The King of the Golden River Read online

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  The King of the Golden River

  by

  John Ruskin

  PREFACE

  "The King of the Golden River" is a delightful fairy tale told with allRuskin's charm of style, his appreciation of mountain scenery, and withhis usual insistence upon drawing a moral. None the less, it is quiteunlike his other writings. All his life long his pen was busyinterpreting nature and pictures and architecture, or persuading tobetter views those whom he believed to be in error, or arousing, withthe white heat of a prophet's zeal, those whom he knew to beunawakened. There is indeed a good deal of the prophet about JohnRuskin. Though essentially an interpreter with a singularly fineappreciation of beauty, no man of the nineteenth century felt morekeenly that he had a mission, and none was more loyal to what hebelieved that mission to be.

  While still in college, what seemed a chance incident gave occasion anddirection to this mission. A certain English reviewer had ridiculed thework of the artist Turner. Now Ruskin held Turner to be the greatestlandscape painter the world had seen, and he immediately wrote anotable article in his defense. Slowly this article grew into apamphlet, and the pamphlet into a book, the first volume of "ModernPainters." The young man awoke to find himself famous. In the nextfew years four more volumes were added to "Modern Painters," and theother notable series upon art, "The Stones of Venice" and "The SevenLamps of Architecture," were sent forth.

  Then, in 1860, when Ruskin was about forty years old, there came agreat change. His heaven-born genius for making the appreciation ofbeauty a common possession was deflected from its true field. He hadbeen asking himself what are the conditions that produce great art, andthe answer he found declared that art cannot be separated from life,nor life from industry and industrial conditions. A civilizationfounded upon unrestricted competition therefore seemed to himnecessarily feeble in appreciation of the beautiful, and unequal to itscreation. In this way loyalty to his mission bred apparent disloyalty.Delightful discourses upon art gave way to fervid pleas for humanity.For the rest of his life he became a very earnest, if not always verywise, social reformer and a passionate pleader for what he believed tobe true economic ideals.

  There is nothing of all this in "The King of the Golden River." Unlikehis other works, it was written merely to entertain. Scarcely that,since it was not written for publication at all, but to meet achallenge set him by a young girl.

  The circumstance is interesting. After taking his degree at Oxford,Ruskin was threatened with consumption and hurried away from the chilland damp of England to the south of Europe. After two years offruitful travel and study he came back improved in health but notstrong, and often depressed in spirit. It was at this time that theGuys, Scotch friends of his father and mother, came for a visit to hishome near London, and with them their little daughter Euphemia. Thecoming of this beautiful, vivacious, light-hearted child opened a newchapter in Ruskin's life. Though but twelve years old, she sought toenliven the melancholy student, absorbed in art and geology, and badehim leave these and write for her a fairy tale. He accepted, and afterbut two sittings, presented her with this charming story. The incidentproved to have awakened in him a greater interest than at firstappeared, for a few years later "Effie" Grey became John Ruskin's wife.Meantime she had given the manuscript to a friend. Nine years after itwas written, this friend, with John Ruskin's permission, gave the storyto the world.

  It was published in London in 1851, with illustrations by thecelebrated Richard Doyle, and at once became a favorite. Threeeditions were printed the first year, and soon it had found its wayinto German, Italian, and Welsh. Since then countless children havehad cause to be grateful for the young girl's challenge that won thestory of Gluck's golden mug and the highly satisfactory handling of theBlack Brothers by Southwest Wind, Esquire.

  For this edition new drawings have been prepared by Mr. Hiram P.Barnes. They very successfully preserve the spirit of Doyle'sillustrations, which unfortunately are not technically suitable forreproduction here.

  In the original manuscript there was an epilogue bearing the heading"Charitie"--a morning hymn of Treasure Valley, whither Gluck hadreturned to dwell, and where the inheritance lost by cruelty wasregained by love:

  The beams of morning are renewed The valley laughs their light to seeAnd earth is bright with gratitude And heaven with charitie.

  R.H. COE