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diff --git a/5338-0.txt b/5338-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ad395ba --- /dev/null +++ b/5338-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3663 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Mark Rutherford's Deliverance, by Mark +Rutherford + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Mark Rutherford's Deliverance + + +Author: Mark Rutherford + + + +Release Date: August 14, 2014 [eBook #5338] +[This file was first posted on July 2, 2002] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MARK RUTHERFORD'S DELIVERANCE*** + + +Transcribed from the 1913 Hodder and Stoughton edition by David Price, +email ccx074@pglaf.org + + [Picture: Man comforting woman] + + + + + + MARK RUTHERFORD’S + DELIVERANCE + + + BY + MARK RUTHERFORD + + [Picture: Decoractive graphic] + + HODDER & STOUGHTON’S + SEVENPENNY LIBRARY + + * * * * * + + HODDER AND STOUGHTON + LONDON NEW YORK TORONTO + + + + +CONTENTS + + PAGE + CHAPTER I +NEWSPAPERS 3 + CHAPTER II +M’KAY 23 + CHAPTER III +MISS LEROY 40 + CHAPTER IV +A NECESSARY DEVELOPMENT 62 + CHAPTER V +WHAT IT ALL CAME TO 81 + CHAPTER VI +DRURY LANE THEOLOGY 103 + CHAPTER VII +QUI DEDIT IN MARI VIAM 116 + CHAPTER VIII +FLAGELLUM NON APPROQUINABIT TABERNACULO TUO 127 + CHAPTER IX +HOLIDAYS 145 + + + + +CHAPTER I +NEWSPAPERS + + +WHEN I had established myself in my new lodgings in Camden Town, I found +I had ten pounds in my pocket, and again there was no outlook. I +examined carefully every possibility. At last I remembered that a +relative of mine, who held some office in the House of Commons, added to +his income by writing descriptive accounts of the debates, throwing in by +way of supplement any stray scraps of gossip which he was enabled to +collect. The rules of the House as to the admission of strangers were +not so strict then as they are now, and he assured me that if I could but +secure a commission from a newspaper, he could pass me into one of the +galleries, and, when there was nothing to be heard worth describing, I +could remain in the lobby, where I should by degrees find many +opportunities of picking up intelligence which would pay. So far, so +good; but how to obtain the commission? I managed to get hold of a list +of all the country papers, and I wrote to nearly every one, offering my +services. I am afraid that I somewhat exaggerated them, for I had two +answers, and, after a little correspondence, two engagements. This was +an unexpected stroke of luck; but alas! both journals circulated in the +same district. I never could get together more stuff than would fill +about a column and a half, and consequently I was obliged, with infinite +pains, to vary, so that it could not be recognised, the form of what, at +bottom, was essentially the same matter. This was work which would have +been disagreeable enough, if I had not now ceased in a great measure to +demand what was agreeable. In years past I coveted a life, not of mere +sensual enjoyment—for that I never cared—but a life which should be +filled with activities of the noblest kind, and it was intolerable to me +to reflect that all my waking hours were in the main passed in merest +drudgery, and that only for a few moments at the beginning or end of the +day could it be said that the higher sympathies were really operative. +Existence to me was nothing but these few moments, and consequently +flitted like a shadow. I was now, however, the better of what was half +disease and half something healthy and good. In the first place, I had +discovered that my appetite was far larger than my powers. Consumed by a +longing for continuous intercourse with the best, I had no ability +whatever to maintain it, and I had accepted as a fact, however mysterious +it might be, that the human mind is created with the impulses of a seraph +and the strength of a man. Furthermore, what was I that I should demand +exceptional treatment? Thousands of men and women superior to myself, +are condemned, if that is the proper word to use, to almost total absence +from themselves. The roar of the world for them is never lulled to rest, +nor can silence ever be secured in which the voice of the Divine can be +heard. + +My letters were written twice a week, and as each contained a column and +a half, I had six columns weekly to manufacture. These I was in the +habit of writing in the morning, my evenings being spent at the House. +At first I was rather interested, but after a while the occupation became +tedious beyond measure, and for this reason. In a discussion of any +importance about fifty members perhaps would take part, and had made up +their minds beforehand to speak. There could not possibly be more than +three or four reasons for or against the motion, and as the knowledge +that what the intending orator had to urge had been urged a dozen times +before on that very night never deterred him from urging it again, the +same arguments, diluted, muddled, and mispresented, recurred with the +most wearisome iteration. + +The public outside knew nothing or very little of the real House of +Commons, and the manner in which time was squandered there, for the +reports were all of them much abbreviated. In fact, I doubt whether +anybody but the Speaker, and one or two other persons in the same +position as myself, really felt with proper intensity what the waste was, +and how profound was the vanity of members and the itch for expression; +for even the reporters were relieved at stated intervals, and the +impression on their minds was not continuous. Another evil result of +these attendances at the House was a kind of political scepticism. Over +and over again I have seen a Government arraigned for its conduct of +foreign affairs. The evidence lay in masses of correspondence which it +would have required some days to master, and the verdict, after knowing +the facts, ought to have depended upon the application of principles, +each of which admitted a contrary principle for which much might be +pleaded. There were not fifty members in the House with the leisure or +the ability to understand what it was which had actually happened, and if +they had understood it, they would not have had the wit to see what was +the rule which ought to have decided the case. Yet, whether they +understood or not, they were obliged to vote, and what was worse, the +constituencies also had to vote, and so the gravest matters were settled +in utter ignorance. This has often been adduced as an argument against +an extended suffrage, but, if it is an argument against anything, it is +an argument against intrusting the aristocracy and even the House itself +with the destinies of the nation; for no dock labourer could possibly be +more entirely empty of all reasons for action than the noble lords, +squires, lawyers, and railway directors whom I have seen troop to the +division bell. There is something deeper than this scepticism, but the +scepticism is the easiest and the most obvious conclusion to an open mind +dealing so closely and practically with politics as it was my lot to do +at this time of my life. Men must be governed, and when it comes to the +question, by whom? I, for one, would far sooner in the long run trust the +people at large than I would the few, who in everything which relates to +Government are as little instructed as the many and more difficult to +move. The very fickleness of the multitude, the theme of such constant +declamation, is so far good that it proves a susceptibility to +impressions to which men hedged round by impregnable conventionalities +cannot yield. {7} + +When I was living in the country, the pure sky and the landscape formed a +large portion of my existence, so large that much of myself depended on +it, and I wondered how men could be worth anything if they could never +see the face of nature. For this belief my early training on the +“Lyrical Ballads” is answerable. When I came to London the same creed +survived, and I was for ever thirsting for intercourse with my ancient +friend. Hope, faith, and God seemed impossible amidst the smoke of the +streets. It was now very difficult for me, except at rare opportunities, +to leave London, and it was necessary for me, therefore, to understand +that all that was essential for me was obtainable there, even though I +should never see anything more than was to be seen in journeying through +the High Street, Camden Town, Tottenham Court Road, the Seven Dials, and +Whitehall. I should have been guilty of a simple surrender to despair if +I had not forced myself to make this discovery. I cannot help saying, +with all my love for the literature of my own day, that it has an evil +side to it which none know except the millions of sensitive persons who +are condemned to exist in great towns. It might be imagined from much of +this literature that true humanity and a belief in God are the offspring +of the hills or the ocean; and by implication, if not expressly, the vast +multitudes who hardly ever see the hills or the ocean must be without a +religion. The long poems which turn altogether upon scenery, perhaps in +foreign lands, and the passionate devotion to it which they breathe, may +perhaps do good in keeping alive in the hearts of men a determination to +preserve air, earth, and water from pollution; but speaking from +experience as a Londoner, I can testify that they are most depressing, +and I would counsel everybody whose position is what mine was to avoid +these books and to associate with those which will help him in his own +circumstances. + +Half of my occupation soon came to an end. One of my editors sent me a +petulant note telling me that all I wrote he could easily find out +himself, and that he required something more “graphic and personal.” I +could do no better, or rather I ought to say, no worse than I had been +doing. These letters were a great trouble to me. I was always conscious +of writing so much of which I was not certain, and so much which was +indifferent to me. The unfairness of parties haunted me. But I +continued to write, because I saw no other way of getting a living, and +surely it is a baser dishonesty to depend upon the charity of friends +because some pleasant, clean, ideal employment has not presented itself, +than to soil one’s hands with a little of the inevitable mud. I don’t +think I ever felt anything more keenly than I did a sneer from an +acquaintance of mine who was in the habit of borrowing money from me. He +was a painter, whose pictures were never sold because he never worked +hard enough to know how to draw, and it came to my ears indirectly that +he had said that “he would rather live the life of a medieval ascetic +than condescend to the degradation of scribbling a dozen columns weekly +of utter trash on subjects with which he had no concern.” At that very +moment he owed me five pounds. God knows that I admitted my dozen +columns to be utter trash, but it ought to have been forgiven by those +who saw that I was struggling to save myself from the streets and to keep +a roof over my head. Degraded, however, as I might be, I could not get +down to the “graphic and personal,” for it meant nothing less than the +absolutely false. I therefore contrived to exist on the one letter, +which, excepting the mechanical labour of writing a second, took up as +much of my time as if I had to write two. + +Never, but once or twice at the most, did my labours meet with the +slightest recognition beyond payment. Once I remember that I accused a +member of a discreditable manœuvre to consume the time of the House, and +as he represented a borough in my district, he wrote to the editor +denying the charge. The editor without any inquiry—and I believe I was +mistaken—instantly congratulated me on having “scored.” At another time, +when Parliament was not sitting, I ventured, by way of filling up my +allotted space, to say a word on behalf of a now utterly forgotten novel. +I had a letter from the authoress thanking me, but alas! the illusion +vanished. I was tempted by this one novel to look into others which I +found she had written, and I discovered that they were altogether silly. +The attraction of the one of which I thought so highly, was due not to +any real merit which it possessed, but to something I had put into it. +It was dead, but it had served as a wall to re-echo my own voice. +Excepting these two occasions, I don’t think that one solitary human +being ever applauded or condemned one solitary word of which I was the +author. All my friends knew where my contributions were to be found, but +I never heard that they looked at them. They were never worth reading, +and yet such complete silence was rather lonely. The tradesman who makes +a good coat enjoys the satisfaction of having fitted and pleased his +customer, and a bricklayer, if he be diligent, is rewarded by knowing +that his master understands his value, but I never knew what it was to +receive a single response. I wrote for an abstraction; and spoke to +empty space. I cannot help claiming some pity and even respect for the +class to which I belonged. I have heard them called all kinds of hard +names, hacks, drudges, and something even more contemptible, but the +injustice done to them is monstrous. Their wage is hardly earned; it is +peculiarly precarious, depending altogether upon their health, and no +matter how ill they may be they must maintain the liveliness of manner +which is necessary to procure acceptance. I fell in with one poor fellow +whose line was something like my own. I became acquainted with him +through sitting side by side with him at the House. He lived in lodgings +in Goodge Street, and occasionally I walked with him as far as the corner +of Tottenham Court Road, where I caught the last omnibus northward. He +wrote like me a “descriptive article” for the country, but he also wrote +every now and then—a dignity to which I never attained—a “special” for +London. His “descriptive articles” were more political than mine, and he +was obliged to be violently Tory. His creed, however, was such a pure +piece of professionalism, that though I was Radical, and was expected to +be so, we never jarred, and often, as we wandered homewards, we exchanged +notes, and were mutually useful, his observations appearing in my paper, +and mine in his, with proper modifications. How he used to roar in the +_Gazette_ against the opposite party, and yet I never heard anything from +him myself but what was diffident and tender. He had acquired, as an +instrument necessary to him, an extraordinarily extravagant style, and he +laid about him with a bludgeon, which inevitably descended on the heads +of all prominent persons if they happened not to be Conservative, no +matter what their virtues might be. One peculiarity, however, I noted in +him. Although he ought every now and then, when the subject was +uppermost, to have flamed out in the _Gazette_ on behalf of the Church, I +never saw a word from him on that subject. He drew the line at religion. +He did not mind acting his part in things secular, for his performances +were, I am sure, mostly histrionic, but there he stopped. The unreality +of his character was a husk surrounding him, but it did not touch the +core. It was as if he had said to himself, “Political controversy is +nothing to me, and, what is more, is so uncertain that it matters little +whether I say yes or no, nor indeed does it matter if I say yes _and_ no, +and I must keep my wife and children from the workhouse; but when it +comes to the relationship of man to God, it is a different matter.” His +altogether outside vehemence and hypocrisy did in fact react upon him, +and so far from affecting harmfully what lay deeper, produced a more +complete sincerity and transparency extending even to the finest verbal +distinctions. Over and over again have I heard him preach to his wife, +almost with pathos, the duty of perfect exactitude in speech in +describing the commonest occurrences. “Now, my dear, _is_ that so?” was +a perpetual remonstrance with him; and he always insisted upon it that +there is no training more necessary for children than that of teaching +them not merely to speak the truth in the ordinary, vulgar sense of the +term, but to speak it in a much higher sense, by rigidly compelling, +point by point, a correspondence of the words with the fact external or +internal. He never would tolerate in his own children a mere hackneyed, +borrowed expression, but demanded exact portraiture; and nothing vexed +him more than to hear one of them spoil and make worthless what he or she +had seen, by reporting it in some stale phrase which had been used by +everybody. This refusal to take the trouble to watch the presentment to +the mind of anything which had been placed before it, and to reproduce it +in its own lines and colours was, as he said, nothing but falsehood, and +he maintained that the principal reason why people are so uninteresting +is not that they have nothing to say. It is rather that they will not +face the labour of saying in their own tongue what they have to say, but +cover it up and conceal it in commonplace, so that we get, not what they +themselves behold and what they think, but a hieroglyphic or symbol +invented as the representative of a certain class of objects or emotions, +and as inefficient to represent a particular object or emotion as _x_ or +_y_ to set forth the relation of Hamlet to Ophelia. He would even +exercise his children in this art of the higher truthfulness, and would +purposely make them give him an account of something which he had seen +and they had seen, checking them the moment he saw a lapse from +originality. Such was the Tory correspondent of the _Gazette_. + +I ought to say, by way of apology for him, that in his day it signified +little or nothing whether Tory or Whig was in power. Politics had not +become what they will one day become, a matter of life or death, dividing +men with really private love and hate. What a mockery controversy was in +the House! How often I have seen members, who were furious at one +another across the floor, quietly shaking hands outside, and inviting one +another to dinner! I have heard them say that we ought to congratulate +ourselves that parliamentary differences do not in this country breed +personal animosities. To me this seemed anything but a subject of +congratulation. Men who are totally at variance ought not to be friends, +and if Radical and Tory are not totally, but merely superficially at +variance, so much the worse for their Radicalism and Toryism. + +It is possible, and even probable, that the public fury and the +subsequent amity were equally absurd. Most of us have no real loves and +no real hatreds. Blessed is love, less blessed is hatred, but thrice +accursed is that indifference which is neither one nor the other, the +muddy mess which men call friendship. + +M’Kay—for that was his name—lived, as I have said, in Goodge Street, +where he had unfurnished apartments. I often spent part of the Sunday +with him, and I may forestall obvious criticism by saying that I do not +pretend for a moment to defend myself from inconsistency in denouncing +members of Parliament for their duplicity, M’Kay and myself being also +guilty of something very much like it. But there was this difference +between us and our parliamentary friends, that we always divested +ourselves of all hypocrisy when we were alone. We then dropped the stage +costume which members continued to wear in the streets and at the +dinner-table, and in which some of them even slept and said their +prayers. + +London Sundays to persons who are not attached to any religious +community, and have no money to spend, are rather dreary. We tried +several ways of getting through the morning. If we heard that there was +a preacher with a reputation, we went to hear him. As a rule, however, +we got no good in that way. Once we came to a chapel where there was a +minister supposed to be one of the greatest orators of the day. We had +much difficulty in finding standing room. Just as we entered we heard +him say, “My friends, I appeal to those of you who are parents. You know +that if you say to a child ‘go,’ he goeth, and if you say ‘come,’ he +cometh. So the Lord”— But at this point M’Kay, who had children, nudged +me to come out; and out we went. Why does this little scene remain with +me? I can hardly say, but here it stands. It is remembered, not so much +by reason of the preacher as by reason of the apparent acquiescence and +admiration of the audience, who seemed to be perfectly willing to take +over an experience from their pastor—if indeed it was really an +experience—which was not their own. Our usual haunts on Sunday were +naturally the parks and Kensington Gardens; but artificial limited +enclosures are apt to become wearisome after a time, and we longed for a +little more freedom if a little less trim. So we would stroll towards +Hampstead or Highgate, the only drawback to these regions being the +squalid, ragged, half town, half suburb, through which it was necessary +to pass. The skirts of London when the air is filled with north-easterly +soot, grit, and filth, are cheerless, and the least cheerful part of the +scene is the inability of the vast wandering masses of people to find any +way of amusing themselves. At the corner of one of the fields in Kentish +Town, just about to be devoured, stood a public-house, and opposite the +door was generally encamped a man who sold nothing but Brazil nuts. +Swarms of people lazily wandered past him, most of them waiting for the +public-house to open. Brazil nuts on a cold black Sunday morning are not +exhilarating, but the costermonger found many customers who bought his +nuts, and ate them, merely because they had nothing better to do. We +went two or three times to a freethinking hall, where we were entertained +with demonstrations of the immorality of the patriarchs and Jewish +heroes, and arguments to prove that the personal existence of the devil +was a myth, the audience breaking out into uproarious laughter at comical +delineations of Noah and Jonah. One morning we found the place +completely packed. A “celebrated Christian,” as he was described to us, +having heard of the hall, had volunteered to engage in debate on the +claims of the Old Testament to Divine authority. He turned out to be a +preacher whom we knew quite well. He was introduced by his freethinking +antagonist, who claimed for him a respectful hearing. The preacher said +that before beginning he should like to “engage in prayer.” Accordingly +he came to the front of the platform, lifted up his eyes, told God why he +was there, and besought Him to bless the discussion in the conversion “of +these poor wandering souls, who have said in their hearts that there is +no God, to a saving faith in Him and in the blood of Christ.” I expected +that some resentment would be displayed when the wandering souls found +themselves treated like errant sheep, but to my surprise they listened +with perfect silence; and when he had said “Amen,” there were great +clappings of hands, and cries of “Bravo.” They evidently considered the +prayer merely as an elocutionary show-piece. The preacher was much +disconcerted, but he recovered himself, and began his sermon, for it was +nothing more. He enlarged on the fact that men of the highest eminence +had believed in the Old Testament. Locke and Newton had believed in it, +and did it not prove arrogance in us to doubt when the “gigantic +intellect which had swept the skies, and had announced the law which +bound the universe together was satisfied?” The witness of the Old +Testament to the New was another argument, but his main reliance was upon +the prophecies. From Adam to Isaiah there was a continuous prefigurement +of Christ. Christ was the point to which everything tended; and “now, my +friends,” he said, “I cannot sit down without imploring you to turn your +eyes on Him who never yet repelled the sinner, to wash in that eternal +Fountain ever open for the remission of sins, and to flee from the wrath +to come. I believe the sacred symbol of the cross has not yet lost its +efficacy. For eighteen hundred years, whenever it has been exhibited to +the sons of men, it has been potent to reclaim and save them. ‘I, if I +be lifted up,’ cried the Great Sufferer, ‘will draw all men unto Me,’ and +He has drawn not merely the poor and ignorant but the philosopher and the +sage. Oh, my brethren, think what will happen if you reject Him. I +forbear to paint your doom. And think again, on the other hand, of the +bliss which awaits you if you receive Him, of the eternal companionship +with the Most High and with the spirits of just men made perfect.” His +hearers again applauded vigorously, and none less so than their appointed +leader, who was to follow on the other side. He was a little man with +small eyes; his shaven face was dark with a black beard lurking under the +skin, and his nose was slightly turned up. He was evidently a trained +debater who had practised under railway arches, discussion “forums,” and +in the classes promoted by his sect. He began by saying that he could +not compliment his friend who had just sat down on the inducements which +he had offered them to become Christians. The New Cut was not a nice +place on a wet day, but he had rather sit at a stall there all day long +with his feet on a basket than lie in the bosom of some of the just men +made perfect portrayed in the Bible. Nor, being married, should he feel +particularly at ease if he had to leave his wife with David. David +certainly ought to have got beyond all that kind of thing, considering it +must be over 3000 years since he first saw Bathsheba; but we are told +that the saints are for ever young in heaven, and this treacherous +villain, who would have been tried by a jury of twelve men and hung +outside Newgate if he had lived in the nineteenth century, might be +dangerous now. He was an amorous old gentleman up to the very last. +(Roars of laughter.) Nor did the speaker feel particularly anxious to be +shut up with all the bishops, who of course are amongst the elect, and on +their departure from this vale of tears tempered by ten thousand a year, +are duly supplied with wings. Much more followed in the same strain upon +the immorality of the Bible heroes, their cruelty, and the cruelty of the +God who sanctioned it. Then followed a clever exposition of the +inconsistencies of the Old Testament history, the impossibility of any +reference to Jesus therein, and a really earnest protest against the +quibbling by which those who believed in the Bible as a revelation sought +to reconcile it with science. “Finally,” said the speaker, “I am sure we +all of us will pass a vote of thanks to our reverend friend for coming to +see us, and we cordially invite him to come again. If I might be allowed +to offer a suggestion, it would be that he should make himself acquainted +with our case before he pays us another visit, and not suppose that we +are to be persuaded with the rhetoric which may do very well for the +young women of his congregation, but won’t go down here.” This was fair +and just, for the eminent Christian was nothing but an ordinary minister, +who, when he was prepared for his profession, had never been allowed to +see what are the historical difficulties of Christianity, lest he should +be overcome by them. On the other hand, his sceptical opponents were +almost devoid of the faculty for appreciating the great remains of +antiquity, and would probably have considered the machinery of the +Prometheus Bound or of the Iliad a sufficient reason for a sneer. That +they should spend their time in picking the Bible to pieces when there +was so much positive work for them to do, seemed to me as melancholy as +if they had spent themselves upon theology. To waste a Sunday morning in +ridiculing such stories as that of Jonah was surely as imbecile as to +waste it in proving their verbal veracity. + + + + +CHAPTER II +M’KAY + + +IT was foggy and overcast as we walked home to Goodge Street. The +churches and chapels were emptying themselves, but the great mass of the +population had been “nowhere.” I had dinner with M’Kay, and as the day +wore on the fog thickened. London on a dark Sunday afternoon, more +especially about Goodge Street, is depressing. The inhabitants drag +themselves hither and thither in languor and uncertainty. Small mobs +loiter at the doors of the gin palaces. Costermongers wander aimlessly, +calling “walnuts” with a cry so melancholy that it sounds as the wail of +the hopelessly lost may be imagined to sound when their anguish has been +deadened by the monotony of a million years. + +About two or three o’clock decent working men in their best clothes +emerge from the houses in such streets as Nassau Street. It is part of +their duty to go out after dinner on Sunday with the wife and children. +The husband pushes the perambulator out of the dingy passage, and gazes +doubtfully this way and that way, not knowing whither to go, and +evidently longing for the Monday, when his work, however disagreeable it +may be, will be his plain duty. The wife follows carrying a child, and a +boy and girl in unaccustomed apparel walk by her side. They come out +into Mortimer Street. There are no shops open; the sky over their heads +is mud, the earth is mud under their feet, the muddy houses stretch in +long rows, black, gaunt, uniform. The little party reach Hyde Park, also +wrapped in impenetrable mud-grey. The man’s face brightens for a moment +as he says, “It is time to go back,” and so they return, without the +interchange of a word, unless perhaps they happen to see an omnibus horse +fall down on the greasy stones. What is there worth thought or speech on +such an expedition? Nothing! The tradesman who kept the oil and colour +establishment opposite to us was not to be tempted outside. It was a +little more comfortable than Nassau Street, and, moreover, he was +religious and did not encourage Sabbath-breaking. He and his family +always moved after their mid-day Sabbath repast from the little back room +behind the shop up to what they called the drawing-room overhead. It was +impossible to avoid seeing them every time we went to the window. The +father of the family, after his heavy meal, invariably sat in the +easy-chair with a handkerchief over his eyes and slept. The children +were always at the windows, pretending to read books, but in reality +watching the people below. At about four o’clock their papa generally +awoke, and demanded a succession of hymn tunes played on the piano. When +the weather permitted, the lower sash was opened a little, and the +neighbours were indulged with the performance of “Vital Spark,” the +father “coming in” now and then with a bass note or two at the end where +he was tolerably certain of the harmony. At five o’clock a prophecy of +the incoming tea brought us some relief from the contemplation of the +landscape or brick-scape. I say “some relief,” for meals at M’Kay’s were +a little disagreeable. His wife was an honest, good little woman, but so +much attached to him and so dependent on him that she was his mere echo. +She had no opinions which were not his, and whenever he said anything +which went beyond the ordinary affairs of the house, she listened with +curious effort, and generally responded by a weakened repetition of +M’Kay’s own observations. He perpetually, therefore, had before him an +enfeebled reflection of himself, and this much irritated him, +notwithstanding his love for her; for who could help loving a woman who, +without the least hesitation, would have opened her veins at his command, +and have given up every drop of blood in her body for him? Over and over +again I have heard him offer some criticism on a person or event, and the +customary chime of approval would ensue, provoking him to such a degree +that he would instantly contradict himself with much bitterness, leaving +poor Mrs. M’Kay in much perplexity. Such a shot as this generally +reduced her to timid silence. As a rule, he always discouraged any topic +at his house which was likely to serve as an occasion for showing his +wife’s dependence on him. He designedly talked about her household +affairs, asked her whether she had mended his clothes and ordered the +coals. She knew that these things were not what was upon his mind, and +she answered him in despairing tones, which showed how much she felt the +obtrusive condescension to her level. I greatly pitied her, and +sometimes, in fact, my emotion at the sight of her struggles with her +limitations almost overcame me and I was obliged to get up and go. She +was childishly affectionate. If M’Kay came in and happened to go up to +her and kiss her, her face brightened into the sweetest and happiest +smile. I recollect once after he had been unusually annoyed with her he +repented just as he was leaving home, and put his lips to her head, +holding it in both his hands. I saw her gently take the hand from her +forehead and press it to her mouth, the tears falling down her cheek +meanwhile. Nothing would ever tempt her to admit anything against her +husband. M’Kay was violent and unjust at times. His occupation he +hated, and his restless repugnance to it frequently discharged itself +indifferently upon everything which came in his way. His children often +thought him almost barbarous, but in truth he did not actually see them +when he was in one of these moods. What was really present with him, +excluding everything else, was the sting of something more than usually +repulsive of which they knew nothing. Mrs. M’Kay’s answer to her +children’s remonstrances when they were alone with her always was, “He is +so worried,” and she invariably dwelt upon their faults which had given +him the opportunity for his wrath. + +I think M’Kay’s treatment of her wholly wrong. I think that he ought not +to have imposed himself upon her so imperiously. I think he ought to +have striven to ascertain what lay concealed in that modest heart, to +have encouraged its expression and development, to have debased himself +before her that she might receive courage to rise, and he would have +found that she had something which he had not; not _his_ something +perhaps, but something which would have made his life happier. As it +was, he stood upon his own ground above her. If she could reach him, +well and good, if not, the helping hand was not proffered, and she fell +back, hopeless. Later on he discovered his mistake. She became ill very +gradually, and M’Kay began to see in the distance a prospect of losing +her. A frightful pit came in view. He became aware that he could not do +without her. He imagined what his home would have been with other women +whom he knew, and he confessed that with them he would have been less +contented. He acknowledged that he had been guilty of a kind of criminal +epicurism; that he rejected in foolish, fatal, nay, even wicked +indifference, the bread of life upon which he might have lived and +thriven. His whole effort now was to suppress himself in his wife. He +read to her, a thing he never did before, and when she misunderstood, he +patiently explained; he took her into his counsels and asked her opinion; +he abandoned his own opinion for hers, and in the presence of her +children he always deferred to her, and delighted to acknowledge that she +knew more than he did, that she was right and he was wrong. She was now +confined to her house, and the end was near, but this was the most +blessed time of her married life. She grew under the soft rain of his +loving care, and opened out, not, indeed, into an oriental flower, rich +in profound mystery of scent and colour, but into a blossom of the +chalk-down. Altogether concealed and closed she would have remained if +it had not been for this beneficent and heavenly gift poured upon her. +He had just time enough to see what she really was, and then she died. +There are some natures that cannot unfold under pressure or in the +presence of unregarding power. Hers was one. They require a clear space +round them, the removal of everything which may overmaster them, and +constant delicate attention. They require too a recognition of the fact, +which M’Kay for a long time did not recognise, that it is folly to force +them and to demand of them that they shall be what they cannot be. I +stood by the grave this morning of my poor, pale, clinging little friend +now for some years at peace, and I thought that the tragedy of Promethean +torture or Christ-like crucifixion may indeed be tremendous, but there is +a tragedy too in the existence of a soul like hers, conscious of its +feebleness and ever striving to overpass it, ever aware that it is an +obstacle to the return of the affection of the man whom she loves. + +Meals, as I have said, were disagreeable at M’Kay’s, and when we wanted +to talk we went out of doors. The evening after our visit to the +debating hall we moved towards Portland Place, and walked up and down +there for an hour or more. M’Kay had a passionate desire to reform the +world. The spectacle of the misery of London, and of the distracted +swaying hither and thither of the multitudes who inhabit it, tormented +him incessantly. He always chafed at it, and he never seemed sure that +he had a right to the enjoyment of the simplest pleasures so long as +London was before him. What a farce, he would cry, is all this poetry, +philosophy, art, and culture, when millions of wretched mortals are +doomed to the eternal darkness and crime of the city! Here are the +educated classes occupying themselves with exquisite emotions, with +speculations upon the Infinite, with addresses to flowers, with the +worship of waterfalls and flying clouds, and with the incessant +portraiture of a thousand moods and variations of love, while their +neighbours lie grovelling in the mire, and never know anything more of +life or its duties than is afforded them by a police report in a bit of +newspaper picked out of the kennel. We went one evening to hear a great +violin-player, who played such music, and so exquisitely, that the limits +of life were removed. But we had to walk up the Haymarket home, between +eleven and twelve o’clock, and the violin-playing became the merest +trifling. M’Kay had been brought up upon the Bible. He had before him, +not only there, but in the history of all great religious movements, a +record of the improvement of the human race, or of large portions of it, +not merely by gradual civilisation, but by inspiration spreading itself +suddenly. He could not get it out of his head that something of this +kind is possible again in our time. He longed to try for himself in his +own poor way in one of the slums about Drury Lane. I sympathised with +him, but I asked him what he had to say. I remember telling him that I +had been into St. Paul’s Cathedral, and that I pictured to myself the +cathedral full, and myself in the pulpit. I was excited while imagining +the opportunity offered me of delivering some message to three or four +thousand persons in such a building, but in a minute or two I discovered +that my sermon would be very nearly as follows: “Dear friends, I know no +more than you know; we had better go home.” I admitted to him that if he +could believe in hell-fire, or if he could proclaim the Second Advent, as +Paul did to the Thessalonians, and get people to believe, he might change +their manners, but otherwise he could do nothing but resort to a much +slower process. With the departure of a belief in the supernatural +departs once and for ever the chance of regenerating the race except by +the school and by science. {31} However, M’Kay thought he would try. +His earnestness was rather a hindrance than a help to him, for it +prevented his putting certain important questions to himself, or at any +rate it prevented his waiting for distinct answers. He recurred to the +apostles and Bunyan, and was convinced that it was possible even now to +touch depraved men and women with an idea which should recast their +lives. So it is that the main obstacle to our success is a success which +has preceded us. We instinctively follow the antecedent form, and +consequently we either pass by, or deny altogether, the life of our own +time, because its expression has changed. We never do practically +believe that the Messiah is not incarnated twice in the same flesh. He +came as Jesus, and we look for Him as Jesus now, overlooking the +manifestation of to-day, and dying, perhaps, without recognising it. + +M’Kay had found a room near Parker Street, Drury Lane, in which he +proposed to begin, and that night, as we trod the pavement of Portland +Place, he propounded his plans to me, I listening without much +confidence, but loth nevertheless to take the office of Time upon myself, +and to disprove what experience would disprove more effectually. His +object was nothing less than gradually to attract Drury Lane to come and +be saved. + +The first Sunday I went with him to the room. As we walked over the +Drury Lane gratings of the cellars a most foul stench came up, and one in +particular I remember to this day. A man half dressed pushed open a +broken window beneath us, just as we passed by, and there issued such a +blast of corruption, made up of gases bred by filth, air breathed and +rebreathed a hundred times, charged with odours of unnameable personal +uncleanness and disease, that I staggered to the gutter with a qualm +which I could scarcely conquer. At the doors of the houses stood grimy +women with their arms folded and their hair disordered. Grimier boys and +girls had tied a rope to broken railings, and were swinging on it. The +common door to a score of lodgings stood ever open, and the children +swarmed up and down the stairs carrying with them patches of mud every +time they came in from the street. The wholesome practice which amongst +the decent poor marks off at least one day in the week as a day on which +there is to be a change; when there is to be some attempt to procure +order and cleanliness; a day to be preceded by soap and water, by +shaving, and by as many clean clothes as can be procured, was unknown +here. There was no break in the uniformity of squalor; nor was it even +possible for any single family to emerge amidst such altogether +suppressive surroundings. All self-respect, all effort to do anything +more than to satisfy somehow the grossest wants, had departed. The shops +were open; most of them exhibiting a most miscellaneous collection of +goods, such as bacon cut in slices, fire-wood, a few loaves of bread, and +sweetmeats in dirty bottles. Fowls, strange to say, black as the +flagstones, walked in and out of these shops, or descended into the dark +areas. The undertaker had not put up his shutters. He had drawn down a +yellow blind, on which was painted a picture of a suburban cemetery. Two +funerals, the loftiest effort of his craft, were depicted approaching the +gates. When the gas was alight behind the blind, an effect was produced +which was doubtless much admired. He also displayed in his window a +model coffin, a work of art. It was about a foot long, varnished, +studded with little brass nails, and on the lid was fastened a rustic +cross stretching from end to end. The desire to decorate existence in +some way or other with more or less care is nearly universal. The most +sensual and the meanest almost always manifest an indisposition to be +content with mere material satisfaction. I have known selfish, +gluttonous, drunken men spend their leisure moments in trimming a bed of +scarlet geraniums, and the vulgarest and most commonplace of mortals +considers it a necessity to put a picture in the room or an ornament on +the mantelpiece. The instinct, even in its lowest forms, is divine. It +is the commentary on the text that man shall not live by bread alone. It +is evidence of an acknowledged compulsion—of which art is the highest +manifestation—to _escape_. In the alleys behind Drury Lane this +instinct, the very salt of life, was dead, crushed out utterly, a symptom +which seemed to me ominous, and even awful to the last degree. The only +house in which it survived was in that of the undertaker, who displayed +the willows, the black horses, and the coffin. These may have been +nothing more than an advertisement, but from the care with which the +cross was elaborated, and the neatness with which it was made to resemble +a natural piece of wood, I am inclined to believe that the man felt some +pleasure in his work for its own sake, and that he was not utterly +submerged. The cross in such dens as these, or, worse than dens, in such +sewers! If it be anything, it is a symbol of victory, of power to +triumph over resistance, and even death. Here was nothing but sullen +subjugation, the most grovelling slavery, mitigated only by a tendency to +mutiny. Here was a strength of circumstance to quell and dominate which +neither Jesus nor Paul could have overcome—worse a thousandfold than +Scribes or Pharisees, or any form of persecution. The preaching of Jesus +would have been powerless here; in fact, no known stimulus, nothing ever +held up before men to stir the soul to activity, can do anything in the +back streets of great cities so long as they are the cesspools which they +are now. + +We came to the room. About a score of M’Kay’s own friends were there, +and perhaps half-a-dozen outsiders, attracted by the notice which had +been pasted on a board at the entrance. M’Kay announced his errand. The +ignorance and misery of London he said were intolerable to him. He could +not take any pleasure in life when he thought upon them. What could he +do? that was the question. He was not a man of wealth. He could not buy +up these hovels. He could not force an entrance into them and persuade +their inhabitants to improve themselves. He had no talents wherewith to +found a great organisation or create public opinion. He had determined, +after much thought, to do what he was now doing. It was very little, but +it was all he could undertake. He proposed to keep this room open as a +place to which those who wished might resort at different times, and find +some quietude, instruction, and what fortifying thoughts he could collect +to enable men to endure their almost unendurable sufferings. He did not +intend to teach theology. Anything which would be serviceable he would +set forth, but in the main he intended to rely on holding up the examples +of those who were greater than ourselves and were our redeemers. He +meant to teach Christ in the proper sense of the word. Christ now is +admired probably more than He had ever been. Everybody agrees to admire +Him, but where are the people who really do what He did? There is no +religion now-a-days. Religion is a mere literature. Cultivated persons +sit in their studies and write overflowingly about Jesus, or meet at +parties and talk about Him; but He is not of much use to me unless I say +to myself, _how is it with thee_? unless I myself become what He was. +This was the meaning of Jesus to the Apostle Paul. Jesus was in him; he +had put on Jesus; that is to say, Jesus lived in him like a second soul, +taking the place of his own soul and directing him accordingly. That was +religion, and it is absurd to say that the English nation at this moment, +or any section of it, is religious. Its educated classes are inhabited +by a hundred minds. We are in a state of anarchy, each of us with a +different aim and shaping himself according to a different type; while +the uneducated classes are entirely given over to the “natural man.” He +was firmly persuaded that we need religion, poor and rich alike. We need +some controlling influence to bind together our scattered energies. We +do not know what we are doing. We read one book one day and another book +another day, but it is idle wandering to right and left; it is not +advancing on a straight road. It is not possible to bind ourselves down +to a certain defined course, but still it is an enormous, an incalculable +advantage for us to have some irreversible standard set up in us by which +everything we meet is to be judged. That is the meaning of the +prophecy—whether it will ever be fulfilled God only knows—that Christ +shall judge the world. All religions have been this. They have said +that in the midst of the infinitely possible—infinitely possible evil and +infinitely possible good too—we become distracted. A thousand forces +good and bad act upon us. It is necessary, if we are to be men, if we +are to be saved, that we should be rescued from this tumult, and that our +feet should be planted upon a path. His object, therefore, would be to +preach Christ, as before said, and to introduce into human life His +unifying influence. He would try and get them to see things with the +eyes of Christ, to love with His love, to judge with His judgment. He +believed Christ was fitted to occupy this place. He deliberately chose +Christ as worthy to be our central, shaping force. He would try by +degrees to prove this; to prove that Christ’s way of dealing with life is +the best way, and so to create a genuinely Christian spirit, which, when +any choice of conduct is presented to us, will prompt us to ask first of +all, _how would Christ have it_? or, when men and things pass before us, +will decide through him what we have to say about them. M’Kay added that +he hoped his efforts would not be confined to talking. He trusted to be +able, by means of this little meeting, gradually to gain admittance for +himself and his friends into the houses of the poor and do some practical +good. At present he had no organisation and no plans. He did not +believe in organisation and plans preceding a clear conception of what +was to be accomplished. Such, as nearly as I can now recollect, is an +outline of his discourse. It was thoroughly characteristic of him. He +always talked in this fashion. He was for ever insisting on the +aimlessness of modern life, on the powerlessness of its vague activities +to mould men into anything good, to restrain them from evil or moderate +their passions, and he was possessed by a vision of a new Christianity +which was to take the place of the old and dead theologies. I have +reported him in my own language. He strove as much as he could to make +his meaning plain to everybody. Just before he finished, three or four +out of the half-a-dozen outsiders who were present whistled with all +their might and ran down the stairs shouting to one another. As we went +out they had collected about the door, and amused themselves by pushing +one another against us, and kicking an old kettle behind us and amongst +us all the way up the street, so that we were covered with splashes. +Mrs. M’Kay went with us, and when we reached home, she tried to say +something about what she had heard. The cloud came over her husband’s +face at once; he remained silent for a minute, and getting up and going +to the window, observed that it ought to be cleaned, and that he could +hardly see the opposite house. The poor woman looked distressed, and I +was just about to come to her rescue by continuing what she had been +saying, when she rose, not in anger, but in trouble, and went upstairs. + + + + +CHAPTER III +MISS LEROY + + +DURING the great French war there were many French prisoners in my native +town. They led a strange isolated life, for they knew nothing of our +language, nor, in those days, did three people in the town understand +theirs. The common soldiers amused themselves by making little trifles +and selling them. I have now before me a box of coloured straw with the +date 1799 on the bottom, which was bought by my grandfather. One of +these prisoners was an officer named Leroy. Why he did not go back to +France I never heard, but I know that before I was born he was living +near our house on a small income; that he tried to teach French, and that +he had as his companion a handsome daughter who grew up speaking English. +What she was like when she was young I cannot say, but I have had her +described to me over and over again. She had rather darkish brown hair, +and she was tall and straight as an arrow. This she was, by the way, +even into old age. She surprised, shocked, and attracted all the sober +persons in our circle. Her ways were not their ways. She would walk out +by herself on a starry night without a single companion, and cause +thereby infinite talk, which would have converged to a single focus if it +had not happened that she was also in the habit of walking out at four +o’clock on a summer’s morning, and that in the church porch of a little +village not far from us, which was her favourite resting-place, a copy of +the _De Imitatione Christi_ was found which belonged to her. So the talk +was scattered again and its convergence prevented. She used to say +doubtful things about love. One of them struck my mother with horror. +Miss Leroy told a male person once, and told him to his face, that if she +loved him and he loved her, and they agreed to sign one another’s +foreheads with a cross as a ceremony, it would be as good to her as +marriage. This may seem a trifle, but nobody now can imagine what was +thought of it at the time it was spoken. My mother repeated it every now +and then for fifty years. It may be conjectured how easily any other +girls of our acquaintance would have been classified, and justly +classified, if they had uttered such barefaced Continental immorality. +Miss Leroy’s neighbours were remarkably apt at classifying their +fellow-creatures. They had a few, a very few holes, into which they +dropped their neighbours, and they must go into one or the other. +Nothing was more distressing than a specimen which, notwithstanding all +the violence which might be used to it, would not fit into a hole, but +remained an exception. Some lout, I believe, reckoning on the legitimacy +of his generalisation, and having heard of this and other observations +accredited to Miss Leroy, ventured to be slightly rude to her. What she +said to him was never known, but he was always shy afterwards of +mentioning her name, and when he did he was wont to declare that she was +“a rum un.” She was not particular, I have heard, about personal +tidiness, and this I can well believe, for she was certainly not +distinguished when I knew her for this virtue. She cared nothing for the +linen-closet, the spotless bed-hangings, and the bright poker, which were +the true household gods of the respectable women of those days. She +would have been instantly set down as “slut,” and as having “nasty dirty +forrin ways,” if a peculiar habit of hers had not unfortunately presented +itself, most irritating to her critics, so anxious promptly to gratify +their philosophic tendency towards scientific grouping. Mrs. Mobbs, who +lived next door to her, averred that she always slept with the window +open. Mrs. Mobbs, like everybody else, never opened her window except to +“air the room.” Mrs. Mobbs’ best bedroom was carpeted all over, and +contained a great four-post bedstead, hung round with heavy hangings, and +protected at the top from draughts by a kind of firmament of white +dimity. Mrs. Mobbs stuffed a sack of straw up the chimney of the +fireplace, to prevent the fall of the “sutt,” as she called it. Mrs. +Mobbs, if she had a visitor, gave her a hot supper, and expected her +immediately afterwards to go upstairs, draw the window curtains, get into +this bed, draw the bed curtains also, and wake up the next morning +“bilious.” This was the proper thing to do. Miss Leroy’s sitting-room +was decidedly disorderly; the chairs were dusty; “yer might write yer +name on the table,” Mrs. Mobbs declared; but, nevertheless, the casement +was never closed night nor day; and, moreover, Miss Leroy was believed by +the strongest circumstantial evidence to wash herself all over every +morning, a habit which Mrs. Mobbs thought “weakening,” and somehow +connected with ethical impropriety. When Miss Leroy was married, and +first as an elderly woman became known to me, she was very +inconsequential in her opinions, or at least appeared so to our eyes. +She must have been much more so when she was younger. In our town we +were all formed upon recognised patterns, and those who possessed any one +mark of the pattern, had all. The wine-merchant, for example, who went +to church, eminently respectable, Tory, by no means associating with the +tradesfolk who displayed their goods in the windows, knowing no +“experience,” and who had never felt the outpouring of the Spirit, was a +specimen of a class like him. Another class was represented by the +dissenting ironmonger, deacon, presiding at prayer-meetings, strict +Sabbatarian, and believer in eternal punishments; while a third was set +forth by “Guffy,” whose real name was unknown, who got drunk, unloaded +barges, assisted at the municipal elections, and was never once seen +inside a place of worship. These patterns had existed amongst us from +the dimmest antiquity, and were accepted as part of the eternal order of +things; so much so, that the deacon, although he professed to be sure +that nobody who had not been converted would escape the fire—and the +wine-merchant certainly had not been converted—was very far from +admitting to himself that the wine-merchant ought to be converted, or +that it would be proper to try and convert him. I doubt, indeed, whether +our congregation would have been happy, or would have thought any the +better of him, if he had left the church. Such an event, however, could +no more come within the reach of our vision than a reversal of the +current of our river. It would have broken up our foundations and +party-walls, and would have been considered as ominous, and anything but +a subject for thankfulness. But Miss Leroy was not the wine-merchant, +nor the ironmonger, nor Guffy, and even now I cannot trace the hidden +centre of union from which sprang so much that was apparently +irreconcilable. She was a person whom nobody could have created in +writing a novel, because she was so inconsistent. As I have said before, +she studied Thomas à Kempis, and her little French Bible was brown with +constant use. But then she read much fiction in which there were scenes +which would have made our hair stand on end. The only thing she +constantly abhorred in books was what was dull and opaque. Yet, as we +shall see presently, her dislike to dulness, once at least in her life, +notably failed her. She was not Catholic, and professed herself +Protestant, but such a Protestantism! She had no sceptical doubts. She +believed implicitly that the Bible was the Word of God, and that +everything in it was true, but her interpretation of it was of the +strangest kind. Almost all our great doctrines seemed shrunk to nothing +in her eyes, while others, which were nothing to us, were all-important +to her. The atonement, for instance, I never heard her mention, but +Unitarianism was hateful to her, and Jesus was her God in every sense of +the word. On the other hand, she was partly Pagan, for she knew very +little of that consideration for the feeble, and even for the foolish, +which is the glory of Christianity. She was rude to foolish people, and +she instinctively kept out of the way of all disease and weakness, so +that in this respect she was far below the commonplace tradesman’s wife, +who visited the sick, sat up with them, and, in fact, never seemed so +completely in her element as when she could be with anybody who was ill +in bed. + +Miss Leroy’s father was republican, and so was my grandfather. My +grandfather and old Leroy were the only people in our town who refused to +illuminate when a victory was gained over the French. Leroy’s windows +were spared on the ground that he was not a Briton, but the mob +endeavoured to show my grandfather the folly of his belief in democracy +by smashing every pane of glass in front of his house with stones. This +drew him and Leroy together, and the result was, that although Leroy +himself never set foot inside any chapel or church, Miss Leroy was often +induced to attend our meeting-house in company with a maiden aunt of +mine, who rather “took to her.” Now comes the for ever mysterious +passage in history. There was amongst the attendants at that +meeting-house a young man who was apprentice to a miller. He was a big, +soft, quiet, plump-faced, awkward youth, very good, but nothing more. He +wore on Sunday a complete suit of light pepper-and-salt clothes, and +continued to wear pepper-and-salt on Sunday all his life. He taught in +the Sunday-school, and afterwards, as he got older, he was encouraged to +open his lips at a prayer-meeting, and to “take the service” in the +village chapels on Sunday evening. He was the most singularly placid, +even-tempered person I ever knew. I first became acquainted with him +when I was a child and he was past middle life. What he was then, I am +told, he always was; and I certainly never heard one single violent word +escape his lips. His habits, even when young, had a tendency to harden. +He went to sleep after his mid-day dinner with the greatest regularity, +and he never could keep awake if he sat by a fire after dark. I have +seen him, when kneeling at family worship and praying with his family, +lose himself for an instant and nod his head, to the confusion of all who +were around him. He is dead now, but he lived to a good old age, which +crept upon him gradually with no pain, and he passed away from this world +to the next in a peaceful doze. He never read anything, for the simple +reason that whenever he was not at work or at chapel he slumbered. To +the utter amazement of everybody, it was announced one fine day that Miss +Leroy and he—George Butts—were to be married. They were about the last +people in the world, who, it was thought, could be brought together. My +mother was stunned, and never completely recovered. I have seen her, +forty years after George Butts’ wedding-day, lift up her hands, and have +heard her call out with emotion, as fresh as if the event were of +yesterday, “What made that girl have George I can _not_ think—but there!” +What she meant by the last two words we could not comprehend. Many of +her acquaintances interpreted them to mean that she knew more than she +dared communicate, but I think they were mistaken. I am quite certain if +she had known anything she must have told it, and, in the next place, the +phrase “but there” was not uncommon amongst women in our town, and was +supposed to mark the consciousness of a prudently restrained ability to +give an explanation of mysterious phenomena in human relationships. For +my own part, I am just as much in the dark as my mother. My father, who +was a shrewd man, was always puzzled, and could not read the riddle. He +used to say that he never thought George could have “made up” to any +young woman, and it was quite clear that Miss Leroy did not either then +or afterwards display any violent affection for him. I have heard her +criticise and patronise him as a “good soul,” but incapable, as indeed he +was, of all sympathy with her. After marriage she went her way and he +his. She got up early, as she was wont to do, and took her Bible into +the fields while he was snoring. She would then very likely suffer from +a terrible headache during the rest of the day, and lie down for hours, +letting the house manage itself as best it could. What made her +selection of George more obscure was that she was much admired by many +young fellows, some of whom were certainly more akin to her than he was; +and I have heard from one or two reports of encouraging words, and even +something more than words, which she had vouchsafed to them. A solution +is impossible. The affinities, repulsions, reasons in a nature like that +of Miss Leroy’s are so secret and so subtle, working towards such +incalculable and not-to-be-predicted results, that to attempt to make a +major and minor premiss and an inevitable conclusion out of them would be +useless. One thing was clear, that by marrying George she gained great +freedom. If she had married anybody closer to her, she might have jarred +with him; there might have been collision and wreck as complete as if +they had been entirely opposed; for she was not the kind of person to +accommodate herself to others even in the matter of small differences. +But George’s road through space lay entirely apart from hers, and there +was not the slightest chance of interference. She was under the +protection of a husband; she could do things that, as an unmarried woman, +especially in a foreign land, she could not do, and the compensatory +sacrifice to her was small. This is really the only attempt at +elucidation I can give. She went regularly all her life to chapel with +George, but even when he became deacon, and “supplied” the villages +round, she never would join the church as a member. She never agreed +with the minister, and he never could make anything out of her. They did +not quarrel, but she thought nothing of his sermons, and he was perplexed +and uncomfortable in the presence of a nondescript who did not respond to +any dogmatic statement of the articles of religion, and who yet could not +be put aside as “one of those in the gallery”—that is to say, as one of +the ordinary unconverted, for she used to quote hymns with amazing +fervour, and she quoted them to him with a freedom and a certain +superiority which he might have expected from an aged brother minister, +but certainly not from one of his own congregation. He was a preacher of +the Gospel, it was true; and it was his duty, a duty on which he +insisted, to be “instant in season and out of season” in saying spiritual +things to his flock; but then they were things proper, decent, +conventional, uttered with gravity at suitable times—such as were +customary amongst all the ministers of the denomination. It was not +pleasant to be outbid in his own department, especially by one who was +not a communicant, and to be obliged, when he went on a pastoral visit to +a house in which Mrs. Butts happened to be, to sit still and hear her, +regardless of the minister’s presence, conclude a short mystical +monologue with Cowper’s verse— + + “Exults our rising soul, + Disburdened of her load, + And swells unutterably full + Of glory and of God.” + +This was _not_ pleasant to our minister, nor was it pleasant to the +minister’s wife. But George Butts held a responsible position in our +community, and the minister’s wife held also a responsible position, so +that she taxed all her ingenuity to let her friends understand at +tea-parties what she thought of Mrs. Butts without saying anything which +could be the ground of formal remonstrance. Thus did Mrs. Butts live +among us, as an Arabian bird with its peculiar habits, cries, and plumage +might live in one of our barn-yards with the ordinary barn-door fowls. + +I was never happier when I was a boy than when I was with Mrs. Butts at +the mill, which George had inherited. There was a grand freedom in her +house. The front door leading into the garden was always open. There +was no precise separation between the house and the mill. The business +and the dwelling-place were mixed up together, and covered with flour. +Mr. Butts was in the habit of walking out of his mill into the +living-room every now and then, and never dreamed when one o’clock came +that it was necessary for him to change his floury coat before he had his +dinner. His cap he also often retained, and in any weather, not +extraordinarily cold, he sat in his shirtsleeves. The garden was large +and half-wild. A man from the mill, if work was slack, gave a day to it +now and then, but it was not trimmed and raked and combed like the other +gardens in the town. It was full of gooseberry trees, and I was +permitted to eat the gooseberries without stint. The mill-life, too, was +inexpressibly attractive—the dark chamber with the great, green, dripping +wheel in it, so awfully mysterious as the central life of the whole +structure; the machinery connected with the wheel—I knew not how; the +hole where the roach lay by the side of the mill-tail in the eddy; the +haunts of the water-rats which we used to hunt with Spot, the black and +tan terrier, and the still more exciting sport with the ferrets—all this +drew me down the lane perpetually. I liked, and even loved Mrs. Butts, +too, for her own sake. Her kindness to me was unlimited, and she was +never overcome with the fear of “spoiling me,” which seemed the constant +dread of most of my hostesses. I never lost my love for her. It grew as +I grew, despite my mother’s scarcely suppressed hostility to her, and +when I heard she was ill, and was likely to die, I went to be with her. +She was eighty years old then. I sat by her bedside with her hand in +mine. I was there when she passed away, and—but I have no mind and no +power to say any more, for all the memories of her affection and of the +sunny days by the water come over me and prevent the calmness necessary +for a chronicle. She with all her faults and eccentricities will always +have in my heart a little chapel with an ever-burning light. She was one +of the very very few whom I have ever seen who knew how to love a child. + +Mrs. Butts and George had one son who was named Clement. He was exactly +my own age, and naturally we were constant companions. We went to the +same school. He never distinguished himself at his books, but he was +chief among us. He had a versatile talent for almost every +accomplishment in which we delighted, but he was not supreme in any one +of them. There were better cricketers, better football players, better +hands at setting a night-line, better swimmers than Clem, but he could do +something, and do it well, in all these departments. He generally took +up a thing with much eagerness for a time, and then let it drop. He was +foremost in introducing new games and new fashions, which he permitted to +flourish for a time, and then superseded. As he grew up he displayed a +taste for drawing and music. He was soon able to copy little paintings +of flowers, or even little country scenes, and to play a piece of no very +great difficulty with tolerable effect. But as he never was taught by a +master, and never practised elementary exercises and studies, he was +deficient in accuracy. When the question came what was to be done with +him after he left school, his father naturally wished him to go into the +mill. Clem, however, set his face steadily against this project, and his +mother, who was a believer in his genius, supported him. He actually +wanted to go to the University, a thing unheard of in those days amongst +our people; but this was not possible, and after dangling about for some +time at home, he obtained the post of usher in a school, an occupation +which he considered more congenial and intellectual than that of grinding +flour. Strange to say, although he knew less than any of his colleagues, +he succeeded better than any of them. He managed to impress a sense of +his own importance upon everybody, including the headmaster. He slid +into a position of superiority above three or four colleagues who would +have shamed him at an examination, and who uttered many a curse because +they saw themselves surpassed and put in the shade by a stranger, who, +they were confident, could hardly construct a hexameter. He never +quarrelled with them nor did he grossly patronise them, but he always let +them know that he considered himself above them. His reading was +desultory; in fact, everything he did was desultory. He was not selfish +in the ordinary sense of the word. Rather was he distinguished by a +large and liberal open-handedness; but he was liberal also to himself to +a remarkable degree, dressing himself expensively, and spending a good +deal of money in luxuries. He was specially fond of insisting on his +half French origin, made a great deal of his mother, was silent as to his +father, and always signed himself C. Leroy Butts, although I don’t +believe the second Christian name was given him in baptism. +Notwithstanding his generosity he was egotistical and hollow at heart. +He knew nothing of friendship in the best sense of the word, but had a +multitude of acquaintances, whom he invariably sought amongst those who +were better off than himself. He was popular with them, for no man knew +better than he how to get up an entertainment, or to make a success of an +evening party. He had not been at his school for two years before he +conceived the notion of setting up for himself. He had not a penny, but +he borrowed easily what was wanted from somebody he knew, and in a +twelvemonth more he had a dozen pupils. He took care to get the ablest +subordinates he could find, and he succeeded in passing a boy for an open +scholarship at Oxford, against two competitors prepared by the very man +whom he had formerly served. After this he prospered greatly, and would +have prospered still more, if his love of show and extravagance had not +increased with his income. His talents were sometimes taxed when people +who came to place their sons with him supposed ignorantly that his origin +and attainments were what might be expected from his position; and poor +Chalmers, a Glasgow M.A., who still taught, for £80 a year, the third +class in the establishment in which Butts began life, had some bitter +stories on that subject. Chalmers was a perfect scholar, but he was not +agreeable. He had black finger-nails, and wore dirty collars. Having a +lively remembrance of his friend’s “general acquaintance” with Latin +prosody, Chalmers’ opinion of Providence was much modified when he +discovered what Providence was doing for Butts. Clem took to the Church +when he started for himself. It would have been madness in him to remain +a Dissenter. But in private, if it suited his purpose, he could always +be airily sceptical, and he had a superficial acquaintance, second-hand, +with a multitude of books, many of them of an infidel turn. I once +rebuked him for his hypocrisy, and his defence was that religious +disputes were indifferent to him, and that at any rate a man associates +with gentlemen if he is a churchman. Cultivation and manners he thought +to be of more importance than Calvinism. I believe that he partly meant +what he said. He went to church because the school would have failed if +he had gone to chapel; but he was sufficiently keen-sighted and clever to +be beyond the petty quarrels of the sects, and a song well sung was of +much greater moment to him than an essay on pædo-baptism. It was all +very well of Chalmers to revile him for his shallowness. He was shallow, +and yet he possessed in some mysterious way a talent which I greatly +coveted, and which in this world is inestimably precious—the talent of +making people give way before him—a capacity of self-impression. +Chalmers could never have commanded anybody. He had no power whatever, +even when he was right, to put his will against the wills of others, but +yielded first this way and then the other. Clem, on the contrary, +without any difficulty or any effort, could conquer all opposition, and +smilingly force everybody to do his bidding. + +Clem had a peculiar theory with regard to his own rights and those of the +class to which he considered that he belonged. He always held implicitly +and sometimes explicitly that gifted people live under a kind of +dispensation of grace; the law existing solely for dull souls. What in a +clown is a crime punishable by the laws of the land might in a man of +genius be a necessary development, or at any rate an excusable offence. +He had nothing to say for the servant-girl who had sinned with the +shopman, but if artist or poet were to carry off another man’s wife, it +might not be wrong. + +He believed, and acted upon the belief, that the inferior ought to render +perpetual incense to the superior, and that the superior should receive +it as a matter of course. When his father was ill he never waited on him +or sat up a single night with him. If duty was disagreeable to him Clem +paid homage to it afar off, but pleaded exemption. He admitted that +waiting on the sick is obligatory on people who are fitted for it, and is +very charming. Nothing was more beautiful to him than tender, filial +care spending itself for a beloved object. But it was not his vocation. +His nerves were more finely ordered than those of mankind generally, and +the sight of disease and suffering distressed him too much. Everything +was surrendered to him in the houses of his friends. If any +inconvenience was to be endured, he was the first person to be protected +from it, and he accepted the greatest sacrifices, with a graceful +acknowledgment, it is true, but with no repulse. To what better purpose +could the best wine be put than in cherishing his imagination. It was +simple waste to allow it to be poured out upon the earth, and to give it +to a fool was no better. After he succeeded so well in the world, Clem, +to a great extent, deserted me, although I was his oldest friend and the +friend of his childhood. I heard that he visited a good many rich +persons, that he made much of them, and they made much of him. He kept +up a kind of acquaintance with me, not by writing to me, but by the very +cheap mode of sending me a newspaper now and then with a marked paragraph +in it announcing the exploits of his school at a cricket-match, or +occasionally with a report of a lecture which he had delivered. He was a +decent orator, and from motives of business if from no other, he not +unfrequently spoke in public. One or two of these lectures wounded me a +good deal. There was one in particular on _As You Like It_, in which he +held up to admiration the fidelity which is so remarkable in Shakespeare, +and lamented that in these days it was so rare to find anything of the +kind, he thought that we were becoming more indifferent to one another. +He maintained, however, that man should be everything to man, and he then +enlarged on the duty of really cultivating affection, of its superiority +to books, and on the pleasure and profit of self-denial. I do not mean +to accuse Clem of downright hypocrisy. I have known many persons come up +from the country and go into raptures over a playhouse sun and moon who +have never bestowed a glance or a thought on the real sun and moon to be +seen from their own doors; and we are all aware it by no means follows +because we are moved to our very depths by the spectacle of unrecognised, +uncomplaining endurance in a novel, that therefore we can step over the +road to waste an hour or a sixpence upon the unrecognised, uncomplaining +endurance of the poor lone woman left a widow in the little villa there. +I was annoyed with myself because Clem’s abandonment of me so much +affected me. I wished I could cut the rope and carelessly cast him +adrift as he had cast me adrift, but I could not. I never could make out +and cannot make out what was the secret of his influence over me; why I +was unable to say, “If you do not care for me I do not care for you.” I +longed sometimes for complete rupture, so that we might know exactly +where we were, but it never came. Gradually our intercourse grew thinner +and thinner, until at last I heard that he had been spending a fortnight +with some semi-aristocratic acquaintance within five miles of me, and +during the whole of that time he never came near me. I met him in a +railway station soon afterwards, when he came up to me effusive and +apparently affectionate. “It was a real grief to me, my dear fellow,” he +said, “that I could not call on you last month, but the truth was I was +so driven: they would make me go here and go there, and I kept putting +off my visit to you till it was too late.” Fortunately my train was just +starting, or I don’t know what might have happened. I said not a word; +shook hands with him; got into the carriage; he waved his hat to me, and +I pretended not to see him, but I did see him, and saw him turn round +immediately to some well-dressed officer-like gentleman with whom he +walked laughing down the platform. The rest of that day was black to me. +I cared for nothing. I passed away from the thought of Clem, and dwelt +upon the conviction which had long possessed me that I was +_insignificant_, that there was _nothing much in me_, and it was this +which destroyed my peace. We may reconcile ourselves to poverty and +suffering, but few of us can endure the conviction that there is _nothing +in us_, and that consequently we cannot expect anybody to gravitate +towards us with any forceful impulse. It is a bitter experience. And +yet there is consolation. The universe is infinite. In the presence of +its celestial magnitudes who is there who is really great or small, and +what is the difference between you and me, my work and yours? I sought +refuge in the idea of GOD, the God of a starry night with its +incomprehensible distances; and I was at peace, content to be the meanest +worm of all the millions that crawl on the earth. + + + + +CHAPTER IV +A NECESSARY DEVELOPMENT + + +THE few friends who have read the first part of my autobiography may +perhaps remember that in my younger days I had engaged myself to a girl +named Ellen, from whom afterwards I parted. After some two or three +years she was left an orphan, and came into the possession of a small +property, over which unfortunately she had complete power. She was +attractive and well-educated, and I heard long after I had broken with +her, and had ceased to have intercourse with Butts, that the two were +married. He of course, living so near her, had known her well, and he +found her money useful. How they agreed I knew not save by report, but I +was told that after the first child was born, the only child they ever +had, Butts grew indifferent to her, and that she, to use my friend’s +expression, “went off,” by which I suppose he meant that she faded. +There happened in those days to live near Butts a small squire, married, +but with no family. He was a lethargic creature, about five-and-thirty +years old, farming eight hundred acres of his own land. He did not, +however, belong to the farming class. He had been to Harrow, was on the +magistrates’ bench, and associated with the small aristocracy of the +country round. He was like every other squire whom I remember in my +native county, and I can remember scores of them. He read no books and +tolerated the usual conventional breaches of the moral law, but was an +intense worshipper of respectability, and hated a scandal. On one point +he differed from his neighbours. He was a Whig and they were all Tories. +I have said he read no books, and this, on the whole, is true, but +nevertheless he did know something about the history of the early part of +the century, and he was rather fond at political gatherings of making +some allusion to Mr. Fox. His father had sat in the House of Commons +when Fox was there, and had sternly opposed the French war. I don’t +suppose that anybody not actually _in it_—no Londoner certainly—can +understand the rigidity of the bonds which restricted county society when +I was young, and for aught I know may restrict it now. There was with us +one huge and dark exception to the general uniformity. The earl had +broken loose, had ruined his estate, had defied decorum and openly lived +with strange women at home and in Paris, but this black background did +but set off the otherwise universal adhesion to the Church and to +authorised manners, an adhesion tempered and rendered tolerable by port +wine. It must not, however, be supposed that human nature was different +from the human nature of to-day or a thousand years ago. There were +then, even as there were a thousand years ago, and are to-day, small, +secret doors, connected with mysterious staircases, by which access was +gained to freedom; and men and women, inmates of castles with walls a +yard thick, and impenetrable portcullises, sought those doors and +descended those stairs night and day. But nobody knew, or if we did +know, the silence was profound. The broad-shouldered, yellow-haired Whig +squire, had a wife who was the opposite of him. She came from a distant +part of the country, and had been educated in France. She was small, +with black hair, and yet with blue eyes. She spoke French perfectly, was +devoted to music, read French books, and, although she was a constant +attendant at church, and gave no opportunity whatever for the slightest +suspicion, the matrons of the circle in which she moved were never quite +happy about her. This was due partly to her knowledge of French, and +partly to her having no children. Anything more about her I do not know. +She was beyond us, and although I have seen her often enough I never +spoke to her. Butts, however, managed to become a visitor at the +squire’s house. Fancy _my_ going to the squire’s! But Butts did, was +accepted there, and even dined there with a parson, and two or three +half-pay officers. The squire never called on Butts. That was an +understood thing, nor did Mrs. Butts accompany her husband. That also +was an understood thing. It was strange that Butts could tolerate and +even court such a relationship. Most men would scorn with the scorn of a +personal insult an invitation to a house from which their wives were +expressly excluded. The squire’s lady and Clem became great friends. +She discovered that his mother was a Frenchwoman, and this was a bond +between them. She discovered also that Clem was artistic, that he was +devotedly fond of music, that he could draw a little, paint a little, and +she believed in the divine right of talent wherever it might be found to +assert a claim of equality with those who were better born. The women in +the country-side were shy of her; for the men she could not possibly +care, and no doubt she must at times have got rather weary of her heavy +husband with his one outlook towards the universal in the person of +George James Fox, and the Whig policy of 1802. I am under some +disadvantage in telling this part of my story, because I was far away +from home, and only knew afterwards at second hand what the course of +events had been; but I learned them from one who was intimately +concerned, and I do not think I can be mistaken on any essential point. +I imagine that by this time Mrs. Butts must have become changed into what +she was in later years. She had grown older since she and I had parted; +she had seen trouble; her child had been born, and although she was not +exactly estranged from Clem, for neither he nor she would have admitted +any coolness, she had learned that she was nothing specially to him. I +have often noticed what an imperceptible touch, what a slight shifting in +the balance of opposing forces, will alter the character. I have +observed a woman, for example, essentially the same at twenty and +thirty—who is there who is not always essentially the same?—and yet, what +was a defect at twenty, has become transformed and transfigured into a +benignant virtue at thirty; translating the whole nature from the human +to the divine. Some slight depression has been wrought here, and some +slight lift has been given there, and beauty and order have miraculously +emerged from what was chaotic. The same thing may continually be noticed +in the hereditary transmission of qualities. The redeeming virtue of the +father palpably present in the son becomes his curse, through a faint +diminution of the strength of the check which caused that virtue to be +the father’s salvation. The propensity, too, which is a man’s evil +genius, and leads him to madness and utter ruin, gives vivid reality to +all his words and thoughts, and becomes all his strength, if by divine +assistance it can just be subdued and prevented from rising in victorious +insurrection. But this is a digression, useful, however, in its way, +because it will explain Mrs. Butts when we come a little nearer to her in +the future. + +For a time Clem’s visits to the squire’s house always took place when the +squire was at home, but an amateur concert was to be arranged in which +Clem was to take part together with the squire’s lady. Clem consequently +was obliged to go to the Hall for the purpose of practising, and so it +came to pass that he was there at unusual hours and when the master was +afield. These morning and afternoon calls did not cease when the concert +was over. Clem’s wife did not know anything about them, and, if she +noticed his frequent absence, she was met with an excuse. Perhaps the +worst, or almost the worst effect of relationships which we do not like +to acknowledge, is the secrecy and equivocation which they beget. From +the very first moment when the intimacy between the squire’s wife and +Clem began to be anything more than harmless, he was compelled to shuffle +and to become contemptible. At the same time I believe he defended +himself against himself with the weapons which were ever ready when self +rose against self because of some wrong-doing. He was not as other men. +It was absurd to class what he did with what an ordinary person might do, +although externally his actions and those of the ordinary person might +resemble one another. I cannot trace the steps by which the two sinners +drew nearer and nearer together, for the simple reason that this is an +autobiography, and not a novel. I do not know what the development was, +nor did anybody except the person concerned. Neither do I know what was +the mental history of Mrs. Butts during this unhappy period. She seldom +talked about it afterwards. I do, however, happen to recollect hearing +her once say that her greatest trouble was the cessation, from some +unknown cause, of Clem’s attempts—they were never many—to interest and +amuse her. It is easy to understand how this should be. If a man is +guilty of any defection from himself, of anything of which he is ashamed, +everything which is better becomes a farce to him. After he has been +betrayed by some passion, how can he pretend to the perfect enjoyment of +what is pure? The moment he feels any disposition to rise, he is +stricken through as if with an arrow, and he drops. Not until weeks, +months, and even years have elapsed, does he feel justified in +surrendering himself to a noble emotion. I have heard of persons who +have been able to ascend easily and instantaneously from the mud to the +upper air, and descend as easily; but to me at least they are +incomprehensible. Clem, less than most men, suffered permanently, or +indeed in any way from remorse, because he was so shielded by his +peculiar philosophy; but I can quite believe that when he got into the +habit of calling at the Hall at mid-day, his behaviour to his wife +changed. + +One day in December the squire had gone out with the hounds. Clem, going +on from bad to worse, had now reached the point of planning to be at the +Hall when the squire was not at home. On that particular afternoon Clem +was there. It was about half-past four o’clock, and the master was not +expected till six. There had been some music, the lady accompanying, and +Clem singing. It was over, and Clem, sitting down beside her at the +piano, and pointing out with his right hand some passage which had +troubled him, had placed his left arm on her shoulder, and round her +neck, she not resisting. He always swore afterwards that never till then +had such a familiarity as this been permitted, and I believe that he did +not tell a lie. But what was there in that familiarity? The worst was +already there, and it was through a mere accident that it never showed +itself. The accident was this. The squire, for some unknown reason, had +returned earlier than usual, and dismounting in the stable-yard, had +walked round the garden on the turf which came close to the windows of +the ground floor. Passing the drawing-room window, and looking in by the +edge of the drawn-down blind, he saw his wife and Clem just at the moment +described. He slipped round to the door, took off his boots so that he +might not be heard, and as there was a large screen inside the room he +was able to enter it unobserved. Clem caught sight of him just as he +emerged from behind the screen, and started up instantly in great +confusion, the lady, with greater presence of mind, remaining perfectly +still. Without a word the squire strode up to Clem, struck out at him, +caught him just over the temple, and felled him instantaneously. He lay +for some time senseless, and what passed between husband and wife I +cannot say. After about ten minutes, perhaps, Clem came to himself; +there was nobody to be seen; and he managed to get up and crawl home. He +told his wife he had met with an accident; that he would go to bed, and +that she should know all about it when he was better. His forehead was +dressed, and to bed he went. That night Mrs. Butts had a letter. It ran +as follows:— + + “MADAM,—It may at first sight seem a harsh thing for me to write and + tell you what I have to say, but I can assure you I do not mean to be + anything but kind to you, and I think it will be better, for reasons + which I will afterwards explain, that I should communicate with you + rather than with your husband. For some time past I have suspected + that he was too fond of my wife, and last night I caught him with his + arms round her neck. In a moment of not unjustifiable anger I + knocked him down. I have not the honour of knowing you personally, + but from what I have heard of you I am sure that he has not the + slightest reason for playing with other women. A man who will do + what he has done will be very likely to conceal from you the true + cause of his disaster, and if you know the cause you may perhaps be + able to reclaim him. If he has any sense of honour left in him, and + of what is due to you, he will seek your pardon for his baseness, and + you will have a hold on him afterwards which you would not have if + you were in ignorance of what has happened. For him I do not care a + straw, but for you I feel deeply, and I believe that my frankness + with you, although it may cause you much suffering now, will save you + more hereafter. I have only one condition to make. Mr. Butts must + leave this place, and never let me see his face again. He has ruined + my peace. Nothing will be published through me, for, as far as I can + prevent it, I will have no public exposure. If Mr. Butts were to + remain here it would be dangerous for us to meet, and probably + everything, by some chance, would become common property.—Believe me + to be, Madam, with many assurances of respect, truly yours,—.” + +I cannot distinguish the precise proportion of cruelty in this letter. +Did the writer designedly torture Butts by telling his wife, or did he +really think that she would in the end be happier because Butts would not +have a secret reserved from her,—a temptation to lying—and because with +this secret in her possession, he might perhaps be restrained in future? +Nobody knows. All we know is that there are very few human actions of +which it can be said that this or that taken by itself produced them. +With our inborn tendency to abstract, to separate mentally the concrete +into factors which do not exist separately, we are always disposed to +assign causes which are too simple, and which, in fact, have no being _in +rerum natura_. Nothing in nature is propelled or impeded by one force +acting alone. There is no such thing, save in the brain of the +mathematician. I see no reason why even motives diametrically opposite +should not unite in one resulting deed, and think it very probable that +the squire was both cruel and merciful to the same person in the letter; +influenced by exactly conflicting passions, whose conflict ended _so_. + +As to the squire and his wife, they lived together just as before. I do +not think, that, excepting the four persons concerned, anybody ever heard +a syllable about the affair, save myself a long while afterwards. Clem, +however, packed up and left the town, after selling his business. He had +a reputation for restlessness; and his departure, although it was sudden, +was no surprise. He betook himself to Australia, his wife going with +him. I heard that they had gone, and heard also that he was tired of +school-keeping in England, and had determined to try his fortune in +another part of the world. Our friendship had dwindled to nothing, and I +thought no more about him. Mrs. Butts never uttered one word of reproach +to her husband. I cannot say that she loved him as she could have loved, +but she had accepted him, and she said to herself that as perhaps it was +through her lack of sympathy with him that he had strayed, it was her +duty more and more to draw him to herself. She had a divine disposition, +not infrequent amongst women, to seek in herself the reason for any wrong +which was done to her. That almost instinctive tendency in men, to +excuse, to transfer blame to others, to be angry with somebody else when +they suffer from the consequences of their own misdeeds, in her did not +exist. + +During almost the whole of her married life, before this affair between +the squire and Clem, Mrs. Butts had had much trouble, although her +trouble was, perhaps, rather the absence of joy than the presence of any +poignant grief. She was much by herself. She had never been a great +reader, but in her frequent solitude she was forced to do something in +order to obtain relief, and she naturally turned to the Bible. It would +be foolish to say that the Bible alone was to be credited with the +support she received. It may only have been the occasion for a +revelation of the strength that was in her. Reading, however, under such +circumstances, is likely to be peculiarly profitable. It is never so +profitable as when it is undertaken in order that a positive need may be +satisfied or an inquiry answered. She discovered in the Bible much that +persons to whom it is a mere literature would never find. The water of +life was not merely admirable to the eye; she drank it, and knew what a +property it possessed for quenching thirst. No doubt the thought of a +heaven hereafter was especially consolatory. She was able to endure, and +even to be happy because the vision of lengthening sorrow was bounded by +a better world beyond. “A very poor, barbarous gospel,” thinks the +philosopher who rests on his Marcus Antoninus and Epictetus. I do not +mean to say, that in the shape in which she believed this doctrine, it +was not poor and barbarous, but yet we all of us, whatever our creed may +be, must lay hold at times for salvation upon something like it. Those +who have been plunged up to the very lips in affliction know its +necessity. To such as these it is idle work for the prosperous and the +comfortable to preach satisfaction with the life that now is. There are +seasons when it is our sole resource to recollect that in a few short +years we shall be at rest. While upon this subject I may say, too, that +some injustice has been done to the Christian creed of immortality as an +influence in determining men’s conduct. Paul preached the imminent +advent of Christ and besought his disciples, therefore, to watch, and we +ask ourselves what is the moral value to us of such an admonition. But +surely if we are to have any reasons for being virtuous, this is as good +as any other. It is just as respectable to believe that we ought to +abstain from iniquity because Christ is at hand, and we expect to meet +Him, as to abstain from it because by our abstention we shall be +healthier or more prosperous. Paul had a dream—an absurd dream let us +call it—of an immediate millennium, and of the return of his Master +surrounded with divine splendour, judging mankind and adjusting the +balance between good and evil. It was a baseless dream, and the +enlightened may call it ridiculous. It is anything but that, it is the +very opposite of that. Putting aside its temporary mode of expression, +it is the hope and the prophecy of all noble hearts, a sign of their +inability to concur in the present condition of things. + +Going back to Clem’s wife; she laid hold, as I have said, upon heaven. +The thought wrought in her something more than forgetfulness of pain or +the expectation of counterpoising bliss. We can understand what this +something was, for although we know no such heaven as hers, a new temper +is imparted to us, a new spirit breathed into us; I was about to say a +new hope bestowed upon us, when we consider that we live surrounded by +the soundless depths in which the stars repose. Such a consideration has +a direct practical effect upon us, and so had the future upon the mind of +Mrs. Butts. “Why dost thou judge thy brother,” says Paul, “for we shall +all stand before the judgment-seat of God.” Paul does not mean that God +will punish him and that we may rest satisfied that our enemy will be +turned into hell fire. Rather does he mean, what we, too, feel, that, +reflecting on the great idea of God, and upon all that it involves, our +animosities are softened, and our heat against our brother is cooled. + +One or two reflections may perhaps be permitted here on this passage in +Mrs. Butts’ history. + +The fidelity of Clem’s wife to him, if not entirely due to the New +Testament, was in a great measure traceable to it. She had learned from +the Epistle to the Corinthians that charity beareth all things, believeth +all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things; and she interpreted +this to mean, not merely charity to those whom she loved by nature, but +charity to those with whom she was not in sympathy, and who even wronged +her. Christianity no doubt does teach such a charity as this, a love +which is to be: independent of mere personal likes and dislikes, a love +of the human in man. The natural man, the man of this century, +uncontrolled by Christianity, considers himself a model of what is +virtuous and heroic if he really loves his friends, and he permits all +kinds of savage antipathies to those of his fellow creatures with whom he +is not in harmony. Jesus on the other hand asks with His usual perfect +simplicity, “If ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? Do not +even the publicans the same?” It would be a great step in advance for +most of us to love anybody, and the publicans of the time of Jesus must +have been a much more Christian set than most Christians of the present +day; but that we should love those who do not love us is a height never +scaled now, except by a few of the elect in whom Christ still survives. +In the gospel of Luke, also, Mrs. Butts read that she was to hope for +nothing again from her love, and that she was to be merciful, as her +Father in heaven is merciful. That is really the expression of the +_idea_ in morality, and incalculable is the blessing that our great +religious teacher should have been bold enough to teach the idea, and not +any limitation of it. He always taught it, the inward born, the heavenly +law towards which everything strives. He always trusted it; He did not +deal in exceptions; He relied on it to the uttermost, never despairing. +This has always seemed to me to be the real meaning of the word faith. +It is permanent confidence in the idea, a confidence never to be broken +down by apparent failure, or by examples by which ordinary people prove +that qualification is necessary. It was precisely because Jesus taught +the idea, and nothing below it, that He had such authority over a soul +like my friend’s, and the effect produced by Him could not have been +produced by anybody nearer to ordinary humanity. + +It must be admitted, too, that the Calvinism of those days had a powerful +influence in enabling men and women to endure, although I object to +giving the name of Calvin to a philosophy which is a necessity in all +ages. “Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall +not fall on the ground without your Father.” This is the last word which +can be said. Nothing can go beyond it, and at times it is the only +ground which we feel does not shake under our feet. All life is summed +up, and due account is taken of it, according to its degree. Mrs. Butts’ +Calvinism, however, hardly took the usual dogmatic form. She was too +simple to penetrate the depths of metaphysical theology, and she never +would have dared to set down any of her fellow creatures as irrevocably +lost. She adapted the Calvinistic creed to something which suited her. +For example, she fully understood what St. Paul means when he tells the +Thessalonians that _because_ they were called, _therefore_ they were to +stand fast. She thought with Paul that being called; having a duty +plainly laid upon her; being bidden as if by a general to do something, +she _ought_ to stand fast; and she stood fast, supported against all +pressure by the consciousness of fulfilling the special orders of One who +was her superior. There is no doubt that this dogma of a personal +calling is a great consolation, and it is a great truth. Looking at the +masses of humanity, driven this way and that way, the Christian teaching +is apt to be forgotten that for each individual soul there is a vocation +as real as if that soul were alone upon the planet. Yet it is a fact. +We are blinded to it and can hardly believe it, because of the impotency +of our little intellects to conceive a destiny which shall take care of +every atom of life on the globe: we are compelled to think that in such +vast crowds of people as we behold, individuals must elude the eye of the +Maker, and be swept into forgetfulness. But the truth of truths is that +the mind of the universe is not our mind, or at any rate controlled by +our limitations. + +This has been a long digression which I did not intend; but I could not +help it. I was anxious to show how Mrs. Butts met her trouble through +her religion. The apostle says that “_they drank of that spiritual Rock +which followed them_, _and that Rock was Christ_.” That was true of her. +The way through the desert was not annihilated; the path remained stony +and sore to the feet, but it was accompanied to the end by a sweet stream +to which she could turn aside, and from which she could obtain +refreshment and strength. + +Just about the time that we began our meetings near Drury Lane, I heard +that Clem was dead; that he had died abroad. I knew nothing more; I +thought about him and his wife perhaps for a day, but I had parted from +both long ago, and I went on with my work. + + + + +CHAPTER V +WHAT IT ALL CAME TO + + +FOR two years or thereabouts, M’Kay and myself continued our labours in +the Drury Lane neighbourhood. There is a proverb that it is the first +step which is the most difficult in the achievement of any object, and +the proverb has been altered by ascribing the main part of the difficulty +to the last step. Neither the first nor the last has been the difficult +step with me, but rather what lies between. The first is usually helped +by the excitement and the promise of new beginnings, and the last by the +prospect of triumph; but the intermediate path is unassisted by +enthusiasm, and it is here we are so likely to faint. M’Kay nevertheless +persevered, supporting me, who otherwise might have been tempted to +despair, and at the end of the two years we were still at our posts. We +had, however, learned something. We had learned that we could not make +the slightest impression on Drury Lane proper. Now and then an idler, or +sometimes a dozen, lounged in, but what was said was strange to them; +they were out of their own world as completely as if they were in another +planet, and all our efforts to reach them by simplicity of statement and +by talking about things which we supposed would interest them utterly +failed. I did not know, till I came in actual contact with them, how far +away the classes which lie at the bottom of great cities are from those +above them; how completely they are inaccessible to motives which act +upon ordinary human beings, and how deeply they are sunk beyond ray of +sun or stars, immersed in the selfishness naturally begotten of their +incessant struggle for existence and the incessant warfare with society. +It was an awful thought to me, ever present on those Sundays, and +haunting me at other times, that men, women, and children were living in +such brutish degradation, and that as they died others would take their +place. Our civilisation seemed nothing but a thin film or crust lying +over a volcanic pit, and I often wondered whether some day the pit would +not break up through it and destroy us all. Great towns are answerable +for the creation and maintenance of the masses of dark, impenetrable, +subterranean blackguardism, with which we became acquainted. The filthy +gloom of the sky, the dirt of the street, the absence of fresh air, the +herding of the poor into huge districts which cannot be opened up by +those who would do good, are tremendous agencies of corruption which are +active at such a rate that it is appalling to reflect what our future +will be if the accumulation of population be not checked. To stand face +to face with the insoluble is not pleasant. A man will do anything +rather than confess it is beyond him. He will create pleasant fictions, +and fancy a possible escape here and there, but this problem of Drury +Lane was round and hard like a ball of adamant. The only thing I could +do was faintly, and I was about to say stupidly, hope—for I had no +rational, tangible grounds for hoping—that some force of which we are not +now aware might some day develop itself which will be able to resist and +remove the pressure which sweeps and crushes into a hell, sealed from the +upper air, millions of human souls every year in one quarter of the globe +alone. + +M’Kay’s dreams therefore were not realised, and yet it would be a mistake +to say that they ended in nothing. It often happens that a grand +attempt, although it may fail—miserably fail—is fruitful in the end and +leaves a result, not the hoped for result it is true, but one which would +never have been attained without it. A youth strives after the +impossible, and he is apt to break his heart because he has never even +touched it, but nevertheless his whole life is the sweeter for the +striving; and the archer who aims at a mark a hundred yards away will +send his arrow further than he who sets his bow and his arm for fifty +yards. So it was with M’Kay. He did not convert Drury Lane, but he +saved two or three. One man whom we came to know was a labourer in +Somerset House, a kind of coal porter employed in carrying coals into the +offices there from the cellars below, and in other menial duties. He had +about fifteen or sixteen shillings a week, and as the coals must +necessarily be in the different rooms before ten o’clock in the morning, +he began work early, and was obliged to live within an easy distance of +the Strand. This man had originally been a small tradesman in a country +town. He was honest, but he never could or never would push his trade in +any way. He was fond of all kinds of little mechanical contrivings, +disliked his shop, and ought to have been a carpenter or +cabinet-maker—not as a master but as a journeyman, for he had no ability +whatever to control men or direct large operations. He was married, and +a sense of duty to his wife—he fortunately had no children—induced him to +stand or sit behind his counter with regularity, but people would not +come to buy of him, because he never seemed to consider their buying as +any favour conferred on him; and thus he became gradually displaced by +his more energetic or more obsequious rivals. In the end he was obliged +to put up his shutters. Unhappily for him, he had never been a very +ardent attendant at any of the places of religious worship in the town, +and he had therefore no organisation to help him. Not being master of +any craft, he was in a pitiable plight, and was slowly sinking, when he +applied to the solicitor of the political party for which he had always +voted to assist him. The solicitor applied to the member, and the +member, much regretting the difficulty of obtaining places for grown-up +men, and explaining the pressure upon the Treasury, wrote to say that the +only post at his disposal was that of labourer. He would have liked to +offer a messengership, but the Treasury had hundreds of applications from +great people who wished to dispose of favourite footmen whose services +they no longer required. Our friend Taylor had by this time been brought +very low, or he would have held out for something better, but there was +nothing to be done. He was starving, and he therefore accepted; came to +London; got a room, one room only, near Clare Market, and began his new +duties. He was able to pick up a shilling or two more weekly by going on +errands for the clerks during his slack time in the day, so that +altogether on the average he made up about eighteen shillings. Wandering +about the Clare Market region on Sunday he found us out, came in, and +remained constant. Naturally, as we had so few adherents, we gradually +knew these few very intimately, and Taylor would often spend a holiday or +part of the Sunday with us. He was not eminent for anything in +particular, and an educated man, selecting as his friends those only who +stand for something, would not have taken the slightest notice of him. +He had read nothing particular, and thought nothing particular—he was +indeed one of the masses—but in this respect different, that he had not +the tendency to association, aggregation, or clanship which belong to the +masses generally. He was different, of course, in all his ways from his +neighbours born and bred to Clare Market and its alleys. Although +commonplace, he had demands made upon him for an endurance by no means +commonplace, and he had sorrows which were as exquisite as those of his +betters. He did not much resent his poverty. To that I think he would +have submitted, and in fact he did submit to it cheerfully. What rankled +in him was the brutal disregard of him at the office. He was a servant +of servants. The messengers, who themselves were exposed to all the +petty tyrannies of the clerks, and dared not reply, were Taylor’s +masters, and sought a compensation for their own serfdom by making his +ten times worse. The head messenger, who had been a butler, swore at +him, and if Taylor had “answered” he would have been reported. He had +never been a person of much importance, but at least he had been +independent, and it was a new experience for him to feel that he was a +thing fit for nothing but to be cuffed and cursed. Upon this point he +used to get eloquent—as eloquent as he could be, for he had small power +of expression, and he would describe to me the despair which came over +him down in those dark vaults at the prospect of life continuing after +this fashion, and with not the minutest gleam of light even at the very +end. Nobody ever cared to know the most ordinary facts about him. +Nobody inquired whether he was married or single; nobody troubled himself +when he was ill. If he was away, his pay was stopped; and when he +returned to work nobody asked if he was better. Who can wonder that at +first, when he was an utter stranger in a strange land, he was overcome +by the situation, and that the world was to him a dungeon worse than that +of Chillon? Who can wonder that he was becoming reckless? A little more +of such a life would have transformed him into a brute. He had not the +ability to become revolutionary, or it would have made him a conspirator. +Suffering of any kind is hard to bear, but the suffering which especially +damages character is that which is caused by the neglect or oppression of +man. At any rate it was so in Taylor’s case. I believe that he would +have been patient under any inevitable ordinance of nature, but he could +not lie still under contempt, the knowledge that to those about him he +was of less consequence than the mud under their feet. He was timid and, +after his failure as a shopkeeper, and the near approach to the +workhouse, he dreaded above everything being again cast adrift. Strange +conflict arose in him, for the insults to which he was exposed drove him +almost to madness; and yet the dread of dismissal in a moment checked him +when he was about to “fire up,” as he called it, and reduced him to a +silence which was torture. Once he was ordered to bring some coals for +the messenger’s lobby. The man who gave him the order, finding that he +was a long time bringing them, went to the top of the stairs, and bawled +after him with an oath to make haste. The reason of the delay was that +Taylor had two loads to bring up—one for somebody else. When he got to +the top of the steps, the messenger with another oath took the coals, and +saying that he “would teach him to skulk there again,” kicked the other +coal-scuttle down to the bottom. Taylor himself told me this; and yet, +although he would have rejoiced if the man had dropped down dead, and +would willingly have shot him, he was dumb. The check operated in an +instant. He saw himself without a penny, and in the streets. He went +down into the cellar, and raged and wept for an hour. Had he been a +workman, he would probably have throttled his enemy, or tried to do it, +or what is more likely, his enemy would not have dared to treat him in +such fashion, but he was powerless, and once losing his situation he +would have sunk down into the gutter, whence he would have been swept by +the parish into the indiscriminate heap of London pauperism, and carted +away to the Union, a conclusion which was worse to him than being hung. + +Another of our friends was a waiter in one of the public-houses and +chop-houses combined, of which there are so many in the Strand. He lived +in a wretched alley which ran from St. Clement’s Church to Boswell +Court—I have forgotten its name—a dark crowded passage. He was a man of +about sixty—invariably called John, without the addition of any surname. +I knew him long before we opened our room, for I was in the habit of +frequently visiting the chop-house in which he served. His hours were +incredible. He began at nine o’clock in the morning with sweeping the +dining-room, cleaning the tables and the gas globes, and at twelve +business commenced with early luncheons. Not till three-quarters of an +hour after midnight could he leave, for the house was much used by +persons who supped there after the theatres. During almost the whole of +this time he was on his legs, and very often he was unable to find two +minutes in the day in which to get his dinner. Sundays, however, were +free. John was not a head waiter, but merely a subordinate, and I never +knew why at his time of life he had not risen to a better position. He +used to say that “things had been against him,” and I had no right to +seek for further explanations. He was married, and had had three +children, of whom one only was living—a boy of ten years old, whom he +hoped to get into the public-house as a potboy for a beginning. Like +Taylor, the world had well-nigh overpowered John entirely—crushed him out +of all shape, so that what he was originally, or might have been, it was +almost impossible to tell. There was no particular character left in +him. He may once have been this or that, but every angle now was knocked +off, as it is knocked off from the rounded pebbles which for ages have +been dragged up and down the beach by the waves. For a lifetime he had +been exposed to all sorts of whims and caprices, generally speaking of +the most unreasonable kind, and he had become so trained to take +everything without remonstrance or murmuring that every cross in his life +came to him as a chop alleged by an irritated customer to be raw or done +to a cinder. Poor wretch! he had one trouble, however, which he could +not accept with such equanimity, or rather with such indifference. His +wife was a drunkard. This was an awful trial to him. The worst +consequence was that his boy knew that his mother got drunk. The +neighbours kindly enough volunteered to look after the little man when he +was not at school, and they waylaid him and gave him dinner when his +mother was intoxicated; but frequently he was the first when he returned +to find out that there was nothing for him to eat, and many a time he got +up at night as late as twelve o’clock, crawled downstairs, and went off +to his father to tell him that “she was very bad, and he could not go to +sleep.” The father, then, had to keep his son in the Strand till it was +time to close, take him back, and manage in the best way he could. Over +and over again was he obliged to sit by this wretched woman’s bedside +till breakfast time, and then had to go to work as usual. Let anybody +who has seen a case of this kind say whether the State ought not to +provide for the relief of such men as John, and whether he ought not to +have been able to send his wife away to some institution where she might +have been tended and restrained from destroying, not merely herself, but +her husband and her child. John hardly bore up under this sorrow. A man +may endure much, provided he knows that he will be well supported when +his day’s toil is over; but if the help for which he looks fails, he +falls. Oh those weary days in that dark back dining-room, from which not +a square inch of sky was visible! weary days haunted by a fear that while +he was there unknown mischief was being done! weary days, whose close +nevertheless he dreaded! Beaten down, baffled, disappointed, if we are +in tolerable health we can contrive to live on some almost impossible +chance, some most distant flicker of hope. It is astonishing how minute +a crack in the heavy uniform cloud will relieve us; but when with all our +searching we can see nothing, then at last we sink. Such was John’s case +when I first came to know him. He attracted me rather, and bit by bit he +confided his story to me. He found out that I might be trusted, and that +I could sympathise, and he told me what he had never told to anybody +before. I was curious to discover whether religion had done anything for +him, and I put the question to him in an indirect way. His answer was +that “some on ’em say there’s a better world where everything will be put +right, but somehow it seemed too good to be true.” That was his reason +for disbelief, and heaven had not the slightest effect on him. He found +out the room, and was one of our most constant friends. + +Another friend was of a totally different type. His name was Cardinal. +He was a Yorkshireman, broad-shouldered, ruddy in the face, short-necked, +inclined apparently to apoplexy, and certainly to passion. He was a +commercial traveller in the cloth trade, and as he had the southern +counties for his district, London was his home when he was not upon his +journeys. His wife was a curious contrast to him. She was dark-haired, +pinched-up, thin-lipped, and always seemed as if she suffered from some +chronic pain or gnawing—not sufficient to make her ill, but sufficient to +make her miserable. They had no children. Cardinal in early life had +been a member of an orthodox Dissenting congregation, but he had fallen +away. He had nobody to guide him, and the position into which he fell +was peculiar. He never busied himself about religion or philosophy; +indeed he had had no training which would have led him to take an +interest in abstract questions, but he read all kinds of romances and +poetry without any order and upon no system. He had no discriminating +faculty, and mixed up together the most heterogeneous mass of trumpery +novels, French translations, and the best English authors, provided only +they were unworldly or sentimental. Neither did he know how far to take +what he read and use it in his daily life. He often selected some +fantastical motive which he had found set forth as operative in one of +his heroes, and he brought it into his business, much to the astonishment +of his masters and customers. For this reason he was not stable. He +changed employers two or three times; and, so far as I could make out, +his ground of objection to each of the firms whom he left might have been +a ground of dislike in a girl to a suitor, but certainly nothing more. +During the intervals of his engagements, unless he was pressed for money, +he did nothing—not from laziness, but because he had got a notion in his +head that his mind wanted rest and reinvigoration. His habit then was to +consume the whole day—day after day—in reading or in walking out by +himself. It may easily be supposed that with a temperament like his, and +with nobody near him to take him by the hand, he made great mistakes. +His wife and he cared nothing for one another, but she was jealous to the +last degree. I never saw such jealousy. It was strange that, although +she almost hated him, she watched him with feline sharpness and patience, +and would even have killed any woman whom she knew had won his affection. +He, on the other hand, openly avowed that marriage without love was +nothing, and flaunted without the least modification the most ideal +theories as to the relation between man and woman. Not that he ever went +actually wrong. His boyish education, his natural purity, and a fear +never wholly suppressed, restrained him. He exasperated people by his +impracticability, and it must be acknowledged that it is very irritating +in a difficult complexity demanding the gravest consideration—the +balancing of this against that—to hear a man suddenly propose some naked +principle with which everybody is acquainted, and decide by it solely. I +came to know him through M’Kay, who had known him for years; but M’Kay at +last broke out against him, and called him a stupid fool when he threw up +a handsome salary and refused to serve any longer under a house which had +always treated him well, because they, moving with the times, had +determined to offer their customers a cheaper description of goods, which +Cardinal thought was dishonest. M’Kay said, and said truly, that many +poor persons would buy these goods who could buy nothing else, and that +Cardinal, before yielding to such scruples, ought to satisfy himself +that, by yielding, he would not become a burden upon others less +fanciful. This was just what happened. Cardinal could get no work again +for a long time, and had to borrow money. I was sorry; but for my part, +this and other eccentricities did not disturb my confidence in him. He +was an honest, affectionate soul, and his peculiarities were a necessary +result of the total chaos of a time without any moral guidance. With no +church, no philosophy, no religion, the wonder is that anybody on whom +use and wont relax their hold should ever do anything more than blindly +rove hither and thither, arriving at nothing. Cardinal was adrift, like +thousands and hundreds of thousands of others, and amidst the storm and +pitchy darkness of the night, thousands and hundreds of thousands of +voices offer us pilotage. It spoke well for him that he did nothing +worse than take a few useless phantoms on board which did him no harm, +and that he held fast to his own instinct for truth and goodness. I +never let myself be annoyed by what he produced to me from his books. +All that I discarded. Underneath all that was a solid worth which I +loved, and which was mostly not vocal. What was vocal in him was, I am +bound to say, not of much value. + +About the time when our room opened, Mrs. Cardinal had become almost +insupportable to her husband. Poor woman; I always pitied her; she was +alone sometimes for a fortnight at a stretch; she read nothing; there was +no child to occupy her thoughts; she knew that her husband lived in a +world into which she never entered, and she had nothing to do but to +brood over imaginary infidelities. She was literally possessed, and who +shall be hard upon her? Nobody cared for her; everybody with whom her +husband associated disliked her, and she knew perfectly well they never +asked her to their houses except for his sake. Cardinal vowed at last he +would endure her no longer, and that they must separate. He was induced +one Sunday morning, when his resolution was strong within him, and he was +just about to give effect to it, to come with us. The quiet seemed to +soothe him, and he went home with me afterwards. He was not slow to +disclose to me his miserable condition, and his resolve to change it. I +do not know now what I said, but it appeared to me that he ought not to +change it, and that change would be for him most perilous. I thought +that with a little care life might become at least bearable with his +wife; that by treating her not so much as if she were criminal, but as if +she were diseased, hatred might pass into pity, and pity into merciful +tenderness to her, and that they might dwell together upon terms not +harder than those upon which many persons who have made mistakes in youth +agree to remain with each other; terms which, after much consideration, +they adjudge it better to accept than to break loose, and bring upon +themselves and those connected with them all that open rupture involves. +The difficulty was to get Cardinal to give up his theory of what two +abstract human beings should do between whom no love exists. It seemed +to him something like atheism to forsake his clearly-discerned, simple +rule for a course which was dictated by no easily-grasped higher law, and +it was very difficult to persuade him that there is anything of equal +authority in a law less rigid in its outline. However, he went home. I +called on him some time afterwards, and saw that a peace, or at any rate +a truce, was proclaimed, which lasted up to the day of his death. M’Kay +and I agreed to make as much of Mrs. Cardinal as we could, and yielding +to urgent invitation, she came to the room. This wonderfully helped to +heal her. She began to feel that she was not overlooked, put on one +side, or despised, and the bonds which bound her constricted lips into +bitterness were loosened. + +Another friend, and the last whom I shall name, was a young man named +Clark. He was lame, and had been so from childhood. His father was a +tradesman, working hard from early morning till late at night, and +burdened with a number of children. The boy Richard, shut out from the +companionship of his fellows, had a great love of books. When he left +school his father did not know what to do with him—in fact there was only +one occupation open to him, and that was clerical work of one kind or +another. At last he got a place in a house in Fleet Street, which did a +large business in those days in sending newspapers into the country. His +whole occupation all day long was to write addresses, and for this he +received twenty-five shillings a week, his hours being from nine o’clock +till seven. The office in which he sat was crowded, and in order to +squeeze the staff into the smallest space, rent being dear, a gallery had +been run round the wall about four feet from the ceiling. This was +provided with desks and gas lamps, and up there Clark sat, artificial +light being necessary four days out of five. He came straight from the +town in which his father lived to Fleet Street, and once settled in it +there seemed no chance of change for the better. He knew what his +father’s struggles were; he could not go back to him, and he had not the +energy to attempt to lift himself. It is very doubtful too whether he +could have succeeded in achieving any improvement, whatever his energy +might have been. He had got lodgings in Newcastle Street, and to these +he returned in the evening, remaining there alone with his little +library, and seldom moving out of doors. He was unhealthy +constitutionally, and his habits contributed to make him more so. +Everything which he saw which was good seemed only to sharpen the +contrast between himself and his lot, and his reading was a curse to him +rather than a blessing. I sometimes wished that he had never inherited +any love whatever for what is usually considered to be the Best, and that +he had been endowed with an organisation coarse and commonplace, like +that of his colleagues. If he went into company which suited him, or +read anything which interested him, it seemed as if the ten hours of the +gallery in Fleet Street had been made thereby only the more +insupportable, and his habitual mood was one of despondency, so that his +fellow clerks who knew his tastes not unnaturally asked what was the use +of them if they only made him wretched; and they were more than ever +convinced that in their amusements lay true happiness. Habit, which is +the saviour of most of us, the opiate which dulls the otherwise +unbearable miseries of life, only served to make Clark more sensitive. +The monotony of that perpetual address-copying was terrible. He has told +me with a kind of shame what an effect it had upon him—that sometimes for +days he would feed upon the prospect of the most childish trifle because +it would break in some slight degree the uniformity of his toil. For +example, he would sometimes change from quill to steel pens and back +again, and he found himself actually looking forward with a kind of +joy—merely because of the variation—to the day on which he had fixed to +go back to the quill after using steel. He would determine, two or three +days beforehand, to get up earlier, and to walk to Fleet Street by way of +Great Queen Street and Lincoln’s Inn Fields, and upon this he would +subsist till the day came. He could make no longer excursions because of +his lameness. All this may sound very much like simple silliness to most +people, but those who have not been bound to a wheel do not know what +thoughts come into the head of the strongest man who is extended on it. +Clark sat side by side in his gallery with other young men of rather a +degraded type, and the confinement bred in them a filthy grossness with +which they tormented him. They excited in him loathsome images, from +which he could not free himself either by day or night. He was +peculiarly weak in his inability to cast off impressions, or to get rid +of mental pictures when once formed, and his distress at being haunted by +these hateful, disgusting thoughts was pitiable. They were in fact +almost more than thoughts, they were transportations out of himself—real +visions. It would have been his salvation if he could have been a +carpenter or a bricklayer, in country air, but this could not be. + +Clark had no power to think connectedly to a conclusion. When an idea +came into his head, he dwelt upon it incessantly, and no correction of +the false path upon which it set him was possible, because he avoided +society. Work over, he was so sick of people that he went back to +himself. So it came to pass that when brought into company, what he +believed and cherished was frequently found to be open to obvious +objection, and was often nothing better than nonsense which was rudely, +and as he himself was forced to admit, justly overthrown. He ought to +have been surrounded with intelligent friends, who would have enabled him +to see continually the other side, and who would have prevented his long +and useless wanderings. Like many other persons, too, whom I have +known—just in proportion to his lack of penetrative power was his +tendency to occupy himself with difficult questions. By a cruel destiny +he was impelled to dabble in matters for which he was totally unfitted. +He never could go beyond his author a single step, and he lost himself in +endless mazes. If he could but have been persuaded to content himself +with sweet presentations of wholesome happy existence, with stories and +with history, how much better it would have been for him! He had had no +proper training whatever for anything more, he was ignorant of the exact +meaning of the proper terminology of science, and an unlucky day it was +for him when he picked up on a bookstall some very early translation of +some German book on philosophy. One reason, as may be conjectured, for +his mistakes was his education in dissenting Calvinism, a religion which +is entirely metaphysical, and encourages, unhappily, in everybody a taste +for tremendous problems. So long as Calvinism is unshaken, the mischief +is often not obvious, because a ready solution taken on trust is +provided; but when doubts arise, the evil results become apparent, and +the poor helpless victim, totally at a loss, is torn first in this +direction and then in the other, and cannot let these questions alone. +He has been taught to believe they are connected with salvation, and he +is compelled still to busy himself with them, rather than with simple +external piety. + + + + +CHAPTER VI +DRURY LANE THEOLOGY + + +SUCH were some of our disciples. I do not think that church or chapel +would have done them much good. Preachers are like unskilled doctors +with the same pill and draught for every complaint. They do not know +where the fatal spot lies on lung or heart or nerve which robs us of +life. If any of these persons just described had gone to church or +chapel they would have heard discourses on the usual set topics, none of +which would have concerned them. Their trouble was not the forgiveness +of sins, the fallacies of Arianism, the personality of the Holy Ghost, or +the doctrine of the Eucharist. They all _wanted_ something distinctly. +They had great gaping needs which they longed to satisfy, intensely +practical and special. Some of these necessities no words could in any +way meet. It was obvious, for instance, that Clark must at once be taken +away from his gallery and his copying if he was to live—at least in +sanity. He had fortunately learned shorthand, and M’Kay got him +employment on a newspaper. His knowledge of his art was by no means +perfect at first, but he was sent to attend meetings where _verbatim_ +reports were not necessary, and he quickly advanced. Taylor, too, we +tried to remove, and we succeeded in attaching him to a large club as an +out-of-doors porter. The poor man was now at least in the open air, and +freed from insolent tyranny. This, however, was help such as anybody +might have given. The question of most importance is, What gospel had we +to give? Why, in short, did we meet on the Sunday? What was our +justification? In the first place, there was the simple quietude. The +retreat from the streets and from miserable cares into a place where +there was peace and room for reflection was something. It is all very +well for cultivated persons with libraries to scoff at religious +services. To the poor the cathedral or the church might be an immense +benefit, if only for the reason that they present a barrier to worldly +noise, and are a distinct invitation by architecture and symbolic +decoration to meditation on something beyond the business which presses +on them during the week. Poor people frequently cannot read for want of +a place in which to read. Moreover, they require to be provoked by a +stronger stimulus than that of a book. They willingly hear a man talk if +he has anything to say, when they would not care to look at what he said +if it were printed. But to come more closely to the point. Our main +object was to create in our hearers contentment with their lot; and even +some joy in it. That was our religion; that was the central thought of +all we said and did, giving shape and tendency to everything. We +admitted nothing which did not help us in that direction, and everything +which did help us. Our attempts, to any one who had not the key, may +have seemed vague and desultory. We might by a stranger have been +accused of feeble wandering, of idle dabbling, now in this subject and +now in that, but after a while he would have found that though we were +weak creatures, with no pretence to special knowledge in any subject, we +at least knew what we meant, and tried to accomplish it. For my own +part, I was happy when I had struck that path. I felt as if somehow, +after many errors, I had once more gained a road, a religion in fact, and +one which essentially was not new but old, the religion of the +Reconciliation, the reconciliation of man with God; differing from the +current creed in so far as I did not lay stress upon sin as the cause of +estrangement, but yet agreeing with it in making it my duty of duties to +suppress revolt, and to submit calmly and sometimes cheerfully to the +Creator. This surely, under a thousand disguises, has been the meaning +of all the forms of worship which we have seen in the world. Pain and +death are nothing new, and men have been driven into perplexed +scepticism, and even insurrection by them, ever since men came into +being. Always, however, have the majority, the vast majority of the +race, felt instinctively that in this scepticism and insurrection they +could not abide, and they have struggled more or less blindly after +explanation; determined not to desist till they had found it, and +reaching a result embodied in a multitude of shapes irrational and absurd +to the superficial scoffer, but of profound interest to the thoughtful. +I may observe, in passing, that this is a reason why all great religions +should be treated with respect, and in a certain sense preserved. It is +nothing less than a wicked waste of accumulated human strivings to sneer +them out of existence. They will be found, every one of them, to have +incarnated certain vital doctrines which it has cost centuries of toil +and devotion properly to appreciate. Especially is this true of the +Catholic faith, and if it were worth while, it might be shown how it is +nothing less than a divine casket of precious remedies, and if it is to +be brutally broken, it will take ages to rediscover and restore them. Of +one thing I am certain, that their rediscovery and restoration will be +necessary. I cannot too earnestly insist upon the need of our holding, +each man for himself, by some faith which shall anchor him. It must not +be taken up by chance. We must fight for it, for only so will it become +_our_ faith. The halt in indifference or in hostility is easy enough and +seductive enough. The half-hearted thinks that when he has attained that +stage he has completed the term of human wisdom. I say go on: do not +stay there; do not take it for granted that there is nothing beyond; +incessantly attempt an advance, and at last a light, dim it may be, will +arise. It will not be a completed system, perfect in all points, an +answer to all our questions, but at least it will give ground for hope. + +We had to face the trials of our friends, and we had to face death. I do +not say for an instant that we had any effectual reply to these great +arguments against us. We never so much as sought for one, knowing how +all men had sought and failed. But we were able to say there is some +compensation, that there is another side, and this is all that man can +say. No theory of the world is possible. The storm, the rain slowly +rotting the harvest, children sickening in cellars are obvious; but +equally obvious are an evening in June, the delight of men and women in +one another, in music, and in the exercise of thought. There can surely +be no question that the sum of satisfaction is increasing, not merely in +the gross but for each human being, as the earth from which we sprang is +being worked out of the race, and a higher type is being developed. I +may observe, too, that although it is usually supposed, it is erroneously +supposed, that it is pure doubt which disturbs or depresses us. Simple +suspense is in fact very rare, for there are few persons so constituted +as to be able to remain in it. It is dogmatism under the cloak of doubt +which pulls us down. It is the dogmatism of death, for example, which we +have to avoid. The open grave is dogmatic, and we say _that man has +gone_, but this is as much a transgression of the limits of certitude as +if we were to say _he is an angel in bliss_. The proper attitude, the +attitude enjoined by the severest exercise of the reason is, _I do not +know_; and in this there is an element of hope, now rising and now +falling, but always sufficient to prevent that blank despair which we +must feel if we consider it as settled that when we lie down under the +grass there is an absolute end. + +The provision in nature of infinity ever present to us is an immense +help. No man can look up to the stars at night and reflect upon what +lies behind them without feeling that the tyranny of the senses is +loosened, and the tyranny, too, of the conclusions of his logic. The +beyond and the beyond, let us turn it over as we may, let us consider it +as a child considers it, or by the light of the newest philosophy, is a +constant, visible warning not to make our minds the measure of the +universe. Underneath the stars what dreams, what conjectures arise, +shadowy enough, it is true; but one thing we cannot help believing as +irresistibly as if by geometrical deduction—that the sphere of that +understanding of ours, whose function it seems to be to imprison us, is +limited. + +Going through a churchyard one afternoon I noticed that nearly all the +people who were buried there, if the inscriptions on the tombstones might +be taken to represent the thoughts of the departed when they were alive, +had been intent solely on their own personal salvation. The question +with them all seemed to have been, shall _I_ go to heaven? Considering +the tremendous difference between heaven and hell in the popular +imagination, it was very natural that these poor creatures should be +anxious above everything to know whether they would be in hell or heaven +for ever. Surely, however, this is not the highest frame of mind, nor is +it one to be encouraged. I would rather do all I can to get out of it, +and to draw others out of it too. Our aim ought not so much to be the +salvation of this poor petty self, but of that in me which alone makes it +worth while to save me; of that alone which I hope will be saved, +immortal truth. The very centre of the existence of the ordinary +chapel-goer and church-goer needs to be shifted from self to what is +outside self, and yet is truly self, and the sole truth of self. If the +truth lives, _we_ live, and if it dies, we are dead. Our theology stands +in need of a reformation greater than that of Luther’s. It may be said +that the attempt to replace the care for self in us by a care for the +universal is ridiculous. Man cannot rise to that height. I do not +believe it. I believe we can rise to it. Every ordinary unselfish act +is a proof of the capacity to rise to it; and the mother’s denial of all +care for her own happiness, if she can but make her child happy, is a +sublime anticipation. It may be called an instinct, but in the course of +time it will be possible to develop a wider instinct in us, so that our +love for the truth shall be even maternally passionate and +self-forgetting. + +After all our searching it was difficult to find anything which, in the +case of a man like John the waiter, for example, could be of any service +to him. At his age efficient help was beyond us, and in his case the +problem presented itself in its simple nakedness. What comfort is there +discoverable for the wretched which is not based upon illusion? We could +not tell him that all he endured was right and proper. But even to him +we were able to offer something. We did all we could to soothe him. On +the Sunday, at least, he was able to find some relief from his labours, +and he entered into a different region. He came to see us in the +afternoon and evening occasionally, and brought his boy. Father and son +were pulled up out of the vault, brought into the daylight, and led into +an open expanse. We tried above everything to interest them, even in the +smallest degree, in what is universal and impersonal, feeling that in +that direction lies healing. We explained to the child as well as we +could some morsels of science, and in explaining to him we explained to +the father as well. When the anguish begotten by some outbreak on the +part of the wife more violent than usual became almost too much to bear, +we did our best to counsel, and as a last consolation we could point to +Death, divine Death, and repose. It was but for a few more years at the +utmost, and then must come a rest which no sorrow could invade. “Having +death as an ally, I do not tremble at shadows,” is an immortal quotation +from some unknown Greek author. Providence, too, by no miracle, came to +our relief. The wife died, as it was foreseen she must, and that weight +being removed, some elasticity and recoil developed itself. John’s one +thought now was for his child, and by means of the child the father +passed out of himself, and connected himself with the future. The child +did in fact teach the father exactly what we tried to teach, and taught +it with a power of conviction which never could have been produced by any +mere appeals to the reason. The father felt that he was battered, +useless, and a failure, but that in the boy there were unknown +possibilities, and that he might in after life say that it was to this +battered, useless failure of a father he owed his success. There was +nothing now that he would not do to help Tom’s education, and we joyfully +aided as best we could. So, partly I believe by us, but far more by +nature herself, John’s salvation was wrought out at least in a measure; +discord by the intervention of another note resolved itself into a kind +of harmony, and even through the skylight in the Strand a glimpse of the +azure was obtained. + +I hope my readers, if I should ever have any, will remember that what I +wish to do is to give some account of the manner in which we sought to be +of service to the small and very humble circle of persons whom we had +collected about us. I have preserved no record of anything; I am merely +putting down what now comes into my mind—the two or three articles, not +thirty-nine, nor, alas! a third of that number—which we were able to +hold. I recollect one or two more which perhaps are worth preservation. +In my younger days the aim of theologians was the justification of the +ways of God to man. They could not succeed. They succeeded no better +than ourselves in satisfying the intellect with a system. Nor does the +Christian religion profess any such satisfaction. It teaches rather the +great doctrine of a Remedy, of a Mediator; and therein it is profoundly +true. It is unphilosophical in the sense that it offers no explanation +from a single principle, and leaves the ultimate mystery as dark as +before, but it is in accordance with our intuitions. Everywhere in +nature we see exaction of penalties down to the uttermost farthing, but +following after this we discern forgiveness, obliterating and +restorative. Both tendencies exist. Nature is Rhadamanthine, and more +so, for she visits the sins of the fathers upon the children; but there +is in her also an infinite Pity, healing all wounds, softening all +calamities, ever hastening to alleviate and repair. Christianity in +strange historical fashion is an expression of nature, a projection of +her into a biography and a creed. + +We endeavoured to follow Christianity in the depth of its distinction +between right and wrong. Herein this religion is of priceless value. +Philosophy proclaims the unity of our nature. To philosophy every +passion is as natural as every act of saintlike negation, and one of the +usual effects of thinking or philosophising is to bring together all that +is apparently contrary in man, and to show how it proceeds really from +one centre. But Christianity had not to propound a theory of man; it had +to redeem the world. It laid awful stress on the duality in us, and the +stress laid on that duality is the world’s salvation. The words right +and wrong are not felt now as they were felt by Paul. They shade off one +into the other. Nevertheless, if mankind is not to be lost, the ancient +antagonism must be maintained. The shallowest of mortals is able now to +laugh at the notion of a personal devil. No doubt there is no such thing +existent; but the horror at evil which could find no other expression +than in the creation of a devil is no subject for laughter, and if it do +not in some shape or other survive, the race itself will not survive. No +religion, so far as I know, has dwelt like Christianity with such +profound earnestness on the bisection of man—on the distinction within +him, vital to the very last degree, between the higher and the lower, +heaven and hell. What utter folly is it because of an antique vesture to +condemn as effete what the vesture clothes! Its doctrine and its sacred +story are fixtures in concrete form of precious thoughts purchased by +blood and tears. + +I fancy I see the sneer of theologians and critics at our efforts. The +theologians will mock us because we had nothing better to say. I can +only reply that we did our best. We said all we knew, and we would most +thankfully have said more, had we been sure that it must be true. I +would remind, too, those of our judges who think that we were such +wretched mortals, blind leaders of the blind, that there have been long +ages during which men never pretended to understand more than we +professed to understand. To say nothing of the Jews, whose meagre system +would certainly not have been thought either satisfying or orthodox by +modern Christians, the Greeks and Romans lived in no clearer light than +that which shines on me. The critics, too, will condemn because of our +weakness; but this defect I at once concede. The severest critic could +not possibly be so severe as I am upon myself. I _know_ my failings. +He, probably, would miss many of them. But, again I urge that men are +not to be debarred by reason of weakness from doing what little good may +lie within reach of their hands. Had we attempted to save scholars and +thinkers we should have deserved the ridicule with which no doubt we +shall be visited. We aspired to save nobody. We knew no salvation +ourselves. We ventured humbly to bring a feeble ray of light into the +dwellings of two or three poor men and women; and if Prometheus, fettered +to his rock, dwelt with pride on the blind hopes which he had caused to +visit mortals, the hopes which “stopped the continued anticipation of +their destiny,” we perhaps may be pardoned if at times we thought that +what we were doing was not altogether vanity. + + + + +CHAPTER VII +QUI DEDIT IN MARI VIAM + + +FROM time to time I received a newspaper from my native town, and one +morning, looking over the advertisements, I caught sight of one which +arrested me. It was as follows:— + + “A Widow Lady desires a situation as Daily Governess to little + children. Address E. B., care of Mrs. George Andrews, Fancy Bazaar, + High Street.” + +Mrs. George Andrews was a cousin of Ellen Butts, and that this was her +advertisement I had not the slightest doubt. Suddenly, without being +able to give the least reason for it, an unconquerable desire to see her +arose within me. I could not understand it. I recollected that +memorable resolution after Miss Arbour’s story years ago. How true that +counsel of Miss Arbour’s was! and yet it had the defect of most counsel. +It was but a principle; whether it suited this particular case was the +one important point on which Miss Arbour was no authority. What _was_ it +which prompted this inexplicable emotion? A thousand things rushed +through my head without reason or order. I begin to believe that a first +love never dies. A boy falls in love at eighteen or nineteen. The +attachment comes to nothing. It is broken off for a multitude of +reasons, and he sees its absurdity. He marries afterwards some other +woman whom he even adores, and he has children for whom he spends his +life; yet in an obscure corner of his soul he preserves everlastingly the +cherished picture of the girl who first was dear to him. She, too, +marries. In process of time she is fifty years old, and he is fifty-two. +He has not seen her for thirty years or more, but he continually turns +aside into the little oratory, to gaze upon the face as it last appeared +to him when he left her at her gate and saw her no more. He inquires now +and then timidly about her whenever he gets the chance. And once in his +life he goes down to the town where she lives, solely in order to get a +sight of her without her knowing anything about it. He does not succeed, +and he comes back and tells his wife, from whom he never conceals any +secrets, that he has been away on business. I did not for a moment +confess that my love for Ellen had returned. I knew who she was and what +she was, and what had led to our separation; but nevertheless, all this +obstinately remained in the background, and all the passages of love +between us, all our kisses, and above everything, her tears at that +parting in her father’s house, thrust themselves upon me. It was a +mystery to me. What should have induced that utterly unexpected +resurrection of what I believed to be dead and buried, is beyond my +comprehension. However, the fact remains. I did not to myself admit +that this was love, but it _was_ love, and that it should have shot up +with such swift vitality merely because I had happened to see those +initials was miraculous. I pretended to myself that I should like once +more to see Mrs. Butts—perhaps she might be in want and I could help her. +I shrank from writing to her or from making myself known to her, and at +last I hit upon the expedient of answering her advertisement in a feigned +name, and requesting her to call at the King’s Arms hotel upon a +gentleman who wished to engage a widow lady to teach his children. To +prevent any previous inquiries on her part, I said that my name was +Williams, that I lived in the country at some little distance from the +town, but that I should be there on business on the day named. I took up +my quarters at the King’s Arms the night before. It seemed very strange +to be in an inn in the place in which I was born. I retired early to my +bedroom, and looked out in the clear moonlight over the river. The +landscape seemed haunted by ghosts of my former self. At one particular +point, so well known, I stood fishing. At another, equally well known, +where the water was dangerously deep, I was examining the ice; and round +the corner was the boathouse where we kept the little craft in which I +had voyaged so many hundreds of miles on excursions upwards beyond where +the navigation ends, or, still more fascinating, down to where the water +widens and sails are to be seen, and there is a foretaste of the distant +sea. It is no pleasure to me to revisit scenes in which earlier days +have been passed. I detest the sentimental melancholy which steals over +me; the sense of the lapse of time, and the reflection that so many whom +I knew are dead. I would always, if possible, spend my holiday in some +new scene, fresh to me, and full of new interest. I slept but little, +and when the morning came, instead of carrying out my purpose of +wandering through the streets, I was so sick of the mood by which I had +been helplessly overcome, that I sat at a distance from the window in the +coffee-room, and read diligently last week’s _Bell’s Weekly Messenger_. +My reading, however, was nothing. I do not suppose I comprehended the +simplest paragraph. My thoughts were away, and I watched the clock +slowly turning towards the hour when Ellen was to call. I foresaw that I +should not be able to speak to her at the inn. If I have anything +particular to say to anybody, I can always say it so much better out of +doors. I dreaded the confinement of the room, and the necessity for +looking into her face. Under the sky, and in motion, I should be more at +liberty. At last eleven struck from the church in the square, and five +minutes afterwards the waiter entered to announce Mrs. Butts. I was +therefore right, and she was “E. B.” I was sure that I should not be +recognised. Since I saw her last I had grown a beard, my hair had got a +little grey, and she was always a little short-sighted. She came in, and +as she entered she put away over her bonnet her thick black veil. Not +ten seconds passed before she was seated on the opposite side of the +table to that on which I was sitting, but I re-read in her during those +ten seconds the whole history of years. I cannot say that externally she +looked worn or broken. I had imagined that I should see her undone with +her great troubles, but to some extent, and yet not altogether, I was +mistaken. The cheek-bones were more prominent than of old, and her +dark-brown hair drawn tightly over her forehead increased the clear +paleness of the face; the just perceptible tint of colour which I +recollect being now altogether withdrawn. But she was not haggard, and +evidently not vanquished. There was even a gaiety on her face, perhaps a +trifle enforced, and although the darkness of sorrow gleamed behind it, +the sorrow did not seem to be ultimate, but to be in front of a final +background, if not of joy, at least of resignation. Her ancient levity +of manner had vanished, or at most had left nothing but a trace. I +thought I detected it here and there in a line about the mouth, and +perhaps in her walk. There was a reminiscence of it too in her clothes. +Notwithstanding poverty and distress, the old neatness—that particular +care which used to charm me so when I was little more than a child, was +there still. I was always susceptible to this virtue, and delicate hands +and feet, with delicate care bestowed thereon, were more attractive to me +than slovenly beauty. I noticed that the gloves, though mended, fitted +with the same precision, and that her dress was unwrinkled and perfectly +graceful. Whatever she might have had to endure, it had not destroyed +that self-centred satisfaction which makes life tolerable. + +I was impelled at once to say that I had to beg her pardon for asking her +there. Unfortunately I was obliged to go over to Cowston, a village +which was about three miles from the town. Perhaps she would not mind +walking part of the way with me through the meadows, and then we could +talk with more freedom, as I should not feel pressed for time. To this +arrangement she at once agreed, and dropping her thick veil over her +face, we went out. In a few minutes we were clear of the houses, and I +began the conversation. + +“Have you been in the habit of teaching?” + +“No. The necessity for taking to it has only lately arisen.” + +“What can you teach?” + +“Not much beyond what children of ten or eleven years old are expected to +know; but I could take charge of them entirely.” + +“Have you any children of your own?” + +“One.” + +“Could you take a situation as resident teacher if you have a child?” + +“I must get something to do, and if I can make no arrangement by which my +child can live with me, I shall try and place her with a friend. I may +be able to hear of some appointment as a daily governess.” + +“I should have thought that in your native town you would have been +easily able to find employment—you must be well known?” + +There was a pause, and after a moment or so she said:— + +“We were well known once, but we went abroad and lost all our money. My +husband died abroad. When I returned, I found that there was very little +which my friends could do for me. I am not accomplished, and there are +crowds of young women who are more capable than I am. Moreover, I saw +that I was becoming a burden, and people called on me rather as a matter +of duty than for any other reason. You don’t know how soon all but the +very best insensibly neglect very poor relatives if they are not gifted +or attractive. I do not wonder at being made to feel this, nor do I +blame anybody. My little girl is a cripple, my rooms are dull, and I +have nothing in me with which to amuse or entertain visitors. Pardon my +going into this detail. It was necessary to say something in order to +explain my position.” + +“May I ask what salary you will require if you live in the house?” + +“Five-and-thirty pounds a year, but I might take less if I were asked to +do so.” + +“Are you a member of the Church of England?” + +“No.” + +“To what religious body do you belong?” + +“I am an Independent, but I would go to Church if my employers wished +it.” + +“I thought the Independents objected to go to Church.” + +“They do; but I should not object, if I could hear anything at the Church +which would help me.” + +“I am rather surprised at your indifference.” + +“I was once more particular, but I have seen much suffering, and some +things which were important to me are not so now, and others which were +not important have become so.” + +I then made up a little story. My sister and I lived together. We were +about to take up our abode at Cowston, but were as yet strangers to it. +I was left a widower with two little children whom my sister could not +educate, as she could not spare the time. She would naturally have +selected the governess herself, but she was at some distance. She would +like to see Mrs. Butts before engaging her finally, but she thought that +as this advertisement presented itself, I might make some preliminary +inquiries. Perhaps, however, now that Mrs. Butts knew the facts, she +would object to living in the house. I put it in this way, feeling sure +that she would catch my meaning. + +“I am afraid that this situation will not suit me. I could not go +backwards and forwards so far every day.” + +“I understand you perfectly, and feared that this would be your decision. +But if you hesitate, I can give you the best of references. I had not +thought of that before. References of course will be required by you as +well as by me.” + +I put my hand in my pocket for my pocket-book, but I could not find it. +We had now reached a part of our road familiar enough to both of us. +Along that very path Ellen and I had walked years ago. Under those very +trees, on that very seat had we sat, and she and I were there again. All +the old confidences, confessions, tendernesses, rushed upon me. What is +there which is more potent than the recollection of past love to move us +to love, and knit love with closest bonds? Can we ever cease to love the +souls who have once shared all that we know and feel? Can we ever be +indifferent to those who have our secrets, and whose secrets we hold? As +I looked at her, I remembered what she knew about me, and what I knew +about her, and this simple thought so overmastered me, that I could hold +out no longer. I said to her that if she would like to rest for one +moment, I might be able to find my papers. We sat down together, and she +drew up her veil to read the address which I was about to give her. She +glanced at me, as I thought, with a strange expression of excited +interrogation, and something swiftly passed across her face, which warned +me that I had not a moment to lose. I took out one of my own cards, +handed it to her, and said, “Here is a reference which perhaps you may +know.” She bent over it, turned to me, fixed her eyes intently and +directly on mine for one moment, and then I thought she would have +fallen. My arm was around her in an instant, her head was on my +shoulder, and my many wanderings were over. It was broad, high, sunny +noon, the most solitary hour of the daylight in those fields. We were +roused by the distant sound of the town clock striking twelve; we rose +and went on together to Cowston by the river bank, returning late in the +evening. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII +FLAGELLUM NON APPROQUINABIT TABERNACULO TUO + + +I SUPPOSE that the reason why in novels the story ends with a marriage is +partly that the excitement of the tale ceases then, and partly also +because of a theory that marriage is an epoch, determining the career of +life after it. The epoch once announced, nothing more need be explained; +everything else follows as a matter of course. These notes of mine are +autobiographical, and not a romance. I have never known much about +epochs. I have had one or two, one specially when I first began to read +and think; but after that, if I have changed, it has been slowly and +imperceptibly. My life, therefore, is totally unfitted to be the basis +of fiction. My return to Ellen, and our subsequent marriage, were only +partially an epoch. A change had come, but it was one which had long +been preparing. Ellen’s experiences had altered her position, and mine +too was altered. She had been driven into religion by trouble, and +knowing nothing of criticism or philosophy, retained the old forms for +her religious feeling. But the very quickness of her emotion caused her +to welcome all new and living modes of expressing it. It is only when +feeling has ceased to accompany a creed that it becomes fixed, and verbal +departures from it are counted heresy. I too cared less for argument, +and it even gave me pleasure to talk in her dialect, so familiar to me, +but for so many years unused. + +It was now necessary for me to add to my income. I had nothing upon +which to depend save my newspaper, which was obviously insufficient. At +last, I succeeded in obtaining some clerical employment. For no other +work was I fit, for my training had not been special in any one +direction. My hours were long, from ten in the morning till seven in the +evening, and as I was three miles distant from the office, I was really +away from home for eleven hours every day, excepting on Sundays. I began +to calculate that my life consisted of nothing but the brief spaces +allowed to me for rest, and these brief spaces I could not enjoy because +I dwelt upon their brevity. There was some excuse for me. Never could +there be any duty incumbent upon man much more inhuman and devoid of +interest than my own. How often I thought about my friend Clark, and his +experiences became mine. The whole day I did nothing but write, and what +I wrote called forth no single faculty of the mind. Nobody who has not +tried such an occupation can possibly forecast the strange habits, +humours, fancies, and diseases which after a time it breeds. I was shut +up in a room half below the ground. In this room were three other men +besides myself, two of them between fifty and sixty, and one about three +or four-and-twenty. All four of us kept books or copied letters from ten +to seven, with an interval of three-quarters of an hour for dinner. In +all three of these men, as in the case of Clark’s companions, there had +been developed, partly I suppose by the circumstance of enforced idleness +of brain, the most loathsome tendency to obscenity. This was the one +subject which was common ground, and upon which they could talk. It was +fostered too by a passion for beer, which was supplied by the publican +across the way, who was perpetually travelling to and fro with cans. My +horror when I first found out into what society I was thrust was +unspeakable. There was a clock within a hundred yards of my window which +struck the hours and quarters. How I watched that clock! My spirits +rose or fell with each division of the day. From ten to twelve there was +nothing but gloom. By half-past twelve I began to discern dinner time, +and the prospect was brighter. After dinner there was nothing to be done +but doggedly to endure until five, and at five I was able to see over the +distance from five to seven. My disgust at my companions, however, came +to be mixed with pity. I found none of them cruel, and I received many +little kindnesses from them. I discovered that their trade was largely +answerable for the impurity of thought and speech which so shocked me. +Its monotony compelled some countervailing stimulus, and as they had +never been educated to care for anything in particular, they found the +necessary relief in sensuality. At first they “chaffed” and worried me a +good deal because of my silence, but at last they began to think I was +“religious,” and then they ceased to torment me. I rather encouraged +them in the belief that I had a right to exemption from their +conversation, and I passed, I believe, for a Plymouth brother. The only +thing which they could not comprehend was that I made no attempt to +convert them. + +The whole establishment was under the rule of a deputy-manager, who was +the terror of the place. He was tall, thin, and suffered occasionally +from spitting of blood, brought on no doubt from excitement. He was the +strangest mixture of exactitude and passion. He had complete mastery +over every detail of the business, and he never blundered. All his work +was thorough, down to the very bottom, and he had the most intolerant +hatred of everything which was loose and inaccurate. He never passed a +day without flaming out into oaths and curses against his subordinates, +and they could not say in his wildest fury that his ravings were beside +the mark. He was wrong in his treatment of men—utterly wrong—but his +facts were always correct. I never saw anybody hated as he was, and the +hatred against him was the more intense because nobody could convict him +of a mistake. He seemed to enjoy a storm, and knew nothing whatever of +the constraints which with ordinary men prevent abusive and brutal +language to those around them. Some of his clerks suffered greatly from +him, and he almost broke down two or three from the constant nervous +strain upon them produced by fear of his explosions. For my own part, +although I came in for a full share of his temper, I at once made up my +mind as soon as I discovered what he was, not to open my lips to him +except under compulsion. My one object now was to get a living. I +wished also to avoid the self-mortification which must ensue from +altercation. I dreaded, as I have always dreaded beyond what I can tell, +the chaos and wreck which, with me, follows subjugation by anger, and I +held to my resolve under all provocation. It was very difficult, but how +many times I have blessed myself for adhesion to it. Instead of going +home undone with excitement, and trembling with fear of dismissal, I have +walked out of my dungeon having had to bite my lips till the blood came, +but still conqueror, and with peace of mind. + +Another stratagem of defence which I adopted at the office was never to +betray to a soul anything about myself. Nobody knew anything about me, +whether I was married or single, where I lived, or what I thought upon a +single subject of any importance. I cut off my office life in this way +from my life at home so completely that I was two selves, and my true +self was not stained by contact with my other self. It was a comfort to +me to think the moment the clock struck seven that my second self died, +and that my first self suffered nothing by having anything to do with it. +I was not the person who sat at the desk downstairs and endured the +abominable talk of his colleagues and the ignominy of serving such a +chief. I knew nothing about him. I was a citizen walking London +streets; I had my opinions upon human beings and books; I was on equal +terms with my friends; I was Ellen’s husband; I was, in short, a man. By +this scrupulous isolation, I preserved myself, and the clerk was not +debarred from the domain of freedom. + +It is very terrible to think that the labour by which men are to live +should be of this order. The ideal of labour is that it should be +something in which we can take an interest and even a pride. Immense +masses of it in London are the merest slavery, and it is as mechanical as +the daily journey of the omnibus horse. There is no possibility of +relieving it, and all the ordinary copybook advice of moralists and poets +as to the temper in which we should earn our bread is childish nonsense. +If a man is a painter, or a physician, or a barrister, or even a +tradesman, well and good. The maxims of authors may be of some service +to him, and he may be able to exemplify them; but if he is a copying +clerk they are an insult, and he can do nothing but arch his back to bear +his burden and find some compensation elsewhere. True it is, that +beneficent Nature here, as always, is helpful. Habit, after a while, +mitigated much of the bitterness of destiny. The hard points of the +flint became smoothed and worn away by perpetual tramping over them, so +that they no longer wounded with their original sharpness; and the sole +of the foot was in time provided with a merciful callosity. Then, too, +there was developed an appetite which was voracious for all that was +best. Who shall tell the revulsion on reaching home, which I should +never have known had I lived a life of idleness! Ellen was fond of +hearing me read, and with a little care I was able to select what would +bear reading—dramas, for example. She liked the reading for the +reading’s sake, and she liked to know that what I thought was +communicated to her; that she was not excluded from the sphere in which I +lived. Of the office she never heard a word, and I never would tell her +anything about it; but there was scarcely a single book in my possession +which could be read aloud, that we did not go through together in this +way. I don’t prescribe this kind of life to everybody. Some of my best +friends, I know, would find it intolerable, but it suited us. Philosophy +and religion I did not touch. It was necessary to choose themes with +varying human interest, such as the best works of fiction, a play, or a +poem; and these perhaps, on the whole, did me more good at that time than +speculation. Oh, how many times have I left my office humiliated by some +silently endured outbreak on the part of my master, more galling because +I could not put it aside as altogether gratuitous; and in less than an +hour it was two miles away, and I was myself again. If a man wants to +know what the potency of love is, he must be a menial; he must be +despised. Those who are prosperous and courted cannot understand its +power. Let him come home after he has suffered what is far worse than +hatred—the contempt of a superior, who knows that he can afford to be +contemptuous, seeing that he can replace his slave at a moment’s notice. +Let him be trained by his tyrant to dwell upon the thought that he +belongs to the vast crowd of people in London who are unimportant; almost +useless; to whom it is a charity to offer employment; who are conscious +of possessing no gift which makes them of any value to anybody, and he +will then comprehend the divine efficacy of the affection of that woman +to whom he is dear. God’s mercy be praised ever more for it! I cannot +write poetry, but if I could, no theme would tempt me like that of love +to such a person as I was—not love, as I say again, to the hero, but love +to the Helot. Over and over again, when I have thought about it, I have +felt my poor heart swell with a kind of uncontrollable fervour. I have +often, too, said to myself that this love is no delusion. If we were to +set it down as nothing more than a merciful cheat on the part of the +Creator, however pleasant it might be, it would lose its charm. If I +were to think that my wife’s devotion to me is nothing more than the +simple expression of a necessity to love somebody, that there is nothing +in me which justifies such devotion, I should be miserable. Rather, I +take it, is the love of woman to man a revelation of the relationship in +which God stands to him—of what _ought_ to be, in fact. In the love of a +woman to the man who is of no account God has provided us with a true +testimony of what is in His own heart. I often felt this when looking at +myself and at Ellen. “What is there in me?” I have said, “is she not the +victim of some self-created deception?” and I was wretched till I +considered that in her I saw the Divine Nature itself, and that her +passion was a stream straight from the Highest. The love of woman is, in +other words, a living witness never failing of an actuality in God which +otherwise we should never know. This led me on to connect it with +Christianity; but I am getting incoherent and must stop. + +My employment now was so incessant, for it was still necessary that I +should write for my newspaper—although my visits to the House of Commons +had perforce ceased—that I had no time for any schemes or dreams such as +those which had tormented me when I had more leisure. In one respect +this was a blessing. Destiny now had prescribed for me. I was no longer +agitated by ignorance of what I ought to do. My present duty was +obviously to get my own living, and having got that, I could do little +besides save continue the Sundays with M’Kay. + +We were almost entirely alone. We had no means of making any friends. +We had no money, and no gifts of any kind. We were neither of us witty +nor attractive, but I have often wondered, nevertheless, what it was +which prevented us from obtaining acquaintance with persons who thronged +to houses in which I could see nothing worth a twopenny omnibus fare. +Certain it is, that we went out of our way sometimes to induce people to +call upon us whom we thought we should like; but, if they came once or +twice, they invariably dropped off, and we saw no more of them. This +behaviour was so universal that, without the least affectation, I +acknowledge there must be something repellent in me, but what it is I +cannot tell. That Ellen was the cause of the general aversion, it is +impossible to believe. The only theory I have is, that partly owing to a +constant sense of fatigue, due to imperfect health, and partly to chafing +irritation at mere gossip, although I had no power to think of anything +better, or say anything better myself, I was avoided both by the +commonplace and those who had talent. Commonplace persons avoided me +because I did not chatter, and persons of talent because I stood for +nothing. “There was nothing in me.” We met at M’Kay’s two gentlemen +whom we thought we might invite to our house. One of them was an +antiquarian. He had discovered in an excavation in London some Roman +remains. This had led him on to the study of the position and boundaries +of the Roman city. He had become an authority upon this subject, and had +lectured upon it. He came; but as we were utterly ignorant, and could +not, with all our efforts, manifest any sympathy which he valued at the +worth of a pin, he soon departed, and departed for ever. The second was +a student of Elizabethan literature, and I rashly concluded at once that +he must be most delightful. He likewise came. I showed him my few poor +books, which he condemned, and I found that such observations as I could +make he considered as mere twaddle. I knew nothing, or next to nothing, +about the editions or the curiosities, or the proposed emendations of +obscure passages, and he, too, departed abruptly. I began to think after +he had gone that my study of Shakespeare was mere dilettantism but I +afterwards came to the conclusion that if a man wishes to spoil himself +for Shakespeare, the best thing he can do is to turn Shakespearian +critic. + +My worst enemy at this time was ill health, and it was more distressing +than it otherwise would have been, because I had such responsibilities +upon me. When I lived alone I knew that if anything should happen to me +it would be of no particular consequence, but now whenever I felt sick I +was anxious on account of Ellen. What would become of her—this was the +thought which kept me awake night after night when the terrors of +depression were upon me, as they often were. But still, terrors with +growing years had lost their ancient strength. My brain and nerves were +quiet compared with what they were in times gone by, and I had gradually +learned the blessed lesson which is taught by familiarity with sorrow, +that the greater part of what is dreadful in it lies in the imagination. +The true Gorgon head is seldom seen in reality. That it exists I do not +doubt, but it is not so commonly visible as we think. Again, as we get +older we find that all life is given us on conditions of uncertainty, and +yet we walk courageously on. The labourer marries and has children, when +there is nothing but his own strength between him and ruin. A million +chances are encountered every day, and any one of the million accidents +which might happen would cripple him or kill him, and put into the +workhouse those who depend upon him. Yet he treads his path undisturbed. +Life to all of us is a narrow plank placed across a gulf, which yawns on +either side, and if we were perpetually looking down into it we should +fall. So at last, the possibility of disaster ceased to affright me. I +had been brought off safely so many times when destruction seemed +imminent, that I grew hardened, and lay down quietly at night, although +the whim of a madman might to-morrow cast me on the pavement. +Frequently, as I have said, I could not do this, but I strove to do it, +and was able to do it when in health. + +I tried to think about nothing which expressed whatever in the world may +be insoluble or simply tragic. A great change is just beginning to come +over us in this respect. So many books I find are written which aim +merely at new presentation of the hopeless. The contradictions of fate, +the darkness of death, the fleeting of man over this brief stage of +existence, whence we know not, and whither we know not, are favourite +subjects with writers who seem to think that they are profound, because +they can propose questions which cannot be answered. There is really +more strength of mind required for resolving the commonest difficulty +than is necessary for the production of poems on these topics. The +characteristic of so much that is said and written now is melancholy; and +it is melancholy, not because of any deeper acquaintance with the secrets +of man than that which was possessed by our forefathers, but because it +is easy to be melancholy, and the time lacks strength. + +As I am now setting down, without much order or connection, the lessons +which I had to learn, I may perhaps be excused if I add one or two +others. I can say of them all, that they are not book lessons. They +have been taught me by my own experience, and as a rule I have always +found that in my own most special perplexities I got but little help from +books or other persons. I had to find out for myself what was for me the +proper way of dealing with them. + +My love for Ellen was great, but I discovered that even such love as this +could not be left to itself. It wanted perpetual cherishing. The lamp, +if it was to burn brightly, required daily trimming, for people became +estranged and indifferent, not so much by open quarrel or serious +difference, as by the intervention of trifles which need but the +smallest, although continuous effort for their removal. The true wisdom +is to waste no time over them, but to eject them at once. Love, too, +requires that the two persons who love one another shall constantly +present to one another what is best in them, and to accomplish this, +deliberate purpose, and even struggle, are necessary. If through relapse +into idleness we do not attempt to bring soul and heart into active +communion day by day, what wonder if this once exalted relationship +become vulgar and mean? + +I was much overworked. It was not the work itself which was such a +trial, but the time it consumed. At best, I had but a clear space of an +hour, or an hour and a half at home, and to slave merely for this seemed +such a mockery! Day after day sped swiftly by, made up of nothing but +this infernal drudgery, and I said to myself—Is this life? But I made up +my mind that _never would I give myself tongue_. I clapped a muzzle on +my mouth. Had I followed my own natural bent, I should have become +expressive about what I had to endure, but I found that expression reacts +on him who expresses and intensifies what is expressed. If we break out +into rhetoric over a toothache, the pangs are not the easier, but the +worse to be borne. + +I naturally contracted a habit of looking forward from the present moment +to one beyond. The whole week seemed to exist for the Sunday. On Monday +morning I began counting the hours till Sunday should arrive. The +consequence was, that when it came, it was not enjoyed properly, and I +wasted it in noting the swiftness of its flight. Oh, how absurd is man! +If we were to reckon up all the moments which we really enjoy for their +own sake, how few should we find them to be! The greatest part, far the +greatest part, of our lives is spent in dreaming over the morrow, and +when it comes, it, too, is consumed in the anticipation of a brighter +morrow, and so the cheat is prolonged, even to the grave. This tendency, +unconquerable though it may appear to be, can to a great extent at any +rate, be overcome by strenuous discipline. I tried to blind myself to +the future, and many and many a time, as I walked along that dreary New +Road or Old St. Pancras Road, have I striven to compel myself not to look +at the image of Hampstead Heath or Regent’s Park, as yet six days in +front of me, but to get what I could out of what was then with me. + +The instinct which leads us perpetually to compare what we are with what +we might be is no doubt of enormous value, and is the spring which +prompts all action, but, like every instinct, it is the source of +greatest danger. I remember the day and the very spot on which it +flashed into me, like a sudden burst of the sun’s rays, that I had no +right to this or that—to so much happiness, or even so much virtue. What +title-deeds could I show for such a right? Straightway it seemed as if +the centre of a whole system of dissatisfaction were removed, and as if +the system collapsed. God, creating from His infinite resources a whole +infinitude of beings, had created me with a definite position on the +scale, and that position only could I claim. Cease the trick of +contrast. If I can by any means get myself to consider myself alone +without reference to others, discontent will vanish. I walk this Old St. +Pancras Road on foot—another rides. Keep out of view him who rides and +all persons riding, and I shall not complain that I tramp in the wet. So +also when I think how small and weak I am. + +How foolish it is to try and cure by argument what time will cure so +completely and so gently if left to itself. As I get older, the anxiety +to prove myself right if I quarrel dies out. I hold my tongue and time +vindicates me, if it is possible to vindicate me, or convicts me if I am +wrong. Many and many a debate too which I have had with myself alone has +been settled in the same way. The question has been put aside and has +lost its importance. The ancient Church thought, and seriously enough, +no doubt, that all the vital interests of humanity were bound up with the +controversies upon the Divine nature; but the centuries have rolled on, +and who cares for those controversies now. The problems of death and +immortality once upon a time haunted me so that I could hardly sleep for +thinking about them. I cannot tell how, but so it is, that at the +present moment, when I am years nearer the end, they trouble me but very +little. If I could but bury and let rot things which torment me and come +to no settlement—if I could always do this—what a blessing it would be. + + + + +CHAPTER IX +HOLIDAYS + + +I HAVE said that Ellen had a child by her first husband. Marie, for that +was her name, was now ten years old. She was like neither her mother nor +father, and yet was _shot_ as it were with strange gleams which reminded +me of her paternal grandmother for a moment, and then disappeared. She +had rather coarse dark hair, small black eyes, round face, and features +somewhat blunt or blurred, the nose in particular being so. She had a +tendency to be stout. For books she did not care, and it was with the +greatest difficulty we taught her to read. She was not orderly or +careful about her person, and in this respect was a sore +disappointment—not that she was positively careless, but she took no +pride in dress, nor in keeping her room and her wardrobe neat. She was +fond of bright colours, which was another trial to Ellen, who disliked +any approach to gaudiness. She was not by any means a fool, and she had +a peculiarly swift mode of expressing herself upon persons and things. A +stranger looking at her would perhaps have adjudged her inclined to +sensuousness, and dull. She was neither one nor the other. She ate +little, although she was fond of sweets. Her rather heavy face, with no +clearly cut outline in it, was not the typical face for passion; but she +was capable of passion to an extraordinary degree, and what is more +remarkable, it was not explosive passion, or rather it was not passion +which she suffered to explode. I remember once when she was a little +mite she was asked out somewhere to tea. She was dressed and ready, but +it began to rain fast, and she was told she could not go. She besought, +but it was in vain. We could not afford cabs, and there was no omnibus. +Marie, finding all her entreaties were useless, quietly walked out of the +room; and after some little time her mother, calling her and finding she +did not come, went to look for her. She had gone into the back-yard, and +was sitting there in the rain by the side of the water-butt. She was +soaked, and her best clothes were spoiled. I must confess that I did not +take very kindly to her. I was irritated at her slowness in learning; it +was, in fact, painful to be obliged to teach her. I thought that perhaps +she might have some undeveloped taste for music, but she showed none, and +our attempts to get her to sing ordinary melodies were a failure. She +was more or less of a locked cabinet to me. I tried her with the two or +three keys which I had, but finding that none of them fitted, I took no +more pains about her. + +One Sunday we determined upon a holiday. It was a bold adventure for us, +but we had made up our minds. There was an excursion train to Hastings, +and accordingly Ellen, Marie, and myself were at London Bridge Station +early in the morning. It was a lovely summer’s day in mid-July. The +journey down was uncomfortable enough in consequence of the heat and +dust, but we heeded neither one nor the other in the hope of seeing the +sea. We reached Hastings at about eleven o’clock, and strolled westwards +towards Bexhill. Our pleasure was exquisite. Who can tell, save the +imprisoned Londoner, the joy of walking on the clean sea-sand! What a +delight that was, to say nothing of the beauty of the scenery! To be +free of the litter and filth of a London suburb, of its broken hedges, +its brickbats, its torn advertisements, its worn and trampled grass in +fields half given over to the speculative builder: in place of this, to +tread the immaculate shore over which breathed a wind not charged with +soot; to replace the dull, shrouding obscurity of the smoke by a distance +so distinct that the masts of the ships whose hulls were buried below the +horizon were visible—all this was perfect bliss. It was not very poetic +bliss, perhaps; but nevertheless it is a fact that the cleanness of the +sea and the sea air was as attractive to us as any of the sea attributes. +We had a wonderful time. Only in the country is it possible to note the +change of morning into mid-day, of mid-day into afternoon, and of +afternoon into evening; and it is only in the country, therefore, that a +day seems stretched out into its proper length. We had brought all our +food with us, and sat upon the shore in the shadow of a piece of the +cliff. A row of heavy white clouds lay along the horizon almost +unchangeable and immovable, with their summit-lines and the part of the +mass just below them steeped in sunlight. The level opaline water +differed only from a floor by a scarcely perceptible heaving motion, +which broke into the faintest of ripples at our feet. So still was the +great ocean, so quietly did everything lie in it, that the wavelets which +licked the beach were as pure and bright as if they were a part of the +mid-ocean depths. About a mile from us, at one o’clock, a long row of +porpoises appeared, showing themselves in graceful curves for +half-an-hour or so, till they went out farther to sea off Fairlight. +Some fishing-boats were becalmed just in front of us. Their shadows +slept, or almost slept, upon the water, a gentle quivering alone showing +that it was not complete sleep, or if sleep, that it was sleep with +dreams. The intensity of the sunlight sharpened the outlines of every +little piece of rock, and of the pebbles, in a manner which seemed +supernatural to us Londoners. In London we get the heat of the sun, but +not his light, and the separation of individual parts into such vivid +isolation was so surprising that even Marie noticed it, and said it “all +seemed as if she were looking through a glass.” It was perfect—perfect +in its beauty—and perfect because, from the sun in the heavens down to +the fly with burnished wings on the hot rock, there was nothing out of +harmony. Everything breathed one spirit. Marie played near us; Ellen +and I sat still, doing nothing. We wanted nothing, we had nothing to +achieve; there were no curiosities to be seen, there was no particular +place to be reached, no “plan of operations,” and London was forgotten +for the time. It lay behind us in the north-west, and the cliff was at +the back of us shutting out all thought of it. No reminiscences and no +anticipations disturbed us; the present was sufficient, and occupied us +totally. + +I should like, if I could, to write an essay upon the art of enjoying a +holiday. It is sad to think how few people know how to enjoy one, +although they are so precious. We do not sufficiently consider that +enjoyment of every kind is an art carefully to be learnt, and specially +the art of making the most of a brief space set apart for pleasure. It +is foolish, for example, if a man, city bred, has but twelve hours before +him, to spend more of it in eating and drinking than is necessary. +Eating and drinking produce stupidity, at least in some degree, which may +just as well be reserved for town. It is foolish also to load the twelve +hours with a task—so much to be done. The sick person may perhaps want +exercise, but to the tolerably healthy the best of all recreation is the +freedom from fetters even when they are self-imposed. + +Our train homewards was due at Bexhill a little after seven. By five +o’clock a change gradual but swift was observed. The clouds which had +charmed us all through the morning and afternoon were in reality +thunder-clouds, which woke up like a surprised army under perfect +discipline, and moved magnificently towards us. Already afar off we +heard the softened echoing roll of the thunder. Every now and then we +saw a sharp thrust of lightning down into the water, and shuddered when +we thought that perhaps underneath that stab there might be a ship with +living men. The battle at first was at such a distance that we watched +it with intense and solemn delight. As yet not a breath of air stirred, +but presently, over in the south-east, a dark ruffled patch appeared on +the horizon, and we agreed that it was time to go. The indistinguishable +continuous growl now became articulated into distinct crashes. I had +miscalculated the distance to the station, and before we got there the +rain, skirmishing in advance, was upon us. We took shelter in a cottage +for a moment in order that Ellen might get a glass of water—bad-looking +stuff it was, but she was very thirsty—and put on her cloak. We then +started again on our way. We reached the station at about half-past six, +before the thunder was overhead, but not before Ellen had got wet, +despite all my efforts to protect her. She was also very hot from +hurrying, and yet there was nothing to be done but to sit in a kind of +covered shed till the train came up. The thunder and lightning were, +however, so tremendous, that we thought of nothing else. When they were +at their worst, the lightning looked like the upset of a cauldron of +white glowing metal—with such strength, breadth, and volume did it +descend. Just as the train arrived, the roar began to abate, and in +about half-an-hour it had passed over to the north, leaving behind the +rain, cold and continuous, which fell all round us from a dark, heavy, +grey sky. The carnage in which we were was a third-class, with seats +arranged parallel to the sides. It was crowded, and we were obliged to +sit in the middle, exposed to the draught which the tobacco smoke made +necessary. Some of the company were noisy, and before we got to Red Hill +became noisier, as the brandy-flasks which had been well filled at +Hastings began to work. Many were drenched, and this was an excuse for +much of the drinking; although for that matter, any excuse or none is +generally sufficient. At Red Hill we were stopped by other trains, and +before we came to Croydon we were an hour late. We had now become +intolerably weary. The songs were disgusting, and some of the women who +were with the men had also been drinking, and behaved in a manner which +it was not pleasant that Ellen and Marie should see. The carriage was +lighted fortunately by one dim lamp only which hung in the middle, and I +succeeded at last in getting seats at the further end, where there was a +knot of more decent persons who had huddled up there away from the +others. All the glory of the morning was forgotten. Instead of three +happy, exalted creatures, we were three dejected, shivering mortals, half +poisoned with foul air and the smell of spirits. We crawled up to London +Bridge at the slowest pace, and, finally, the railway company discharged +us on the platform at ten minutes past eleven. Not a place in any +omnibus could be secured, and we therefore walked for a mile or so till I +saw a cab, which—unheard-of expense for me—I engaged, and we were landed +at our own house exactly at half-past twelve. The first thing to be done +was to get Marie to bed. She was instantly asleep, and was none the +worse for her journey. With Ellen the case was different. She could not +sleep, and the next morning was feverish. She insisted that it was +nothing more than a bad cold, and would on no account permit me even to +give her any medicine. She would get up presently, and she and Marie +could get on well enough together. But when I reached home on Monday +evening, Ellen was worse, and was still in bed. + +I sent at once for the doctor, who would give no opinion for a day or +two, but meanwhile directed that she was to remain where she was, and +take nothing but the lightest food. Tuesday night passed, and the fever +still increased. I had become very anxious, but I dared not stay with +her, for I knew not what might happen if I were absent from my work. I +was obliged to try and think of somebody who would come and help us. Our +friend Taylor, who once was the coal-porter at Somerset House, came into +my mind. He, as I have said when talking about him, was married, but had +no children. To him accordingly I went. I never shall forget the +alacrity with which he prompted his wife to go, and with which she +consented. I was shut up in my own sufferings, but I remember a flash of +joy that all our efforts in our room had not been in vain. I was +delighted that I had secured assistance, but I do believe the uppermost +thought was delight that we had been able to develop gratitude and +affection. Mrs. Taylor was an “ordinary woman.” She was about fifty, +rather stout, and entirely uneducated. But when she took charge at our +house, all her best qualities found expression. It is true enough, +_omnium consensu capax imperii nisi imperasset_, but it is equally true +that under the pressure of trial and responsibility we are often stronger +than when there is no pressure. Many a man will acknowledge that in +difficulty he has surprised himself by a resource and coolness which he +never suspected before. Mrs. Taylor I always thought to be rather weak +and untrustworthy, but I found that when _weight_ was placed upon her, +she was steady as a rock, a systematic and a perfect manager. There was +no doubt in a very short time as to the nature of the disease. It was +typhoid fever, the cause probably being the impure water drunk as we were +coming home. I have no mind to describe what Ellen suffered. Suffice it +to say, that her treatment was soon reduced to watching her every minute +night and day, and administering small quantities of milk. Her +prostration and emaciation were excessive, and without the most constant +attention she might at any moment have slipped out of our hands. I was +like a man shipwrecked and alone in a polar country, whose existence +depends upon one spark of fire, which he tries to cherish, left +glimmering in a handful of ashes. Oh those days, prolonged to weeks, +during which that dreadful struggle lasted—days swallowed up with one +sole, intense, hungry desire that her life might be spared!—days filled +with a forecast of the blackness and despair before me if she should +depart. I tried to obtain release from the office. The answer was that +nobody could of course prevent my being away, but that it was not usual +for a clerk to be absent merely because his wife was not well. The brute +added with a sneer that a wife was “a luxury” which he should have +thought I could hardly afford. We divided between us, however, at home +the twenty-four hours during which we stood sentinels against death, and +occasionally we were relieved by one or two friends. I went on duty from +about eight in the evening till one in the morning, and was then relieved +by Mrs. Taylor, who remained till ten or eleven. She then went to bed, +and was replaced by little Marie. What a change came over that child! I +was amazed at her. All at once she seemed to have found what she was +born to do. The key had been discovered, which unlocked and revealed +what there was in her, of which hitherto I had been altogether unaware. +Although she was so little, she became a perfect nurse. Her levity +disappeared; she was grave as a matron, moved about as if shod in felt, +never forgot a single direction, and gave proper and womanly answers to +strangers who called. Faculties unsuspected grew almost to full height +in a single day. Never did she relax during the whole of that dreadful +time, or show the slightest sign of discontent. She sat by her mother’s +side, intent, vigilant; and she had her little dinner prepared and taken +up into the sickroom by Mrs. Taylor before she went to bed. I remember +once going to her cot in the night, as she lay asleep, and almost +breaking my heart over her with remorse and thankfulness—remorse, that I, +with blundering stupidity, had judged her so superficially; and +thankfulness, that it had pleased God to present to me so much of His own +divinest grace. Fool that I was, not to be aware that messages from Him +are not to be read through the envelope in which they are enclosed. I +never should have believed, if it had not been for Marie, that any +grown-up man could so love a child. Such love, I should have said, was +only possible between man and woman, or, perhaps, between man and man. +But now I doubt whether a love of that particular kind could be felt +towards any grown-up human being, love so pure, so imperious, so awful. +My love to Marie was love of God Himself as He is—an unrestrained +adoration of an efflux from Him, adoration transfigured into love, +because the revelation had clothed itself with a child’s form. It was, +as I say, the love of God as He is. It was not necessary, as it so often +is necessary, to qualify, to subtract, to consider the other side, to +deplore the obscurity or the earthly contamination with which the Word is +delivered to us. This was the Word itself, without even consciousness on +the part of the instrument selected for its vocalisation. I may appear +extravagant, but I can only put down what I felt and still feel. I +appeal, moreover, to Jesus Himself for justification. I had seen the +kingdom of God through a little child. I, in fact, have done nothing +more than beat out over a page in my own words what passed through His +mind when He called a little child and set him in the midst of His +disciples. How I see the meaning of those words now! and so it is that a +text will be with us for half a lifetime, recognised as great and good, +but not penetrated till the experience comes round to us in which it was +born. + +Six weeks passed before the faint blue point of light which flickered on +the wick began to turn white and show some strength. At last, however, +day by day, we marked a slight accession of vitality which increased with +change of diet. Every evening when I came home I was gladdened by the +tidings which showed advance, and Ellen, I believe, was as much pleased +to see how others rejoiced over her recovery as she was pleased for her +own sake. She, too, was one of those creatures who always generously +admit improvement. For my own part, I have often noticed that when I +have been ill, and have been getting better, I have refused to +acknowledge it, and that it has been an effort to me to say that things +were not at their worst. She, however, had none of this niggardly +baseness, and always, if only for the sake of her friends, took the +cheerful side. Mrs. Taylor now left us. She left us a friend whose +friendship will last, I hope, as long as life lasts. She had seen all +our troubles and our poverty: we knew that she knew all about us: she had +helped us with the most precious help—what more was there necessary to +knit her to us?—and it is worth noting that the assistance which she +rendered, and her noble self-sacrifice, so far from putting us, in her +opinion, in her debt, only seemed to her a reason why she should be more +deeply attached to us. + +It was late in the autumn before Ellen had thoroughly recovered, but at +last we said that she was as strong as she was before, and we determined +to celebrate our deliverance by one more holiday before the cold weather +came. It was again Sunday—a perfectly still, warm, autumnal day, with a +high barometer and the gentlest of airs from the west. The morning in +London was foggy, so much so that we doubted at first whether we should +go; but my long experience of London fog told me that we should escape +from it with that wind if we got to the chalk downs away out by +Letherhead and Guildford. We took the early train to a point at the base +of the hills, and wound our way up into the woods at the top. We were +beyond the smoke, which rested like a low black cloud over the city in +the north-east, reaching a third of the way up to the zenith. The beech +had changed colour, and glowed with reddish-brown fire. We sat down on a +floor made of the leaves of last year. At mid-day the stillness was +profound, broken only by the softest of whispers descending from the +great trees which spread over us their protecting arms. Every now and +then it died down almost to nothing, and then slowly swelled and died +again, as if the Gods of the place were engaged in divine and harmonious +talk. By moving a little towards the external edge of our canopy we +beheld the plain all spread out before us, bounded by the heights of +Sussex and Hampshire. It was veiled with the most tender blue, and above +it was spread a sky which was white on the horizon and deepened by +degrees into azure over our heads. The exhilaration of the air satisfied +Marie, although she had no playmate, and there was nothing special with +which she could amuse herself. She wandered about looking for flowers +and ferns, and was content. We were all completely happy. We strained +our eyes to see the furthest point before us, and we tried to find it on +the map we had brought with us. The season of the year, which is usually +supposed to make men pensive, had no such effect upon us. Everything in +the future, even the winter in London, was painted by Hope, and the death +of the summer brought no sadness. Rather did summer dying in such +fashion fill our hearts with repose, and even more than repose—with +actual joy. + + * * * * * + +Here ends the autobiography. A month after this last holiday my friend +was dead and buried. He had unsuspected disease of the heart, and one +day his master, of whom we have heard something, was more than usually +violent. Mark, as his custom was, was silent, but evidently greatly +excited. His tyrant left the room; and in a few minutes afterwards Mark +was seen to turn white and fall forward in his chair. It was all over! +His body was taken to a hospital and thence sent home. The next morning +his salary up to the day of his death came in an envelope to his widow, +without a single word from his employers save a request for +acknowledgment. Towards mid-day, his office coat, and a book found in +his drawer, arrived in a brown paper parcel, carriage unpaid. + +On looking over his papers, I found the sketch of his life and a mass of +odds and ends, some apparently written for publication. Many of these +had evidently been in envelopes, and had most likely, therefore, been +offered to editors or publishers, but all, I am sure, had been refused. +I add one or two by way of appendix, and hope they will be thought worth +saving. + + R. S. + + * * * * * + + LONDON: HODDER AND STOUGHTON, 1913. + + + + +FOOTNOTES + + +{7} This was written many years ago, but is curiously pertinent to the +discussions of this year.—EDITOR, 1884. + +{31} Not exactly untrue, but it sounds strangely now when socialism, +nationalisation of the land, and other projects have renewed in men the +hope of regeneration by political processes. 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