The Second Thoughts of an Idle Fellow

The rockets rushed heavenward and descended in stars, the Roman candles tossed their fiery balls into the darkness, the Catherine wheels sparkled and whirled, the crackers cracked, and the squibs banged. That night he went to bed a proud and happy boy, and dreamed of fame. He stood surrounded by blazing fireworks, and the vast crowd cheered him. His relations, most of whom, he knew, regarded him as the coming idiot of the family, were there to witness his triumph; so too was Dickey Bowles, who laughed at him because he could not throw straight. The girl at the bun-shop, she also was there, and saw that he was clever.

The night of the festival arrived, and with it the guests. They sat, wrapped up in shawls and cloaks, outside the hall door – uncles, cousins, aunts, little boys and big boys, little girls and big girls, with, as the theatre posters say, villagers and retainers, some forty of them in all, and waited.

But the fireworks did not go off. Why they did not go off I cannot explain; nobody ever could explain. The laws of nature seemed to be suspended for that night only. The rockets fell down and died where they stood. No human agency seemed able to ignite the squibs. The crackers gave one bang and collapsed. The Roman candles might have been English rushlights. The Catherine wheels became mere revolving glow-worms. The fiery serpents could not collect among them the spirit of a tortoise. The set piece, a ship at sea, showed one mast and the captain, and then went out. One or two items did their duty, but this only served to render the foolishness of the whole more striking. The little girls giggled, the little boys chaffed, the aunts and cousins said it was beautiful, the uncles inquired if it was all over, and talked about supper and trains, the “villagers and retainers” dispersed laughing, the indulgent mother said “never mind,” and explained how well everything had gone off yesterday; the clever little boy crept upstairs to his room, and blubbered his heart out in the dark.

Hours later, when the crowd had forgotten him, he stole out again into the garden. He sat down amid the ruins of his hope, and wondered what could have caused the fiasco. Still puzzled, he drew from his pocket a box of matches, and, lighting one, he held it to the seared end of a rocket he had tried in vain to light four hours ago. It smouldered for an instant, then shot with a swish into the air and broke into a hundred points of fire. He tried another and another with the same result. He made a fresh attempt to fire the set piece. Point by point the whole picture – minus the captain and one mast – came out of the night, and stood revealed in all the majesty of flame. Its sparks fell upon the piled-up heap of candles, wheels, and rockets that a little while before had obstinately refused to burn, and that, one after another, had been thrown aside as useless. Now with the night frost upon them, they leaped to light in one grand volcanic eruption. And in front of the gorgeous spectacle he stood with only one consolation – his mother’s hand in his.

The whole thing was a mystery to him at the time, but, as he learned to know life better, he came to understand that it was only one example of a solid but inexplicable fact, ruling all human affairs —your fireworks won’t go off while the crowd is around.

Our brilliant repartees do not occur to us till the door is closed upon us and we are alone in the street, or, as the French would say, are coming down the stairs. Our after-dinner oratory, that sounded so telling as we delivered it before the looking-glass, falls strangely flat amidst the clinking of the glasses. The passionate torrent of words we meant to pour into her ear becomes a halting rigmarole, at which – small blame to her – she only laughs.

I would, gentle Reader, you could hear the stories that I meant to tell you. You judge me, of course, by the stories of mine that you have read – by this sort of thing, perhaps; but that is not just to me. The stories I have not told you, that I am going to tell you one day, I would that you judge me by those.

They are so beautiful; you will say so; over them, you will laugh and cry with me.

They come into my brain unbidden, they clamour to be written, yet when I take my pen in hand they are gone. It is as though they were shy of publicity, as though they would say to me – “You alone, you shall read us, but you must not write us; we are too real, too true. We are like the thoughts you cannot speak. Perhaps a little later, when you know more of life, then you shall tell us.”

Next to these in merit I would place, were I writing a critical essay on myself, the stories I have begun to write and that remain unfinished, why I cannot explain to myself. They are good stories, most of them; better far than the stories I have accomplished. Another time, perhaps, if you care to listen, I will tell you the beginning of one or two and you shall judge. Strangely enough, for I have always regarded myself as a practical, commonsensed man, so many of these still-born children of my mind I find, on looking through the cupboard where their thin bodies lie, are ghost stories. I suppose the hope of ghosts is with us all. The world grows somewhat interesting to us heirs of all the ages. Year by year, Science with broom and duster tears down the moth-worn tapestry, forces the doors of the locked chambers, lets light into the secret stairways, cleans out the dungeons, explores the hidden passages – finding everywhere only dust. This echoing old castle, the world, so full of mystery in the days when we were children, is losing somewhat its charm for us as we grow older. The king sleeps no longer in the hollow of the hills. We have tunnelled through his mountain chamber. We have shivered his beard with our pick. We have driven the gods from Olympus. No wanderer through the moonlit groves now fears or hopes the sweet, death-giving gleam of Aphrodite’s face. Thor’s hammer echoes not among the peaks – ’tis but the thunder of the excursion train. We have swept the woods of the fairies. We have filtered the sea of its nymphs. Even the ghosts are leaving us, chased by the Psychical Research Society.

Perhaps of all, they are the least, however, to be regretted. They were dull old fellows, clanking their rusty chains and groaning and sighing. Let them go.

And yet how interesting they might be, if only they would. The old gentleman in the coat of mail, who lived in King John’s reign, who was murdered, so they say, on the outskirts of the very wood I can see from my window as I write – stabbed in the back, poor gentleman, as he was riding home, his body flung into the moat that to this day is called Tor’s tomb. Dry enough it is now, and the primroses love its steep banks; but a gloomy enough place in those days, no doubt, with its twenty feet of stagnant water. Why does he haunt the forest paths at night, as they tell me he does, frightening the children out of their wits, blanching the faces and stilling the laughter of the peasant lads and lasses, slouching home from the village dance? Instead, why does he not come up here and talk to me? He should have my easy-chair and welcome, would he only be cheerful and companionable.

What brave tales could he not tell me. He fought in the first Crusade, heard the clarion voice of Peter, met the great Godfrey face to face, stood, hand on sword-hilt, at Runny-mede, perhaps. Better than a whole library of historical novels would an evening’s chat be with such a ghost. What has he done with his eight hundred years of death? where has he been? what has he seen? Maybe he has visited Mars; has spoken to the strange spirits who can live in the liquid fires of Jupiter. What has he learned of the great secret? Has he found the truth? or is he, even as I, a wanderer still seeking the unknown?

You, poor, pale, grey nun – they tell me that of midnights one may see your white face peering from the ruined belfry window, hear the clash of sword and shield among the cedar-trees beneath.

It was very sad, I quite understand, my dear lady. Your lovers both were killed, and you retired to a convent. Believe me, I am sincerely sorry for you, but why waste every night renewing the whole painful experience? Would it not be better forgotten? Good Heavens, madam, suppose we living folk were to spend our lives wailing and wringing our hands because of the wrongs done to us when we were children? It is all over now. Had he lived, and had you married him, you might not have been happy. I do not wish to say anything unkind, but marriages founded upon the sincerest mutual love have sometimes turned out unfortunately, as you must surely know.

Do take my advice. Talk the matter over with the young men themselves. Persuade them to shake hands and be friends. Come in, all of you, out of the cold, and let us have some reasonable talk.

Why seek you to trouble us, you poor pale ghosts? Are we not your children? Be our wise friends. Tell me, how loved the young men in your young days? how answered the maidens? Has the world changed much, do you think? Had you not new women even then? girls who hated the everlasting tapestry frame and spinning-wheel? Your father’s servants, were they so much worse off than the freemen who live in our East-end slums and sew slippers for fourteen hours a day at a wage of nine shillings a week? Do you think Society much improved during the last thousand years? Is it worse? is it better? or is it, on the whole, about the same, save that we call things by other names? Tell me, what have you learned?

Yet might not familiarity breed contempt, even for ghosts.

One has had a tiring day’s shooting. One is looking forward to one’s bed. As one opens the door, however, a ghostly laugh comes from behind the bed-curtains, and one groans inwardly, knowing what is in store for one: a two or three hours’ talk with rowdy old Sir Lanval – he of the lance. We know all his tales by heart, and he will shout them. Suppose our aunt, from whom we have expectations, and who sleeps in the next room, should wake and overhear! They were fit and proper enough stories, no doubt, for the Round Table, but we feel sure our aunt would not appreciate them: – that story about Sir Agravain and the cooper’s wife! and he always will tell that story.

Or imagine the maid entering after dinner to say —

“Oh, if you please, sir, here is the veiled lady.”

“What, again!” says your wife, looking up from her work.

“Yes, ma’am; shall I show her up into the bedroom?”

“You had better ask your master,” is the reply. The tone is suggestive of an unpleasant five minutes so soon as the girl shall have withdrawn, but what are you to do?

“Yes, yes, show her up,” you say, and the girl goes out, closing the door.

Your wife gathers her work together, and rises.

“Where are you going?” you ask.

“To sleep with the children,” is the frigid answer.

“It will look so rude,” you urge. “We must be civil to the poor thing; and you see it really is her room, as one might say. She has always haunted it.”

“It is very curious,” returns the wife of your bosom, still more icily, “that she never haunts it except when you are down here. Where she goes when you are in town I’m sure I don’t know.”

This is unjust. You cannot restrain your indignation.

“What nonsense you talk, Elizabeth,” you reply; “I am only barely polite to her.”

“Some men have such curious notions of politeness,” returns Elizabeth. “But pray do not let us quarrel. I am only anxious not to disturb you. Two are company, you know. I don’t choose to be the third, that’s all.” With which she goes out.

And the veiled lady is still waiting for you up-stairs. You wonder how long she will stop, also what will happen after she is gone.

I fear there is no room for you, ghosts, in this our world. You remember how they came to Hiawatha – the ghosts of the departed loved ones. He had prayed to them that they would come back to him to comfort him, so one day they crept into his wigwam, sat in silence round his fireside, chilled the air for Hiawatha, froze the smiles of Laughing Water.

There is no room for you, oh you poor pale ghosts, in this our world. Do not trouble us. Let us forget. You, stout elderly matron, your thin locks turning grey, your eyes grown weak, your chin more ample, your voice harsh with much scolding and complaining, needful, alas! to household management, I pray you leave me. I loved you while you lived. How sweet, how beautiful you were. I see you now in your white frock among the apple-blossom. But you are dead, and your ghost disturbs my dreams. I would it haunted me not.

You, dull old fellow, looking out at me from the glass at which I shave, why do you haunt me? You are the ghost of a bright lad I once knew well. He might have done much, had he lived. I always had faith in him. Why do you haunt me? I would rather think of him as I remember him. I never imagined he would make such a poor ghost.

ON THE PREPARATION AND EMPLOYMENT OF LOVE PHILTRES

Occasionally a friend will ask me some such question as this, Do you prefer dark women or fair? Another will say, Do you like tall women or short? A third, Do you think light-hearted women, or serious, the more agreeable company? I find myself in the position that, once upon a time, overtook a certain charming young lady of taste who was asked by an anxious parent, the years mounting, and the family expenditure not decreasing, which of the numerous and eligible young men, then paying court to her, she liked the best. She replied, that was her difficulty. She could not make up her mind which she liked the best. They were all so nice. She could not possibly select one to the exclusion of all the others. What she would have liked would have been to marry the lot, but that, she presumed, was impracticable.

I feel I resemble that young lady, not so much, perhaps, in charm and beauty as indecision of mind, when questions such as the above are put to me. It is as if one were asked one’s favourite food. There are times when one fancies an egg with one’s tea. On other occasions one dreams of a kipper. To-day one clamours for lobsters. To-morrow one feels one never wishes to see a lobster again; one determines to settle down, for a time, to a diet of bread and milk and rice-pudding. Asked suddenly to say whether I preferred ices to soup, or beefsteaks to caviare, I should be nonplussed.

I like tall women and short, dark women and fair, merry women and grave.

Do not blame me, Ladies, the fault lies with you. Every right-thinking man is an universal lover; how could it be otherwise? You are so diverse, yet each so charming of your kind; and a man’s heart is large. You have no idea, fair Reader, how large a man’s heart is: that is his trouble – sometimes yours.

May I not admire the daring tulip, because I love also the modest lily? May I not press a kiss upon the sweet violet, because the scent of the queenly rose is precious to me?

“Certainly not,” I hear the Rose reply. “If you can see anything in her, you shall have nothing to do with me.”

“If you care for that bold creature,” says the Lily, trembling, “you are not the man I took you for. Good-bye.”

“Go to your baby-faced Violet,” cries the Tulip, with a toss of her haughty head. “You are just fitted for each other.”

And when I return to the Lily, she tells me that she cannot trust me. She has watched me with those others. She knows me for a gad-about. Her gentle face is full of pain.

So I must live unloved merely because I love too much.

My wonder is that young men ever marry. The difficulty of selection must be appalling. I walked the other evening in Hyde Park. The band of the Life Guards played heart-lifting music, and the vast crowd were basking in a sweet enjoyment such as rarely woos the English toiler. I strolled among them, and my attention was chiefly drawn towards the women. The great majority of them were, I suppose, shop-girls, milliners, and others belonging to the lower middle-class. They had put on their best frocks, their bonniest hats, their newest gloves. They sat or walked in twos and threes, chattering and preening, as happy as young sparrows on a clothes line. And what a handsome crowd they made! I have seen German crowds, I have seen French crowds, I have seen Italian crowds; but nowhere do you find such a proportion of pretty women as among the English middle-class. Three women out of every four were worth looking at, every other woman was pretty, while every fourth, one might say without exaggeration, was beautiful. As I passed to and fro the idea occurred to me: suppose I were an unprejudiced young bachelor, free from predilection, looking for a wife; and let me suppose – it is only a fancy – that all these girls were ready and willing to accept me. I have only to choose! I grew bewildered. There were fair girls, to look at whom was fatal; dark girls that set one’s heart aflame; girls with red gold hair and grave grey eyes, whom one would follow to the confines of the universe; baby-faced girls that one longed to love and cherish; girls with noble faces, whom a man might worship; laughing girls, with whom one could dance through life gaily; serious girls, with whom life would be sweet and good, domestic-looking girls – one felt such would make delightful wives; they would cook, and sew, and make of home a pleasant, peaceful place. Then wicked-looking girls came by, at the stab of whose bold eyes all orthodox thoughts were put to a flight, whose laughter turned the world into a mad carnival; girls one could mould; girls from whom one could learn; sad girls one wanted to comfort; merry girls who would cheer one; little girls, big girls, queenly girls, fairy-like girls.

Suppose a young man had to select his wife in this fashion from some twenty or thirty thousand; or that a girl were suddenly confronted with eighteen thousand eligible young bachelors, and told to take the one she wanted and be quick about it? Neither boy nor girl would ever marry. Fate is kinder to us. She understands, and assists us. In the hall of a Paris hotel I once overheard one lady asking another to recommend her a milliner’s shop.

“Go to the Maison Nouvelle,” advised the questioned lady, with enthusiasm. “They have the largest selection there of any place in Paris.”

“I know they have,” replied the first lady, “that is just why I don’t mean to go there. It confuses me. If I see six bonnets I can tell the one I want in five minutes. If I see six hundred I come away without any bonnet at all. Don’t you know a little shop?”

Fate takes the young man or the young woman aside.

“Come into this village, my dear,” says Fate; “into this by-street of this salubrious suburb, into this social circle, into this church, into this chapel. Now, my dear boy, out of these seventeen young ladies, which will you have? – out of these thirteen young men, which would you like for your very own, my dear?”

“No, miss, I am sorry, but I am not able to show you our up-stairs department to-day, the lift is not working. But I am sure we shall be able to find something in this room to suit you. Just look round, my dear, perhaps you will see something.”

“No, sir, I cannot show you the stock in the next room, we never take that out except for our very special customers. We keep our most expensive goods in that room. (Draw that curtain, Miss Circumstance, please. I have told you of that before.) Now, sir, wouldn’t you like this one? This colour is quite the rage this season; we are getting rid of quite a lot of these.”

“No, sir! Well, of course, it would not do for every one’s taste to be the same. Perhaps something dark would suit you better. Bring out those two brunettes, Miss Circumstance. Charming girls both of them, don’t you think so, sir? I should say the taller one for you, sir. Just one moment, sir, allow me. Now, what do you think of that, sir? might have been made to fit you, I’m sure. You prefer the shorter one. Certainly, sir, no difference to us at all. Both are the same price. There’s nothing like having one’s own fancy, I always say. No, sir, I cannot put her aside for you, we never do that. Indeed, there’s rather a run on brunettes just at present. I had a gentleman in only this morning, looking at this particular one, and he is going to call again to-night. Indeed, I am not at all sure – Oh, of course, sir, if you like to settle on this one now, that ends the matter. (Put those others away, Miss Circumstance, please, and mark this one sold.) I feel sure you’ll like her, sir, when you get her home. Thank you, sir. Good-morning!”

“Now, miss, have you seen anything you fancy? Yes, miss, this is all we have at anything near your price. (Shut those other cupboards, Miss Circumstance; never show more stock than you are obliged to, it only confuses customers. How often am I to tell you that?) Yes, miss, you are quite right, there is a slight blemish. They all have some slight flaw. The makers say they can’t help it – it’s in the material. It’s not once in a season we get a perfect specimen; and when we do ladies don’t seem to care for it. Most of our customers prefer a little faultiness. They say it gives character. Now, look at this, miss. This sort of thing wears very well, warm and quiet. You’d like one with more colour in it? Certainly. Miss Circumstance, reach me down the art patterns. No, miss, we don’t guarantee any of them over the year, so much depends on how you use them. Oh yes, miss, they’ll stand a fair amount of wear. People do tell you the quieter patterns last longer; but my experience is that one is much the same as another. There’s really no telling any of them until you come to try them. We never recommend one more than another. There’s a lot of chance about these goods, it’s in the nature of them. What I always say to ladies is – ‘Please yourself, it’s you who have got to wear it; and it’s no good having an article you start by not liking.’ Yes, miss, it is pretty and it looks well against you: it does indeed. Thank you, miss. Put that one aside, Miss Circumstance, please. See that it doesn’t get mixed up with the unsold stock.”

It is a useful philtre, the juice of that small western flower, that Oberon drops upon our eyelids as we sleep. It solves all difficulties in a trice. Why of course Helena is the fairer. Compare her with Hermia! Compare the raven with the dove! How could we ever have doubted for a moment? Bottom is an angel, Bottom is as wise as he is handsome. Oh, Oberon, we thank you for that drug. Matilda Jane is a goddess; Matilda Jane is a queen; no woman ever born of Eve was like Matilda Jane. The little pimple on her nose – her little, sweet, tip-tilted nose – how beautiful it is. Her bright eyes flash with temper now and then; how piquant is a temper in a woman. William is a dear old stupid, how lovable stupid men can be – especially when wise enough to love us. William does not shine in conversation; how we hate a magpie of a man. William’s chin is what is called receding, just the sort of chin a beard looks well on. Bless you, Oberon darling, for that drug; rub it on our eyelids once again. Better let us have a bottle, Oberon, to keep by us.

Oberon, Oberon, what are you thinking of? You have given the bottle to Puck. Take it away from him, quick. Lord help us all if that Imp has the bottle. Lord save us from Puck while we sleep.

Or may we, fairy Oberon, regard your lotion as an eye-opener, rather than as an eye-closer? You remember the story the storks told the children, of the little girl who was a toad by day, only her sweet dark eyes being left to her. But at night, when the Prince clasped her close to his breast, lo! again she became the king’s daughter, fairest and fondest of women. There be many royal ladies in Marshland, with bad complexion and thin straight hair, and the silly princes sneer and ride away to woo some kitchen wench decked out in queen’s apparel. Lucky the prince upon whose eyelids Oberon has dropped the magic philtre.

In the gallery of a minor Continental town I have forgotten, hangs a picture that lives with me. The painting I cannot recall, whether good or bad; artists must forgive me for remembering only the subject. It shows a man, crucified by the roadside. No martyr he. If ever a man deserved hanging it was this one. So much the artist has made clear. The face, even under its mask of agony, is an evil, treacherous face. A peasant girl clings to the cross; she stands tip-toe upon a patient donkey, straining her face upward for the half-dead man to stoop and kiss her lips.