Produced by Suzanne Shell, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team.
1910
To those who hear.
As a boy he constructed so vividly in imagination that he came to believein the living reality of his creations: for everybody and everything hefound names—real names. Inside him somewhere stretched immenseplaygrounds, compared to which the hay-fields and lawns of his father'sestate seemed trivial: plains without horizon, seas deep enough to floatthe planets like corks, and "such tremendous forests" with "trees liketall pointed hilltops." He had only to close his eyes, drop his thoughtsinwards, sink after them himself, call aloud and—see.
His imagination conceived and bore—worlds; but nothing in these worldsbecame alive until he discovered its true and living name. The name wasthe breath of life; and, sooner or later, he invariably found it.
Once, having terrified his sister by affirming that a little man he hadcreated would come through her window at night and weave a peaked cap forhimself by pulling out all her hairs "that hadn't gone to sleep with therest of her body," he took characteristic measures to protect her fromthe said depredations. He sat up the entire night on the lawn beneathher window to watch, believing firmly that what his imagination had madealive would come to pass.
She did not know this. On the contrary, he told her that the little manhad died suddenly; only, he sat up to make sure. And, for a boy of eight,those cold and haunted hours must have seemed endless from ten o'clock tofour in the morning, when he crept back to his own corner of the nightnursery. He possessed, you see, courage as well as faith and imagination.
Yet the name of the little man was nothing more formidable than "Winky!"
"You might have known he wouldn't hurt you, Teresa," he said. "Any onewith that name would be light as a fly and awf'ly gentle—a regular dickysort of chap!"
"But he'd have pincers," she protested, "or he couldn't pull the hairsout. Like an earwig he'd be. Ugh!"
"Not Winky! Never!" he explained scornfully, jealous of his offspring'sreputation. "He'd do it with his rummy little fingers."
"Then his fingers would have claws at the ends!" she insisted; for noamount of explanation could persuade her that a person named Winky couldbe nice and gentle, even though he were "quicker than a second." Sheadded that his death rejoiced her.
"But I can easily make another—such a nippy little beggar, and twice ashoppy as the first. Only I won't do it," he added magnanimously, "becauseit frightens you."
For to name with him was to create. He had only to run out some distanceinto his big mental prairie, call aloud a name in a certain commandingway, and instantly its owner would run up to claim it. Names describedsouls. To learn the name of a thing or person was to know all about themand make them subservient to his will; and "Winky" could only have been avery soft and furry little person, swift as a shadow, nimble as amouse—just the sort of fellow who would make a conical cap out of agirl's fluffy hair … and love the mischief of doing it.
And so with all things: names were vital and important. To address beingsby their intimate first names, bein