CHAPTER IV.
CONTRARIES FRATERNIZE IN HATE.
Success is hateful, especially to those whom it overthrows. It is rarethat the eaten adore the eaters.
The Laughing Man had decidedly made a hit. The mountebanks around wereindignant. A theatrical success is a syphon--it pumps in the crowd andcreates emptiness all round. The shop opposite is done for. Theincreased receipts of the Green Box caused a corresponding decrease inthe receipts of the surrounding shows. Those entertainments, popular upto that time, suddenly collapsed. It was like a low-water mark, showinginversely, but in perfect concordance, the rise here, the fall there.Theatres experience the effect of tides: they rise in one only oncondition of falling in another. The swarming foreigners who exhibitedtheir talents and their trumpetings on the neighbouring platforms,seeing themselves ruined by the Laughing Man, were despairing, yetdazzled. All the grimacers, all the clowns, all the merry-andrews enviedGwynplaine. How happy he must be with the snout of a wild beast! Thebuffoon mothers and dancers on the tight-rope, with pretty children,looked at them in anger, and pointing out Gwynplaine, would say, "What apity you have not a face like that!" Some beat their babes savagely forbeing pretty. More than one, had she known the secret, would havefashioned her son's face in the Gwynplaine style. The head of an angel,which brings no money in, is not as good as that of a lucrative devil.One day the mother of a little child who was a marvel of beauty, and whoacted a cupid, exclaimed,--
"Our children are failures! They only succeeded with Gwynplaine." Andshaking her fist at her son, she added, "If I only knew your father,wouldn't he catch it!"
Gwynplaine was the goose with the golden eggs! What a marvellousphenomenon! There was an uproar through all the caravans. Themountebanks, enthusiastic and exasperated, looked at Gwynplaine andgnashed their teeth. Admiring anger is called envy. Then it howls! Theytried to disturb "Chaos Vanquished;" made a cabal, hissed, scolded,shouted! This was an excuse for Ursus to make out-of-door harangues tothe populace, and for his friend Tom-Jim-Jack to use his fists tore-establish order. His pugilistic marks of friendship brought him stillmore under the notice and regard of Ursus and Gwynplaine. At a distance,however, for the group in the Green Box sufficed to themselves, and heldaloof from the rest of the world, and because Tom-Jim-Jack, this leaderof the mob, seemed a sort of supreme bully, without a tie, without afriend; a smasher of windows, a manager of men, now here, now gone,hail-fellow-well-met with every one, companion of none.
This raging envy against Gwynplaine did not give in for a few friendlyhits from Tom-Jim-Jack. The outcries having miscarried, the mountebanksof Tarrinzeau Field fell back on a petition. They addressed to theauthorities. This is the usual course. Against an unpleasant success wefirst try to stir up the crowd and then we petition the magistrate.
With the merry-andrews the reverends allied themselves. The Laughing Manhad inflicted a blow on the preachers. There were empty places not onlyin the caravans, but in the churches. The congregations in the churchesof the five parishes in Southwark had dwindled away. People left beforethe sermon to go to Gwynplaine. "Chaos Vanquished," the Green Box, theLaughing Man, all the abominations of Baal, eclipsed the eloquence ofthe pulpit. The voice crying in the desert, _vox clamantis in deserto_,is discontented, and is prone to call for the aid of the authorities.The clergy of the five parishes complained to the Bishop of London, whocomplained to her Majesty.
The complaint of the merry-andrews was based on religion. They declaredit to be insulted. They described Gwynplaine as a sorcerer, and Ursus asan atheist. The reverend gentlemen invoked social order. Settingorthodoxy aside they took action on the fact that Acts of Parliamentwere violated. It was clever. Because it was the period of Mr. Locke,who had died but six months previously--28th October, 1704--and whenscepticism, which Bolingbroke had imbibed from Voltaire, was takingroot. Later on Wesley came and restored the Bible, as Loyola restoredthe papacy.
Thus the Green Box was battered on both sides; by the merry-andrews, inthe name of the Pentateuch, and by chaplains in the name of the police.In the name of Heaven and of the inspectors of nuisances. The Green Boxwas denounced by the priests as an obstruction, and by the jugglers assacrilegious.
Had they any pretext? Was there any excuse? Yes. What was the crime?This: there was the wolf. A dog was allowable; a wolf forbidden. InEngland the wolf is an outlaw. England admits the dog which barks, butnot the dog which howls--a shade of difference between the yard and thewoods.
The rectors and vicars of the five parishes of Southwark calledattention in their petitions to numerous parliamentary and royalstatutes putting the wolf beyond the protection of the law. They movedfor something like the imprisonment of Gwynplaine and the execution ofthe wolf, or at any rate for their banishment. The question was one ofpublic importance, the danger to persons passing, etc. And on thispoint, they appealed to the Faculty. They cited the opinion of theEighty physicians of London, a learned body which dates from HenryVIII., which has a seal like that of the State, which can raise sickpeople to the dignity of being amenable to their jurisdiction, which hasthe right to imprison those who infringe its law and contravene itsordinances, and which, amongst other useful regulations for the healthof the citizens, put beyond doubt this fact acquired by science; that ifa wolf sees a man first, the man becomes hoarse for life. Besides, hemay be bitten.
Homo, then, was a pretext.
Ursus heard of these designs through the inn-keeper. He was uneasy. Hewas afraid of two claws--the police and the justices. To be afraid ofthe magistracy, it is sufficient to be afraid, there is no need to beguilty. Ursus had no desire for contact with sheriffs, provosts,bailiffs, and coroners. His eagerness to make their acquaintanceamounted to nil. His curiosity to see the magistrates was about as greatas the hare's to see the greyhound.
He began to regret that he had come to London. "'Better' is the enemy of'good,'" murmured he apart. "I thought the proverb was ill-considered. Iwas wrong. Stupid truths are true truths."
Against the coalition of powers--merry-andrews taking in hand the causeof religion, and chaplains, indignant in the name of medicine--the poorGreen Box, suspected of sorcery in Gwynplaine and of hydrophobia inHomo, had only one thing in its favour (but a thing of great power inEngland), municipal inactivity. It is to the local authorities lettingthings take their own course that Englishmen owe their liberty. Libertyin England behaves very much as the sea around England. It is a tide.Little by little manners surmount the law. A cruel system of legislationdrowned under the wave of custom; a savage code of laws still visiblethrough the transparency of universal liberty: such is England.
The Laughing Man, "Chaos Vanquished," and Homo might have mountebanks,preachers, bishops, the House of Commons, the House of Lords, herMajesty, London, and the whole of England against them, and remainundisturbed so long as Southwark permitted.
The Green Box was the favourite amusement of the suburb, and the localauthorities seemed disinclined to interfere. In England, indifference isprotection. So long as the sheriff of the county of Surrey, to thejurisdiction of which Southwark belongs, did not move in the matter,Ursus breathed freely, and Homo could sleep on his wolf's ears.
So long as the hatred which it excited did not occasion acts ofviolence, it increased success. The Green Box was none the worse for it,for the time. On the contrary, hints were scattered that it containedsomething mysterious. Hence the Laughing Man became more and morepopular. The public follow with gusto the scent of anything contraband.To be suspected is a recommendation. The people adopt by instinct thatat which the finger is pointed. The thing which is denounced is like thesavour of forbidden fruit; we rush to eat it. Besides, applause whichirritates some one, especially if that some one is in authority, issweet. To perform, whilst passing a pleasant evening, both an act ofkindness to the oppressed and of opposition to the oppressor isagreeable. You are protecting at the same time that you are beingamused. So the theatrical caravans on the bowling-green continued tohowl and to cabal against the Laughing Man. Not
hing could be bettercalculated to enhance his success. The shouts of one's enemies areuseful and give point and vitality to one's triumph. A friend weariessooner in praise than an enemy in abuse. To abuse does not hurt. Enemiesare ignorant of this fact. They cannot help insulting us, and thisconstitutes their use. They cannot hold their tongues, and thus keep thepublic awake.
The crowds which flocked to "Chaos Vanquished" increased daily.
Ursus kept what Master Nicless had said of intriguers and complaints inhigh places to himself, and did not tell Gwynplaine, lest it shouldtrouble the ease of his acting by creating anxiety. If evil was to come,he would be sure to know it soon enough.