CHAPTER VIII.
AFTER a long interval, I am again impelled by the restless spirit within meto continue my narration; but I must alter the mode which I have hithertoadopted. The details contained in the foregoing pages, apparently trivial,yet each slightest one weighing like lead in the depressed scale of humanafflictions; this tedious dwelling on the sorrows of others, while my ownwere only in apprehension; this slowly laying bare of my soul's wounds:this journal of death; this long drawn and tortuous path, leading to theocean of countless tears, awakens me again to keen grief. I had used thishistory as an opiate; while it described my beloved friends, fresh withlife and glowing with hope, active assistants on the scene, I was soothed;there will be a more melancholy pleasure in painting the end of all. Butthe intermediate steps, the climbing the wall, raised up between what wasand is, while I still looked back nor saw the concealed desert beyond, is alabour past my strength. Time and experience have placed me on an heightfrom which I can comprehend the past as a whole; and in this way I mustdescribe it, bringing forward the leading incidents, and disposing lightand shade so as to form a picture in whose very darkness there will beharmony.
It would be needless to narrate those disastrous occurrences, for which aparallel might be found in any slighter visitation of our giganticcalamity. Does the reader wish to hear of the pest-houses, where death isthe comforter--of the mournful passage of the death-cart--of theinsensibility of the worthless, and the anguish of the loving heart--ofharrowing shrieks and silence dire--of the variety of disease, desertion,famine, despair, and death? There are many books which can feed theappetite craving for these things; let them turn to the accounts ofBoccaccio, De Foe, and Browne. The vast annihilation that has swallowed allthings--the voiceless solitude of the once busy earth--the lonely stateof singleness which hems me in, has deprived even such details of theirstinging reality, and mellowing the lurid tints of past anguish with poetichues, I am able to escape from the mosaic of circumstance, by perceivingand reflecting back the grouping and combined colouring of the past.
I had returned from London possessed by the idea, with the intimate feelingthat it was my first duty to secure, as well as I was able, the well-beingof my family, and then to return and take my post beside Adrian. The eventsthat immediately followed on my arrival at Windsor changed this view ofthings. The plague was not in London alone, it was every where--it cameon us, as Ryland had said, like a thousand packs of wolves, howling throughthe winter night, gaunt and fierce. When once disease was introduced intothe rural districts, its effects appeared more horrible, more exigent, andmore difficult to cure, than in towns. There was a companionship insuffering there, and, the neighbours keeping constant watch on each other,and inspired by the active benevolence of Adrian, succour was afforded, andthe path of destruction smoothed. But in the country, among the scatteredfarm-houses, in lone cottages, in fields, and barns, tragedies were actedharrowing to the soul, unseen, unheard, unnoticed. Medical aid was lesseasily procured, food was more difficult to obtain, and human beings,unwithheld by shame, for they were unbeheld of their fellows, ventured ondeeds of greater wickedness, or gave way more readily to their abjectfears.
Deeds of heroism also occurred, whose very mention swells the heart andbrings tears into the eyes. Such is human nature, that beauty and deformityare often closely linked. In reading history we are chiefly struck by thegenerosity and self-devotion that follow close on the heels of crime,veiling with supernal flowers the stain of blood. Such acts were notwanting to adorn the grim train that waited on the progress of the plague.
The inhabitants of Berkshire and Bucks had been long aware that the plaguewas in London, in Liverpool, Bristol, Manchester, York, in short, in allthe more populous towns of England. They were not however the lessastonished and dismayed when it appeared among themselves. They wereimpatient and angry in the midst of terror. They would do something tothrow off the clinging evil, and, while in action, they fancied that aremedy was applied. The inhabitants of the smaller towns left their houses,pitched tents in the fields, wandering separate from each other careless ofhunger or the sky's inclemency, while they imagined that they avoided thedeath-dealing disease. The farmers and cottagers, on the contrary, struckwith the fear of solitude, and madly desirous of medical assistance,flocked into the towns.
But winter was coming, and with winter, hope. In August, the plague hadappeared in the country of England, and during September it made itsravages. Towards the end of October it dwindled away, and was in somedegree replaced by a typhus, of hardly less virulence. The autumn was warmand rainy: the infirm and sickly died off--happier they: many youngpeople flushed with health and prosperity, made pale by wasting malady,became the inhabitants of the grave. The crop had failed, the bad corn, andwant of foreign wines, added vigour to disease. Before Christmas halfEngland was under water. The storms of the last winter were renewed; butthe diminished shipping of this year caused us to feel less the tempests ofthe sea. The flood and storms did more harm to continental Europe than tous--giving, as it were, the last blow to the calamities which destroyedit. In Italy the rivers were unwatched by the diminished peasantry; and,like wild beasts from their lair when the hunters and dogs are afar, didTiber, Arno, and Po, rush upon and destroy the fertility of the plains.Whole villages were carried away. Rome, and Florence, and Pisa wereoverflowed, and their marble palaces, late mirrored in tranquil streams,had their foundations shaken by their winter-gifted power. In Germany andRussia the injury was still more momentous.
But frost would come at last, and with it a renewal of our lease of earth.Frost would blunt the arrows of pestilence, and enchain the furiouselements; and the land would in spring throw off her garment of snow,released from her menace of destruction. It was not until February that thedesired signs of winter appeared. For three days the snow fell, ice stoppedthe current of the rivers, and the birds flew out from crackling branchesof the frost-whitened trees. On the fourth morning all vanished. Asouth-west wind brought up rain--the sun came out, and mocking the usuallaws of nature, seemed even at this early season to burn with solsticialforce. It was no consolation, that with the first winds of March the laneswere filled with violets, the fruit trees covered with blossoms, that thecorn sprung up, and the leaves came out, forced by the unseasonable heat.We feared the balmy air--we feared the cloudless sky, the flower-coveredearth, and delightful woods, for we looked on the fabric of the universe nolonger as our dwelling, but our tomb, and the fragrant land smelled to theapprehension of fear like a wide church-yard.
Pisando la tierra dura de continuo el hombre esta y cada passo que da es sobre su sepultura.[1]
Yet notwithstanding these disadvantages winter was breathing time; and weexerted ourselves to make the best of it. Plague might not revive with thesummer; but if it did, it should find us prepared. It is a part of man'snature to adapt itself through habit even to pain and sorrow. Pestilencehad become a part of our future, our existence; it was to be guardedagainst, like the flooding of rivers, the encroachments of ocean, or theinclemency of the sky. After long suffering and bitter experience, somepanacea might be discovered; as it was, all that received infection died--all however were not infected; and it became our part to fix deep thefoundations, and raise high the barrier between contagion and the sane; tointroduce such order as would conduce to the well-being of the survivors,and as would preserve hope and some portion of happiness to those who werespectators of the still renewed tragedy. Adrian had introduced systematicmodes of proceeding in the metropolis, which, while they were unable tostop the progress of death, yet prevented other evils, vice and folly, fromrendering the awful fate of the hour still more tremendous. I wished toimitate his example, but men are used to
--move all together, if they move at all,[2]
and I could find no means of leading the inhabitants of scatteredtowns and villages, who forgot my words as soon as they heard themnot, and veered with every baffling wind, that might arise from anapparent change of circumstance.
I adopted another plan. Those writers who have imagined a reign of peaceand happiness on earth, have generally described a rural country, whereeach small township was directed by the elders and wise men. This was thekey of my design. Each village, however small, usually contains a leader,one among themselves whom they venerate, whose advice they seek indifficulty, and whose good opinion they chiefly value. I was immediatelydrawn to make this observation by occurrences that presented themselves tomy personal experience.
In the village of Little Marlow an old woman ruled the community. She hadlived for some years in an alms-house, and on fine Sundays her thresholdwas constantly beset by a crowd, seeking her advice and listening to heradmonitions. She had been a soldier's wife, and had seen the world;infirmity, induced by fevers caught in unwholesome quarters, had come onher before its time, and she seldom moved from her little cot. The plagueentered the village; and, while fright and grief deprived the inhabitantsof the little wisdom they possessed, old Martha stepped forward and said--"Before now I have been in a town where there was the plague."--"And youescaped?"--"No, but I recovered."--After this Martha was seated morefirmly than ever on the regal seat, elevated by reverence and love. Sheentered the cottages of the sick; she relieved their wants with her ownhand; she betrayed no fear, and inspired all who saw her with some portionof her own native courage. She attended the markets--she insisted uponbeing supplied with food for those who were too poor to purchase it. Sheshewed them how the well-being of each included the prosperity of all. Shewould not permit the gardens to be neglected, nor the very flowers in thecottage lattices to droop from want of care. Hope, she said, was betterthan a doctor's prescription, and every thing that could sustain andenliven the spirits, of more worth than drugs and mixtures.
It was the sight of Little Marlow, and my conversations with Martha, thatled me to the plan I formed. I had before visited the manor houses andgentlemen's seats, and often found the inhabitants actuated by the purestbenevolence, ready to lend their utmost aid for the welfare of theirtenants. But this was not enough. The intimate sympathy generated bysimilar hopes and fears, similar experience and pursuits, was wanting here.The poor perceived that the rich possessed other means of preservation thanthose which could be partaken of by themselves, seclusion, and, as far ascircumstances permitted, freedom from care. They could not place relianceon them, but turned with tenfold dependence to the succour and advice oftheir equals. I resolved therefore to go from village to village, seekingout the rustic archon of the place, and by systematizing their exertions,and enlightening their views, encrease both their power and their use amongtheir fellow-cottagers. Many changes also now occurred in these spontaneousregal elections: depositions and abdications were frequent, while, in theplace of the old and prudent, the ardent youth would step forward, eagerfor action, regardless of danger. Often too, the voice to which alllistened was suddenly silenced, the helping hand cold, the sympathetic eyeclosed, and the villagers feared still more the death that had selected achoice victim, shivering in dust the heart that had beat for them, reducingto incommunicable annihilation the mind for ever occupied with projects fortheir welfare.
Whoever labours for man must often find ingratitude, watered by vice andfolly, spring from the grain which he has sown. Death, which had in ouryounger days walked the earth like "a thief that comes in the night," now,rising from his subterranean vault, girt with power, with dark bannerfloating, came a conqueror. Many saw, seated above his vice-regal throne, asupreme Providence, who directed his shafts, and guided his progress, andthey bowed their heads in resignation, or at least in obedience. Othersperceived only a passing casualty; they endeavoured to exchange terror forheedlessness, and plunged into licentiousness, to avoid the agonizingthroes of worst apprehension. Thus, while the wise, the good, and theprudent were occupied by the labours of benevolence, the truce of winterproduced other effects among the young, the thoughtless, and the vicious.During the colder months there was a general rush to London in search ofamusement--the ties of public opinion were loosened; many were rich,heretofore poor--many had lost father and mother, the guardians of theirmorals, their mentors and restraints. It would have been useless to haveopposed these impulses by barriers, which would only have driven thoseactuated by them to more pernicious indulgencies. The theatres were openand thronged; dance and midnight festival were frequented--in many ofthese decorum was violated, and the evils, which hitherto adhered to anadvanced state of civilization, were doubled. The student left his books,the artist his study: the occupations of life were gone, but the amusementsremained; enjoyment might be protracted to the verge of the grave. Allfactitious colouring disappeared--death rose like night, and, protectedby its murky shadows the blush of modesty, the reserve of pride, thedecorum of prudery were frequently thrown aside as useless veils. This wasnot universal. Among better natures, anguish and dread, the fear of eternalseparation, and the awful wonder produced by unprecedented calamity, drewcloser the ties of kindred and friendship. Philosophers opposed theirprinciples, as barriers to the inundation of profligacy or despair, and theonly ramparts to protect the invaded territory of human life; thereligious, hoping now for their reward, clung fast to their creeds, as therafts and planks which over the tempest-vexed sea of suffering, would bearthem in safety to the harbour of the Unknown Continent. The loving heart,obliged to contract its view, bestowed its overflow of affection in tripleportion on the few that remained. Yet, even among these, the present, as anunalienable possession, became all of time to which they dared commit theprecious freight of their hopes.
The experience of immemorial time had taught us formerly to count ourenjoyments by years, and extend our prospect of life through a lengthenedperiod of progression and decay; the long road threaded a vast labyrinth,and the Valley of the Shadow of Death, in which it terminated, was hid byintervening objects. But an earthquake had changed the scene--under ourvery feet the earth yawned--deep and precipitous the gulph below openedto receive us, while the hours charioted us towards the chasm. But it waswinter now, and months must elapse before we are hurled from our security.We became ephemera, to whom the interval between the rising and setting sunwas as a long drawn year of common time. We should never see our childrenripen into maturity, nor behold their downy cheeks roughen, their blithehearts subdued by passion or care; but we had them now--they lived, andwe lived--what more could we desire? With such schooling did my poorIdris try to hush thronging fears, and in some measure succeeded. It wasnot as in summer-time, when each hour might bring the dreaded fate--untilsummer, we felt sure; and this certainty, short lived as it must be, yetfor awhile satisfied her maternal tenderness. I know not how to express orcommunicate the sense of concentrated, intense, though evanescenttransport, that imparadized us in the present hour. Our joys were dearerbecause we saw their end; they were keener because we felt, to its fullestextent, their value; they were purer because their essence was sympathy--as a meteor is brighter than a star, did the felicity of this wintercontain in itself the extracted delights of a long, long life.
How lovely is spring! As we looked from Windsor Terrace on the sixteenfertile counties spread beneath, speckled by happy cottages and wealthiertowns, all looked as in former years, heart-cheering and fair. The land wasploughed, the slender blades of wheat broke through the dark soil, thefruit trees were covered with buds, the husbandman was abroad in thefields, the milk-maid tripped home with well-filled pails, the swallows andmartins struck the sunny pools with their long, pointed wings, the newdropped lambs reposed on the young grass, the tender growth of leaves--
Lifts its sweet head into the air, and feeds A silent space with ever sprouting green.[3]
Man himself seemed to regenerate, and feel the frost of winter yield toan elastic and warm renewal of life--reason told us that care and sorrowwould grow with the opening year--but how to believe the ominous voicebreathed up with pestiferous vapours from fear's dim cavern, while nature,laughing and scattering from her green lap flowers, and fruits, andsparkling waters, invited us
to join the gay masque of young life sheled upon the scene?
Where was the plague? "Here--every where!" one voice of horror and dismayexclaimed, when in the pleasant days of a sunny May the Destroyer of manbrooded again over the earth, forcing the spirit to leave its organicchrysalis, and to enter upon an untried life. With one mighty sweep of itspotent weapon, all caution, all care, all prudence were levelled low: deathsat at the tables of the great, stretched itself on the cottager's pallet,seized the dastard who fled, quelled the brave man who resisted:despondency entered every heart, sorrow dimmed every eye.
Sights of woe now became familiar to me, and were I to tell all of anguishand pain that I witnessed, of the despairing moans of age, and the moreterrible smiles of infancy in the bosom of horror, my reader, his limbsquivering and his hair on end, would wonder how I did not, seized withsudden frenzy, dash myself from some precipice, and so close my eyes forever on the sad end of the world. But the powers of love, poetry, andcreative fancy will dwell even beside the sick of the plague, with thesqualid, and with the dying. A feeling of devotion, of duty, of a high andsteady purpose, elevated me; a strange joy filled my heart. In the midst ofsaddest grief I seemed to tread air, while the spirit of good shed round mean ambrosial atmosphere, which blunted the sting of sympathy, and purifiedthe air of sighs. If my wearied soul flagged in its career, I thought of myloved home, of the casket that contained my treasures, of the kiss of loveand the filial caress, while my eyes were moistened by purest dew, and myheart was at once softened and refreshed by thrilling tenderness.
Maternal affection had not rendered Idris selfish; at the beginning of ourcalamity she had, with thoughtless enthusiasm, devoted herself to the careof the sick and helpless. I checked her; and she submitted to my rule. Itold her how the fear of her danger palsied my exertions, how the knowledgeof her safety strung my nerves to endurance. I shewed her the dangers whichher children incurred during her absence; and she at length agreed not togo beyond the inclosure of the forest. Indeed, within the walls of theCastle we had a colony of the unhappy, deserted by their relatives, and inthemselves helpless, sufficient to occupy her time and attention, whileceaseless anxiety for my welfare and the health of her children, howevershe strove to curb or conceal it, absorbed all her thoughts, and underminedthe vital principle. After watching over and providing for their safety,her second care was to hide from me her anguish and tears. Each night Ireturned to the Castle, and found there repose and love awaiting me. OftenI waited beside the bed of death till midnight, and through the obscurityof rainy, cloudy nights rode many miles, sustained by one circumstanceonly, the safety and sheltered repose of those I loved. If some scene oftremendous agony shook my frame and fevered my brow, I would lay my head onthe lap of Idris, and the tumultuous pulses subsided into a temperate flow--her smile could raise me from hopelessness, her embrace bathe mysorrowing heart in calm peace. Summer advanced, and, crowned with the sun'spotent rays, plague shot her unerring shafts over the earth. The nationsbeneath their influence bowed their heads, and died. The corn that sprungup in plenty, lay in autumn rotting on the ground, while the melancholywretch who had gone out to gather bread for his children, lay stiff andplague-struck in the furrow. The green woods waved their boughsmajestically, while the dying were spread beneath their shade, answeringthe solemn melody with inharmonious cries. The painted birds flittedthrough the shades; the careless deer reposed unhurt upon the fern--theoxen and the horses strayed from their unguarded stables, and grazed amongthe wheat, for death fell on man alone.
With summer and mortality grew our fears. My poor love and I looked at eachother, and our babes.--"We will save them, Idris," I said, "I will savethem. Years hence we shall recount to them our fears, then passed away withtheir occasion. Though they only should remain on the earth, still theyshall live, nor shall their cheeks become pale nor their sweet voiceslanguish." Our eldest in some degree understood the scenes passing around,and at times, he with serious looks questioned me concerning the reason ofso vast a desolation. But he was only ten years old; and the hilarity ofyouth soon chased unreasonable care from his brow. Evelyn, a laughingcherub, a gamesome infant, without idea of pain or sorrow, would, shakingback his light curls from his eyes, make the halls re-echo with hismerriment, and in a thousand artless ways attract our attention to hisplay. Clara, our lovely gentle Clara, was our stay, our solace, ourdelight. She made it her task to attend the sick, comfort the sorrowing,assist the aged, and partake the sports and awaken the gaiety of the young.She flitted through the rooms, like a good spirit, dispatched from thecelestial kingdom, to illumine our dark hour with alien splendour.Gratitude and praise marked where her footsteps had been. Yet, when shestood in unassuming simplicity before us, playing with our children, orwith girlish assiduity performing little kind offices for Idris, onewondered in what fair lineament of her pure loveliness, in what soft toneof her thrilling voice, so much of heroism, sagacity and active goodnessresided.
The summer passed tediously, for we trusted that winter would at leastcheck the disease. That it would vanish altogether was an hope too dear--too heartfelt, to be expressed. When such a thought was heedlessly uttered,the hearers, with a gush of tears and passionate sobs, bore witness howdeep their fears were, how small their hopes. For my own part, my exertionsfor the public good permitted me to observe more closely than most others,the virulence and extensive ravages of our sightless enemy. A short monthhas destroyed a village, and where in May the first person sickened, inJune the paths were deformed by unburied corpses--the houses tenantless,no smoke arising from the chimneys; and the housewife's clock marked onlythe hour when death had been triumphant. From such scenes I have sometimessaved a deserted infant--sometimes led a young and grieving mother fromthe lifeless image of her first born, or drawn the sturdy labourer fromchildish weeping over his extinct family.
July is gone. August must pass, and by the middle of September we may hope.Each day was eagerly counted; and the inhabitants of towns, desirous toleap this dangerous interval, plunged into dissipation, and strove, byriot, and what they wished to imagine to be pleasure, to banish thought andopiate despair. None but Adrian could have tamed the motley population ofLondon, which, like a troop of unbitted steeds rushing to their pastures,had thrown aside all minor fears, through the operation of the fearparamount. Even Adrian was obliged in part to yield, that he might be able,if not to guide, at least to set bounds to the license of the times. Thetheatres were kept open; every place of public resort was frequented;though he endeavoured so to modify them, as might best quiet the agitationof the spectators, and at the same time prevent a reaction of misery whenthe excitement was over. Tragedies deep and dire were the chief favourites.Comedy brought with it too great a contrast to the inner despair: when suchwere attempted, it was not unfrequent for a comedian, in the midst of thelaughter occasioned by his disporportioned buffoonery, to find a word orthought in his part that jarred with his own sense of wretchedness, andburst from mimic merriment into sobs and tears, while the spectators,seized with irresistible sympathy, wept, and the pantomimic revelry waschanged to a real exhibition of tragic passion.
It was not in my nature to derive consolation from such scenes; fromtheatres, whose buffoon laughter and discordant mirth awakened distemperedsympathy, or where fictitious tears and wailings mocked the heart-feltgrief within; from festival or crowded meeting, where hilarity sprung fromthe worst feelings of our nature, or such enthralment of the better ones,as impressed it with garish and false varnish; from assemblies of mournersin the guise of revellers. Once however I witnessed a scene of singularinterest at one of the theatres, where nature overpowered art, as anoverflowing cataract will tear away the puny manufacture of a mock cascade,which had before been fed by a small portion of its waters.
I had come to London to see Adrian. He was not at the palace; and, thoughthe attendants did not know whither he had gone, they did not expect himtill late at night. It was between six and seven o'clock, a fine summerafternoon, and I spent my leisure hours
in a ramble through the emptystreets of London; now turning to avoid an approaching funeral, now urgedby curiosity to observe the state of a particular spot; my wanderings wereinstinct with pain, for silence and desertion characterized every place Ivisited, and the few beings I met were so pale and woe-begone, so markedwith care and depressed by fear, that weary of encountering only signs ofmisery, I began to retread my steps towards home.
I was now in Holborn, and passed by a public house filled with uproariouscompanions, whose songs, laughter, and shouts were more sorrowful than thepale looks and silence of the mourner. Such an one was near, hovering roundthis house. The sorry plight of her dress displayed her poverty, she wasghastly pale, and continued approaching, first the window and then the doorof the house, as if fearful, yet longing to enter. A sudden burst of songand merriment seemed to sting her to the heart; she murmured, "Can he havethe heart?" and then mustering her courage, she stepped within thethreshold. The landlady met her in the passage; the poor creature asked,"Is my husband here? Can I see George?"
"See him," cried the woman, "yes, if you go to him; last night he was takenwith the plague, and we sent him to the hospital."
The unfortunate inquirer staggered against a wall, a faint cry escaped her--"O! were you cruel enough," she exclaimed, "to send him there?"
The landlady meanwhile hurried away; but a more compassionate bar-maid gaveher a detailed account, the sum of which was, that her husband had beentaken ill, after a night of riot, and sent by his boon companions with allexpedition to St. Bartholomew's Hospital. I had watched this scene, forthere was a gentleness about the poor woman that interested me; she nowtottered away from the door, walking as well as she could down HolbornHill; but her strength soon failed her; she leaned against a wall, and herhead sunk on her bosom, while her pallid cheek became still more white. Iwent up to her and offered my services. She hardly looked up--"You can dome no good," she replied; "I must go to the hospital; if I do not diebefore I get there."
There were still a few hackney-coaches accustomed to stand about thestreets, more truly from habit than for use. I put her in one of these, andentered with her that I might secure her entrance into the hospital. Ourway was short, and she said little; except interrupted ejaculations ofreproach that he had left her, exclamations on the unkindness of some ofhis friends, and hope that she would find him alive. There was a simple,natural earnestness about her that interested me in her fate, especiallywhen she assured me that her husband was the best of men,--had been so,till want of business during these unhappy times had thrown him into badcompany. "He could not bear to come home," she said, "only to see ourchildren die. A man cannot have the patience a mother has, with her ownflesh and blood."
We were set down at St. Bartholomew's, and entered the wretched precinctsof the house of disease. The poor creature clung closer to me, as she sawwith what heartless haste they bore the dead from the wards, and took theminto a room, whose half-opened door displayed a number of corpses, horribleto behold by one unaccustomed to such scenes. We were directed to the wardwhere her husband had been first taken, and still was, the nurse said, ifalive. My companion looked eagerly from one bed to the other, till at theend of the ward she espied, on a wretched bed, a squalid, haggard creature,writhing under the torture of disease. She rushed towards him, she embracedhim, blessing God for his preservation.
The enthusiasm that inspired her with this strange joy, blinded her to thehorrors about her; but they were intolerably agonizing to me. The ward wasfilled with an effluvia that caused my heart to heave with painful qualms.The dead were carried out, and the sick brought in, with like indifference;some were screaming with pain, others laughing from the influence of moreterrible delirium; some were attended by weeping, despairing relations,others called aloud with thrilling tenderness or reproach on the friendswho had deserted them, while the nurses went from bed to bed, incarnateimages of despair, neglect, and death. I gave gold to my lucklesscompanion; I recommended her to the care of the attendants; I then hastenedaway; while the tormentor, the imagination, busied itself in picturing myown loved ones, stretched on such beds, attended thus. The country affordedno such mass of horrors; solitary wretches died in the open fields; and Ihave found a survivor in a vacant village, contending at once with famineand disease; but the assembly of pestilence, the banqueting hall of death,was spread only in London.
I rambled on, oppressed, distracted by painful emotions--suddenly I foundmyself before Drury Lane Theatre. The play was Macbeth--the first actorof the age was there to exert his powers to drug with irreflection theauditors; such a medicine I yearned for, so I entered. The theatre wastolerably well filled. Shakspeare, whose popularity was established by theapproval of four centuries, had not lost his influence even at this dreadperiod; but was still "Ut magus," the wizard to rule our hearts and governour imaginations. I came in during the interval between the third andfourth act. I looked round on the audience; the females were mostly of thelower classes, but the men were of all ranks, come hither to forget awhilethe protracted scenes of wretchedness, which awaited them at theirmiserable homes. The curtain drew up, and the stage presented the scene ofthe witches' cave. The wildness and supernatural machinery of Macbeth, wasa pledge that it could contain little directly connected with our presentcircumstances. Great pains had been taken in the scenery to give thesemblance of reality to the impossible. The extreme darkness of the stage,whose only light was received from the fire under the cauldron, joined to akind of mist that floated about it, rendered the unearthly shapes of thewitches obscure and shadowy. It was not three decrepid old hags that bentover their pot throwing in the grim ingredients of the magic charm, butforms frightful, unreal, and fanciful. The entrance of Hecate, and the wildmusic that followed, took us out of this world. The cavern shape the stageassumed, the beetling rocks, the glare of the fire, the misty shades thatcrossed the scene at times, the music in harmony with all witch-likefancies, permitted the imagination to revel, without fear of contradiction,or reproof from reason or the heart. The entrance of Macbeth did notdestroy the illusion, for he was actuated by the same feelings thatinspired us, and while the work of magic proceeded we sympathized in hiswonder and his daring, and gave ourselves up with our whole souls to theinfluence of scenic delusion. I felt the beneficial result of suchexcitement, in a renewal of those pleasing flights of fancy to which I hadlong been a stranger. The effect of this scene of incantation communicateda portion of its power to that which followed. We forgot that Malcolm andMacduff were mere human beings, acted upon by such simple passions aswarmed our own breasts. By slow degrees however we were drawn to the realinterest of the scene. A shudder like the swift passing of an electricshock ran through the house, when Rosse exclaimed, in answer to "StandsScotland where it did?"
Alas, poor country; Almost afraid to know itself! It cannot Be called our mother, but our grave: where nothing, But who knows nothing, is once seen to smile; Where sighs, and groans, and shrieks that rent the air, Are made, not marked; where violent sorrow seems A modern extasy: the dead man's knell Is there scarce asked, for who; and good men's lives Expire before the flowers in their caps, Dying, or ere they sicken.
Each word struck the sense, as our life's passing bell; we feared to lookat each other, but bent our gaze on the stage, as if our eyes could fallinnocuous on that alone. The person who played the part of Rosse, suddenlybecame aware of the dangerous ground he trod. He was an inferior actor, buttruth now made him excellent; as he went on to announce to Macduff theslaughter of his family, he was afraid to speak, trembling fromapprehension of a burst of grief from the audience, not from hisfellow-mime. Each word was drawn out with difficulty; real anguish paintedhis features; his eyes were now lifted in sudden horror, now fixed in dreadupon the ground. This shew of terror encreased ours, we gasped with him,each neck was stretched out, each face changed with the actor's changes--at length while Macduff, who, attending to his part, was unobservant of thehigh wrought sympathy of the house, cried with well acted passion
:
All my pretty ones? Did you say all?--O hell kite! All? What! all my pretty chickens, and their dam, At one fell swoop!
A pang of tameless grief wrenched every heart, a burst of despair wasechoed from every lip.--I had entered into the universal feeling--Ihad been absorbed by the terrors of Rosse--I re-echoed the cry of Macduff,and then rushed out as from an hell of torture, to find calm in the freeair and silent street.
Free the air was not, or the street silent. Oh, how I longed then for thedear soothings of maternal Nature, as my wounded heart was still furtherstung by the roar of heartless merriment from the public-house, by thesight of the drunkard reeling home, having lost the memory of what he wouldfind there in oblivious debauch, and by the more appalling salutations ofthose melancholy beings to whom the name of home was a mockery. I ran on atmy utmost speed until I found myself I knew not how, close to WestminsterAbbey, and was attracted by the deep and swelling tone of the organ. Ientered with soothing awe the lighted chancel, and listened to the solemnreligious chaunt, which spoke peace and hope to the unhappy. The notes,freighted with man's dearest prayers, re-echoed through the dim aisles, andthe bleeding of the soul's wounds was staunched by heavenly balm. In spiteof the misery I deprecated, and could not understand; in spite of the coldhearths of wide London, and the corpse-strewn fields of my native land; inspite of all the variety of agonizing emotions I had that eveningexperienced, I thought that in reply to our melodious adjurations, theCreator looked down in compassion and promise of relief; the awful peal ofthe heaven-winged music seemed fitting voice wherewith to commune with theSupreme; calm was produced by its sound, and by the sight of many otherhuman creatures offering up prayers and submission with me. A sentimentapproaching happiness followed the total resignation of one's being to theguardianship of the world's ruler. Alas! with the failing of this solemnstrain, the elevated spirit sank again to earth. Suddenly one of thechoristers died--he was lifted from his desk, the vaults below werehastily opened--he was consigned with a few muttered prayers to thedarksome cavern, abode of thousands who had gone before--now wide yawningto receive even all who fulfilled the funeral rites. In vain I would thenhave turned from this scene, to darkened aisle or lofty dome, echoing withmelodious praise. In the open air alone I found relief; among nature'sbeauteous works, her God reassumed his attribute of benevolence, and againI could trust that he who built up the mountains, planted the forests, andpoured out the rivers, would erect another state for lost humanity, wherewe might awaken again to our affections, our happiness, and our faith.
Fortunately for me those circumstances were of rare occurrence that obligedme to visit London, and my duties were confined to the rural district whichour lofty castle overlooked; and here labour stood in the place of pastime,to occupy such of the country people as were sufficiently exempt fromsorrow or disease. My endeavours were directed towards urging them to theirusual attention to their crops, and to the acting as if pestilence did notexist. The mower's scythe was at times heard; yet the joyless haymakersafter they had listlessly turned the grass, forgot to cart it; theshepherd, when he had sheared his sheep, would let the wool lie to bescattered by the winds, deeming it useless to provide clothing for anotherwinter. At times however the spirit of life was awakened by theseemployments; the sun, the refreshing breeze, the sweet smell of the hay,the rustling leaves and prattling rivulets brought repose to the agitatedbosom, and bestowed a feeling akin to happiness on the apprehensive. Nor,strange to say, was the time without its pleasures. Young couples, who hadloved long and hopelessly, suddenly found every impediment removed, andwealth pour in from the death of relatives. The very danger drew themcloser. The immediate peril urged them to seize the immediate opportunity;wildly and passionately they sought to know what delights existenceafforded, before they yielded to death, and
Snatching their pleasures with rough strife Thorough the iron gates of life,[4]
they defied the conquering pestilence to destroy what had been, or toerase even from their death-bed thoughts the sentiment of happinesswhich had been theirs.
One instance of this kind came immediately under our notice, where ahigh-born girl had in early youth given her heart to one of meanerextraction. He was a schoolfellow and friend of her brother's, and usuallyspent a part of the holidays at the mansion of the duke her father. Theyhad played together as children, been the confidants of each other's littlesecrets, mutual aids and consolers in difficulty and sorrow. Love had creptin, noiseless, terrorless at first, till each felt their life bound up inthe other, and at the same time knew that they must part. Their extremeyouth, and the purity of their attachment, made them yield with lessresistance to the tyranny of circumstances. The father of the fair Julietseparated them; but not until the young lover had promised to remain absentonly till he had rendered himself worthy of her, and she had vowed topreserve her virgin heart, his treasure, till he returned to claim andpossess it.
Plague came, threatening to destroy at once the aim of the ambitious andthe hopes of love. Long the Duke of L----derided the idea that therecould be danger while he pursued his plans of cautious seclusion; and he sofar succeeded, that it was not till this second summer, that the destroyer,at one fell stroke, overthrew his precautions, his security, and his life.Poor Juliet saw one by one, father, mother, brothers, and sisters, sickenand die. Most of the servants fled on the first appearance of disease,those who remained were infected mortally; no neighbour or rustic venturedwithin the verge of contagion. By a strange fatality Juliet alone escaped,and she to the last waited on her relatives, and smoothed the pillow ofdeath. The moment at length came, when the last blow was given to the lastof the house: the youthful survivor of her race sat alone among the dead.There was no living being near to soothe her, or withdraw her from thishideous company. With the declining heat of a September night, a whirlwindof storm, thunder, and hail, rattled round the house, and with ghastlyharmony sung the dirge of her family. She sat upon the ground absorbed inwordless despair, when through the gusty wind and bickering rain shethought she heard her name called. Whose could that familiar voice be? Notone of her relations, for they lay glaring on her with stony eyes. Againher name was syllabled, and she shuddered as she asked herself, am Ibecoming mad, or am I dying, that I hear the voices of the departed? Asecond thought passed, swift as an arrow, into her brain; she rushed to thewindow; and a flash of lightning shewed to her the expected vision, herlover in the shrubbery beneath; joy lent her strength to descend thestairs, to open the door, and then she fainted in his supporting arms.
A thousand times she reproached herself, as with a crime, that she shouldrevive to happiness with him. The natural clinging of the human mind tolife and joy was in its full energy in her young heart; she gave herselfimpetuously up to the enchantment: they were married; and in their radiantfeatures I saw incarnate, for the last time, the spirit of love, ofrapturous sympathy, which once had been the life of the world.
I envied them, but felt how impossible it was to imbibe the same feeling,now that years had multiplied my ties in the world. Above all, the anxiousmother, my own beloved and drooping Idris, claimed my earnest care; I couldnot reproach the anxiety that never for a moment slept in her heart, but Iexerted myself to distract her attention from too keen an observation ofthe truth of things, of the near and nearer approaches of disease, misery,and death, of the wild look of our attendants as intelligence of anotherand yet another death reached us; for to the last something new occurredthat seemed to transcend in horror all that had gone before. Wretchedbeings crawled to die under our succouring roof; the inhabitants of theCastle decreased daily, while the survivors huddled together in fear, and,as in a famine-struck boat, the sport of the wild, interminable waves, eachlooked in the other's face, to guess on whom the death-lot would next fall.All this I endeavoured to veil, so that it might least impress my Idris;yet, as I have said, my courage survived even despair: I might bevanquished, but I would not yield.
One day, it was the ninth of September, seemed devoted
to every disaster,to every harrowing incident. Early in the day, I heard of the arrival ofthe aged grandmother of one of our servants at the Castle. This old womanhad reached her hundredth year; her skin was shrivelled, her form was bentand lost in extreme decrepitude; but as still from year to year shecontinued in existence, out-living many younger and stronger, she began tofeel as if she were to live for ever. The plague came, and the inhabitantsof her village died. Clinging, with the dastard feeling of the aged, to theremnant of her spent life, she had, on hearing that the pestilence had comeinto her neighbourhood, barred her door, and closed her casement, refusingto communicate with any. She would wander out at night to get food, andreturned home, pleased that she had met no one, that she was in no dangerfrom the plague. As the earth became more desolate, her difficulty inacquiring sustenance increased; at first, her son, who lived near, hadhumoured her by placing articles of food in her way: at last he died. But,even though threatened by famine, her fear of the plague was paramount; andher greatest care was to avoid her fellow creatures. She grew weaker eachday, and each day she had further to go. The night before, she had reachedDatchet; and, prowling about, had found a baker's shop open and deserted.Laden with spoil, she hastened to return, and lost her way. The night waswindless, hot, and cloudy; her load became too heavy for her; and one byone she threw away her loaves, still endeavouring to get along, though herhobbling fell into lameness, and her weakness at last into inability tomove.
She lay down among the tall corn, and fell asleep. Deep in midnight, shewas awaked by a rustling near her; she would have started up, but her stiffjoints refused to obey her will. A low moan close to her ear followed, andthe rustling increased; she heard a smothered voice breathe out, Water,Water! several times; and then again a sigh heaved from the heart of thesufferer. The old woman shuddered, she contrived at length to sit upright;but her teeth chattered, and her knees knocked together--close, veryclose, lay a half-naked figure, just discernible in the gloom, and the cryfor water and the stifled moan were again uttered. Her motions at lengthattracted the attention of her unknown companion; her hand was seized witha convulsive violence that made the grasp feel like iron, the fingers likethe keen teeth of a trap.--"At last you are come!" were the words givenforth--but this exertion was the last effort of the dying--the jointsrelaxed, the figure fell prostrate, one low moan, the last, marked themoment of death. Morning broke; and the old woman saw the corpse, markedwith the fatal disease, close to her; her wrist was livid with the holdloosened by death. She felt struck by the plague; her aged frame was unableto bear her away with sufficient speed; and now, believing herselfinfected, she no longer dreaded the association of others; but, as swiftlyas she might, came to her grand-daughter, at Windsor Castle, there tolament and die. The sight was horrible; still she clung to life, andlamented her mischance with cries and hideous groans; while the swiftadvance of the disease shewed, what proved to be the fact, that she couldnot survive many hours.
While I was directing that the necessary care should be taken of her, Claracame in; she was trembling and pale; and, when I anxiously asked her thecause of her agitation, she threw herself into my arms weeping andexclaiming--"Uncle, dearest uncle, do not hate me for ever! I must tellyou, for you must know, that Evelyn, poor little Evelyn"--her voice waschoked by sobs. The fear of so mighty a calamity as the loss of our adoredinfant made the current of my blood pause with chilly horror; but theremembrance of the mother restored my presence of mind. I sought the littlebed of my darling; he was oppressed by fever; but I trusted, I fondly andfearfully trusted, that there were no symptoms of the plague. He was notthree years old, and his illness appeared only one of those attacksincident to infancy. I watched him long--his heavy half-closed lids, hisburning cheeks and restless twining of his small fingers--the fever wasviolent, the torpor complete--enough, without the greater fear ofpestilence, to awaken alarm. Idris must not see him in this state. Clara,though only twelve years old, was rendered, through extreme sensibility, soprudent and careful, that I felt secure in entrusting the charge of him toher, and it was my task to prevent Idris from observing their absence. Iadministered the fitting remedies, and left my sweet niece to watch besidehim, and bring me notice of any change she should observe.
I then went to Idris, contriving in my way, plausible excuses for remainingall day in the Castle, and endeavouring to disperse the traces of care frommy brow. Fortunately she was not alone. I found Merrival, the astronomer,with her. He was far too long sighted in his view of humanity to heed thecasualties of the day, and lived in the midst of contagion unconscious ofits existence. This poor man, learned as La Place, guileless andunforeseeing as a child, had often been on the point of starvation, he, hispale wife and numerous offspring, while he neither felt hunger, norobserved distress. His astronomical theories absorbed him; calculationswere scrawled with coal on the bare walls of his garret: a hard-earnedguinea, or an article of dress, was exchanged for a book without remorse;he neither heard his children cry, nor observed his companion's emaciatedform, and the excess of calamity was merely to him as the occurrence of acloudy night, when he would have given his right hand to observe acelestial phenomenon. His wife was one of those wondrous beings, to befound only among women, with affections not to be diminished by misfortune.Her mind was divided between boundless admiration for her husband, andtender anxiety for her children--she waited on him, worked for them, andnever complained, though care rendered her life one long-drawn, melancholydream.
He had introduced himself to Adrian, by a request he made to observe someplanetary motions from his glass. His poverty was easily detected andrelieved. He often thanked us for the books we lent him, and for the use ofour instruments, but never spoke of his altered abode or change ofcircumstances. His wife assured us, that he had not observed anydifference, except in the absence of the children from his study, and toher infinite surprise he complained of this unaccustomed quiet.
He came now to announce to us the completion of his Essay on thePericyclical Motions of the Earth's Axis, and the precession of theequinoctial points. If an old Roman of the period of the Republic hadreturned to life, and talked of the impending election of somelaurel-crowned consul, or of the last battle with Mithridates, his ideaswould not have been more alien to the times, than the conversation ofMerrival. Man, no longer with an appetite for sympathy, clothed histhoughts in visible signs; nor were there any readers left: while each one,having thrown away his sword with opposing shield alone, awaited theplague, Merrival talked of the state of mankind six thousand years hence.He might with equal interest to us, have added a commentary, to describethe unknown and unimaginable lineaments of the creatures, who would thenoccupy the vacated dwelling of mankind. We had not the heart to undeceivethe poor old man; and at the moment I came in, he was reading parts of hisbook to Idris, asking what answer could be given to this or that position.
Idris could not refrain from a smile, as she listened; she had alreadygathered from him that his family was alive and in health; though not aptto forget the precipice of time on which she stood, yet I could perceivethat she was amused for a moment, by the contrast between the contractedview we had so long taken of human life, and the seven league strides withwhich Merrival paced a coming eternity. I was glad to see her smile,because it assured me of her total ignorance of her infant's danger: but Ishuddered to think of the revulsion that would be occasioned by a discoveryof the truth. While Merrival was talking, Clara softly opened a door behindIdris, and beckoned me to come with a gesture and look of grief. A mirrorbetrayed the sign to Idris--she started up. To suspect evil, to perceivethat, Alfred being with us, the danger must regard her youngest darling, tofly across the long chambers into his apartment, was the work but of amoment. There she beheld her Evelyn lying fever-stricken and motionless. Ifollowed her, and strove to inspire more hope than I could myselfentertain; but she shook her head mournfully. Anguish deprived her ofpresence of mind; she gave up to me and Clara the physician's and nurse'sparts; she sat by the bed, holding one lit
tle burning hand, and, withglazed eyes fixed on her babe, passed the long day in one unvaried agony.It was not the plague that visited our little boy so roughly; but she couldnot listen to my assurances; apprehension deprived her of judgment andreflection; every slight convulsion of her child's features shook her frame--if he moved, she dreaded the instant crisis; if he remained still, shesaw death in his torpor, and the cloud on her brow darkened.
The poor little thing's fever encreased towards night. The sensation ismost dreary, to use no stronger term, with which one looks forward topassing the long hours of night beside a sick bed, especially if thepatient be an infant, who cannot explain its pain, and whose flickeringlife resembles the wasting flame of the watch-light,
Whose narrow fire Is shaken by the wind, and on whose edge Devouring darkness hovers.[5]
With eagerness one turns toward the east, with angry impatienceone marks the unchequered darkness; the crowing of a cock, thatsound of glee during day-time, comes wailing and untuneable--the creakingof rafters, and slight stir of invisible insect is heard and felt as thesignal and type of desolation. Clara, overcome by weariness, had seatedherself at the foot of her cousin's bed, and in spite of her effortsslumber weighed down her lids; twice or thrice she shook it off; but atlength she was conquered and slept. Idris sat at the bedside, holdingEvelyn's hand; we were afraid to speak to each other; I watched the stars--I hung over my child--I felt his little pulse--I drew near themother--again I receded. At the turn of morning a gentle sigh from thepatient attracted me, the burning spot on his cheek faded--his pulse beatsoftly and regularly--torpor yielded to sleep. For a long time I darednot hope; but when his unobstructed breathing and the moisture thatsuffused his forehead, were tokens no longer to be mistaken of thedeparture of mortal malady, I ventured to whisper the news of the change toIdris, and at length succeeded in persuading her that I spoke truth.
But neither this assurance, nor the speedy convalescence of our child couldrestore her, even to the portion of peace she before enjoyed. Her fear hadbeen too deep, too absorbing, too entire, to be changed to security. Shefelt as if during her past calm she had dreamed, but was now awake; shewas
As one In some lone watch-tower on the deep, awakened From soothing visions of the home he loves, Trembling to hear the wrathful billows roar;[6]
as one who has been cradled by a storm, and awakes to find thevessel sinking. Before, she had been visited by pangs of fear--now, shenever enjoyed an interval of hope. No smile of the heart ever irradiatedher fair countenance; sometimes she forced one, and then gushing tearswould flow, and the sea of grief close above these wrecks of pasthappiness. Still while I was near her, she could not be in utter despair--she fully confided herself to me--she did not seem to fear my death, orrevert to its possibility; to my guardianship she consigned the fullfreight of her anxieties, reposing on my love, as a wind-nipped fawn by theside of a doe, as a wounded nestling under its mother's wing, as a tiny,shattered boat, quivering still, beneath some protecting willow-tree. WhileI, not proudly as in days of joy, yet tenderly, and with glad consciousnessof the comfort I afforded, drew my trembling girl close to my heart, andtried to ward every painful thought or rough circumstance from hersensitive nature.
One other incident occurred at the end of this summer. The Countess ofWindsor, Ex-Queen of England, returned from Germany. She had at thebeginning of the season quitted the vacant city of Vienna; and, unable totame her haughty mind to anything like submission, she had delayed atHamburgh, and, when at last she came to London, many weeks elapsed beforeshe gave Adrian notice of her arrival. In spite of her coldness and longabsence, he welcomed her with sensibility, displaying such affection assought to heal the wounds of pride and sorrow, and was repulsed only by hertotal apparent want of sympathy. Idris heard of her mother's return withpleasure. Her own maternal feelings were so ardent, that she imagined herparent must now, in this waste world, have lost pride and harshness, andwould receive with delight her filial attentions. The first check to herduteous demonstrations was a formal intimation from the fallen majesty ofEngland, that I was in no manner to be intruded upon her. She consented,she said, to forgive her daughter, and acknowledge her grandchildren;larger concessions must not be expected.
To me this proceeding appeared (if so light a term may be permitted)extremely whimsical. Now that the race of man had lost in fact alldistinction of rank, this pride was doubly fatuitous; now that we felt akindred, fraternal nature with all who bore the stamp of humanity, thisangry reminiscence of times for ever gone, was worse than foolish. Idriswas too much taken up by her own dreadful fears, to be angry, hardlygrieved; for she judged that insensibility must be the source of thiscontinued rancour. This was not altogether the fact: but predominantself-will assumed the arms and masque of callous feeling; and the haughtylady disdained to exhibit any token of the struggle she endured; while theslave of pride, she fancied that she sacrificed her happiness to immutableprinciple.
False was all this--false all but the affections of our nature, and thelinks of sympathy with pleasure or pain. There was but one good and oneevil in the world--life and death. The pomp of rank, the assumption ofpower, the possessions of wealth vanished like morning mist. One livingbeggar had become of more worth than a national peerage of dead lords--alas the day!--than of dead heroes, patriots, or men of genius. There wasmuch of degradation in this: for even vice and virtue had lost theirattributes--life--life--the continuation of our animal mechanism--was the Alpha and Omega of the desires, the prayers, the prostrate ambitionof human race.
[1] Calderon de la Barca.[2] Wordsworth.[3] Keats.[4] Andrew Marvell.[5] The Cenci[6] The Brides' Tragedy, by T. L. Beddoes, Esq.