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GEORGE CROLY

Salathiel, or Tarry Thou Till I Come!

George Croly, the author of "Salathiel," was born at Dublin
on August 17, 1780, and became a clergyman of the Church of
England. After a short time as curate in the north of Ireland
he came to London and devoted himself chiefly to literary
pursuits. In 1835 he was presented to the valuable living of
St. Stephen's, Walbrook, London, by Lord Brougham, where his
eloquent preaching attracted large congregations. It was a
saying among Americans of the period, "Be sure and hear
Croly!" Croly was a scholar, an orator, and a man of
incredible energy. Poems, biographies, dramas, sermons,
novels, satires, magazine articles, newspaper leaders, and
theological works were dashed off by his facile pen; and,
according to Hogg, the Ettrick shepherd, he was great in
conversation. Croly's _chef d'oeuvre_ is "Salathiel," which,
published in 1829, created a prodigious sensation, Salathiel
being the character better known as the Wandering Jew. The
description of the fall of Jerusalem is a wonderful piece of
sustained eloquence, hardly to be squalled in romantic
writings. Croly died on November 24, 1860.

_I.--Immortality on Earth_

"_Tarry thou till I come_!" The words shot through me. I felt them like
an arrow in my heart. The troops, the priests, the populace, the world,
passed from before my senses like phantoms.

Every fibre of my frame quivers as I still hear the echo of the anathema
that sprang first from my furious lips, the self-pronounced ruin, the
words of desolation, "His blood be upon us, and our children!"

But in the moment of my exultation I was stricken. He who had refused an
hour of life to the victim was, in terrible retribution, condemned to
know the misery of life interminable. I heard through all the voices of
Jerusalem--I should have heard through all the thunders of heaven, the
calm, low voice, "Tarry thou till I come!"

I felt at once my fate. I sprang away through the shouting hosts as if
the avenging angel waved his sword above my head. I was never to know
the shelter of the grave! Immortality on earth! The perpetual compulsion
of existence in a world made for change! I was to survive my country.
Wife, child, friend, even to the last being with whom my heart could
imagine a human bond, were to perish in my sight. I was to know no l