The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 06, No. 38, December, 1860

The Doctor paused a moment, after hearing this report from his private detective, and then got into his chaise, and turned Caustic's head in the direction of the Dudley mansion. He had been suspicious of Dick from the first. He did not like his mixed blood, not his looks, nor his ways. He had formed a conjecture about his projects early. He had made a shrewd guess as to the probable jealousy Dick would feel of the schoolmaster, had found out something of his movements, and had cautioned Mr. Bernard,–as we have seen. He felt an interest in the young man,–a student of his own profession, an intelligent and ingenuously unsuspecting young fellow, who had been thrown by accident into the companionship or the neighborhood of two person, one of whom he knew to be dangerous, and the other he believed instinctively might be capable of crime.

The Doctor rode down to the Dudley mansion solely for the sake of seeing Old Sophy. He was lucky enough to find her alone in her kitchen. He began talking with her as a physician; he wanted to know how her rheumatism had been. The shrewd old woman saw though all that with her little beady black eyes. It was something quite different he had come for, and Old Sophy answered very briefly for her aches and ails.

"Old folks' bones a'n't like young folks'," she said. "It's the Lord's doin's, 'n' 't a'n't much matter. I sh'n't be long roun' this kitchen. It's the young Missis, Doctor,–it's our Elsie,–it's the baby, as we use' t' call her,–don' you remember, Doctor? Seventeen year ago, 'n' her poor mother cryin' for her,–'Where is she? where is she? Let me see her!'–'n' how I run up-stairs,–I could run then,–'n' got the coral necklace 'n' put it round her little neck, 'n' then showed her to her mother,–'n' how her mother looked at her, 'n' looked, 'n' then put out her poor thin fingers 'n' lifted the necklace,–'n' fell right back on her piller, as white as though she was laid out to bury?"

The Doctor answered her by silence and a look of grave assent. He had never chosen to let Old Sophy dwell upon these matters, for obvious reasons. The girl must not grow up haunted by perpetual fears and prophecies, if it were possible to prevent it.

"Well, how has Elsie seemed of late?" he said, after this brief pause.

The old woman shook her head. Then she looked up at the Doctor so steadily and searchingly that the diamond eyes of Elsie herself could hardly have pierced more deeply.

The Doctor raised his head, by his habitual movement, and met the old woman's look with his own calm and scrutinizing gaze, sharpened by the glasses through which he now saw her.

Sophy spoke presently in an awed tone, as if telling a vision.

"We shall be havin' trouble before long. The' 's somethin' comin' from the Lord. I've had dreams, Doctor. It's many a year I've been a-dreamin', but now they're comin' over 'n' over the same thing. Three times I've dreamed one thing, Doctor,–one thing!"

"And what was that?" the Doctor said, with that shade of curiosity in his tone which a metaphysician would probably say is an index of a certain tendency to belief in the superstition to which the question refers.

"I ca'n' jestly tell y' what it was, Doctor," the old woman answered, as if bewildered and trying to clear up her recollections; "but it was somethin' fearful, with a great noise 'n' a great cryin' o' people,–like the Las' Day, Doctor! The Lord have mercy on my poor chil', 'n' take care of her, if anything happens! But I's feared she'll never live to see the Las' Day, 'f 't don' come pooty quick."

Poor Sophy, only the third generation from cannibalism, was, not unnaturally, somewhat confused in her theological notions. Some of the Second-Advent preachers had been about, and circulated their predictions among the kitchen-population of Rockland. This was the way in which it happened that she mingled her fears in such a strange manner with their doctrines.

The Doctor answered solemnly, that of the day and hour we knew not, but it became us to be always ready.–"Is there anything going on in the household different from common?"

Old Sophy's wrinkled face looked as full of life and intelligence, when she turned it full upon the Doctor, as if she had slipped off her infirmities and years like an outer garment. All those fine instincts of observation which came straight to her from her savage grandfather looked out of her little eyes. She had a kind of faith that the Doctor was a mighty conjuror, who, if he would, could bewitch any of them. She had relieved her feelings by her long talk with the minister, but the Doctor was the immediate adviser of the family, and had watched them through all their troubles. Perhaps he could tell them what to do. She had but one real object of affection in the world,–this child that she had tended from infancy to womanhood. Troubles were gathering thick round her; how soon they would break upon her, and blight or destroy her, no one could tell; but there was nothing in all the catalogue of terrors that might not come upon the household at any moment. Her own wits had sharpened themselves in keeping watch by day and night, and her face had forgotten its age in the excitement which gave life to its features.

"Doctor," Old Sophy said, "there's strange things goin' on here by night and by day. I don' like that man,–that Dick,–I never liked him. He giv' me some o' these things I' got on; I take 'em 'cos I know it make him mad, if I no take 'em; I wear 'em, so that he needn' feel as if I didn' like him; but, Doctor, I hate him,–jes' as much as a member o' the church has the Lord's leave to hate anybody."

Her eyes sparkled with the old savage light, as if her ill-will to Mr. Richard Venner might perhaps go a little farther than the Christian limit she had assigned. But remember that her grandfather was in the habit of inviting his friends to dine with him upon the last enemy he had bagged, and that her grandmother's teeth were filed down to points, so that they were as sharp as a shark's.

"What is it that you have seen about Mr. Richard Venner that gives you such a spite against him, Sophy?" asked the Doctor.

"What I' seen 'bout Dick Venner?" she replied, fiercely. "I'll tell y' what I' seen. Dick wan's to marry our Elsie,–that's what he wan's; 'n' he don' love her, Doctor,–he hates her, Doctor, as bad as I hate him! He wan's to marry our Elsie, 'n' live here in the big house, 'n' have nothin' to do but jes' lay still 'n' watch Massa Venner 'n' see how long 't 'll take him to die, 'n' 'f he don' die fas' 'nuff, help him some way t' die fasser!–Come close up t' me, Doctor! I wan' t' tell you somethin' I tol' th' minister t'other day. Th' minister, he come down 'n' prayed 'n' talked good,–he's a good man, that Doctor Honeywood, 'n' I tol' him all 'bout our Elsie,–but he didn' tell nobody what to do to stop all what I been dreamin' about happenin'. Come close up to me, Doctor!"

The Doctor drew his chair close up to that of the old woman.

"Doctor, nobody mus'n' never marry our Elsie 's long 's she lives! Nobody mus'n' never live with Elsie but Ol' Sophy; 'n' Ol' Sophy won't never die 's long 's Elsie's alive to be took care of. But I 's feared, Doctor, I 's greatly feared Elsie wan' to marry somebody. The' 's a young gen'l'm'n up at that school where she go,–so some of 'em tells me,–'n' she loves t' see him 'n' talk wi' him, 'n' she talks about him when she's asleep sometimes. She mus'n' never marry nobody, Doctor! If she do, he die, certain!"

"If she has a fancy for the young man up at the school there," the Doctor said, "I shouldn't think there would be much danger from Dick."

"Doctor, nobody know nothin' 'bout Elsie but Ol' Sophy. She no like any other creatur' th't ever drawed the bref o' life. If she ca'n' marry one man cos she love him, she marry another man cos she hate him."

"Marry a man because she hates him, Sophy? No woman ever did such a thing as that, or ever will do it."

"Who tol' you Elsie was a woman, Doctor?" said Old Sophy, with a flash of strange intelligence in her eyes.

The Doctor's face showed that he was startled. The old woman could not know much about Elsie that he did not know; but what strange superstition had got into her head, he was puzzled to guess. He had better follow Sophy's lead and find out what she meant.

"I should call Elsie a woman, and a very handsome one," he said. "You don't mean that she has any ugly thing about her, except–you know–under the necklace?"

The old woman resented the thought of any deformity about her darling.

"I didn' say she had nothin'–but jes' that–you know. My beauty have anything ugly? She's the beautifullest-shaped lady that ever had a shinin' silk gown drawed over her shoulders. On'y she a'n't like no other woman in none of her ways. She don't cry 'n' laugh like other women. An' she ha'n' got the same kind o' feelin's as other women.–Do you know that young gen'l'm'n up at the school, Doctor?"

"Yes, Sophy, I've met him sometimes. He's a very nice sort of young man, handsome, too, and I don't much wonder Elsie takes to him. Tell me, Sophy, what do you think would happen, if he should chance to fall in love with Elsie, and she with him, and he should marry her?"

"Put your ear close to my lips, Doctor, dear!" She whispered a little to the Doctor, then added aloud, "He die,–that's all."

"But surely, Sophy, you a'n't afraid to have Dick marry her, if she would have him for any reason, are you? He can take care of himself, if anybody can."

"Doctor!" Sophy answered, "nobody can take care of hisself that live wi' Elsie! Nobody never in all this worl' mus' live wi' Elsie but Ol' Sophy, I tell you. You don' think I care for Dick? What do I care, if Dick Venner die? He wan's to marry our Elsie so's to live in the big house 'n' get all the money 'n' all the silver things 'n' all the chists full o' linen 'n' beautiful clothes! That's what Dick wan's. An' he hates Elsie 'cos she don' like him. But if he marries Elsie, she'll make him die some wrong way or other, 'n' they'll take her 'n' hang her, or he'll get mad with her 'n' choke her.–Oh, I know his chokin' tricks!–he don' leave his keys roun' for nothin'!"

"What's that you say, Sophy? Tell me what you mean by all that."

So poor Sophy had to explain certain facts not in all respects to her credit. She had taken the opportunity of his absence to look about his chamber, and, having found a key in one of his drawers, had applied it to a trunk, and, finding that it opened the trunk, had made a kind of inspection for contraband articles, and, seeing the end of a leather thong, had followed it up until she saw that it finished with a noose, which, from certain appearances, she inferred to have seen service of at least doubtful nature. An unauthorized search; but Old Sophy considered that a game of life and death was going on in the household, and that she was bound to look out for her darling.

The Doctor paused a moment to think over this odd piece of information. Without sharing Sophy's belief as to the kind of use this mischievous-looking piece of property had been put to, it was certainly very odd that Dick should have such a thing at the bottom of his trunk. The Doctor remembered reading or hearing something about the lasso and the lariat and the bolas, and had an indistinct idea that they had been sometimes used as weapons of warfare or private revenge; but they were essentially a huntsman's implements, after all, and it was not very strange that this young man had brought one of them with him. Not strange, perhaps, but worth noting.

"Do you really think Dick means mischief to anybody, that he has such dangerous-looking things?" the Doctor said, presently.

"I tell you, Doctor. Dick means to have Elsie. If he ca'n' get her, he never let nobody else have her. Oh, Dick's a dark man, Doctor! I know him! I 'member him when he was little boy,–he always cunnin'. I think he mean mischief to somebody. He come home late nights,–come in softly,–oh, I hear him! I lay awake, 'n' got sharp ears,–I hear the cats walkin' over the roofs,–'n' I hear Dick Venner, when he comes up in his stockin'-feet as still as a cat. I think he mean mischief to somebody. I no like his looks these las' days.–Is that a very pooty gen'l'm'n up at the school-house, Doctor?"

"I told you he was good-looking. What if he is?"

"I should like to see him, Doctor,–I should like to see the pooty gen'l'm'n that my poor Elsie loves. She mus'n' never marry nobody,–but, oh, Doctor, I should like to see him, 'n' jes' think a little how it would ha' been, if the Lord hadn' been so hard on Elsie."

She wept and wrung her hands. The kind Doctor was touched, and left her a moment to her thoughts.

"And how does Mr. Dudley Venner take all this?" he said, by way of changing the subject a little.

"Oh, Massa Venner, he good man, but he don' know nothin' 'bout Elsie, as Ol' Sophy do. I keep close by her; I help her when she go to bed, 'n' set by her sometime when she 'sleep; I come to her in th' mornin' 'n' help her put on her things."–Then, in a whisper,–"Doctor, Elsie lets Ol' Sophy take off that necklace for her. What you think she do, 'f anybody else tech it?"

"I don't know, I'm sure, Sophy,–strike the person, perhaps."

"Oh, yes, strike 'em! but not with her hands, Doctor!"–The old woman's significant pantomime must be guessed at.

"But you haven't told me, Sophy, what Mr. Dudley Venner thinks of his nephew, nor whether he has any notion that Dick wants to marry Elsie."

"I tell you. Massa Venner, he good man, but he no see nothin' 'bout what goes on here in the house. He sort o' broken-hearted, you know,–sort o' giv' up,–don' know what to do wi' Elsie, 'xcep' say 'Yes, yes.' Dick always look smilin' 'n' behave well before him. One time I thought Massa Venner b'lieve Dick was goin' to take to Elsie; but now he don' seem to take much notice;–he kin' o' stupid-like 'bout sech things. It's trouble, Doctor; 'cos Massa Venner bright man naterally,–'n' he's got a great heap o' books. I don' think Massa Venner never been jes' heself sence Elsie's born. He done all he know how,–but, Doctor, that wa'n' a great deal. You men-folks don' know nothin' 'bout these young gals; 'n' 'f you knowed all the young gals that ever lived, y' wouldn' know nothin' 'bout our Elsie."

"No,–but, Sophy, what I want to know is, whether you think Mr. Venner has any kind of suspicion about his nephew,–whether he has any notion that he's a dangerous sort of fellow,–or whether he feels safe to have him about, or has even taken a sort of fancy to him."

"Lor' bless you, Doctor, Massa Venner no more idee 'f any mischief 'bout Dick than he has 'bout you or me. Y' see, he very fond o' the Cap'n,–that Dick's father,–'n' he live so long alone here, 'long wi' us, that he kin' o' like to see mos' anybody 't 's got any o' th' ol' family-blood in 'em. He ha'n't got no more suspicions 'n a baby,–y' never see sech a man 'n y'r life. I kin' o' think he don' care for nothin' in this world 'xcep' jes' t' do what Elsie wan's him to. The fus' year after young Madam die he do nothin' but jes' set at the window 'n' look out at her grave, 'n' then come up 'n' look at the baby's neck 'n' say, 'It's fadin', Sophy, a'n't it?' 'n' then go down in the study 'n' walk 'n' walk, 'n' then kneel down 'n' pray. Doctor, there was two places in the old carpet that was all threadbare, where his knees had worn 'em. An sometimes,–you remember 'bout all that,–he'd go off up into The Mountain 'n' be gone all day, 'n' kill all the Ugly Things he could find up there.–Oh, Doctor, I don' like to think o' them days!–An' by-'n'-by he grew kin' o' still, 'n' begun to read a little, 'n' 't las' he got's quiet 's a lamb, 'n' that's the way he is now. I think he's got religion, Doctor; but he a'n't so bright about what's goin' on, 'n' I don' believe he never suspec' nothin' till somethin' happens;–for the' 's somethin' goin' to happen, Doctor, if the Las' Day doesn' come to stop it; 'n' you mus' tell us what to do, 'n' save my poor Elsie, my baby that the Lord hasn' took care of like all his other childer."

The Doctor assured the old woman that he was thinking a great deal about them all, and that there were other eyes on Dick besides her own. Let her watch him closely about the house, and he would keep a look-out elsewhere. If there was anything new, she must let him know at once. Send up one of the men-servants, and he would come down at a moment's warning.

There was really nothing definite against this young man; but the Doctor was sure that he was meditating some evil design or other. He rode straight up to the Institute. There he saw Mr. Bernard, and had a brief conversation with him, principally on matters relating to his personal interests.

That evening, for some unknown reason, Mr. Bernard changed the place of his desk and drew down the shades of his windows. Late that night Mr. Richard Venner drew the charge of a rifle, and put the gun back among the fowling-pieces, swearing that a leather halter was worth a dozen of it.

A PLEA FOR FREEDOM FROM SPEECH AND FIGURES OF SPEECH-MAKERS

I observe, Messieurs of the "Atlantic," that your articles are commonly written in the imperial style; but I must beg allowance to use the first person singular. I cannot, like old Weller, spell myself with a We. Ours is, I believe, the only language that has shown so much sense of the worth of the individual (to himself) as to erect the first personal pronoun into a kind of votive column to the dignity of human nature. Other tongues have, or pretend, a greater modesty.

I

What a noble letter it is! In it every reader sees himself as in a glass. As for me, without my I-s, I should be as poorly off as the great mole of Hadrian, which, being the biggest, must be also, by parity of reason, the blindest in the world. When I was in college, I confess I always liked those passages best in the choruses of the Greek drama which were well sprinkled with ai ai, they were so grandly simple. The force of great men is generally to be found in their intense individuality,–in other words, it is all in their I. The merit of this essay will be similar.

What I was going to say is this.

My mind has been much exercised of late on the subject of two epidemics, which, showing themselves formerly in a few sporadic cases, have begun to set in with the violence of the cattle-disease: I mean Eloquence and Statuary. They threaten to render the country unfit for human habitation, except by the Deaf and Blind. We had hitherto got on very well in Chesumpscot, having caught a trick of silence, perhaps from the fish which we cured, more medicorum, by laying them out. But this summer some misguided young men among us got up a lecture-association. Of course it led to a general quarrel; for every pastor in the town wished to have the censorship of the list of lecturers. A certain number of the original projectors, however, took the matter wholly into their own hands, raised a subscription to pay expenses, and resolved to call their lectures "The Universal Brotherhood Course,"–for no other reason, that I can divine, but that they had set the whole village by the ears. They invited that distinguished young apostle of Reform, Mr. Philip Vandal, to deliver the opening lecture. He has just done so, and, from what I have heard about his discourse, it would have been fitter as the introductory to a nunnery of Kilkenny cats than to anything like universal brotherhood. He opened our lyceum as if it had been an oyster, without any regard for the feelings of those inside. He pitched into the world in general, and all his neighbors past and present in particular. Even the babe unborn did not escape some unsavory epithets in the way of vaticination. I sat down, meaning to write you an essay on "The Right of Private Judgment as distinguished from the Right of Public Vituperation"; but I forbear. It may be that I do not understand the nature of philanthropy.

Why, here is Philip Vandal, for example. He loves his kind so much that he has not a word softer than a brickbat for a single mother's son of them. He goes about to save them by proving that not one of them is worth damning. And he does it all from the point of view of an early (a knurly) Christian. Let me illustrate. I was sauntering along Broadway once, and was attracted by a bird-fancier's shop. I like dealers in out-of-the-way things,–traders in bigotry and virtue are too common,–and so I went in. The gem of the collection was a terrier,–a perfect beauty, uglier than philanthropy itself, and hairier, as a Cockney would say, than the 'ole British hairystocracy. "A'n't he a stunner?" said my disrespectable friend, the master of the shop. "Ah, you should see him worry a rat! He does it like a puffic Christian!" Since then, the world has been divided for me into Christians and perfect Christians; and I find so many of the latter species in proportion to the former, that I begin to pity the rats. They (the rats) have at least one virtue,–they are not eloquent.

It is, I think, a universally recognized truth of natural history, that a young lady is sure to fall in love with a young man for whom she feels at first an unconquerable aversion; and it must be on the same principle that the first symptoms of love for our neighbor almost always manifest themselves in a violent disgust at the world in general, on the part of the apostles of that gospel. They give every token of hating their neighbors consumedly; argal, they are going to be madly enamored of them. Or, perhaps, this is the manner in which Universal Brotherhood shows itself in people who wilfully subject themselves to infection as a prophylactic. In the natural way we might find the disease inconvenient and even expensive; but thus vaccinated with virus from the udders (whatever they may be) that yield the (butter-)milk of human kindness, the inconvenience is slight, and we are able still to go about our ordinary business of detesting our brethren as usual. It only shows that the milder type of the disease has penetrated the system, which will thus be enabled to out-Jenneral its more dangerous congener. Before long we shall have physicians of our ailing social system writing to the "Weekly Brandreth's Pill" somewhat on this wise:–"I have a very marked and hopeful case in Pequawgus Four Corners. Miss Hepzibah Tarbell, daughter of that arch-enemy of his kind, Deacon Joash T., attended only one of my lectures. In a day or two the symptoms of eruption were most encouraging. She has already quarrelled with all her family,–accusing her father of bigamy, her uncle Benoni of polytheism, her brother Zeno C. of aneurism, and her sister Eudoxy Trithemia of the variation of the magnetic needle. If ever hopes of seeing a perfect case of Primitive Christian were well-founded, I think we may entertain them now."

What I chiefly object to in the general denunciation sort of reformers is that they make no allowance for character and temperament. They wish to repeal universal laws, and to patch our natural skins for us, as if they always wanted mending. That while they talk so much of the godlike nature of man, they should so forget the human natures of men! The Flathead Indian squeezes the child's skull between two boards till it shapes itself into a kind of gambrel-roof against the rain,–the readiest way, perhaps, of uniforming a tribe that wear no clothes. But does he alter the inside of the head? Not a hair's-breadth. You remember the striking old gnomic poem that tells how Aaron, in a moment of fanatical zeal against that member by which mankind are so readily led into mischief, proposes a rhinotomic sacrifice to Moses? What is the answer of the experienced lawgiver?

"Says Moses to Aaron,''Tis the fashion to wear 'em!'"

Shall we advise the Tadpole to get his tail cut off, as a badge of the reptile nature in him, and to achieve the higher sphere of the Croakers at a single hop? Why, it is all he steers by; without it, he would be as helpless as a compass under the flare of Northern Lights; and he no doubt regards it as a mark of blood, the proof of his kinship with the preadamite family of the Saurians. Shall we send missionaries to the Bear to warn him against raw chestnuts, because they are sometimes so discomforting to our human intestines, which are so like his own? One sermon from the colic were worth the whole American Board.

Moreover, as an author, I protest in the name of universal Grub Street against a unanimity in goodness. Not to mention that a Quaker world, all faded out to an autumnal drab, would be a little tedious,–what should we do for the villain of our tragedy or novel? No rascals, no literature. You have your choice. Were we weak enough to consent to a sudden homogeneousness in virtue, many industrious persons would be thrown out of employment. The wife and mother, for example, with as indeterminate a number of children as the Martyr Rogers, who visits me monthly,–what claim would she have upon me, were not her husband forever taking to drink, or the penitentiary, or Spiritualism? The pusillanimous lapse of her lord into morality would not only take the very ground of her invention from under her feet, but would rob her and him of an income that sustains them both in blissful independence of the curse of Adam. But do not let us be disheartened. Nature is strong; she is persistent; she completes her syllogism after we have long been feeding the roots of her grasses, and has her own way in spite of us. Some ancestral Cromwellian trooper leaps to life again in Nathaniel Greene, and makes a general of him, to confute five generations of Broadbrims. The Puritans were good in their way, and we enjoy them highly as a preterite phenomenon: but they were not good at cakes and ale, and that is one reason why they are a preterite phenomenon.