometimes find an unexpected addition to their meals, in the shape of a junior member of the neighbor's family who had made an involuntary descent into the pot!

The house where we dined was that of the chief inhabitant. The room was a good big one, about eight feet high, clean, with "dope" walls. A large bed with clean coverlet and a hand-loom stood in one corner, the rest being bare. An interested crowd watched and discussed us with respectful attention till we finished an excellent repast; the only good one, by the way, that the cook ever prepared for us, and on the strength of which he got royally drunk and gave away all of our cigarettes and tobacco. Then the crowd closed in, and we endeavored, with the assistance of a slender Cretan vocabulary and a cast-iron English pronunciation, to interview our hosts. We met with but slight success, the only portion of the conversation worthy of note being an endeavor, on the part of the mayor, to demonstrate the habitat and habits of the agrimia by means of an orange, the cups, and the table cutlery, From this we gathered that they fed in the open and then retired to the bush, which was plentiful. This, alas! was amply demonstrated by our subsequent experience. After an hour or so of this very fatiguing conversation we were conducted to the spot where our tents were pitched; a most alarming walk it was, in the dark, up a very narrow path along the side of the hill. Soon after we got to bed we discovered that the mayor, in mistaken kindness, had honored us with a double sentry over our tents. These two good people chatted, smoked, stumbled about, and laughed in such a way as to banish all chance of rest, until at about midnight they and we dropped of simultaneously to sleep.

Next morning we were up at cockcrow, hoping to make an early start. In this we were disappointed. The muleteers mostly had relations in the

village and showed a disinclination to load up and go; while the cook was lying among the débris of his kitchen utensils in a semi-comatose state, gradually recovering from his excesses of the previous evening. His name, by the way, was Polyzoës Pikodopoulos, and it is too much to expect of any one to own such a name without having ary compensating disadvantages! The villagers were anxious to be of assistance and were most civil. These highlanders are tall, handsome, jolly fellows, looking more like Englishmen than any other race I ever saw. They were neither arrogant nor cringing, but treated us as honored guests of their own standing.

It was nine o'clock before we had sobered "Poly" and collected the men, and we then rode on in front of the caravan to the elevated plain of Omalos. About five hours' steady ascent, partly over unrideable masses of rough boulders, brought us to our destination: a little cluster of shepherds' huts lying at one end of the plateau. To our disappointment these were inhabited. They are used by the shepherds in the summer while their sheep are feeding on the Omalos pastures, and in the winter snows are deserted, the flocks being taken to lower ground. The snow was only just gone, and reached down the surrounding mountain sides to within a few hundred feet of the plain. As we were now at an altitude of about four thousand, five hundred feet we were glad of the thick clothes we had taken the precaution of bringing, and even under piles of bedding and waterproof sheets suffered very much from the cold at night.

In the neighborhood of Omalos there are several similar elevated plateaus having a number of streams running into them and no outlet for the water but a subterranean one. The outlet or "katavothron" of Omalos was close to our camp, and I made a short expedition into it. It was a huge cavern, the opening at the mouth being about forty feet in diameter, completely lined with ferns. I penetrated about a hundred yards into the interior, but the in

creasing darkness and steepness made further progress almost impossible and I returned.

As soon as the baggage came up and we had had some food we started to spy out the land and get some idea of the lie of the country, with a view to making plans for the following day. The direction I went in was evidently not that in which the ibex lay, as we saw no signs of them either on or below the snow. My companion on his side saw two lots with the glass, in what looked practicable country, so next morning we went off together in the direction where he had seen them.

A three-mile walk brought us to a sinal dismantled "Martello" tower commanding an abrupt descent into a deep gorge. Looking over the edge it seemed impossible that a path should be able to find its way down such a precipice to the torrent roaring along the bottom some two thousand feet below us. Not three years ago this path, which is known as the "Xiloskala" or "Wooden Stair-case," was absolutely impracticable for mules, and it is only since the Turkish government spent a lot of money in restoring it, that the connection in this portion of the island has been re-established between the north and south coasts.

The gorge into which the Xiloskala descends is about ten miles in length, with a right-angled bend in it, at which point the path is situated. It is in no place more than a mile in width at the top, and seldom less than two thousand feet deep. The mountains on each side tower to an altitude of from six thousand to eight thousand feet. The views in all parts are magnificent and can be compared to nothing but the Yosemite Valley, though of course on a smaller scale vertically. The sides of the gorge are of limestone, the bare rock alternating with tracts of rough scrub and coniferous trees. Along the bottom grow some splendid cypresses, the trunks being about six feet in diameter.

Half-way down the path we stopped and spied for an hour or more, during which time we saw no ibex but noticed