CHAPTER XIX.
BODY AND SOUL.
Balsamo was punctual and found, at six o'clock, Marat and his servant, awoman of all work, decking up the room with flowers in a vase in honorof the visitor. At sight of the master, the surgeon blushed more plainlythan was becoming in a stoic.
"Where are we first going?" asked Balsamo when they got down to thestreet door.
"To Surgeon' Hall," was the reply. "I have selected a corpse there, asubject which died of acute meningitis; I have to make some observationson the brain and do not wish my colleagues to cut it up before I do."
"Let us to the hall, then."
"It is only a couple of steps; besides, you need not go in; you mightwait for me at the door."
"On the contrary, I want to go in with you and have your opinion on thesubject, since it is a dead body."
"Take care," said Marat; "For I am an expert anatomist and have theadvantage of you there."
"Pride, more pride," muttered the Italian.
"What is that?"
"I say that we shall see about that. Let us enter."
Balsamo followed him without shrinking into the amphitheatre, onHautefeuille Street. On a marble slab in the long, narrow hall were twocorpses, a man's and a woman's. She had died young: he was old and bald;a wornout sheet veiled their bodies but half exposed their faces.
Side by side on the chilly bed, they might never have met in life and iftheir souls could see them now, they would have been mutually surprisedat the neighborhood.
Marat pulled off the shroud of coarse linen from the two unfortunatesequalised by death under the surgeon's knife. They were nude.
"Is not the sight repugnant to you?" asked Marat with his usualbraggadocia.
"It makes me sad," replied the other.
"From not being habituated to it," said the dissector. "I see the thingdaily and I feel neither sadness nor dislike. We surgical practitionershave to live with the lifeless and we do not on their account interruptany of the functions of our life."
"It is a sad privilege of your profession."
"And why should I feel in the matter? Against sadness, I havereflection; against the other thing, habit. What is to frighten me in acorpse, a statue of flesh instead of stone?"
"As you say, in a corpse there is nothing, while in the living bodythere is---- "
"Motion," replied Marat loftily.
"You have not spoken of the soul."
"I have never come across it when I searched with my scalpel."
"Because you searched the dead only."
"Oh, I have probed living bodies."
"But have met nothing more than in dead ones?"
"Yes, pain; you don't call that the soul, do you?"
"Do you not believe in the soul?"
"I believe in it but I may call it the Moving Power, if I like."
"Very well; all I ask is if you believe in the soul; it makes me happyto think so."
"Stop an instant, master," interrupted Marat with his viper-like smile:"let us come to an understanding and not exaggerate; we surgicaloperators are rather materialists."
"These bodies are quite cold," mused Balsamo aloud, "and this woman wasgood-looking. A fine soul must have dwelt in that fine temple."
"There was the mistake--it was a vile blade of metal in that showyscabbard. This body, master, is that of a drab who was taken from theMagdalen Prison of St. Lazare where she died of brain fever, to the MainHospital. Her story is very scandalous and long. If you call her movingimpulse a soul, you do ours wrong."
"The soul might have been healed and it was lost, because no physicianfor the soul came along."
"Alas, master, this is another of your theories. Only for bodies arethere medicines," sneered Marat with a bitter laugh. "You use wordswhich are a reflection of a part of 'Macbeth,' and it makes you smile.Who can minister to a mind diseased? Shakespeare calls your 'sou' themind."
"No, you are wrong, and you do not know why I smile. For the moment weare to conclude that these earthly vessels are empty?"
"And senseless," went on Marat, raising the head of the woman andletting it fall down on the slab with a bang, without the remainsshuddering or moving.
"Very well: let us go to the hospital now," said Balsamo.
"Not until I have cut off the head and put it by, as this coveted headis the seat of a curious malady."
He opened his instrument-case, took out a bistory, and picked up in acorner a mallet spotted with blood. With a skilled hand he traced acircular incision separating all the flesh and neck muscles. Cleaving tothe spine, he thrust his steel between two joints and gave with the maula sharp, forcible rap. The head rolled on the table, and bounced to theground. Marat was obliged to pick it up with his moistened hands.Balsamo turned his head not to fill the operator with too much delight.
"One of these days," said the latter, thinking he had caught hissuperior in a weak moment, "some philanthropist who ponders over deathas I do over life will invent a machine to chop off the head to bringabout instantaneous extinction of the vital spark, which is not done byany means of execution now in practice. The rack, the garrote the rope,these are all methods of torture appertaining to barbarous peoples andnot to the civilized. An enlightened nation like France ought to punishand not revenge: for the society which racks, strangles and decapitatesby the sword inflicts punishment by the pain besides that of deathalone, the culprit's portion. This is overdoing the penalty by half, Ithink."
"It is my opinion, too. What idea do you have of such an instrument?"
"A machine, cold and emotionless as the Law itself; the man charged withthe inflection is affected by the sight of the criminal in his ownlikeness; and he misses his stroke, as at the beheading of Chalais andof the Duke of Monmouth. A machine would not do that, say, a wooden armwhich brought down an ax on the neck."
"I have seen something of the kind in operation, the Maiden, it iscalled in Scotland, and the Mannaja, in Italy. But I have also seen thedecapitated criminals rise without their heads, from the seat on whichthey were placed, and stagger off a dozen paces. I have picked up suchheads, by the hair, as you just did that one which tumbled off thetable, and when I uttered in the ear the name with which it wasbaptized, I saw the eyes open to see who called and showed that still onthe earth it had quitted one could cry after what was passing from timeto eternity."
"Merely a nervous movement."
"Are not the nerves the organs of sense? I conclude that it would bebetter for man, instead of seeking a machine to kill without pain forpunishment, he had better seek the way to punish without killing. Thesociety that discovers that will be the best and most enlightened."
"Another Utopia!" exclaimed Marat.
"Perhaps you are right, this once," responded Balsamo. "It is time thatwill enlighten us."
Marat wrapped up the female head in his handkerchief which he tied bythe four corners in a knot.
"In this way, I am sure that my colleagues will not rob me of my head,"he said.
Walking side by side the dreamer and the practitioner went to the greatHospital.
"You cut that head off coldly and skillfully," said the former. "Haveyou less emotion when dealing with the quick? Does suffering affect youless than insensibility? Are you more pitiless with living bodies thanthe dead?"
"No, for it would be a fault, as in an executioner to let himself feelanything. A man would die from being miscut in the limb as surely asthough his head were struck off. A good surgeon ought to operate withhis hand and not his heart, though he knows in his heart that he isgoing to give years of life and happiness for the second's suffering.That is the golden lining to our profession."
"Yes; but in the living, I hope you meet with the soul?"
"Yes, if you hold that the soul is the moving impulse--thesensitiveness; that I do meet, and it is very troublesome sometimes forit kills more patients than my scalpel."
Guided by Marat, who would not put aside his ghastly burden, Balsamo wasintroduced into the operation w
ard, crowded with the chief surgeon andthe students.
The aids brought in a young man, knocked down the previous week by aheavy wagon which had crushed his foot. A hasty operation at that timehad not sufficed; mortification had spread and amputation of the leg wasnecessary. Stretched on the bed of anguish, the poor fellow looked witha terror which would have melted tigers, on the band of eager men whowaited for the time of his martyrdom, his death perchance, to study thescience of life--the marvellous phenomenon which conceals the gloomy oneof death. He seemed to sue from the surgeon and assistants some smile ofcomfort, but he met indifference on all sides, steel in every eye.
A remnant of courage and manly pride kept him mute, reserving all to tryto check the screams which agony would tear from him.
Still, when he felt the kindly heavy hand of the porter on his shoulder,and the aid's arms interlace him like serpents, and heard the operator'svoice saying "Keep up your pluck my brave man!" he ventured to break thestillness by asking in a plaintive tone:
"You are not going to hurt me much?"
"Not at all; be quiet," replied Marat, with a false smile which mightseem sweet to the sufferer, but was ironical to Balsamo, and noting thatthe latter had seen through him, the young surgeon whispered to him:
"It is a dreadful operation. The bone is splintered and sensitive so asto make any one pity him. He will die of the pain, not the injury; thatwill make his soul want to fly away."
"Why operate on him--why not let him die tranquilly?"
"Because it is a surgeon's duty to attempt a cure when it isimpossible."
"But you say that he will suffer dreadfully on account of his having asoul too tender for his frame? then, why not operate on the soul so thatthe tranquillity of the one will be the salvation of the other?"
"Just what I have done," replied Marat, while the patient was tied down."By my words, I spoke to the soul--to his sensitiveness, what made theGreek philosopher say, 'Pain, thou art no ill.' I told him he would notfeel much pain, and it is the business of his soul not to feel any. Thatis the only remedy known up to the present. As for the questions of thesoul--lies! why is this deuce of a soul clamped to the body? When Iknocked this head off a spell ago, the body said nothing. Yet that was agrave operation enough. But the movement had ceased, sensitiveness wasno more and the soul had fled, as you spiritualists say. That is why thehead and the body which I severed, made no remonstrance to me. But thebody of this unhappy fellow with the soul still in, will be yellingawfully in a little while. Stop up your ears closely, master. For youare sensitive, and your theory will be killed by the shock, until theday when your theory can separate the soul from the body."
"You believe such separation will never come?" said Balsamo.
"Try, for this is a capital opening."
"I will; this young man interests me and I do not want him to feel thepain."
"You are a leader of men," said Marat, "but you are not a heavenlybeing, and you cannot prevent the lad from suffering."
"If he should not suffer, would his recovery be sure?"
"It would be likely, but not sure."
Balsamo cast an inexpressible look of triumph on the speaker and placinghimself before the patient, whose frightened and terror-filled eyes hecaught, he said: "Sleep!" not with the mouth solely but with look, will,all the heat of his blood and the fluid electricity in his system.
At this instant the chief surgeon was beginning to feel the injuredthigh and point out to the pupils the extent of the ail.
But at this command from the mesmerist, the young man, who had beenraised by an assistant, swung a little and let his head sink, while hiseyes closed.
"He feels bad," said Marat; "he loses consciousness."
"Nay, he sleeps."
Everybody looked at this stranger whom they took for a lunatic.
Over Marat's lips flitted a smile of incredulity.
"Does a man usually speak in a swoon?" asked Balsamo. "Question him andhe will answer you."
"I say, young man," shouted Marat.
"No, there is no need for you to halloo at him," said Balsamo, "he willhear you in your ordinary voice."
"Give us an idea what you are doing?"
"I was told to sleep, and I am sleeping," replied the patient, in aperfectly unruffled voice strongly contrasting with that heard from himshortly before.
All the bystanders stared at one another.
"Now, untie him," said Balsamo.
"No, you must not do that," remonstrated the head surgeon, "theoperation would be spoilt by the slightest movement."
"I assure you that he will not stir, and he will do the same: ask him."
"Can you be left free, my friend?"
"I can."
"And you promise not to budge?"
"I promise, if I am ordered so."
"I order you."
"Upon my word, sir," said the chief surgeon, "you speak with so muchcertainty that I am inclined to try the experiment."
"Do so, and have no fear."
"Unbind him," said the surgeon.
As the men obeyed Balsamo went to the head of the couch.
"From this time forward do not stir till I bid you."
A statue on a tombstone could not be more motionless than the patientafter this command.
"Now, sir, proceed with the operation; the patient is properlyprepared."
The surgeon had his steel ready, but he hesitated at the beginning.
"Proceed," repeated Balsamo with the manner of an inspired prophet.
Mastered as Marat and the patient had been and as all the rest were, thesurgeon put the knife edge to the flesh: it "squeaked" literally at thecut, but the patient did not flinch or utter a sigh.
"What countryman are you, friend?" asked the mesmerist.
"From Brittany, my lord."
"Do you love your country?"
"Ay, it is such a fine one," and he smiled.
Meanwhile the operator was making the circular incisions which are thepreliminary steps in amputations to lay the bone bare.
"Did you leave it when early in life?" continued Balsamo.
"I was only ten years old, my lord."
The cuts being made, the surgeon applied the saw to the gash.
"My friend," said Balsamo, "sing me that song the saltmakers of Batzsing on knocking off work of an evening. I only remember the first linewhich goes:
'Hail to the shining salt!'"
The saw bit into the bone: but at the request of the magnetiser, thepatient smilingly commenced to sing, slowly and melodiously like a loveror a poet:
"Hail to the shining salt, Drawn from the sky-blue lake: Hail to the smoking kiln, And my rye-and-honey cake! Here comes wife and dad, And all my chicks I love: All but the one who sleeps, Yon, in the heather grove. Hail! for there ends the day, And to my rest I come: After the toil the pay; After the pay, I'm home."
The severed limb fell on the board, but the man was still singing. Hewas regarded with astonishment and the mesmeriser with admiration. Theythought both were insane. Marat repeated this impression in Balsamo'sear.
"Terror drove the poor lad out of his wits so that he felt no pain," hesaid.
"I am not of your opinion," replied the Italian sage: "far from havinglost his wits, I warrant that he will tell us if I question him, the dayof his death if he is to die; or how long his recovery will take if heis to get through."
Marat was now inclined to share the general opinion that his friend wasmad, like the patient.
In the meantime the surgeon was taking up the arteries from whichspirted jets of blood.
Balsamo took a phial from his pocket, let a few drops fall on a wad oflint, and asked the chief surgeon to apply this to the cut. He obeyedwith marked curiosity.
He was one of the most celebrated operators of the period, truly in lovewith his science, repudiating none of its mysteries, and taking hazardas the outlet to doubt. He clapped the plug to the wound, and thearteries
seared up, hissing, and the blood came through only drop bydrop. He could then tie the grand artery with the utmost facility.
Here Balsamo obtained a true triumph, and everybody wanted to know wherehe had studied and of what school he was.
"I am a physician of the University of Gottingen," he replied, "and Imade the discovery which you have witnessed. But, gentlemen and brothersof the lancet and ligature, I should like it kept secret, as I havegreat fear of being burnt at the stake, and the Parliament of Parismight once again like the spectacle of a wizard being so treated."
The head surgeon was brooding; Marat was dreaming and reflecting. But hewas the first to speak.
"You asserted," he said, "that if this man were interrogated about theresult of his operation he would certainly tell it though it is in thewomb of the future?"
"I said so: what is the man's name?"
"Havard."
Balsamo turned to the patient, who was still humming the lay.
"Well, friend, what do you augur about our poor Havard's fate?" heasked.
"Wait till I come back from Brittany, where I am, and get to theHospital where Havard is."
"Of course. Come hither, enter, and tell me the truth about him."
"He is in a very bad way; they have cut off his leg. That was neatlydone, but he has a dreadful strait to go through; he will have feverto-night at seven o'clock---- "
The bystanders looked at each other.
"This fever will pull him down; but I am sure he will get through thefirst fit."
"And will be saved?"
"No: for the fever returns and--poor Havard! he has a wife and littleones!"
His eyes filled with tears.
"His wife will be left a widow and the little ones orphans?"
"Wait, wait--no, no!" he cried, clasping his hands. "They prayed so hardfor him that their prayers have been granted."
"He will get well?"
"Yes, he will go forth from here, where he came five days ago, a haleman, two months and fifteen days after."
"But," said Marat, "incapable of working and consequently to feed hisfamily."
"God is good and he will provide."
"How?" continued Marat: "while I am gathering information, I may as welllearn this?"
"God hath sent to his bedside a charitable lord who took pity on him,and he is saying to himself: 'I am not going to let poor Havard want foranything.'"
All looked at Balsamo, who smiled.
"Verily, we witness a singular incident," remarked the head surgeon, ashe took the patient's hand and felt his pulse and his forehead. "Thisman is dreaming aloud."
"Do you think so?" retorted the mesmerist. "Havard, awake," he addedwith a look full of authority and energy.
The young man opened his eyes with an effort and gazed with profoundsurprise on the bystanders, become for him as inoffensive as they weremenacing at the first.
"Ah, well," he said, "have you not begun your work? Are you going togive me pain?"
Balsamo hastened to speak as he feared a shock to the sufferer. Therewas no need for him to hasten as far as the others were concerned asnone of them could get out a word, their surprise was so great.
"Keep quiet, friend," he said; "the chief surgeon has performed on yourleg an operation which suits the requirement of your case. My poor lad,you must be rather weak of mind, for you swooned away at the outset."
"I am glad I did for I felt nothing of it," replied the Breton merrily:"my sleep was a sweet one and did me good. What a good thing that I amnot to lose my leg."
At this very moment he looked over himself, and saw the couch floodedwith blood and the severed limb. He uttered a scream and swooned away,this time really.
"Question him, now, and see whether he will reply," said Balsamo sternlyto Marat.
Taking the chief surgeon aside while the aids carried the patient to hisbed, he said:
"You heard what the poor fellow said---- "
"About his getting well?"
"About heaven having pity on him and inspiring a nobleman to help hisfamily. He spoke the truth on that head as on the other. Will you pleasebe the intermediary between heaven and your patient. Here is a diamondworth about twenty thousand livres; when the man is nearly able to goout, sell it and give him the money. Meanwhile, since the soul has greatinfluence on the body, as your pupil Marat says justly, tell Havard thathis future is assured."
"But if he should not recover," said the doctor hesitating.
"He will."
"Still I must give you a receipt; I could not think of taking an objectof this value otherwise."
"Just as you please; my name is Count Fenix."
Five minutes afterwards Balsamo put the receipt in his pocket, and wentout accompanied by Marat.
"Do not forget your head!" said Balsamo, to whom the absence of mind inthis cool student was a compliment.
Marat parted from the chief of the Order with doubt in his heart butmeditation in his eyes, and he said to himself: "Does the soul reallyexist?"