Upload
shubham-sharma
View
216
Download
15
Tags:
Embed Size (px)
DESCRIPTION
Essays and short stories
Citation preview
SELECTED ESSAYS
A BOOKISH TOPIC
By R. K. Narayan
My blackest thoughts are reserved for those who borrow my books. I am unable to forgive a
man who fails to return a book he has taken from my shelf. I would not hesitate to tell him
precisely what I thought of him, if he would only give me a chance to speak, but as a general
rule the book pirate shows no inclination to continue his friendship with me; he stoops besides
his hedge and remains still until I have safely passed his gate : if he meets me on the road face
to face he doubles his pace with an air of one going desperately in search of doctor. It is a
matter of life and death to someone, and he has no time to engage himself in any conversation
centering round some miserable book in a weak moment. This is the worst of the book pirate.
He begins to feel that it was due to some weakness that he ever entertained the idea perusing
(reading carefully) such and such a book, while a busy man like him could find no time even to
read his(neighbor’s) newspaper fully. Later it develops into an aversion (dislike) both for the
book and the man who lent him it. For a few days he keeps saying, “I have not yet read it, but
I’d like to, if I may .” And the lender of the book, ever a generous brood, says, “Oh yes, by all
means keep it. You have kept it so long, it would be pointless if you returned it without going
through it keep it, keep it”.
At the next meeting the lender feels delicate to ask again about the book. A few months pass
and then a happy new year and another happy one, and suddenly you realize that the gap in
your bookshelf is still there. And then one day you abruptly begin the meeting with: ‘Where is
the book?’
‘Which book’ asks the gentleman?
When you have succeeded in stimulating his memory, he only says,’ oh, that! I will have to
search for it. Naturally you don’t like the tone, and say: ‘well, why not search now?’Your instinct
now tells you will never see you book. You will feel that you are now seeing humanity at its
worst. Words fail you. You cannot trust yourself further and you go away. At the next meeting
the man says brazenly (shamelessly), with an air of condescending to give a thought to your
subject : ‘I’ve not found your book. I was out of town for a while on business. I believe it must
be with my brother-in-law. You know my brother-in-law?’
‘I don’t. Why don’t you get it back from him?’
‘I will, I will ,certainly ,’ he replies mechanically.
‘Or I will myself go and and beg him to return it, where is he?’
‘That’s what I must find out. He has been a tour.’
‘Why not send him a letter? I will bear the postal expenses.’
‘Oh, letters are not good; he is a very bad correspondent.’
The whereabouts of the book, you feel, are already trailing away into indefiniteness. At the next
meeting- the gentleman goes behind his hedge and disowns you completely.
It is under this condition you became a misanthrope (hates humanity), and ask why it is that
you cannot complain to the police about the loss of your book. In a more perfectly arranged
world, it should be possible. At the next election, my vote goes to the party which pledges itself
to eliminate (along with illiteracy, poverty and disease) book-borrowing from our society. I am
scrutinizing every manifesto and party programme for this possible promise.
All of us love to keep our books, and also share the delight of good reading with others.
This is an impossible combination and turns out to be a painful experiment. If you love your
book, don’t lend it to anyone on earth. This really ought to be one’s guiding principle. You
cannot lend your books and yet have them just as you cannot your cake and have it.
I know only one person who has achieved both. He lends book and yet retains his library in
shape. He has an elaborately built up library at home, and he is most enthusiastic in lending out
books- provided the borrower, even if he happens to be his son-in-law, signs a ledger and
returns the book on the proper date. He levies a fine of six pies per day if the book is held over
beyond the due date and he ruthlessly demands replacement of any book that’s lost. If he
should be told : ‘My brother-in-law must have taken it and I don’t know where he is, ‘he would
have replied: ‘Surely you wouldn’t have allowed your brother-in-law to walk with one of chairs,
coats or spoons. How dare anyone think that he can be as irresponsible as he likes where a
book is concerned? Don’t tell me about your brother-in-law. ‘I am interested only in my books.
It costs nine rupees plus postage. Write at once to so and so, booksellers.’ This book lover has
been called rude, pugnacious (aggressive), petty minded, and so forth. But it does not bother
him. He knows where his favourite volumes are to be found at any given moment.
As an author my problem is a little more complicated. I have (or rather try to have), in my shelf,
not only books written by others but also those written by me. An author may be pardoned if
he likes to have his own books, too, in his library. It may not at all be vanity. He may have to
work further on it for a subsequent edition or he may value it for being the first copy to arrive
from his publishers. A publisher gives only six copies for presentation when a book come out.
While I am prepared to scatter five abroad I like to be free to keep the sixth. But where is it?
Whenever I wish to see any of my own books for any purpose, I borrow it from a library. I wish
others would also do the same thing instead of asking complacently, ‘Why should an author
want his own books? ’
How One Should Read a Book
By Virginia Woolf
In the first place, I want to emphasize the note of interrogation at the end of my title. Even if
could answer the question for myself, the answer would apply only to me and not to you. The
only advice, indeed, that person can give another about reading is to take no advice, to follow
your own instincts, to use your own conclusions . If this is agreed between us, then I feel at
liberty to put forward a few ideas and suggestions, because you will not allow them to fetter
that independence which is the most important quality that a reader can possess. After all,
what laws can be laid down about books? The battle of Waterloo was certainly fought on a
certain day; but is Hamlet a better play than Lear? Nobody can say. Each must decide that
question for himself. To admit authorities, however heavily furred and gowned, into our
libraries and let them tell us how to read, what to read, what value to place upon what we
read, is to destroy the spirit of freedom which is the breath of those sanctuaries. Everywhere
else we may be bound by laws and conventions- there we have none.
But to enjoy freedom, if platitude is pardonable, we have of course to control ourselves. We
must not squander our powers, helplessly and ignorantly, squirting half the house in order to
water a single rose bush; we must train them exactly and powerfully, here on the very spot .
This, it may be, is one of the first difficulties that faces us in a library. What is ‘the very spot’?
There may well seem to be nothing but a conglomeration and huddle of confusion. Poems and
novels, histories and memoirs, dictionaries and blue-books; books written in all languages by
men and women of all tempers, races, and ages jostle each other on the shelf. And outside the
donkey brays, the women gossip at the pump, the colts gallop across the field. Where are we to
begin? How are we to bring order into this multitudinous chaos and get the best and widest
pleasure from what we read?
It is simple enough to say that since books have classes – fiction, biography, poetry- we should
separate them and take from each what it is right that each should give us. Yet few people take
from books what books can give us. Most commonly some come to books with blurred and
divided minds, asking of fiction that it shall be true, of poetry that it shall be false, of biography
that it shall be flattering, of history that it shall enforce our own prejudices. If we could banish
all such preconceptions when we read, that would be an admirable beginning. Do not dictate to
your author; try to become him. Be his fellow-worker and accomplice. If u hang back, and
reserve and criticize at first, you are preventing yourself from getting the fullest possible value
from what you read. But if you open your mind as widely as possible, then signs and hints of
almost imperceptible fineness, from the twists and turns of the first sentences, will bring you
into the presence of a human being unlike any other. Steep yourself in this, acquaint yourself
with this, and soon you will find that your author is giving you, or attempting to give you,
something far more definite.
How to Speak Correct English
By Bernard Shaw
Let me introduce myself, Bernard Shaw.
I am asked to give you a specimen of spoken English. But first let me give you a warning. You
think you are hearing my voice. But unless you know how to use your gramophone properly,
what you are hearing maybe grotesquely unlike any sound that has ever come from my lips.
A few days ago I heard a gramophone record of a speech by Mr. Ramsay MacDonald, the
parliamentary chief of the British Labour Party, who has a fine deep Scottish voice and a
remarkably musical and dignified delivery. What I heard was a high pitched, sharp, cackling
voice, most unmusical, suggesting a small, egotistical, very ill mannered man, complaining of
something. I said, "That is not Mr. MacDonald, I know his voice as well as I know my own." The
gramophone operator assured me that it was and showed me the label on the record to prove
it. I said, "No, that is not Ramsay MacDonald. But let me see whether I cannot find him for you."
Then, as the record started again, I took the screw, which regulates the speed, and slowed the
record down gradually until the high pitched yapping changed to the deep tones of Mr.
MacDonald's voice. And the unmusical, quarrelsome self-assertion became the melodious
rhetoric of the Scottish orator. "There," I said, "that is Mr. MacDonald."
So you see what you are hearing now is not my voice unless your gramophone is turning at
exactly the right speed. I have records of famous singers and speakers who are dead; but whose
voices I can remember quite well: Adelina Patti, Sarah Bernard, Charles Santley, Caruso,
Tamagno. But they sound quite horrible and silly until I have found the right speed for them as I
found it for Mr. MacDonalds.
Now the worst of it is that I cannot tell you how to find the right speed for me. Those of you,
who have heard me speak, either face to face with me or over the wireless, will have no
difficulty. You have just to change the speed until you recognize the voice you remember. But
what are you to do, if you have never heard me? Well, I can give you a hint that will help you. If
what you hear is very disappointing and you feel instinctively, that must be a horrid man, you
may be quite sure the speed is wrong. Slow it down, until you feel that you are listening to an
amiable old gentleman of 71 with a rather pleasant Irish voice. Then that is me. All the other
people, whom you hear at the other speeds, are impostors, sham Shaws, phantoms who never
existed.
I am now going to suppose that you are a foreign student of the English language, and that you
desire to speak it well enough to be understood when you travel in the British Commonwealth
or in America or when you meet a native of those countries. Or it may be that you are yourself
a native, but that you speak in a provincial or Cockney dialect of which you are a little ashamed
or which perhaps prevents you from obtaining some employment, which is open to those only
who speak what is called correct English.
Now whether you are a foreigner or a native the first thing I must impress on you is that there is
no such thing as ideally correct English. No two British subjects speak exactly alike.
I am a member of a committee established by the British Broadcasting Corporation, for the
purpose of deciding how the utterances of speakers employed by the corporation should be
pronounced, in order that they should be a model of correct English speech for the British
islands.
All the members of that committee are educated persons, whose speech would pass as correct
and refined in any society or any employment in London. Our chairman is the poet laureate
who is not only an artist, whose materials are the sounds of spoken English, but a specialist in
their pronunciation. One of our members is Sir Johnston Forbes-Robertson, famous not only as
an actor, but for the beauty of his speech. I was selected for service on the committee because
as a writer of plays I am accustomed to superintend their rehearsals. And to listen critically to
the way in which they are spoken by actors who are by profession trained speakers, being
myself a public speaker of long experience.
That committee knows as much as anyone knows about English speech. And yet its members
do not agree as to the pronunciation of some of the simplest and commonest words in the
English language.
The two simplest and commonest words in any language are yes and no. But no two members
of the committee pronounce them exactly alike. All that can be said is that every member
pronounces them in such a way that they would not only be intelligible in every English
speaking country, but would stamp the speaker as a cultivated person, as distinguished from an
ignorant and illiterate one.
You will say, "Well, that is good enough for me. That is how I desire to speak." But which
member of the committee will you take for your model? There are Irish members, Scottish
members, Welsh members, Oxford University members, American members. All recognizable
as such by their differences of speech. They differ also according to the country in which they
were born. Now as they all speak differently it is nonsense to say that they all speak correctly.
All we can claim is that they all speak presentably. And if you speak as they do you will be
understood in any English speaking country and accepted as a person of good social standing.
I wish I could offer you your choice among them all as a model. But for the moment I am afraid
you must put up with me, an Irish man.
I have said enough to you about the fact that no two native speakers of English speak it alike.
But perhaps you are clever enough to ask me whether I myself always speak it in the same way.
I must confess at once that I do not. Nobody does.
I am at present speaking to an audience of many thousands of gramophone listeners. Many of
whom are trying hard to follow my words syllable by syllable. If I were to speak to you as
carelessly as I speak to my wife at home this record would be useless. And if I were to speak to
my wife at home as carefully as I am speaking to you she would think that I was going mad. As a
public speaker I have to take care that every word I say is heard distinctfully at the far end of
large halls containing thousands of people.
But at home, when I have to consider only my wife sitting within six feet of me at breakfast, I
take so little pains with my speech, that very often, instead of giving me the expected answer,
she says, "Don't mumble and don't turn your head away when you speak. I can't hear a word
you are saying". And she also is a little careless. Sometimes I have to say, "What?" two or three
times during our meal. And she suspects me of growing deafer and deafer. So she does not say
so, because as I am now over 70 it might be true. No doubt I ought to speak to my wife as
carefully as I should speak to a queen and she to me as carefully as she would speak to a king.
We ought to, but we don't. Don't by the way is short for do not.
We all have company manners and home manners. If you were to call on a strange family and
to listen through the key hole, not that I would suggest for a moment that you are capable
doing of such a very unladylike or ungentlemanlike thing. But still, if in your enthusiasm for
studying languages you could bring yourself to do it, just for a few seconds to hear how a family
speaks to one another, when there is nobody else listening to them, and then walk into the
room and hear how very differently they speak in your presence, the change would surprise
you.
Even when our home manners are as good as our company manners, and of course they ought
to be much better, they are always different. And the difference is greater in speech than in
anything else.
Suppose I forget to wind my watch and it stops. I have to ask somebody to tell me the time. If I
ask a stranger I say, "What o'clock is it?" The stranger hears every syllable distinctly. But if I ask
my wife all she hears is "Clock's it". That is good enough for her, but it would not be good
enough for you.
So I am speaking to you now much more carefully than I speak to her. But please don't tell her.
I am now going to address myself especially to my foreign hearers. I have to give them another
warning of quite a different type. If you are learning English, because you intend to travel in
England and wish to be understood there do not try to speak English perfectly. Because if you
do no one will understand you.
I have already explained that 'though there is no such thing as perfectly correct English, there is
presentable English, which we call good English. But in London 999 out of every thousand
people not only speak bad English, but speak even that very badly. You may say, that even if
they do not speak English well themselves, they can at least understand it when it is well
spoken. They can when the speaker is English. But when the speaker is a foreigner, the better
he speaks, the harder it is to understand him.
No foreigner can ever stress the syllables and make the voice rise and fall in question and
answer, assertion and denial, in refusal and consent, in inquiry or information, exactly as a
native does. Therefore the first thing you have to do is to speak with a strong foreign accent
and speak broken English. That is English without any grammar. Then every English person, to
whom you speak, will at once know that you are a foreigner and try to understand you and be
ready to help you. He will not expect you to be polite and to use elaborate grammatical
phrases. He will be interested in you, because you are a foreigner and pleased by his own
cleverness in making out your meaning and being able to tell you what you want to know.
If you say, "Will you have the goodness, sir, to direct me to the railway terminus at Charing
Cross," pronouncing all the vowels and consonants beautifully, he will not understand you. And
will suspect you of being a beggar or a confidence trickster. But if you shout, "Please, Charing
Cross, which way?" you will have no difficulty. Half a dozen people will immediately overwhelm
you with directions. Even in private intercourse with cultivated people you must not speak too
well.
Apply this to your attempts to learn foreign languages and never try to speak them too well.
And do not be afraid to travel, you will be surprised to find out how little you need to know or
how badly you may pronounce. Even among English people to speak too well is a pedantic
affectation. In a foreigner it is something worse than an affectation; it is an insult to the native
who cannot understand his own language when it is too well spoken.
That is all I can tell you. The record will hold no more. Good bye.
.....
This speech was recorded in 1927.
MAKING WRITING SIMPLE
BY J.B.PRIESTLEY
At the end of a long talk with a youngish critic, a sincere fellow whose personality (though not
his values) I respect, he stared at me and then slowly : ‘I don’t understand you. Your talk is so
much more complicated – subtle (noticable) – than your writing. Your writing always seems to
me too simple.’ And I replied : ‘But I’ve spent years trying to make my writing simple. What you
see as a fault, I regard as a virtue’.
There was now revealed to us the gulf between his generation and mine. He and his lot,
matured in the early thirties, wanted literature to be difficult. They grew up in revolt against the
Mass Communication antics of their age. They did not want to share anything with the crowd.
Writing that was hard to understand was like a password to their secret society. A good writer
to them was one who made his readers toil (hard work) and sweat. They admired extreme
cleverness and solemnity (serious), poets like political cardinals, critics who came to literature
like specialists summoned to consultation at a king’s beside.
A genuine author, an artist, as distinct from hacks who tried to please the mob, began with
some simple thoughts and impressions and then proceeded to complicate his account of them,
if only to keep away the fools. Difficulty was demanded, hence the vogue (fashion) to Donne
and Hopkins. Literature had to respond to something twisted, tormented, esoteric (unusual), in
their own secret natures. In all this there was no pose and here their elders went wrong about
them. They could be accused not unjustly of narrowness and arrogance, but not of insincerity.
They were desperately sincere in believing that the true artist must hide from the crowd behind
a thicket (dense) of briers. They grew up terrified of the crowd, who in this new Mass Age
seemed to them to be threatening all decent values.
But I was born in the Nineteenth century and my most impressionable years were those just
before 1914. Rightly or wrongly, I am not afraid of the crowd. And art to me is not synonymous
with introversion. (I regard this as the great critical fallacy of our time). Because I am what is
called ‘an intellectual’—and I am just as much ‘an intellectual’ as these younger chaps—I do not
feel that there is a glass wall between me and the people in the nearest factories, shops and
pubs. I prefer therefore a wide channel of communications. Deliberately I aim at simplicity and
not complexity in my writing. No matter what the subject in hand might be, I want to write
something that a pinch I could read aloud in a bar-parlour. (And the time came when I was
heard and understood in a thousand bar-parlours).
I do not pretend to be subtle and profound, but when I am at work I try to appear simpler than I
really am. Perhaps I make it too easy for the reader, do too much of the toiling and sweating
myself. No doubt I am altogether too obvious for the cleverest fellows, who want to beat their
brains against something hard and knotty. But then I am not impressed by this view of
literature as a cerebral activity.
Some contemporary critics would be better occupied solving chess problems and breaking
down cyphers. They are no customers of mine, and I do not display my goods to catch. But any
man who thinks the kind of simplicity I attempt is easy should try it for himself, if only in his
next letter to The Times. I find it much easier now than I used to do but that is because I have
kept this aim in view throughout years of hardwork. I do not claim to have achieved even now a
prose that is like an easy pursuasive voice, preferably my own at its best; but this is what I have
been trying to do for years, quite deliberately, and it is this that puzzled my friend, the youngish
critic who cannot help wanting something quite different.
This habit of simplification has its own little triumphs. Thus, I was asked to pay a birthday
tribute, on the air, to C. G. Jung, for whose work and personality I have massive admiration. To
explain Jung in thirteen and a half minutes so that the ordinary listener could understand what
the fuss was about! My friends said it could not be done. The psychologists said it could not be
done. But I can reasonably claim, backed by first class evidence, that I did it. It was a tough little
task, but when I had come to the end of it I found, like honey in the rock, a taste of delight.
OF REVENGE
By Francis Bacon
REVENGE is a kind of wild justice; which the more man's nature runs to, the more ought law to
weed it out. For as for the first wrong, it doth but offend the law; but the revenge of that wrong
pulleth the law out of office. Certainly, in taking revenge, a man is but even with his enemy; but
in passing it over, he is superior; for it is a prince's part to pardon. And Salomon, I am sure,
saith, It is the glory of a man to pass by an offence.
That which is past is gone, and irrevocable; and wise men have enough to do with things
present and to come: therefore they do but trifle with themselves, that labour in past matters.
There is no man doth a wrong for the wrong's sake; but thereby to purchase himself profit, or
pleasure, or honour, or the like. There why should I be angry with a man for loving himself
better than me? And if any man should do wrong merely out of ill nature, why, yet it is but like
the thorn or briar, which prick and scratch, because they can do no other.
The most tolerable sort of revenge is for those wrongs which there is no law or remedy; but
then let a man take heed the revenge be such as there is no law to punish; else a man's enemy
is still beforehand, and it is two for one.
Some, when they take revenge, are desirous the party should know whence it cometh: this is
the more generous. For the delight seemeth to be not so much in doing the hurt as in making
the party repent: but base and crafty cowards are like the arrow that flieth in the dark.
Cosmus, Duke of Florence, had a desperate saying against perfidious or neglecting friends, as if
those wrongs were unpardonable: You shall read (saith he) that we are commanded to forgive
our friends. But yet the spirit of Job was in a better tune: Shall we (saith he) take good at God's
hands, and not be content to take evil also? And so of friends in a proportion.
This is certain, that a man that studieth revenge keeps his own wounds green, which otherwise
would heal and do well.
Public revenges are for the most part fortunate; as that for the death of Caesar; for the death of
Pertinax(1); for the death of Henry the Third of France (2); and many more. But in private
revenges it is not so. Nay rather, vindictive persons live the life of witches; who as they are
mischievous, so end they unfortunate.
Notes:
(1) Publius Helvius Pertinax became emperor of Rome in 193 and was assassinated three
months after his accession to the throne by a soldier in his praetorian Guard.
(2) King of France, 1574-1589, assassinated during the Siege of Paris.
OF STUDIES
By Francis Bacon
Studies serve for delight, for ornament, and for ability. Their chief use for delight is in
privateness and retiring; for ornament, is in discourse; and for ability, is in the judgment and
disposition of business. For expert men can execute, and perhaps judge of particulars, one by
one; but the general counsels, and the plots and marshalling of affairs, come best from those
that are learned. To spend too much time in studies is sloth; to use them too much for
ornament, is affectation; to make judgment wholly by their rules, is the humor of a scholar.
They perfect nature, and are perfected by experience: for natural abilities are like natural
plants, that need pruning (trimming), by study; and studies themselves do give forth directions
too much at large, except they be bounded in by experience. Crafty men condemn studies,
simple men admire them, and wise men use them; for they teach not their own use; but that is
wisdom without them, and above them, won by observation. Read not to contradict and
confute; nor to believe and take for granted; nor to find talk and discourse; but to weigh and
consider. Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed
and digested; that is, some books are to be read only in parts; others to be read, but not
curiously; and some few to be read wholly, and with diligence and attention. Some books also
may be read by deputy, and extracts made of them by others; but that would be only in the less
important arguments and the meaner sort of books, else distilled books are like common
distilled waters, flashy things. Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing
an exact man. And therefore, if a man write little, he had need have a great memory; if he
confer (talk) little, he had need have a present wit: and if he read little, he had need have much
cunning, to seem to know that he doth not. Histories make men wise; poets witty; the
mathematics subtle (fine); natural philosophy deep; moral grave; logic and rhetoric able to
contend (argue). Abeunt studia in mores [Studies pass into and influence manners]. Nay, there
is no stond (stand) or impediment (barrier) in the wit but may be wrought out by fit studies; like
as diseases of the body may have appropriate exercises. Bowling is good for the stone and
reins; shooting for the lungs and breast; gentle walking for the stomach; riding for the head;
and the like. So if a man’s wit be wandering, let him study the mathematics; for in
demonstrations, if his wit be called away never so little, he must begin again. If his wit be not
apt to distinguish or find differences, let him study the Schoolmen; for they are cymini sectores
[splitters of hairs]. If he be not apt to beat over matters, and to call up one thing to prove and
illustrate another, let him study the lawyers’ cases. So every defect of the mind may have a
special receipt.
SELECTED SHORT STORIES
THE BET
By Anton Chekhov
IT WAS a dark autumn night. The old banker was walking up and down his study and remembering
how, fifteen years before, he had given a party one autumn evening. There had been many clever
men there, and there had been interesting conversations. Among other things they had talked of
capital punishment. The majority of the guests, among whom were many journalists and
intellectual men, disapproved of the death penalty. They considered that form of punishment out
of date, immoral, and unsuitable for Christian States. In the opinion of some of them the death
penalty ought to be replaced everywhere by imprisonment for life.
"I don't agree with you," said their host the banker. "I have not tried either the death penalty or
imprisonment for life, but if one may judge _a priori_, the death penalty is more moral and more
humane than imprisonment for life. Capital punishment kills a man at once, but lifelong
imprisonment kills him slowly. Which executioner is the more humane, he who kills you in a few
minutes or he who drags the life out of you in the course of many years?"
"Both are equally immoral," observed one of the guests, "for they both have the same object -- to
take away life. The State is not God. It has not the right to take away what it cannot restore when it
wants to."
Among the guests was a young lawyer, a young man of five-and-twenty. When he was asked his
opinion, he said:
"The death sentence and the life sentence are equally immoral, but if I had to choose between the
death penalty and imprisonment for life, I would certainly choose the second. To live anyhow is
better than not at all."
A lively discussion arose. The banker, who was younger and more nervous in those days, was
suddenly carried away by excitement; he struck the table with his fist and shouted at the young
man:
"It's not true! I'll bet you two millions you wouldn't stay in solitary confinement for five years."
"If you mean that in earnest," said the young man, "I'll take the bet, but I would stay not five but
fifteen years."
"Fifteen? Done!" cried the banker. "Gentlemen, I stake two millions!"
"Agreed! You stake your millions and I stake my freedom!" said the young man.
And this wild, senseless bet was carried out! The banker, spoilt and frivolous (playful), with millions
beyond his reckoning (sums), was delighted at the bet. At supper he made fun of the young man,
and said:
"Think better of it, young man, while there is still time. To me two millions are a trifle, but you are
losing three or four of the best years of your life. I say three or four, because you won't stay longer.
Don't forget either, you unhappy man, that voluntary confinement is a great deal harder to bear
than compulsory. The thought that you have the right to step out in liberty at any moment will
poison your whole existence in prison. I am sorry for you."
And now the banker, walking to and fro, remembered all this, and asked himself: "What was the
object of that bet? What is the good of that man's losing fifteen years of his life and my throwing
away two millions? Can it prove that the death penalty is better or worse than imprisonment for
life? No, no. It was all nonsensical and meaningless. On my part it was the caprice (fancy) of a
pampered man, and on his part simple greed for money. . . ."
Then he remembered what followed that evening. It was decided that the young man should spend
the years of his captivity under the strictest supervision in one of the lodges in the banker's garden.
It was agreed that for fifteen years he should not be free to cross the threshold of the lodge, to see
human beings, to hear the human voice, or to receive letters and newspapers. He was allowed to
have a musical instrument and books, and was allowed to write letters, to drink wine, and to
smoke. By the terms of the agreement, the only relations he could have with the outer world were
by a little window made purposely for that object. He might have anything he wanted -- books,
music, wine, and so on -- in any quantity he desired by writing an order, but could only receive
them through the window. The agreement provided for every detail and every trifle that would
make his imprisonment strictly solitary, and bound the young man to stay there exactly fifteen
years, beginning from twelve o'clock of November 14, 1870, and ending at twelve o'clock of
November 14, 1885. The slightest attempt on his part to break the conditions, if only two minutes
before the end, released the banker from the obligation to pay him two millions.
For the first year of his confinement, as far as one could judge from his brief notes, the prisoner
suffered severely from loneliness and depression. The sounds of the piano could be heard
continually day and night from his lodge. He refused wine and tobacco. Wine, he wrote, excites the
desires, and desires are the worst foes of the prisoner; and besides, nothing could be more dreary
than drinking good wine and seeing no one. And tobacco spoilt the air of his room. In the first year
the books he sent for were principally of a light character; novels with a complicated love plot,
sensational and fantastic stories, and so on.
In the second year the piano was silent in the lodge, and the prisoner asked only for the classics. In
the fifth year music was audible again, and the prisoner asked for wine. Those who watched him
through the window said that all that year he spent doing nothing but eating and drinking and lying
on his bed, frequently yawning and angrily talking to himself. He did not read books. Sometimes at
night he would sit down to write; he would spend hours writing, and in the morning tear up all that
he had written. More than once he could be heard crying.
In the second half of the sixth year the prisoner began zealously studying languages, philosophy,
and history. He threw himself eagerly into these studies -- so much so that the banker had enough
to do to get him the books he ordered. In the course of four years some six hundred volumes were
procured at his request. It was during this period that the banker received the following letter from
his prisoner:
"My dear Jailer, I write you these lines in six languages. Show them to people who know the
languages. Let them read them. If they find not one mistake I implore you to fire a shot in the
garden. That shot will show me that my efforts have not been thrown away. The geniuses of all
ages and of all lands speak different languages, but the same flame burns in them all. Oh, if you
only knew what unearthly happiness my soul feels now from being able to understand them!" The
prisoner's desire was fulfilled. The banker ordered two shots to be fired in the garden.
Then after the tenth year, the prisoner sat immovably at the table and read nothing but the Gospel.
It seemed strange to the banker that a man who in four years had mastered six hundred learned
volumes should waste nearly a year over one thin book easy of comprehension. Theology and
histories of religion followed the Gospels.
In the last two years of his confinement the prisoner read an immense quantity of books quite
indiscriminately (haphazardly). At one time he was busy with the natural sciences, then he would
ask for Byron or Shakespeare. There were notes in which he demanded at the same time books on
chemistry, and a manual of medicine, and a novel, and some treatise on philosophy or theology. His
reading suggested a man swimming in the sea among the wreckage of his ship, and trying to save
his life by greedily clutching first at one spar (box) and then at another.
II
The old banker remembered all this, and thought:
"To-morrow at twelve o'clock he will regain his freedom. By our agreement I ought to pay him two
millions. If I do pay him, it is all over with me: I shall be utterly ruined."
Fifteen years before, his millions had been beyond his reckoning; now he was afraid to ask himself
which were greater, his debts (unpaid sums) or his assets (property). Desperate gambling on the
Stock Exchange, wild speculation and the excitability which he could not get over even in advancing
years, had by degrees led to the decline of his fortune and the proud, fearless, self-confident
millionaire had become a banker of middling rank, trembling at every rise and fall in his
investments. "Cursed bet!" muttered the old man, clutching his head in despair "Why didn't the
man die? He is only forty now. He will take my last penny from me, he will marry, will enjoy life, will
gamble on the Exchange; while I shall look at him with envy like a beggar, and hear from him every
day the same sentence: 'I am indebted to you for the happiness of my life, let me help you!' No, it is
too much! The one means of being saved from bankruptcy and disgrace is the death of that man!"
It struck three o'clock, the banker listened; everyone was asleep in the house and nothing could be
heard outside but the rustling of the chilled trees. Trying to make no noise, he took from a fireproof
safe the key of the door which had not been opened for fifteen years, put on his overcoat, and
went out of the house.
It was dark and cold in the garden. Rain was falling. A damp cutting wind was racing about the
garden, howling and giving the trees no rest. The banker strained his eyes, but could see neither
the earth nor the white statues, nor the lodge, nor the trees. Going to the spot where the lodge
stood, he twice called the watchman. No answer followed. Evidently the watchman had sought
shelter from the weather, and was now asleep somewhere either in the kitchen or in the
greenhouse.
"If I had the pluck to carry out my intention," thought the old man, "Suspicion would fall first upon
the watchman."
He felt in the darkness for the steps and the door, and went into the entry of the lodge. Then he
groped his way into a little passage and lighted a match. There was not a soul there. There was a
bedstead with no bedding on it, and in the corner there was a dark cast-iron stove. The seals on the
door leading to the prisoner's rooms were intact (unbroken).
When the match went out the old man, trembling with emotion, peeped through the little window.
A candle was burning dimly in the prisoner's room. He was sitting at the table. Nothing could be
seen but his back, the hair on his head, and his hands. Open books were lying on the table, on the
two easy-chairs, and on the carpet near the table.
Five minutes passed and the prisoner did not once stir. Fifteen years' imprisonment had taught him
to sit still. The banker tapped at the window with his finger, and the prisoner made no movement
whatever in response. Then the banker cautiously broke the seals off the door and put the key in
the keyhole. The rusty lock gave a grating sound and the door creaked. The banker expected to
hear at once footsteps and a cry of astonishment, but three minutes passed and it was as quiet as
ever in the room. He made up his mind to go in.
At the table a man unlike ordinary people was sitting motionless. He was a skeleton with the skin
drawn tight over his bones, with long curls like a woman's and a shaggy beard. His face was yellow
with an earthy tint in it, his cheeks were hollow, his back long and narrow, and the hand on which
his shaggy head was propped was so thin and delicate that it was dreadful to look at it. His hair was
already streaked with silver, and seeing his emaciated, aged-looking face, no one would have
believed that he was only forty. He was asleep. . . . In front of his bowed head there lay on the table
a sheet of paper on which there was something written in fine handwriting.
"Poor creature!" thought the banker, "he is asleep and most likely dreaming of the millions. And I
have only to take this half-dead man, throw him on the bed, stifle him a little with the pillow, and
the most conscientious expert would find no sign of a violent death. But let us first read what he
has written here. . . ."
The banker took the page from the table and read as follows:
"To-morrow at twelve o'clock I regain my freedom and the right to associate with other men, but
before I leave this room and see the sunshine, I think it necessary to say a few words to you. With a
clear conscience I tell you, as before God, who beholds me, that I despise freedom and life and
health, and all that in your books is called the good things of the world.
"For fifteen years I have been intently studying earthly life. It is true I have not seen the earth nor
men, but in your books I have drunk fragrant wine, I have sung songs, I have hunted stags and wild
boars in the forests, have loved women. . . . Beauties as ethereal as clouds, created by the magic of
your poets and geniuses, have visited me at night, and have whispered in my ears wonderful tales
that have set my brain in a whirl. In your books I have climbed to the peaks of Elburz and Mont
Blanc, and from there I have seen the sun rise and have watched it at evening flood the sky, the
ocean, and the mountain-tops with gold and crimson. I have watched from there the lightning
flashing over my head and cleaving the storm-clouds. I have seen green forests, fields, rivers, lakes,
towns. I have heard the singing of the sirens, and the strains of the shepherds' pipes; I have
touched the wings of comely devils who flew down to converse with me of God. . . . In your books I
have flung myself into the bottomless pit, performed miracles, slain, burned towns, preached new
religions, conquered whole kingdoms. . . .
"Your books have given me wisdom. All that the unresting thought of man has created in the ages is
compressed into a small compass in my brain. I know that I am wiser than all of you.
"And I despise (hate) your books, I despise wisdom and the blessings of this world. It is all
worthless, fleeting, illusory, and deceptive, like a mirage. You may be proud, wise, and fine, but
death will wipe you off the face of the earth as though you were no more than mice burrowing
under the floor, and your posterity, your history, your immortal geniuses will burn or freeze
together with the earthly globe.
"You have lost your reason and taken the wrong path. You have taken lies for truth, and
hideousness for beauty. You would marvel if, owing to strange events of some sorts, frogs and
lizards suddenly grew on apple and orange trees instead of fruit, or if roses began to smell like a
sweating horse; so I marvel at you who exchange heaven for earth. I don't want to understand you.
"To prove to you in action how I despise all that you live by, I renounce the two millions of which I
once dreamed as of paradise and which now I despise. To deprive myself of the right to the money I
shall go out from here five hours before the time fixed, and so break the compact. . . ."
When the banker had read this he laid the page on the table, kissed the strange man on the head,
and went out of the lodge, weeping. At no other time, even when he had lost heavily on the Stock
Exchange, had he felt so great a contempt for himself. When he got home he lay on his bed, but his
tears and emotion kept him for hours from sleeping.
Next morning the watchmen ran in with pale faces, and told him they had seen the man who lived
in the lodge climb out of the window into the garden, go to the gate, and disappear. The banker
went at once with the servants to the lodge and made sure of the flight of his prisoner. To avoid
arousing unnecessary talk, he took from the table the writing in which the millions were
renounced, and when he got home locked it up in the fireproof safe.
THE HOME-COMING
By Rabindra Nath Tagore
Phatik Chakravorti was ringleader among the boys of the village. A new mischief got into his
head. There was a heavy log lying on the mud-flat of the river waiting to be shaped into a mast
for a boat. He decided that they should all work together to shift the log by main force from its
place and roll it away. The owner of the log would be angry and surprised, and they would all
enjoy the fun. Every one seconded the proposal, and it was carried unanimously.
But just as the fun was about to begin, Makhan, Phatik's younger brother, sauntered up, and
sat down on the log in front of them all without a word. The boys were puzzled for a moment.
He was pushed, rather timidly, by one of the boys and told to get up but he remained quite
unconcerned. He appeared like a young philosopher meditating on the futility of games. Phatik
was furious. "Makhan," he cried, "if you don't get down this minute I'll thrash you!"
Makhan only moved to a more comfortable position.
Now, if Phatik was to keep his regal dignity before the public, it was clear he ought to carry out
his threat. But his courage failed him at the crisis. His fertile brain, however, rapidly seized upon
a new manoeuvre (plan) which would discomfit his brother and afford his followers an added
amusement. He gave the word of command to roll the log and Makhan over together. Makhan
heard the order, and made it a point of honour to stick on. But he overlooked the fact, like
those who attempt earthly fame in other matters, that there was peril (risk) in it.
The boys began to heave at the log with all their might, calling out, "One, two, three, go," At the
word "go" the log went; and with it went Makhan's philosophy, glory and all.
All the other boys shouted themselves hoarse with delight. But Phatik was a little frightened. He
knew what was coming. And, sure enough, Makhan rose from Mother Earth blind as Fate and
screaming like the furies (anger). He rushed at Phatik and scratched his face and beat him and
kicked him, and then went crying home. The first act of the drama was over.
Phatik wiped his face, and sat down on the edge of a sunken barge (hurry) on the river bank,
and began to chew a piece of grass. A boat came up to the landing, and a middle-aged man,
with grey hair and dark moustache, stepped on shore. He saw the boy sitting there doing
nothing, and asked him where the Chakravortis lived. Phatik went on chewing the grass, and
said: "Over there," but it was quite impossible to tell where he pointed. The stranger asked him
again. He swung his legs to and fro on the side of the barge, and said; "Go and find out," and
continued to chew the grass as before.
But now a servant came down from the house, and told Phatik his mother wanted him. Phatik
refused to move. But the servant was the master on this occasion. He took Phatik up roughly,
and carried him, kicking and struggling in impotent (powerless) rage.
When Phatik came into the house, his mother saw him. She called out angrily: "So you have
been hitting Makhan again?"
Phatik answered indignantly: "No, I haven't; who told you that?"
His mother shouted: "Don't tell lies! You have."
Phatik said suddenly: "I tell you, I haven't. You ask Makhan!" But Makhan thought it best to
stick to his previous statement. He said: "Yes, mother. Phatik did hit me."
Phatik's patience was already exhausted. He could not hear this injustice. He rushed at Makban,
and hammered him with blows: "Take that" he cried, "and that, and that, for telling lies."
His mother took Makhan's side in a moment, and pulled Phatik away, beating him with her
hands. When Phatik pushed her aside, she shouted out: "What are you little villain! would you
hit your own mother?"
It was just at this critical juncture that the grey-haired stranger arrived. He asked what was the
matter. Phatik looked sheepish and ashamed.
But when his mother stepped back and looked at the stranger, her anger was changed to
surprise. For she recognised her brother, and cried: "Why, Dada! Where have you come from?
"As she said these words, she bowed to the ground and touched his feet. Her brother had gone
away soon after she had married, and he had started business in Bombay. His sister had lost her
husband while he was in Bombay. Bishamber had now come back to Calcutta, and had at once
made enquiries about his sister. He had then hastened to see her as soon as he found out
where she was.
The next few days were full of rejoicing. The brother asked after the education of the two boys.
He was told by his sister that Phatik was a perpetual nuisance. He was lazy, disobedient, and
wild. But Makhan was as good as gold, as quiet as a lamb, and very fond of reading, Bishamber
kindly offered to take Phatik off his sister's hands, and educate him with his own children in
Calcutta. The widowed mother readily agreed. When his uncle asked Phatik If he would like to
go to Calcutta with him, his joy knew no bounds, and he said; "Oh, yes, uncle! " In a way that
made it quite clear that he meant it.
It was an immense relief to the mother to get rid of Phatik. She had a prejudice against the boy,
and no love was lost between the two brothers. She was in daily fear that he would either
drown Makhan some day in the river, or break his head in a fight, or run him into some danger
or other. At the same time she was somewhat distressed to see Phatik's extreme eagerness to
get away.
Phatik, as soon as all was settled, kept asking his uncle every minute when they were to start.
He was on pins and needles all day long with excitement, and lay awake most of the night. He
bequeathed (leave) to Makhan, in perpetuity (infinity), his fishing-rod, his big kite and his
marbles. Indeed, at this time of departure his generosity towards Makhan was unbounded.
When they reached Calcutta, Phatik made the acquaintance of his aunt for the first time. She
was by no means pleased with this unnecessary addition to her family. She found her own three
boys quite enough to manage without taking any one else. And to bring a village lad of fourteen
into their midst was terribly upsetting. Bishamber should really have thought twice before
committing such an indiscretion (carelessness).
In this world of human affairs there is no worse nuisance than a boy at the age of fourteen. He
is neither ornamental, nor useful. It is impossible to shower affection on him as on a little boy;
and he is always getting in the way. If he talks with a childish lisp he is called a baby, and if he
answers in a grown-up way he is called impertinent (impolite). In fact any talk at all from him is
resented (disliked). Then he is at the unattractive, growing age. He grows out of his clothes with
indecent haste; his voice grows hoarse (rough) and breaks and quavers (shake); his face grows
suddenly angular (bony) and unsightly. It is easy to excuse the shortcomings of early childhood,
but it is hard to tolerate even unavoidable lapses (slip) in a boy of fourteen. The lad himself
becomes painfully self-conscious. When he talks with elderly people he is either unduly
forward, or else so unduly shy that he appears ashamed of his very existence.
Yet it is at this very age when in his heart of hearts a young lad (boy) most craves for
recognition and love; and he becomes the devoted slave of any one who shows him
consideration. But none dare openly love him, for that would be regarded as undue indulgence,
and therefore bad for the boy. So, what with scolding and chiding, he becomes very much like a
stray (wandering) dog that has lost his master.
For a boy of fourteen his own home is the only Paradise. To live in a strange house with strange
people is little short of torture, while the height of bliss is to receive the kind looks of women,
and never to be slighted (insulted) by them.
It was anguish to Phatik to be the unwelcome guest in his aunt's house, despised by this elderly
woman, and slighted, on every occasion. If she ever asked him to do anything for her, he would
be so overjoyed that he would overdo it; and then she would tell him not to be so stupid, but to
get on with his lessons.
The cramped atmosphere of neglect in his aunt's house oppressed Phatik so much that he felt
that he could hardly breathe. He wanted to go out into the open country and fill his lungs and
breathe freely. But there was no open country to go to. Surrounded on all sides by Calcutta
houses and walls, be would dream night after night of his village home, and long to be back
there. He remembered the glorious meadow where he used to fly his kite all day long; the
broad river-banks where he would wander about the livelong day singing and shouting for joy;
the narrow brook where he could go and dive and swim at any time he liked. He thought of his
band of boy companions over whom he was despot (dictator); and, above all, the memory of
that tyrant mother of his, who had such a prejudice against him, occupied him day and night. A
kind of physical love like that of animals; a longing to be in the presence of the one who is
loved; an inexpressible wistfulness during absence; a silent cry of the inmost heart for the
mother, like the lowing of a calf in the twilight;-this love, which was almost an animal instinct,
agitated (restless) the shy, nervous, lean, uncouth and ugly boy. No one could understand it,
but it preyed upon his mind continually.
There was no more backward boy in the whole school than Phatik. He gaped and remained
silent when the teacher asked him a question, and like an over laden ass patiently suffered all
the blows that came down on his back. When other boys were out at play, he stood wistfully by
the window and gazed at the roofs of the distant houses. And if by chance he espied (see)
children playing on the open terrace of any roof, his heart would ache (pain) with longing
(wish).
One day he summoned up all his courage, and asked his uncle: "Uncle, when can I go home?"
His uncle answered; "Wait till the holidays come."But the holidays would not come till
November, and there was a long time still to wait.
One day Phatik lost his lesson-book. Even with the help of books he had found it very difficult
indeed to prepare his lesson. Now it was impossible. Day after day the teacher would cane him
unmercifully. His condition became so abjectly miserable that even his cousins were ashamed
to own him. They began to jeer and insult him more than the other boys. He went to his aunt at
last, and told her that he had lost his book.
His aunt pursed her lips in contempt, and said: "You great clumsy, country lout (thug). How can
I afford, with all my family, to buy you new books five times a month?"
That night, on his way back from school, Phatik had a bad headache with a fit of shivering. He
felt he was going to have an attack of malarial fever. His one great fear was that he would be a
nuisance to his aunt.
The next morning Phatik was nowhere to be seen. All searches in the neighbourhood proved
futile. The rain had been pouring in torrents all night, and those who went out in search of the
boy got drenched through to the skin. At last Bishamber asked help from the police.
At the end of the day a police van stopped at the door before the house. It was still raining and
the streets were all flooded. Two constables brought out Phatik in their arms and placed him
before Bishamber. He was wet through from head to foot, muddy all over, his face and eyes
flushed red with fever, and his limbs all trembling. Bishamber carried him in his arms, and took
him into the inner apartments. When his wife saw him, she exclaimed; "What a heap of trouble
this boy has given us. Hadn't you better send him home ?"
Phatik heard her words, and sobbed out loud: "Uncle, I was just going home; but they dragged
me back again,"
The fever rose very high, and all that night the boy was delirious (hot). Bishamber brought in a
doctor. Phatik opened his eyes flushed with fever, and looked up to the ceiling, and said
vacantly: "Uncle, have the holidays come yet? May I go home?"
Bishamber wiped the tears from his own eyes, and took Phatik's lean and burning hands in his
own, and sat by him through the night. The boy began again to mutter. At last his voice became
excited: "Mother," he cried, "don't beat me like that! Mother! I am telling the truth!"
The next day Phatik became conscious for a short time. He turned his eyes about the room, as if
expecting someone to come. At last, with an air of disappointment, his head sank back on the
pillow. He turned his face to the wall with a deep sigh.
Bishamber knew his thoughts, and, bending down his head, whispered: "Phatik, I have sent for
your mother." The day went by. The doctor said in a troubled voice that the boy's condition was
very critical.
Phatik began to cry out; "By the mark! --three fathoms (measuring water). By the mark-- four
fathoms. By the mark-." He had heard the sailor on the river- steamer calling out the mark on
the plumb-line. Now he was himself plumbing an unfathomable sea.
Later in the day Phatik's mother burst into the room like a whirlwind, and began to toss from
side to side and moan and cry in a loud voice.
Bishamber tried to calm her agitation, but she flung herself on the bed, and cried: "Phatik, my
darling, my darling."
Phatik stopped his restless movements for a moment. His hands ceased beating up and down.
He said: "Eh?"
The mother cried again: "Phatik, my darling, my darling."
Phatik very slowly turned his head and, without seeing anybody, said: "Mother, the holidays
have come."
A Predicament
By Edgar Allan Poe
What chance, good lady, hath bereft you thus?
--COMUS.
IT was a quiet and still afternoon when I strolled forth in the goodly city of Edina. The confusion
and bustle in the streets were terrible. Men were talking. Women were screaming. Children
were choking. Pigs were whistling. Carts they rattled. Bulls they bellowed. Cows they lowed.
Horses they neighed. Cats they caterwauled. Dogs they danced. Danced! Could it then be
possible? Danced! Alas, thought I, my dancing days are over! Thus it is ever. What a host of
gloomy recollections will ever and anon be awakened in the mind of genius and imaginative
contemplation, especially of a genius doomed to the everlasting and eternal, and continual,
and, as one might say, the -- continued -- yes, the continued and continuous, bitter, harassing,
disturbing, and, if I may be allowed the expression, the very disturbing influence of the serene,
and godlike, and heavenly, and exalted, and elevated, and purifying effect of what may be
rightly termed the most enviable, the most truly enviable -- nay! the most benignly beautiful,
the most deliciously ethereal, and, as it were, the most pretty (if I may use so bold an
expression) thing (pardon me, gentle reader!) in the world -- but I am always led away by my
feelings. In such a mind, I repeat, what a host of recollections are stirred up by a trifle! The dogs
danced! I -- I could not! They frisked -- I wept. They capered -- I sobbed aloud. Touching
circumstances! which cannot fail to bring to the recollection of the classical reader that
exquisite passage in relation to the fitness of things, which is to be found in the commencement
of the third volume of that admirable and venerable Chinese novel the Jo-Go-Slow.
In my solitary walk through, the city I had two humble but faithful companions. Diana, my
poodle! sweetest of creatures! She had a quantity of hair over her one eye, and a blue ribband
tied fashionably around her neck. Diana was not more than five inches in height, but her head
was somewhat bigger than her body, and her tail being cut off exceedingly close, gave an air of
injured innocence to the interesting animal which rendered her a favorite with all.
And Pompey, my negro! -- sweet Pompey! how shall I ever forget thee? I had taken Pompey's
arm. He was three feet in height (I like to be particular) and about seventy, or perhaps eighty,
years of age. He had bow-legs and was corpulent. His mouth should not be called small, nor his
ears short. His teeth, however, were like pearl, and his large full eyes were deliciously white.
Nature had endowed him with no neck, and had placed his ankles (as usual with that race) in
the middle of the upper portion of the feet. He was clad with a striking simplicity. His sole
garments were a stock of nine inches in height, and a nearly -- new drab overcoat which had
formerly been in the service of the tall, stately, and illustrious Dr. Moneypenny. It was a good
overcoat. It was well cut. It was well made. The coat was nearly new. Pompey held it up out of
the dirt with both hands.
There were three persons in our party, and two of them have already been the subject of
remark. There was a third -- that person was myself. I am the Signora Psyche Zenobia. I am not
Suky Snobbs. My appearance is commanding. On the memorable occasion of which I speak I
was habited in a crimson satin dress, with a sky-blue Arabian mantelet. And the dress had
trimmings of green agraffas, and seven graceful flounces of the orange-colored auricula. I thus
formed the third of the party. There was the poodle. There was Pompey. There was myself. We
were three. Thus it is said there were originally but three Furies -- Melty, Nimmy, and Hetty --
Meditation, Memory, and Fiddling.
Leaning upon the arm of the gallant Pompey, and attended at a respectable distance by Diana, I
proceeded down one of the populous and very pleasant streets of the now deserted Edina. On
a sudden, there presented itself to view a church -- a Gothic cathedral -- vast, venerable, and
with a tall steeple, which towered into the sky. What madness now possessed me? Why did I
rush upon my fate? I was seized with an uncontrollable desire to ascend the giddy pinnacle, and
then survey the immense extent of the city. The door of the cathedral stood invitingly open. My
destiny prevailed. I entered the ominous archway. Where then was my guardian angel? -- if
indeed such angels there be. If! Distressing monosyllable! what world of mystery, and meaning,
and doubt, and uncertainty is there involved in thy two letters! I entered the ominous archway!
I entered; and, without injury to my orange-colored auriculas, I passed beneath the portal, and
emerged within the vestibule. Thus it is said the immense river Alfred passed, unscathed, and
unwetted, beneath the sea.__
I thought the staircase would never have an end. Round! Yes, they went round and up, and
round and up and round and up, until I could not help surmising, with the sagacious Pompey,
upon whose supporting arm I leaned in all the confidence of early affection -- I could not help
surmising that the upper end of the continuous spiral ladder had been accidentally, or perhaps
designedly, removed. I paused for breath; and, in the meantime, an accident occurred of too
momentous a nature in a moral, and also in a metaphysical point of view, to be passed over
without notice. It appeared to me -- indeed I was quite confident of the fact -- I could not be
mistaken -- no! I had, for some moments, carefully and anxiously observed the motions of my
Diana -- I say that I could not be mistaken -- Diana smelt a rat! At once I called Pompey's
attention to the subject, and he -- he agreed with me. There was then no longer any reasonable
room for doubt. The rat had been smelled -- and by Diana. Heavens! shall I ever forget the
intense excitement of the moment? Alas! what is the boasted intellect of man? The rat! -- it
was there -- that is to say, it was somewhere. Diana smelled the rat. I -- I could not! Thus it is
said the Prussian Isis has, for some persons, a sweet and very powerful perfume, while to
others it is perfectly scentless.
The staircase had been surmounted, and there were now only three or four more upward steps
intervening between us and the summit. We still ascended, and now only one step remained.
One step! One little, little step! Upon one such little step in the great staircase of human life
how vast a sum of human happiness or misery depends! I thought of myself, then of Pompey,
and then of the mysterious and inexplicable destiny which surrounded us. I thought of Pompey!
-- alas, I thought of love! I thought of my many false steps which have been taken, and may be
taken again. I resolved to be more cautious, more reserved. I abandoned the arm of Pompey,
and, without his assistance, surmounted the one remaining step, and gained the chamber of
the belfry. I was followed immediately afterward by my poodle. Pompey alone remained
behind. I stood at the head of the staircase, and encouraged him to ascend. He stretched forth
to me his hand, and unfortunately in so doing was forced to abandon his firm hold upon the
overcoat. Will the gods never cease their persecution? The overcoat is dropped, and, with one
of his feet, Pompey stepped upon the long and trailing skirt of the overcoat. He stumbled and
fell -- this consequence was inevitable. He fell forward, and, with his accursed head, striking me
full in the -- in the breast, precipitated me headlong, together with himself, upon the hard,
filthy, and detestable floor of the belfry. But my revenge was sure, sudden, and complete.
Seizing him furiously by the wool with both hands, I tore out a vast quantity of black, and crisp,
and curling material, and tossed it from me with every manifestation of disdain. It fell among
the ropes of the belfry and remained. Pompey arose, and said no word. But he regarded me
piteously with his large eyes and -- sighed. Ye Gods -- that sigh! It sunk into my heart. And the
hair -- the wool! Could I have reached that wool I would have bathed it with my tears, in
testimony of regret. But alas! it was now far beyond my grasp. As it dangled among the cordage
of the bell, I fancied it alive. I fancied that it stood on end with indignation. Thus the happy-
dandy Flos Aeris of Java bears, it is said, a beautiful flower, which will live when pulled up by the
roots. The natives suspend it by a cord from the ceiling and enjoy its fragrance for years.
Our quarrel was now made up, and we looked about the room for an aperture through which
to survey the city of Edina. Windows there were none. The sole light admitted into the gloomy
chamber proceeded from a square opening, about a foot in diameter, at a height of about
seven feet from the floor. Yet what will the energy of true genius not effect? I resolved to
clamber up to this hole. A vast quantity of wheels, pinions, and other cabalistic -- looking
machinery stood opposite the hole, close to it; and through the hole there passed an iron rod
from the machinery. Between the wheels and the wall where the hole lay there was barely
room for my body -- yet I was desperate, and determined to persevere. I called Pompey to my
side.
"You perceive that aperture, Pompey. I wish to look through it. You will stand here just beneath
the hole -- so. Now, hold out one of your hands, Pompey, and let me step upon it -- thus. Now,
the other hand, Pompey, and with its aid I will get upon your shoulders."
He did every thing I wished, and I found, upon getting up, that I could easily pass my head and
neck through the aperture. The prospect was sublime. Nothing could be more magnificent. I
merely paused a moment to bid Diana behave herself, and assure Pompey that I would be
considerate and bear as lightly as possible upon his shoulders. I told him I would be tender of
his feelings -- ossi tender que beefsteak. Having done this justice to my faithful friend, I gave
myself up with great zest and enthusiasm to the enjoyment of the scene which so obligingly
spread itself out before my eyes.
Upon this subject, however, I shall forbear to dilate. I will not describe the city of Edinburgh.
Every one has been to the city of Edinburgh. Every one has been to Edinburgh -- the classic
Edina. I will confine myself to the momentous details of my own lamentable adventure. Having,
in some measure, satisfied my curiosity in regard to the extent, situation, and general
appearance of the city, I had leisure to survey the church in which I was, and the delicate
architecture of the steeple. I observed that the aperture through which I had thrust my head
was an opening in the dial-plate of a gigantic clock, and must have appeared, from the street, as
a large key-hole, such as we see in the face of the French watches. No doubt the true object
was to admit the arm of an attendant, to adjust, when necessary, the hands of the clock from
within. I observed also, with surprise, the immense size of these hands, the longest of which
could not have been less than ten feet in length, and, where broadest, eight or nine inches in
breadth. They were of solid steel apparently, and their edges appeared to be sharp. Having
noticed these particulars, and some others, I again turned my eyes upon the glorious prospect
below, and soon became absorbed in contemplation.__
From this, after some minutes, I was aroused by the voice of Pompey, who declared that he
could stand it no longer, and requested that I would be so kind as to come down. This was
unreasonable, and I told him so in a speech of some length. He replied, but with an evident
misunderstanding of my ideas upon the subject. I accordingly grew angry, and told him in plain
words, that he was a fool, that he had committed an ignoramus e-clench-eye, that his notions
were mere insommary Bovis, and his words little better than an ennemywerrybor'em. With this
he appeared satisfied, and I resumed my contemplations.
It might have been half an hour after this altercation when, as I was deeply absorbed in the
heavenly scenery beneath me, I was startled by something very cold which pressed with a
gentle pressure on the back of my neck. It is needless to say that I felt inexpressibly alarmed. I
knew that Pompey was beneath my feet, and that Diana was sitting, according to my explicit
directions, upon her hind legs, in the farthest corner of the room. What could it be? Alas! I but
too soon discovered. Turning my head gently to one side, I perceived, to my extreme horror,
that the huge, glittering, scimetar-like minute-hand of the clock had, in the course of its hourly
revolution, descended upon my neck. There was, I knew, not a second to be lost. I pulled back
at once -- but it was too late. There was no chance of forcing my head through the mouth of
that terrible trap in which it was so fairly caught, and which grew narrower and narrower with a
rapidity too horrible to be conceived. The agony of that moment is not to be imagined. I threw
up my hands and endeavored, with all my strength, to force upward the ponderous iron bar. I
might as well have tried to lift the cathedral itself. Down, down, down it came, closer and yet
closer. I screamed to Pompey for aid; but he said that I had hurt his feelings by calling him 'an
ignorant old squint-eye:' I yelled to Diana; but she only said 'bow-wow-wow,' and that I had
told her 'on no account to stir from the corner.' Thus I had no relief to expect from my
associates.
Meantime the ponderous and terrific Scythe of Time (for I now discovered the literal import of
that classical phrase) had not stopped, nor was it likely to stop, in its career. Down and still
down, it came. It had already buried its sharp edge a full inch in my flesh, and my sensations
grew indistinct and confused. At one time I fancied myself in Philadelphia with the stately Dr.
Moneypenny, at another in the back parlor of Mr. Blackwood receiving his invaluable
instructions. And then again the sweet recollection of better and earlier times came over me,
and I thought of that happy period when the world was not all a desert, and Pompey not
altogether cruel.
The ticking of the machinery amused me. Amused me, I say, for my sensations now bordered
upon perfect happiness, and the most trifling circumstances afforded me pleasure. The eternal
click-clak, click-clak, click-clak of the clock was the most melodious of music in my ears, and
occasionally even put me in mind of the graceful sermonic harangues of Dr. Ollapod. Then there
were the great figures upon the dial-plate -- how intelligent how intellectual, they all looked!
And presently they took to dancing the Mazurka, and I think it was the figure V. who performed
the most to my satisfaction. She was evidently a lady of breeding. None of your swaggerers, and
nothing at all indelicate in her motions. She did the pirouette to admiration -- whirling round
upon her apex. I made an endeavor to hand her a chair, for I saw that she appeared fatigued
with her exertions -- and it was not until then that I fully perceived my lamentable situation.
Lamentable indeed! The bar had buried itself two inches in my neck. I was aroused to a sense of
exquisite pain. I prayed for death, and, in the agony of the moment, could not help repeating
those exquisite verses of the poet Miguel De Cervantes:
Vanny Buren, tan escondida
Query no te senty venny
Pork and pleasure, delly morry
Nommy, torny, darry, widdy!
But now a new horror presented itself, and one indeed sufficient to startle the strongest
nerves. My eyes, from the cruel pressure of the machine, were absolutely starting from their
sockets. While I was thinking how I should possibly manage without them, one actually tumbled
out of my head, and, rolling down the steep side of the steeple, lodged in the rain gutter which
ran along the eaves of the main building. The loss of the eye was not so much as the insolent air
of independence and contempt with which it regarded me after it was out. There it lay in the
gutter just under my nose, and the airs it gave itself would have been ridiculous had they not
been disgusting. Such a winking and blinking were never before seen. This behavior on the part
of my eye in the gutter was not only irritating on account of its manifest insolence and shameful
ingratitude, but was also exceedingly inconvenient on account of the sympathy which always
exists between two eyes of the same head, however far apart. I was forced, in a manner, to
wink and to blink, whether I would or not, in exact concert with the scoundrelly thing that lay
just under my nose. I was presently relieved, however, by the dropping out of the other eye. In
falling it took the same direction (possibly a concerted plot) as its fellow. Both rolled out of the
gutter together, and in truth I was very glad to get rid of them.
The bar was now four inches and a half deep in my neck, and there was only a little bit of skin to
cut through. My sensations were those of entire happiness, for I felt that in a few minutes, at
farthest, I should be relieved from my disagreeable situation. And in this expectation I was not
at all deceived. At twenty-five minutes past five in the afternoon, precisely, the huge minute-
hand had proceeded sufficiently far on its terrible revolution to sever the small remainder of my
neck. I was not sorry to see the head which had occasioned me so much embarrassment at
length make a final separation from my body. It first rolled down the side of the steeple, then
lodge, for a few seconds, in the gutter, and then made its way, with a plunge, into the middle of
the street.
I will candidly confess that my feelings were now of the most singular -- nay, of the most
mysterious, the most perplexing and incomprehensible character. My senses were here and
there at one and the same moment. With my head I imagined, at one time, that I, the head,
was the real Signora Psyche Zenobia -- at another I felt convinced that myself, the body, was
the proper identity. To clear my ideas on this topic I felt in my pocket for my snuff-box, but,
upon getting it, and endeavoring to apply a pinch of its grateful contents in the ordinary
manner, I became immediately aware of my peculiar deficiency, and threw the box at once
down to my head. It took a pinch with great satisfaction, and smiled me an acknowledgement
in return. Shortly afterward it made me a speech, which I could hear but indistinctly without
ears. I gathered enough, however, to know that it was astonished at my wishing to remain alive
under such circumstances. In the concluding sentences it quoted the noble words of Ariosto--
Il pover hommy che non sera corty
And have a combat tenty erry morty; thus comparing me to the hero who, in the heat of the
combat, not perceiving that he was dead, continued to contest the battle with inextinguishable
valor. There was nothing now to prevent my getting down from my elevation, and I did so.
What it was that Pompey saw so very peculiar in my appearance I have never yet been able to
find out. The fellow opened his mouth from ear to ear, and shut his two eyes as if he were
endeavoring to crack nuts between the lids. Finally, throwing off his overcoat, he made one
spring for the staircase and disappeared. I hurled after the scoundrel these vehement words of
Demosthenes-
Andrew O'Phlegethon, you really make haste to fly, and then turned to the darling of my heart,
to the one-eyed! the shaggy-haired Diana. Alas! what a horrible vision affronted my eyes? Was
that a rat I saw skulking into his hole? Are these the picked bones of the little angel who has
been cruelly devoured by the monster? Ye gods! and what do I behold -- is that the departed
spirit, the shade, the ghost, of my beloved puppy, which I perceive sitting with a grace so
melancholy, in the corner? Hearken! for she speaks, and, heavens! it is in the German of
Schiller-
"Unt stubby duk, so stubby dun
Duk she! duk she!" Alas! and are not her words too true?
"And if I died, at least I died
For thee -- for thee." Sweet creature! she too has sacrificed herself in my behalf. Dogless,
niggerless, headless, what now remains for the unhappy Signora Psyche Zenobia? Alas --
nothing! I have done.
THE MAN OF THE CROWD
by Edgar Allan Poe
IT WAS well said of a certain German book that "er lasst sich nicht lesen"–it does not permit
itself to be read. There are some secrets which do not permit themselves to be told. Men die
nightly in their beds, wringing the hands of ghostly confessors, and looking them piteously in
the eyes–die with despair of heart and convulsion of throat, on account of the hideousness of
mysteries which will not suffer themselves to be revealed. Now and then, alas, the conscience
of man takes up a burden so heavy in horror that it can be thrown down only into the grave.
And thus the essence of all crime is undivulged. Not long ago, about the closing in of an evening
in autumn, I sat at the large bow–window of the D-–Coffee-House in London. For some months
I had been ill in health, but was now convalescent, and, with returning strength, found myself in
one of those happy moods which are so precisely the converse of ennui-moods of the keenest
appetency, when the film from the mental vision departs–achlus os prin epeen- and the
intellect, electrified, surpasses as greatly its everyday condition, as does the vivid yet candid
reason of Leibnitz, the mad and flimsy rhetoric of Gorgias. Merely to breathe was enjoyment;
and I derived positive pleasure even from many of the legitimate sources of pain. I felt a calm
but inquisitive interest in everything. With a cigar in my mouth and a newspaper in my lap, I
had been amusing myself for the greater part of the afternoon, now in poring over
advertisements, now in observing the promiscuous company in the room, and now in peering
through the smoky panes into the street. This latter is one of the principal thoroughfares of the
city, and had been very much crowded during the whole day. But, as the darkness came on, the
throng momently increased; and, by the time the lamps were well lighted, two dense and
continuous tides of population were rushing past the door. At this particular period of the
evening I had never before been in a similar situation, and the tumultuous sea of human heads
filled me, therefore, with a delicious novelty of emotion. I gave up, at length, all care of things
within the hotel, and became absorbed in contemplation of the scene without.
At first my observations took an abstract and generalizing turn. I looked at the passengers in
masses, and thought of them in their aggregate relations. Soon, however, I descended to
details, and regarded with minute interest the innumerable varieties of figure, dress, air, gait,
visage, and expression of countenance. By far the greater number of those who went by had a
satisfied, business-like demeanor, and seemed to be thinking only of making their way through
the press. Their brows were knit, and their eyes rolled quickly; when pushed against by fellow-
wayfarers they evinced no symptom of impatience, but adjusted their clothes and hurried on.
Others, still a numerous class, were restless in their movements, had flushed faces, and talked
and gesticulated to themselves, as if feeling in solitude on account of the very denseness of the
company around. When impeded in their progress, these people suddenly ceased muttering;
but redoubled their gesticulations, and awaited, with an absent and overdone smile upon their
lips, the course of the persons impeding them. If jostled, they bowed profusely to the jostlers,
and appeared overwhelmed with confusion. There was nothing very distinctive about these two
large classes beyond what I have noted. Their habiliments belonged to that order which is
pointedly termed the decent. They were undoubtedly noblemen, merchants, attorneys,
tradesmen, stock-jobbers–the Eupatrids and the common-places of society–men of leisure and
men actively engaged in affairs of their own–conducting business upon their own responsibility.
They did not greatly excite my attention.
The tribe of clerks was an obvious one; and here I discerned two remarkable divisions. There
were the junior clerks of flash houses- young gentlemen with tight coats, bright boots, well-
oiled hair, and supercilious lips. Setting aside a certain dapperness of carriage, which may be
termed deskism for want of a better word, the manner of these persons seemed to be an exact
facsimile of what had been the perfection of bon ton about twelve or eighteen months before.
They wore the castoff graces of the gentry;–and this, I believe, involves the best definition of
the class. The division of the upper clerks of staunch firms, or of the "steady old fellows," it was
not possible to mistake. These were known by their coats and pantaloons of black or brown,
made to sit comfortably, with white cravats and waistcoats, broad solid-looking shoes, and
thick hose or gaiters. They had all slightly bald heads, from which the right ears, long used to
pen-holding, had an odd habit of standing off on end. I observed that they always removed or
settled their hats with both bands, and wore watches, with short gold chains of a substantial
and ancient pattern. Theirs was the affectation of respectability–if indeed there be an
affectation so honorable.
There were many individuals of dashing appearance, whom I easily understood as belonging to
the race of swell pick-pockets, with which all great cities are infested. I watched these gentry
with much inquisitiveness, and found it difficult to imagine how they should ever be mistaken
for gentlemen by gentlemen themselves. Their voluminousness of wristband, with an air of
excessive frankness, should betray them at once. The gamblers, of whom I descried not a few,
were still more easily recognizable. They wore every variety of dress, from that of the desperate
thimble-rig bully, with velvet waistcoat, fancy neckerchief, gilt chains, and filigreed buttons, to
that of the scrupulously inornate clergyman, than which nothing could be less liable to
suspicion. Still all were distinguished by a certain sodden swarthiness of complexion, a filmy
dimness of eye, and pallor and compression of lip. There were two other traits, moreover, by
which I could always detect them: a guarded lowness of tone in conversation, and a more than
ordinary extension of the thumb in a direction at right angles with the fingers. Very often, in
company with these sharpers, I observed an order of men somewhat different in habits, but still
birds of a kindred feather. They may be defined as the gentlemen who live by their wits. They
seem to prey upon the public in two battalions–that of the dandies and that of the military
men. Of the first grade the leading features are long locks and smiles; of the second, frogged
coats and frowns. Descending in the scale of what is termed gentility, I found darker and deeper
themes for speculation. I saw Jew peddlers, with hawk eyes flashing from countenances whose
every other feature wore only an expression of abject humility; sturdy professional street
beggars scowling upon mendicants of a better stamp, whom despair alone had driven forth into
the night for charity; feeble and ghastly invalids, upon whom death had placed a sure hand, and
who sidled and tottered through the mob, looking every one beseechingly in the face, as if in
search of some chance consolation, some lost hope; modest young girls returning from long
and late labor to a cheerless home, and shrinking more tearfully than indignantly from the
glances of ruffians, whose direct contact, even, could not be avoided; women of the town of all
kinds and of all ages– the unequivocal beauty in the prime of her womanhood, putting one in
mind of the statue in Lucian, with the surface of Parian marble, and the interior filled with filth–
the loathsome and utterly lost leper in rags–the wrinkled, bejewelled, and paint-begrimed
beldame, making a last effort at youth–the mere child of immature form, yet, from long
association, an adept in the dreadful coquetries of her trade, and burning with a rabid ambition
to be ranked the equal of her elders in vice; drunkards innumerable and indescribable–some in
shreds and patches, reeling, inarticulate, with bruised visage and lack-lustre eyes–some in
whole although filthy garments, with a slightly unsteady swagger, thick sensual lips, and hearty-
looking rubicund faces–others clothed in materials which had once been good, and which even
now were scrupulously well brushed-men who walked with a more than naturally firm and
springy step, but whose countenances were fearfully pale, and whose eyes were hideously wild
and red; and who clutched with quivering fingers, as they strode through the crowd, at every
object which came within their reach; beside these, pic-men, porters, coal-heavers, sweeps;
organ-grinders, monkey-exhibitors, and ballad-mongers, those who vended with those who
sang; ragged artizans and exhausted laborers of every description, and all full of a noisy and
inordinate vivacity which jarred discordantly upon the ear, and gave an aching sensation to the
eye.
As the night deepened, so deepened to me the interest of the scene; for not only did the
general character of the crowd materially alter (its gentler features retiring in the gradual
withdrawal of the more orderly portion of the people, and its harsher ones coming out into
bolder relief, as the late hour brought forth every species of infamy from its den), but the rays
of the gas-lamps, feeble at first in their struggle with the dying day, had now at length gained
ascendancy, and threw over everything a fitful and garish luster. All was dark yet splendid–as
that ebony to which has been likened the style of Tertullian.
The wild effects of the light enchained me to an examination of individual faces; and although
the rapidity with which the world of light flitted before the window prevented me from casting
more than a glance upon each visage, still it seemed that, in my then peculiar mental state, I
could frequently read, even in that brief interval of a glance, the history of long years. With my
brow to the glass, I was thus occupied in scrutinizing the mob, when suddenly there came into
view a countenance (that of a decrepit old man, some sixty-five or seventy years of age)–a
countenance which at once arrested and absorbed my whole attention, on account of the
absolute idiosyncrasy of its expression. Anything even remotely resembling that expression I
had never seen before. I well remember that my first thought, upon beholding it, was that
Retszch, had he viewed it, would have greatly preferred it to his own pectoral incarnations of
the fiend. As I endeavored, during the brief minute of my original survey, to form some analysis
of the meaning conveyed, there arose confusedly and paradoxically within my mind, the ideas
of vast mental power, of caution, of penuriousness, of avarice, of coolness, of malice, of
bloodthirstiness, of triumph, of merriment, of excessive terror, of intense–of supreme despair. I
felt singularly aroused, startled, fascinated. "How wild a history," I said to myself, "is written
within that bosom!" Then came a craving desire to keep the man in view–to know more of him.
Hurriedly putting on all overcoat, and seizing my hat and cane, I made my way into the street,
and pushed through the crowd in the direction which I had seen him take; for he had already
disappeared. With some little difficulty I at length came within sight of him, approached, and
followed him closely, yet cautiously, so as not to attract his attention.
I had now a good opportunity of examining his person. He was short in stature, very thin, and
apparently very feeble. His clothes, generally, were filthy and ragged; but as he came, now and
then, within the strong glare of a lamp, I perceived that his linen, although dirty, was of
beautiful texture; and my vision deceived me, or, through a rent in a closely buttoned and
evidently second-handed roquelaire which enveloped him, I caught a glimpse both of a
diamond and of a dagger. These observations heightened my curiosity, and I resolved to follow
the stranger whithersoever he should go. It was now fully night-fall and a thick humid fog hung
over the city, soon ending in a settled and heavy rain. This change of weather had an odd effect
upon the crowd, the whole of which was at once put into new commotion, and overshadowed
by a world of umbrellas. The waver, the jostle, and the hum increased in a tenfold degree. For
my own part I did not much regard the rain–the lurking of an old fever in my system rendering
the moisture somewhat too dangerously pleasant. Tying a handkerchief about my mouth, I kept
on. For half an hour the old man held his way with difficulty along the great thoroughfare; and I
here walked close at his elbow through fear of losing sight of him. Never once turning his head
to look back, he did not observe me. By and by he passed into a cross street, which, although
densely filled with people, was not quite so much thronged as the main one he had quitted.
Here a change in his demeanor became evident. He walked more slowly and with less object
than before- more hesitatingly. He crossed and recrossed the way repeatedly, without apparent
aim; and the press was still so thick, that, at every such movement, I was obliged to follow him
closely. The street was a narrow and long one, and his course lay within it for nearly an hour,
during which the passengers had gradually diminished to about that number which is ordinarily
seen at noon in Broadway near the park–so vast a difference is there between a London
populace and that of the most frequented American city. A second turn brought us into a
square, brilliantly lighted, and overflowing with life. The old manner of the stranger
reappeared. His chin fell upon his breast, while his eyes rolled wildly from under his knit brows,
in every direction, upon those who hemmed him in. He urged his way steadily and
perseveringly. I was surprised, however, to find, upon his having made the circuit of the square,
that he turned and retraced his steps. Still more was I astonished to see him repeat the same
walk several times–once nearly detecting me as he came around with a sudden movement.
In this exercise he spent another hour, at the end of which we met with far less interruption
from passengers than at first. The rain fell fast, the air grew cool; and the people were retiring
to their homes. With a gesture of impatience, the wanderer passed into a by-street
comparatively deserted. Down this, some quarter of a mile long, he rushed with an activity I
could not have dreamed of seeing in one so aged, and which put me to much trouble in pursuit.
A few minutes brought us to a large and busy bazaar, with the localities of which the stranger
appeared well acquainted, and where his original demeanor again became apparent, as he
forced his way to and fro, without aim, among the host of buyers and sellers.
During the hour and a half, or thereabouts, which we passed in this place, it required much
caution on my part to keep him within reach without attracting his observation. Luckily I wore a
pair of caoutchouc overshoes, and could move about in perfect silence. At no moment did he
see that I watched him. He entered shop after shop, priced nothing, spoke no word, and looked
at all objects with a wild and vacant stare. I was now utterly amazed at his behavior, and firmly
resolved that we should not part until I had satisfied myself in some measure respecting him.
A loud-toned clock struck eleven, and the company were fast deserting the bazaar. A
shopkeeper, in putting up a shutter, jostled the old man, and at the instant I saw a strong
shudder come over his frame. He hurried into the street, looked anxiously around him for an
instant, and then ran with incredible swiftness through many crooked and people less lanes,
until we emerged once more upon the great thoroughfare whence we had started–the street of
the D--- Hotel. It no longer wore, however, the same aspect. It was still brilliant with gas; but
the rain fell fiercely, and there were few persons to be seen. The stranger grew pale. He walked
moodily some paces up the once populous avenue, then, with a heavy sigh, turned in the
direction of the river, and, plunging through a great variety of devious ways, came out, at
length, in view of one of the principal theatres. It was about being closed, and the audience was
thronging from the doors. I saw the old man gasp as if for breath while he threw himself amid
the crowd; but I thought that the intense agony of his countenance had, in some measure,
abated. His head again fell upon his breast; he appeared as I had seen him at first. I observed
that he now took the course in which had gone the greater number of the audience but, upon
the whole, I was at a loss to comprehend the waywardness of his actions.
As he proceeded, the company grew more scattered, and his old uneasiness and vacillation
were resumed. For some time he followed closely a party of some ten or twelve roisterers; but
from this number one by one dropped off, until three only remained together, in a narrow and
gloomy lane, little frequented. The stranger paused, and, for a moment, seemed lost in
thought; then, with every mark of agitation, pursued rapidly a route which brought us to the
verge of the city, amid regions very different from those we had hitherto traversed. It was the
most noisome quarter of London, where everything wore the worst impress of the most
deplorable poverty, and of the most desperate crime. By the dim light of an accidental lamp,
tall, antique, wormeaten, wooden tenements were seen tottering to their fall, in directions so
many and capricious, that scarce the semblance of a passage was discernible between them.
The paving-stones lay at random, displaced from their beds by the rankly-growing grass.
Horrible filth festered in the dammed-up gutters. The whole atmosphere teemed with
desolation. Yet, as we proceeded, the sounds of human life revived by sure degrees, and at
length large bands of the most abandoned of a London populace were seen reeling to and fro.
The spirits of the old man again flickered up, as a lamp which is near its death-hour. Once more
he strode onward with elastic tread. Suddenly a corner was turned, a blaze of light burst upon
our sight, and we stood before one of the huge suburban temples of Intemperance–one of the
palaces of the fiend, Gin. It was now nearly daybreak; but a number of wretched inebriates still
pressed in and out of the flaunting entrance. With a half shriek of joy the old man forced a
passage within, resumed at once his original bearing, and stalked backward and forward,
without apparent object, among the throng. He had not been thus long occupied, however,
before a rush to the doors gave token that the host was closing them for the night. It was
something even more intense than despair that I then observed upon the countenance of the
singular being whom I had watched so pertinaciously. Yet he did not hesitate in his career, but,
with a mad energy, retraced his steps at once, to the heart of the mighty London. Long and
swiftly he fled, while I followed him in the wildest amazement, resolute not to abandon a
scrutiny in which I now felt an interest allabsorbing.
The sun arose while we proceeded, and, when we had once again reached that most thronged
mart of the populous town, the street of the D-–Hotel, it presented an appearance of human
bustle and activity scarcely inferior to what I had seen on the evening before. And here, long,
amid the momently increasing confusion, did I persist in my pursuit of the stranger. But, as
usual, he walked to and fro, and during the day did not pass from out the turmoil of that street.
And, as the shades of the second evening came on, I grew wearied unto death, and, stopping
fully in front of the wanderer, gazed at him steadfastly in the face. He noticed me not, but
resumed his solemn walk, while I, ceasing to follow, remained absorbed in contemplation.
"The old man," I said at length, "is the type and the genius of deep crime. He refuses to be
alone.
He is the man of the crowd. It will be in vain to follow, for I shall learn no more of him, nor of
his deeds. The worst heart of the world is a grosser book than the 'Hortulus Animae,'* and
perhaps it is but one of the great mercies of God that "er lasst sich nicht lesen."