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1980

71250 _ i

BLACK WOOD'S |

MAGAZINE.

VOL. CXLL

JANUARY— JUNE 1887.

WILLIAM BLACKWOOD & SONS, EDINBURGH ;

AND

37 PATEENOSTER ROW, LONDON.

1887.

All Rights of Translation and Republication reserved.

AP

V-lHI

No. DOOOLV.

JANUARY 1887.

VOL. CXLI.

THE LAND OF DARKNESS.

[THE following narrative forms a necessary part of the Little Pilgrim's experiences in the spiritual world, though it is not her per- sonal story, but is drawn from the Archives of which, in their bearing upon the universal history of mankind, she was informed.]

I FOUND myself standing on my feet, with the tingling sensation of having come down rapidly upon the ground from a height. There was a similar feeling in my head, as of the whirling and sickening sensation of passing downward through the air, like the descrip- tion Dante gives of his descent upon Geryon. My mind, curiously enough, was sufficiently disengaged to think of that, or at least to allow swift passage for the recol- lection through n:y thoughts. All the aching of wonder, doubt, and fear which I had been conscious of a little while before was gone. There was no distinct interval be- tween the one condition and the other, nor in my fall (as I supposed it must have been) had I any con- sciousness of change. There was the whirling of the air, resisting my passage, yet giving way under me in giddy circles, and then the

VOL. CXLI. — NO. DCCCLV.

sharp shock of once more feeling under my feet something solid, which struck yet sustained. After a little while the giddiness above and the tingling below passed away, and I felt able to look about me and discern where I was. But not all at once : the things immediately about me impressed me first — then the general aspect of the new place.

First of all the light, which was lurid, as if a thunderstorm were coming on. I looked up involun- tarily to see if it had begun to rain ; but there was nothing of the kind, though what I saw above me was a lowering canopy of cloud, dark, threatening, with a faint reddish tint diffused upon the vap- orous darkness. It was, however, quite sufficiently clear to see every- thing, and there was a good deal to see. I was in a street of what seemed a great and very populous

The Land of Darkness.

[Jan.

place. There were shops on either side, full apparently of all sorts of costly wares. There was a con- tinual current of passengers up and down on both sides of the way, and in the middle of the street carriages of every description, hum- ble and splendid. The noise was great and ceaseless, the traffic con- tinual. Some of the shops were most brilliantly lighted, attracting one's eyes in the sombre light outside, which, however, had just enough of day in it to make these spots of illumination look sickly ; most of the places thus distinguished were apparently bright with the electric or some other scientific light ; and delicate machines of every descrip- tion, brought to the greatest per- fection, were in some windows, as were also many fine produc- tions of art, but mingled with the gaudiest and coarsest in a way which struck me with astonish- ment. I was also much surprised by the fact that the traffic, which was never stilled for a moment, seemed to have no sort of regula- tion. Some carriages dashed along, upsetting the smaller vehicles in their way, without the least re- straint or order, either, as it seemed, from their own good sense, or from the laws and customs of the place. When an accident happened, there was a great shouting, and some- times a furious encounter — but no- body seemed to interfere. This was the first impression made upon me. The passengers on the pavement were equally regard- less. I was myself pushed out of the way, first to one side, then to another, hustled when I paused for a moment, trodden upon and driven about. I retreated soon to the doorway of a shop, from whence with a little more safety I could see what was going on. The noise made my head ring. It seemed to me that I could not hear

myself think. If this were to go on for ever, I said to myself, I should soon go mad.

" Oh no," said some one behind me, " not at all ; you will get used to it ; you will be glad of it. One does not want to hear one's thoughts; most of them are not worth hearing."

I turned round and saw it was the master of the shop, who had come to the door on seeing me. He had the usual smile of a man who hoped to sell his wares ; but to my horror and astonishment, by some process which I could not understand, I saw that he was

saying to himself, "What a d d

fool ! here's another of those cursed

wretches, d him ! " all with the

same smile. I started back, and answered him as hotly, " What do

you mean by calling me a d d

fool? — fool yourself, and all the rest of it. Is this the way you receive strangers here1?"

"Yes," he said, with the same smile, " this is the way ; and I only describe you as you are, as you will soon see. Will you walk in and look over my shop? Per- haps you will find something to suit you if you are just setting up, as I suppose."

I looked at him closely, but this time I could not see that he was saying anything beyond what was expressed by his lips, and I fol- lowed him into the shop, princi- pally because it was quieter than the street, and without any inten- tion of buying — for what should I buy in a strange place where I had no settled habitation, and which probably I was only pass- ing through 1

" I will look at your things," I said, in a way which I believe I had, of perhaps undue pretension. I had never been over-rich, or of very elevated station ; but I was believed by my friends (or enemies)

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to have an inclination to make myself out something more im- portant than I was. " I will look at your things, and possibly I may find something that may suit me ; but with all the ateliers of Paris and London to draw from, it is scarcely to be expected that in a place like this —

Here I stopped to draw my breath, with a good deal of confu- sion ; for I was unwilling to let him see that I did not know where I was.

" A place like this," said the shopkeeper, with a little laugh which seemed to me full of mock- ery, "will supply you better, you will find, than — any other place. At least you will find it the only place practicable," he added. " I perceive you are a stranger here."

" Well — I may allow myself to be so — more or less. I have not had time to form much acquaint- ance with — the place : what — do you call the place? — its formal name, I mean," I said, with a great desire to keep up the air of superior information. Except for the first moment I had not experienced that strange power of looking into the man below the surface which had frightened me. Now there occurred another gleam of insight, which gave me once more a sensa- tion of alarm. I seemed to see a light of hatred and contempt below his smile, and I felt that he was not in the least taken in by the air which I assumed.

"The name of the place," he said, " is not a pretty one. I hear the gentlemen who come to my shop say that it is not to be name.d to ears polite ; and I am sure your ears are very polite." He said this with the most offensive laugh, and I turned upon him and an- swered him, without mincing mat- ters, with a plainness of speech which startled myself, but did not

seem to move him, for he only laughed again. "Are you not afraid," I said, "that I will leave your shop and never enter it more ? "

"Oh, it helps to pass the time," he said ; and without any further . comment began to show me very elaborate and fine articles of fur- niture. I had always been at- tracted to this sort of thing, and had longed to buy such articles for my house when I had one, but never had it in my power. Now I had no house, nor any means of paying so far as I knew, but I felt quite at my ease about buy- ing, and inquired into the prices with the greatest composure.

" They are just the sort of thing I want. I will take these, I think ; but you must set them aside for me, for I do not at the present moment exactly know '

" You mean you have got no rooms to put them in," said the master of the shop. " You must get a house directly, that's all. If you're only up to it, it is easy enough. Look about until you find something you like, and then — take possession."

"Take possession" — I was so much surprised that I stared at him with mingled indignation and surprise — "of what belongs to another man?" I said.

I was not conscious of anything ridiculous in my look. I was in- dignant, which is not a state of mind in which there is any absurd- ity ; but the shopkeeper suddenly burst into a storm of laughter. He laughed till he seemed almost to fall into convulsions, with a harsh mirth which reminded me of the old image of the crackling of thorns, and had neither amuse- ment nor warmth in it ; and pres- ently this was echoed all around, and looking up, I saw grinning faces full of derision, bent upon

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[Jan.

me from every side, from the stairs which led to the upper part of the house and from the depths of the shop behind — faces with pens be- hind their ears, faces in workmen's caps, all distended from ear to ear, with a sneer and a mock and a rage of laughter which nearly sent me mad. I hurled I don't know what imprecations at them as I rushed out, stopping my ears in a paroxysm of fury and morti- fication. My mind was so dis- tracted by this occurrence that I rushed without knowing it upon some one who was passing, and threw him down with the violence of my exit ; upon which I was set on by a party of half - a - dozen ruffians, apparently his compan- ions, who would, I thought, kill me, but who only flung me, wound- ed, bleeding, and feeling as if every bone in my body had been broken, down on the pavement — when they went away, laughing too.

I picked myself up from the edge of the causeway, aching and sore from head to foot, scarcely able to move, yet conscious that if I did not get myself out of the way one or other of the vehicles which were dashing along would run over me. It would be impos- sible to describe the miserable sensations, both of body and mind, with which I dragged my- self across the crowded pavement, not without curses and even kicks from the passers-by ; and, avoiding the shop from which I still heard those shrieks of devilish laughter, gathered myself up in the shelter of a little projection of a wall, where I was for the moment safe. The pain which I felt was as nothing to the sense of humilia- tion, the mortification, the rage with which I was possessed. There is nothing in existence more dreadful than rage which is

impotent, which cannot punish or avenge, which has to restrain it- self and put up with insults show- ered upon it. I had never known before what that helpless, hideous exasperation was; and I was humil- iated beyond description, brought down — I, whose inclination it was to make more of myself than was justifiable — to the aspect of a miserable ruffian beaten in a brawl, soiled, covered with mud and dust, my clothes torn, my face bruised and disfigured : all this within half an hour or thereabout of my arrival in a strange place where nobody knew me or could do me justice ! I kept looking out fever- ishly for some one with an air of authority to whom I could appeal. Sooner or later somebody must go by, who, seeing me in such a plight, must inquire how it came about, must help me and vindicate me. I sat there for I cannot tell how long, expecting every moment that, were it but a policeman, somebody would notice and help me. But no one came. Crowds seemed to sweep by without a pause — all hurrying, restless : some with anx- ious faces, as if any delay would be mortal ; some in noisy groups intercepting the passage of the others. Sometimes one would pause to point me out to his com- rades, with a shout of derision at my miserable plight ; or if by a change of posture I got outside the protection of my wall, would kick me back with a coarse in- junction to keep out of the way. No one was sorry for me — not a look of compassion, not a word of inquiry was wasted upon me ; no representative of authority ap- peared. I saw a dozen quarrels while I lay there, cries of the weak, and triumphant shouts of the strong ; but that was all.

I was drawn after a while from the fierce and burning sense of my

1887.]

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own grievances by a querulous voice quite close to me. "This is my corner," it said. " I've sat here for years, and I have a right to it. And here you come, you big ruffian, because you know I haven't got the strength to push you away."

" Who are you ? " I said, turn- ing round horror-stricken ; for close beside me was a miserable man, apparently in the last stage of disease. He was pale as death, yet eaten up with sores. His body was agitated by a nervous trembling. He seemed to shuffle along on hands and feet, as though the ordinary mode of locomotion was impossible to him, and yet was in possession of all his limbs. Pain was written in his face. I drew away to leave him room, with mingled pity and horror that this poor wretch should be the partner of the only shelter I could find within so short a time of my arrival. I who It was hor- rible, shameful, humiliating ; and yet the suffering in his wretched face was so evident that I could not but feel a pang of pity too. "I have nowhere to go," I said. " I am — a stranger. I have been badly used, and nobody seems to care. "

" No," he said ; " nobody cares — don't you look for that. Why should they 1 Why, you look as if you were sorry for me ! What a joke ! " he murmured to himself — " what a joke ! Sorry for some one else ! What a fool the fellow must be ! "

"You look," I said, "as if you were suffering horribly ; and you say you have come here for years."

"Suffering! I should think I was," said the sick man ; " but what is that to you 1 Yes ; I've been here for years — oh, years ! — that means nothing, — for longer

than can be counted. Suffering is not the word — it's torture — it's agony. But who cares? Take your leg out of my way."

I drew myself out of his way from a sort of habit, though against my will, and asked, from habit too, " Are you never any better than now ? "

He looked at me more closely, and an air of astonishment came over his face. "What d'ye want here," he said, " pitying a man ! That's something new here. No ; I'm not always so • bad, if you want to know. I get better, and then I go and do what makes me bad again, and that's how it will go on; and I choose it to be so, and you needn't bring any of your d d pity here."

" I may ask, at least, why aren't you looked after 1 Why don't you get into some hospital 1 " I said.

" Hospital ! " cried the sick man, and then he too burst out into that furious laugh, the most awful sound I ever had heard. Some of the passers-by stopped to hear what the joke was, and surrounded me with once more a circle of mockers. " Hospitals ! perhaps you would like a whole Red Cross Society, with ambulances and all ar- ranged1?" cried one. "Or the Miseri- cordia ! " shouted another. I sprang up to my feet, crying, "Why not?" with an impulse of rage which gave me strength. Was I never to meet with anything but this fiendish laughter 1 " There's some authority, I suppose," I cried in my fury. " It is not the rabble that is the only master here, I hope." But nobody took the least trouble to hear what I had to say for myself. The last speaker struck me on the mouth, and called me an accursed fool for talking of what I did not under- stand ; and finally they all swept on and passed away.

The Land of Darkness.

[Jan.

I had been, as I thought, severe- ly injured when I dragged myself into that corner to save myself from the crowd ; but I sprang up now as if nothing had happened to me. My wounds had disappeared, my bruises were gone. I was, as I had been when I dropped, giddy and amazed, upon the same pave- ment, how long — an hour? — be- fore? It might have been an hour, it might have been a year, I cannot tell. The light was the same as ever, the thunderous at- mosphere unchanged. Day, if it was day, had made no progress ; night, if it was evening, had come no nearer : all was the same.

As I went on again presently, with a vexed and angry spirit, re- garding on every side around me the endless surging of the crowd, and feeling a loneliness, a sense of total abandonment and solitude, which I cannot describe, there came up to me a man of remark- able appearance. That he was a person of importance, of great knowledge and information, could not be doubted. He was very pale, and of a worn but command- ing aspect. The lines of his face were deeply drawn, his eyes were sunk under high arched brows, from which they looked out as from caves, full of a fiery impa- tient light. His thin lips were never quite without a smile ; but it was not a smile in which any pleasure was. He walked slowly, not hurrying, like most of the pas- sengers. He had a reflective look, as if pondering many things. He came up to me suddenly, without introduction or preliminary, and took me by the arm. " What ob- ject had you in talking of these anti- quated institutions ? " he said.

And I saw in his rnind the gleam of the thought, which seemed to be the first with all, that I was a fool, and that it was the natural thins

to wish me harm, — just as in the earth above it was the natural thing, professed at least, to wish well — to say, Good morning, good day, by habit and without thought. In this strange country the stranger was received with a curse, and it woke an answer not unlike the hasty " Curse you, then, also ! " which seemed to come without any will of mine through my mind. But this provoked only a smile from my new friend. He took no no- tice. He was disposed to examine me — to find some amusement per- haps— how could I tell 1 — in what I might say.

" What antiquated things ? "

" Are you still so slow of under- standing? What were they? hos- pitals : the pretences of a world that can still deceive itself. Did you expect to find them here ? "

" I expected to find — how should I know ? " I said, bewildered — " some shelter for a poor wretch where he could be cared for — not to be left there to die in the street. Expected ! I never thought. I took it for granted —

" To die in the street ! " he cried, with a smile, and a shrug of his shoulders. " You'll learn bet- ter by-and-by. And if he did die in the street, what then ? What is that to you ? "

" To me ! " I turned and looked at him amazed ; but he had some- how shut his soul, so that I could see nothing but the deep eyes in their caves, and the smile upon the close-shut mouth. " No more to me than to any one. I only spoke for humanity's sake, as — a fellow- creature."

My new acquaintance gave way to a silent laugh within himself, which was not so offensive as the loud laugh of the crowd, but yet was more exasperating than words can say. " You think that mat- ters ? But it does not hurt you

1887.]

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that he should be in pain. It would do you no good if he were to get well. Why should you trouble yourself one way or the other? Let him die — if he can

That makes no difference

to you or me."

" I must be dull indeed," I cried, — " slow of understanding, as you say. This is going back to the ideas of times beyond knowledge

— before Christianity " As

soon as I had said this I felt some- how— I could not tell how — as if my voice jarred, as if something false and unnatural was in what I said. My companion gave my arm a twist as if with a shock of sur- prise, then laughed in his inward way again.

" We don't think much of that here ; nor of your modern pre- tences in general. The only thing that touches you and me is what hurts or helps ourselves. To be sure, it all comes to the same thing— for I suppose it annoys you to- see that wretch writhing : it hurts your more delicate, highly cultivated consciousness."

" It has nothing to do with my consciousness," I cried, angrily ; " it is a shame to let a fellow- creature suffer if we can prevent it."

" Why shouldn't he suffer 1 " said my companion. We passed as he spoke some other squalid wretched creatures shuffling among the crowd, whom he kicked with his foot, calling forth a yell of pain and curses. This he regarded with a supreme contemptuous calm which stupefied me. Nor did any of the passers-by show the slightest inclination to take the part of the sufferers. They laughed, or shouted out a gibe, or, what was still more wonderful, went on with a com- plete unaffected indifference, as if all this was natural. I tried to disengage my arm in horror and

dismay, but he held me fast, with a pressure that hurt me. " That's the question," he said. " What have we to do with itl Your fictitious consciousness makes it painful to you. To me, on the contrary, who take the view of nature, it is a pleasurable feeling. It enhances the amount of ease, whatever that may be, which I enjoy. I am in no pain. That brute who is " — and he flicked with a stick he carried the uncovered wound of a wretch upon the road- side— •" makes me more satisfied with my condition. Ah ! you think it is I who am the brute1? You will change your mind by- and-by."

" Never !" I cried, wrenching my arm from his with an effort, " if I should live a hundred years."

" A hundred years — a drop in the bucket ! " he said, with his silent laugh. " You will live for ever, and you will come to my view ; and we shall meet in the course of ages, from time to time, to com- pare notes. I would say good-bye after the old fashion, but you are but newly arrived, and I will not treat you so badly as that." With which he parted from me, waving his hand, with his everlasting hor- rible smile.

" Good-bye ! " 1 said to myself, " good-bye — why should it be treat- ing me badly to say good-bye "

I was startled by a buffet on the mouth. " Take that ! " cried some one, " to teach you how to wish the worst of tortures to people who have done you no harm."

" What have I said 1 I meant no harm. I repeated only what is the commonest civility, the merest good manners."

" You wished, "said the man who had struck me, — " I won't repeat the words : to me, for it was I only that heard them, the awful company that hurts most— that sets every-

8

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[Jan.

thing before us, both past and to come, and cuts like a sword and burns like fire. I'll say it to your- self, and see how it feels. God be with you ! There ! it is said, and we all must bear it, thanks, you fool and accursed, to you."

And then there came a pause over all the place — an awful still- ness— hundreds of men and women standing clutching with desperate movements at their hearts as if to tear them out, moving their heads as if to dash them against the wall, wringing their hands, with a look upon all their convulsed faces which I can never forget. They all turned to me, cursing me, with those horrible eyes of anguish. And everything was still — the noise all stopped for a moment — the air all silent, with a silence that could be felt. And then sud- denly out of the crowd there came a great piercing cry ; and every- thing began again exactly as before.

While this pause occurred, and while I stood wondering, bewil- dered, understanding nothing, there came over me a darkness, a blackness, a sense of misery such as never in all my life, though I have known troubles enough, I had felt before. All that had happened to me throughout my existence seemed to rise pale and terrible in a hundred scenes before me, all momentary, intense, as if each was the present moment. And in each of these scenes I saw what I had never seen before. I saw where I had taken the wrong in- stead of the right step — in what wantonness, with what self-will it had been done ; how God (I shud- dered at the name) had spoken and called me, and even entreated, and I had withstood and refused. All the evil I had done came back, and spread itself out before my eyes ; and I loathed it, yet knew that I had chosen it, and that

it would be with me for ever. I saw it all in the twinkling of an. eye, in a moment, while I stood there, and all men with me, in the horror of awful thought. Then it ceased as it had come, instanta- neously, and the noise and the laughter, and the quarrels and cries, and all the commotion of this new bewildering place, in a moment began again. I had seen no one while this strange paroxysm lasted. When it disappeared, I came to myself emerging as from a dream, and looked into the face of the man whose words, not care- less like mine, had brought it upon us. Our eyes met, and his were surrounded by curves and lines of anguish which were ter- rible to see.

"Well," he said, with a short laugh, which was forced and harsh, "how do you like it? that is what

happens when If it came

often, who could endure it ? " He was not like the rest. There was no sneer upon his face, no gibe at my simplicity. Even now, when all had recovered, he was still quivering with some- thing that looked like a nobler pain. His face was very grave, the lines deeply drawn in it, and he seemed to be seeking no amuse- ment or distraction, nor to take any part in the noise and tumult which was going on around.

" Do you know what that cry meant 1 " he said. " Did you hear that cry 1 It was some one who saw — even here once in a long time, they say, it can be seen "

" What can be seen ? "

He shook his head, looking at me with a meaning which I could not interpret. It was beyond the range of my thoughts. I came to know after, or I never could have made this record. But on that subject he said no more. He

1887.]

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turned the way I was going, though it mattered nothing what way I went, for all were the same to me. " You are one of the new- comers ? " he said ; " you have not been long here —

" Tell me," I cried, " what you mean by here. Where are we ? How can one tell who has fallen — he knows not whence or where ? What is this place ? I have never seen anything like it. It seems to me that I hate it already, though I know not what it is."

He shook his head once more. " You will hate it more and more," he said ; " but of these dreadful streets you will never be free, unless — — ' And here he stopped again.

" Unless — what ? If it is pos- sible, I will be free of them, and that before long."

He smiled at me faintly, as we smile at children, but not with derision.

" How shall you do that ? Be- tween this miserable world and all others there is a great gulf fixed. It is full of all the bitter- ness and tears that come from all the universe. These drop from them, but stagnate here. We, you perceive, have no tears, not even at moments — Then,

"You will soon be accustomed to all this," he said. " You will fall into the way. Perhaps you will be able to amuse yourself, to make it passable. Many do. There are a number of fine things to be seen here. If you are curious, come with me and I will show you. Or work — there is even work. There is only one thing that is impossible — or if not impossible — And here he paused again, and raised his eyes to the dark clouds and lurid sky overhead. "The man who gave that cry ! if I could but find him — he must have seen

"What could he see?" I asked. But there rose in my mind some- thing like contempt. A visionary ! who could not speak plainly, who broke off into mysterious infer- ences, and appeared to know more than he would say. It seemed foolish to waste time when evi- dently there was still so much to see, in the company of such a man. And I began already to feel more at home. There was something in that moment of anguish which had wrought a strange familiarity in me with my surroundings. It was so great a relief to return out of the misery of that sharp and horrible self - realisation, to what had come to be, in compari- son, easy and well known. I had no desire to go back and grope among the mysteries and anguish so suddenly revealed. I was glad to be free from them, to be left to myself, to get a little pleasure perhaps like the others. While these thoughts passed through my mind, I had gone on without any active impulse of my own, as everybody else did ; and my latest companion had disappeared. He saw, no doubt, without any need for words, what my feelings were. And I proceeded on my way. I felt better as I got more accus- tomed to the place, or perhaps it was the sensation of relief after that moment of indescribable pain. As for the sights in the streets, I began to grow used to them. The wretched creatures who strolled or sat about with signs of sickness or wounds upon them disgusted me only, they no longer called forth my pity. I began to feel ashamed of my silly questions about the hospital. All the same, it would have been a good thing to have had some receptacle for them, into which they might have been driven out of the way. I felt an inclination to push them

10

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[Jan.

aside as I saw other people do, but was a little ashamed of that impulse too ; and so I went on. There seemed no quiet streets, so far as I could make out, in the place. Some were smaller, meaner, with a different kind of passengers, but the same hubbub and unresting movement everywhere. I saw no signs of melancholy or seriousness ; active pain, violence, brutality, the continual shock of quarrels and blows : but no pensive faces about, no sorrowfulness, nor the kind of trouble which brings thought. Everybody was fully occupied, pushing on as if in a race, pausing for nothing.

The glitter of the lights, the shouts, and sounds of continual going, the endless whirl of passers- by, confused and tired me after a while. I went as far out as I could go to what seemed the outskirts of the place, where I could by glimpses perceive a low horizon all lurid and glowing, which seemed to sweep round and round. Against it in the distance stood up the outline, black against that red glow, of other towers and house- tops, so many and great that there was evidently another town be- tween us and the sunset, if sunset it was. I have seen a western sky like it when there were storms about, and all the colours of the sky were heightened and darkened by angry influences. The distant town rose against it, cutting the firmament so that it might have been tongues of flame flickering between the dark solid outlines ; and across the waste open country which lay between the two cities, there came a distant hum like the sound of the sea, which was in reality the roar of that other mul- titude. The country between showed no greenness or beauty ; it lay dark under the dark over- hanging sky. Here and there

seemed a cluster of giant trees scathed as if by lightning, their bare boughs standing up as high as the distant towers, their trunks like black columns without foliage ; openings here and there, with glim- mering lights, looked like the mouths of mines : but of passen- gers there were scarcely any. A figure here and there flew along as if pursued, imperfectly seen, a shadow only a little darker than the space about. And in contrast with the sound of the city, here was no sound at all, except the low roar on either side, and a vague cry or two from the openings of the mine— a scene all drawn in darkness, in variations of gloom, deriving scarcely any light at all from the red and gloomy burning of that distant evening sky.

A faint curiosity to go forward, to see what the mines were, per- haps to get a share in what was brought up from them, crossed my mind. But I was afraid of the dark, of the wild uninhabited sav- age look of the landscape : though when I thought of it, there seemed no reason why a narrow stretch of country between two great towns should be alarming. But the im- pression was strong and above reason. I turned back to the street in which I had first alighted, and which seemed to end in a great square full of people. In the middle there was a stage erected, from which some one was delivering an oration or address of some sort. He stood beside a long table, upon which lay something which I could not clearly distin- guish, except that it seemed alive and moved, or rather writhed with convulsive twitchings, as if try- ing to get free of the bonds which confined it. Round the stage in front were a number of seats occupied by listeners, many of whom were women, whose interest

1887.]

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11.

seemed to be very great, some of them being furnished with note- books ; while a great unsettled crowd coming and going, drifted round — many, arrested for a time as they passed, proceeding on their way when the interest flagged, as is usual to such open-air assemblies. I followed two of those who pushed their way to within a short dis- tance of the stage, and who were strong, big men, more fitted to elbow the crowd aside than I, after my rough treatment in the first place, and the agitation I had passed through, could be. I was glad, besides, to take advantage of the explanation which one was giving to the other. " It's always fun to see this fellow demonstrate," he said, "and the subject to-day's a capital one. Let's get well for- ward, and see all that's going on." " Which subject do you mean 1 " said the other ; " the theme or the example 1" And they both laughed, though I did not seize the point of the wit.

"Well, both," said the first speaker ; " the theme is nerves : and as a lesson in construction and the calculation of possibilities, it's fine. He's very clever at that. He shows how they are all strung to give as much pain and do as much harm as can be ; and yet how well it's all managed, don't you know, to look the reverse. As for the example, he's a capital one — all nerves together, lying, if you like, just on the surface, ready for the knife."

" If they're on the surface I can't see where the fun is," said the other.

" Metaphorically speaking : of course they are just where other people's nerves are ; but he's what you call a highly organised nervous specimen. There will be plenty of fun. Hush ! he is just going to begin,"

" The arrangement of these threads of being," said the lec- turer, evidently resuming after a pause, "so as to convey to the brain the most instantaneous mes- sages of pain or pleasure, is won- derfully skilful and clever. I need not say to the audience before me, enlightened as it is by experiences of the most striking kind, that the messages are less of pleasure than of pain. They report to the brain the stroke of injury far more often than the thrill of pleasure : though sometimes that too, no doubt, or life could scarcely be maintained. The powers that be have found it neces- sary to mingle a little sweet of pleasurable sensation, else our miserable race would certainly have found some means of pro- curing annihilation. I do not for a moment pretend to say that the pleasure is sufficient to offer a just counterbalance to the other. None of my hearers will, I hope, accuse me of inconsistency. I am ready to allow that in a previous condition I asserted somewhat strongly that this was the case. But experience has enlightened us on that point. Our circum- stances are now understood by us all, in a manner impossible while we were still in a condition of in- completeness. We are all con- vinced that there is no compensa- tion. The pride of the position, of bearing everything rather than give in, or making a submission we do not feel, of preserving our own will and individuality to all eter- nity, is the only compensation. I am satisfied with it, for my part." The orator made a pause, holding his head high, and there was a certain amount of applause. The two men before me cheered vocifer- ously. " That is the right way to look at it," one of them said. My eyes were upon, them, with no par- ticular motive, and T could not

12

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help starting, as I saw suddenly underneath their applause and laughter a snarl of cursing, which was the real expression of their thoughts. I felt disposed in the same way to curse the speaker, though I knew no reason why.

He went on a little further, ex- plaining what he meant to do ; and then turning round, approached the table. An assistant, who was waiting, uncovered it quickly. The audience stirred with quickened interest, and I with consternation made a step forward, crying out with horror. The object on the table, writhing, twitching, to get free, but bound down by every limb, was a living man. The lec- turer went forward calmly, taking his instruments from their case with perfect composure and cool- ness. " Now, ladies and gentle- men," he said : and inserted the knife in the flesh, making a long clear cut in. the bound arm. I shrieked out, unable to restrain myself. The sight of the deliberate wound, the blood, the cry of agony that came from the victim, the calmness of all the lookers-on, filled me with horror and rage indescrib- able. I felt myself clear the crowd away with a rush, and spring on the platform, I could not tell how. "You devil!" I cried, "let the man go. Where is the police ? — where is a magistrate ? — let the man go this moment ! fiends in human shape ! I'll have you brought to justice ! " I heard myself shouting wildly, as I flung myself upon the wretched sufferer, interposing be- tween him and the knife. It was something like this that I said. My horror and rage were delirious, and carried me beyond all attempt at control.

Through it all I heard a shout of laughter rising from everybody round. The lecturer laughed, the audience roared with that sound

of horrible mockery which had driven me out of myself in my first experience. All kinds of mocking cries sounded around me. "Let him a little blood to calm him down." "Let the fool have a taste of it himself, doctor." Last of all came a voice mingled with the cries of the sufferer whom I was trying to shield — " Take him instead ; curse him ! take him instead." I was bending over the man with my arms outstretched, protecting him, when he gave vent to this cry. And I heard immedi- ately behind me a shout of assent, which seemed to come from the two strong young men with whom I had been standing, and the sound of a rush to seize me. I looked round, half mad with terror and rage ; a second more and I should have been strapped on the table too. I made one wild bound into the midst of the crowd, and struggling among the arms stretch- ed out to catch me, amid the roar of the laughter and cries — fled — fled wildly, I knew not whither, in panic and rage and horror, which no words could describe. Terror winged my feet. I flew, thinking as little of whom I met, or knocked down, or trod upon in my way, as the others did at whom I had wondered a little while ago.

No distinct impression of this headlong course remains in my mind, save the sensation of mad fear such as I had never felt be- fore. I came to myself on the edge of the dark valley which surrounded the town. All my pursuers had dropped off before that time, and I have the recollec- tion of flinging myself upon the ground on my face in the extrem- ity of fatigue and exhaustion. I must have lain there undisturbed for some time. A few steps came and went, passing me ; but no one took any notice, and the absence

1887.]

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13

of the noise and crowding gave me a momentary respite. But in my heat and fever I got no relief of coolness from the contact of the soil. I might have flung myself upon a bed of hot ashes, so much was it unlike the dewy cool earth which I expected, upon which one can always throw one's self with a sensation of repose. Presently the uneasiness of it made me struggle up again and look around me. I was safe : at least the cries of the pursuers had died away, the laugh- ter which made my blood boil offended my ears no more. The noise of the city was behind me, softened into an indefinite roar by distance, and before me stretched out the dreary landscape in which there seemed no features of attrac- tion. Now that I was nearer to it, I found it not so unpeopled as I thought. At no great distance from me was the mouth of one of the mines, from which came an indication of subterranean lights : and I perceived that the flying figures which I had taken for travellers between one city and another, were in reality wayfarers endeavouring to keep clear of what seemed a sort of pressgang at the openings. One of them, unable to stop himself in his flight, adopted the same expedient as myself, and threw himself on the ground close to me when he had got beyond the range of pursuit. It was curious that we should meet there, he fly- ing from a danger which I was about to face, and ready to en- counter that from which I had fled. I waited for a few minutes till he had recovered his breath, and then : " What are you running from 1 " I said ; "is there any clan- ger there 1" The man looked up at me with the same continual question in his eyes — Who is this fool?

" Danger 1 " he said. " Are you

so new here, or such a cursed idiot, as not to know the danger of the mines ? You are going across yourself, I suppose, and then you'll see."

" But tell me," I said ; " my ex- perience may be of use to you afterwards, if you will tell me yours now."

"Of use !" he cried staring; "who cares 1 Find out for yourself. If they get hold of you, you will soon understand."

I no longer took this for rude- ness, but answered in his own way, cursing him too for a fool. "If I ask a warning I can give one ; as for kindness," I said, " I was not looking for that."

At this he laughed, indeed we laughed together — there seemed something ridiculous in the thought : and presently he told me, for the mere relief of talking, that round each of these pit-mouths there was a band to entrap every passer- by who allowed himself to be caught, and send him down below to work in the mine. " Once there, there is no telling when you may get free," he said ; " one time or other most people have a taste of it. You don't know what hard labour is if you have never been there. I had a spell once. There is neither air nor light, your blood boils in your veins from the fervent heat, you are never al- lowed to rest. You are put in every kind of contortion to get at it, your limbs twisted, and your muscles strained."

"For what?" I said.

" For gold ! " he cried with a flash in his eyes — " gold ! there it is inexhaustible ; however hard you may work there is always more, and more ! "

" And to whom does all that belong 1" I said.

" To whoever is strong enough to get hold and keep possession

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— sometimes one, sometimes an- other. The only thing you are sure of is that it will never be you."

Why not I as well as another ? was the thought that went through my mind, and my new companion spied it with a shriek of derision.

" It is not for you nor your kind," he cried. " How do you think you could force other people to serve you? Can you terrify them or hurt them, or give them anything 1 You have not learnt yet who are the masters here."

This troubled me, for it was true. "I had begun to think," I said, " that there was no authority at all — for every man seems to do as he pleases : you ride over one, and knock another down ; or you seize a living man and cut him to pieces" — I shuddered as I thought of it — " and there is nobody to interfere."

"Who should interfere?" he said. " Why shouldn't every man amuse himself as he can 1 But yet for all that we've got our masters," he cried, with a scowl, waving his clenched fist in the direction of the mines; "you'll find it out when you get there."

It was a long time after this before I ventured to move — for here it seemed to me that for the moment I was safe — outside the city, yet not within reach of the dangers of that intermediate space which grew clearer before me as my eyes became accustomed to the lurid threatening afternoon light. One after another the fugi- tives came flying past me, — people who had escaped from the armed bands whom I could now see on the watch near the pit's mouth. I could see, too, the tactics of these bands — how they retired, veiling the lights and the opening, when a greater number than usual of travellers appeared on the way, and then suddenly widening out, throwing out flanking lines, sur-

rounded and drew in the unwary. I could even hear the cries with which their victims disappeared over the opening which seemed to go down into the bowels of the earth. By-and-by there came fly- ing towards me a wretch more dreadful in aspect than any I had seen. His scanty clothes seemed singed and burnt into rags ; his hair, which hung about his face unkempt and uncared for, had the same singed aspect ; his skin was brown and baked. I got up as he approached, and caught him and threw him to the ground, without heeding his struggles to get on. " Don't you see," he cried with a gasp, "they may get me again." He was one of those who had escaped out of the mines ; but what was it to me whether they caught him again or not? I wanted to know how he had been caught, and what he had been set to do, and how he had escaped. Why should I hesitate to use my superior strength when no one else did ? I kept watch over him that he should not get away.

" You have been in the mines 1 " I said.

" Let me go ! " he cried ; " do you need to ask ? " and he cursed me as he struggled, with the most terrible imprecations. " They may get me yet. Let me go ! "

"Not till you tell me," I cried. " Tell me and I'll protect you. If they come near I'll let you go. Who are they, man 1 I must know."

He struggled up from the ground, clearing his hot eyes from the ashes that were in them, and putting aside his singed hair. He gave me a glance of hatred and impotent resistance (for I was stronger than he), and then cast a wild terrified look back. The skirmishers did not seem to remark that anybody had escaped,

1887.]

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and he became gradually a little more composed. " Who are they ! " he said hoarsely ; " they're cursed wretches like you and me : and there are as many bands of them as there are mines on the road : and you'd better turn back and stay where you are. You are

I/ V

safe here."

" I will not turn back," I said.

" I know well enough : you can't. You've got to go the round like the rest," he said, with a laugh which was like a sound uttered by a wild animal rather than a human voice. The man was in my power, and I struck him, miserable as he was. It seemed a relief thus to get rid of some of the fury in my mind. " It's a lie," I said ; " I go because I please. Why shouldn't I gather a band of my own if I please, and fight those brutes, not fly from them like you 1 "

He chuckled and laughed below his breath, struggling and cursing and crying out, as I struck him again, " You gather a band ! What could you offer them ? — where would you find them 1 Are you better than the rest of us 1 Are you not a man like the rest ? Strike me you can, for I'm down. But make yourself a master and a chief

-you

l»

" Why not 1 1 " I shouted again, wild with rage and the sense that I had no power over him, save to hurt him. That passion made my hands tremble : he slipped from me in a moment, bounded from the ground like a ball, and with a yell of derision escaped, and plunged in- to the streets and the clamour of the city from which I had just flown. I felt myself rage after him, shaking my fists with a consciousness of the ridiculous passion of impotence that was in me, but no power of restraining it ; and there was not one of the fugitives who passed, however desperate he might be, who

did not make a mock at me as he darted by. The laughing-stock of all those miserable objects, the sport of fate, afraid to go forward, unable to go back, with a fire in my veins urging me on ! But presently I grew a little calmer out of mere exhaustion, which was all the relief that was possible to me. And by-and-by, collect- ing all my faculties, and impelled by this impulse, which I seemed unable to resist, I got up and went cautiously on.

Fear can act in two ways : it paralyses and it renders cunning. At this moment I found it inspire me. I made my plans before I started, how to steal along under the cover of the blighted brushwood which broke the line of the valley here and there. I set out only after long thought, seizing the mo- ment when the vaguely perceived band were scouring in the other di- rection intercepting the travellers. Thus, with many pauses, I got near to the pit's mouth in safety. But my curiosity was as great as, almost greater than, my terror. I had kept far from the road, dragging myself sometimes on hands and feet over broken ground, tearing my clothes and my flesh upon the thorns ; and on that further side all seemed so silent and so dark in the shadow cast by some disused machinery, behind which the glare of the fire from below blazed upon the other side of the opening, that I could not crawl along in the dark- ness, and pass, which would have been the safe way ; but with a breathless hot desire to see and know, dragged myself to the very edge to look down. Though I was in the shadow, my eyes were nearly put out by the glare on which I gazed. It was not fire ; it was the lurid glow of the gold, glowing like flame, at which count- less miners were working. They

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[Jan.

were all about like flies, some on their knees, some bent double as they stooped over their work, some lying cramped upon shelves and ledges. The sight was wonderful, and terrible beyond description. The workmen seemed to consume away with the heat and the glow, even in the few minutes I gazed. Their eyes shrank into their heads, their faces blackened. I could see some trying to secrete morsels of the glowing metal, which burned whatever it touched, and some who were being searched by the superiors of the mines, and some who were punishing the offenders, fixing them up against the blazing wall of gold. The fear went out of my mind, so much absorbed was I in this sight. I gazed, seeing further and further every moment, into crevices and seams of the glowing metal, always with more and more slaves at work, and the entire pantomime of labour and theft, and search and punishment, going on and 011 — the baked faces dark against the golden glare, the hot eyes taking a yellow reflection, the monotonous clamour of pick and shovel, and cries and curses, and all the indistinguishable sound of a multitude of human creatures. And the floor below, and the low roof which overhung whole myriads within a few inches of their faces, and the irregular walls all breached and shelved, were every one the same, a pandemonium of gold, — gold everywhere. I had loved many foolish things in my life, but never this : which was perhaps why I • gazed and kept my sight, though there rose out of it a blast of heat which scorched the brain.

While I stooped over, intent on the sight, some one who had come up by my side to gaze too was caught by the fumes (as I suppose) ; for suddenly I was aware of a dark object falling

prone into the glowing interior with a cry and crash which brought back my first wild panic. He fell in a heap, from which his arms shot forth wildly as he reached the bot- tom, and his cry was half anguish yet half desire. I saw him seized by half - a - dozen eager watchers, and pitched upon a ledge just under the roof, and tools thrust into his hands. I held on by an old shaft, trembling, unable to move. Per- haps I cried too in my horror — for one of the overseers who stood in the centre of the glare looked up. He had the air of ordering all that was going on, and stood unaffected by the blaze, commanding the other wretched officials, who obeyed him like dogs. He seemed to me, in my terror, like a figure of gold, the image, perhaps, of wealth or Pluto, or I know not what : for I suppose my brain began to grow confused, and my hold on the shaft to relax. I had strength enough, however, for I cared not for the gold, to fling myself back the other way upon the ground, where I rolled backward, downward, I knew not how, turn- ing over and over, upon sharp ashes and metallic edges, which tore my hair and beard, — and for a moment I knew no more.

This fall saved me. I came to myself after a time, and heard the pressgang searching about. I had sense to lie still among the ashes thrown up out of the pit, while I heard their voices. Once I gave myself up for lost. The glitter of a lantern flashed in my eyes, a foot passed, ci'ashing among the ashes so close to my cheek that the shoe grazed it. I found the mark after, burned upon my flesh : but I escaped notice by a miracle. And presently I was able to drag myself up and crawl away. But how I reached the end of the valley I cannot tell. I pushed my way along mechanically on the

1887.]

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dark side. I had no further de- sire to see what was going on in the openings of the mines. I went on, stumbling and stupid, scarcely cap- able even of fear, conscious only of wretchedness and weariness, till at last I fe]t myself drop across the road within the gateway of the other town — and lay there, with no thought of anything but the relief of being at rest.

When I came to myself, it seemed to me that there was a change in the atmosphere and the light. It was less lurid, paler, grey, more like twilight than the stormy afternoon of the other city. A certain dead serenity was in the sky — a black paleness, whiteness, everything faint in it. This town was walled, but the gates stood open, and I saw no defences of troops or other guardians. I found myself lying across the threshold, but pushed to one side, so that the carriages which went and came should not be stopped or I injured by their passage. It seemed to me that there was some thought- fulness and kindness in this ac- tion, and my heart sprang up in a reaction of hope. I looked back as if upon a nightmare on the dreadful city which I had left, on its tumults and noise, the wild racket of the streets, the wounded wretches who sought refuge in the corners, the strife and misery that were abroad, and, climax of all, the horrible entertainment which had been going on in. the square, the unhappy being strapped upon the table. How, I said to myself, could such things be 1 Was it a dream 1 was it a nightmare ? was it something presented to me in a vision — a strong delusion to make me think that the old fables which had been told concerning the end of mortal life were true 1 When I looked back it appeared like an allegory,

VOL. CXLT. — NO. DCCCLV.

so that I might have seen it in a dream ; and still more like an alle- gory were the gold-mines in the val- ley, and the myriads who laboured there. Was it all true ? or only a reflection from the old life, mingling with the strange novelties which would most likely elude under- standing, on the entrance into this new 1 I sat within the shelter of the gateway, on my awakening, and thought over all this. My heart was quite calm — almost, in the revulsion from the terrors I had been through, happy. I per- suaded myself that I was but now beginning ; that there had been no reality in these latter experiences, only a curious succession of night- mares, such as might so well be supposed to follow a wonderful transformation like that which must take place between our mor- tal life and — the world to come. The world to come ! I paused and thought of it all, until the heart began to beat loud in my breast. What was this, where I lay ? An- other world ; a world which was not happiness, not bliss ? Oh no — perhaps there was no world of bliss save in dreams. This, on the other hand, I said to myself, was not misery : for was not I seated here, with a certain tremulousness about me it was true, after all the experiences which, supposing them even to have been but dreams, I had come through, — a tremulousness very comprehensi- ble, and not at all without hope 1 I will not say that I believed even what I tried to think. Some- thing in me lay like a dark sha- dow in the midst of all my the- ories ; but yet I succeeded to a great degree in convincing myself that the hope in me was real, and that I was but now beginning — beginning with at least a possi- bility that all might be well. In this half conviction, and after all

B

18

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[Jan.

the troubles that were over (even though they might only have been imaginary troubles), I felt a cer- tain sweetness in resting there, within the gateway, with my back against it. I was unwilling to get up again, and bring myself in contact with reality. I felt that there was pleasure in being left alone. Carriages rolled past me occasionally, and now and then some people on foot ; but they did not kick me out of the way or in- terfere with my repose.

Presently as I sat trying to per- suade myself to rise and pursue my way, two men came up to me in a sort of uniform. I recognised with another distinct sensation of pleasure that here were people who had authority, representatives of some kind of government. They came up to me and bade me come with them in tones which were peremptory enough : but what of that 1 — better the most peremp- tory supervision than the lawless- ness from which I had come. They raised me from the ground with a touch, for I could not re- sist them, and led me quickly along the street, into which that gateway gave access, which was a handsome street with tall houses on either side. Groups of people were moving about along the pavement, talking now and then with considerable animation ; but when my companions were seen, there was an immediate modera- tion of tone, a sort of respect which looked like fear. There was no brawling nor tumult of any kind in the street. The only incident that occurred was this : when we had gone some way, I saw a lame man dragging himself along with difficulty on the other side of the street. My conductors had no sooner perceived him than they gave each other a look and darted across, conveying me with them,

by a sweep of magnetic influence I thought, that prevented me from staying behind. He made an attempt with his crutches to get out of the way, hurrying on — and I will allow that this attempt of his seemed to me very grotesque, so that I could scarcely help laughing : the other lookers-on in the street laughed too, though some put on an aspect of disgust. " Look, the tortoise ! " some one said ; " does he think he can go quicker than the order- lies 1 " My companions came up to the man while this commentary was going on, and seized him by each arm . ' ' Wh ere were you going ? Where have you come from 1 How dare you make an exhibition of yourself 1 " they cried. They took the crutches from him as they spoke and threw them away, and dragged him on until we reached a great grated door which one of them opened with a key, while the other held the offender, for he seemed an offender, roughly up by one shoul- der, causing him great pain. When the door was opened, I saw a number of people within, who seemed to crowd to the door as if seeking to get out. But this was not at all what was intended. My second companion dragged the lame man forward, and pushed him in with so much violence that I could see him fall forward on his face on the floor. Then the other locked the door, and we proceeded on our way. It was not till some time later that I understood why. In the meantime I was hurried on, meeting a great many people who took no notice of me, to a central building in the middle of the town, where I was brought before an official attended by clerks, with great books spread out before him. Here I was questioned as to my name and my antecedents, and the time of my

1887.]

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arrival, then dismissed with a nod to one of my conductors. He led me back again down the street, took me into one of the tall great houses, opened the door of a room which was num- bered, and left me there without a word. I cannot convey to any one the bewildered consternation with which I felt myself deposited here ; and as the steps of my con- ductor died away in the long cor- ridor, I sat down, and looking my- self in the face as it were, tried to make out what it was that had happened to me. The room was small and bare. There was but one thing hung upon the undecor- ated walls, and that was a long list of printed regulations which I had not the courage for the mo- ment to look at. The light was indifferent, though the room was high up, and the street from the window looked far away below. I cannot tell how long I sat there thinking, and yet it could scarcely be called thought. I asked my- self over and over again, Where am I ? is it a prison 1 am I shut in, to leave this enclosure no more1? what am I to do? how is the time to pass 1 I shut my eyes for a mo- ment and tried to realise all that had happened to me ; but nothing save a whirl through my head of disconnected thoughts seemed pos- sible, and some force was upon me to open my eyes again, to see the blank room, the dull light, the vacancy round me in which there was nothing to interest the mind, nothing to please the eye, a blank wherever I turned. Presently there came upon me a burning regret for everything I had left, for the noisy town with all its tu- mults and cruelties, for the dark valley with all its dangers. Every- thing seemed bearable, almost agreeable, in comparison with this. I seemed to have been brought

here to make acquaintance once more with myself, to learn over again what manner of man I was. Needless knowledge, acquaintance unnecessary, unhappy ! for what was there in me to make me to myself a good companion ? Never, I knew, could I separate myself from that eternal consciousness ; but it was cruelty to force the con- templation upon me. All blank, blank, around me, a prison ! And was this to last for ever 1

I do not know how long I sat, rapt in this gloomy vision ; but at last it occurred to me to rise and try the door, which to my aston- ishment was open. I went out with a throb of new hope. After all, it might not be necessary to come back ; there might be other expedients : I might fall among friends. I turned down the long echoing stairs, on which I met various people, who took no notice of me, and in whom I felt no in- terest save a desire to avoid them, and at last reached the street. To be out of doors in the air was something, though there was no wind, but a motionless still atmo- sphere which nothing disturbed. The streets, indeed, were full of movement, but not of life — though this seems a paradox. The pass- engers passed on their way in long regulated lines — those who went towards the gates keeping rigor- ously to one side of the pavement, those who came, to the other. They talked to each other here and there ; but whenever two men in uniform, such as those who had been my conductors, appeared, silence ensued, and the wayfarers shrank even from the looks of these persons in authority. I walked all about the spacious town. Everywhere there were tall houses, everywhere streams of people com- ing and going, but no one spoke to me, or remarked me at all. I

20

Thf Land of Darkness.

[Jan.

was as lonely as if I had been in a wilderness. I was indeed in a wilderness of men, who were as though they did not see me, pass- ing without even a look of human fellowship, each absorbed in his own concerns. I walked and walked till my limbs trembled under me, from one end to another of the great streets, up and down, and round and round. But no one said, How are you ? "Whence come you ? What are you doing ? At length in despair I turned again to the blank and miserable room, which had looked to me like a cell in a prison. I had wilfully made no note of its situation, try- ing to avoid rather than to find it, but my steps were drawn thither against my will. I found myself retracing my steps, mounting the long stairs, passing the same peo- ple, who streamed along with no recognition of me, as I desired nothing to do with them ; and at last found myself within the same four blank walls as before.

Soon after I returned I became conscious of measured steps pass- ing the door, and of an eye upon me. I can say no more than this. From what point it was that I was inspected I cannot tell ; but that I was inspected, closely scrutinised by some one, and that not only ex- ternally, but by a cold observation that went through and through me, I knew and felt beyond any possibility of mistake. This re- curred from time to time, horribly, at uncertain moments, so that I never felt myself secure from it. I knew when the watcher was coming by tremors and shiverings through all my being : and no sen- sation so unsupportable has it ever been mine to bear. How much that is to say, no one can tell who has not gone through those regions of darkness, and learned what is in all their abysses. I tried at first

to hide, to fling myself on the floor, to cover my face, to burrow in a dark corner. Useless attempts ! The eyes that looked in upon me had powers beyond my powers. I felt sometimes conscious of the derisive smile with Avhich my mis- erable subterfuges were regarded. They were all in vain.

And what was still more strange was that I had not energy to think of attempting any escape. My steps, though watched, were not restrained in "any way, so far as I was aware. The gates of the city stood open on all sides, free to those who went as well as to those who came ; but I did not think of flight. Of flight ! Whence should I go from myself 1 Though that horrible inspection was from the eyes of some unseen being, it was in some mysterious way connected with my own thinking and reflec- tions, so that the thought came ever more and more strongly upon me, that from myself I could never escape. And that reflection took all energy, all impulse from me. I might have gone away when I pleased, beyond reach of the authority which regulated every- thing, — how one should walk, where one should live,— but never from my own consciousness. On the other side of the town lay a great plain, traversed by roads on every side. There was no reason why I should not continue my journey there. But I did not. I had no wish nor any power in me to go away.

In one of my long, dreary, com- panionless walks, unshared by any human fellowship, I saw at last a face which I remembered ; it was that of the cynical spectator who had spoken to me in the noisy street in the midst of my early experiences. He gave a glance round him to see that there were no officials in sight, then left

1887.]

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the tile in which he was walking, and joined me. " Ah ! " he said, " you are here already," with the same derisive smile with which he had before regarded me. I hated the man and his sneer, yet that he should speak to me was something, almost a pleasure.

"Yes," said I, "I am here." Then, after a pause, in which I did not know what to say — " It is quiet here," I said.

" Quiet enough. Do you like it better for that 1 To do whatever you please with no one to interfere ; or to do nothing you please, but as you are forced to do it, — which do you think is best ? "

I felt myself instinctively glance round, as he had done, to make sure that no one was in sight. Then I answered, faltering, " I have al- ways held that law and order were necessary things ; and the lawless- ness of that— that place — I don't know its name — if there is such a place," I cried, " I thought it was a dream."

He laughed in his mocking way. " Perhaps it is all a dream — who knows 1 " he said.

" Sir," said I, " you have been longer here than I "

" Oh," cried he, with a laugh that was dry and jarred upon the air almost like a shriek, " since be- fore your forefathers were born ! " It seemed to me that he spoke like one who, out of bitterness and despite, made every darkness blacker still. A kind of madman in his way ; for what was this claim of age 1 — a piece of bravado, no doubt, like the rest.

"That is strange," I said, as- senting, as when there is such a hallucination it is best to do. " You can tell me, then, whence all this authority conies, and why we are obliged to obey."

He looked at me as if he were thinking in his mind how to hurt

me most. Then, with that dry laugh, "We have trial of all things in this world," he said, " to see if perhaps we can find some- thing we shall like — discipline here, freedom in the other place. When you have gone all the round like me, then, perhaps, you will be able to choose."

"Have you chosen 1" I asked.

He only answered with a laugh. "Come," he said, "there is amuse- ment to be had too, and that of the most elevated kind. We make researches here into the moral nature of man. Will you come? But you must take the risk," he added, with a smile which after- wards I understood.

We went on together after this till we reached the centre of the place, in which stood an immense building with a dome, which dom- inated the city, and into a great hall in the centre of that, where a crowd of people were assembled. The sound of human speech, which murmured all around, brought new life to my heart. And as I gazed at a curious apparatus erected 011 a platform, several people spoke to me.

" We have again," said one, "the old subject to-day."

"Is it something about the con- stitution of the place 1 " I asked, in the bewilderment of my mind.

My neighbours looked at me with alarm, glancing behind them to see what officials might be near.

" The constitution of the place is the result of the sense of the inhabitants that order must be preserved," said the one who had spoken to me first. " The lawless can find refuge in other places. Here we have chosen to have su- pervision, nuisances removed, and order kept. That is enough. The; constitution is not under discus- sion."

" But man is," said a second

22

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[Jan.

speaker. " Let us keep to that in which we can mend nothing. Sir, you may have to contribute your quota to our enlightenment. We are investigating the rise of thought. You are a stranger ; you may be able to help us."

" I am no philosopher," I said, with a panic which I could not explain to myself.

"That does not matter. You are a fresh subject." The speaker made a slight movement with his hand, and I turned round to escape in wild, sudden fright, though I had no conception what could be done to me. But the crowd had pressed close round me, hemming me in on every side. I was so wildly alarmed that I struggled among them, pushing backwards with all my force, and clearing a space round me with my arms. But my efforts were vain. Two of the officers suddenly appeared out of the crowd, and seizing me by the arms, forced me forward. The throng dispersed before them on either side, and I was half dragged, half lifted up upon the platform, where stood the strange apparatus which I had contem- plated with a dull wonder when I came into the hall. My wonder did not last long. I felt myself fixed in it, standing supported in that position by bands and springs, so that no effort of mine was necessary to hold myself up, and none possible to release myself. I was caught by every joint, sus- tained, supported, exposed to the gaze of what seemed a world of upturned faces : among which I saw, with a sneer upon it, keeping a little behind the crowd, the face of the man who had led me here. Above my head was a strong light, more brilliant than anything I had ever seen, and which blazed upon my brain till the hair seemed to singe and the skin shrink. I

hope I may never feel such a sen- sation again. The pitiless light went into me like a knife ; but even my cries were stopped by the framework in which I was bound. I could breathe and suf- fer, but that was all.

Then some one got up on the platform above me and began to speak. He said, so far as I could comprehend in the anguish and torture in which I was held, that the origin of thought was the ques- tion he was investigating, but that in every previous subject the con- fusion of ideas had bewildered them, and the rapidity with which one followed another. "The present example has been found to exhibit great persistency of idea," he said. " We hope that by his means some clearer theory may be arrived at." Then he pulled over me a great movable lens as of a miscroscope, which concentrated the insupportable light. The wild, hopeless passion that raged within my soul had no outlet in the immovable apparatus that held me. I was let down among the crowd, and exhibited to them, every secret movement of my being, by some awful process which I have never fathomed. A burn- ing fire was in my brain, flame seemed to run along all my nerves, speechless, horrible, incommuni- cable fury raged in my soul. But I was like a child — nay, like an image of wood or wax in the pitiless hands that held me. What was the cut of a surgeon's knife to this? And I had thought that cruel ! And I was powerless, and could do nothing — to blast, to destroy, to burn with this same horrible flame the fiends that surrounded me, as I desired to do.

Suddenly, in the raging fever of my thoughts, there surged up the recollection of that word which had paralysed all around, and myself

1887.]

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23

with them. The thought that I must share the anguish, did not restrain me from my revenge. With a tremendous effort I got my voice, though the instrument pressed upon my lips. I know not what I articulated save " God," whether it was a curse or a blessing. I had been swung out into the middle of the hall, and hung amid the crowd, exposed to all their observations, when I suc- ceeded in gaining utterance. My God ! my God ! Another moment and I had forgotten them and all my fury in the tortures that arose within myself. What, then, was the light that racked my brain ? Once more my life from its begin- ning to its end rose up before me — each scene like a spectre, like the harpies of the old fables rend- ing me with tooth and claw. Once more I saw what might have been, the noble things I might have done, the happiness I had lost, the turnings of the fated road which I might have taken, — every- thing that was once so possible, so possible, so easy ! but now possible no more. My anguish was immeasurable ; I turned and wrenched myself, in the strength of pain, out of the machinery that held me, and fell down, down among all the curses that were being hurled at me — among the horrible and miserable crowd. I had brought upon them the evil which I shared, and they fell upon me with a fury which was like that which had prompted myself a few minutes before. But they could do nothing to me so tre- mendous as the vengeance I had taken upon them. I was too miserable to feel the blows that rained upon me, but presently I suppose I lost consciousness alto- gether, being almost torn to pieces by the multitude.

While this lasted, it seemed to

me that I had a dream. I felt the blows raining down upon me, and my body struggling upon the ground ; and yet it seemed to me that I was lying outside upon the ground, and above me the pale sky which never brightened at the touch of the sun. And I thought that dull, persistent cloud wavered and broke for an instant, and that I saw behind a glimpse of that blue which is heaven when we are on the earth — the blue sky — which is nowhere to be seen but in the mortal life; which is heaven enough, which is delight enough, for those who can look up to it, and feel themselves in the land of hope. It might be but a dream : in this strange world who could tell what was vision and what was true ?

The next thing I remember was, that I found myself lying on the floor of a great room full of people, with every kind of disease and deformity, some pale with sickness, some with fresh wounds, the lame, and the maimed, and the miserable. They lay round me in every attitude of pain, many with sores, some bleeding, with broken limbs, but all struggling, some on hands and knees, dragging themselves up from the ground to stare at me. They roused in my mind a loathing and sense of disgust which it is impossible to express. I could scarcely tolerate the thought that I — I ! should be forced to re- main a moment in this lazar-house. The feeling with which I had re- garded the miserable creature who shared the corner of the wall with me, and who had cursed me for being sorry for him, had altogether gone out of my mind. I called out, to whom I know not, adjuring some one to open the door and set me free ; but my cry was answered only by a shout from my compan- ions in trouble. " Who do you think will let you out ? " " Who is

The Land of Darkness.

[Jan.

going to help you more than the rest." My whole body was racked with pain ; I could not move from the floor, on which I lay. I had to put up with the stares of the curious, and the mockeries, and re- marks on me of whoever chose to criticise. Among them was the lame man whom I had seen thrust in by the two officers who had taken me from the gate. He was the first to gibe. " But for him they would never have seen me," he said. "I should have been well by this time in the fresh air." "It is his turn now," said another. I turned my head as well as I could and spoke to them all.

" I am a stranger here," I cried. " They have made my brain burn with their experiments. Will no- body help me 1 It is no fault of mine, it is their fault. If I am to be left here uncared for, I shall die."

At this a sort of dreadful chuckle ran round the place. " If that is what you are afraid of, you will not die," somebody said, touching me on my head in a way which gave me intolerable pain, " Don't touch me,"I cried. "Why shouldn't 1 1 " said the other, and pushed me again upon the throbbing brain. So far as my sensations went, there were no coverings at all, neither skull nor skin upon the intolerable throbbing of my head, which had been exposed to the curiosity of the crowd, and every touch was agony ; but my cry brought no guardian, nor any defence or soothing. I dragged myself into a corner after a time, from which some other wretch had been rolled out in the course of a quarrel ; and as I found that silence was the only policy, I kept silent, with rage consuming my heart.

Presently I discovered by means of the new arrivals which kept coming in, hurled into the midst of us without thought or question,

that this was the common fate of all who were repulsive to the sight, or who had any weakness or im- perfection which offended the eyes, of the population. They were tossed in among us, not to be healed, or for repose or safety, but to be out of sight, that they might not disgust or annoy those who were more fortunate, to whom no injury had happened ; and because in their sickness and imperfection they were of no use in the studies of the place, and disturbed the good order of the streets. And there they lay one above another, a mass of bruised and 'broken crea- tures, most of them suffering from injuries which they had sustained in what would have been called in other regions the service of the State. They had served like myself as objects of experiments. They had fallen from heights where they had been placed, in il- lustration of some theory. They had been tortured or twisted to give satisfaction to some question. And then, that the consequences of these proceedings might offend no one's eyeSj they were flung into this receptacle, to be released if chance or strength enabled them to push their way out when others were brought in, or when their importun- ate knocking wearied some watch- man, and brought him angry and threatening to hear what was wanted. The sound of this knock- ing against the door, and of the cries that accompanied it, and the rush towards the opening when any one was brought in, caused a hideous continuous noise and scuffle which was agony to my brain. Every one pushed before the other; there was an endless rising and fall- ing as in the changes of a feverish dream, each man as he got strength to struggle forward himself, thrust- ing back his neighbours, and those who were nearest to the door beat-

1887.]

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ing upon it without cease, like the beating of a drum without cadence or measure, sometimes a dozen passionate hands together, making a horrible din and riot. As I lay unable to join in that struggle, and moved by rage un- speakable towards all who could, I reflected strangely that I had never heard when outside this horrible continual appeal of the suffering. In the streets of the city, as I now reflected, quiet reigned. I had even made com- parisons on my first entrance, in the moment of pleasant anticipa- tion which came over me, of the happy stillness here, with the hor- ror and tumult of that place of unrule which I had left.

When my thoughts reached this point I was answered by the voice of some one on a level with myself, lying helpless like me on the floor of the lazar-house. "They have taken their precautions," he said ; "if they will not endure the sight of suffering, how should they hear the sound of it 1 Every cry is silenced there."

" I wish they could be silenced within too," I cried savagely ; "I would make them dumb had I the power."

"The spirit of the place is in you," said the other voice.

" And not in you 1 " I said, raising my head, though every movement was agony ; but this pre- tence of superiority was more than I could bear.

The other made no answer for a moment : then he said, faintly, "If it is so, it is but for greater misery."

And then his voice died away, and the hubbub of beating, and crying, and cursing, and groaning filled all the echoes. They cried, but no one listened to them. They thundered on the door, but in vain. They aggravated all their pangs

in that mad struggle to get free. After a while my companion, who- ever he was, spoke again.

" They would rather," he said, " lie on the roadside to be kicked and trodden on, as we have seen ; though to see that made you mis- erable."

" Made me miserable ! You mock me," I said. " Why should a man be miserable save for suffering of his own 1 "

"You thought otherwise once," my neighbour said.

And then I remembered the wretch in the corner of the wall in the other town, who had cursed me for pitying him. I cursed myself now for that folly. Pity him ! was he not better off than I ? "I wish," I cried, "that I could crush them into nothing, and be rid of this infernal noise they make ! "

"The spirit of the place has entered into you," said that voice.

I raised my arm to strike him ; but my hand fell on the stone floor instead, and sent a jar of new pain all through my battered frame. And then I mastered my rage, and lay still, for I knew there was no way but this of recovering my strength, — the strength with which, when I got it back, I would annihilate that reproachful voice, and crush the life out of those groaning fools, whose cries and impotent struggles I could not endure. And we lay a long time without moving, with always that tumult raging in our ears. At last there came into my mind a longing to hear spoken words again. I said, "Are you still there?"

"I shall be here," he said, "till I am able to begin again."

" To begin ! Is there here, then, either beginning or ending 1 Go on : speak to me : it makes me a little forget my pain."

" I have a fire in my heart," he

26

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said ; "I must begin and begin — till perhaps I find the way."

" What way 1 " I cried, feverish and eager ; for though I despised him, yet it made me wonder to think that he should speak riddles which I could not understand.

He answered very faintly, " I do not know." The fool ! then it was only folly, as from the first I knew it was. I felt then that I could treat him roughly, after the fashion of the place — which he said had got into me. " Poor wretch ! " I said, "you have hopes, have you 1 Where have you come from ? You might have learned better before now."

" I have come," he said, " from where we met before. I have come by the valley of gold. I have worked in the mines. I have served in the troops of those who are masters there. I have lived in this town of tyrants, and lain in this lazar - house before. Every- thing has happened to me, more and worse than you dream of."

" And still you go on 1 I would dash my head against the wall and die."

" When will you learn," he said, with a strange tone in his voice, which, though no one had been lis- tening to us, made a sudden silence for a moment — it was so strange : it moved me like that glimmer of the blue sky in my dream, and roused all the sufferers round with an expectation — though I know not what. The cries stopped, the hands beat no longer. I think all the miserable crowd were still, and turned to where he lay. " When will you learn — that you have died, and can die no more 1 "

There was a shout of fury all round me. " Is that all you have to say1?" the crowd burst forth : and I think they rushed upon him and killed him : for I heard no more : until the hubbub began again

more wild than ever, with furious hands beating, beating, against the locked door.

After a while I began to feel my strength come back. I raised my head. I sat up. I began to see the faces of those around me, and the groups into which they gathered ; the noise was no longer so insup- portable— my racked nerves were regaining health. It was with a mixture of pleasure and despair that I became conscious of this. I had been through many deaths ; but I did not die, perhaps could not, as that man had said. I looked about for him, to see if he had contra- dicted his own theory. But he was not dead. He was lying close to me, covered with wounds ; but he opened his eyes, and something like a smile came upon his lips. A smile — I had heard laughter, and seen ridicule and derision, but this I had not seen. I could not bear it. To seize him and shake the little remaining life out of him was my impulse. But neither did I obey that. Again he reminded me of my dream — was it a dream ? — of the opening in the clouds. From that moment I tried to shelter him, and as I grew stronger and stronger, and pushed my way to the door, I dragged him along with me. How long the struggle was I cannot tell, or how often I was balked — or how many darted through before me when the door was opened. But I did not let him go ; and at the last, for now I was as strong as before — stronger than most about me — I got out into the air and brought him with me. Into the air ! it was an atmosphere so still and motionless that there was no feeling of life in it, as I have said ; but the change seemed to me happiness for the moment. It was freedom. The noise of the struggle was over, the horrible

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sights were left behind. My spirit sprang up as if I had been born into new life. It had the same effect, I suppose, upon niy companion, though he was much weaker than I, for he rose to his feet at once with almost a leap of eagerness, and turned instantane- ously towards the other side of the city.

" Not that way," I said ; " come with me and rest."

"No rest — no rest— my rest is to go on ; " and then he turned to- wards me and smiled and said "Thanks" — looking into my face. What a word to hear ! I had not

heard it since A rush of strange

arid sweet and dreadful thoughts came into my mind. I shrank and trembled, and let go his arm, which I had been holding. But when I left that hold I seemed to fall back into depths of blank pain and longing. I put out my hand again and caught him. " I will go," I said, " where you go."

A pair of the officials of the place passed as I spoke. They looked at me with a threatening glance, and half paused, but then passed on. It was I now who hurried my companion along. I recollected him now. He was a man who had met me in the streets of the other city when I was still ignorant, who had con- vulsed me with the utterance of that name which, in all this world where we were, is never named but for punishment, — the name which I had named once more in the great hall in the midst of my torture, so that all who heard me were transfixed with that suffer- ing too. He had been haggard then, but he was more haggard now. His features were sharp with continual pain, his eyes were wild with weakness and trouble, though there was a meaning in them which went to my heart.

It seemed to me that in his touch there was a certain help, though he was weak and tottered, and every moment seemed full of suf- fering. Hope sprang up in my mind — the hope that where he was so eager to go there would be something better, a life more live- able than in this place. In every new place there is new hope. I was not worn out of that human impulse. I forgot the nightmare which had crushed me before — the horrible sense that from myself there was no escape — and holding fast to his arm, I hurried on with him, not heeding where. We went aside into less frequented streets, that we might escape observation. I seemed to myself the guide, though I was the follower. A great faith in this man sprang up in my breast. I was ready to go with him wherever he went, any- where— anywhere must be better than this. Thus I pushed him on, holding by his arm, till we reached the very outmost limits of the city. Here he stood still for a moment, turning upon me, and took me by the hands.

"Friend," he said, "before you were born into the pleasant earth I had come here. I have gone all the weary round. Listen to one who knows : all is harder, harder, as you go on. You are stirred to go on by the restlessness in your heart, and each new place you come to the spirit of that place enters into you. You are better here than you will be further on. You were better where you were at first, or even in the mines than here. Come no further. Stay

— unless " but here his voice

gave way. He looked at me with anxiety in his eyes, and said no more.

"Then why," I cried, "do you go on 1 Why do you not stay 1 "

He shook his head, and his eyes

28

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[Jan.

grew more and more soft. " I ani going," he said, and his voice shook again. " I am going — to try — the most awful and the most dangerous

journey " His voice died away

altogether, and he only looked at me to say the rest.

" A journey? Where?" I can tell no man what his eyes said. I understood, I cannot tell how ; and with trembling all my limbs seemed to drop out of joint and my face grow moist with ter- ror. I could not speak any more than he, but with my lips shaped, How ? The awful thought made a tremor in the very air around. He shook his head slowly as he looked at me — his eyes, all circled with deep lines, looking out of caves of anguish and anxiety ; and then I remembered how he had said, and I had scoffed at him, that the way he sought was one he did not know. I had dropped his hands in my fear ; and yet to leave him seemed dragging the heart out of my breast, for none but he had spoken to me like a brother — had taken my hand and thanked me. I looked out across the plain, and the roads seemed tranquil and still. There was a coolness in the air. It looked like evening, as if some- where in those far distances there might be a place where a weary soul might rest. Then I looked behind me, and thought what I had suffered, and remembered the lazar- house and the voices that cried and the hands that beat against the door ; and also the horrible quiet of the room in which I lived, and the eyes which looked in at me and turned my gaze upon myself. Then I rushed after him, for he had turned to go on upon his way ; and caught at his clothes, crying — " Behold me, be- hold me ! I will go too ! "

He reached me his hand and went on without a word; and I

with terror crept after him, tread- ing in his step, following like his shadow. What it was to walk with another, and follow, and be at one, is more than I can tell ; but likewise my heart failed me for fear, for dread of what we might encounter, and of hearing that name, or entering that pres- ence, which -was more terrible than all torture. I wondered how it could be that one should willingly face that which racked the soul, and how he had learned that it was possible, and where he had heard of the way. And as we went on I said no word — for he began to seem to me a being of another kind, a figure full of awe ; and I followed as one might follow a ghost. Where would he go ? Were we not fixed here for ever, where our lot had been cast? and there were still many other great cities where there might be much to see, and something to distract the mind, and where it might be more possible to live than it had proved in the other places. There might be no tyrants there, nor cruelty, nor horrible noises, nor dreadful silence. To- wards the right hand, across the plain, there seemed to rise out of the grey distance a cluster of towers and roofs like another habitable place — and who could tell that something better might not be there? Surely every- thing could not turn to torture and misery. I dragged on be- hind him, with all these thoughts hurrying through my mind. He was going — I dare to say it now, though I did not dare then — to seek out a way to God ; to try, if it was possible, to find the road that led back — that road which had been open once to all. But for me, I trembled at the thought of that road. I feared the name, which was as the plunging of a sword into my inmost parts. All

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things could be borne but that. I dared not even think upon that name. To feel my hand in an- other man's hand was much, but to be led into that awful presence, by awful ways, which none knew — how could I bear it 1 My spirits failed me, and my strength. My hand became loose in his hand : he grasped me still, but my'hold failed, and ever with slower and slower steps I followed, while he seemed to acquire strength with every winding of the way. At length he said to me, looking back upon me, " I cannot stop : but your heart fails you. Shall I loose my hand and let you go ? "

" I am afraid ; I am afraid ! " I cried.

" And I too am afraid ; but it is better to suffer more and to es- cape than to suffer less and to remain."

" Has it ever been known that one escaped 1 No one has ever es- caped. This is our place," I said, "there is no other world."

" There are other worlds — there is a world where every way leads to One who loves us still."

I cried out with a great cry of misery and scorn. " There is no love ! " I said.

He stood still for a moment and turned .and looked at me. His eyes seemed to melt my soul. A great cloud passed over them, as in the pleasant earth a cloud will sweep across the moon ; and then the light came out and looked at me again. For neither did he know. Where he was going all might end in despair and double and double pain. But if it were possible that at the end there should be found that for which he longed, upon which his heart was set ! He said with a faltering voice — " Among all whom I have questioned and seen there was but one who found the way. But if

one has found it, so may I. If you will not come, yet let me go."

" They will tear you limb from limb — they will burn you in the endless fires," I said. But what is it to be torn limb from limb, or burned with fire ? There came upon his face a smile, and in my heart even I laughed to scorn what I had said.

" If I were dragged every nerve apart, and every thought turned in- to a fiery dart — and that is so," he said; "yet will I go, if but, per- haps, I may see Love at the end."

"There is no love !" I cried again, with a sharp and bitter cry ; and the echo seemed to come back and back from every side, No love ! no love ! till the man who was my friend faltered and stumbled like a drunken man ; but afterwards he recovered strength and resumed his way.

And thus once more we went on. On the right hand was that city, growing ever clearer, with noble towers rising up to the sky, and battlements and lofty roofs, and behind a yellow clearness, as of a golden sunset. My heart drew me there ; it sprang up in my breast and sang in my ears, Come, and Come. Myself invited me to this new place as to a home. The others were wretched, but this will be happy : delights and pleasures will be there. And before us the way grew dark with storms, and there grew visible among the mists a black line of mountains, perpen- dicular cliffs, and awful precipices, which seemed to bar the way. I turned from that line of gloomy heights, and gazed along the path to where the towers stood up against the sky. And presently my hand dropped by my side, that had been held in my companion's hand ; and I saw him no more.

I went on to the city of the evening light. Ever and ever, as I

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proceeded on my way, the sense of haste and restless impatience grew upon me, so that I felt myself in- capable of remaining long in a place, and my desire grew stronger to hasten on and on ; but when I entered the gates of the city this longing vanished from my mind. There seemed some great festival or public holiday going on there. The streets were full of pleasure-parties, and in every open place (of which there were many) were bands of dancers, and music playing ; and the houses about were hung with tapestries and embroideries and garlands of flow- ers. A load seemed to be taken from my spirit when I saw all this — for a whole population does not rejoice in such a way without some cause. And to think that, after all, I had found a place in which I might live and forget the misery and pain which I had known, and all that was behind me, was de- lightful to my soul. It seemed to me that all the dancers were beau- tiful and young, their steps went gaily to the music, their faces were bright with smiles. Here and there was a master of the feast, who arranged the dances and guided the musicians, yet seemed to have a look and smile for new-comers too. One of these came forward to meet me, and re- ceived me with a welcome, and showed me a vacant place at a table, on which were beautiful fruits piled up in baskets, and all the provisions for a meal. " You were expected, you perceive," he said. A delightful sense of well- being came into my mind. I sat down in the sweetness of ease after fatigue, of refreshment after weari- ness, of pleasant sounds and sights after the arid way. I said to my- self that my past experiences had been a mistake, that this was where I ought to have come from the

first, that life here would be happy, and that all intruding thoughts must soon vanish and die away. After I had rested, I strolled about, and entered fully into the pleasures of the place. Wherever I went, through all the city, there was nothing but brightness and pleasure, music playing, and flags waving, and flowers and dancers and everything that was most gay. I asked several people whom I met what was the cause of the rejoicing ; but either they were too much oc- cupied with their own pleasures, or my question was lost in the hum of merriment, the sound of the instruments and of the dancers' feet. When I had seen as much as I desired of the pleasure out of doors, I was taken by some to see the interiors of houses, which were all decorated for this festival, whatever it was — lighted up with curious varieties of lighting, in tints of different colours. The doors and windows were all open, and whosoever would could come in from the dance or from the laden tables, and sit down where they pleased and rest, always with a pleasant view out upon the streets, so that they should lose nothing of the spectacle. And the dresses, both of women and men, were beautiful in form and colour, made in the finest fabrics, and affording delightful combina- tions to the eye. The pleasure which I took in all I saw and heard was enhanced by the sur- prise of it, and by the aspect of the places from which I had come, where there was no regard to beauty nor anything lovely or bright. Before my arrival here I had come in my thoughts to the conclusion that life had no brightness in these regions, and that whatever occupation or study there might be, pleasure had ended and was over, and everything that

1887.]

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had been sweet in the former life. I changed that opinion with a sense of relief, which was more warm even than the pleasure of the present moment ; for hav- ing made one such mistake, how could I tell that there were not more discoveries awaiting me, that life might not prove more endurable, might not rise to some- thing grander and more powerful ? The old prejudices, the old fore- gone conclusion of earth that this was a world of punishment, had warped my vision and my thoughts. With so many added faculties of being, incapable of fatigue as we were, incapable of death, recover- ing from every wound or accident as I had myself done, and with no foolish restraint as to what we should or should not do, why might not we rise in this land to strength unexampled, to the highest powers ? I rejoiced that I had dropped my companion's hand, that I had not followed him in his mad quest. Some time, I said to myself, I would make a pilgrimage to the foot of those gloomy mountains, and bring him back, all racked and tortured as he was, and show him the pleasant place which he had missed.

In the meantime the music and the dance went on. But it began to surprise me a little that there was no pause, that the festival continued without intermission. I went up to one of those who seemed the masters of ceremony, directing what was going on. He was an old man, with a flowing robe of bro- cade, and a chain and badge which denoted his office. He stood with a smile upon his lips, beating time with his hand to the music, watch- ing the figure of the dance.

" I can get no one to tell me," I said, " what the occasion of all this rejoicing is."

" It is for your coming," he re-

plied, without hesitation, with a smile and a bow.

For the moment a wonderful elation came over me. " For my coming ! " But then I paused and shook my head. " There are others coming besides me. See ! they ar- rive every moment."

" It is for their coming too," he said, with another smile and a still deeper bow ; " but you are the first as you are the chief."

This was what I could not un- derstand ; but it was pleasant to hear, and I made no further objec- tion. " And how long will it go on P I said.

" So long as it pleases you," said the old courtier.

How he smiled ! His smile did not please me. He saw this, and distracted my attention. " Look at this dance," he said ; " how beautiful are those round young limbs ! Look how the dress con- ceals yet shows the form and beautiful movements ! It was in- vented in your honour. All that is lovely is for you. Choose where you will, all is yours. We live only for this : all is for you." While he spoke, the dancers came nearer and nearer till they circled us round, and danced and made their pretty obeisances, and sang : " All is yours ; all is for you : " then breaking their lines floated away in other circles and proces- sions and endless groups, singing and laughing till it seemed to ring from every side, " Everything is yours ; all is for you."

I accepted this flattery I know not why : for I soon became aware that I was no more than others, and that the same words were said to every new-comer. Yet my heart was elated, and I threw my- self into all that was set before me. But there was always in my mind an expectation that presently the music and the dancing would cease,

32

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and the tables be withdrawn, and a pause come. At one of the feasts I was placed by the side of a lady very fair and richly dressed, but with a look of great weariness in her eyes. She turned her beautiful face to me, not with any show of pleasure, and there was something like compassion in her look. She said, "You are very tired," as she made room for me by her side.

"Yes," I said, though with sur- prise, for I had not yet acknow- ledged that even to myself . "There is so much to enjoy. We have need of a little rest."

" Of rest," said she, shaking her head, "this is not the place for rest."

"Yet pleasure requires it," I

said, "as much as " I was

about to say pain ; but why should one speak of pain in a place given up to pleasure 1 She smiled faintly and shook her head again. All her movements were languid and faint ; her eyelids drooped over her eyes. Yet, when I turned to her, she made an effort to smile. " I think you are also tired," I said.

At this she roused herself a little. " We must not say so : nor do I say so. Pleasure is very ex- acting. It demands more of you than anything else. One must be always ready "

"For what?"

" To give enjoyment, and to re- ceive it." There was an effort in. her voice to rise to this sentiment, but it fell back into weariness again.

" I hope you receive as well as give," I said.

The lady turned her eyes to me with a look which I cannot forget, and life seemed once more to be roused within her. But not the life of pleasure : her eyes were full of loathing, and fatigue, and

disgust, and despair. " Are you so new to this place," she said, " and have not learned even yet what is the height of all misery and all weariness : what is worse than pain and trouble, more dreadful than the lawless streets and the burning mines, and the torture of the great hall and the misery of the lazar-house "

" Oh, lady," I said, " have you been there 1 "

She answered me with her eyes alone ; there was no need of more. " But pleasure is more terrible than all," she said ; and I knew in my heart that what she said was true.

There is no record of time in that place. I could not count it by days or nights : but soon after this it happened to me that the dances and the music became no more than a dizzy maze of sound and sight, which made my brain whirl round and round ; and I too loathed what was spread on the table, and the soft couches, and the garlands, and the fluttering flags and ornaments. To sit for ever at a feast, to see for ever the merry-makers turn round and round, to hear in your ears for ever the whirl of the music, the laughter, the cries of pleasure ! There were some who went on and on, and never seemed to tire ; but to me the endless round came at last to be a torture from which I could not escape. Finally, I could distinguish nothing — neither what I heard nor what I saw : and only a consciousness of something intolerable buzzed and echoed in my brain. I longed for the quiet of the place I had left ; I longed for the noise in the streets, and the hubbub and tumult of my first experiences. Anything, any- thing rather than this ! I said to my- self ; and still the dancers turned, the music sounded, the bystanders smiled, and everything went on and on. My eyes grew weary

1887.]

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with seeing, and my ears with hearing. To watch the new-com- ers rush in, all pleased and eager, to see the eyes of the others glaze with weariness, wrought upon my strained nerves. I could not think, I could not rest, I could not endure. Music for ever and ever — a whirl, a rush of music, always going on and on ; and ever that maze of movement, till the eyes were feverish and the mouth parched ; ever that mist of faces, now one gleaming out of the chaos, now another, some like the faces of angels, some miser- able, weary, strained with smil- ing, with the monotony, and the endless, aimless, never - changing round. I heard myself calling to them to be still — to be still ! to pause a moment. I felt myself stumble and turn round in the giddiness and horror of that move- ment without repose. And finally, I fell under the feet of the crowd, and felt the whirl go over and over me, and beat upon my brain, until I was pushed and thrust out of the way lest I should stop the measure. There I lay, sick, sati- ate, for I know not how long ; loathing everything around me, ready to give all I had (but what had I to give ?) for one moment of silence. But always the music went on, and the dancers danced, and the people feasted, and the songs and the voices echoed up to the skies.

How at last I stumbled forth I cannot tell. Desperation must have moved me, and that im- patience which, after every hope and disappointment, comes back and back, the one sensation that never fails. I dragged my- self at last by intervals, like a sick dog, outside the revels, still hearing them, which was torture to me, even when at last I got beyond the crowd. It was some-

VOL. CXLI. — NO. DCCCLV.

thing to lie still upon the ground, though without power to move, and sick beyond all thought, loath- ing myself and all that I had been and seen. For I had not even the sense that I had been wronged to keep me up, but only a nausea and horror of movement, a giddi- ness and whirl of every sense. I lay like a log upon the ground.

When I recovered my faculties a little, it was to find myself once more in the great vacant plain which surrounded that accursed home of pleasure — a great and desolate waste upon which I could see no track, which my heart fainted to look at, which no longer roused any hope in me, as if it might lead to another beginning, or any place in which yet at the last it might be pos- sible to live. As I lay in that horrible giddiness and faintness, I loathed life and this continu- ance which brought me through one misery after another, and forbade me to die. Oh that death would come — death which is silent and still, which makes no movement and hears no sound ! that I might end and be no more ! Oh that I could go back even to the still- ness of that chamber which I had not been able to endure ! Oh that I could return — return ! to what 1 to other miseries and other pain, which looked less because they were past. But I knew now that return was impossible until I had circled all the dreadful round ; and already I felt again the burning of that desire that pricked and drove me on — not back, for that was impossible. Little by little I had learned to understand, each step printed upon my brain as with red-hot irons : not back, but on, and on. To greater anguish, yes ; but on : to fuller despair, to experiences more ter- rible : but on, and on, and on. I c

34

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arose again, for this was my fate. I could not pause even for all the teachings of despair.

The waste stretched far as eyes could see. It was wild and ter- rible, with neither vegetation nor sign of life. Here and there were heaps of ruin, which had been villages and cities ; but nothing was in them save reptiles and crawling poisonous life, and traps for the unwary wanderer. How often I stumbled and fell among these ashes and dust - heaps of the past — through what dread mo- ments I lay, with cold and slimy things leaving their trace upon my flesh — the horrors which seized me, so that I beat my head against a stone, — why should I tell? These were nought; they touched not the soul. They were but accidents of the way.

At length, when body and soul were low and worn out with misery and weariness, I came to another place, where all was so different from the last, that the sight gave me a momentary solace. It was full of furnaces and clanking ma- chinery and endless work. The whole air round was aglow with the fury of the fires, and men went and came like demons in the flames, with red-hot melting met- al, pouring it into moulds and beating it on anvils. In the huge workshops in the background there was a perpetual whir of machin- ery— of wheels turning and turn- ing, and pistons beating, and all the din of labour, which for a time renewed the anguish of my brain, yet also soothed it ; for there was meaning in the beatings and the whirlings. And a hope rose within me that with all the forces that were here, some revolution might be possible — something that would change the features of this place and overturn the worlds. I went from workshop to workshop, and

examined all that was being done and understood — for I had known a little upon the earth, and my old knowledge came back, and to learn so much more filled me with new life. The master of all was one who never rested, nor seemed to feel weariness, nor pain, nor pleasure. He had everything in his hand. All who were there were his workmen, or his assistants, or his servants. ISTo one shared with him in his councils. He was more than a prince among them — he was as a god. And the things he planned and made, and at which in armies and legions his work- men toiled and laboured, were like living things. They were made of steel and iron, but they moved like the brains and nerves of men. They went where he directed them, and did what he command- ed, and moved at a touch. And though he talked little, when he saw how I followed all that he did, he was a little moved towards me, and spoke and explained to me the conceptions that were in his mind, one rising out of an- other, like the leaf out of the stem and the flower out of the bud. For nothing pleased him that he did, and necessity was upon him to go on and on.

"They are like living things," I said — " they do your bidding whatever you command them. They are like another and a stronger race of men."

"Men!" he said, "what are men1? the most contemptible of all things that are made — creatures who will undo in a moment what it has taken millions of years, and all the skill and all the strength of gen- erations to do. These are better than men. They cannot think or feel. They cannot stop but at my bidding, or begin unless I will. Had men been made so, we should be masters of the world."

1887.]

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" Had men been made so, you would never have been — for what could genius have done or thought? — you would have been a machine like all the rest."

" And better so ! " he said, and turned away; for at that moment, watching keenly as he spoke the action of a delicate combination of movements, all made and bal- anced to a hair's-breadth, there had come to him suddenly the idea of something which made it a hun- dredfold more strong and terrible. For they were terrible these things that lived yet did not live, which were his slaves, and moved at his will. When he had done this, he looked at me, and a smile came upon his mouth : but his eyes smiled not, nor ever changed from the set look they wore. And the words he spoke were familiar words, not his, but out of the old life. " What a piece of work is a man ! " he said ; " how noble in reason, how infinite in faculty ! in form and moving how express and admirable ! And yet to me what is this quintessence of dust ? " His mind had followed another strain of thought, which to me was bewildering, so that I did not know how to reply. I answered like a child, upon his last word.

" We are dust no more," I cried, for pride was in my heart — pride of him and his wonderful strength, and his thoughts which created strength, and all the marvels he did — " those things which hinder- ed are removed. Go on, go on — you want but another step. What is to prevent that you should not shake the universe, and overturn this doom, and break all our bonds 1 There is enough here to explode this grey fiction of a firmament, and to rend those precipices and to dissolve that waste — as at the time when the primeval seas dried up, and those infernal mountains rose."

He laughed, and the echoes caught the sound and gave it back as if they mocked it. " There is enough to rend us all into shreds," he said, "and shake, as you say, both heaven and earth, and these plains and those hills."

"Then why," I cried in my haste, with a dreadful hope pierc- ing through my soul — " why do you create and perfect, but never employ ? When we had armies on the earth we used them. You have more than armies. You have force beyond the thoughts of man : but all without use as yet."

" All," he cried, " for no use ! All in vain ! — in vain ! "

"O master!" I said, "great, and more great, in time to come. Why?— why?"

He took me by the arm and drew me close.

"Have you strength," he said, " to bear it if I tell you why ?"

I knew what he was about to say. I felt it in the quivering of my veins, and my heart that bounded as if it would escape from my breast. But I would not quail from what he did not shrink to utter. I could speak no word, but I looked him in the face and waited — for that which was more terrible than all.

He held me by the arm, as if he would hold me up when the shock of anguish came. " They are in vain," he said, "in vain — because God rules over all."

His arm was strong ; but I fell at his feet like a dead man.

How miserable is that image, and how unfit to use ! Death is still and cool and sweet. There is nothing in it that pierces like a sword, that burns like fire, that rends and tears like the turning wheels. O life, O pain, O terrible name of God, in which is all succour and all torment ! What are pangs and tortures to that, which ever in-

36

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creases in its awful power, and has no limit, nor any alleviation, but whenever it is spoken penetrates through and through the miserable soul ? O God, whom once I called my Father ! O Thou who gavest me being, against whom I have fought, whom I fight to the end, shall there never be anything but anguish in the sound of Thy great name?

When I returned to such com- mand of myself as one can have who has bpen transfixed by that sword of fire, the master stood by me still. He had not fallen like me, but his face was drawn with anguish and sorrow like the face of my friend who had been with me in the lazar-house, who had disappeared on the dark mountains. And as I looked at him, terror seized hold upon me, and a desire to flee and save myself, that I might not be drawn after him by the longing that was in his eyes.

The Master gave me his hand to help me to rise, and it trembled, but not like mine.

"Sir," I cried, "have not we enough to bear ? Is it for hatred, is it for vengeance, that you speak that name ! "

"O friend," he said, "neither for hatred nor revenge. It is like a fire in my veins : if one could find Him again ! "

" You, who are as a god — who can make and destroy — you, who could shake His throne ! "

He put up his hand. " I who am His creature, even here — and still His child, though I am so

far, so far " He caught my

hand in his, and pointed with the other trembling. " Look ! your eyes are more clear than mine, for they are not anxious like mine. Can you see anything upon the way ? "

The waste lay wild before us, dark with a faintly rising cloud, for darkness and cloud and the gloom of death attended upon that name. I thought, in his great genius and splendour of intellect, he had gone mad, as sometimes may be. "There is nothing," I said, and scorn came into my soul ; but even as I spoke I saw — I cannot tell what I saw — a moving spot of milky whiteness in that dark and miserable wil- derness,— no bigger than a man's hand, no bigger than a flower. "There is something," I said un- willingly; "it has no shape nor form. It is a gossamer-web upon some bush, or a butterfly blown on the wind."

"There are neither butterflies nor gossamers here."

" Look for yourself then ! " I cried, flinging his hand from me. I was angry with a rage which had no cause. I turned from him, though I loved him, with a desire to kill him in my ' heart ; and hurriedly took the other way. The waste was wild : but rather that than to see the man who might have shaken earth and hell thus turning, turning to madness and the awful journey. For I knew what in his heart he thought, and I knew that it was so. It was something from that other sphere — can I tell you what? a child perhaps — oh, thought that wrings the heart ! for do you know what manner of thing a child is? There are none in the land of darkness. I turned my back upon the place where that whiteness was. On, on, across the waste ! On to the cities of the night ! On, far away from mad- dening thought, from hope that is torment, and from the awful Name !

1887.]

Mr Hayward and his Letters.

37

MB HAYWARD AND HIS LETTERS.1

WHEN Mr Hayward died nearly three years ago, he had been for a long time a remarkable figure in the social life of London. What it was that made him notable did not at first sight appear. He had been bred to the Bar, and had at- tained to the dignity of Queen's Counsel, but he had for long aban- doned the practice of his profession. He wrote reviews in an exceed- ingly good and popular style, but they were mostly on subjects of a light class, and they were purely and simply reviews, containing nothing which was not founded on the acts or thoughts of others. His conversation, likewise, afforded no evidence of originality; it was not in the least brilliant, and displayed chiefly a remarkable memory and power of quotation, great accuracy in dates and facts, strong opinions strongly expressed, and an impa- tience of contradiction, or even of dissent, amounting to intolerance, and not unfrequently leading to unpleasant collisions of temper. He was evidently not a rich man — he might even be called a poor one — inhabiting a small set of rooms on the second floor of a house in St James's Street, and sallying thence to dine at his club, the Athenseum. To the great majority of those who might chance to notice his small bent figure traversing Pall Mall with a rapid step, he was absolutely un- known by name. It might be supposed from all this that there was nothing greatly to distinguish him from a number of others who write essays and reviews anony- mously in excellent English. But

to have supposed this would have been a mistake. Though unaided by fortune or fame, he exercised in many respects an influence due only to a commanding intellect in a commanding position. In Lon- don and in country-houses he moved in a very elevated stratum of society — in most gatherings of the most fashionable people he was pretty sure to be found. Great ladies talked of him as " Hay- ward." Eminent persons dining at his club gravitated to the table where, like Cato, he gave his little senate laws. Foreign statesmen, known throughout Europe, were his correspondents, and when they visited London, would seek inter- views with him. But his influ- ence appeared most distinctly in a political crisis, when great leaders would send for him, discuss the situation, and employ him in nego- tiating with statesmen of the class from which ministries are formed. This remarkable difference between the position which his apparent merits might naturally have gained for him and that which he actually enjoyed, formed a curious problem. It is to be accounted for not so much by his intellectual as by his moral characteristics. He was an exceedingly social man, and pushed his way with a hardihood which seemed to defy denial. His fond- ness for the company of persons of worldly consideration, backed by his strong self-confidence, procured for him a great number of impor- tant acquaintances, and these, it must be said, he never sought to propitiate by flattery ; in all com- panies he was still Hayward,

1 A Selection from the Correspondence of Abraham Hayward, Q.C., from 1834 to 1884, with an Account of his Early Life. Edited by Henry E. Carlisle. Lon-

don: John Murray. 1886.

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Mr Hayward and his Letters.

[Jan.

ready to meet all comers, and asserting himself and his opinions without compromise. Then he took an intense interest in pub- lic affairs and in other people's affairs. Though he never held any public office, he threw himself into the questions of the day with all the ardour of a professional politi- cian, and always as an uncompro- mising partisan. With the same vehemence he would press into the quarrels, scandals, intrigues, and family histories of the world around him ; and having an extraordinary memory, his value as a social chron- icle, joined to his extensive literary information, rendered him accept- able in the boudoirs, and thus in- creased his general importance. Thus it came to pass that he had a large circulation ; that those who met him everywhere took him to be somebody ; and that public men found him most convenient to refer to on all matters of recent political history, and also on the opinions of their rivals and oppon- ents, which, as soon as they were imparted to him, he never failed to proclaim most impartially : and as nothing afforded him so much delight as to be for the moment Mercury among the gods, he came to be known as a useful person in a difficulty, and, at moments when fear of change was perplexing min- istries, might be met with hur- rying from one great man to an- other, hanging on their arms in the public ways, asserting their policy, denouncing their opponents with a singular ardour of animos- ity, and telling everybody every- thing he knew about the matter, — for reticence was a virtue which he habitually cast to the winds.

These letters begin, in 1834, when he was thirty -three years old, and had been ten years in London. He had been for some years editor of the 'Law Maga- zine,' and in that character paid

a visit to the jurists of Gottin- gen. Goethe was then alive, and Hayward heard so much about him from his admirers, that he set about a translation of ' Faust ' in prose, which he published ; and with his accustomed energy, before issuing a second edition, went again to Germany, where he consulted many eminent liter- ary men and friends of the poet; and, thus fortified, the new edition rapidly attained to consideration both in Germany and England. This opened for him a door in London society, which he was not the man to remain outside of, and gave him the opportunity of using those means for pushing his way with which he was so notably equipped. Hobhouse, Macaulay, Scarlett, Whewell, Thirlwall, John Wilson, Babbage, Wordsworth, Southey, Sydney Smith, Lady Blessington, were some of his cor- respondents and acquaintances at this period. At this time he had chambers in the Temple (having apparently a certain amount of practice), and gave little dinners, which it was his ambition to ren- der choice of their kind. The com- pany was of the best, with such guests as Lockhart, Hook, James Smith, Lord Lyndhurst, Macaulay, Tom Moore, Louis Napoleon, and Mrs Norton. The viands were carefully selected, and the enter- tainments owed perhaps some of their undoubted vogue to the fact that the host had just repub- lished a couple of articles in the ' Quarterly ' on the art of dining, which made him appear much more of an epicure than he really was. Going the western circuit, visiting a good deal at the in- teresting country - houses of in- teresting people, making fresh acquaintances among notables, din- ner - giving and dinner - frequent- ing, pushing, dictating, denounc- ing, writing letters and receiving

1887.]

Mr Hayward and his Letters.

39

them, and preparing his careful articles for (at this time) the ' Edinburgh Review ' — with an oc- casional trip to Paris, — such was the routine of his life, and so it continued to the end. We may here remark that these Letters show us nothing of the positive, combative, news-bearing, anecdote- recounting personage who wrote them — and it is no offence to say that the letters of such corre- spondents as Sydney Smith and Mrs Norton are far more enter- taining than his own. It is really unfortunate that directly Hay- ward took pen in hand to write a letter, he dropped his remarkable personality. We say it is unfor- tunate, because in no other way could that remarkable personality have been more harmlessly dis- played. To insist very strongly on a particular view of a matter in a letter would have been prefer- able to proclaiming it aggressively before a whole company. It would have been much more inoffensive to denounce some opponent to a third person, than personally to assail himself ; the phraseology would have gained force by being more carefully chosen than what he was accustomed to utter, his criticisms on men and their works would have found expression more worthy of his keen critical faculty, his anecdotes would have been more sparingly introduced ; and we should thus have had Hayward painted in permanent and favour- able colours by himself, instead of the somewhat featureless inditer of a decorous and merely histori- cal correspondence. On the other hand, it would have been a great gain had he transferred to his con- versation somewhat of the style of his letters. He would thereby have largely increased the circle of his friends and diminished that of his enemies ; he would have gained for himself a hearing by

better means than insistence ; and he would have enjoyed an advan- tage which he did not often per- mit himself, in eliciting the free expression of the opinions of others, and in listening to, and profiting by them. Nevertheless we must guard the reader against the inference that, with all his aggressiveness, he had not friends, and very good friends. Many such adhered to him up to the very end of his life, testified strongly their regard for him, and continue still to lament his loss. The fact is, that he had some very sterling qualities. Though always a par- tisan, no partisan ever was more honest : biassed he might be by prejudice, but not by fear or by expectation of profit to himself. He was very thorough in his friendships. He was none of your lukewarm adherents who wait to be called on — he did not call that backing of his friends — but made their quarrel for the time his own. His outspokenness often took the form of serviceable candour, which made it all the more satisfactory for those to consult him who might know that his prepossessions were already on their side ; for they felt that while they had in him a stanch advocate, yet, when he might differ from them, they would be sure to hear of it, and his objection would be worth attention. And though he was undoubtedly too pugnacious, yet the courage which led him to strike the most renowned shields with his sharp point was of itself a title to confidence and applause. It would be difficult to say to what political party Mr Hayward might be most inclined by nature. It has been indeed a silly Radical taunt, that Intolerance and arbi- trary tendencies are Tory traits ; but it has long been evident that nobody is so intolerant as a Radical. However this may be, Mr Hay- ward began life as a Tory at twenty-

40

Mr Hay ward and his Letters.

[Jan.

five, when he was a member of the London Debating Society, and gained distinction in it by speeches which we are sure were clear and sharply put. As he never was in Parliament, his political views were of no great consequence till they underwent a change with the great schism of the Peelites. He had made a study of political economy, and, like most who ventured into that new country, became a free- trader. Therefore when the Peel- ites, in 1852, stood aloof from both the great parties, and when the endeavour was made to bring them into a Coalition Government along with the Whigs and the Radicals, Hayward threw himself into the scheme with such ardour, that he became, according to his own ac- count, the principal agent, after the leading statesmen, in effecting the coalition. He set forth the views of the Peelites in the ' Morn- ing Chronicle,' and fought their battles in all companies. Hence- forth he threw in his lot with the Liberals, and the statesmen he sided with were the Duke of Newcastle, Sir G. Lewis, Sidney Herbert, Sir James Graham, Mr Cardwell, and Mr Gladstone — in fact, the Peel- ites. Later, he followed Mr Glad- stone in the strides he made far in advance of the Liberal party ; and if he were now alive, he might pos- sibly be following him still.

No explanation is given in these letters of why Hayward never tried to enter Parliament. He would seem to have been the very man to ardently covet a seat. He had the strongest bent towards party poli- tics. In the contentions of fac- tions he would have been in his element ; and he might thus have replaced by a new profession the one he had abandoned : for when made a Queen's Counsel in 1845, he got into a quarrel with the Benchers, and entered upon a con- flict with these enemies in a fash-

ion so very earnest, that his pros- pects of practice as a Q.C. were accounted as nought in the fury of battle, and were left to take care of themselves ; so that, when his strife with these antagonists had come to an end, his legal career had come to an end also.

This piece of negotiation of 1852 was his first essay in the business of cabinet-making. His part in it is not made clear ; probably it con- sisted in fitting the mortises and applying the glue ; but whatever it was, he appears to have performed it very much to his own satisfac- tion. It is curious that his corre- spondence should give us so little information on this and similar subjects. There is no doubt that, while he was engaged on the busi- ness, everybody whom he chanced to converse with was made aware of all that was happening at every stage of it. But in the less per- ishable record, he imparts to his correspondents only the briefest notices of that intrigue, his share in which gave him so much de- light, and the accomplishment of which he looked back on with so much satisfaction. The chief rec- ord of it is the notice of a din- ner which he gave to the leading Peelites, and which, he says, " has done great good by consolidating the Peel party, as there was a rumour that the leaders were divided." But his exertions must have gone beyond this conciliatory festival, for he tells a relation, " I have no doubt at all that if any- thing that suited me should turn up, they would offer it to me, as I have been of great use to them throughout." He was advised to apply for a commissionership under the Charitable Trusts Act, and used some efforts to get it. "I have most reluctantly become a place- hunter," he says; "but the plain matter of fact is, that I lost a con- siderable part of my small fortune

1887.]

Mr Hayivard and his Letters.

41

on my brother's death." He failed to get it — why, we do not learn. Some years later Lord Aberdeen offered him the secretaryship of the Poor Law Board, expected to become vacant ; but the vacancy did not occur, and Hayward re- mained to the close of his life an unofficial and unrewarded servant of the party he adhered to, doing his best to secure victories which brought him nothing, and fighting because he rejoiced iri the battle.

It is likely that one cause of Hayward's devotion to Mr Glad- stone was the animosity which he cherished towards Mr Gladstone's rival. The provocations seem to have been mutual, and which began them we know not. So early as 1850 we find Hayward pronouncing " Disraeli very nearly, if not quite, forgotten. How soon one of these puffed-up reputations goes down ! It is like a bladder after the pricking of a pin." This prophecy is not, perhaps, much to his credit as a soothsayer; but he did more than prophesy. He not only furnished materials for attacks on Disraeli, but made one him- self in the ' Edinburgh,' by which, he says exultingly, "the Disrael- ites were frenzied with rage." On the other hand, Mr Disraeli spoke of the raconteur Hayward as " in his anecdotage," and was sup- posed to have made a very uncom- fortable allusion to him in a novel. On the whole, Hayward probably did his antagonist the more seri- ous damage. When there was a prospect of Liberal victory at the election of 1880, he says, "I have been longing for the fall of the Disraeli Government as I did for the fall of the Second Empire " — and his longing impelled him to endeavour to secure the support of the ' Times ' for the new Min- istry. After an interview with Mr Gladstone, Lord Hartington, and Lord Granville, " I went off,"

he says, "in the middle of the night to the ' Times ' office, where I saw Chenery, the editor, an inti- mate friend of mine ; and the first leading article in the 'Times' of to-day was the result." Whether anybody could now take pride in having helped to form that ru- inous Administration is another question.

Meanwhile Hayward's contribu- tions to periodical literature went on regularly. As we have seen, he had written a great deal for the 'Edinburgh,' but that connection came to an end, and apparently not a friendly end ; for with refer- ence to a pamphlet he had written, he says : "I feel convinced they will lie and misquote in the ' Edin- burgh.'" But he now returned to the ' Quarterly,' resuming a con- nection which had begun in Lock- hart's time, and thereafter regu- larly had an article in every num- ber till a few months before his death. On each of these occasions the process of incubation went on in a very public fashion. The pro- gress of the article was communi- cated freely to his numerous ac- quaintances till the final hatching had little left to reveal, and it afforded a fruitful theme for dis- cussion, orally and by letter, as soon as it was before the public, — so that his essays, besides the writing of them, contributed a great deal both to the interest and the business of his life. They were very highly estimated by men of letters like Lord Lyt- ton and Lord Houghton, and certainly deserved it. He spared no pains to be accurate. He would consult any number of people to verify a single fact, or to procure a result which would be recorded in a few words. He had known so many persons of author- ity in his long and busy life, that he could at once command the best sources of information on any con-

42

Mr Hayward and his Letters.

[Jan.

temporary topic. What he most enjoyed, therefore, because he felt most at home in it, was to review some new book of memoirs relating to the literary or social or political history of the time. His style was perfectly lucid, and of its kind — that is, of a kind excluding all play of imagination or exercise of invention — excellent ; clear-cut, logical, forcible without heaviness, and thickly set with the allusions, quotations, and anecdotes, which his extensive reading and large ac- quaintance with men had stored his mind with, and which his accu- rate memory could always place ready to his hand. So assured did he feel of his own infallible accu- racy, that if any circumstance were called in question which he had at any time recorded, he would cite the fact that he had done so as a kind of evidence from which there could be no appeal. But the most curious identification of himself with his writings was in the claim which he always asserted to con- sider any anecdote he had once related as his own property, which nobody thenceforward ought to meddle with. The present writer having heard from Richard Doyle a good story about Lord Nelson, repeated it to Hayward. But few stories could be told to him which he was not already acquainted with ; and he had not only heard this one, but had narrated it, which caused him indignantly to ask, " What the devil does Doyle mean by spoiling my story 1 " On this occasion, however, Doyle's version turned out to be right.

It was not, however, contem- porary subjects alone which could engage his attention. He once, on the appearance of the ' Memoirs of Sir Philip Francis,' took up the question as to who was Junius, with the view of disproving Sir Philip's claim. What was Junius to him, or he to Junius? Yet he

threw himself into the question with an ardour which might have seemed excessive in a contemporary — pommelled Sir Philip Francis to his heart's content — seemed inclined to back Lord George Sackville's pretensions ; but finally decided that the once formidable letters were supplied by " the Grenvilles," which, perhaps, does not help us much to a conclusion ; — a failure, however, that matters the less, as few people now feel a lively interest in identifying the truculent phantom.

Among other subjects, he once wrote a dissertation on whist ; and being in the habit of playing the game a good deal at the Athenae- um, he used vigorously to propound its rules at the whist-table for the benefit of transgressors — so that, on very animated evenings, his rubber might be called a severe lecture on whist, with occasional illustrations from the cards; and if some fellow - player unhappily showed an impatient temper, the green cloth, " sacred to neatness and repose," became an arena of resounding conflict. What might have happened if he had ever played whist with Charles Lamb's friend, Mrs Battle, is terrible to contemplate.

The titles of some of his other articles will serve to indicate the tracks in which his pen habitu- ally ran. " Pearls and Mock Pearls of History " gave his mem- ory a wide range, so did " Vari- eties of History and Art," " Curi- osities of German Archives," and " Vicissitudes of Families." An- cient scandals were investigated with great gusto, as in the papers, "Marie Antoinette" and "The Countess of Albany and Alfieri." Sometimes the subject bore a graver title, as " Lanfrey's Napol- eon," " The British Parliament, its History and Eloquence," and "Eng- land and France — their National

1887.]

Mr Hayward and his Letters.

43

Qualities, Manners, Morals, and Society;" but these, too, were treat- ed from their light sides, and the same gay stream of agreeable gossip about them bore on its tide great shoals of anecdotes. " Sir Henry Holland's Recollec- tions," "Madame de Sevigne," "Madame du Deffand," suggest papers in which he would be quite in his element, passing with a light step through scenes made pictur- esque and interesting by the notable and historic figures which crowd- ed them. But of the whole list, the two in which Hayward must have revelled most are " Holland House " and " Strawberry Hill " ; combining researches into corners of the history of former genera- tions with personal recollections of famous guests who had frequented those mansions along with him ; the whole illustrated by a wealth of anecdote such as no one but him- self had amassed, and much of which, until he recorded it, was drifting on the casual current of oral narrative towards oblivion. To tell a good story about famous people for the first time was probably as high a pleasure as he could know.

Towards the end of his life his strong memory perhaps began a little to fail him. In his " Madame de Sevigne," published in the vol- ume of 1880, he quotes the well- known passage about Cleopatra thus —

"Age cannot weary her, nor custom tire Her infinite variety," —

instead of "wither" and "stale." This was pointed out to him as a supposed injury done to him by the printer ; but he shook his head and said he feared he, not the printer, was the culprit.

Besides the seven volumes of his selected Essays, he appears only to have published two other works in volumes — the one his

translation of ' Faust,' his earliest publication ; the other the bio- graphy of Goethe for " Black- wood's Foreign Classics " — written when he was already a very old man.

We have been induced to offer this sketch of Mr Hayward be- cause, as we have already noted, he presented a very remarkable individuality, and one well worth preserving, which is nowhere made apparent in these Letters. They might have been written by a man fond of society, of almost any pro- fession or almost any persuasion. When he wrote his letters he put off his shoes of swiftness and laid aside his sword of sharpness, but put on his cloak of darkness, and went masquerading in the, for him, fancy costume of a quite common- place character. In all companies he was irrepressible and conspicu- ous. Nobody who knew him could imagine him as conceding, or con- ciliating, or deferring, or implying concurrence which he did not feel, or meeting dissent with silence, or ignoring arrogant pretension, or resorting to any of the amiable shifts which oil the machinery of social life. He was nothing if not a gladiator. And he led, under these somewhat adverse conditions, a very pleasant life. That there was plenty of matter to outweigh his defects is apparent from the fact that most of his friends went on habitually dining with him up to the last with high mutual satisfac- tion. He alludes, in the Letters, to the well-known table at the Athen- feum, which he had got to consider his own, as " the Corner," where his most frequent companion was his old and intimate friend Mr King- lake, whom he esteemed probably more than he esteemed anybody else. Here he enjoyed, on most evenings when he was not dining out — which he very often was — one of the greatest pleasures he

44

Mr Hayward and his Letters.

[Jan.

could desire, that of being a con- spicuous member of a party of distinguished men. To the old friends who generally assembled round him, he added, at every opportunity, any eminent foreigner or stranger admitted as a tempor- ary guest by the rules of the Club — and only such are admitted. To say the truth, he carried this appropriation of desirable guests to an extreme ; and many a pro- jected quiet converse between old friends, just met after long separa- tion, has been upset by Hayward insisting on laying hands on the illustrious stranger. Here he would air his anecdotes, ventilate his projects, report the progress of his literary work in hand, and inveigh against his enemies, in- cluding in that comprehensive class everybody who differed from him. These scenes he continued to vary by visits to some of the most agree- able houses in England, and to most entertainments in London where many great people were gathered together. For this kind of life he made his income suffice ; and it is quite probable that an accession of wealth would not have made him happier. He had quite enough to preserve, what he doubt- less valued above most things, his independence.

He was of a small, slight figure, stooping a good deal — pale of com- plexion and high-featured, large of nose and mouth. His hair, white latterly, was smooth, and ended in rows of small curls — in- somuch that a lady to whom we pointed him out across Bond Street, noting this fleecy chevelure, ob- served that he was like a pet lamb — an animal which he did not in other respects resemble. He seemed to enjoy unfailing health up to his final illness, when, in his eighty-third year, at the approach

of winter, he found that he could no longer take his seat at the Club. He remained for many weeks in his rooms, still able to enjoy the com- pany of the many fast friends who came to sit with him, his chief con- solation being in the company of his tried associate Kinglake, who was unremitting in those visits which gave such comfort to the departing Hayward. For the last few days he took to his bed, having a nurse to take care of him. Towards the close he wandered a little, and at one time fancied the Government wanted to talk with him about difficulties in Egypt, and that he ought to go to them. The nurse, experienced in such matters, sought to soothe him — " No, no, Mr Hay- ward, 'tis all right about Egypt ! " This audacity of hers, first in con- tradicting him, and then in presum- ing to know anything about Egypt, recalled his wandering faculties. Looking at the erring though well- meaning woman, he said, "You hold your tongue; you don't know anything at all about it ! " — which characteristic utterance was one of his very last.

Of the book itself we have said little, for there is little to say. Many of the letters are written by notable persons ; but the sub- ject-matter is dull, and often triv- ial. An unusual amount of it consists of what people don't want to read, or of what they have read elsewhere. To take an instance — there are many letters about the Crimean war ; but what new light do they throw on it 1 How can it interest anybody to be told what each of several correspondents thought of each of Mr Hay ward's articles 1 or that the Duke of New- castle was anxious to get into the Athenaeum Club 1 Yet if all mat- ter of this kind were taken out of the book, what would be left 1

1887.]

Moss from a Rolling Stone.

45

MOSS FROM A ROLLING STONE.

XIV. — THE ATTACK ON THE BRITISH LEGATION IN JAPAN IN 1861.

IN October 1860, Mr de Nor- man, First Secretary of Legation in japan, who was temporarily attached to Lord Elgin's second special embassy to China, was bar- barously tortured and murdered at Pekin ; and early in the follow- ing year I was sent out to succeed him. Sir Rutherford Alcock, who had been appointed Minister to Japan under the treaty which we made with that country in 1858, when I was acting-secretary to the special mission, had applied for two years' leave; and thus the prospect was opened to me of act- ing as charge d'affaires at Yedo for that period. It was one which my former brief experience in that interesting and comparatively un- known country rendered extreme- ly tempting ; and early in June I reached Shanghai, on my way to Yokohama. I was extremely sorry to find that I had just missed Sir Rutherford, who had left Shanghai, only a fortnight be- fore, for Nagasaki, from which town he intended to travel over- land to Yedo — a most interesting journey of at least a month, through an entirely unknown country ; an experience which, in view of my future residence in it, would have been valuable in many ways. There was nothing left for it but to go, on the first opportunity, by sea ; and towards the end of the month I reached Yokohama, from which port I lost no time in pushing on to Yedo. Here I found the Legation established in a temple at the en- trance to the city, in one of its principal suburbs, called Sinagawa. It was separated from the sea by a highroad, and on entering the

large gateway, an avenue, about three hundred yards long, led to a second gateway behind which stood the temple buildings. In the outside court were the ser- vants' offices and stables, in which stood always, saddled and bridled, like those of the knights of Brank- some Hall, the horses of our mount- ed Japanese body-guard, without whose escort no member of the Legation could at that time take a ride abroad. Besides these, there was a foot-guard, partly composed of soldiers of the Tycoon, or Tem- poral Emperor, as he was then called, and partly by retainers of the Daimios, or feudatory chiefs of the country — the whole amount- ing to 150 men. These guards were placed here by the Govern- ment for our protection, although some of us at the time thought that the precaution was altogether exaggerated and unnecessary, and that their constant presence was intended rather as a measure of surveillance over our movements. To what extent this latter motive operated it is impossible to con- jecture, but the sequel showed that the apprehensions of the Govern- ment for our safety were by no means unfounded. I had been ac- companied from England by Mr Reginald Russell, who had been appointed attache, and it was with no little curiosity that we rode up the avenue to what was to be our future home.

Two or three members of the Legation were waiting to receive us, and showed us over the quaint construction which had been ap- propriated by the Japanese Gov- ernment to the use of the first

46

Moss from a Rolling Stone.

[Jan.

foreign Minister who had ever resided in their capital. Part of the building was still used for ecclesiastical purposes, and haunt- ed by priests ; but our quarters were roomy and comfortable, the interior economy being susceptible of modification in the number, size, and arrangement of the rooms, by the simple expedient of mov- ing the partition-walls, which con- sisted of paper-screens running in grooves. The ease with which these could be burst through, as it afterwards proved, afforded equal facilities of escape and attack. One felt rather as if one was liv- ing in a bandbox ; and there was an air of flimsiness about the whole construction by no means calcu- lated to inspire a sense of security in a capital of over two millions of people, a large proportion of whom we were given to under- stand were thirsting for our lives. Fortunately for our peace of mind, we did not realise this at the time, and were taken up rather by the qaintness and novelty of our new abode, and the picturesqueness of its surroundings. We congratu- lated ourselves upon the charming garden and grounds, comprising probably two or three acres, abun- dantly furnished with magnificent wide-spreading trees, and innumer- able shrubs and plants which were new to us ; while small ponds and tiny islands contributed a feature which is generally to be found in the landscape-gardening in which the Japanese are so proficient. Sir Rutherford Alcock was not expected to arrive for a week, and I occupied the time in establishing myself in my new quarters, and in exploring the neighbourhood on horseback.

On these occasions we were al- ways accompanied by an escort of twenty or thirty horsemen, or ya- conins, as they are called, mounted

on wiry ponies shod with straw shoes, and with a marked tendency to being vicious and unmanage- able. These exploratory rides were a great source of delight and in- terest to me, for although I had been in the country before, my visit had only lasted a fortnight ; and my time had been exclusively devoted to official work, and the examination of the city of Yedo itself, so that I had seen nothing whatever of the surrounding coun- try. Now we scampered across it, to the great consternation of our escort, who found great difficulty in keeping up with us — so much so, that upon more than one occasion only two or three of the original number succeeded in reaching home with us. I had determined, more- over, upon making an entomologi- cal collection for the British Mu- seum, and set the juvenile part of the population of the villages "through which I passed to collect- ing insects, in the hope that on subsequent visits I might find something worth having. I was successful in almost my first ride in finding a common-looking but very rare beetle ; and in this pur- suit my English servant — who had spent his youth in the house of a naturalist and ornithologist, and was skilled in the use of the blow- pipe, and in the cleaning and stuff- ing of birds — took an eager interest. After I had been at Yedo about a week, we received news of the approach of Sir Rutherford Alcock and his party, and rode out ten miles to meet them. We were delighted to see them arrive safe and sound after a land-journey of thirty -two days, as we had not been without anxiety on their behalf — for Japan at that period was a region in which sinister rumours were rife, and we never knew how much or how little to believe of them ; but now the great ex-

1887.] XIV. — Attack on the British Legation in Japan in 1861. 47

periment of traversing the country for the first time by Europeans had been safely and successfully accomplished, and perhaps contrib- uted to lull us into a security, the fallacy of which was destined so shortly to be proved to us.

On the night of the 5th of July a comet was visible, a circumstance to which some of us possibly owed our lives, for we sat up till an un- usually late hour looking at it. As one of the party was gifted with a good voice and an exten- sive repertory of songs, and the evening was warm and still, we protracted our vigil in the open air until past midnight. At our mid-day halt on my ride from Yo- kohama to Yedo, I had acquired the affections of a stray dog, by feeding him with our luncheon- scraps ; and this animal had per- manently attached himself to me, and was lying across the threshold of the door of my room when I went to bed. I had scarcely blown out my candle and settled myself to a grateful repose, when this dog- broke into a sudden and furious barking, and at the same moment I heard the sounds of a watchman's rattle. We had two of these func- tionaries, whose business it was to perambulate the garden alternate- ly throughout the night, and to show that] they were on the alert by springing from time to time a rattle made of bamboo which they carried. Roused by these noises, I listened attentively, and distinctly heard the sounds of what seemed a scuffle at the front door. My room was on the other side of the house, and opened on to the garden, from which quarter it was entirely unprotected. It was connected with the front of the house by a narrow passage, the walls of which, if I remember right, were of lath- and -plastei', or at all events of some firmer

material than the usual paper- screens. Thinking that the dis- turbance was probably caused by some quarrel among the servants, I jumped out of bed, intending to arm myself with my revolver, which was lying in its case on the table. Unfortunately my servant had that day been cleaning it, and after replacing it and locking the case, had put the key where I could not lay my hand upon it. A box which contained a sword and a coat of mail, which had been laughingly presented to me before leaving England by an anxious friend, had not been opened ; so, although well sup- plied with means both of offence and defence, I was forced in the hurry of the moment to content myself with a hunting-crop, the handle of which was so heavily weighted, that I considered it a sufiicently formidable weapon with which to meet anybody belonging to our own household that I was likely to encounter. Meantime the dog continued to bark violently, and to exhibit unmistakable signs of alarm. Stepping past him, I pro- ceeded along the passage leading to the front of the house, which was only dimly lighted by an oil- lamp that was standing in the dining-room ; the first room on my left was that occupied by Russell, whom I hurriedly roused, and then hearing the noise increasing, rushed out towards it. I had scarcely taken two steps, when I dimly perceived the advancing figure of a Japanese, with uplifted arms and sword ; and now commenced a struggle of which it is difficult to render an account. I remember feeling most unaccountably ham- pered in my efforts to bring the heavy butt-end of my hunting-whip to bear upon him, and to be aware that he was aiming blow after blow at me, and no less unaccountably

48

Moss from a Rolling Stone.

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missing me, and feeling ready to cry with vexation at being without my revolver, and being aware that it was a life-and-death struggle, which would only end one way, when suddenly I was blinded by the flash of a shot, and my left arm, which I was instinctively holding up to shield my head, dropped disabled. I naturally thought I had been shot, but it turned out that this shot saved my life. Among those who had accompanied Sir Rutherford Al- cock from Nagasaki was Mr Mor- rison, then consul at that port. His servant seems to have encoun- tered one of our assailants, masked and in chain-armour, in his first rush into the building, about which he fortunately did not know his way, and the servant, escaping from him, succeeded in safely reaching his master's room, and in arousing him. Seizing his revolver, Morrison sal- lied forth, and, attracted by the noise of my struggle, approached from behind me, and placing his revolver over my shoulder, shot my antagonist at the very moment that he had inflicted a severe cut with his long two-handed sword on my left arm, a little above the wrist. A moment after, Morrison received a cut over the forehead and across the eyebrow from an- other Japanese, at whom he emptied the second barrel of his pistol. An instant lull succeeded these shots. It was too dark to see what their effect had been, but the narrow passage was no longer blocked by the forms of our assail- .ants. My impression is that one was on the ground. We were both bleeding so profusely, and felt so disabled, that there was nothing left for us but to retreat, and this we instinctively did to the room which contained the light. This was placed in a part of the dining-room which had been

screened off so as to make an office for Sir Rutherford Alcock, with whose bedroom it communi- cated. The screen reached about three - fourths across the dining- room. In this office we found Sir Rutherford, who had just been roused, and were joined in the next minute or two by three other members of the Legation, Mr Russell, and my servant B., all hurriedly escaping from a noise and confusion which increased in intensity every moment. B., on the first alarm, had begun to load his double-barrelled gun, and had finished with the exception of putting on the caps — this was be- fore the days of breech-loaders — when two Japanese jumped in at his window. Fortunately, spread out before it on a table were two open insect-cases, with the spoils of the week impaled on pins. On these the assailants jumped with their bare feet, and upsetting the table, came sprawling into the room, thus giving B., who had lost the caps in the start he re- ceived, time to spring through the paper wall of his room, like a harle- quin, and reach us in safety. At this juncture the position of affairs was not reassuring. We numbered eight behind the screen, of whom two were hors de combat. Our available means of defence con- sisted of three revolvers and a double - barrelled gun. Of the European inmates of the Legation three were missing ; one of these was Mr Wirgman, the artist of the ' Illustrated London News,' who had accompanied Sir Rutherford in his journey from Nagasaki ; and of the two others, one lived in a cottage somewhat detached from the temple. Meantime Sir Ruth- erford, who fortunately possessed some surgical skill, was engaged in binding up my arm. The gash was to the bone, cutting through

1887.] XIV. — Attack on the British Legation in Japan in 1861. 49

three of the extensor tendons, so that to this day I am unable to hold erect three fingers of my left hand. I should undoubtedly have bled to death had it not been for the efficient measures thus kindly and promptly adopted to stop the haemorrhage. As it was, I was becoming very faint from loss of blood, as I now discovered that I had also received another and very serious wound over the right collar-bone, and unpleasantly near the jugular vein, of which, in the excitement of the struggle, I had been totally unconscious. Also a very slight tip from the sword high up on the right arm, the mark of which, however, is still visible ; and a blow which I did not dis- cover till next day, which broke several of the metacarpal bones of the left hand. I never could ima- gine how or when I received this blow ; but it was an evidence that we must have been at one moment of the struggle at very close quarters. Meantime the noise of cutting and slashing resounded through the house ; and while it drew nearer every moment, we were at a loss to conceive who our assailants could be, and why the guard had not come to our rescue — unless, indeed, they were in the plot to murder us. At last we heard all the glass crash on the sideboard in the dining-room, and we knew that our moment had come. My companions had made up their minds to sell their lives dearly ; and every man who was fortunate enough to possess one, was standing with his finger on the trigger of his revolver, while this time the caps were safely on B.'s double-barrelled gun. I suggested to one of the party — I forget which now — that they would have a chance for their lives by escaping into the garden and hiding among the bushes, which they could

VOL. CXLI. — NO. DCCCLV.

easily have done ; but the answer was that they could not take me with them, and they had deter- mined not to desert me, but to stand or fall together — for which I felt at the time intensely grate- ful, and do still, though I had at that moment given up all hope of escape. I was overcome by a feeling of faintness which made me regard the prospect of imme- diate death with complete indif- ference, until B., while he was giving me some water to drink, murmured in my ear, " Do you think they will torture us, sir, before they kill us ? " This hor- rible suggestion brought out a cold perspiration; and I trust I may never again experience the sensation of dread with which it inspired me, and which I was too weak to fight against. It did not last long, however, for almost at the same moment there was an immense increase of noise, and the clashing of swords, intermingled with sharp cries and ejaculations, resounded from the other side of the screen, and our curiosity and hope were excited in the highest degree, for we thought it indicated a possible rescue. In a few moments it subsided, and all was still ; and Sir Rutherford, followed by Mr Lowder, went cautiously out on a reconnoitring expedition, to find the dining-room looking like a shambles, and to discover some Japanese retreating down the passage, at whom Mr Lowder fired a shot from his re- volver. Shortly after they re- turned, Mr Macdonald, one of the gentlemen whose room was situated out of the line of attack, appeared disguised in a Japanese dress, ac- companied by some of the guard, excited and blood-bespattered, and we knew that we were saved by them, though not a second too soon. Had our assailants not been at-

50

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[Jan.

tacked in rear by the guard at the moment they were in the dining-room, they must inevitably in a few seconds more have dis- covered us behind the screen, and this account of that eventful night's proceedings would never have been written. We were now informed that some of our assailants had been killed, that the guard were searching for others in the grounds, and that reinforcements had been sent for. These appeared soon after ; and I have never seen a more dramatic and picturesque sight than these men, all clad in chain-armour, with their steel headpieces, long two- handed swords, and Japanese lan- terns, filing through the house, and out into the starlight. It was like a scene from the " Hugue- nots," and as I watched them from the arm-chair in which I was still lying, swathed and bandaged, was one of the most vivid impressions produced upon my mind on that night of lively sensations.

About this time Mr Wirgman, the artist of the ' Illustrated Lon- don News,' turned up, coated with a thick breastplate of mud. He had taked refuge under the house, which was raised about eighteen inches from the ground, and crawl- ing in on his stomach, had re- mained in profound but somewhat dirty security under the flooring. With the true spirit of his calling, he immediately set about portray- ing the most striking features of the episode, for the benefit of the British public. Mr Gower, an- other gentleman who lived in a little cottage apart, also appeared safe and sound, having been throughout removed from the scene of the strife.

It was about three o'clock in the morning that I determined to struggle back to bed ; and even then the soldiers were hunting

about the garden for concealed members of the gang that had attacked us, prodding the bushes with their swords, and searching into hidden recesses. As, sup- ported by friendly arms, I tottered round the screen into the dining- room, a ghastly sight met my gaze. Under the sideboard, completely severed from the body, was a man's head. The body was lying in the middle of the room. I had in the first instance rushed out of my bedroom barefooted, and in my night-dress. I now found my- self stepping about in blood, — for butchers' work had been done here, — and feeling something like an oyster under my bare foot, I per- ceived it was a human eye. One of the bodies was terribly disfig- ured ; the whole of the front part of the head had been sliced off as though with an adze, leaving only the back of the brain vis- ible. Early in the morning I was roused from a troubled doze by six or eight solemn-looking el- derly Japanese, who announced that they were the Imperial phy- sicians come to inquire after my health. I positively refused to allow them to remove the band- ages and examine the wounds ; so they contented themselves with looking very wise, examining my tongue, and placing their ears over my heart. As the day advanced, and I recovered somewhat from the excitement and the exhaustion, I was surprised at finding that I suffered so little pain, and felt so well, considering the amount of blood that I had lost. So I scram- bled out to look at the scene of the conflict — for it was difficult under the circumstances to remain quiet- ly in bed. I naturally first visited the spot where I had met my Jap- anese opponent, and discovered that the reason we had so much difficulty in getting at each other

1887.] XIV. — Attack on the British Legation in Japan in 1861. 51

was owing to a small beam, or rather rafter, which spanned the narrow passage, about seven feet from the ground. Its edge was as full of deep sword-cuts as a crimped herring, any one of which would have been sufficient to split open my skull, which he must have thought unusually hard. I evidently owed my life to the fact that I had remained sta- tionary under this beam, which had acted as a permanent and most effective guard — the cuts I received being merely the tips from the sword as it glanced off. There was a plentiful bespattering of blood on the wall at the side, in which was also indented the shape of the handle of my hunting- whip. The blow must have been given with considerable force to make it ; but I feel convinced that under such circumstances one is for the moment endowed with an altogether exceptional strength. I now pursued my investigations into some of the other rooms, which all bore marks of the fero- cious nature of the attack. The assailants appear to have slashed about recklessly in the dark, in the hope of striking a victim. Some of the mattresses were prodded through and through ; one bed- post was completely severed by a single sword-cut ; and a Bible lying on a table was cut three-quarters through. We were now in a posi- tion to add up the list of killed and wounded, and estimate results generally, while we also had to cal- culate how they might affect our own future position and policy.

Although one of our assailants, a stalwart young fellow with a somewhat hang -dog countenance, was taken prisoner and afterwards executed, we had some difficulty in making out at the time of whom the gang was actually composed. That they were Lonins there was

no doubt. Lonins are an outlaw class, the retainers or clansmen of Daimios who, having committed some offence, have left the service of their prince, and, banding them- selves together, form a society of desperadoes, who are employed often by their old chiefs, to whom they continue to owe a certain allegiance, for any daring enter- prise, by which, if it fails, he is not compromised, while if they succeed in it, they have a chance of regaining their position. The question was, to which particular Daimio these Lonins belonged ; and upon this point our guard was singularly reticent. Nor was any light thrown upon the matter by the following document, which was found on the body of one of the gang who was killed, and which ran as follows : —

"I, though I am a person of low standing, have not patience to stand by and see the sacred empire defiled by foreigners. This time I have determined in my heart to undertake to follow out my mas- ter's will. Though, being alto- gether humble myself, I cannot make the might of the country to shine on foreign nations, yet with a little faith, and a little warrior's power, I wish in my heart separ- ately, though I am a person of low degree, to bestow upon my country one out of a great many benefits. If this thing from time to time may cause the foreigners to retire, and partly tranquillise the minds of the Mikado and the Gov- ernment, I shall take to myself the highest praise. Regardless of my own life, I am determined to set out." Here follow fourteen sig- natures.

This document, while it showed that the motive which suggested the attack was the hope that it might frighten us out of the coun- try, also proved that the number

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who had been engaged in it, on this occasion, was fourteen. Some years afterwards I met several Japanese in London, and had some opportunities of being of service to them. I happened one day to mention to one of them that I had been in the British Legation on the night of this attack. "You don't say so," he replied. " How glad I am that you escaped safely ! for I, to whom you have shown so much kindness, planned the whole affair, and was in Sinagawa, just outside the gates, all that night, though, not being a Lonin myself, I did not take an active part in it." He then told me that the Lonins belonged to Prince Mito, upon whom, from his known hos- tility to foreigners, our suspicion had rested from the first ; and as a reminiscence of the event, in addi- tion to the one I already carried on my arm, he presented me with his photograph. We now heard that three of the Lonins, to avoid being captured alive, had com- mitted suicide by ripping them- selves up, an example which was followed by two more a day or two afterwards, making the total list of killed and wounded twenty- eight, which was composed as fol- low : —

DEFENDERS.

Killed.

1 Tycoon's guard. 1 Porter. 1 Groom.

Severely wounded.

1 Secretary of Legation. 1 Tycoon's guard. 1 Daimio's guard.

1 Porter.

2 Servants of the Legation.

Slightly wounded.

1 Consul.

7 Tycoon's guard.

2 Daimio's guard.

1 Priest of the temple.

AsSAILANTa

Killed.

2 on the spot.

3 tracked next day, committed suicide. 2 tracked later, committed suicide.

1 captured, wounded, and executed.

Killed, . . . 11 "Wounded, . . . 17

Total,

28

We heard afterwards that the six Lonins still unaccounted for were caught and executed at in- tervals later, but had no means of verifying the statement; but whether it was true or not, the whole forms a record of a tolerably bloody night's work. We were strongly recommended by the Gov- ernment to place three of the heads of the Lonins over our gateway as a terror to evil-doers, but I cannot remember whether this advice was followed or not. We were now able to gather from our servants many incidents of the attack. It seems that our assailants first knocked at the outside gate, but being refused admittance, scaled the fence and killed the porter. In passing up the avenue in front of the stables, they came across a groom, whom they also killed. They then slew a dog, and severe- ly wounded the cook, who seems to have heard a noise and gone out to see the cause of it. In like manner they captured a watchman, whom they tried to persuade to show them the way ; but he man- aged to escape, receiving, as he did so, two severe cuts on the back : however, he ultimately succeeded in concealing himself in a lotos- pond. This man's back presented the most ghastly appearance, and I did not think he could have lived. The Japanese have a treat- ment of their own for sword-cuts, derived from much experience in them. Instead of bringing the edges of the skin as closely together

1887.] XIV. — Attack on the British Legation in Japan in 1861. 53

as possible, they plug the wound with chewed paper, — a method which, if it is efficacious, leaves the most hideous marks of the gash. The band now seems to have scattered, and to have broken into the temple in parties of three or four, coming across an unfor- tunate priest as they did so, who, however, was not very severely wounded ; and then in the dark- ness they dashed into all the rooms, slashing recklessly about them, and plunging their swords through the mattresses in the hope of transfix- ing a sleeper. There can be little doubt that they would have suc- ceeded in their purpose, had it not been for the lateness \)f the hour at which most of us had retired to rest.

Before daybreak Sir Rutherford Alcock had despatched an express messenger to Captain Craigie of H.M.S. Ringdove, then lying at Yokohama, twenty miles distant, describing the position of mat- ters, and urgently requesting him to come at once to our assist- ance. Meantime the native guards had been increased to 500 men. At one o'clock in the afternoon we were cheered by the sight of twenty blue-jackets, led by their officers, tramping up the avenue, their faces beaming with the an- ticipation of a possible fight in store. Their arrival inspired a confidence which our previously defenceless condition probably ex- aggerated ; for what could so few even well-armed men do against the hostile population by whom we were surrounded, had they chosen to renew the attack, which we considered highly probable1? They were accompanied by Mon- sieur Duchesne de Bellecour, the French Minister, who, on learning of our adventure, instantly put himself on board the Ringdove, bringing with him a party of

French sailors, "pour partager les dangers," as he chivalrously re- marked. Our most welcome rein- forcement instantly set to work improving our means of defence. The palisades all round were looked to and strengthened, and every conceivable measure of pre- caution taken, to prepare for an- other attack during the night, which seemed highly possible, — for we thought that the escaped Lonins might spend the day in recruiting their numbers, and as- sault us in much stronger force. We heard from various sources that the city was in the highest state of excitement, and we felt, therefore, that we had only as yet, perhaps, been actors in the first scene of a drama, the denouement of which it was impossible to fore- see. At the same time we quite felt that the decision at which our Minister had arrived was the right one, and that we must hold our position at all hazards, as it would never do to allow either the Japan- ese Government or people to sup- pose that we could be frightened by isolated acts of violence into abandoning rights which had been solemnly assured to us by treaty. With the exception of the Ameri- can, there was no other foreign Legation in Yedo at the time, and it had so far escaped molestation. In anticipation of a lively night, an elaborate system of sentries was organised upon a somewhat composite basis. At both the gates, and at various points in the grounds, was a mixed guard of Japanese and English or French, while at every bedroom - door a Japanese and a blue-jacket kept watch together. I don't think anybody slept much that night ; and whenever I did fall into a doze, it was only to wake with a start from a dream in which I was being attacked. The bamboo rat-

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tie of the Japanese