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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/6359-8.txt b/6359-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..27a7ad0 --- /dev/null +++ b/6359-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4720 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc, by +Thomas de Quincey + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc + +Author: Thomas de Quincey + +Commentator: Milton Haight Turk + +Editor: Milton Haight Turk + + +Release Date: August, 2004 [EBook #6359] +This file was first posted on December 1, 2002 +Last Updated: June 14, 2013 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ENGLISH MAIL-COACH *** + + + + +Produced by Anne Soulard, Charles Franks and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + + + + + + + + +THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH + +AND + +JOAN OF ARC + +By Thomas De Quincey + +Edited With Introduction And Notes By Milton Haight Turk, Ph.D. + + + + +TO CHARLES DEACON CREE + +THIS LITTLE VOLUME IS AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED + +_Glencairn, Kilmacolm, Scotland June 27, 1905_ + + + + +PREFACE + + +Some portions of this Introduction have been taken from the Athenæum +Press _Selections from De Quincey_; many of the notes have also been +transferred from that volume. A number of the new notes I owe to a +review of the _Selections_ by Dr. Lane Cooper, of Cornell University. +I wish also to thank for many favors the Committee and officers of the +Glasgow University Library. + +If a word by way of suggestion to teachers be pertinent, I would venture +to remark that the object of the teacher of literature is, of course, +only to fulfill the desire of the author--to make clear his facts and +to bring home his ideas in all their power and beauty. Introductions +and notes are only means to this end. Teachers, I think, sometimes lose +sight of this fact; I know it is fatally easy for students to forget it. +That teacher will have rendered a great service who has kept his pupils +alive to the real aim of their studies,--to know the author, not to know +of him. + +M.H.T + + + + +CONTENTS + + +INTRODUCTION I. LIFE II. CRITICAL REMARKS III. BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE + +SELECTIONS THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH + JOAN OF ARC + +NOTES + + + + +INTRODUCTION + +I. LIFE + + +Thomas de Quincey was born in Manchester on the 15th of August, 1785. +His father was a man of high character and great taste for literature as +well as a successful man of business; he died, most unfortunately, when +Thomas was quite young. Very soon after our author's birth the family +removed to The Farm, and later to Greenhay, a larger country place near +Manchester. In 1796 De Quincey's mother, now for some years a widow, +removed to Bath and placed him in the grammar school there. + +Thomas, the future opium-eater, was a weak and sickly child. His first +years were spent in solitude, and when his elder brother, William, a +real boy, came home, the young author followed in humility mingled with +terror the diversions of that ingenious and pugnacious "son of eternal +racket." De Quincey's mother was a woman of strong character and +emotions, as well as excellent mind, but she was excessively formal, and +she seems to have inspired more awe than affection in her children, +to whom she was for all that deeply devoted. Her notions of conduct in +general and of child rearing in particular were very strict. She took +Thomas out of Bath School, after three years' excellent work there, +because he was too much praised, and kept him for a year at an inferior +school at Winkfield in Wiltshire. + +In 1800, at the age of fifteen, De Quincey was ready for Oxford; he had +not been praised without reason, for his scholarship was far in advance +of that of ordinary pupils of his years. "That boy," his master at Bath +School had said, "that boy could harangue an Athenian mob better than +you or I could address an English one." He was sent to Manchester +Grammar School, however, in order that after three years' stay he +might secure a scholarship at Brasenose College, Oxford. He remained +there--strongly protesting against a situation which deprived him "of +_health_, of _society_, of _amusement_, of _liberty_, of _congeniality +of pursuits_"--for nineteen months, and then ran away. + +His first plan had been to reach Wordsworth, whose _Lyrical Ballads_ +(1798) had solaced him in fits of melancholy and had awakened in him a +deep reverence for the neglected poet. His timidity preventing this, +he made his way to Chester, where his mother then lived, in the hope of +seeing a sister; was apprehended by the older members of the family; +and through the intercession of his uncle, Colonel Penson, received the +promise of a guinea a week to carry out his later project of a solitary +tramp through Wales. From July to November, 1802, De Quincey then led +a wayfarer's life. [Footnote: For a most interesting account of this +period see the _Confessions of an English Opium-Eater_, Athenæum Press +_Selections from De Quincey_, pp. 165-171, and notes.] He soon lost +his guinea, however, by ceasing to keep his family informed of his +whereabouts, and subsisted for a time with great difficulty. Still +apparently fearing pursuit, with a little borrowed money he broke away +entirely from his home by exchanging the solitude of Wales for the +greater wilderness of London. Failing there to raise money on his +expected patrimony, he for some time deliberately clung to a life of +degradation and starvation rather than return to his lawful governors. + +Discovered by chance by his friends, De Quincey was brought home and +finally allowed (1803) to go to Worcester College, Oxford, on a reduced +income. Here, we are told, "he came to be looked upon as a strange being +who associated with no one." During this time he learned to take opium. +He left, apparently about 1807, without a degree. In the same year he +made the acquaintance of Coleridge and Wordsworth; Lamb he had sought +out in London several years before. + +His acquaintance with Wordsworth led to his settlement in 1809 at +Grasmere, in the beautiful English Lake District; his home for ten years +was Dove Cottage, which Wordsworth had occupied for several years and +which is now held in trust as a memorial of the poet. De Quincey was +married in 1816, and soon after, his patrimony having been exhausted, he +took up literary work in earnest. + +In 1821 he went to London to dispose of some translations from German +authors, but was persuaded first to write and publish an account of his +opium experiences, which accordingly appeared in the _London Magazine_ +in that year. This new sensation eclipsed Lamb's _Essays of Elia_, which +were appearing in the same periodical. The _Confessions of an English +Opium-Eater_ was forthwith published in book form. De Quincey now made +literary acquaintances. Tom Hood found the shrinking author "at home in +a German ocean of literature, in a storm, flooding all the floor, the +tables, and the chairs--billows of books." Richard Woodhouse speaks of +the "depth and reality of his knowledge. ... His conversation appeared +like the elaboration of a mine of results. ... Taylor led him into +political economy, into the Greek and Latin accents, into antiquities, +Roman roads, old castles, the origin and analogy of languages; upon all +these he was informed to considerable minuteness. The same with regard +to Shakespeare's sonnets, Spenser's minor poems, and the great writers +and characters of Elizabeth's age and those of Cromwell's time." + +From this time on De Quincey maintained himself by contributing to +various magazines. He soon exchanged London and the Lakes for Edinburgh +and its suburb, Lasswade, where the remainder of his life was spent. +_Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine_ and its rival _Tatt's Magazine_ +received a large number of contributions. _The English Mail-Coach_ +appeared in 1849 in Blackwood. _Joan of Arc_ had already been published +(1847) in _Tait_. De Quincey continued to drink laudanum throughout his +life,--twice after 1821 in very great excess. During his last years he +nearly completed a collected edition of his works. He died in Edinburgh +on the 8th of December, 1859. + + +II. CRITICAL REMARKS + + +The Opium-Eater had been a weak, lonely, and over-studious child, and he +was a solitary and ill-developed man. His character and his work present +strange contradictions. He is most precise in statement, yet often +very careless of fact; he is most courteous in manner, yet inexcusably +inconsiderate in his behavior. Again, he sets up a high standard +of purity of diction, yet uses slang quite unnecessarily and +inappropriately; and though a great master of style, he is guilty, at +times, of digression within digression until all trace of the original +subject is lost. + +De Quincey divides his writings into three groups: first, that class +which "proposes primarily to amuse the reader, but which, in doing so, +may or may not happen occasionally to reach a higher station, at which +the amusement passes into an impassioned interest." To this class would +belong the _Autobiographic Sketches_ and the _Literary Reminiscences_. +As a second class he groups "those papers which address themselves +purely to the understanding as an insulated faculty, or do so +primarily." These essays would include, according to Professor Masson's +subdivision, (a) Biographies, such as _Shakespeare_ or _Pope_--_Joan of +Arc_ falls here, yet has some claim to a place in the first class; (b) +Historical essays, like The _Cæsars_; (c) Speculative and Theological +essays; (d) Essays in Political Economy and Politics; (e) Papers of +Literary Theory and Criticism, such as the brilliant discussions of +_Rhetoric, Style_, and _Conversation_, and the famous _On the Knocking +at the Gate in 'Macbeth_.' As a third and "far higher" class the author +ranks the _Confessions of an English Opium-Eater_, and also (but more +emphatically) the _Suspiria de Profundis_. "On these," he says, "as +modes of impassioned prose ranging under no precedents that I am aware +of in any literature, it is much more difficult to speak justly, whether +in a hostile or a friendly character." + +Of De Quincey's essays in general it may be said that they bear witness +alike to the diversity of his knowledge and the penetrative power of his +intellect. The wide range of his subjects, however, deprives his papers +when taken together of the weight which might attach to a series of +related discussions. And, remarkable as is De Quincey's aptitude for +analysis and speculation, more than once we have to regret the lack of +the "saving common-sense" possessed by many far less gifted men. +His erudition and insight are always a little in advance of his good +judgment. + +As to the works of the first class, the _Reminiscences_ are defaced +by the shrewish spirit shown in the accounts of Wordsworth and other +friends; nor can we depend upon them as records of fact. But our author +had had exceptional opportunities to observe these famous men and women, +and he possessed no little insight into literature and personality. As +to the _Autobiographic Sketches_, the handling of events is hopelessly +arbitrary and fragmentary. In truth, De Quincey is drawing an idealized +picture of childhood,--creating a type rather than re-creating a person; +it is a study of a child of talent that we receive from him, and as such +these sketches form one of the most satisfactory products of his pen. + +The _Confessions_ as a narrative is related to the Autobiography, while +its poetical passages range it with the _Suspiria_ and the _Mail-Coach_. +De Quincey seems to have believed that he was creating in such writings +a new literary type of prose poetry or prose phantasy; he had, with +his splendid dreams as subject-matter, lifted prose to heights +hitherto scaled only by the poet. In reality his style owed much to the +seventeenth-century writers, such as Milton and Sir Thomas Browne. He +took part with Coleridge, Lamb, and others in the general revival of +interest in earlier modern English prose, which is a feature of the +Romantic Movement. Still none of his contemporaries wrote as he did; +evidently De Quincey has a distinct quality of his own. Ruskin, in our +own day, is like him, but never the same. + +Yet De Quincey's prose poetry is a very small portion of his work, and +it is not in this way only that he excels. Mr. Saintsbury has spoken of +the strong appeal that De Quincey makes to boys. [Footnote: "Probably +more boys have in the last forty years been brought to a love +of literature proper by De Quincy than by any other writer +whatever."--_History of Nineteenth-Century Literature_, p.198.] It is +not without significance that he mentions as especially attractive to +the young only writings with a large narrative element. [Footnote: "To +read the _Essay on Murder_, the _English Mail-Coach_, _The Spanish Nun_, +_The Cæsars_, and half a score other things at the age of about fifteen +or sixteen is, or ought to be, to fall in love with them."--_Essays in +English Literature_, 1780-1860, p.307.] Few boys read poetry, whether in +verse or prose, and fewer still criticism or philosophy; to every normal +boy the gate of good literature is the good story. It is the narrative +skill of De Quincey that has secured for him, in preference to other +writers of his class, the favor of youthful readers. + +It would be too much to say that the talent that attracts the young to +him must needs be the Opium-Eater's grand talent, though the notion is +defensible, seeing that only salient qualities in good writing appeal to +inexperienced readers. I believe, however, that this skill in narration +is De Quincey's most persistent quality,--the golden thread that unites +all his most distinguished and most enduring work. And it is with him +a part of his genius for style. Creative power of the kind that goes to +the making of plots De Quincey had not; he has proved that forever by +the mediocrity of _Klosterheim_. Give him Bergmann's account of the +Tartar Migration, or the story of the Fighting Nun,--give him the +matter,--and a brilliant narrative will result. Indeed, De Quincey +loved a story for its own sake; he rejoiced to see it extend its winding +course before him; he delighted to follow it, touch it, color it, see it +grow into body and being under his hand. That this enthusiasm should now +and then tend to endanger the integrity of the facts need not surprise +us; as I have said elsewhere, accuracy in these matters is hardly to +be expected of De Quincey. And we can take our pleasure in the skillful +unfolding of the dramatic narrative of the Tartar Flight--we can feel +the author's joy in the scenic possibilities of his theme--even if we +know that here and there an incident appears that is quite in its proper +place--but is unknown to history. + +In his _Confessions_ the same constructive power bears its part in +the author's triumph. A peculiar end was to be reached in that +narrative,--an end in which the writer had a deep personal interest. +What is an opium-eater? Says a character in a recent work of fiction, +of a social wreck: "If it isn't whisky with him, it's opium; if it isn't +opium, it's whisky." This speech establishes the popular category in +which De Quincey's habit had placed him. Our attention was to be drawn +from these degrading connections. And this is done not merely by the +correction of some widespread fallacies as to the effects of the +drug; far more it is the result of narrative skill. As we follow with +ever-increasing sympathy the lonely and sensitive child, the wandering +youth, the neuralgic patient, into the terrible grasp of opium, who +realizes, amid the gorgeous delights and the awful horrors of the tale, +that the writer is after all the victim of the worst of bad habits? We +can hardly praise too highly the art which even as we look beneath it +throws its glamour over us still. + +Nor is it only in this constructive power, in the selection and +arrangement of details, that De Quincey excels as a narrator; a score +of minor excellences of his style, such as the fine Latin words or the +sweeping periodic sentences, contribute to the effective progress of his +narrative prose. Mr. Lowell has said that "there are no such vistas and +avenues of verse as Milton's." The comparison is somewhat hazardous, +still I should like to venture the parallel claim that there are no such +streams of prose as De Quincey's. The movement of his discourse is that +of the broad river, not in its weight or force perhaps, but in its easy +flowing progress, in its serene, unhurried certainty of its end. To be +sure, only too often the waters overflow their banks and run far afield +in alien channels. Yet, when great power over the instrument of language +is joined to so much constructive skill, the result is narrative art of +high quality,--an achievement that must be in no small measure the solid +basis of De Quincey's fame. + + +III. BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE + +I. WORKS + + +1. _The Collected Writings of Thomas de Quincey_. New and enlarged +edition by David Masson. Edinburgh: A. and C. Black, 1889-1890. [New +York: The Macmillan Co. 14 vols., with footnotes, a preface to each +volume, and index. Reissued in cheaper form. The standard edition.] + +2. _The Works of Thomas de Quincey_. Riverside Edition. Boston: +Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1877. [12 vols., with notes and index.] + +3. _Selections from De Quincey._ Edited with an Introduction and Notes, +by M. H. Turk. Athenaeum Press Series. Boston, U.S.A., and London: Ginn +and Company, 1902. ["The largest body of selections from De Quincey +recently published.... The selections are _The affliction of Childhood, +Introduction to the World of Strife, A Meeting with Lamb, A Meeting +with Coleridge, Recollections of Wordsworth, Confessions, A Portion of +Suspiria, The English Mail-Coach, Murder as one of the Fine Arts, Second +Paper, Joan of Arc,_ and _On the Knocking at the Gate in 'Macbeth.'_"] + + +II. BIOGRAPHY AND CRITICISM + + +4. D. MASSON. _Thomas De Quincey._ English Men of Letters. London. +[New York: Harper. An excellent brief biography. This book, with a +good volume of selections, should go far toward supplying the ordinary +student's needs.] + +5. H. S. SALT. DE QUINCEY. Bell's Miniature Series of Great Writers. +London: George Bell and Sons. [A good short life.] 6. A. H. JAPP. +_Thomas De Quincey: His Life and Writings._ London, 1890. [New York: +Scribner. First edition by "H. A. Page," 1877. The standard life of +De Quincey; it contains valuable communications from De Quincey's +daughters, J. Hogg, Rev. F. Jacox, Professor Masson, and others.] + +7. A. H. JAPP. _De Quincey Memorials. Being Letters and Other +Records, here first published. With Communications from Coleridge, the +Wordsworths, Hannah More, Professor Wilson, and others._ 2 vols. London: +W. Heinemann, 1891. + +8. J. HOGG. _De Quincey and his Friends, Personal Recollections, +Souvenirs, and Anecdotes_ [including Woodhouse's _Conversations_, +Findlay's _Personal Recollections_, Hodgson's _On the Genius of De +Quincey_, and a mass of personal notes from a host of friends]. London: +Sampson Low, Marston & Co., 1895. + +9. E. T. MASON. _Personal Traits of British Authors_. New York, 1885. [4 +vols. The volume subtitled _Scott, Hogg,_ etc., contains some accounts +of De Quincey not included by Japp or Hogg.] + +10. L. STEPHEN. _Hours in a Library_. Vol. I. New York, 1892. + +11. W. MINTO. _Manual of English Prose Literature_. Boston, 1889. +[Contains the best general discussion of De Quincey's style.] + +12. L. COOPER. _The Prose Poetry of Thomas De Quincey_. Leipzig, 1902. + + + + +THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH + +SECTION I--THE GLORY OF MOTION + + +Some twenty or more years before I matriculated at Oxford, Mr. Palmer, +at that time M.P. for Bath, had accomplished two things, very hard to +do on our little planet, the Earth, however cheap they may be held by +eccentric people in comets: he had invented mail-coaches, and he had +married the daughter of a duke. He was, therefore, just twice as great +a man as Galileo, who did certainly invent (or, which is the same thing, +[Footnote: "_The same thing_":--Thus, in the calendar of the Church +Festivals, the discovery of the true cross (by Helen, the mother +of Constantine) is recorded (and, one might think, with the express +consciousness of sarcasm) as the _Invention_ of the Cross.] discover) +the satellites of Jupiter, those very next things extant to mail-coaches +in the two capital pretensions of speed and keeping time, but, on the +other hand, who did _not_ marry the daughter of a duke. + +These mail-coaches, as organised by Mr. Palmer, are entitled to a +circumstantial notice from myself, having had so large a share in +developing the anarchies of my subsequent dreams: an agency which they +accomplished, 1st, through velocity at that time unprecedented--for they +first revealed the glory of motion; 2dly, through grand effects for +the eye between lamplight and the darkness upon solitary roads; 3dly, +through animal beauty and power so often displayed in the class of +horses selected for this mail service; 4thly, through the conscious +presence of a central intellect, that, in the midst of vast distances +[Footnote: "Vast distances":--One case was familiar to mail-coach +travellers where two mails in opposite directions, north and south, +starting at the same minute from points six hundred miles apart, met +almost constantly at a particular bridge which bisected the total +distance.]--of storms, of darkness, of danger--overruled all obstacles +into one steady co-operation to a national result. For my own feeling, +this post-office service spoke as by some mighty orchestra, where a +thousand instruments, all disregarding each other, and so far in danger +of discord, yet all obedient as slaves to the supreme _baton_ of some +great leader, terminate in a perfection of harmony like that of heart, +brain, and lungs in a healthy animal organisation. But, finally, that +particular element in this whole combination which most impressed +myself, and through which it is that to this hour Mr. Palmer's +mail-coach system tyrannises over my dreams by terror and terrific +beauty, lay in the awful _political_ mission which at that time it +fulfilled. The mail-coach it was that distributed over the face of the +land, like the opening of apocalyptic vials, the heart-shaking news +of Trafalgar, of Salamanca, of Vittoria, of Waterloo. These were the +harvests that, in the grandeur of their reaping, redeemed the tears and +blood in which they had been sown. Neither was the meanest peasant +so much below the grandeur and the sorrow of the times as to confound +battles such as these, which were gradually moulding the destinies of +Christendom, with the vulgar conflicts of ordinary warfare, so often +no more than gladiatorial trials of national prowess. The victories of +England in this stupendous contest rose of themselves as natural _Te +Deums_ to heaven; and it was felt by the thoughtful that such victories, +at such a crisis of general prostration, were not more beneficial to +ourselves than finally to France, our enemy, and to the nations of all +western or central Europe, through whose pusillanimity it was that the +French domination had prospered. + +The mail-coach, as the national organ for publishing these mighty +events, thus diffusively influential, became itself a spiritualised and +glorified object to an impassioned heart; and naturally, in the Oxford +of that day, _all_ hearts were impassioned, as being all (or nearly all) +in _early_ manhood. In most universities there is one single college; +in Oxford there were five-and-twenty, all of which were peopled by young +men, the _élite_ of their own generation; not boys, but men: none +under eighteen. In some of these many colleges the custom permitted the +student to keep what are called "short terms"; that is, the four terms +of Michaelmas, Lent, Easter, and Act, were kept by a residence, in the +aggregate, of ninety-one days, or thirteen weeks. Under this interrupted +residence, it was possible that a student might have a reason for going +down to his home four times in the year. This made eight journeys to +and fro. But, as these homes lay dispersed through all the shires of the +island, and most of us disdained all coaches except his Majesty's mail, +no city out of London could pretend to so extensive a connexion with Mr. +Palmer's establishment as Oxford. Three mails, at the least, I remember +as passing every day through Oxford, and benefiting by my personal +patronage--viz., the Worcester, the Gloucester, and the Holyhead mail. +Naturally, therefore, it became a point of some interest with us, whose +journeys revolved every six weeks on an average, to look a little into +the executive details of the system. With some of these Mr. Palmer had +no concern; they rested upon bye-laws enacted by posting-houses for +their own benefit, and upon other bye-laws, equally stern, enacted +by the inside passengers for the illustration of their own haughty +exclusiveness. These last were of a nature to rouse our scorn; from +which the transition was not very long to systematic mutiny. Up to this +time, say 1804, or 1805 (the year of Trafalgar), it had been the fixed +assumption of the four inside people (as an old tradition of all +public carriages derived from the reign of Charles II) that they, the +illustrious quaternion, constituted a porcelain variety of the human +race, whose dignity would have been compromised by exchanging one word +of civility with the three miserable delf-ware outsides. Even to have +kicked an outsider might have been held to attaint the foot concerned +in that operation, so that, perhaps, it would have required an act +of Parliament to restore its purity of blood. What words, then, could +express the horror, and the sense of treason, in that case, which _had_ +happened, where all three outsides (the trinity of Pariahs) made a vain +attempt to sit down at the same breakfast-table or dinner-table with +the consecrated four? I myself witnessed such an attempt; and on that +occasion a benevolent old gentleman endeavoured to soothe his three holy +associates, by suggesting that, if the outsides were indicted for this +criminal attempt at the next assizes, the court would regard it as a +case of lunacy or _delirium tremens_ rather than of treason. England +owes much of her grandeur to the depth of the aristocratic element in +her social composition, when pulling against her strong democracy. I +am not the man to laugh at it. But sometimes, undoubtedly, it expressed +itself in comic shapes. The course taken with the infatuated outsiders, +in the particular attempt which I have noticed, was that the waiter, +beckoning them away from the privileged _salle-à-manger_, sang out, +"This way, my good men," and then enticed these good men away to the +kitchen. But that plan had not always answered. Sometimes, though +rarely, cases occurred where the intruders, being stronger than usual, +or more vicious than usual, resolutely refused to budge, and so far +carried their point as to have a separate table arranged for themselves +in a corner of the general room. Yet, if an Indian screen could be found +ample enough to plant them out from the very eyes of the high table, or +_dais_, it then became possible to assume as a fiction of law that the +three delf fellows, after all, were not present. They could be ignored +by the porcelain men, under the maxim that objects not appearing and +objects not existing are governed by the same logical construction. +[Footnote: _De non apparentibus_, etc.] + +Such being, at that time, the usage of mail-coaches, what was to be done +by us of young Oxford? We, the most aristocratic of people, who were +addicted to the practice of looking down superciliously even upon the +insides themselves as often very questionable characters--were we, +by voluntarily going outside, to court indignities? If our dress and +bearing sheltered us generally from the suspicion of being "raff" +(the name at that period for "snobs" [Footnote: "_Snobs_," and its +antithesis, "_nobs_," arose among the internal factions of shoemakers +perhaps ten years later. Possibly enough, the terms may have existed +much earlier; but they were then first made known, picturesquely and +effectively, by a trial at some assizes which happened to fix the public +attention.]), we really _were_ such constructively by the place we +assumed. If we did not submit to the deep shadow of eclipse, we entered +at least the skirts of its penumbra. And the analogy of theatres was +valid against us,--where no man can complain of the annoyances incident +to the pit or gallery, having his instant remedy in paying the higher +price of the boxes. But the soundness of this analogy we disputed. +In the case of the theatre, it cannot be pretended that the inferior +situations have any separate attractions, unless the pit may be supposed +to have an advantage for the purposes of the critic or the dramatic +reporter. But the critic or reporter is a rarity. For most people, the +sole benefit is in the price. Now, on the contrary, the outside of the +mail had its own incommunicable advantages. These we could not forego. +The higher price we would willingly have paid, but not the price +connected with the condition of riding inside; which condition we +pronounced insufferable. The air, the freedom of prospect, the proximity +to the horses, the elevation of seat: these were what we required; +but, above all, the certain anticipation of purchasing occasional +opportunities of driving. + +Such was the difficulty which pressed us; and under the coercion of this +difficulty we instituted a searching inquiry into the true quality and +valuation of the different apartments about the mail. We conducted +this inquiry on metaphysical principles; and it was ascertained +satisfactorily that the roof of the coach, which by some weak men had +been called the attics, and by some the garrets, was in reality the +drawing-room; in which drawing-room the box was the chief ottoman or +sofa; whilst it appeared that the _inside_ which had been traditionally +regarded as the only room tenantable by gentlemen, was, in fact, the +coal-cellar in disguise. + +Great wits jump. The very same idea had not long before struck the +celestial intellect of China. Amongst the presents carried out by our +first embassy to that country was a state-coach. It had been specially +selected as a personal gift by George III; but the exact mode of +using it was an intense mystery to Pekin. The ambassador, indeed (Lord +Macartney), had made some imperfect explanations upon this point; but, +as His Excellency communicated these in a diplomatic whisper at the +very moment of his departure, the celestial intellect was very feebly +illuminated, and it became necessary to call a cabinet council on the +grand state question, "Where was the Emperor to sit?" The hammer-cloth +happened to be unusually gorgeous; and, partly on that consideration, +but partly also because the box offered the most elevated seat, was +nearest to the moon, and undeniably went foremost, it was resolved by +acclamation that the box was the imperial throne, and, for the scoundrel +who drove,--he might sit where he could find a perch. The horses, +therefore, being harnessed, solemnly his imperial majesty ascended his +new English throne under a flourish of trumpets, having the first lord +of the treasury on his right hand, and the chief jester on his left. +Pekin gloried in the spectacle; and in the whole flowery people, +constructively present by representation, there was but one discontented +person, and _that_ was the coachman. This mutinous individual +audaciously shouted, "Where am _I_ to sit?" But the privy council, +incensed by his disloyalty, unanimously opened the door, and kicked him +into the inside. He had all the inside places to himself; but such is +the rapacity of ambition that he was still dissatisfied. "I say," he +cried out in an extempore petition addressed to the Emperor through the +window--"I say, how am I to catch hold of the reins?"--"Anyhow," was the +imperial answer; "don't trouble _me_, man, in my glory. How catch +the reins? Why, through the windows, through the keyholes--_anyhow_." +Finally this contumacious coachman lengthened the check-strings into a +sort of jury-reins communicating with the horses; with these he drove +as steadily as Pekin had any right to expect. The Emperor returned after +the briefest of circuits; he descended in great pomp from his throne, +with the severest resolution never to remount it. A public thanksgiving +was ordered for his majesty's happy escape from the disease of a broken +neck; and the state-coach was dedicated thenceforward as a votive +offering to the god Fo Fo--whom the learned more accurately called Fi +Fi. + +A revolution of this same Chinese character did young Oxford of that +era effect in the constitution of mail-coach society. It was a perfect +French Revolution; and we had good reason to say, _ça ira_. In fact, +it soon became _too_ popular. The "public"--a well-known character, +particularly disagreeable, though slightly respectable, and notorious +for affecting the chief seats in synagogues--had at first loudly +opposed this revolution; but, when the opposition showed itself to be +ineffectual, our disagreeable friend went into it with headlong zeal. +At first it was a sort of race between us; and, as the public is usually +from thirty to fifty years old, naturally we of young Oxford, that +averaged about twenty, had the advantage. Then the public took to +bribing, giving fees to horse-keepers, &c., who hired out their persons +as warming-pans on the box seat. _That_, you know, was shocking to all +moral sensibilities. Come to bribery, said we, and there is an end +to all morality,--Aristotle's, Zeno's, Cicero's, or anybody's. And, +besides, of what use was it? For _we_ bribed also. And, as our bribes, +to those of the public, were as five shillings to sixpence, here again +young Oxford had the advantage. But the contest was ruinous to +the principles of the stables connected with the mails. This whole +corporation was constantly bribed, rebribed, and often surrebribed; a +mail-coach yard was like the hustings in a contested election; and a +horse-keeper, ostler, or helper, was held by the philosophical at that +time to be the most corrupt character in the nation. + +There was an impression upon the public mind, natural enough from the +continually augmenting velocity of the mail, but quite erroneous, that +an outside seat on this class of carriages was a post of danger. On the +contrary, I maintained that, if a man had become nervous from some +gipsy prediction in his childhood, allocating to a particular moon +now approaching some unknown danger, and he should inquire earnestly, +"Whither can I fly for shelter? Is a prison the safest retreat? or a +lunatic hospital? or the British Museum?" I should have replied, "Oh no; +I'll tell you what to do. Take lodgings for the next forty days on the +box of his Majesty's mail. Nobody can touch you there. If it is by +bills at ninety days after date that you are made unhappy--if noters and +protesters are the sort of wretches whose astrological shadows darken +the house of life--then note you what I vehemently protest: viz., that, +no matter though the sheriff and under-sheriff in every county should be +running after you with his _posse_, touch a hair of your head he cannot +whilst you keep house and have your legal domicile on the box of the +mail. It is felony to stop the mail; even the sheriff cannot do that. +And an _extra_ touch of the whip to the leaders (no great matter if +it grazes the sheriff) at any time guarantees your safety." In fact, a +bedroom in a quiet house seems a safe enough retreat; yet it is liable +to its own notorious nuisances--to robbers by night, to rats, to fire. +But the mail laughs at these terrors. To robbers, the answer is packed +up and ready for delivery in the barrel of the guard's blunderbuss. Rats +again! there _are_ none about mail-coaches any more than snakes in Von +Troil's Iceland; [Footnote: "_Von Troil's Iceland_":--The allusion is +to a well-known chapter in Von Troil's work, entitled, "Concerning +the Snakes of Iceland." The entire chapter consists of these six +words--"_There art no snakes in Iceland_."] except, indeed, now and then +a parliamentary rat, who always hides his shame in what I have shown +to be the "coal-cellar." And, as to fire, I never knew but one in a +mail-coach; which was in the Exeter mail, and caused by an obstinate +sailor bound to Devonport. Jack, making light of the law and the +lawgiver that had set their faces against his offence, insisted on +taking up a forbidden seat [Footnote: "_Forbidden seat_":--The very +sternest code of rules was enforced upon the mails by the Post-office. +Throughout England, only three outsides were allowed, of whom one was +to sit on the box, and the other two immediately behind the box; none, +under any pretext, to come near the guard; an indispensable caution; +since else, under the guise of a passenger, a robber might by any one +of a thousand advantages--which sometimes are created, but always are +favoured, by the animation of frank social intercourse--have disarmed +the guard. Beyond the Scottish border, the regulation was so far relaxed +as to allow of _four_ outsides, but not relaxed at all as to the mode of +placing them. One, as before, was seated on the box, and the other three +on the front of the roof, with a determinate and ample separation from +the little insulated chair of the guard. This relaxation was conceded +by way of compensating to Scotland her disadvantages in point of +population. England, by the superior density of her population, might +always count upon a large fund of profits in the fractional trips of +chance passengers riding for short distances of two or three stages. In +Scotland this chance counted for much less. And therefore, to make good +the deficiency, Scotland was allowed a compensatory profit upon one +_extra_ passenger.] in the rear of the roof, from which he could +exchange his own yarns with those of the guard. No greater offence was +then known to mail-coaches; it was treason, it was _læsa majestas_, it +was by tendency arson; and the ashes of Jack's pipe, falling amongst the +straw of the hinder boot, containing the mail-bags, raised a flame +which (aided by the wind of our motion) threatened a revolution in +the republic of letters. Yet even this left the sanctity of the box +unviolated. In dignified repose, the coachman and myself sat on, resting +with benign composure upon our knowledge that the fire would have +to burn its way through four inside passengers before it could reach +ourselves. I remarked to the coachman, with a quotation from Virgil's +"Æneid" really too hackneyed-- + + "Jam proximus ardet + Ucalegon." + +But, recollecting that the Virgilian part of the coachman's education +might have been neglected, I interpreted so far as to say that perhaps +at that moment the flames were catching hold of our worthy brother and +inside passenger, Ucalegon. The coachman made no answer,--which is my +own way when a stranger addresses me either in Syriac or in Coptic; +but by his faint sceptical smile he seemed to insinuate that he knew +better,--for that Ucalegon, as it happened, was not in the way-bill, and +therefore could not have been booked. + +No dignity is perfect which does not at some point ally itself with the +mysterious. The connexion of the mail with the state and the executive +government--a connexion obvious, but yet not strictly defined--gave to +the whole mail establishment an official grandeur which did us service +on the roads, and invested us with seasonable terrors. Not the +less impressive were those terrors because their legal limits were +imperfectly ascertained. Look at those turnpike gates: with what +deferential hurry, with what an obedient start, they fly open at our +approach! Look at that long line of carts and carters ahead, audaciously +usurping the very crest of the road. Ah! traitors, they do not hear us +as yet; but, as soon as the dreadful blast of our horn reaches them with +proclamation of our approach, see with what frenzy of trepidation they +fly to their horses' heads, and deprecate our wrath by the precipitation +of their crane-neck quarterings. Treason they feel to be their crime; +each individual carter feels himself under the ban of confiscation and +attainder; his blood is attainted through six generations; and nothing +is wanting but the headsman and his axe, the block and the sawdust, to +close up the vista of his horrors. What! shall it be within benefit of +clergy to delay the king's message on the high road?--to interrupt the +great respirations, ebb and flood, _systole_ and _diastole_, of the +national intercourse?--to endanger the safety of tidings running day and +night between all nations and languages? Or can it be fancied, amongst +the weakest of men, that the bodies of the criminals will be given up to +their widows for Christian burial? Now, the doubts which were raised +as to our powers did more to wrap them in terror, by wrapping them in +uncertainty, than could have been effected by the sharpest definitions +of the law from the Quarter Sessions. We, on our parts (we, the +collective mail, I mean), did our utmost to exalt the idea of our +privileges by the insolence with which we wielded them. Whether this +insolence rested upon law that gave it a sanction, or upon conscious +power that haughtily dispensed with that sanction, equally it spoke from +a potential station; and the agent, in each particular insolence of the +moment, was viewed reverentially, as one having authority. + +Sometimes after breakfast his Majesty's mail would become frisky; and, +in its difficult wheelings amongst the intricacies of early markets, +it would upset an apple-cart, a cart loaded with eggs, &c. Huge was +the affliction and dismay, awful was the smash. I, as far as possible, +endeavoured in such a case to represent the conscience and moral +sensibilities of the mail; and, when wildernesses of eggs were lying +poached under our horses' hoofs, then would I stretch forth my hands +in sorrow, saying (in words too celebrated at that time, from the false +echoes [Footnote: "_False echoes_":--Yes, false! for the words ascribed +to Napoleon, as breathed to the memory of Desaix, never were uttered at +all. They stand in the same category of theatrical fictions as the cry +of the foundering line-of-battle ship _Vengeur_, as the vaunt of General +Cambronne at Waterloo, "La Garde meurt, mais ne se rend pas," or as the +repartees of Talleyrand.] of Marengo), "Ah! wherefore have we not time +to weep over you?"--which was evidently impossible, since, in fact, we +had not time to laugh over them. Tied to post-office allowance in some +cases of fifty minutes for eleven miles, could the royal mail pretend to +undertake the offices of sympathy and condolence? Could it be expected +to provide tears for the accidents of the road? If even it seemed to +trample on humanity, it did so, I felt, in discharge of its own more +peremptory duties. + +Upholding the morality of the mail, _a fortiori_ I upheld its rights; as +a matter of duty, I stretched to the uttermost its privilege of imperial +precedency, and astonished weak minds by the feudal powers which I +hinted to be lurking constructively in the charters of this proud +establishment. Once I remember being on the box of the Holyhead mail, +between Shrewsbury and Oswestry, when a tawdry thing from Birmingham, +some "Tallyho" or "Highflyer," all flaunting with green and gold, came +up alongside of us. What a contrast to our royal simplicity of form and +colour in this plebeian wretch! The single ornament on our dark ground +of chocolate colour was the mighty shield of the imperial arms, but +emblazoned in proportions as modest as a signet-ring bears to a seal +of office. Even this was displayed only on a single panel, whispering, +rather than proclaiming, our relations to the mighty state; whilst the +beast from Birmingham, our green-and-gold friend from false, fleeting, +perjured Brummagem, had as much writing and painting on its sprawling +flanks as would have puzzled a decipherer from the tombs of Luxor. For +some time this Birmingham machine ran along by our side--a piece +of familiarity that already of itself seemed to me sufficiently +Jacobinical. But all at once a movement of the horses announced a +desperate intention of leaving us behind. "Do you see _that?_" I said to +the coachman.--"I see," was his short answer. He was wide awake,--yet +he waited longer than seemed prudent; for the horses of our audacious +opponent had a disagreeable air of freshness and power. But his motive +was loyal; his wish was that the Birmingham conceit should be full-blown +before he froze it. When _that_ seemed right, he unloosed, or, to speak +by a stronger word, he _sprang_, his known resources: he slipped our +royal horses like cheetahs, or hunting-leopards, after the affrighted +game. How they could retain such a reserve of fiery power after the work +they had accomplished seemed hard to explain. But on our side, besides +the physical superiority, was a tower of moral strength, namely the +king's name, "which they upon the adverse faction wanted." Passing them +without an effort, as it seemed, we threw them into the rear with so +lengthening an interval between us as proved in itself the bitterest +mockery of their presumption; whilst our guard blew back a shattering +blast of triumph that was really too painfully full of derision. + +I mention this little incident for its connexion with what followed. A +Welsh rustic, sitting behind me, asked if I had not felt my heart burn +within me during the progress of the race? I said, with philosophic +calmness, _No_; because we were not racing with a mail, so that no glory +could be gained. In fact, it was sufficiently mortifying that such a +Birmingham thing should dare to challenge us. The Welshman replied +that he didn't see _that_; for that a cat might look at a king, and a +Brummagem coach might lawfully race the Holyhead mail. "_Race_ us, if +you like," I replied, "though even _that_ has an air of sedition; but +not _beat_ us. This would have been treason; and for its own sake I +am glad that the 'Tallyho' was disappointed." So dissatisfied did the +Welshman seem with this opinion that at last I was obliged to tell him +a very fine story from one of our elder dramatists: viz., that once, +in some far Oriental kingdom, when the sultan of all the land, with his +princes, ladies, and chief omrahs, were flying their falcons, a hawk +suddenly flew at a majestic eagle, and, in defiance of the eagle's +natural advantages, in contempt also of the eagle's traditional royalty, +and before the whole assembled field of astonished spectators from Agra +and Lahore, killed the eagle on the spot. Amazement seized the sultan at +the unequal contest, and burning admiration for its unparalleled result. +He commanded that the hawk should be brought before him; he caressed the +bird with enthusiasm; and he ordered that, for the commemoration of his +matchless courage, a diadem of gold and rubies should be solemnly +placed on the hawk's head, but then that, immediately after this solemn +coronation, the bird should be led off to execution, as the most valiant +indeed of traitors, but not the less a traitor, as having dared to rise +rebelliously against his liege lord and anointed sovereign, the eagle. +"Now," said I to the Welshman, "to you and me, as men of refined +sensibilities, how painful it would have been that this poor Brummagem +brute, the 'Tallyho,' in the impossible case of a victory over us, +should have been crowned with Birmingham tinsel, with paste diamonds +and Roman pearls, and then led off to instant execution." The Welshman +doubted if that could be warranted by law. And, when I hinted at the +6th of Edward Longshanks, chap. 18, for regulating the precedency +of coaches, as being probably the statute relied on for the capital +punishment of such offences, he replied drily that, if the attempt to +pass a mail really were treasonable, it was a pity that the "Tallyho" +appeared to have so imperfect an acquaintance with law. + +The modern modes of travelling cannot compare with the old mail-coach +system in grandeur and power. They boast of more velocity,--not, +however, as a consciousness, but as a fact of our lifeless knowledge, +resting upon _alien_ evidence: as, for instance, because somebody +_says_ that we have gone fifty miles in the hour, though we are far from +feeling it as a personal experience; or upon the evidence of a result, +as that actually we find ourselves in York four hours after leaving +London. Apart from such an assertion, or such a result, I myself am +little aware of the pace. But, seated on the old mail-coach, we needed +no evidence out of ourselves to indicate the velocity. On this system +the word was not _magna loquimur_, as upon railways, but _vivimus_. Yes, +"magna _vivimus_"; we do not make verbal ostentation of our grandeurs, +we realise our grandeurs in act, and in the very experience of life. The +vital experience of the glad animal sensibilities made doubts impossible +on the question of our speed; we heard our speed, we saw it, we felt it +as a thrilling; and this speed was not the product of blind insensate +agencies, that had no sympathy to give, but was incarnated in the +fiery eyeballs of the noblest amongst brutes, in his dilated nostril, +spasmodic muscles, and thunder-beating hoofs. The sensibility of the +horse, uttering itself in the maniac light of his eye, might be the last +vibration of such a movement; the glory of Salamanca might be the +first. But the intervening links that connected them, that spread the +earthquake of battle into the eyeballs of the horse, were the heart of +man and its electric thrillings--kindling in the rapture of the fiery +strife, and then propagating its own tumults by contagious shouts and +gestures to the heart of his servant the horse. But now, on the new +system of travelling, iron tubes and boilers have disconnected man's +heart from the ministers of his locomotion. Nile nor Trafalgar has power +to raise an extra bubble in a steam-kettle. The galvanic cycle is +broken up for ever; man's imperial nature no longer sends itself forward +through the electric sensibility of the horse; the inter-agencies are +gone in the mode of communication between the horse and his master out +of which grew so many aspects of sublimity under accidents of mists that +hid, or sudden blazes that revealed, of mobs that agitated, or midnight +solitudes that awed. Tidings fitted to convulse all nations must +henceforwards travel by culinary process; and the trumpet that once +announced from afar the laurelled mail, heart-shaking when heard +screaming on the wind and proclaiming itself through the darkness to +every village or solitary house on its route, has now given way for +ever to the pot-wallopings of the boiler. Thus have perished multiform +openings for public expressions of interest, scenical yet natural, in +great national tidings,--for revelations of faces and groups that could +not offer themselves amongst the fluctuating mobs of a railway station. +The gatherings of gazers about a laurelled mail had one centre, and +acknowledged one sole interest. But the crowds attending at a railway +station have as little unity as running water, and own as many centres +as there are separate carriages in the train. + +How else, for example, than as a constant watcher for the dawn, and for +the London mail that in summer months entered about daybreak amongst the +lawny thickets of Maryborough forest, couldst thou, sweet Fanny of the +Bath road, have become the glorified inmate of my dreams? Yet Fanny, as +the loveliest young woman for face and person that perhaps in my whole +life I have beheld, merited the station which even now, from a distance +of forty years, she holds in my dreams; yes, though by links of natural +association she brings along with her a troop of dreadful creatures, +fabulous and not fabulous, that are more abominable to the heart than +Fanny and the dawn are delightful. + +Miss Fanny of the Bath road, strictly speaking, lived at a mile's +distance from that road, but came so continually to meet the mail that +I on my frequent transits rarely missed her, and naturally connected her +image with the great thoroughfare where only I had ever seen her. Why +she came so punctually I do not exactly know; but I believe with some +burden of commissions, to be executed in Bath, which had gathered to +her own residence as a central rendezvous for converging them. The +mail-coachman who drove the Bath mail and wore the royal livery +[Footnote: "Wore the royal livery":--The general impression was that +the royal livery belonged of right to the mail-coachmen as their +professional dress. But that was an error. To the guard it _did_ belong, +I believe, and was obviously essential as an official warrant, and as a +means of instant identification for his person, in the discharge of his +important public duties. But the coachman, and especially if his place +in the series did not connect him immediately with London and the +General Post-Office, obtained the scarlet coat only as an honorary +distinction after long (or, if not long, trying and special) service.] +happened to be Fanny's grandfather. A good man he was, that loved his +beautiful granddaughter, and, loving her wisely, was vigilant over her +deportment in any case where young Oxford might happen to be concerned. +Did my vanity then suggest that I myself, individually, could fall +within the line of his terrors? Certainly not, as regarded any physical +pretensions that I could plead; for Fanny (as a chance passenger from +her own neighbourhood once told me) counted in her train a hundred and +ninety-nine professed admirers, if not open aspirants to her favour; and +probably not one of the whole brigade but excelled myself in personal +advantages. Ulysses even, with the unfair advantage of his accursed bow, +could hardly have undertaken that amount of suitors. So the danger might +have seemed slight--only that woman is universally aristocratic; it is +amongst her nobilities of heart that she _is_ so. Now, the aristocratic +distinctions in my favour might easily with Miss Fanny have compensated +my physical deficiencies. Did I then make love to Fanny? Why, yes; about +as much love as one _could_ make whilst the mail was changing horses--a +process which, ten years later, did not occupy above eighty seconds; but +_then_,--viz., about Waterloo--it occupied five times eighty. Now, four +hundred seconds offer a field quite ample enough for whispering into +a young woman's ear a great deal of truth, and (by way of parenthesis) +some trifle of falsehood. Grandpapa did right, therefore, to watch me. +And yet, as happens too often to the grandpapas of earth in a contest +with the admirers of granddaughters, how vainly would he have watched me +had I meditated any evil whispers to Fanny! She, it is my belief, would +have protected herself against any man's evil suggestions. But he, as +the result showed, could not have intercepted the opportunities for +such suggestions. Yet, why not? Was he not active? Was he not blooming? +Blooming he was as Fanny herself. + +"Say, all our praises why should lords----" + +Stop, that's not the line. + +"Say, all our roses why should girls engross?" + +The coachman showed rosy blossoms on his face deeper even than his +granddaughter's--_his_ being drawn from the ale-cask, Fanny's from +the fountains of the dawn. But, in spite of his blooming face, some +infirmities he had; and one particularly in which he too much resembled +a crocodile. This lay in a monstrous inaptitude for turning round. The +crocodile, I presume, owes that inaptitude to the absurd _length_ of his +back; but in our grandpapa it arose rather from the absurd _breadth_ of +his back, combined, possibly, with some growing stiffness in his legs. +Now, upon this crocodile infirmity of his I planted a human advantage +for tendering my homage to Miss Fanny. In defiance of all his honourable +vigilance, no sooner had he presented to us his mighty Jovian back (what +a field for displaying to mankind his royal scarlet!), whilst inspecting +professionally the buckles, the straps, and the silvery turrets +[Footnote: "_Turrets_":--As one who loves and venerates Chaucer for his +unrivalled merits of tenderness, of picturesque characterisation, and of +narrative skill, I noticed with great pleasure that the word _torrettes_ +is used by him to designate the little devices through which the reins +are made to pass. This same word, in the same exact sense, I heard +uniformly used by many scores of illustrious mail-coachmen to whose +confidential friendship I had the honour of being admitted in my younger +days.] of his harness, than I raised Miss Fanny's hand to my lips, and, +by the mixed tenderness and respectfulness of my manner, caused her +easily to understand how happy it would make me to rank upon her list +as No. 10 or 12: in which case a few casualties amongst her lovers (and, +observe, they _hanged_ liberally in those days) might have promoted me +speedily to the top of the tree; as, on the other hand, with how +much loyalty of submission I acquiesced by anticipation in her award, +supposing that she should plant me in the very rearward of her favour, +as No. 199 + 1. Most truly I loved this beautiful and ingenuous girl; +and, had it not been for the Bath mail, timing all courtships by +post-office allowance, heaven only knows what might have come of it. +People talk of being over head and ears in love; now, the mail was the +cause that I sank only over ears in love,--which, you know, still left a +trifle of brain to overlook the whole conduct of the affair. + +Ah, reader! when I look back upon those days, it seems to me that all +things change--all things perish. "Perish the roses and the palms of +kings": perish even the crowns and trophies of Waterloo: thunder and +lightning are not the thunder and lightning which I remember. Roses +are degenerating. The Fannies of our island--though this I say with +reluctance--are not visibly improving; and the Bath road is notoriously +superannuated. Crocodiles, you will say, are stationary. Mr. Waterton +tells me that the crocodile does _not change_,--that a cayman, in fact, +or an alligator, is just as good for riding upon as he was in the time +of the Pharaohs. _That_ may be; but the reason is that the crocodile +does not live fast--he is a slow coach. I believe it is generally +understood among naturalists that the crocodile is a blockhead. It is +my own impression that the Pharaohs were also blockheads. Now, as +the Pharaohs and the crocodile domineered over Egyptian society, this +accounts for a singular mistake that prevailed through innumerable +generations on the Nile. The crocodile made the ridiculous blunder of +supposing man to be meant chiefly for his own eating. Man, taking a +different view of the subject, naturally met that mistake by another: he +viewed the crocodile as a thing sometimes to worship, but always to +run away from. And this continued till Mr. Waterton [Footnote: "_Mr. +Waterton_":--Had the reader lived through the last generation, he would +not need to be told that, some thirty or thirty-five years back, +Mr. Waterton, a distinguished country gentleman of ancient family in +Northumberland, publicly mounted and rode in top-boots a savage old +crocodile, that was restive and very impertinent, but all to no purpose. +The crocodile jibbed and tried to kick, but vainly. He was no more able +to throw the squire than Sinbad was to throw the old scoundrel who used +his back without paying for it, until he discovered a mode (slightly +immoral, perhaps, though some think not) of murdering the old fraudulent +jockey, and so circuitously of unhorsing him.] changed the relations +between the animals. The mode of escaping from the reptile he showed to +be not by running away, but by leaping on its back booted and spurred. +The two animals had misunderstood each other. The use of the crocodile +has now been cleared up--viz., to be ridden; and the final cause of +man is that he may improve the health of the crocodile by riding him +a-fox-hunting before breakfast. And it is pretty certain that any +crocodile who has been regularly hunted through the season, and is +master of the weight he carries, will take a six-barred gate now as well +as ever he would have done in the infancy of the pyramids. + +If, therefore, the crocodile does _not_ change, all things else +undeniably _do_: even the shadow of the pyramids grows less. And often +the restoration in vision of Fanny and the Bath road makes me too +pathetically sensible of that truth. Out of the darkness, if I happen +to call back the image of Fanny, up rises suddenly from a gulf of forty +years a rose in June; or, if I think for an instant of the rose in +June, up rises the heavenly face of Fanny. One after the other, like the +antiphonies in the choral service, rise Fanny and the rose in June, then +back again the rose in June and Fanny. Then come both together, as in +a chorus--roses and Fannies, Fannies and roses, without end, thick +as blossoms in paradise. Then comes a venerable crocodile, in a royal +livery of scarlet and gold, with sixteen capes; and the crocodile is +driving four-in-hand from the box of the Bath mail. And suddenly we upon +the mail are pulled up by a mighty dial, sculptured with the hours, that +mingle with the heavens and the heavenly host. Then all at once we are +arrived at Marlborough forest, amongst the lovely households [Footnote: +"_Households_":--Roe-deer do not congregate in herds like the fallow +or the red deer, but by separate families, parents and children; which +feature of approximation to the sanctity of human hearths, added to +their comparatively miniature and graceful proportions, conciliates +to them an interest of peculiar tenderness, supposing even that this +beautiful creature is less characteristically impressed with the +grandeurs of savage and forest life.] of the roe-deer; the deer and +their fawns retire into the dewy thickets; the thickets are rich with +roses; once again the roses call up the sweet countenance of Fanny; and +she, being the granddaughter of a crocodile, awakens a dreadful host of +semi-legendary animals--griffins, dragons, basilisks, sphinxes--till +at length the whole vision of fighting images crowds into one towering +armorial shield, a vast emblazonry of human charities and human +loveliness that have perished, but quartered heraldically with +unutterable and demoniac natures, whilst over all rises, as a +surmounting crest, one fair female hand, with the forefinger pointing, +in sweet, sorrowful admonition, upwards to heaven, where is sculptured +the eternal writing which proclaims the frailty of earth and her +children. + + +GOING DOWN WITH VICTORY + + +But the grandest chapter of our experience within the whole mail-coach +service was on those occasions when we went down from London with the +news of victory. A period of about ten years stretched from Trafalgar +to Waterloo; the second and third years of which period (1806 and +1807) were comparatively sterile; but the other nine (from 1805 to 1815 +inclusively) furnished a long succession of victories, the least of +which, in such a contest of Titans, had an inappreciable value of +position: partly for its absolute interference with the plans of our +enemy, but still more from its keeping alive through central Europe the +sense of a deep-seated vulnerability in France. Even to tease the coasts +of our enemy, to mortify them by continual blockades, to insult them +by capturing if it were but a baubling schooner under the eyes of their +arrogant armies, repeated from time to time a sullen proclamation of +power lodged in one quarter to which the hopes of Christendom turned in +secret. How much more loudly must this proclamation have spoken in the +audacity [Footnote: "_Audacity_":--Such the French accounted it; and it +has struck me that Soult would not have been so popular in London, at +the period of her present Majesty's coronation, or in Manchester, +on occasion of his visit to that town, if they had been aware of the +insolence with which he spoke of us in notes written at intervals from +the field of Waterloo. As though it had been mere felony in our army +to look a French one in the face, he said in more notes than one, +dated from two to four P.M. on the field of Waterloo, "Here are the +English--we have them; they are caught _en flagrant délit_" Yet no man +should have known us better; no man had drunk deeper from the cup of +humiliation than Soult had in 1809, when ejected by us with headlong +violence from Oporto, and pursued through a long line of wrecks to the +frontier of Spain; and subsequently at Albuera, in the bloodiest of +recorded battles, to say nothing of Toulouse, he should have learned our +pretensions.] of having bearded the _élite_ of their troops, and having +beaten them in pitched battles! Five years of life it was worth paying +down for the privilege of an outside place on a mail-coach, when +carrying down the first tidings of any such event. And it is to be noted +that, from our insular situation, and the multitude of our frigates +disposable for the rapid transmission of intelligence, rarely did any +unauthorised rumour steal away a prelibation from the first aroma of the +regular despatches. The government news was generally the earliest news. + +From eight P.M. to fifteen or twenty minutes later imagine the mails +assembled on parade in Lombard Street; where, at that time, [Footnote: +"_At that time_":--I speak of the era previous to Waterloo.] and not in +St. Martin's-le-Grand, was seated the General Post-Office. In what exact +strength we mustered I do not remember; but, from the length of each +separate _attelage_, we filled the street, though a long one, and +though we were drawn up in double file. On _any_ night the spectacle +was beautiful. The absolute perfection of all the appointments about the +carriages and the harness, their strength, their brilliant cleanliness, +their beautiful simplicity--but, more than all, the royal magnificence +of the horses--were what might first have fixed the attention. Every +carriage on every morning in the year was taken down to an official +inspector for examination: wheels, axles, linchpins, pole, glasses, +lamps, were all critically probed and tested. Every part of every +carriage had been cleaned, every horse had been groomed, with as much +rigour as if they belonged to a private gentleman; and that part of the +spectacle offered itself always. But the night before us is a night +of victory; and, behold! to the ordinary display what a heart-shaking +addition!--horses, men, carriages, all are dressed in laurels and +flowers, oak-leaves and ribbons. The guards, as being officially his +Majesty's servants, and of the coachmen such as are within the privilege +of the post-office, wear the royal liveries of course; and, as it is +summer (for all the _land_ victories were naturally won in summer), they +wear, on this fine evening, these liveries exposed to view, without any +covering of upper coats. Such a costume, and the elaborate arrangement +of the laurels in their hats, dilate their hearts, by giving to them +openly a personal connexion with the great news in which already they +have the general interest of patriotism. That great national sentiment +surmounts and quells all sense of ordinary distinctions. Those +passengers who happen to be gentlemen are now hardly to be distinguished +as such except by dress; for the usual reserve of their manner in +speaking to the attendants has on this night melted away. One heart, +one pride, one glory, connects every man by the transcendent bond of +his national blood. The spectators, who are numerous beyond precedent, +express their sympathy with these fervent feelings by continual hurrahs. +Every moment are shouted aloud by the post-office servants, and summoned +to draw up, the great ancestral names of cities known to history through +a thousand years--Lincoln, Winchester, Portsmouth, Gloucester, Oxford, +Bristol, Manchester, York, Newcastle, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Perth, +Stirling, Aberdeen--expressing the grandeur of the empire by the +antiquity of its towns, and the grandeur of the mail establishment by +the diffusive radiation of its separate missions. Every moment you hear +the thunder of lids locked down upon the mail-bags. That sound to each +individual mail is the signal for drawing off; which process is the +finest part of the entire spectacle. Then come the horses into play. +Horses! can these be horses that bound off with the action and gestures +of leopards? What stir!--what sea-like ferment!--what a thundering of +wheels!--what a trampling of hoofs!--what a sounding of trumpets!--what +farewell cheers--what redoubling peals of brotherly congratulation, +connecting the name of the particular mail--"Liverpool for ever!"--with +the name of the particular victory--"Badajoz for ever!" or "Salamanca +for ever!" The half-slumbering consciousness that all night long, and +all the next day--perhaps for even a longer period--many of these mails, +like fire racing along a train of gunpowder, will be kindling at +every instant new successions of burning joy, has an obscure effect of +multiplying the victory itself, by multiplying to the imagination into +infinity the stages of its progressive diffusion. A fiery arrow seems +to be let loose, which from that moment is destined to travel, +without intermission, westwards for three hundred [Footnote: "_Three +hundred_":--Of necessity, this scale of measurement, to an American, if +he happens to be a thoughtless man, must sound ludicrous. Accordingly, +I remember a case in which an American writer indulges himself in the +luxury of a little fibbing, by ascribing to an Englishman a pompous +account of the Thames, constructed entirely upon American ideas of +grandeur, and concluding in something like these terms:--"And, sir, +arriving at London, this mighty father of rivers attains a breadth of +at least two furlongs, having, in its winding course, traversed the +astonishing distance of one hundred and seventy miles." And this +the candid American thinks it fair to contrast with the scale of the +Mississippi. Now, it is hardly worth while to answer a pure fiction +gravely; else one might say that no Englishman out of Bedlam ever +thought of looking in an island for the rivers of a continent, nor, +consequently, could have thought of looking for the peculiar grandeur of +the Thames in the length of its course, or in the extent of soil which +it drains. Yet, if he _had_ been so absurd, the American might have +recollected that a river, not to be compared with the Thames even as to +volume of water--viz., the Tiber--has contrived to make itself heard of +in this world for twenty-five centuries to an extent not reached as +yet by any river, however corpulent, of his own land. The glory of +the Thames is measured by the destiny of the population to which it +ministers, by the commerce which it supports, by the grandeur of the +empire in which, though far from the largest, it is the most influential +stream. Upon some such scale, and not by a transfer of Columbian +standards, is the course of our English mails to be valued. The American +may fancy the effect of his own valuations to our English ears by +supposing the case of a Siberian glorifying his country in these +terms:--"These wretches, sir, in France and England, cannot march half a +mile in any direction without finding a house where food can be had and +lodging; whereas such is the noble desolation of our magnificent country +that in many a direction for a thousand miles I will engage that a dog +shall not find shelter from a snow-storm, nor a wren find an apology for +breakfast."] miles--northwards for six hundred; and the sympathy of our +Lombard Street friends at parting is exalted a hundredfold by a sort of +visionary sympathy with the yet slumbering sympathies which in so vast a +succession we are going to awake. + +Liberated from the embarrassments of the city, and issuing into the +broad uncrowded avenues of the northern suburbs, we soon begin to enter +upon our natural pace of ten miles an hour. In the broad light of the +summer evening, the sun, perhaps, only just at the point of setting, we +are seen from every storey of every house. Heads of every age crowd to +the windows; young and old understand the language of our victorious +symbols; and rolling volleys of sympathising cheers run along us, behind +us, and before us. The beggar, rearing himself against the wall, forgets +his lameness--real or assumed--thinks not of his whining trade, but +stands erect, with bold exulting smiles, as we pass him. The victory has +healed him, and says, Be thou whole! Women and children, from garrets +alike and cellars, through infinite London, look down or look up with +loving eyes upon our gay ribbons and our martial laurels; sometimes +kiss their hands; sometimes hang out, as signals of affection, +pocket-handkerchiefs, aprons, dusters, anything that, by catching the +summer breezes, will express an aerial jubilation. On the London side of +Barnet, to which we draw near within a few minutes after nine, observe +that private carriage which is approaching us. The weather being so +warm, the glasses are all down; and one may read, as on the stage of a +theatre, everything that goes on within. It contains three ladies--one +likely to be "mamma," and two of seventeen or eighteen, who are probably +her daughters. What lovely animation, what beautiful unpremeditated +pantomime, explaining to us every syllable that passes, in these +ingenuous girls! By the sudden start and raising of the hands on first +discovering our laurelled equipage, by the sudden movement and appeal to +the elder lady from both of them, and by the heightened colour on their +animated countenances, we can almost hear them saying, "See, see! Look +at their laurels! Oh, mamma! there has been a great battle in Spain; and +it has been a great victory." In a moment we are on the point of passing +them. We passengers--I on the box, and the two on the roof behind +me--raise our hats to the ladies; the coachman makes his professional +salute with the whip; the guard even, though punctilious on the matter +of his dignity as an officer under the crown, touches his hat. The +ladies move to us, in return, with a winning graciousness of gesture; +all smile on each side in a way that nobody could misunderstand, and +that nothing short of a grand national sympathy could so instantaneously +prompt. Will these ladies say that we are nothing to _them_? Oh no; they +will not say _that_. They cannot deny--they do not deny--that for this +night they are our sisters; gentle or simple, scholar or illiterate +servant, for twelve hours to come, we on the outside have the honour +to be their brothers. Those poor women, again, who stop to gaze upon +us with delight at the entrance of Barnet, and seem, by their air of +weariness, to be returning from labour--do you mean to say that they are +washerwomen and charwomen? Oh, my poor friend, you are quite mistaken. I +assure you they stand in a far higher rank; for this one night they feel +themselves by birthright to be daughters of England, and answer to no +humbler title. + +Every joy, however, even rapturous joy--such is the sad law of +earth--may carry with it grief, or fear of grief, to some. Three miles +beyond Barnet, we see approaching us another private carriage, nearly +repeating the circumstances of the former case. Here, also, the glasses +are all down; here, also, is an elderly lady seated; but the two +daughters are missing; for the single young person sitting by the lady's +side seems to be an attendant--so I judge from her dress, and her air +of respectful reserve. The lady is in mourning; and her countenance +expresses sorrow. At first she does not look up; so that I believe she +is not aware of our approach, until she hears the measured beating of +our horses' hoofs. Then she raises her eyes to settle them painfully on +our triumphal equipage. Our decorations explain the case to her at once; +but she beholds them with apparent anxiety, or even with terror. Some +time before this, I, finding it difficult to hit a flying mark when +embarrassed by the coachman's person and reins intervening, had given +to the guard a "Courier" evening paper, containing the gazette, for the +next carriage that might pass. Accordingly he tossed it in, so folded +that the huge capitals expressing some such legend as GLORIOUS VICTORY +might catch the eye at once. To see the paper, however, at all, +interpreted as it was by our ensigns of triumph, explained everything; +and, if the guard were right in thinking the lady to have received it +with a gesture of horror, it could not be doubtful that she had suffered +some deep personal affliction in connexion with this Spanish war. + +Here, now, was the case of one who, having formerly suffered, might, +erroneously perhaps, be distressing herself with anticipations of +another similar suffering. That same night, and hardly three hours +later, occurred the reverse case. A poor woman, who too probably +would find herself, in a day or two, to have suffered the heaviest +of afflictions by the battle, blindly allowed herself to express an +exultation so unmeasured in the news and its details as gave to her the +appearance which amongst Celtic Highlanders is called _fey_. This was at +some little town where we changed horses an hour or two after midnight. +Some fair or wake had kept the people up out of their beds, and had +occasioned a partial illumination of the stalls and booths, presenting +an unusual but very impressive effect. We saw many lights moving about +as we drew near; and perhaps the most striking scene on the whole +route was our reception at this place. The flashing of torches and the +beautiful radiance of blue lights (technically, Bengal lights) upon +the heads of our horses; the fine effect of such a showery and ghostly +illumination falling upon our flowers and glittering laurels [Footnote: +"_Glittering laurels_":--I must observe that the colour of _green_ +suffers almost a spiritual change and exaltation under the effect of +Bengal lights.]; whilst all around ourselves, that formed a centre of +light, the darkness gathered on the rear and flanks in massy blackness: +these optical splendours, together with the prodigious enthusiasm of the +people, composed a picture at once scenical and affecting, theatrical +and holy. As we staid for three or four minutes, I alighted; and +immediately from a dismantled stall in the street, where no doubt she +had been presiding through the earlier part of the night, advanced +eagerly a middle-aged woman. The sight of my newspaper it was that had +drawn her attention upon myself. The victory which we were carrying +down to the provinces on _this_ occasion was the imperfect one of +Talavera--imperfect for its results, such was the virtual treachery of +the Spanish general, Cuesta, but not imperfect in its ever-memorable +heroism. I told her the main outline of the battle. The agitation of +her enthusiasm had been so conspicuous when listening, and when first +applying for information, that I could not but ask her if she had not +some relative in the Peninsular army. Oh yes; her only son was there. +In what regiment? He was a trooper in the 23d Dragoons. My heart sank +within me as she made that answer. This sublime regiment, which an +Englishman should never mention without raising his hat to their memory, +had made the most memorable and effective charge recorded in military +annals. They leaped their horses--_over_ a trench where they could; +_into_ it, and with the result of death or mutilation, when they could +_not_. What proportion cleared the trench is nowhere stated. Those +who _did_ closed up and went down upon the enemy with such divinity of +fervour (I use the word _divinity_ by design: the inspiration of God +must have prompted this movement for those whom even then He was calling +to His presence) that two results followed. As regarded the enemy, this +23d Dragoons, not, I believe, originally three hundred and fifty strong, +paralysed a French column six thousand strong, then ascended the hill, +and fixed the gaze of the whole French army. As regarded themselves, +the 23d were supposed at first to have been barely not annihilated; but +eventually, I believe, about one in four survived. And this, then, was +the regiment--a regiment already for some hours glorified and hallowed +to the ear of all London, as lying stretched, by a large majority, upon +one bloody aceldama--in which the young trooper served whose mother was +now talking in a spirit of such joyous enthusiasm. Did I tell her the +truth? Had I the heart to break up her dreams? No. To-morrow, said I +to myself--to-morrow, or the next day, will publish the worst. For one +night more wherefore should she not sleep in peace? After to-morrow +the chances are too many that peace will forsake her pillow. This brief +respite, then, let her owe to _my_ gift and _my_ forbearance. But, if I +told her not of the bloody price that had been paid, not therefore was +I silent on the contributions from her son's regiment to that day's +service and glory. I showed her not the funeral banners under which the +noble regiment was sleeping. I lifted not the overshadowing laurels from +the bloody trench in which horse and rider lay mangled together. But I +told her how these dear children of England, officers and privates, +had leaped their horses over all obstacles as gaily as hunters to the +morning's chase. I told her how they rode their horses into the midst of +death,--saying to myself, but not saying to _her_ "and laid down their +young lives for thee, O mother England! as willingly--poured out their +noble blood as cheerfully--as ever, after a long day's sport, when +infants, they had rested their weary heads upon their mother's knees, or +had sunk to sleep in her arms." Strange it is, yet true, that she seemed +to have no fears for her son's safety, even after this knowledge +that the 23d Dragoons had been memorably engaged; but so much was she +enraptured by the knowledge that _his_ regiment, and therefore that +_he_, had rendered conspicuous service in the dreadful conflict--a +service which had actually made them, within the last twelve hours, +the foremost topic of conversation in London--so absolutely was fear +swallowed up in joy--that, in the mere simplicity of her fervent nature, +the poor woman threw her arms round my neck, as she thought of her son, +and gave to _me_ the kiss which secretly was meant for _him_. + + +SECTION II--THE VISION OF SUDDEN DEATH + + +What is to be taken as the predominant opinion of man, reflective and +philosophic, upon SUDDEN DEATH? It is remarkable that, in different +conditions of society, sudden death has been variously regarded as the +consummation of an earthly career most fervently to be desired, or, +again, as that consummation which is with most horror to be deprecated. +Cæsar the Dictator, at his last dinner-party (_coena_), on the very +evening before his assassination, when the minutes of his earthly career +were numbered, being asked what death, in _his_ judgment, might be +pronounced the most eligible, replied "That which should be most +sudden." On the other hand, the divine Litany of our English Church, +when breathing forth supplications, as if in some representative +character, for the whole human race prostrate before God, places such +a death in the very van of horrors: "From lightning and tempest; from +plague, pestilence, and famine; from battle and murder, and from SUDDEN +DEATH--_Good Lord, deliver us_." Sudden death is here made to crown the +climax in a grand ascent of calamities; it is ranked among the last of +curses; and yet by the noblest of Romans it was ranked as the first of +blessings. In that difference most readers will see little more than +the essential difference between Christianity and Paganism. But this, +on consideration, I doubt. The Christian Church may be right in its +estimate of sudden death; and it is a natural feeling, though after all +it may also be an infirm one, to wish for a quiet dismissal from +life, as that which _seems_ most reconcilable with meditation, with +penitential retrospects, and with the humilities of farewell prayer. +There does not, however, occur to me any direct scriptural warrant for +this earnest petition of the English Litany, unless under a special +construction of the word "sudden." It seems a petition indulged rather +and conceded to human infirmity than exacted from human piety. It is not +so much a doctrine built upon the eternities of the Christian system +as a plausible opinion built upon special varieties of physical +temperament. Let that, however, be as it may, two remarks suggest +themselves as prudent restraints upon a doctrine which else _may_ +wander, and _has_ wandered, into an uncharitable superstition. The +first is this: that many people are likely to exaggerate the horror of +a sudden death from the disposition to lay a false stress upon words +or acts simply because by an accident they have become _final_ words or +acts. If a man dies, for instance, by some sudden death when he happens +to be intoxicated, such a death is falsely regarded with peculiar +horror; as though the intoxication were suddenly exalted into a +blasphemy. But _that_ is unphilosophic. The man was, or he was not, +_habitually_ a drunkard. If not, if his intoxication were a solitary +accident, there can be no reason for allowing special emphasis to this +act simply because through misfortune it became his final act. Nor, +on the other hand, if it were no accident, but one of his _habitual_ +transgressions, will it be the more habitual or the more a transgression +because some sudden calamity, surprising him, has caused this habitual +transgression to be also a final one. Could the man have had any reason +even dimly to foresee his own sudden death, there would have been a +new feature in his act of intemperance--a feature of presumption and +irreverence, as in one that, having known himself drawing near to the +presence of God, should have suited his demeanour to an expectation +so awful. But this is no part of the case supposed. And the only new +element in the man's act is not any element of special immorality, but +simply of special misfortune. + +The other remark has reference to the meaning of the word _sudden_. +Very possibly Cæsar and the Christian Church do not differ in the way +supposed,--that is, do not differ by any difference of doctrine as +between Pagan and Christian views of the moral temper appropriate +to death; but perhaps they are contemplating different cases. Both +contemplate a violent death, a _Biathanatos_--death that is _biaios_, +or, in other words, death that is brought about, not by internal and +spontaneous change, but by active force having its origin from without. +In this meaning the two authorities agree. Thus far they are in +harmony. But the difference is that the Roman by the word "sudden" means +_unlingering_, whereas the Christian Litany by "sudden death" means a +death _without warning_, consequently without any available summons to +religious preparation. The poor mutineer who kneels down to gather into +his heart the bullets from twelve firelocks of his pitying comrades dies +by a most sudden death in Cæsar's sense; one shock, one mighty spasm, +one (possibly _not_ one) groan, and all is over. But, in the sense +of the Litany, the mutineer's death is far from sudden: his offence +originally, his imprisonment, his trial, the interval between his +sentence and its execution, having all furnished him with separate +warnings of his fate--having all summoned him to meet it with solemn +preparation. + +Here at once, in this sharp verbal distinction, we comprehend the +faithful earnestness with which a holy Christian Church pleads on behalf +of her poor departing children that God would vouchsafe to them the +last great privilege and distinction possible on a death-bed, viz., +the opportunity of untroubled preparation for facing this mighty trial. +Sudden death, as a mere variety in the modes of dying where death in +some shape is inevitable, proposes a question of choice which, equally +in the Roman and the Christian sense, will be variously answered +according to each man's variety of temperament. Meantime, one aspect of +sudden death there is, one modification, upon which no doubt can +arise, that of all martyrdoms it is the most agitating--viz., where it +surprises a man under circumstances which offer (or which seem to offer) +some hurrying, flying, inappreciably minute chance of evading it. Sudden +as the danger which it affronts must be any effort by which such an +evasion can be accomplished. Even _that_, even the sickening necessity +for hurrying in extremity where all hurry seems destined to be +vain,--even that anguish is liable to a hideous exasperation in one +particular case: viz., where the appeal is made not exclusively to the +instinct of self-preservation, but to the conscience, on behalf of some +other life besides your own, accidentally thrown upon _your_ protection. +To fail, to collapse in a service merely your own, might seem +comparatively venial; though, in fact, it is far from venial. But to +fail in a case where Providence has suddenly thrown into your hands the +final interests of another,--a fellow creature shuddering between the +gates of life and death: this, to a man of apprehensive conscience, +would mingle the misery of an atrocious criminality with the misery of a +bloody calamity. You are called upon, by the case supposed, possibly to +die, but to die at the very moment when, by any even partial failure or +effeminate collapse of your energies, you will be self-denounced as a +murderer. You had but the twinkling of an eye for your effort, and that +effort might have been unavailing; but to have risen to the level of +such an effort would have rescued you, though not from dying, yet from +dying as a traitor to your final and farewell duty. + +The situation here contemplated exposes a dreadful ulcer, lurking far +down in the depths of human nature. It is not that men generally are +summoned to face such awful trials. But potentially, and in shadowy +outline, such a trial is moving subterraneously in perhaps all men's +natures. Upon the secret mirror of our dreams such a trial is darkly +projected, perhaps, to every one of us. That dream, so familiar to +childhood, of meeting a lion, and, through languishing prostration in +hope and the energies of hope, that constant sequel of lying down before +the lion publishes the secret frailty of human nature--reveals its +deep-seated falsehood to itself--records its abysmal treachery. Perhaps +not one of us escapes that dream; perhaps, as by some sorrowful doom of +man, that dream repeats for every one of us, through every generation, +the original temptation in Eden. Every one of us, in this dream, has a +bait offered to the infirm places of his own individual will; once again +a snare is presented for tempting him into captivity to a luxury of +ruin; once again, as in aboriginal Paradise, the man falls by his +own choice; again, by infinite iteration, the ancient earth groans +to Heaven, through her secret caves, over the weakness of her child. +"Nature, from her seat, sighing through all her works," again "gives +signs of woe that all is lost"; and again the counter-sigh is repeated +to the sorrowing heavens for the endless rebellion against God. It is +not without probability that in the world of dreams every one of us +ratifies for himself the original transgression. In dreams, perhaps +under some secret conflict of the midnight sleeper, lighted up to the +consciousness at the time, but darkened to the memory as soon as all +is finished, each several child of our mysterious race completes for +himself the treason of the aboriginal fall. + +The incident, so memorable in itself by its features of horror, and so +scenical by its grouping for the eye, which furnished the text for this +reverie upon _Sudden Death_ occurred to myself in the dead of night, +as a solitary spectator, when seated on the box of the Manchester and +Glasgow mail, in the second or third summer after Waterloo. I find it +necessary to relate the circumstances, because they are such as could +not have occurred unless under a singular combination of accidents. +In those days, the oblique and lateral communications with many rural +post-offices were so arranged, either through necessity or through +defect of system, as to make it requisite for the main north-western +mail (_i.e._, the _down_ mail) on reaching Manchester to halt for a +number of hours; how many, I do not remember; six or seven, I think; but +the result was that, in the ordinary course, the mail recommenced its +journey northwards about midnight. Wearied with the long detention at a +gloomy hotel, I walked out about eleven o'clock at night for the sake +of fresh air; meaning to fall in with the mail and resume my seat at +the post-office. The night, however, being yet dark, as the moon had +scarcely risen, and the streets being at that hour empty, so as to offer +no opportunities for asking the road, I lost my way, and did not reach +the post-office until it was considerably past midnight; but, to my +great relief (as it was important for me to be in Westmoreland by the +morning), I saw in the huge saucer eyes of the mail, blazing through +the gloom, an evidence that my chance was not yet lost. Past the time +it was; but, by some rare accident, the mail was not even yet ready to +start. I ascended to my seat on the box, where my cloak was still lying +as it had lain at the Bridgewater Arms. I had left it there in imitation +of a nautical discoverer, who leaves a bit of bunting on the shore of +his discovery, by way of warning off the ground the whole human race, +and notifying to the Christian and the heathen worlds, with his best +compliments, that he has hoisted his pocket-handkerchief once and for +ever upon that virgin soil: thenceforward claiming the _jus dominii_ to +the top of the atmosphere above it, and also the right of driving shafts +to the centre of the earth below it; so that all people found after this +warning either aloft in upper chambers of the atmosphere, or groping +in subterraneous shafts, or squatting audaciously on the surface of +the soil, will be treated as trespassers--kicked, that is to say, +or decapitated, as circumstances may suggest, by their very faithful +servant, the owner of the said pocket-handkerchief. In the present case, +it is probable that my cloak might not have been respected, and the +_jus gentium_ might have been cruelly violated in my person--for, in +the dark, people commit deeds of darkness, gas being a great ally of +morality; but it so happened that on this night there was no other +outside passenger; and thus the crime, which else was but too probable, +missed fire for want of a criminal. + +Having mounted the box, I took a small quantity of laudanum, having +already travelled two hundred and fifty miles--viz., from a point +seventy miles beyond London. In the taking of laudanum there was nothing +extraordinary. But by accident it drew upon me the special attention +of my assessor on the box, the coachman. And in _that_ also there was +nothing extraordinary. But by accident, and with great delight, it drew +my own attention to the fact that this coachman was a monster in point +of bulk, and that he had but one eye. In fact, he had been foretold by +Virgil as + + "Monstrum horrendum, informe, ingens, cui lumen ademptum." + +He answered to the conditions in every one of the items:--1, a monster +he was; 2, dreadful; 3, shapeless; 4, huge; 5, who had lost an eye. But +why should _that_ delight me? Had he been one of the Calendars in the +"Arabian Nights," and had paid down his eye as the price of his criminal +curiosity, what right had _I_ to exult in his misfortune? I did _not_ +exult; I delighted in no man's punishment, though it were even merited. +But these personal distinctions (Nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5) identified in an +instant an old friend of mine whom I had known in the south for some +years as the most masterly of mail-coachmen. He was the man in all +Europe that could (if _any_ could) have driven six-in-hand full +gallop over _Al Sirat_--that dreadful bridge of Mahomet, with no side +battlements, and of _extra_ room not enough for a razor's edge--leading +right across the bottomless gulf. Under this eminent man, whom in Greek +I cognominated Cyclops _Diphrélates_ (Cyclops the Charioteer), I, and +others known to me, studied the diphrelatic art. Excuse, reader, a word +too elegant to be pedantic. As a pupil, though I paid extra fees, it is +to be lamented that I did not stand high in his esteem. It showed his +dogged honesty (though, observe, not his discernment) that he could +not see my merits. Let us excuse his absurdity in this particular by +remembering his want of an eye. Doubtless _that_ made him blind to my +merits. In the art of conversation, however, he admitted that I had the +whip-hand of him. On the present occasion great joy was at our meeting. +But what was Cyclops doing here? Had the medical men recommended +northern air, or how? I collected, from such explanations as he +volunteered, that he had an interest at stake in some suit-at-law now +pending at Lancaster; so that probably he had got himself transferred +to this station for the purpose of connecting with his professional +pursuits an instant readiness for the calls of his lawsuit. + +Meantime, what are we stopping for? Surely we have now waited long +enough. Oh, this procrastinating mail, and this procrastinating +post-office! Can't they take a lesson upon that subject from _me_? Some +people have called _me_ procrastinating. Yet you are witness, reader, +that I was here kept waiting for the post-office. Will the post-office +lay its hand on its heart, in its moments of sobriety, and assert that +ever it waited for me? What are they about? The guard tells me that +there is a large extra accumulation of foreign mails this night, owing +to irregularities caused by war, by wind, by weather, in the packet +service, which as yet does not benefit at all by steam. For an _extra_ +hour, it seems, the post-office has been engaged in threshing out the +pure wheaten correspondence of Glasgow, and winnowing it from the chaff +of all baser intermediate towns. But at last all is finished. Sound your +horn, guard! Manchester, good-bye! we've lost an hour by your criminal +conduct at the post-office: which, however, though I do not mean to part +with a serviceable ground of complaint, and one which really _is_ such +for the horses, to me secretly is an advantage, since it compels us to +look sharply for this lost hour amongst the next eight or nine, and to +recover it (if we can) at the rate of one mile extra per hour. Off we +are at last, and at eleven miles an hour; and for the moment I detect no +changes in the energy or in the skill of Cyclops. + +From Manchester to Kendal, which virtually (though not in law) is the +capital of Westmoreland, there were at this time seven stages of eleven +miles each. The first five of these, counting from Manchester, terminate +in Lancaster; which is therefore fifty-five miles north of Manchester, +and the same distance exactly from Liverpool. The first three stages +terminate in Preston (called, by way of distinction from other towns +of that name, _Proud_ Preston); at which place it is that the separate +roads from Liverpool and from Manchester to the north become confluent. +[Footnote: "_Confluent_":--Suppose a capital Y (the Pythagorean letter): +Lancaster is at the foot of this letter; Liverpool at the top of the +_right_ branch; Manchester at the top of the _left_; Proud Preston at +the centre, where the two branches unite. It is thirty-three miles +along either of the two branches; it is twenty-two miles along the +stem,--viz., from Preston in the middle to Lancaster at the root. +There's a lesson in geography for the reader!] Within these first three +stages lay the foundation, the progress, and termination of our night's +adventure. During the first stage, I found out that Cyclops was +mortal: he was liable to the shocking affection of sleep--a thing which +previously I had never suspected. If a man indulges in the vicious habit +of sleeping, all the skill in aurigation of Apollo himself, with the +horses of Aurora to execute his notions, avails him nothing. "Oh, +Cyclops!" I exclaimed, "thou art mortal. My friend, thou snorest." +Through the first eleven miles, however, this infirmity--which I grieve +to say that he shared with the whole Pagan Pantheon--betrayed itself +only by brief snatches. On waking up, he made an apology for himself +which, instead of mending matters, laid open a gloomy vista of coming +disasters. The summer assizes, he reminded me, were now going on at +Lancaster: in consequence of which for three nights and three days he +had not lain down on a bed. During the day he was waiting for his own +summons as a witness on the trial in which he was interested, or else, +lest he should be missing at the critical moment, was drinking with the +other witnesses under the pastoral surveillance of the attorneys. During +the night, or that part of it which at sea would form the middle watch, +he was driving. This explanation certainly accounted for his drowsiness, +but in a way which made it much more alarming; since now, after several +days' resistance to this infirmity, at length he was steadily giving +way. Throughout the second stage he grew more and more drowsy. In +the second mile of the third stage he surrendered himself finally and +without a struggle to his perilous temptation. All his past resistance +had but deepened the weight of this final oppression. Seven atmospheres +of sleep rested upon him; and, to consummate the case, our worthy guard, +after singing "Love amongst the Roses" for perhaps thirty times, without +invitation and without applause, had in revenge moodily resigned himself +to slumber--not so deep, doubtless, as the coachman's, but deep enough +for mischief. And thus at last, about ten miles from Preston, it came +about that I found myself left in charge of his Majesty's London and +Glasgow mail, then running at the least twelve miles an hour. + +What made this negligence less criminal than else it must have been +thought was the condition of the roads at night during the assizes. +At that time, all the law business of populous Liverpool, and also of +populous Manchester, with its vast cincture of populous rural districts, +was called up by ancient usage to the tribunal of Lilliputian Lancaster. +To break up this old traditional usage required, 1, a conflict with +powerful established interests, 2, a large system of new arrangements, +and 3, a new parliamentary statute. But as yet this change was merely in +contemplation. As things were at present, twice in the year [Footnote: +"_Twice in the year_":--There were at that time only two assizes even +in the most populous counties--viz., the Lent Assizes and the Summer +Assizes.] so vast a body of business rolled northwards from the southern +quarter of the county that for a fortnight at least it occupied the +severe exertions of two judges in its despatch. The consequence of this +was that every horse available for such a service, along the whole line +of road, was exhausted in carrying down the multitudes of people who +were parties to the different suits. By sunset, therefore, it usually +happened that, through utter exhaustion amongst men and horses, the road +sank into profound silence. Except the exhaustion in the vast adjacent +county of York from a contested election, no such silence succeeding to +no such fiery uproar was ever witnessed in England. + +On this occasion the usual silence and solitude prevailed along the +road. Not a hoof nor a wheel was to be heard. And, to strengthen this +false luxurious confidence in the noiseless roads, it happened also +that the night was one of peculiar solemnity and peace. For my own +part, though slightly alive to the possibilities of peril, I had so far +yielded to the influence of the mighty calm as to sink into a profound +reverie. The month was August; in the middle of which lay my own +birthday--a festival to every thoughtful man suggesting solemn and often +sigh-born [Footnote: "_Sigh-born_":--I owe the suggestion of this +word to an obscure remembrance of a beautiful phrase in "Giraldus +Cambrensis"--viz., _suspiriosæ cogitationes_.] thoughts. The county was +my own native county--upon which, in its southern section, more than +upon any equal area known to man past or present, had descended the +original curse of labour in its heaviest form, not mastering the bodies +only of men, as of slaves, or criminals in mines, but working through +the fiery will. Upon no equal space of earth was, or ever had been, the +same energy of human power put forth daily. At this particular season +also of the assizes, that dreadful hurricane of flight and pursuit, as +it might have seemed to a stranger, which swept to and from Lancaster +all day long, hunting the county up and down, and regularly subsiding +back into silence about sunset, could not fail (when united with this +permanent distinction of Lancashire as the very metropolis and citadel +of labour) to point the thoughts pathetically upon that counter-vision +of rest, of saintly repose from strife and sorrow, towards which, as +to their secret haven, the profounder aspirations of man's heart are in +solitude continually travelling. Obliquely upon our left we were nearing +the sea; which also must, under the present circumstances, be repeating +the general state of halcyon repose. The sea, the atmosphere, the light, +bore each an orchestral part in this universal lull. Moonlight and the +first timid tremblings of the dawn were by this time blending; and the +blendings were brought into a still more exquisite state of unity by a +slight silvery mist, motionless and dreamy, that covered the woods and +fields, but with a veil of equable transparency. Except the feet of +our own horses,--which, running on a sandy margin of the road, made but +little disturbance,--there was no sound abroad. In the clouds and on the +earth prevailed the same majestic peace; and, in spite of all that +the villain of a schoolmaster has done for the ruin of our sublimer +thoughts, which are the thoughts of our infancy, we still believe in no +such nonsense as a limited atmosphere. Whatever we may swear with our +false feigning lips, in our faithful hearts we still believe, and must +for ever believe, in fields of air traversing the total gulf between +earth and the central heavens. Still, in the confidence of children that +tread without fear every chamber in their father's house, and to whom no +door is closed, we, in that Sabbatic vision which sometimes is revealed +for an hour upon nights like this, ascend with easy steps from the +sorrow-stricken fields of earth upwards to the sandals of God. + +Suddenly, from thoughts like these I was awakened to a sullen sound, as +of some motion on the distant road. It stole upon the air for a moment; +I listened in awe; but then it died away. Once roused, however, I could +not but observe with alarm the quickened motion of our horses. Ten +years' experience had made my eye learned in the valuing of motion; and +I saw that we were now running thirteen miles an hour. I pretend to no +presence of mind. On the contrary, my fear is that I am miserably and +shamefully deficient in that quality as regards action. The palsy of +doubt and distraction hangs like some guilty weight of dark unfathomed +remembrances upon my energies when the signal is flying for _action_. +But, on the other hand, this accursed gift I have, as regards _thought_, +that in the first step towards the possibility of a misfortune I see its +total evolution; in the radix of the series I see too certainly and too +instantly its entire expansion; in the first syllable of the dreadful +sentence I read already the last. It was not that I feared for +ourselves. _Us_ our bulk and impetus charmed against peril in any +collision. And I had ridden through too many hundreds of perils that +were frightful to approach, that were matter of laughter to look back +upon, the first face of which was horror, the parting face a jest--for +any anxiety to rest upon _our_ interests. The mail was not built, I +felt assured, nor bespoke, that could betray _me_ who trusted to its +protection. But any carriage that we could meet would be frail and light +in comparison of ourselves. And I remarked this ominous accident of our +situation,--we were on the wrong side of the road. But then, it may be +said, the other party, if other there was, might also be on the wrong +side; and two wrongs might make a right. _That_ was not likely. The same +motive which had drawn _us_ to the right-hand side of the road--viz., +the luxury of the soft beaten sand as contrasted with the paved +centre--would prove attractive to others. The two adverse carriages +would therefore, to a certainty, be travelling on the same side; and +from this side, as not being ours in law, the crossing over to the other +would, of course, be looked for from _us_. [Footnote: It is true that, +according to the law of the case as established by legal precedents, +all carriages were required to give way before royal equipages, and +therefore before the mail as one of them. But this only increased +the danger, as being a regulation very imperfectly made known, very +unequally enforced, and therefore often embarrassing the movements on +both sides.] Our lamps, still lighted, would give the impression of +vigilance on our part. And every creature that met us would rely upon +_us_ for quartering. [Footnote: "_Quartering_":--This is the technical +word, and, I presume, derived from the French _cartayer_, to evade a +rut or any obstacle.] All this, and if the separate links of the +anticipation had been a thousand times more, I saw, not discursively, +or by effort, or by succession, but by one flash of horrid simultaneous +intuition. + +Under this steady though rapid anticipation of the evil which _might_ be +gathering ahead, ah! what a sullen mystery of fear, what a sigh of woe, +was that which stole upon the air, as again the far-off sound of a +wheel was heard! A whisper it was--a whisper from, perhaps, four miles +off--secretly announcing a ruin that, being foreseen, was not the less +inevitable; that, being known, was not therefore healed. What could be +done--who was it that could do it--to check the storm-flight of these +maniacal horses? Could I not seize the reins from the grasp of the +slumbering coachman? You, reader, think that it would have been in +_your_ power to do so. And I quarrel not with your estimate of yourself. +But, from the way in which the coachman's hand was viced between his +upper and lower thigh, this was impossible. Easy was it? See, then, +that bronze equestrian statue. The cruel rider has kept the bit in +his horse's mouth for two centuries. Unbridle him for a minute, if you +please, and wash his mouth with water. Easy was it? Unhorse me, then, +that imperial rider; knock me those marble feet from those marble +stirrups of Charlemagne. + +The sounds ahead strengthened, and were now too clearly the sounds of +wheels. Who and what could it be? Was it industry in a taxed cart? Was +it youthful gaiety in a gig? Was it sorrow that loitered, or joy that +raced? For as yet the snatches of sound were too intermitting, from +distance, to decipher the character of the motion. Whoever were the +travellers, something must be done to warn them. Upon the other party +rests the active responsibility, but upon _us_--and, woe is me! +that _us_ was reduced to my frail opium-shattered self--rests the +responsibility of warning. Yet, how should this be accomplished? Might I +not sound the guard's horn? Already, on the first thought, I was making +my way over the roof of the guard's seat. But this, from the accident +which I have mentioned, of the foreign mails being piled upon the roof, +was a difficult and even dangerous attempt to one cramped by nearly +three hundred miles of outside travelling. And, fortunately, before I +had lost much time in the attempt, our frantic horses swept round +an angle of the road which opened upon us that final stage where the +collision must be accomplished and the catastrophe sealed. All was +apparently finished. The court was sitting; the case was heard; the +judge had finished; and only the verdict was yet in arrear. + +Before us lay an avenue straight as an arrow, six hundred yards, +perhaps, in length; and the umbrageous trees, which rose in a regular +line from either side, meeting high overhead, gave to it the character +of a cathedral aisle. These trees lent a deeper solemnity to the early +light; but there was still light enough to perceive, at the further end +of this Gothic aisle, a frail reedy gig, in which were seated a young +man, and by his side a young lady. Ah, young sir! what are you about? +If it is requisite that you should whisper your communications to this +young lady--though really I see nobody, at an hour and on a road so +solitary, likely to overhear you--is it therefore requisite that you +should carry your lips forward to hers? The little carriage is creeping +on at one mile an hour; and the parties within it, being thus tenderly +engaged, are naturally bending down their heads. Between them and +eternity, to all human calculation, there is but a minute and a half. Oh +heavens! what is it that I shall do? Speaking or acting, what help can +I offer? Strange it is, and to a mere auditor of the tale might seem +laughable, that I should need a suggestion from the "Iliad" to prompt +the sole resource that remained. Yet so it was. Suddenly I remembered +the shout of Achilles, and its effect. But could I pretend to shout like +the son of Peleus, aided by Pallas? No: but then I needed not the shout +that should alarm all Asia militant; such a shout would suffice as might +carry terror into the hearts of two thoughtless young people and one +gig-horse. I shouted--and the young man heard me not. A second time I +shouted--and now he heard me, for now he raised his head. + +Here, then, all had been done that, by me, _could_ be done; more on _my_ +part was not possible. Mine had been the first step; the second was for +the young man; the third was for God. If, said I, this stranger is a +brave man, and if indeed he loves the young girl at his side--or, loving +her not, if he feels the obligation, pressing upon every man worthy +to be called a man, of doing his utmost for a woman confided to his +protection--he will at least make some effort to save her. If _that_ +fails, he will not perish the more, or by a death more cruel, for having +made it; and he will die as a brave man should, with his face to the +danger, and with his arm about the woman that he sought in vain to +save. But, if he makes no effort,--shrinking without a struggle from his +duty,--he himself will not the less certainly perish for this baseness +of poltroonery. He will die no less: and why not? Wherefore should we +grieve that there is one craven less in the world? No; _let_ him perish, +without a pitying thought of ours wasted upon him; and, in that case, +all our grief will be reserved for the fate of the helpless girl who +now, upon the least shadow of failure in _him_, must by the fiercest +of translations--must without time for a prayer--must within seventy +seconds stand before the judgment-seat of God. + +But craven he was not: sudden had been the call upon him, and sudden was +his answer to the call. He saw, he heard, he comprehended, the ruin +that was coming down: already its gloomy shadow darkened above him; and +already he was measuring his strength to deal with it. Ah! what a vulgar +thing does courage seem when we see nations buying it and selling it for +a shilling a-day: ah! what a sublime thing does courage seem when some +fearful summons on the great deeps of life carries a man, as if running +before a hurricane, up to the giddy crest of some tumultuous crisis from +which lie two courses, and a voice says to him audibly, "One way lies +hope; take the other, and mourn for ever!" How grand a triumph if, even +then, amidst the raving of all around him, and the frenzy of the danger, +the man is able to confront his situation--is able to retire for a +moment into solitude with God, and to seek his counsel from _Him!_ + +For seven seconds, it might be, of his seventy, the stranger settled his +countenance steadfastly upon us, as if to search and value every element +in the conflict before him. For five seconds more of his seventy he sat +immovably, like one that mused on some great purpose. For five more, +perhaps, he sat with eyes upraised, like one that prayed in sorrow, +under some extremity of doubt, for light that should guide him to the +better choice. Then suddenly he rose; stood upright; and, by a powerful +strain upon the reins, raising his horse's fore-feet from the ground, +he slewed him round on the pivot of his hind-legs, so as to plant the +little equipage in a position nearly at right angles to ours. Thus far +his condition was not improved; except as a first step had been taken +towards the possibility of a second. If no more were done, nothing was +done; for the little carriage still occupied the very centre of our +path, though in an altered direction. Yet even now it may not be too +late: fifteen of the seventy seconds may still be unexhausted; and one +almighty bound may avail to clear the ground. Hurry, then, hurry! for +the flying moments--_they_ hurry. Oh, hurry, hurry, my brave young +man! for the cruel hoofs of our horses--_they_ also hurry! Fast are the +flying moments, faster are the hoofs of our horses. But fear not for +_him_, if human energy can suffice; faithful was he that drove to his +terrific duty; faithful was the horse to _his_ command. One blow, one +impulse given with voice and hand, by the stranger, one rush from the +horse, one bound as if in the act of rising to a fence, landed the +docile creature's forefeet upon the crown or arching centre of the +road. The larger half of the little equipage had then cleared our +over-towering shadow: _that_ was evident even to my own agitated sight. +But it mattered little that one wreck should float off in safety if upon +the wreck that perished were embarked the human freightage. The rear +part of the carriage--was _that_ certainly beyond the line of absolute +ruin? What power could answer the question? Glance of eye, thought of +man, wing of angel, which of these had speed enough to sweep between the +question and the answer, and divide the one from the other? Light +does not tread upon the steps of light more indivisibly than did our +all-conquering arrival upon the escaping efforts of the gig. _That_ must +the young man have felt too plainly. His back was now turned to us; not +by sight could he any longer communicate with the peril; but, by the +dreadful rattle of our harness, too truly had his ear been instructed +that all was finished as regarded any effort of _his_. Already in +resignation he had rested from his struggle; and perhaps in his heart he +was whispering, "Father, which art in heaven, do Thou finish above what +I on earth have attempted." Faster than ever mill-race we ran past +them in our inexorable flight. Oh, raving of hurricanes that must have +sounded in their young ears at the moment of our transit! Even in +that moment the thunder of collision spoke aloud. Either with the +swingle-bar, or with the haunch of our near leader, we had struck the +off-wheel of the little gig; which stood rather obliquely, and not quite +so far advanced as to be accurately parallel with the near-wheel. The +blow, from the fury of our passage, resounded terrifically. I rose in +horror, to gaze upon the ruins we might have caused. From my elevated +station I looked down, and looked back upon the scene; which in a moment +told its own tale, and wrote all its records on my heart for ever. + +Here was the map of the passion that now had finished. The horse was +planted immovably, with his fore-feet upon the paved crest of the +central road. He of the whole party might be supposed untouched by the +passion of death. The little cany carriage--partly, perhaps, from the +violent torsion of the wheels in its recent movement, partly from the +thundering blow we had given to it--as if it sympathised with human +horror, was all alive with tremblings and shiverings. The young man +trembled not, nor shivered. He sat like a rock. But _his_ was the +steadiness of agitation frozen into rest by horror. As yet he dared not +to look round; for he knew that, if anything remained to do, by him it +could no longer be done. And as yet he knew not for certain if their +safety were accomplished. But the lady-- + +But the lady--! Oh, heavens! will that spectacle ever depart from my +dreams, as she rose and sank upon her seat, sank and rose, threw up her +arms wildly to heaven, clutched at some visionary object in the air, +fainting, praying, raving, despairing? Figure to yourself, reader, +the elements of the case; suffer me to recall before your mind the +circumstances of that unparalleled situation. From the silence and deep +peace of this saintly summer night--from the pathetic blending of this +sweet moonlight, dawnlight, dreamlight--from the manly tenderness of +this flattering, whispering, murmuring love--suddenly as from the +woods and fields--suddenly as from the chambers of the air opening in +revelation--suddenly as from the ground yawning at her feet, leaped upon +her, with the flashing of cataracts, Death the crowned phantom, with all +the equipage of his terrors, and the tiger roar of his voice. + +The moments were numbered; the strife was finished; the vision was +closed. In the twinkling of an eye, our flying horses had carried us to +the termination of the umbrageous aisle; at the right angles we wheeled +into our former direction; the turn of the road carried the scene out of +my eyes in an instant, and swept it into my dreams for ever. + + +SECTION III--DREAM-FUGUE: + +FOUNDED ON THE PRECEDING THEME OF SUDDEN DEATH + + "Whence the sound + Of instruments, that made melodious chime, + Was heard, of harp and organ; and who moved + Their stops and chords was seen; his volant touch + Instinct through all proportions, low and high, + Fled and pursued transverse the resonant fugue." + _Par. Lost_, Bk. XI. + +_Tumultuosissimamente_ + + +Passion of sudden death! that once in youth I read and interpreted by +the shadows of thy averted signs [Footnote: "_Averted signs_":--I read +the course and changes of the lady's agony in the succession of her +involuntary gestures; but it must be remembered that I read all this +from the rear, never once catching the lady's full face, and even her +profile imperfectly.]!--rapture of panic taking the shape (which +amongst tombs in churches I have seen) of woman bursting her sepulchral +bonds--of woman's Ionic form bending forward from the ruins of her +grave with arching foot, with eyes upraised, with clasped adoring +hands--waiting, watching, trembling, praying for the trumpet's call to +rise from dust for ever! Ah, vision too fearful of shuddering humanity +on the brink of almighty abysses!--vision that didst start back, that +didst reel away, like a shrivelling scroll from before the wrath of fire +racing on the wings of the wind! Epilepsy so brief of horror, wherefore +is it that thou canst not die? Passing so suddenly into darkness, +wherefore is it that still thou sheddest thy sad funeral blights upon +the gorgeous mosaics of dreams? Fragment of music too passionate, heard +once, and heard no more, what aileth thee, that thy deep rolling chords +come up at intervals through all the worlds of sleep, and after forty +years have lost no element of horror? + + +I + + +Lo, it is summer--almighty summer! The everlasting gates of life and +summer are thrown open wide; and on the ocean, tranquil and verdant as +a savannah, the unknown lady from the dreadful vision and I myself are +floating--she upon a fairy pinnace, and I upon an English three-decker. +Both of us are wooing gales of festal happiness within the domain of +our common country, within that ancient watery park, within the pathless +chase of ocean, where England takes her pleasure as a huntress through +winter and summer, from the rising to the setting sun. Ah, what a +wilderness of floral beauty was hidden, or was suddenly revealed, upon +the tropic islands through which the pinnace moved! And upon her deck +what a bevy of human flowers: young women how lovely, young men how +noble, that were dancing together, and slowly drifting towards _us_ +amidst music and incense, amidst blossoms from forests and gorgeous +corymbi from vintages, amidst natural carolling, and the echoes of sweet +girlish laughter. Slowly the pinnace nears us, gaily she hails us, and +silently she disappears beneath the shadow of our mighty bows. But then, +as at some signal from heaven, the music, and the carols, and the sweet +echoing of girlish laughter--all are hushed. What evil has smitten the +pinnace, meeting or overtaking her? Did ruin to our friends couch within +our own dreadful shadow? Was our shadow the shadow of death? I looked +over the bow for an answer, and, behold! the pinnace was dismantled; the +revel and the revellers were found no more; the glory of the vintage was +dust; and the forests with their beauty were left without a witness upon +the seas. "But where," and I turned to our crew--"where are the lovely +women that danced beneath the awning of flowers and clustering corymbi? +Whither have fled the noble young men that danced with _them_?" Answer +there was none. But suddenly the man at the mast-head, whose countenance +darkened with alarm, cried out, "Sail on the weather beam! Down she +comes upon us: in seventy seconds she also will founder." + + +II + + +I looked to the weather side, and the summer had departed. The sea was +rocking, and shaken with gathering wrath. Upon its surface sat mighty +mists, which grouped themselves into arches and long cathedral aisles. +Down one of these, with the fiery pace of a quarrel from a cross-bow, +ran a frigate right athwart our course. "Are they mad?" some voice +exclaimed from our deck. "Do they woo their ruin?" But in a moment, as +she was close upon us, some impulse of a heady current or local vortex +gave a wheeling bias to her course, and off she forged without a shock. +As she ran past us, high aloft amongst the shrouds stood the lady of +the pinnace. The deeps opened ahead in malice to receive her, towering +surges of foam ran after her, the billows were fierce to catch her. But +far away she was borne into desert spaces of the sea: whilst still by +sight I followed her, as she ran before the howling gale, chased by +angry sea-birds and by maddening billows; still I saw her, as at the +moment when she ran past us, standing amongst the shrouds, with her +white draperies streaming before the wind. There she stood, with hair +dishevelled, one hand clutched amongst the tackling--rising, sinking, +fluttering, trembling, praying; there for leagues I saw her as she +stood, raising at intervals one hand to heaven, amidst the fiery crests +of the pursuing waves and the raving of the storm; until at last, upon +a sound from afar of malicious laughter and mockery, all was hidden for +ever in driving showers; and afterwards, but when I knew not, nor how. + + +III + + +Sweet funeral bells from some incalculable distance, wailing over the +dead that die before the dawn, awakened me as I slept in a boat moored +to some familiar shore. The morning twilight even then was breaking; +and, by the dusky revelations which it spread, I saw a girl, adorned +with a garland of white roses about her head for some great festival, +running along the solitary strand in extremity of haste. Her running +was the running of panic; and often she looked back as to some dreadful +enemy in the rear. But, when I leaped ashore, and followed on her steps +to warn her of a peril in front, alas! from me she fled as from another +peril, and vainly I shouted to her of quicksands that lay ahead. Faster +and faster she ran; round a promontory of rocks she wheeled out of +sight; in an instant I also wheeled round it, but only to see the +treacherous sands gathering above her head. Already her person was +buried; only the fair young head and the diadem of white roses around it +were still visible to the pitying heavens; and, last of all, was visible +one white marble arm. I saw by the early twilight this fair young head, +as it was sinking down to darkness--saw this marble arm, as it rose +above her head and her treacherous grave, tossing, faltering, rising, +clutching, as at some false deceiving hand stretched out from the +clouds--saw this marble arm uttering her dying hope, and then uttering +her dying despair. The head, the diadem, the arm--these all had sunk; at +last over these also the cruel quicksand had closed; and no memorial of +the fair young girl remained on earth, except my own solitary tears, and +the funeral bells from the desert seas, that, rising again more softly, +sang a requiem over the grave of the buried child, and over her blighted +dawn. + +I sat, and wept in secret the tears that men have ever given to the +memory of those that died before the dawn, and by the treachery of +earth, our mother. But suddenly the tears and funeral bells were hushed +by a shout as of many nations, and by a roar as from some great king's +artillery, advancing rapidly along the valleys, and heard afar by echoes +from the mountains. "Hush!" I said, as I bent my ear earthwards to +listen--"hush!--this either is the very anarchy of strife, or else"--and +then I listened more profoundly, and whispered as I raised my head--"or +else, oh heavens! it is _victory_ that is final, victory that swallows +up all strife." + + +IV + + +Immediately, in trance, I was carried over land and sea to some distant +kingdom, and placed upon a triumphal car, amongst companions crowned +with laurel. The darkness of gathering midnight, brooding over all the +land, hid from us the mighty crowds that were weaving restlessly about +ourselves as a centre: we heard them, but saw them not. Tidings had +arrived, within an hour, of a grandeur that measured itself against +centuries; too full of pathos they were, too full of joy, to utter +themselves by other language than by tears, by restless anthems, and +_Te Deums_ reverberated from the choirs and orchestras of earth. These +tidings we that sat upon the laurelled car had it for our privilege to +publish amongst all nations. And already, by signs audible through the +darkness, by snortings and tramplings, our angry horses, that knew no +fear or fleshly weariness, upbraided us with delay. Wherefore _was_ it +that we delayed? We waited for a secret word, that should bear witness +to the hope of nations as now accomplished for ever. At midnight +the secret word arrived; which word was--_Waterloo and Recovered +Christendom!_ The dreadful word shone by its own light; before us it +went; high above our leaders' heads it rode, and spread a golden light +over the paths which we traversed. Every city, at the presence of the +secret word, threw open its gates. The rivers were conscious as we +crossed. All the forests, as we ran along their margins, shivered in +homage to the secret word. And the darkness comprehended it. + +Two hours after midnight we approached a mighty Minster. Its gates, +which rose to the clouds, were closed. But, when the dreadful word that +rode before us reached them with its golden light, silently they moved +back upon their hinges; and at a flying gallop our equipage entered the +grand aisle of the cathedral. Headlong was our pace; and at every altar, +in the little chapels and oratories to the right hand and left of our +course, the lamps, dying or sickening, kindled anew in sympathy with the +secret word that was flying past. Forty leagues we might have run in the +cathedral, and as yet no strength of morning light had reached us, when +before us we saw the aerial galleries of organ and choir. Every pinnacle +of fretwork, every station of advantage amongst the traceries, was +crested by white-robed choristers that sang deliverance; that wept no +more tears, as once their fathers had wept; but at intervals that sang +together to the generations, saying, + + "Chant the deliverer's praise in every tongue," + +and receiving answers from afar, + + "Such as once in heaven and earth were sung." + +And of their chanting was no end; of our headlong pace was neither pause +nor slackening. + +Thus as we ran like torrents--thus as we swept with bridal rapture over +the Campo Santo [Footnote: "_Campo Santo_":--It is probable that most +of my readers will be acquainted with the history of the Campo Santo (or +cemetery) at Pisa, composed of earth brought from Jerusalem from a bed +of sanctity as the highest prize which the noble piety of crusaders +could ask or imagine. To readers who are unacquainted with England, or +who (being English) are yet unacquainted with the cathedral cities of +England, it may be right to mention that the graves within-side the +cathedrals often form a flat pavement over which carriages and horses +_might_ run; and perhaps a boyish remembrance of one particular +cathedral, across which I had seen passengers walk and burdens carried, +as about two centuries back they were through the middle of St. +Paul's in London, may have assisted my dream.] of the cathedral +graves--suddenly we became aware of a vast necropolis rising upon +the far-off horizon--a city of sepulchres, built within the saintly +cathedral for the warrior dead that rested from their feuds on earth. Of +purple granite was the necropolis; yet, in the first minute, it lay +like a purple stain upon the horizon, so mighty was the distance. In the +second minute it trembled through many changes, growing into terraces +and towers of wondrous altitude, so mighty was the pace. In the third +minute already, with our dreadful gallop, we were entering its suburbs. +Vast sarcophagi rose on every side, having towers and turrets that, upon +the limits of the central aisle, strode forward with haughty intrusion, +that ran back with mighty shadows into answering recesses. Every +sarcophagus showed many bas-reliefs--bas-reliefs of battles and of +battle-fields; battles from forgotten ages, battles from yesterday; +battle-fields that, long since, nature had healed and reconciled to +herself with the sweet oblivion of flowers; battle-fields that were yet +angry and crimson with carnage. Where the terraces ran, there did _we_ +run; where the towers curved, there did _we_ curve. With the flight +of swallows our horses swept round every angle. Like rivers in flood +wheeling round headlands, like hurricanes that ride into the secrets of +forests, faster than ever light unwove the mazes of darkness, our flying +equipage carried earthly passions, kindled warrior instincts, amongst +the dust that lay around us--dust oftentimes of our noble fathers that +had slept in God from Crécy to Trafalgar. And now had we reached the +last sarcophagus, now were we abreast of the last bas-relief, already +had we recovered the arrow-like flight of the illimitable central aisle, +when coming up this aisle to meet us we beheld afar off a female child, +that rode in a carriage as frail as flowers. The mists which went before +her hid the fawns that drew her, but could not hide the shells and +tropic flowers with which she played--but could not hide the lovely +smiles by which she uttered her trust in the mighty cathedral, and in +the cherubim that looked down upon her from the mighty shafts of its +pillars. Face to face she was meeting us; face to face she rode, as +if danger there were none. "Oh, baby!" I exclaimed, "shalt thou be the +ransom for Waterloo? Must we, that carry tidings of great joy to every +people, be messengers of ruin to thee!" In horror I rose at the thought; +but then also, in horror at the thought, rose one that was sculptured +on a bas-relief--a Dying Trumpeter. Solemnly from the field of battle he +rose to his feet; and, unslinging his stony trumpet, carried it, in his +dying anguish, to his stony lips--sounding once, and yet once again; +proclamation that, in _thy_ ears, oh baby! spoke from the battlements of +death. Immediately deep shadows fell between us, and aboriginal silence. +The choir had ceased to sing. The hoofs of our horses, the dreadful +rattle of our harness, the groaning of our wheels, alarmed the graves +no more. By horror the bas-relief had been unlocked unto life. By horror +we, that were so full of life, we men and our horses, with their fiery +fore-legs rising in mid air to their everlasting gallop, were frozen +to a bas-relief. Then a third time the trumpet sounded; the seals were +taken off all pulses; life, and the frenzy of life, tore into their +channels again; again the choir burst forth in sunny grandeur, as from +the muffling of storms and darkness; again the thunderings of our horses +carried temptation into the graves. One cry burst from our lips, as the +clouds, drawing off from the aisle, showed it empty before us.--"Whither +has the infant fled?--is the young child caught up to God?" Lo! afar +off, in a vast recess, rose three mighty windows to the clouds; and on a +level with their summits, at height insuperable to man, rose an altar of +purest alabaster. On its eastern face was trembling a crimson glory. +A glory was it from the reddening dawn that now streamed _through_ the +windows? Was it from the crimson robes of the martyrs painted _on_ the +windows? Was it from the bloody bas-reliefs of earth? There, suddenly, +within that crimson radiance, rose the apparition of a woman's head, and +then of a woman's figure. The child it was--grown up to woman's height. +Clinging to the horns of the altar, voiceless she stood--sinking, +rising, raving, despairing; and behind the volume of incense that, night +and day, streamed upwards from the altar, dimly was seen the fiery font, +and the shadow of that dreadful being who should have baptized her with +the baptism of death. But by her side was kneeling her better angel, +that hid his face with wings; that wept and pleaded for _her_; that +prayed when _she_ could _not_; that fought with Heaven by tears for +_her_ deliverance; which also, as he raised his immortal countenance +from his wings, I saw, by the glory in his eye, that from Heaven he had +won at last. + + +V + + +Then was completed the passion of the mighty fugue. The golden tubes of +the organ, which as yet had but muttered at intervals--gleaming amongst +clouds and surges of incense--threw up, as from fountains unfathomable, +columns of heart-shattering music. Choir and anti-choir were filling +fast with unknown voices. Thou also, Dying Trumpeter, with thy love +that was victorious, and thy anguish that was finishing, didst enter +the tumult; trumpet and echo--farewell love, and farewell anguish--rang +through the dreadful _sanctus_. Oh, darkness of the grave! that from the +crimson altar and from the fiery font wert visited and searched by the +effulgence in the angel's eye--were these indeed thy children? Pomps of +life, that, from the burials of centuries, rose again to the voice of +perfect joy, did ye indeed mingle with the festivals of Death? Lo! as I +looked back for seventy leagues through the mighty cathedral, I saw the +quick and the dead that sang together to God, together that sang to the +generations of man. All the hosts of jubilation, like armies that ride +in pursuit, moved with one step. Us, that, with laurelled heads, were +passing from the cathedral, they overtook, and, as with a garment, they +wrapped us round with thunders greater than our own. As brothers we +moved together; to the dawn that advanced, to the stars that fled; +rendering thanks to God in the highest--that, having hid His face +through one generation behind thick clouds of War, once again was +ascending, from the Campo Santo of Waterloo was ascending, in the +visions of Peace; rendering thanks for thee, young girl! whom having +overshadowed with His ineffable passion of death, suddenly did God +relent, suffered thy angel to turn aside His arm, and even in thee, +sister unknown! shown to me for a moment only to be hidden for ever, +found an occasion to glorify His goodness. A thousand times, amongst +the phantoms of sleep, have I seen thee entering the gates of the golden +dawn, with the secret word riding before thee, with the armies of the +grave behind thee,--seen thee sinking, rising, raving, despairing; a +thousand times in the worlds of sleep have I seen thee followed by +God's angel through storms, through desert seas, through the darkness +of quicksands, through dreams and the dreadful revelations that are in +dreams; only that at the last, with one sling of His victorious arm, He +might snatch thee back from ruin, and might emblazon in thy deliverance +the endless resurrections of His love! + + + + +JOAN OF ARC + + +[Footnote: "_Arc_":--Modern France, that should know a great +deal better than myself, insists that the name is not D'Arc--_i.e._, +of Arc--but _Darc_. Now it happens sometimes that, if a person whose +position guarantees his access to the best information will content +himself with gloomy dogmatism, striking the table with his fist, and +saying in a terrific voice, "It _is_ so, and there's an end of it," one +bows deferentially, and submits. But, if, unhappily for himself, won +by this docility, he relents too amiably into reasons and arguments, +probably one raises an insurrection against him that may never be +crushed; for in the fields of logic one can skirmish, perhaps, as well +as he. Had he confined himself to dogmatism, he would have intrenched +his position in darkness, and have hidden his own vulnerable points. +But coming down to base reasons he lets in light, and one sees where +to plant the blows. Now, the worshipful reason of modern France for +disturbing the old received spelling is that Jean Hordal, a descendant +of La Pucelle's brother, spelled the name _Darc_ in 1612. But what of +that? It is notorious that what small matter of spelling Providence had +thought fit to disburse amongst man in the seventeenth century was all +monopolised by printers; now, M. Hordal was _not_ a printer.] + + +What is to be thought of _her_? What is to be thought of the poor +shepherd girl from the hills and forests of Lorraine, that--like the +Hebrew shepherd boy from the hills and forests of Judea--rose suddenly +out of the quiet, out of the safety, out of the religious inspiration, +rooted in deep pastoral solitudes, to a station in the van of armies, +and to the more perilous station at the right hand of kings? The Hebrew +boy inaugurated his patriotic mission by an _act_, by a victorious +_act_, such as no man could deny. But so did the girl of Lorraine, if +we read her story as it was read by those who saw her nearest. Adverse +armies bore witness to the boy as no pretender; but so they did to the +gentle girl. Judged by the voices of all who saw them _from a station of +good will_, both were found true and loyal to any promises involved in +their first acts. Enemies it was that made the difference between +their subsequent fortunes. The boy rose to a splendour and a noonday +prosperity, both personal and public, that rang through the records +of his people, and became a byword among his posterity for a thousand +years, until the sceptre was departing from Judah. The poor, forsaken +girl, on the contrary, drank not herself from that cup of rest which she +had secured for France. She never sang together with the songs that rose +in her native Domrémy as echoes to the departing steps of invaders. +She mingled not in the festal dances at Vaucouleurs which celebrated in +rapture the redemption of France. No! for her voice was then silent; no! +for her feet were dust. Pure, innocent, noble-hearted girl! whom, from +earliest youth, ever I believed in as full of truth and self-sacrifice, +this was amongst the strongest pledges for _thy_ truth, that never +once--no, not for a moment of weakness--didst thou revel in the vision +of coronets and honour from man. Coronets for thee! Oh, no! Honours, +if they come when all is over, are for those that share thy blood. +[Footnote: "_Those that share thy blood_":--A collateral relative of +Joanna's was subsequently ennobled by the title of _Du Lys_.] Daughter +of Domrémy, when the gratitude of thy king shall awaken, thou wilt be +sleeping the sleep of the dead. Call her, King of France, but she will +not hear thee. Cite her by the apparitors to come and receive a robe +of honour, but she will be found _en contumace_. When the thunders of +universal France, as even yet may happen, shall proclaim the grandeur of +the poor shepherd girl that gave up all for her country, thy ear, young +shepherd girl, will have been deaf for five centuries. To suffer and to +do, that was thy portion in this life; that was thy destiny; and not for +a moment was it hidden from thyself. Life, thou saidst, is short; +and the sleep which is in the grave is long; let me use that life, so +transitory, for the glory of those heavenly dreams destined to comfort +the sleep which is so long! This pure creature--pure from every +suspicion of even a visionary self-interest, even as she was pure +in senses more obvious--never once did this holy child, as regarded +herself, relax from her belief in the darkness that was travelling to +meet her. She might not prefigure the very manner of her death; she saw +not in vision, perhaps, the aerial altitude of the fiery scaffold, +the spectators without end, on every road, pouring into Rouen as to a +coronation, the surging smoke, the volleying flames, the hostile faces +all around, the pitying eye that lurked but here and there, until nature +and imperishable truth broke loose from artificial restraints--these +might not be apparent through the mists of the hurrying future. But the +voice that called her to death, _that_ she heard for ever. + +Great was the throne of France even in those days, and great was He that +sat upon it; but well Joanna knew that not the throne, nor he that sat +upon it, was for _her_; but, on the contrary, that she was for _them_; +not she by them, but they by her, should rise from the dust. Gorgeous +were the lilies of France, and for centuries had the privilege to spread +their beauty over land and sea, until, in another century, the wrath +of God and man combined to wither them; but well Joanna knew, early at +Domrémy she had read that bitter truth, that the lilies of France would +decorate no garland for _her_. Flower nor bud, bell nor blossom, would +ever bloom for _her_! + + * * * * * + +But stay. What reason is there for taking up this subject of Joanna +precisely in the spring of 1847? Might it not have been left till the +spring of 1947, or, perhaps, left till called for? Yes, but it _is_ +called for, and clamorously. You are aware, reader, that amongst the +many original thinkers whom modern France has produced, one of the +reputed leaders is M. Michelet. All these writers are of a revolutionary +cast; not in a political sense merely, but in all senses; mad, +oftentimes, as March hares; crazy with the laughing gas of recovered +liberty; drunk with the wine cup of their mighty Revolution, snorting, +whinnying, throwing up their heels, like wild horses in the boundless +pampas, and running races of defiance with snipes, or with the winds, or +with their own shadows, if they can find nothing else to challenge. Some +time or other, I, that have leisure to read, may introduce _you_, that +have not, to two or three dozen of these writers; of whom I can assure +you beforehand that they are often profound, and at intervals are even +as impassioned as if they were come of our best English blood. But now, +confining our attention to M. Michelet, we in England--who know him +best by his worst book, the book against priests, etc.--know him +disadvantageously. That book is a rhapsody of incoherence. But his +"History of France" is quite another thing. A man, in whatsoever craft +he sails, cannot stretch away out of sight when he is linked to the +windings of the shore by towing-ropes of History. Facts, and the +consequences of facts, draw the writer back to the falconer's lure +from the giddiest heights of speculation. Here, therefore--in his +"France"--if not always free from flightiness, if now and then off like +a rocket for an airy wheel in the clouds, M. Michelet, with natural +politeness, never forgets that he has left a large audience waiting +for him on earth, and gazing upward in anxiety for his return; return, +therefore, he does. But History, though clear of certain temptations in +one direction, has separate dangers of its own. It is impossible so to +write a history of France, or of England--works becoming every hour +more indispensable to the inevitably political man of this day--without +perilous openings for error. If I, for instance, on the part of England, +should happen to turn my labours into that channel, and (on the model of +Lord Percy going to Chevy Chase) + + "A vow to God should make + My pleasure in the Michelet woods + Three summer days to take," + +probably, from simple delirium, I might hunt M. Michelet into _delirium +tremens_. Two strong angels stand by the side of History, whether French +history or English, as heraldic supporters: the angel of research on +the left hand, that must read millions of dusty parchments, and of pages +blotted with lies; the angel of meditation on the right hand, that must +cleanse these lying records with fire, even as of old the draperies of +_asbestos_ were cleansed, and must quicken them into regenerated life. +Willingly I acknowledge that no man will ever avoid innumerable errors +of detail; with so vast a compass of ground to traverse, this is +impossible; but such errors (though I have a bushel on hand, at M. +Michelet's service) are not the game I chase; it is the bitter and +unfair spirit in which M. Michelet writes against England. Even _that_, +after all, is but my secondary object; the real one is Joanna, the +Pucelle d'Orléans herself. + +I am not going to write the history of La Pucelle: to do this, or even +circumstantially to report the history of her persecution and bitter +death, of her struggle with false witnesses and with ensnaring judges, +it would be necessary to have before us _all_ the documents, and +therefore the collection only now forthcoming in Paris. [Footnote: +"_Only now forthcoming_":--In 1847 _began_ the publication (from +official records) of Joanna's trial. It was interrupted, I fear, by the +convulsions of 1848; and whether even yet finished I do not know.] But +_my_ purpose is narrower. There have been great thinkers, disdaining the +careless judgments of contemporaries, who have thrown themselves boldly +on the judgment of a far posterity, that should have had time to review, +to ponder, to compare. There have been great actors on the stage of +tragic humanity that might, with the same depth of confidence, have +appealed from the levity of compatriot friends--too heartless for the +sublime interest of their story, and too impatient for the labour of +sifting its perplexities--to the magnanimity and justice of enemies. To +this class belongs the Maid of Arc. The ancient Romans were too faithful +to the ideal of grandeur in themselves not to relent, after a generation +or two, before the grandeur of Hannibal. Mithridates, a more doubtful +person, yet, merely for the magic perseverance of his indomitable +malice, won from the same Romans the only real honour that ever he +received on earth. And we English have ever shown the same homage to +stubborn enmity. To work unflinchingly for the ruin of England; to say +through life, by word and by deed, _Delenda est Anglia Victrix_!--that +one purpose of malice, faithfully pursued, has quartered some people +upon our national funds of homage as by a perpetual annuity. Better +than an inheritance of service rendered to England herself has sometimes +proved the most insane hatred to England. Hyder Ali, even his son +Tippoo, though so far inferior, and Napoleon, have all benefited by this +disposition among ourselves to exaggerate the merit of diabolic enmity. +Not one of these men was ever capable, in a solitary instance, of +praising an enemy (what do you say to _that_, reader?); and yet in +_their_ behalf, we consent to forget, not their crimes only, but (which +is worse) their hideous bigotry and anti-magnanimous egotism--for +nationality it was not. Suffren, and some half dozen of other French +nautical heroes, because rightly they did us all the mischief they could +(which was really great), are names justly reverenced in England. On the +same principle, La Pucelle d'Orléans, the victorious enemy of England, +has been destined to receive her deepest commemoration from the +magnanimous justice of Englishmen. + +Joanna, as we in England should call her, but according to her +own statement, Jeanne (or, as M. Michelet asserts, Jean [Footnote: +"_Jean_":--M. Michelet asserts that there was a mystical meaning at that +era in calling a child _Jean_; it implied a secret commendation of a +child, if not a dedication, to St. John the evangelist, the beloved +disciple, the apostle of love and mysterious visions. But, really, as +the name was so exceedingly common, few people will detect a mystery in +calling a _boy_ by the name of Jack, though it _does_ seem mysterious +to call a girl Jack. It may be less so in France, where a beautiful +practice has always prevailed of giving a boy his mother's +name--preceded and strengthened by a male name, as _Charles Anne_, +_Victor Victoire_. In cases where a mother's memory has been unusually +dear to a son, this vocal memento of her, locked into the circle of +his own name, gives to it the tenderness of a testamentary relic, or a +funeral ring. I presume, therefore, that La Pucelle must have borne the +baptismal name of Jeanne Jean; the latter with no reference, perhaps, +to so sublime a person as St. John, but simply to some relative.]) D'Arc +was born at Domrémy, a village on the marches of Lorraine and Champagne, +and dependent upon the town of Vaucouleurs. I have called her a +Lorrainer, not simply because the word is prettier, but because +Champagne too odiously reminds us English of what are for _us_ imaginary +wines--which, undoubtedly, La Pucelle tasted as rarely as we English: we +English, because the champagne of London is chiefly grown in Devonshire; +La Pucelle, because the champagne of Champagne never, by any chance, +flowed into the fountain of Domrémy, from which only she drank. M. +Michelet will have her to be a _Champenoise_, and for no better +reason than that she "took after her father," who happened to be a +_Champenois_. + +These disputes, however, turn on refinements too nice. Domrémy stood +upon the frontiers, and, like other frontiers, produced a _mixed_ race, +representing the _cis_ and the _trans_. A river (it is true) formed the +boundary line at this point--the river Meuse; and _that_, in old days, +might have divided the populations; but in these days it did not; there +were bridges, there were ferries, and weddings crossed from the right +bank to the left. Here lay two great roads, not so much for travellers +that were few, as for armies that were too many by half. These two +roads, one of which was the great highroad between France and Germany, +_decussated_ at this very point; which is a learned way of saying that +they formed a St. Andrew's Cross, or letter X. I hope the compositor +will choose a good large X; in which case the point of intersection, the +_locus_ of conflux and intersection for these four diverging arms, +will finish the reader's geographical education, by showing him to a +hair's-breadth where it was that Domrémy stood. These roads, so grandly +situated, as great trunk arteries between two mighty realms,[Footnote: +And reminding one of that inscription, so justly admired by Paul +Richter, which a Russian Czarina placed on a guide-post near Moscow: +_This is the road that leads to Constantinople._] and haunted for ever +by wars or rumours of wars, decussated (for anything I know to the +contrary) absolutely under Joanna's bedroom window; one rolling away +to the right, past M. D'Arc's old barn, and the other unaccountably +preferring to sweep round that odious man's pig-sty to the left. + +On whichever side of the border chance had thrown Joanna, the same love +to France would have been nurtured. For it is a strange fact, noticed +by M. Michelet and others, that the Dukes of Bar and Lorraine had for +generations pursued the policy of eternal warfare with France on their +own account, yet also of eternal amity and league with France in case +anybody else presumed to attack her. Let peace settle upon France, and +before long you might rely upon seeing the little vixen Lorraine flying +at the throat of France. Let France be assailed by a formidable enemy, +and instantly you saw a Duke of Lorraine insisting on having his own +throat cut in support of France; which favour accordingly was cheerfully +granted to him in three great successive battles: twice by the English, +viz., at Crécy and Agincourt, once by the Sultan at Nicopolis. + +This sympathy with France during great eclipses, in those that during +ordinary seasons were always teasing her with brawls and guerilla +inroads, strengthened the natural piety to France of those that were +confessedly the children of her own house. The outposts of France, as +one may call the great frontier provinces, were of all localities the +most devoted to the Fleurs de Lys. To witness, at any great crisis, the +generous devotion to these lilies of the little fiery cousin that in +gentler weather was for ever tilting at the breast of France, could not +but fan the zeal of France's legitimate daughters; while to occupy +a post of honour on the frontiers against an old hereditary enemy of +France would naturally stimulate this zeal by a sentiment of martial +pride, by a sense of danger always threatening, and of hatred always +smouldering. That great four-headed road was a perpetual memento to +patriotic ardour. To say "This way lies the road to Paris, and that +other way to Aix-la-Chapelle; this to Prague, that to Vienna," nourished +the warfare of the heart by daily ministrations of sense. The eye that +watched for the gleams of lance or helmet from the hostile frontier, the +ear that listened for the groaning of wheels, made the highroad itself, +with its relations to centres so remote, into a manual of patriotic +duty. + +The situation, therefore, _locally_, of Joanna was full of profound +suggestions to a heart that listened for the stealthy steps of change +and fear that too surely were in motion. But, if the place were grand, +the time, the burden of the time, was far more so. The air overhead in +its upper chambers was _hurtling_ with the obscure sound; was dark with +sullen fermenting of storms that had been gathering for a hundred and +thirty years. The battle of Agincourt in Joanna's childhood had reopened +the wounds of France. Crécy and Poictiers, those withering overthrows +for the chivalry of France, had, before Agincourt occurred, been +tranquilised by more than half a century; but this resurrection of their +trumpet wails made the whole series of battles and endless skirmishes +take their stations as parts in one drama. The graves that had closed +sixty years ago seemed to fly open in sympathy with a sorrow that echoed +their own. The monarchy of France laboured in extremity, rocked and +reeled like a ship fighting with the darkness of monsoons. The madness +of the poor king (Charles VI), falling in at such a crisis, like the +case of women labouring in child-birth during the storming of a city, +trebled the awfulness of the time. Even the wild story of the incident +which had immediately occasioned the explosion of this madness--the case +of a man unknown, gloomy, and perhaps maniacal himself, coming out of a +forest at noonday, laying his hand upon the bridle of the king's horse, +checking him for a moment to say, "Oh, king, thou art betrayed," and +then vanishing, no man knew whither, as he had appeared for no man knew +what--fell in with the universal prostration of mind that laid France on +her knees, as before the slow unweaving of some ancient prophetic +doom. The famines, the extraordinary diseases, the insurrections of the +peasantry up and down Europe--these were chords struck from the same +mysterious harp; but these were transitory chords. There had been others +of deeper and more ominous sound. The termination of the Crusades, the +destruction of the Templars, the Papal interdicts, the tragedies caused +or suffered by the house of Anjou, and by the Emperor--these were full +of a more permanent significance. But, since then, the colossal figure +of feudalism was seen standing, as it were on tiptoe, at Crécy, for +flight from earth: that was a revolution unparalleled; yet _that_ was a +trifle by comparison with the more fearful revolutions that were +mining below the Church. By her own internal schisms, by the abominable +spectacle of a double Pope--so that no man, except through political +bias, could even guess which was Heaven's vicegerent, and which the +creature of Hell--the Church was rehearsing, as in still earlier forms +she had already rehearsed, those vast rents in her foundations which no +man should ever heal. + +These were the loftiest peaks of the cloudland in the skies that to +the scientific gazer first caught the colors of the _new_ morning in +advance. But the whole vast range alike of sweeping glooms overhead +dwelt upon all meditative minds, even upon those that could not +distinguish the tendencies nor decipher the forms. It was, therefore, +not her own age alone, as affected by its immediate calamities, that lay +with such weight upon Joanna's mind, but her own age as one section in +a vast mysterious drama, unweaving through a century back, and drawing +nearer continually to some dreadful crisis. Cataracts and rapids were +heard roaring ahead; and signs were seen far back, by help of old men's +memories, which answered secretly to signs now coming forward on the +eye, even as locks answer to keys. It was not wonderful that in such a +haunted solitude, with such a haunted heart, Joanna should see angelic +visions, and hear angelic voices. These voices whispered to her for ever +the duty, self-imposed, of delivering France. Five years she listened +to these monitory voices with internal struggles. At length she could +resist no longer. Doubt gave way; and she left her home for ever in +order to present herself at the dauphin's court. The education of this +poor girl was mean according to the present standard: was ineffably +grand, according to a purer philosophic standard: and only not good for +our age because for us it would be unattainable. She read nothing, for +she could not read; but she had heard others read parts of the Roman +martyrology. She wept in sympathy with the sad "Misereres" of the Romish +Church; she rose to heaven with the glad triumphant "Te Deums" of Rome; +she drew her comfort and her vital strength from the rites of the same +Church. But, next after these spiritual advantages, she owed most to the +advantages of her situation. The fountain of Domrémy was on the brink +of a boundless forest; and it was haunted to that degree by fairies that +the parish priest (_curé_) was obliged to read mass there once a year, +in order to keep them in any decent bounds. Fairies are important, even +in a statistical view: certain weeds mark poverty in the soil; fairies +mark its solitude. As surely as the wolf retires before cities does the +fairy sequester herself from the haunts of the licensed victualer. A +village is too much for her nervous delicacy; at most, she can tolerate +a distant view of a hamlet. We may judge, therefore, by the uneasiness +and extra trouble which they gave to the parson, in what strength the +fairies mustered at Domrémy, and, by a satisfactory consequence, how +thinly sown with men and women must have been that region even in its +inhabited spots. But the forests of Domrémy--those were the glories of +the land: for in them abode mysterious powers and ancient secrets +that towered into tragic strength. "Abbeys there were, and abbey +windows"--"like Moorish temples of the Hindoos"--that exercised even +princely power both in Lorraine and in the German Diets. These had their +sweet bells that pierced the forests for many a league at matins or +vespers, and each its own dreamy legend. Few enough, and scattered +enough, were these abbeys, so as in no degree to disturb the deep +solitude of the region; yet many enough to spread a network or awning +of Christian sanctity over what else might have seemed a heathen +wilderness. This sort of religious talisman being secured, a man the +most afraid of ghosts (like myself, suppose, or the reader) becomes +armed into courage to wander for days in their sylvan recesses. The +mountains of the Vosges, on the eastern frontier of France, have never +attracted much notice from Europe, except in 1813-14 for a few brief +months, when they fell within Napoleon's line of defence against the +Allies. But they are interesting for this among other features, that +they do not, like some loftier ranges, repel woods; the forests and the +hills are on sociable terms. "Live and let live" is their motto. +For this reason, in part, these tracts in Lorraine were a favourite +hunting-ground with the Carlovingian princes. About six hundred years +before Joanna's childhood, Charlemagne was known to have hunted there. +That, of itself, was a grand incident in the traditions of a forest or a +chase. In these vast forests, also, were to be found (if anywhere to +be found) those mysterious fawns that tempted solitary hunters into +visionary and perilous pursuits. Here was seen (if anywhere seen) that +ancient stag who was already nine hundred years old, but possibly a +hundred or two more, when met by Charlemagne; and the thing was put +beyond doubt by the inscription upon his golden collar. I believe +Charlemagne knighted the stag; and, if ever he is met again by a king, +he ought to be made an earl, or, being upon the marches of France, a +marquis. Observe, I don't absolutely vouch for all these things: my own +opinion varies. On a fine breezy forenoon I am audaciously sceptical; +but as twilight sets in my credulity grows steadily, till it becomes +equal to anything that could be desired. And I have heard candid +sportsmen declare that, outside of these very forests, they laughed +loudly at all the dim tales connected with their haunted solitudes, but, +on reaching a spot notoriously eighteen miles deep within them, they +agreed with Sir Roger de Coverley that a good deal might be said on both +sides. + +Such traditions, or any others that (like the stag) connect distant +generations with each other, are, for that cause, sublime; and the sense +of the shadowy, connected with such appearances that reveal themselves +or not according to circumstances, leaves a colouring of sanctity over +ancient forests, even in those minds that utterly reject the legend as a +fact. + +But, apart from all distinct stories of that order, in any solitary +frontier between two great empires--as here, for instance, or in the +desert between Syria and the Euphrates--there is an inevitable tendency, +in minds of any deep sensibility, to people the solitudes with phantom +images of powers that were of old so vast. Joanna, therefore, in her +quiet occupation of a shepherdess, would be led continually to brood +over the political condition of her country by the traditions of the +past no less than by the mementoes of the local present. + +M. Michelet, indeed, says that La Pucelle was not a shepherdess. I beg +his pardon; she was. What he rests upon I guess pretty well: it is the +evidence of a woman called Haumette, the most confidential friend of +Joanna. Now, she is a good witness, and a good girl, and I like her; for +she makes a natural and affectionate report of Joanna's ordinary life. +But still, however good she may be as a witness, Joanna is better; and +she, when speaking to the dauphin, calls herself in the Latin report +_Bergereta_. Even Haumette confesses that Joanna tended sheep in her +girlhood. And I believe that, if Miss Haumette were taking coffee along +with me this very evening (February 12, 1847)--in which there would be +no subject for scandal or for maiden blushes, because I am an intense +philosopher, and Miss H. would be hard upon 450 years old--she would +admit the following comment upon her evidence to be right. A +Frenchman, about forty years ago--M. Simond, in his "Travels"--mentions +accidentally the following hideous scene as one steadily observed and +watched by himself in chivalrous France not very long before the French +Revolution: A peasant was plowing; and the team that drew his plow was +a donkey and a woman. Both were regularly harnessed; both pulled alike. +This is bad enough; but the Frenchman adds that, in distributing his +lashes, the peasant was obviously desirous of being impartial; or, if +either of the yokefellows had a right to complain, certainly it was not +the donkey. Now, in any country where such degradation of females could +be tolerated by the state of manners, a woman of delicacy would shrink +from acknowledging, either for herself or her friend, that she had ever +been addicted to any mode of labour not strictly domestic; because, if +once owning herself a prædial servant, she would be sensible that this +confession extended by probability in the hearer's thoughts to the +having incurred indignities of this horrible kind. Haumette clearly +thinks it more dignified for Joanna to have been darning the stockings +of her horny-hoofed father, M. D'Arc, than keeping sheep, lest she might +then be suspected of having ever done something worse. But, luckily, +there was no danger of _that_: Joanna never was in service; and my +opinion is that her father should have mended his own stockings, since +probably he was the party to make the holes in them, as many a better +man than D'Arc does--meaning by _that_ not myself, because, though +probably a better man than D'Arc, I protest against doing anything of +the kind. If I lived even with Friday in Juan Fernandez, either Friday +must do all the darning, or else it must go undone. The better men that +I meant were the sailors in the British navy, every man of whom mends +his own stockings. Who else is to do it? Do you suppose, reader, that +the junior lords of the admiralty are under articles to darn for the +navy? + +The reason, meantime, for my systematic hatred of D'Arc is this: There +was a story current in France before the Revolution, framed to ridicule +the pauper aristocracy, who happened to have long pedigrees and short +rent rolls: viz., that a head of such a house, dating from the Crusades, +was overheard saying to his son, a Chevalier of St. Louis, "_Chevalier, +as-tu donné au cochon à manger_?" Now, it is clearly made out by the +surviving evidence that D'Arc would much have preferred continuing to +say, "_Ma fille, as-tu donné au cochon à manger_?" to saying, "_Pucelle +d'Orléans, as-tu sauvé les fleurs-de-lys_?" There is an old English copy +of verses which argues thus: + + "If the man that turnips cries + Cry not when his father dies, + Then 'tis plain the man had rather + Have a turnip than his father." + +I cannot say that the logic of these verses was ever _entirely_ to my +satisfaction. I do not see my way through it as clearly as could be +wished. But I see my way most clearly through D'Arc; and the result +is--that he would greatly have preferred not merely a turnip to his +father, but the saving a pound or so of bacon to saving the Oriflamme of +France. + +It is probable (as M. Michelet suggests) that the title of Virgin or +Pucelle had in itself, and apart from the miraculous stories about +her, a secret power over the rude soldiery and partisan chiefs of that +period; for in such a person they saw a representative manifestation of +the Virgin Mary, who, in a course of centuries, had grown steadily upon +the popular heart. + +As to Joanna's supernatural detection of the dauphin (Charles VII) among +three hundred lords and knights, I am surprised at the credulity which +could ever lend itself to that theatrical juggle. Who admires more than +myself the sublime enthusiasm, the rapturous faith in herself, of this +pure creature? But I am far from admiring stage artifices which not La +Pucelle, but the court, must have arranged; nor can surrender myself +to the conjurer's legerdemain, such as may be seen every day for a +shilling. Southey's "Joan of Arc" was published in 1796. Twenty years +after, talking with Southey, I was surprised to find him still owning a +secret bias in favor of Joan, founded on her detection of the dauphin. +The story, for the benefit of the reader new to the case, was this: La +Pucelle was first made known to the dauphin, and presented to his +court, at Chinon; and here came her first trial. By way of testing +her supernatural pretensions, she was to find out the royal personage +amongst the whole ark of clean and unclean creatures. Failing in this +_coup d'essai_, she would not simply disappoint many a beating heart in +the glittering crowd that on different motives yearned for her success, +but she would ruin herself, and, as the oracle within had told her, +would, by ruining herself, ruin France. Our own Sovereign Lady Victoria +rehearses annually a trial not so severe in degree, but the same in +kind. She "pricks" for sheriffs. Joanna pricked for a king. But observe +the difference: our own Lady pricks for two men out of three; Joanna +for one man out of three hundred. Happy Lady of the Islands and the +Orient!--she _can_ go astray in her choice only by one-half: to the +extent of one-half she _must_ have the satisfaction of being right. +And yet, even with these tight limits to the misery of a boundless +discretion, permit me, Liege Lady, with all loyalty, to submit that now +and then you prick with your pin the wrong man. But the poor child from +Domremy, shrinking under the gaze of a dazzling court--not _because_ +dazzling (for in visions she had seen those that were more so), but +because some of them wore a scoffing smile on their features--how should +_she_ throw her line into so deep a river to angle for a king, where +many a gay creature was sporting that masqueraded as kings in dress! +Nay, even more than any true king would have done: for, in Southey's +version of the story, the dauphin says, by way of trying the virgin's +magnetic sympathy with royalty, + + "On the throne, + I the while mingling with the menial throng, + Some courtier shall be seated." + +This usurper is even crowned: "the jeweled crown shines on a menial's +head." But, really, that is "_un peu fort_"; and the mob of spectators +might raise a scruple whether our friend the jackdaw upon the throne, +and the dauphin himself, were not grazing the shins of treason. For +the dauphin could not lend more than belonged to him. According to the +popular notion, he had no crown for himself; consequently none to lend, +on any pretence whatever, until the consecrated Maid should take him to +Rheims. This was the _popular_ notion in France. But certainly it was +the dauphin's interest to support the popular notion, as he meant to use +the services of Joanna. For if he were king already, what was it that +she could do for him beyond Orleans? That is to say, what more than a +merely _military_ service could she render him? And, above all, if he +were king without a coronation, and without the oil from the sacred +ampulla, what advantage was yet open to him by celerity above his +competitor, the English boy? Now was to be a race for a coronation: he +that should win _that_ race carried the superstition of France along +with him: he that should first be drawn from the ovens of Rheims was +under that superstition baked into a king. + +La Pucelle, before she could be allowed to practise as a warrior, was +put through her manual and platoon exercise, as a pupil in divinity, at +the bar of six eminent men in wigs. According to Southey (v. 393, bk. +iii., in the original edition of his "Joan of Arc,") she "appalled the +doctors." It's not easy to do _that_: but they had some reason to +feel bothered, as that surgeon would assuredly feel bothered who, upon +proceeding to dissect a subject, should find the subject retaliating as +a dissector upon himself, especially if Joanna ever made the speech to +them which occupies v. 354-391, bk. iii. It is a double impossibility: +1st, because a piracy from Tindal's "Christianity as old as the +Creation"--a piracy _a parte ante_, and by three centuries; 2d, it is +quite contrary to the evidence on Joanna's trial. Southey's "Joan" of +A.D. 1796 (Cottle, Bristol) tells the doctors, among other secrets, +that she never in her life attended--1st, Mass; nor 2d, the Sacramental +Table; nor 3d, Confession. In the meantime, all this deistical +confession of Joanna's, besides being suicidal for the interest of her +cause, is opposed to the depositions upon _both_ trials. The very best +witness called from first to last deposes that Joanna attended these +rites of her Church even too often; was taxed with doing so; and, by +blushing, owned the charge as a fact, though certainly not as a fault. +Joanna was a girl of natural piety, that saw God in forests and hills +and fountains, but did not the less seek him in chapels and consecrated +oratories. + +This peasant girl was self-educated through her own natural +meditativeness. If the reader turns to that divine passage in "Paradise +Regained" which Milton has put into the mouth of our Saviour when first +entering the wilderness, and musing upon the tendency of those great +impulses growing within himself----- + + "Oh, what a multitude of thoughts at once + Awakened in me swarm, while I consider + What from within I feel myself, and hear + What from without comes often to my ears, + Ill sorting with my present state compared! + When I was yet a child, no childish play + To me was pleasing; all my mind was set + Serious to learn and know, and thence to do, + What might be public good; myself I thought + Born to that end----" + +he will have some notion of the vast reveries which brooded over the +heart of Joanna in early girlhood, when the wings were budding that +should carry her from Orleans to Rheims; when the golden chariot was +dimly revealing itself that should carry her from the kingdom of _France +Delivered_ to the Eternal Kingdom. + +It is not requisite for the honour of Joanna, nor is there in this place +room, to pursue her brief career of _action._ That, though wonderful, +forms the earthly part of her story; the spiritual part is the saintly +passion of her imprisonment, trial, and execution. It is unfortunate, +therefore, for Southey's "Joan of Arc" (which, however, should always +be regarded as a _juvenile_ effort), that precisely when her real glory +begins the poem ends. But this limitation of the interest grew, no +doubt, from the constraint inseparably attached to the law of epic +unity. Joanna's history bisects into two opposite hemispheres, and +both could not have been presented to the eye in one poem, unless by +sacrificing all unity of theme, or else by involving the earlier half, +as a narrative episode, in the latter; which, however, might have been +done, for it might have been communicated to a fellow-prisoner, or +a confessor, by Joanna herself. It is sufficient, as concerns _this_ +section of Joanna's life, to say that she fulfilled, to the height of +her promises, the restoration of the prostrate throne. France had become +a province of England, and for the ruin of both, if such a yoke could be +maintained. Dreadful pecuniary exhaustion caused the English energy to +droop; and that critical opening La Pucelle used with a corresponding +felicity of audacity and suddenness (that were in themselves portentous) +for introducing the wedge of French native resources, for rekindling the +national pride, and for planting the dauphin once more upon his feet. +When Joanna appeared, he had been on the point of giving up the struggle +with the English, distressed as they were, and of flying to the south of +France. She taught him to blush for such abject counsels. She liberated +Orleans, that great city, so decisive by its fate for the issue of the +war, and then beleaguered by the English with an elaborate application +of engineering skill unprecedented in Europe. Entering the city after +sunset on the 29th of April, she sang mass on Sunday, May 8th, for the +entire disappearance of the besieging force. On the 29th of June she +fought and gained over the English the decisive battle of Patay; on the +9th of July she took Troyes by a _coup-de-main_ from a mixed garrison +of English and Burgundians; on the 15th of that month she carried the +dauphin into Rheims; on Sunday the 17th she crowned him; and there she +rested from her labour of triumph. All that was to be _done_ she had now +accomplished; what remained was--to _suffer_. + +All this forward movement was her own; excepting one man, the whole +council was against her. Her enemies were all that drew power from +earth. Her supporters were her own strong enthusiasm, and the headlong +contagion by which she carried this sublime frenzy into the hearts of +women, of soldiers, and of all who lived by labour. Henceforward she +was thwarted; and the worst error that she committed was to lend the +sanction of her presence to counsels which she had ceased to approve. +But she had now accomplished the capital objects which her own visions +had dictated. These involved all the rest. Errors were now less +important; and doubtless it had now become more difficult for herself to +pronounce authentically what _were_ errors. The noble girl had achieved, +as by a rapture of motion, the capital end of clearing out a free space +around her sovereign, giving him the power to move his arms with effect, +and, secondly, the inappreciable end of winning for that sovereign +what seemed to all France the heavenly ratification of his rights, by +crowning him with the ancient solemnities. She had made it impossible +for the English now to step before her. They were caught in an +irretrievable blunder, owing partly to discord among the uncles of Henry +VI, partly to a want of funds, but partly to the very impossibility +which they believed to press with tenfold force upon any French attempt +to forestall theirs. They laughed at such a thought; and, while they +laughed, _she_ did it. Henceforth the single redress for the English +of this capital oversight, but which never _could_ have redressed it +effectually, was to vitiate and taint the coronation of Charles VII as +the work of a witch. That policy, and not malice (as M. Michelet is +so happy to believe), was the moving principle in the subsequent +prosecution of Joanna. Unless they unhinged the force of the first +coronation in the popular mind by associating it with power given from +hell, they felt that the sceptre of the invader was broken. + +But she, the child that, at nineteen, had wrought wonders so great for +France, was she not elated? Did she not lose, as men so often _have_ +lost, all sobriety of mind when standing upon the pinnacle of success so +giddy? Let her enemies declare. During the progress of her movement, and +in the centre of ferocious struggles, she had manifested the temper +of her feelings by the pity which she had everywhere expressed for +the suffering enemy. She forwarded to the English leaders a touching +invitation to unite with the French, as brothers, in a common crusade +against infidels--thus opening the road for a soldierly retreat. She +interposed to protect the captive or the wounded; she mourned over the +excesses of her countrymen; she threw herself off her horse to kneel by +the dying English soldier, and to comfort him with such ministrations, +physical or spiritual, as his situation allowed. "Nolebat," says the +evidence, "uti ense suo, aut quemquam interficere." She sheltered +the English that invoked her aid in her own quarters. She wept as she +beheld, stretched on the field of battle, so many brave enemies that had +died without confession. And, as regarded herself, her elation expressed +itself thus: on the day when she had finished her work, she wept; for +she knew that, when her _triumphal_ task was done, her end must be +approaching. Her aspirations pointed only to a place which seemed to her +more than usually full of natural piety, as one in which it would give +her pleasure to die. And she uttered, between smiles and tears, as +a wish that inexpressibly fascinated her heart, and yet was half +fantastic, a broken prayer that God would return her to the solitudes +from which he had drawn her, and suffer her to become a shepherdess once +more. It was a natural prayer, because nature has laid a necessity upon +every human heart to seek for rest and to shrink from torment. Yet, +again, it was a half-fantastic prayer, because, from childhood upward, +visions that she had no power to mistrust, and the voices which sounded +in her ear for ever, had long since persuaded her mind that for _her_ no +such prayer could be granted. Too well she felt that her mission must be +worked out to the end, and that the end was now at hand. All went wrong +from this time. She herself had created the _funds_ out of which the +French restoration should grow; but she was not suffered to witness +their development or their prosperous application. More than one +military plan was entered upon which she did not approve. But she still +continued to expose her person as before. Severe wounds had not taught +her caution. And at length, in a sortie from Compiègne (whether through +treacherous collusion on the part of her own friends is doubtful to this +day), she was made prisoner by the Burgundians, and finally surrendered +to the English. + +Now came her trial. This trial, moving of course under English +influence, was conducted in chief by the Bishop of Beauvais. He was +a Frenchman, sold to English interests, and hoping, by favour of the +English leaders, to reach the highest preferment. "Bishop that art, +Archbishop that shalt be, Cardinal that mayest be," were the words that +sounded continually in his ear; and doubtless a whisper of visions still +higher, of a triple crown, and feet upon the necks of kings, sometimes +stole into his heart. M. Michelet is anxious to keep us in mind that +this bishop was but an agent of the English. True. But it does not +better the case for his countryman that, being an accomplice in the +crime, making himself the leader in the persecution against the +helpless girl, he was willing to be all this in the spirit, and with +the conscious vileness of a cat's-paw. Never from the foundations of the +earth was there such a trial as this, if it were laid open in all +its beauty of defence and all its hellishness of attack. Oh, child of +France! shepherdess, peasant girl! trodden under foot by all around +thee, how I honour thy flashing intellect, quick as God's lightning, and +true as God's lightning to its mark, that ran before France and laggard +Europe by many a century, confounding the malice of the ensnarer, and +making dumb the oracles of falsehood! Is it not scandalous, is it not +humiliating to civilization, that, even at this day, France exhibits +the horrid spectacle of judges examining the prisoner against himself; +seducing him, by fraud, into treacherous conclusions against his own +head; using the terrors of their power for extorting confessions from +the frailty of hope; nay (which is worse), using the blandishments +of condescension and snaky kindness for thawing into compliances of +gratitude those whom they had failed to freeze into terror? Wicked +judges! barbarian jurisprudence!--that, sitting in your own conceit +on the summits of social wisdom, have yet failed to learn the first +principles of criminal justice--sit ye humbly and with docility at the +feet of this girl from Domrémy, that tore your webs of cruelty into +shreds and dust. "Would you examine me as a witness against myself?" was +the question by which many times she defied their arts. Continually she +showed that their interrogations were irrelevant to any business before +the court, or that entered into the ridiculous charges against her. +General questions were proposed to her on points of casuistical +divinity; two-edged questions, which not one of themselves could have +answered, without, on the one side, landing himself in heresy (as then +interpreted), or, on the other, in some presumptuous expression of +self-esteem. Next came a wretched Dominican, that pressed her with an +objection, which, if applied to the Bible, would tax every one of its +miracles with unsoundness. The monk had the excuse of never having read +the Bible. M. Michelet has no such excuse; and it makes one blush +for him, as a philosopher, to find him describing such an argument +as "weighty," whereas it is but a varied expression of rude Mahometan +metaphysics. Her answer to this, if there were room to place the whole +in a clear light, was as shattering as it was rapid. Another thought to +entrap her by asking what language the angelic visitors of her solitude +had talked--as though heavenly counsels could want polyglot interpreters +for every word, or that God needed language at all in whispering +thoughts to a human heart. Then came a worse devil, who asked her +whether the Archangel Michael had appeared naked. Not comprehending the +vile insinuation, Joanna, whose poverty suggested to her simplicity that +it might be the _costliness_ of suitable robes which caused the demur, +asked them if they fancied God, who clothed the flowers of the valleys, +unable to find raiment for his servants. The answer of Joanna moves +a smile of tenderness, but the disappointment of her judges makes one +laugh exultingly. Others succeeded by troops, who upbraided her with +leaving her father; as if that greater Father, whom she believed herself +to have been serving, did not retain the power of dispensing with his +own rules, or had not said that for a less cause than martyrdom man and +woman should leave both father and mother. + +On Easter Sunday, when the trial had been long proceeding, the poor girl +fell so ill as to cause a belief that she had been poisoned. It was +not poison. Nobody had any interest in hastening a death so certain. M. +Michelet, whose sympathies with all feelings are so quick that one would +gladly see them always as justly directed, reads the case most truly. +Joanna had a twofold malady. She was visited by a paroxysm of the +complaint called _homesickness_. The cruel nature of her imprisonment, +and its length, could not but point her solitary thoughts, in darkness +and in chains (for chained she was), to Domrémy. And the season, +which was the most heavenly period of the spring, added stings to this +yearning. That was one of her maladies--_nostalgia_, as medicine calls +it; the other was weariness and exhaustion from daily combats with +malice. She saw that everybody hated her and thirsted for her blood; +nay, many kind-hearted creatures that would have pitied her profoundly, +as regarded all political charges, had their natural feelings warped by +the belief that she had dealings with fiendish powers. She knew she was +to die; that was _not_ the misery! the misery was that this consummation +could not be reached without so much intermediate strife, as if she were +contending for some chance (where chance was none) of happiness, or were +dreaming for a moment of escaping the inevitable. Why, then, _did_ +she contend? Knowing that she would reap nothing from answering her +persecutors, why did she not retire by silence from the superfluous +contest? It was because her quick and eager loyalty to truth would not +suffer her to see it darkened by frauds which _she_ could expose, but +others, even of candid listeners, perhaps, could not; it was through +that imperishable grandeur of soul which taught her to submit meekly +and without a struggle to her punishment, but taught her _not_ +to submit--no, not for a moment--to calumny as to facts, or to +misconstruction as to motives. Besides, there were secretaries all +around the court taking down her words. That was meant for no good to +_her_. But the end does not always correspond to the meaning. And +Joanna might say to herself, "These words that will be used against me +to-morrow and the next day, perhaps, in some nobler generation, may rise +again for my justification." Yes, Joanna, they _are_ rising even now in +Paris, and for more than justification! + +Woman, sister, there are some things which you do not execute as well as +your brother, man; no, nor ever will. Pardon me if I doubt whether +you will ever produce a great poet from your choirs, or a Mozart, or +a Phidias, or a Michael Angelo, or a great philosopher, or a great +scholar. By which last is meant--not one who depends simply on an +infinite memory, but also on an infinite and electrical power of +combination; bringing together from the four winds, like the angel of +the resurrection, what else were dust from dead men's bones, into the +unity of breathing life. If you _can_ create yourselves into any of +these great creators, why have you not? + +Yet, sister woman, though I cannot consent to find a Mozart or a Michael +Angelo in your sex, cheerfully, and with the love that burns in depths +of admiration, I acknowledge that you can do one thing as well as the +best of us men--a greater thing than even Milton is known to have done, +or Michael Angelo; you can die grandly, and as goddesses would die, were +goddesses mortal. If any distant worlds (which _may_ be the case) are +so far ahead of us Tellurians in optical resources as to see distinctly +through their telescopes all that we do on earth, what is the grandest +sight to which we ever treat them? St. Peter's at Rome, do you fancy, +on Easter Sunday, or Luxor, or perhaps the Himalayas? Oh, no! my friend; +suggest something better; these are baubles to _them_; they see in other +worlds, in their own, far better toys of the same kind. These, take my +word for it, are nothing. Do you give it up? The finest thing, then, we +have to show them is a scaffold on the morning of execution. I assure +you there is a strong muster in those far telescopic worlds, on any +such morning, of those who happen to find themselves occupying the right +hemisphere for a peep at _us_. How, then, if it be announced in some +such telescopic world by those who make a livelihood of catching +glimpses at our newspapers, whose language they have long since +deciphered, that the poor victim in the morning's sacrifice is a woman? +How, if it be published in that distant world that the sufferer wears +upon her head, in the eyes of many, the garlands of martyrdom? How, if +it should be some Marie Antoinette, the widowed queen, coming forward on +the scaffold, and presenting to the morning air her head, turned gray by +sorrow--daughter of Caesars kneeling down humbly to kiss the guillotine, +as one that worships death? How, if it were the noble Charlotte Corday, +that in the bloom of youth, that with the loveliest of persons, that +with homage waiting upon her smiles wherever she turned her face to +scatter them--homage that followed those smiles as surely as the carols +of birds, after showers in spring, follow the reappearing sun and the +racing of sunbeams over the hills--yet thought all these things cheaper +than the dust upon her sandals, in comparison of deliverance from hell +for her dear suffering France! Ah! these were spectacles indeed for +those sympathising people in distant worlds; and some, perhaps, would +suffer a sort of martyrdom themselves, because they could not testify +their wrath, could not bear witness to the strength of love and to the +fury of hatred that burned within them at such scenes, could not +gather into golden urns some of that glorious dust which rested in the +catacombs of earth. + +On the Wednesday after Trinity Sunday in 1431, being then about nineteen +years of age, the Maid of Arc underwent her martyrdom. She was conducted +before mid-day, guarded by eight hundred spearmen, to a platform of +prodigious height, constructed of wooden billets supported by occasional +walls of lath and plaster, and traversed by hollow spaces in every +direction for the creation of air currents. The pile "struck terror," +says M. Michelet, "by its height"; and, as usual, the English purpose +in this is viewed as one of pure malignity. But there are two ways of +explaining all that. It is probable that the purpose was merciful. On +the circumstances of the execution I shall not linger. Yet, to mark the +almost fatal felicity of M. Michelet in finding out whatever may injure +the English name, at a moment when every reader will be interested +in Joanna's personal appearance, it is really edifying to notice the +ingenuity by which he draws into light from a dark corner a very unjust +account of it, and neglects, though lying upon the highroad, a very +pleasing one. Both are from English pens. Grafton, a chronicler, but +little read, being a stiff-necked John Bull, thought fit to say that +no wonder Joanna should be a virgin, since her "foule face" was a +satisfactory solution of that particular merit. Holinshead, on the other +hand, a chronicler somewhat later, every way more important, and at +one time universally read, has given a very pleasing testimony to the +interesting character of Joanna's person and engaging manners. Neither +of these men lived till the following century, so that personally this +evidence is none at all. Grafton sullenly and carelessly believed as +he wished to believe; Holinshead took pains to inquire, and reports +undoubtedly the general impression of France. But I cite the case +as illustrating M. Michelet's candour. [Footnote: Amongst the many +ebullitions of M. Michelet's fury against us poor English are four which +will be likely to amuse the reader; and they are the more conspicuous +in collision with the justice which he sometimes does us, and the very +indignant admiration which, under some aspects, he grants to us. 1. Our +English literature he admires with some gnashing of teeth. He pronounces +it "fine and sombre," but, I lament to add, "skeptical, Judaic, +Satanic--in a word, antichristian." That Lord Byron should figure as a +member of this diabolical corporation will not surprise men. It _will_ +surprise them to hear that Milton is one of its Satanic leaders. Many +are the generous and eloquent Frenchmen, besides Chateaubriand, who +have, in the course of the last thirty years, nobly suspended their own +burning nationality, in order to render a more rapturous homage at the +feet of Milton; and some of them have raised Milton almost to a level +with angelic natures. Not one of them has thought of looking for him +_below_ the earth. As to Shakspere, M. Michelet detects in him a most +extraordinary mare's nest. It is this: he does "not recollect to have +seen the name of God" in any part of his works. On reading such words, +it is natural to rub one's eyes, and suspect that all one has ever seen +in this world may have been a pure ocular delusion. In particular, I +begin myself to suspect that the word "_la gloire_" never occurs in any +Parisian journal. "The great English nation," says M. Michelet, "has one +immense profound vice"--to wit, "pride." Why, really, that may be true; +but we have a neighbour not absolutely clear of an "immense profound +vice," as like ours in colour and shape as cherry to cherry. In short, +M. Michelet thinks us, by fits and starts, admirable--only that we are +detestable; and he would adore some of our authors, were it not that so +intensely he could have wished to kick them. + +2. M. Michelet thinks to lodge an arrow in our sides by a very odd +remark upon Thomas à Kempis: which is, that a man of any conceivable +European blood--a Finlander, suppose, or a Zantiote--might have written +Tom; only not an Englishman. Whether an Englishman could have forged Tom +must remain a matter of doubt, unless the thing had been tried long ago. +That problem was intercepted for ever by Tom's perverseness in choosing +to manufacture himself. Yet, since nobody is better aware than M. +Michelet that this very point of Kempis _having_ manufactured Kempis is +furiously and hopelessly litigated, three or four nations claiming to +have forged his work for him, the shocking old doubt will raise +its snaky head once more--whether this forger, who rests in so much +darkness, might not, after all, be of English blood. Tom, it may be +feared, is known to modern English literature chiefly by an irreverent +mention of his name in a line of Peter Pindar's (Dr Wolcot) fifty years +back, where he is described as + + "Kempis Tom, + Who clearly shows the way to Kingdom Come" + +Few in these days can have read him, unless in the Methodist version of +John Wesley Among those few, however, happens to be myself, which arose +from the accident of having, when a boy of eleven, received a copy of +the "De Imitatione Christi" as a bequest from a relation who died +very young, from which cause, and from the external prettiness of +the book--being a Glasgow reprint by the celebrated Foulis, and gaily +bound--I was induced to look into it, and finally read it many times +over, partly out of some sympathy which, even in those days, I had with +its simplicity and devotional fervour, but much more from the savage +delight I found in laughing at Tom's Latinity that, I freely grant to M +Michelet, is inimitable. Yet, after all, it is not certain whether the +original _was_ Latin. But, however that may have been, if it is possible +that M Michelet [Footnote: "_If M. Michelet can be accurate_"--However, +on consideration, this statement does not depend on Michelet. The +bibliographer Barbier has absolutely _specified_ sixty in a separate +dissertation, _soixante traductions_ among those even that have not +escaped the search. The Italian translations are said to be thirty. As +to mere editions, not counting the early MSS. for half a century before +printing was introduced, those in Latin amount to 2000, and those in +French to 1000. Meantime it is very clear to me that this astonishing +popularity so entirely unparalleled in literature, could not have +existed except in Roman Catholic times, nor subsequently have lingered +in any Protestant land. It was the denial of Scripture fountains +to thirsty lands which made this slender rill of Scripture truth so +passionately welcome.] can be accurate in saying that there are no +less than sixty French versions (not editions, observe, but separate +versions) existing of the "De Imitatione," how prodigious must have +been the adaptation of the book to the religious heart of the fifteenth +century! Excepting the Bible, but excepting _that_ only in Protestant +lands, no book known to man has had the same distinction. It is the most +marvellous bibliographical fact on record. + +3. Our English girls, it seems, are as faulty in one way as we English +males in another. None of us men could have written the _Opera Omnia_ +of Mr. à Kempis; neither could any of our girls have assumed male attire +like La Pucelle. But why? Because, says Michelet, English girls and +German think so much of an indecorum. Well, that is a good fault, +generally speaking. But M. Michelet ought to have remembered a fact in +the martyrologies which justifies both parties--the French heroine for +doing, and the general choir of English girls for _not_ doing. A female +saint, specially renowned in France, had, for a reason as weighty as +Joanna's--viz., expressly to shield her modesty among men--worn a male +military harness. That reason and that example authorised La Pucelle; +but our English girls, as a body, have seldom any such reason, and +certainly no such saintly example, to plead. This excuses _them_. Yet, +still, if it is indispensable to the national character that our young +women should now and then trespass over the frontier of decorum, it then +becomes a patriotic duty in me to assure M. Michelet that we _have_ such +ardent females among us, and in a long series; some detected in naval +hospitals when too sick to remember their disguise; some on fields +of battle; multitudes never detected at all; some only suspected; and +others discharged without noise by war offices and other absurd +people. In our navy, both royal and commercial, and generally from deep +remembrances of slighted love, women have sometimes served in disguise +for many years, taking contentedly their daily allowance of +burgoo, biscuit, or cannon-balls--anything, in short, digestible or +indigestible, that it might please Providence to send. One thing, at +least, is to their credit: never any of these poor masks, with their +deep silent remembrances, have been detected through murmuring, or what +is nautically understood by "skulking." So, for once, M. Michelet has an +_erratum_ to enter upon the fly-leaf of his book in presentation copies. + +4. But the last of these ebullitions is the most lively. We English, at +Orleans, and after Orleans (which is not quite so extraordinary, if +all were told), fled before the Maid of Arc. Yes, says M. Michelet, you +_did_: deny it, if you can. Deny it, _mon cher_? I don't mean to +deny it. Running away, in many cases, is a thing so excellent that no +philosopher would, at times, condescend to adopt any other step. All of +us nations in Europe, without one exception, have shown our philosophy +in that way at times. Even people "_qui ne se rendent pas_" have deigned +both to run and to shout, "_Sauve qui peut_!" at odd times of sunset; +though, for my part, I have no pleasure in recalling unpleasant +remembrances to brave men; and yet, really, being so philosophic, they +ought _not_ to be unpleasant. But the amusing feature in M. Michelet's +reproach is the way in which he _improves_ and varies against us the +charge of running, as if he were singing a catch. Listen to him: They +"_showed their backs_" did these English. (Hip, hip, hurrah! three times +three!) "_Behind good walls they let themselves be taken_." (Hip, hip! +nine times nine!) They "_ran as fast as their legs could carry them_" +(Hurrah! twenty-seven times twenty-seven!) They "_ran before a girl_"; +they did. (Hurrah! eighty-one times eighty-one!) This reminds one of +criminal indictments on the old model in English courts, where (for fear +the prisoner should escape) the crown lawyer varied the charge perhaps +through forty counts. The law laid its guns so as to rake the accused +at every possible angle. While the indictment was reading, he seemed a +monster of crime in his own eyes; and yet, after all, the poor fellow +had but committed one offence, and not always _that_. N. B.--Not having +the French original at hand, I make my quotations from a friend's copy +of Mr. Walter Kelly's translation; which seems to me faithful, spirited, +and idiomatically English--liable, in fact, only to the single reproach +of occasional provincialisms.] + +The circumstantial incidents of the execution, unless with more space +than I can now command, I should be unwilling to relate. I should fear +to injure, by imperfect report, a martyrdom which to myself appears so +unspeakably grand. Yet, for a purpose, pointing not at Joanna, but at M. +Michelet--viz, to convince him that an Englishman is capable of thinking +more highly of La Pucelle than even her admiring countrymen--I shall, +in parting, allude to one or two traits in Joanna's demeanour on the +scaffold, and to one or two in that of the bystanders, which authorise +me in questioning an opinion of his upon this martyr's firmness. The +reader ought to be reminded that Joanna D'Arc was subjected to an +unusually unfair trial of opinion. Any of the elder Christian martyrs +had not much to fear of _personal_ rancour. The martyr was chiefly +regarded as the enemy of Cæsar; at times, also, where any knowledge +of the Christian faith and morals existed, with the enmity that arises +spontaneously in the worldly against the spiritual. But the martyr, +though disloyal, was not supposed to be therefore anti-national; and +still less was _individually_ hateful. What was hated (if anything) +belonged to his class, not to himself separately. Now, Joanna, if hated +at all, was hated personally, and in Rouen on national grounds. Hence +there would be a certainty of calumny arising against _her_ such as +would not affect martyrs in general. That being the case, it would +follow of necessity that some people would impute to her a willingness +to recant. No innocence could escape _that_. Now, had she really +testified this willingness on the scaffold, it would have argued nothing +at all but the weakness of a genial nature shrinking from the instant +approach of torment. And those will often pity that weakness most who, +in their own persons, would yield to it least. Meantime, there never +was a calumny uttered that drew less support from the recorded +circumstances. It rests upon no _positive_ testimony, and it has a +weight of contradicting testimony to stem. And yet, strange to say, M, +Michelet, who at times seems to admire the Maid of Arc as much as I do, +is the one sole writer among her _friends_ who lends some countenance to +this odious slander. His words are that, if she did not utter this word +_recant_ with her lips, she uttered it in her heart. "Whether she _said_ +the word is uncertain; but I affirm that she _thought_ it." + +Now, I affirm that she did not; not in any sense of the word "_thought_" +applicable to the case. Here is France calumniating La Pucelle; here +is England defending her. M. Michelet can only mean that, on _a priori_ +principles, every woman must be presumed liable to such a weakness; that +Joanna was a woman; _ergo_, that she was liable to such a weakness. That +is, he only supposes her to have uttered the word by an argument which +presumes it impossible for anybody to have done otherwise. I, on the +contrary, throw the onus of the argument not on presumable tendencies of +nature, but on the known facts of that morning's execution, as recorded +by multitudes. What else, I demand, than mere weight of metal, absolute +nobility of deportment, broke the vast line of battle then arrayed +against her? What else but her meek, saintly demeanour won, from the +enemies that till now had believed her a witch, tears of rapturous +admiration? "Ten thousand men," says M. Michelet himself--"ten thousand +men wept"; and of these ten thousand the majority were political enemies +knitted together by cords of superstition. What else was it but her +constancy, united with her angelic gentleness, that drove the fanatic +English soldier--who had sworn to throw a fagot on her scaffold as _his_ +tribute of abhorrence, that _did_ so, that fulfilled his vow--suddenly +to turn away a penitent for life, saying everywhere that he had seen +a dove rising upon wings to heaven from the ashes where she had stood? +What else drove the executioner to kneel at every shrine for pardon to +_his_ share in the tragedy? And, if all this were insufficient, then I +cite the closing act of her life as valid on her behalf, were all other +testimonies against her. The executioner had been directed to apply his +torch from below. He did so. The fiery smoke rose upward in billowing +volumes. A Dominican monk was then standing almost at her side. Wrapped +up in his sublime office, he saw not the danger, but still persisted +in his prayers. Even then, when the last enemy was racing up the fiery +stairs to seize her, even at that moment did this noblest of girls think +only for _him_, the one friend that would not forsake her, and not +for herself; bidding him with her last breath to care for his own +preservation, but to leave _her_ to God. That girl, whose latest breath +ascended in this sublime expression of self-oblivion, did not utter the +word _recant_ either with her lips or in her heart. No; she did not, +though one should rise from the dead to swear it. + + * * * * * + +Bishop of Beauvais! thy victim died in fire upon a scaffold--thou upon +a down bed. But, for the departing minutes of life, both are oftentimes +alike. At the farewell crisis, when the gates of death are opening, and +flesh is resting from its struggles, oftentimes the tortured and the +torturer have the same truce from carnal torment; both sink together +into sleep; together both sometimes kindle into dreams. When the mortal +mists were gathering fast upon you two, bishop and shepherd girl--when +the pavilions of life were closing up their shadowy curtains about +you--let us try, through the gigantic glooms, to decipher the flying +features of your separate visions. + +The shepherd girl that had delivered France--she, from her dungeon, +she, from her baiting at the stake, she, from her duel with fire, as she +entered her last dream--saw Domrémy, saw the fountain of Domrémy, saw +the pomp of forests in which her childhood had wandered. That +Easter festival which man had denied to her languishing heart--that +resurrection of springtime, which the darkness of dungeons had +intercepted from _her_, hungering after the glorious liberty of +forests--were by God given back into her hands as jewels that had been +stolen from her by robbers. With those, perhaps (for the minutes of +dreams can stretch into ages), was given back to her by God the bliss +of childhood. By special privilege for _her_ might be created, in this +farewell dream, a second childhood, innocent as the first; but not, +like _that_, sad with the gloom of a fearful mission in the rear. This +mission had now been fulfilled. The storm was weathered; the skirts even +of that mighty storm were drawing off. The blood that she was to reckon +for had been exacted; the tears that she was to shed in secret had +been paid to the last. The hatred to herself in all eyes had been faced +steadily, had been suffered, had been survived. And in her last fight +upon the scaffold she had triumphed gloriously; victoriously she had +tasted the stings of death. For all, except this comfort from her +farewell dream, she had died--died amid the tears of ten thousand +enemies--died amid the drums and trumpets of armies--died amid peals +redoubling upon peals, volleys upon volleys, from the saluting clarions +of martyrs. + +Bishop of Beauvais! because the guilt-burdened man is in dreams haunted +and waylaid by the most frightful of his crimes, and because upon that +fluctuating mirror--rising (like the mocking mirrors of _mirage_ in +Arabian deserts) from the fens of death-most of all are reflected the +sweet countenances which the man has laid in ruins; therefore I know, +bishop, that you also, entering your final dream, saw Domrémy. That +fountain, of which the witnesses spoke so much, showed itself to your +eyes in pure morning dews; but neither dews, nor the holy dawn, could +cleanse away the bright spots of innocent blood upon its surface. By +the fountain, bishop, you saw a woman seated, that hid her face. But, +as _you_ draw near, the woman raises her wasted features. Would Domrémy +know them again for the features of her child? Ah, but _you_ know them, +bishop, well! Oh, mercy! what a groan was _that_ which the servants, +waiting outside the bishop's dream at his bedside, heard from his +labouring heart, as at this moment he turned away from the fountain and +the woman, seeking rest in the forests afar off. Yet not _so_ to escape +the woman, whom once again he must behold before he dies. In the forests +to which he prays for pity, will he find a respite? What a tumult, what +a gathering of feet is there! In glades where only wild deer should run +armies and nations are assembling; towering in the fluctuating crowd +are phantoms that belong to departed hours. There is the great English +Prince, Regent of France. There is my Lord of Winchester, the princely +cardinal, that died and made no sign. There is the bishop of Beauvais, +clinging to the shelter of thickets. What building is that which hands +so rapid are raising? Is it a martyr's scaffold? Will they burn the +child of Domrémy a second time? No; it is a tribunal that rises to the +clouds; and two nations stand around it, waiting for a trial. Shall my +Lord of Beauvais sit again upon the judgment-seat, and again number the +hours for the innocent? Ah, no! he is the prisoner at the bar. Already +all is waiting: the mighty audience is gathered, the Court is hurrying +to their seats, the witnesses are arrayed, the trumpets are sounding, +the judge is taking his place. Oh, but this is sudden! My lord, have you +no counsel? "Counsel I have none; in heaven above, or on earth beneath, +counsellor there is none now that would take a brief from _me_: all +are silent." Is it, indeed, come to this? Alas! the time is short, the +tumult is wondrous, the crowd stretches away into infinity; but yet I +will search in it for somebody to take your brief; I know of somebody +that will be your counsel. Who is this that cometh from Domrémy? Who is +she in bloody coronation robes from Rheims? Who is she that cometh with +blackened flesh from walking the furnaces of Rouen? This is she, the +shepherd girl, counsellor that had none for herself, whom I choose, +bishop, for yours. She it is, I engage, that shall take my lord's brief. +She it is, bishop, that would plead for you; yes, bishop, _she_--when +heaven and earth are silent. + + + + +NOTES + +THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH + + +"In October 1849 there appeared in _Blackwood's Magazine_ an article +entitled _The English Mail-Coach, or the Glory of Motion_. There was +no intimation that it was to be continued; but in December 1849 there +followed in the same magazine an article in two sections, headed by a +paragraph explaining that it was by the author of the previous article +in the October number, and was to be taken in connexion with that +article. One of the sections of this second article was entitled _The +Vision of Sudden Death_, and the other _Dream-Fugue on the above +theme of Sudden Death_. When De Quincey revised the papers in 1854 for +republication in volume iv of the Collective Edition of his writings, +he brought the whole under the one general title of _The English +Mail-Coach_, dividing the text, as at present, into three sections or +chapters, the first with the sub-title _The Glory of Motion_, the second +with the sub-title _The Vision of Sudden Death_, and the third with the +sub-title _Dream-Fugue, founded on the preceding theme of Sudden Death_. +Great care was bestowed on the revision. Passages that had appeared in +the magazine articles were omitted; new sentences were inserted; and +the language was retouched throughout."--MASSON. Cf. as to the revision, +Professor Dowden's article, "How De Quincey worked," _Saturday Review_, +Feb. 23, 1895. This selection is found in _Works_, Masson's ed., Vol. +XIII, pp. 270-327; Riverside ed., Vol. I, pp. 517-582. + +1 6 HE HAD MARRIED THE DAUGHTER OF A DUKE: "Mr. John Palmer, a native of +Bath, and from about 1768 the energetic proprietor of the Theatre Royal +in that city, had been led, by the wretched state in those days of +the means of intercommunication between Bath and London, wand his own +consequent difficulties in arranging for a punctual succession of good +actors at his theatre, to turn his attention to the improvement of the +whole system of Post-Office conveyance, and of locomotive machinery +generally, in the British Islands. The result was a scheme for +superseding, on the great roads at least, the then existing system of +sluggish and irregular stage-coaches, the property of private persons +and companies, by a new system of government coaches, in connexion +with the Post-Office, carrying the mails and also a regulated number of +passengers, with clockwork precision, at a rate of comparative speed, +which he hoped should ultimately be not less than ten miles an hour. The +opposition to the scheme was, of course, enormous; coach proprietors, +innkeepers, the Post-Office officials themselves, were all against +Mr. Palmer; he was voted a crazy enthusiast and a public bore. +Pitt, however, when the scheme was submitted to him, recognized its +feasibility; on the 8th of August 1784 the first mail-coach on Mr. +Palmer's plan started from London at 8 o'clock in the morning and +reached Bristol at 11 o'clock at night; and from that day the success of +the new system was assured.--Mr. Palmer himself, having been appointed +Surveyor and Comptroller-General of the Post-Office, took rank as an +eminent and wealthy public man, M. P. for Bath and what not, and lived +till 1818. De Quincey makes it one of his distinctions that he "had +married the daughter of a duke," and in a footnote to that paragraph he +gives the lady's name as "Lady Madeline Gordon." From an old Debrett, +however, I learn that Lady Madelina Gordon, second daughter of +Alexander, fourth Duke of Gordon, was first married, on the 3d of April +1789, to Sir Robert Sinclair, Bart., and next, on the 25th of November +1805, to _Charles Palmer, of Lockley Park, Berks, Esq._ If Debrett is +right, her second husband was not John Palmer of Mail-Coach celebrity, +and De Quincey is wrong."--MASSON. + +1 (footnote) INVENTION OF THE CROSS: Concerning the _Inventio sanctae +crucis_, see Smith, _Dictionary of Christian Antiquities_, Vol. I, p. +503. + +2 4 NATIONAL RESULT: Cf. De Quincey's paper on _Travelling, Works,_ +Riverside ed., Vol. II, especially pp. 313-314; Masson's ed., Vol. I, +especially pp. 270-271. + +3 13 THE FOUR TERMS OF MICHAELMAS, LENT, EASTER, AND ACT: These might +be called respectively the autumn, winter, spring, and summer terms. +Michaelmas, the feast of St. Michael and All Angels, is on September +29. Hilary and Trinity are other names for Lent term and Act term +respectively. Act term is the last term of the academic year; its name +is that originally given to a disputation for a Master's degree; such +disputations took place at the end of the year generally, and hence gave +a name to the summer term. Although the rules concerning residence +at Oxford are more stringent than in De Quincey's time, only eighteen +weeks' residence is required during the year, six in Michaelmas, six in +Lent, and six in Easter and Act. + +3 17 GOING DOWN: Cf. "Going down with victory," i.e. from London into +the country. + +3 30 POSTING-HOUSES: inns where relays of horses were furnished for +coaches and carriages. Cf. De Quincey on _Travelling, loc. cit._ + +4 3 AN OLD TRADITION... from the reign of Charles II: Then no one sat +outside; later, outside places were taken by servants, and were quite +cheap. + +4 9 ATTAINT THE FOOT: The word is used in its legal sense. The blood of +one convicted of high treason is "attaint," and his deprivations extend +to his descendants, unless Parliament remove the attainder. + +4 14 PARIAHS: The fate of social outcasts seems to have taken early and +strong hold upon De Quincey's mind; one of the _Suspiria_ was to have +enlarged upon this theme. Strictly speaking, the Pariahs is that one of +the lower castes of Hindoo society of which foreigners have seen most; +it is not in all districts the lowest caste, however. + +5 6 OBJECTS NOT APPEARING, ETC.: _De non apparentibus et non +existentibus eadem est lex_, a Roman legal phrase. + +5 16 "SNOBS": Apparently snob originally meant "shoemaker"; then, in +university cant, a "townsman" as opposed to a "gownsman." Cf. _Gradus ad +Cantabrigiam_ (1824), quoted in _Century Dictionary_: "_Snobs_.--A term +applied indiscriminately to all who have not the honour of being members +of the university; but in a more particular manner to the 'profanum +vulgus,' the tag-rag and bob-tail, who vegetate on the sedgy banks of +Camus." This use is in De Quincey's mind. Later, in the strikes of that +time, the workmen who accepted lower wages were called _snobs_; those +who held out for higher, _nobs_. + +7 33 FO FO... FI FI: "This paragraph is a caricature of a story told +in Staunton's Account of the Earl of Macartney's Embassy to China in +1792."--MASSON. + +8 4 ÇA IRA ("This will do," "This is the go"): "a proverb of the French +Revolutionists when they were hanging the aristocrats in the streets, +&c., and the burden of one of the most popular revolutionary songs, 'Ça +ira, ça ira, ça ira.'"--MASSON. + +8 18 ALL MORALITY,--ARISTOTLE'S, ZENO'S, CICERO'S: Each of these three +has a high place in the history of ethical teaching. Aristotle wrote +the so-called _Nicomachean Ethics_. According to his teaching, "ethical +virtue is that permanent direction of the will which guards the mean +[_to méson_] proper for us... Bravery is the mean between cowardice +and temerity; temperance, the mean between inordinate desire and stupid +indifference; etc." (Ueberweg, _History of Philosophy_, Vol. I, p. 169). +Zeno, who died about 264 B.C., founded about 308 the Stoic sect, which +took its name from the "Painted Porch" (_Stoa poklae_) in the Agora at +Athens, where the master taught. The Stoics held that men should be free +from passion, and undisturbed by joy or grief, submitting themselves +uncomplainingly to their fate. Such austere views are, of course, as far +as possible removed from those of the Eudæmonist, who sought happiness +as the end of life. Cicero was the author of De Officiis, "Of Duties." + +9 9 ASTROLOGICAL SHADOWS: misfortunes due to being born under an unlucky +star; house of life is also an astrological term. + +9 24 VON TROIL'S ICELAND: The Letters on Iceland (Pinkerton's Voyages +and Travels, Vol. I, p. 621), containing Observations ... made during +a Voyage undertaken in the year 1772, by Uno Von Troil, D.D., of +Stockholm, contains no chapter of the kind. Such a chapter had appeared, +however, in N. Horrebow's (Danish, 1758) Natural History of Iceland: +"Chap. LXXII. Concerning snakes. No snakes of any kind are to be met +with throughout the whole island." In Boswell's Johnson, Vol. IV, p. +314, Temple ed., there is a much more correct allusion, which may have +been in De Quincey's mind: "Langton said very well to me afterwards, +that he could repeat Johnson's conversation before dinner, as Johnson +had said that he could repeat a complete chapter of The Natural History +of Iceland, from the Danish of Horrebow, the whole of which was exactly +thus: 'Chap. LXXII. Concerning Snakes. There are no snakes to be met +with throughout the whole island.'" + +9 25 A PARLIAMENTARY RAT: one who deserts his own party when it is +losing. + +10 16 "JAM PROXIMUS," etc.: Æneid, II, lines 311-312: "Now next (to +Deiphobus' house) Ucalegon (i.e. his house) blazes!" + +11 27 QUARTERINGS: See p. 47, footnote, and note 47 2. + +11 32 WITHIN BENEFIT OF CLERGY: Benefit of clergy was, under old English +law, the right of clerics, afterward extended to all who could read, to +plead exemption from trial before a secular judge. This privilege was +first legally recognized in 1274, and was not wholly abolished until +1827. + +12 9 QUARTER SESSIONS: This court is held in England in the counties by +justices of the peace for the trial of minor criminal offenses and to +administer the poor laws, etc. + +12 26 FALSE ECHOES OF MARENGO: General Desaix was shot through the heart +at the battle of Marengo (June 14, 1800); he died without a word, and +his body was found by Rovigo (cf. Memoirs of the Duke of Rovigo, London, +1835, Vol. I, p. 181), "stripped of his clothes, and surrounded by other +naked bodies." Napoleon, however, published three different versions +of an heroic and devoted message from Desaix to himself, the original +version being: "Go, tell the First Consul that I die with this +regret,--that I have not done enough for posterity." (Cf. Lanfrey, +History of Napoleon the First, 2d ed., London, 1886, Vol. II, p. 39.) +Napoleon himself was credited likewise with the words De Quincey adopts. +"Why is it not permitted me to weep" is one version (Bussey, _History +of Napoleon_, London, 1840, Vol. I, p. 302). Cf. Hazlitt, _Life of +Napoleon_, 2d ed., London, 1852, Vol. II, p. 317, footnote. + +12 (footnote) THE CRY OF THE FOUNDERING LINE-OF-BATTLE SHIP "VENGEUR": +On the 1st of June, 1794, the English fleet under Lord Howe defeated the +French under Villaret-Joyeuse, taking six ships and sinking a seventh, +the _Vengeur_. This ship sank, as a matter of fact, with part of her +crew on board, imploring kid which there was not time to give them. Some +two hundred and fifty men had been taken off by the English; the rest +were lost. On the 9th of July Barrere published a report setting forth +"how the _Vengeur_, ... being entirely disabled, ... refused to strike, +though sinking; how the enemies fired on her, but she returned +their fire, shot aloft all her tricolor streamers, shouted _Vive la +République_, ... and so, in this mad whirlwind of fire and shouting +and invincible despair, went down into the ocean depths; _Vive la +République_ and a universal volley from the upper deck being the last +sounds she made." Cf. Carlyle, _Sinking of the Vengeur_, and _French +Revolution, Book_ XVIII, Chap. VI. + +12 (footnote) LA GARDE MEURT, ETC.: "This phrase, attributed to +Cambronne, who was made prisoner at Waterloo, was vehemently denied by +him. It was invented by Rougemont, a prolific author of _mots_, two +days after the battle, in the _Indépendant_."--Fournier's _L'Esprit dans +l'Histoire_, trans. Bartlett, _Familiar Quotations_, p. 661. + +13 25 BRUMMAGEM: Birmingham became early the chief place of manufacture +of cheap wares. Hence the name _Brummagem_, a vulgar pronunciation of +the name of the city, has become in England a common name for cheap, +tawdry jewelry. Cf. also Shakespeare, Richard III, Act I, sc. iv, 1. 55: + + False, fleeting, perjured Clarence. + +13 27 LUXOR occupies part of the site of ancient Thebes, capital of +Egypt; its antiquities are famous. + +14 9 BUT ON OUR SIDE... WAS A TOWER OF MORAL STRENGTH, ETC.: Cf. +Shakespeare, _Richard_ III, Act V, sc. in, 11. 12-13: + + Besides, the king's name is a tower of strength, + Which they upon the adverse party want. + +14 20 FELT MY HEART BURN WITHIN ME: Cf. Luke xxiv. 32. + +14 32 A VERY FINE STORY FROM ONE OF OUR ELDER DRAMATISTS: The dramatist +in question has not been identified. I am indebted indirectly to +Professor W. Strunk, Jr., of Cornell University, for reference to Johann +Caius' Of English Dogs, translated by A. Fleming, in Arber's English +Garner, original edition, Vol. III, p. 253 (new edition, Social England +Illustrated, pp. 28-29), where, after telling how Henry the Seventh, +perceiving that four mastiffs could overcome a lion, ordered the dogs +all hanged, the writer continues: "I read an history answerable to +this, of the selfsame HENRY, who having a notable and an excellent +fair falcon, it fortuned that the King's Falconers, in the presence and +hearing of his Grace, highly commended his Majesty's Falcon, saying, +that it feared not to intermeddle with an eagle, it was so venturous and +so mighty a bird; which when the king heard, he charged that the falcon +should be killed without delay: for the selfsame reason, as it may seem, +which was rehearsed in the conclusion of the former history concerning +the same king." + +15 l OMRAHS... FROM AGRA AND LAHORE: There seems to be a reminiscence +here of Wordsworth's Prelude, Book X, 11. 18-20: + + The Great Mogul, when he + Erewhile went forth from Agra or Lahore, + Rajahs and Omrahs in his train. + +Omrah, which is not found in Century Dictionary, is itself really plural +of Arabic amir (ameer), a commander, nobleman. + +15 23 THE 6TH OF EDWARD LONGSHANKS: a De Quinceyan jest, of course. This +wrould refer to a law of the sixth year of Edward I, or 1278, but there +are but fifteen chapters in the laws of that year. + +16 8 NOT MAGNA LOQUIMUR,... BUT VIVIMUS: not "we speak great things," +but "we live" them. + +17 21 MARLBOROUGH FOREST is twenty-seven miles east of Bath, where De +Quincey attended school. + +18 18 ULYSSES, ETC.: The allusion is, of course, to the slaughter of +the suitors of Penelope, his wife, by Ulysses, after his return. Cf. +Odyssey, Books XXI-XXII. + +19 3 ABOUT WATERLOO: i.e. about 1815. This phrase is one of many that +indicate the deep impression made by this event upon the English mind. +Cf. p. 58. + +19 17 "SAY, ALL OUR PRAISES," ETC.: Cf. Pope, Moral Essays: Epistle III, +Of the Use of Riches, II. 249-250: + + But all our praises why should lords engross, + Rise, honest Muse! and sing the Man of Ross. + +20 3 TURRETS: "Tourettes fyled rounde" appears in Chaucer's Knight's +Tale, 1. 1294, where it means the ring on a dog's collar through which +the leash was passed. Skeat explains _torets_ as "probably eyes in which +rings will turn round, because each eye is a little larger than the +thickness of the ring." Cf. Chaucer's _Treatise on the Astrolabe_, Part +I, sec. 2, "This ring renneth in a maner turet," "this ring runs in a +kind of eye." But Chaucer does not refer to harness. + +21 2 MR. WATERTON TELLS ME: Charles Waterton, the naturalist, was +born in 1782 and died in 1865. His _Wanderings in South America_ was +published in 1825. + +23 11 EARTH AND HER CHILDREN: This paragraph is about one fifth of the +length of the corresponding paragraph as it appeared in _Blackwood_. For +the longer version see Masson's ed., Vol. XIII, p. 289, note 2. + +24 14 THE GENERAL POST-OFFICE: The present office was opened Sept. 23, +1829. St. Martin's-le-Grand is a church within the "city" of London, +so named to distinguish it from St. Martin's-in-the-Fields, which faces +what is now Trafalgar Square, and is, as the name indicates, outside the +"city." The street takes its name from the church. + +28 10 BARNET is a Hertfordshire village, eleven miles north of London. + +29 33 A "COURIER" EVENING PAPER, CONTAINING THE GAZETTE: A gazette was +originally one of the three official papers of the kingdom; afterwards +any official announcement, as this of a great victory. + +30 17 FEY: This is not a Celtic word; it is the Anglo-Saxon _faege_ +retained in Lowland Scotch, which is the most northerly English dialect. +The word appears frequently in descriptions of battles, the Anglo-Saxon +fatalistic philosophy teaching that, certain warriors entered the +conflict _faege_, "doomed." Now the meaning is altered slightly: "You +are surely fey," would be said in Scotland, as Professor Masson remarks, +to a person observed to be in extravagantly high spirits, or in any mood +surprisingly beyond the bounds of his ordinary temperament,--the +notion being that the excitement is supernatural, and a presage of his +approaching death, or of some other calamity about to befall him. + +31 27 THE INSPIRATION OF GOD, ETC.: This is an indication--more +interesting than agreeable, perhaps--of the heights to which the martial +ardor of De Quincey's toryism rises. + +33 13 CÆSAR THE DICTATOR, AT HIS LAST DINNER-PARTY, ETC.: related by +Suetonius in his life of Julius Cæsar, Chap. LXXXVII: "The day before he +died, some discourse occurring at dinner in M. Lepidus' house upon that +subject, which was the most agreeable way of dying, he expressed his +preference for what is sudden and unexpected" (repentinum inopinatumque +praetulerat). The story is told by Plutarch and Appian also. + +35 13 _BIATHANATOS_: "De Quincey has evidently taken this from John +Donne's treatise: _BIATHANATOS, A Declaration of that Paradoxe or +Thesis, That Self-homicide is not so naturally Sin, that it may never be +otherwise_, 1644. See his paper on _Suicide, etc._, Masson's ed., VIII, +398 [Riverside, IX, 209]. But not even Donne's precedent justifies the +word formation. The only acknowledged compounds are _biaio-thanasia_, +'violent death,' and _biaio-thanatos_, 'dying a violent death.' Even +_bia thanatos_, 'death by violence,' is not classical."--HART. But the +form _biathanatos_ is older than Donne and is said to be common in MSS. +It should be further remarked that neither of the two compounds cited +is classical. As to De Quincey's interpretation of Cæsar's meaning here, +cf. Merivale's _History of the Romans under the Empire_, Chap. +XXI, where he translates Cæsar's famous reply: "That which is least +expected." Cf. also Shakespeare, _Julius Cæsar_, Act II, sc. ii, 1. 33. + +37 25 "NATURE, FROM HER SEAT," ETC.: Cf. Milton's _Paradise Lost_, Book +IX, 11. 780-784: + + So saying, her rash hand in evil hour + Forth reaching to the fruit, she pluck'd, she eat: + Earth felt the wound, and Nature from her seat + Sighing through all her works gave signs of woe, + That all was lost. + +38 2 SO SCENICAL, ETC.: De Quincey's love for effects of this sort +appears everywhere. Cf. the opening paragraphs of the _Revolt of the +Tartars_, Masson's ed., Vol. VII; Riverside ed., Vol. XII. + +39 4 JUS DOMINII: "the law of ownership," a legal term. + +39 14 JUS GENTIUM: "the law of nations," a legal term. + +39 30 "MONSTRUM HORRENDUM," ETC..: _Æneid_, III, 658. Polyphemus, one of +the Cyclopes, whose eye was put out by Ulysses, is meant. Cf. _Odyssey_, +IX, 371 et seq.; _Æneid_, III, 630 _et seq_. + +40 1 ONE OF THE CALENDARS, ETC.: The histories of the three Calenders, +sons of kings, will be found in most selections from the _Arabian +Nights_. A Calender is one of an order of Dervishes founded in the +fourteenth century by an Andalusian Arab; they are wanderers who preach +in market places and live by alms. + +40 10 AL SIRAT: According to Mahometan teaching this bridge over Hades +was in width as a sword's edge. Over it souls must pass to Paradise. + +40 12 UNDER THIS EMINENT MAN, ETC.: For these two sentences the +original in _Blackwood_ had this, with its addition of good De Quinceyan +doctrine: "I used to call him _Cyclops Mastigophorus_, Cyclops the +Whip-bearer, until I observed that his skill made whips useless, except +to fetch off an impertinent fly from a leader's head, upon which +I changed his Grecian name to _Cyclops Diphrelates_ (Cyclops the +Charioteer). I, and others known to me, studied under him the +diphrelatic art. Excuse, reader, a word too elegant to be pedantic. And +also take this remark from me as a _gage d'amitié_--that no word ever +was or _can_ be pedantic which, by supporting a distinction, supports +the accuracy of logic, or which fills up a chasm for the understanding." + +41 1 SOME PEOPLE HAVE CALLED ME PROCRASTINATING: Cf. Page's (Japp's) +_Life_, Chap. XIX, and Japp's _De Quincey Memorials_, Vol. II, pp. +45,47,49- 42 11 THE WHOLE PAGAN PANTHEON: i.e. all the gods put +together; from the Greek _Pantheion_, a temple dedicated to all the +gods. + +43 2 SEVEN ATMOSPHERES OF SLEEP, ETC.: Professor Hart suggests that De +Quincey is here "indulging in jocular arithmetic. The three nights +plus the three days, plus the present night, equal seven." Dr. Cooper +compares with this a reference to the Seven Sleepers of Ephesus. But it +seems doubtful whether any explanation is necessary. + +43 17 LILLIPUTIAN LANCASTER: the county town of Lancashire, in which +Liverpool and Manchester, towns of recent and far greater growth, are +situated. + +44 (footnote) "Giraldus Cambrensis," or Gerald de Barry (1146-1220), was +a Welsh historian; one of his chief works is the _Itinerarium Cambrica_, +or Voyage in Wales. + +47 2 QUARTERING: De Quincey's derivation of this word in his footnote +is correct, but its use in this French sense is not common. De Quincey, +however, has it above, p. 11. + +49 8 THE SHOUT OF ACHILLES: Cf. Homer, _Iliad_, XVIII, 217 _et seq_. + +50 10 BUYING IT, ETC.: De Quincey refers, no doubt, to the pay of common +soldiers and to the practice of employing mercenaries. + +52 1 FASTER THAN EVER MILL-RACE, ETC.: the change in the wording of this +sentence in De Quincey's revision is, as Masson remarks, particularly +characteristic of his sense of melody; it read in _Blackwood_, "We ran +past them faster than ever mill-race in our inexorable flight." + +52 15 HERE WAS THE MAP, ETC.: This sentence is an addition in the +reprint. Masson remarks "how artistically it causes the due pause +between the horror as still in rush of transaction and the backward look +at the wreck when the crash was past." + +53 18 "WHENCE THE SOUND," ETC.: _Paradise Lost_, Book XI, 11. 558-563. + +54 3 WOMAN'S IONIC FORM: In thus using the word Ionic, De Quincey +doubtless has in mind the character of Ionic architecture, with its tall +and graceful column, differing from the severity of the Doric on the one +hand and from the floridity of the Corinthian on the other. Probably he +is thinking of a caryatid. Cf. the following version of the old story of +the origin of the styles of Greek architecture in Vitruvius, IV, Chap. I +(Gwilt's translation), quoted by Hart: "They measured a man's foot, and +finding its length the sixth part of his height, they gave the column +a similar proportion, that is, they made its height six times the +thickness of the shaft measured at the base. Thus the Doric order +obtained its proportion, its strength, and its beauty from the human +figure. With a similar feeling they afterward built the Temple of Diana. +But in that, seeking a new proportion, they used the female figure as +a standard; and for the purpose of producing a more lofty effect they +first made it eight times its thickness in height. Under it they placed +a base, after the manner of a shoe to the foot; they also added volutes +to its capital, like graceful curling hair hanging on each side, and the +front they ornamented with _cymatia_ and festoons in the place of hair. +On the shafts they sunk channels, which bear a resemblance to the folds +of a matronal garment. Thus two orders were invented, one of a masculine +character, without ornament, the other bearing a character which +resembled the delicacy, ornament, and proportion of a female. The +successors of these people, improving in taste, and preferring a more +slender proportion, assigned seven diameters to the height of the Doric +column, and eight and a half to the Ionic." + +55 3 CORYMBI: clusters of fruit or flowers. + +55 28 QUARREL: the bolt of a crossbow, an arrow having a square, +or four-edged head (from Middle Latin _quadrellus_, diminutive of +_quadrum_, a square). + +58 20 WATERLOO AND RECOVERED CHRISTENDOM! Cf. note 19 3. + +61 20 THEN A THIRD TIME THE TRUMPET SOUNDED: There are throughout this +passage, as Dr. Cooper remarks, many reminiscences of the language of +the Book of Revelation. Cf. this with Revelation viii. 10; cf. 61 28 +with Revelation xii. 5, and 62 5 with ix. 13. + +63 29 THE ENDLESS RESURRECTIONS OF HIS LOVE: The following, which Masson +prints as a postscript, was a part of De Quincey's introduction to the +volume of the Collective Edition containing this piece: + +"'THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH.'--This little paper, according to my original +intention, formed part of the 'Suspiria de Profundis'; from which, for +a momentary purpose, I did not scruple to detach it, and to publish it +apart, as sufficiently intelligible even when dislocated from its place +in a larger whole. To my surprise, however, one or two critics, not +carelessly in conversation, but deliberately in print, professed their +inability to apprehend the meaning of the whole, or to follow the links +of the connexion between its several parts. I am myself as little +able to understand where the difficulty lies, or to detect any lurking +obscurity, as these critics found themselves to unravel my logic. +Possibly I may not be an indifferent and neutral judge in such a case. I +will therefore sketch a brief abstract of the little paper according +to my original design, and then leave the reader to judge how far this +design is kept in sight through the actual execution. + +"Thirty-seven years ago, or rather more, accident made me, in the dead +of night, and of a night memorably solemn, the solitary witness of an +appalling scene, which threatened instant death in a shape the most +terrific to two young people whom I had no means of assisting, except +in so far as I was able to give them a most hurried warning of their +danger; but even _that_ not until they stood within the very shadow +of the catastrophe, being divided from the most frightful of deaths by +scarcely more, if more at all, than seventy seconds. + +"Such was the scene, such in its outline, from which the whole of this +paper radiates as a natural expansion. This scene is circumstantially +narrated in Section the Second, entitled 'The Vision of Sudden Death.' + +"But a movement of horror, and of spontaneous recoil from this dreadful +scene, naturally carried the whole of that scene, raised and idealised, +into my dreams, and very soon into a rolling succession of dreams. +The actual scene, as looked down upon from the box of the mail, was +transformed into a dream, as tumultuous and changing as a musical fugue. +This troubled dream is circumstantially reported in Section the Third, +entitled 'Dream-Fugue on the theme of Sudden Death.' What I had beheld +from my seat upon the mail,--the scenical strife of action and passion, +of anguish and fear, as I had there witnessed them moving in ghostly +silence,--this duel between life and death narrowing itself to a +point of such exquisite evanescence as the collision neared; all these +elements of the scene blended, under the law of association, with +the previous and permanent features of distinction investing the mail +itself; which features at that time lay--1st, in velocity unprecedented, +2dly, in the power and beauty of the horses, 3dly, in the official +connexion with the government of a great nation, and, 4thly, in the +function, almost a consecrated function, of publishing and diffusing +through the land the great political events, and especially the great +battles, during a conflict of unparalleled grandeur. These honorary +distinctions are all described circumstantially in the First or +introductory Section ('The Glory of Motion'). The three first were +distinctions maintained at all times; but the fourth and grandest +belonged exclusively to the war with Napoleon; and this it was +which most naturally introduced Waterloo into the dream. Waterloo, I +understand, was the particular feature of the 'Dream-Fugue' which my +censors were least able to account for. Yet surely Waterloo, which, in +common with every other great battle, it had been our special privilege +to publish over all the land, most naturally entered the dream under the +licence of our privilege. If not--if there be anything amiss--let the +Dream be responsible. The Dream is a law to itself; and as well quarrel +with a rainbow for showing, or for _not_ showing, a secondary arch. +So far as I know, every element in the shifting movements of the Dream +derived itself either primarily from the incidents of the actual scene, +or from secondary features associated with the mail. For example, the +cathedral aisle derived itself from the mimic combination of features +which grouped themselves together at the point of approaching +collision--viz. an arrow-like section of the road, six hundred yards +long, under the solemn lights described, with lofty trees meeting +overhead in arches. The guard's horn, again--a humble instrument in +itself--was yet glorified as the organ of publication for so many great +national events. And the incident of the Dying Trumpeter, who rises from +a marble bas-relief, and carries a marble trumpet to his marble lips +for the purpose of warning the female infant, was doubtless secretly +suggested by my own imperfect effort to seize the guard's horn, and to +blow the warning blast. But the Dream knows best; and the Dream, I say +again, is the responsible party." + + +JOAN OF ARC + + +This article appeared originally in _Taifs Magazine_ for March and +August, 1847; it was reprinted by De Quincey in 1854 in the third volume +of his _Collected Writings_. It is found in _Works_, Masson's ed., Vol. +V, pp. 384-416; Riverside ed., Vol. VI, pp. 178-215. + +64 10 LORRAINE, now in great part in the possession of Germany, is the +district in which Domrémy, Joan's birthplace, is situated. + +65 14 VAUCOULEURS: a town near Domrémy; cf. p. 70. + +65 28 EN CONTUMACE: "in contumacy," a legal term applied to one who, +when summoned to court, fails to appear. + +66 13 ROUEN: the city in Normandy where Joan was burned at the stake. + +66 25 THE LILIES OF FRANCE: the royal emblem of France from very early +times until the Revolution of 1789, when "the wrath of God and man +combined to wither them." + +67 5 M. MICHELET: Jules Michelet (1798-1874) is said to have spent forty +years in the preparation of his great work, the _History of France_. +Cf. the same, translated by G. H. Smith, 2 vols., Appleton, Vol. II, +pp. 119-169; or _Joan of Arc_, from Michelet's _History of France_, +translated by O. W. Wight, New York, 1858. + +67 8 RECOVERED LIBERTY: The Revolution of 1830 had expelled the restored +Bourbon kings. + +67 20 THE BOOK AGAINST PRIESTS: Michelet's lectures as professor of +history in the Collège de France, in which he attacked the Jesuits, were +published as follows: _Des Jésuites_, 1843; _Du Prêtre, de la Femme +et de la Famille_, 1844; _Du Peuple_, 1845. To the second De Quincey +apparently refers. + +67 26 BACK TO THE FALCONER'S LURE: The lure was a decoy used to recall +the hawk to its perch,--sometimes a dead pigeon, sometimes an artificial +bird, with some meat attached. + +68 6 ON THE MODEL OF LORD PERCY: These lines, as Professor Hart notes, +in Percy's Folio, ed. Hales and Furnivall, Vol. II, p. 7, run: + + The stout Erle of Northumberland + a vow to God did make, + his pleasure in the Scottish woods + 3 som_m_ers days to take. + +68 27 PUCELLE D'ORLÉANS: Maid of Orleans (the city on the Loire which +Joan saved). + +69 1 THE COLLECTION, ETC.: The work meant is Quicherat, _Procès de +Condamnation et Réhabilitation de Jeanne d'Arc_, 5 vols., Paris, +1841-1849. Cf. De Quincey's note. + +69 21 DELENDA EST ANGLIA VICTRIX! "Victorious England must be +destroyed!" Cf. _Delenda est Carthago_! "Carthage must be destroyed!" +_Delenda est Karthago_ is the version of Florus (II, 15) of the words +used by Cato the Censor, just before the Third Punic War, whenever he +was called upon to record his vote in the Senate on any subject under +discussion. + +69 27 HYDER ALI (1702-1782), a Mahometan adventurer, made himself +maharajah of Mysore and gave the English in India serious trouble; +he was defeated in 1782 by Sir Eyre Coote. Tippoo Sahib, his son and +successor, proved less dangerous and was finally killed at Seringapatam +in 1799. + +70 4 NATIONALITY IT WAS NOT: i.e. nationalism--patriotism--it was not. +Cf. _Revolt of the Tartars_, Riverside ed., Vol. XII, p. 4; Masson's +ed., Vol. VII, p. 370, where De Quincey speaks of the Torgod as "tribes +whose native ferocity was exasperated by debasing forms of superstition, +and by a nationality as well as an inflated conceit of their own merit +absolutely unparalleled." Cf. also footnote, p. 94. + +70 4 SUFFREN: the great French admiral who in 1780-1781 inflicted so +much loss upon the British. + +70 10 MAGNANIMOUS JUSTICE OF ENGLISHMEN: As Professor Hart observes, the +treatment of Joan in _Henry VI_ is hardly magnanimous. + +71 29 THAT ODIOUS MAN: Cf. pp. 79-80. + +72 12 THREE GREAT SUCCESSIVE BATTLES: Rudolf of Lorraine fell at +Crécy (1346); Frederick of Lorraine at Agincourt (1415); the battle of +Nicopolis, which sacrificed the third Lorrainer, took place in 1396. + +73 24 CHARLES VI (1368-1422) had killed several men during his first fit +of insanity. He was for the rest of his life wholly unfit to govern. He +declared Henry V of England, the conqueror of Agincourt, his successor, +thus disinheriting the Dauphin, his son. + +74 2 THE FAMINES, ETC.: Horrible famines occurred in France and England +in 1315, 1336, and 1353. Such insurrections as Wat Tyler's, in 1381, are +probably in De Quincey's mind. + +74 6 THE TERMINATION OF THE CRUSADES: The Crusades came to an end +about 1271. "The ulterior results of the crusades," concludes Cox in +_Encyclopedia Britannica_, "were the breaking up of the feudal system, +the abolition of serfdom, the supremacy of a common law over the +independent jurisdiction of chiefs who claimed the right of private +wars." + +74 7 THE DESTRUCTION OF THE TEMPLARS: This most famous of the military +orders, founded in the twelfth century for the defense of the Latin +kingdom of Jerusalem, having grown so powerful as to be greatly feared, +was suppressed at the beginning of the fourteenth century. + +74 7 THE PAPAL INTERDICTS: "De Quincey has probably in mind such an +interdict as that pronounced in 1200, by Innocent III, against France. +All ecclesiastical functions were suspended and the land was in +desolation."--HART. England was put under interdict several times, as in +1170 (for the murder of Becket) and 1208. + +74 8 THE TRAGEDIES CAUSED OR SUFFERED BY THE HOUSE OF ANJOU, AND BY +THE EMPEROR: "The Emperor is Konradin, the last of the Hohenstaufen, +beheaded by Charles of Anjou at Naples, 1268. The subsequent cruelties +of Charles in Sicily caused the popular uprising known as the +Sicilian Vespers, 1282, in which many thousands of Frenchmen were +assassinated."--HART. + +74 10 THE COLOSSAL FIGURE OF FEUDALISM, ETC.: The English yeomen at +Crecy, overpowering the mounted knights of France, took from feudalism +its chief support,--the superiority of the mounted knight to the +unmounted yeoman. Cf. Green, _History of the English People_, Book IV, +Chap. II. + +74 15 THE ABOMINABLE SPECTACLE OF A DOUBLE POPE: For thirty-eight years +this paradoxical state of things endured. + +75 15 THE ROMAN MARTYROLOGY: a list of the martyrs of the Church, +arranged according to the order of their festivals, and with accounts of +their lives and sufferings. + +76 4 "ABBEYS THERE WERE," ETC.: Cf. Wordsworth, _Peter Bell_, Part +Second: + + Temples like those among the Hindoos, + And mosques, and spires, and abbey windows, + And castles all with ivy green. + +76 17 THE VOSGES ... HAVE NEVER ATTRACTED MUCH NOTICE, ETC.: They came +into like prominence after De Quincey's day in the Franco-Prussian War +of 1870. + +76 31 THOSE MYSTERIOUS FAWNS, ETC.: In some of the romances of the +Middle Ages, especially those containing Celtic material, a knight, +while hunting, is led by his pursuit of a white fawn (or a white stag or +boar) to a _fee_ (i.e. an inhabitant of the "Happy Other-world") or into +the confines of the "Happy Other-world" itself. Sometimes, as in the +_Guigemar_ of Marie de France, the knight passes on to a series of +adventures in consequence of his meeting with the white fawn. I owe this +note to the kindness of Mr. S. W. Kinney, A.M., of Baltimore. + +76 33 THAT ANCIENT STAG: See _Englische Studien,_ Vol. V, p. 16, +where additions are made to the following account from Hardwicke's +_Traditions, Superstitions, and Folk-Lore,_ Manchester and London, 1872, +p. 154: + +This chasing of the white doe or the white hart by the spectre huntsman +has assumed various forms. According to Aristotle a white hart was +killed by Agathocles, King of Sicily, which a thousand years beforehand +had been consecrated to Diana by Diomedes. Alexander the Great is said +by Pliny to have caught a white stag, placed a collar of gold about its +neck, and afterwards set it free. Succeeding heroes have in after days +been announced as the capturers of this famous white hart. Julius Caesar +took the place of Alexander, and Charlemagne caught a white hart at both +Magdeburg, and in the Holstein woods. In 1172 William [Henry] the Lion +is reported to have accomplished a similar feat, according to a Latin +inscription on the walls of Lubeck Cathedral. Tradition says the white +hart has been caught on Rothwell Hay Common, in Yorkshire, and in +Windsor Forest. + +This reference I owe indirectly to Professor J. M. Manly, of Chicago. + +77 4 OR, BEING UPON THE MARCHES OF FRANCE, A MARQUIS: _Marquis_ is +derived from _march,_ and was originally the title of the guardian of +the frontier, or march. + +77 13 AGREED WITH SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY THAT A GOOD DEAL MIGHT BE SAID +ON BOTH SIDES: This expression, as has been pointed out to me, is from +the middle of _Spectator_ No. 122, where Sir Roger, having been appealed +to on a question of fishing privileges, replied, "with an air of a man +who would not give his judgment rashly, that much might be said on both +sides." It is likely, however, that De Quincey may have connected it +in his mind with the discussion of witchcraft at the beginning of +_Spectator_ No. 117, where Addison balances the grounds for belief and +unbelief somewhat as De Quincey does here. + +78 7 BERGERETA: a very late Latin form of French _bergerette,_ "a +shepherdess." + +78 15 M. SIMOND, IN HIS "TRAVELS": The reference is to _Journal of a +Tour and Residence in Great Britain during the years 1810 and 1811,_ by +Louis Simond, 2d ed. (Edinburgh, 1817), to which is added an appendix on +France, written in December, 1815, and October, 1816. De Quincey refers +to this story with horror several times, but such scenes are not yet +wholly unknown. + +79 21 A CHEVALIER OF ST. LOUIS: The French order of St. Louis +was founded by Louis XIV in 1693 for military service. After its +discontinuance at the Revolution this order was reinstated in 1814; but +no knights have been created since 1830. "Chevalier" is the lowest rank +in such an order; it is here erroneously used by De Quincey as a title +of address. + +79 22 "CHEVALIER, AS-TU DONNÉ," etc.: "Chevalier, have you fed the hog?" +"MA FILLE," ETC.: "My daughter, have you," etc. "PUCELLE," ETC.: "Maid +of Orleans, have you saved the lilies (i.e. France)?" + +79 28 IF THE MAN THAT TURNIPS CRIES: Cf. _Johnsoniana_, ed. R. Napier, +London, 1884, where, in _Anecdotes of Johnson_, by Mrs. Piozzi, p. 29, +is found: "'T is a mere play of words (added he)"--Johnson is speaking +of certain "verses by Lopez de Vega"--"and you might as well say, that + + "If the man who turnips cries, + Cry not when his father dies, + 'T is a proof that he had rather + Have a turnip than his father." + +This reference is given in Bartlett's _Familiar Quotations_. + +80 4 THE ORIFLAMME OF FRANCE: the red banner of St. Denis, preserved in +the abbey of that name, near Paris, and borne before the French king as +a consecrated flag. + +80 22 TWENTY YEARS AFTER, TALKING WITH SOUTHEY: In 1816 De Quincey was +a resident of Grasmere; Southey lived for many years at Keswick, a +few miles away; they met first in 1807. For De Quincey's estimate +of Southey's _Joan of Arc_, see _Works_, Riverside ed., Vol. VI, pp. +262-266; Masson's ed., Vol. V, pp. 238-242. + +80 28 CHINON is a little town near Tours. + +81 3 SHE "PRICKS" FOR SHERIFFS: The old custom was to prick with a pin +the names of those chosen by the sovereign for sheriffs. + +82 9 AMPULLA: the flask containing the sacred oil used at coronations. + +82 10 THE ENGLISH BOY: Henry VI was nine months old when he was +proclaimed king of England and France in 1422, Charles VI of France, and +Henry V, his legal heir, having both died in that year. Henry's mother +was the eldest daughter of Charles VI. + +82 13 DRAWN FROM THE OVENS OF RHEIMS: Rheims, where the kings of France +were crowned, was famous for its biscuits and gingerbread. + +82 26 TINDAL'S "CHRISTIANITY AS OLD AS THE CREATION": Matthew Tindal +(1657-1732) published this work in 1732; its greatest interest lies in +the fact that to this book more than to any other Butler's _Analogy_ was +a reply. Tindal's argument was that natural religion, as taught by the +deists, was complete; that no revelation was necessary. A life according +to nature is all that the best religion can teach. Such doctrine as this +Joan preached in the speech ascribed to her. + +82 27 A PARTE ANTE: "from the part gone before"; Joan's speech being +three centuries earlier than the book from which it was taken. + +83 9 THAT DIVINE PASSAGE IN "PARADISE REGAINED": from Book I, II. +196-205. + +84 34 PATAY IS NEAR ORLEANS: Troyes was the capital of the old province +of Champagne. + +86 25 "NOLEBAT," ETC.: "She would not use her sword or kill any one." + +87 24 MADE PRISONER BY THE BURGUNDIANS: The English have accused the +French officers of conniving at Joan's capture through jealousy of her +successes. Compiègne is fifty miles northeast of Paris. + +87 27 BISHOP OF BEAUVAIS: Beauvais is forty-three miles northwest +of Paris, in Normandy. This bishop, Pierre Cauchon, rector of the +University at Paris, was devoted to the English party. + +87 30 "BISHOP THAT ART," ETC.: Cf. Shakespeare's _Macbeth_, Act I, sc. +v, 1. 13. + +87 33 A TRIPLE CROWN: The papacy is meant, of course. The pope's tiara +is a tall cap of golden cloth, encircled by three coronets. + +88 17 JUDGES EXAMINING THE PRISONER: The judge in France questions a +prisoner minutely when he is first taken, before he is remanded for +trial. De Quincey displays here his inveterate prejudice against the +French; but this practice is widely regarded as the vital error of +French criminal procedure., + +89 5 A WRETCHED DOMINICAN: a member of the order of mendicant friars +established in France by Domingo de Guzman in 1216. Their official name +was Fratres Predicatores, "Preaching Friars," and their chief objects +were preaching and instruction. Their influence was very great until +the rise of the Jesuit order in the sixteenth century. The Dominicans +Le Maitre and Graverent (the Grand Inquisitor) both took part in the +prosecution. + +89 31 FOR A LESS CAUSE THAN MARTYRDOM: Cf. Genesis ii. 24. + +91 14 FROM THE FOUR WINDS: There may be a reminiscence here of Ezekiel +xxxvii. 1-10, especially verse 9: "Come from the four winds, O breath, +and breathe upon these slain, that they may live." + +91 30 LUXOR. See note 13 27. + +92 15 DAUGHTER OF CÆSARS: She was the daughter of the German emperor, +Francis I, whose sovereignty, as the name "Holy Roman Empire" shows, was +supposed to continue that of the ancient Roman emperors. + +92 17 CHARLOTTE CORDAY (1768-93) murdered the revolutionist Marat in the +belief that the good of France required it; two days later she paid the +penalty, as she had expected, with her life. + +93 18 GRAFTON, A CHRONICLER: Richard Grafton died about 1572. He was +printer to Edward VI. His chronicle was published in 1569. + +93 20 "FOULE FACE": _Foule_ formerly meant "ugly." + +9321 HOLINSHEAD: Raphael Holinshed died about 1580. His great work, +_Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland_, was used by Shakespeare +as the source of several plays. He writes of Joan: "Of favor +[appearance] was she counted likesome; of person stronglie made, and +manlie; of courage, great, hardie, and stout withall." + +94 (footnote) SATANIC: This epithet was applied to the work of some +of his contemporaries by Southey in the preface to his _Vision of +Judgement_, 1821. It has been generally assumed that Byron and Shelley +are meant. See Introduction to Byron's _Vision of Judgment_ in the new +Murray edition of Byron, Vol. IV. + +96 (footnote) BURGOO: a thick oatmeal gruel or porridge used by seamen. +According to the _New English Dictionary_ the derivation is unknown; but +in the _Athenaeum_, Oct. 6, 1888, quoted by Hart, the word is explained +as a corruption of Arabic _burghul_. + +101 30 ENGLISH PRINCE, REGENT OF FRANCE: John, Duke of Bedford, uncle +of Henry VI. "In genius for war as in political capacity," says J. +R. Green, "John was hardly inferior to Henry [the Fifth, his brother] +himself" (_A History of the English People_, Book IV, Chap. VI). + +101 31 MY LORD OF WINCHESTER: Henry Beaufort, Bishop of Winchester, +half-brother of Henry IV. He was the most prominent English prelate of +his time and was the only Englishman in the Court that condemned +Joan. As to the story of his death, to which De Quincey alludes, see +Shakespeare, 2 Henry VI, Act III, sc. in. Beaufort became cardinal in +1426. + +102 17 WHO IS THIS THAT COMETH FROM DOMRÉMY? This is an evident +imitation of the famous passage from Isaiah Ixiii. I: "Who is this that +cometh from Edom, with dyed garments from Bozrah?" "Bloody coronation +robes" is rather obscure, but probably refers to the fact that Joan had +shed her own blood to bring about the coronation of her sovereign; she +is supposed to have appeared in armor at the actual coronation ceremony, +and this armor might with reason be imagined as "bloody." + +102 22 SHE ... SHALL TAKE MY LORD'S BRIEF: that is, she shall act as the +bishop's counsel. In the case of Beauvais, as in that of Winchester, +it must be remembered that in all monarchical countries the bishops are +"lords spiritual," on an equality with the greater secular nobles, the +"lords temporal." + + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc, by +Thomas de Quincey + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ENGLISH MAIL-COACH *** + +***** This file should be named 6359-8.txt or 6359-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/6/3/5/6359/ + +Produced by Anne Soulard, Charles Franks and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc + +Author: Thomas de Quincey + +Commentator: Milton Haight Turk + +Editor: Milton Haight Turk + + +Release Date: August, 2004 [EBook #6359] +This file was first posted on December 1, 2002 +Last Updated: June 14, 2013 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ENGLISH MAIL-COACH *** + + +Text file produced by Anne Soulard, Charles Franks and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + +HTML file produced by David Widger + + + + +</pre> + + <div style="height: 8em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h1> + THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH + </h1> + <h4> + AND + </h4> + <h1> + JOAN OF ARC + </h1> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h2> + By Thomas De Quincey + </h2> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h4> + Edited With Introduction And Notes By Milton Haight Turk, Ph.D. + </h4> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h3> + TO CHARLES DEACON CREE + </h3> + <h3> + THIS LITTLE VOLUME IS AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED + </h3> + <h4> + <i>Glencairn, Kilmacolm, Scotland June 27, 1905</i> + </h4> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_PREF" id="link2H_PREF"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + PREFACE + </h2> + <p> + Some portions of this Introduction have been taken from the Athenæum Press + <i>Selections from De Quincey</i>; many of the notes have also been + transferred from that volume. A number of the new notes I owe to a review + of the <i>Selections</i> by Dr. Lane Cooper, of Cornell University. I wish + also to thank for many favors the Committee and officers of the Glasgow + University Library. + </p> + <p> + If a word by way of suggestion to teachers be pertinent, I would venture + to remark that the object of the teacher of literature is, of course, only + to fulfill the desire of the author—to make clear his facts and to + bring home his ideas in all their power and beauty. Introductions and + notes are only means to this end. Teachers, I think, sometimes lose sight + of this fact; I know it is fatally easy for students to forget it. That + teacher will have rendered a great service who has kept his pupils alive + to the real aim of their studies,—to know the author, not to know of + him. + </p> + <h3> + M.H.T + </h3> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + <b>CONTENTS</b> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_PREF"> PREFACE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_INTR"> INTRODUCTION </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0004"> <b>THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH</b> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_SECT"> SECTION I—THE GLORY OF MOTION </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_SECT2"> SECTION II—THE VISION OF SUDDEN DEATH </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_SECT3"> SECTION III—DREAM-FUGUE: </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0008"> <b>JOAN OF ARC</b> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_NOTE"> NOTES </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_INTR" id="link2H_INTR"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + INTRODUCTION + </h2> + <h3> + I. LIFE + </h3> + <p> + Thomas de Quincey was born in Manchester on the 15th of August, 1785. His + father was a man of high character and great taste for literature as well + as a successful man of business; he died, most unfortunately, when Thomas + was quite young. Very soon after our author's birth the family removed to + The Farm, and later to Greenhay, a larger country place near Manchester. + In 1796 De Quincey's mother, now for some years a widow, removed to Bath + and placed him in the grammar school there. + </p> + <p> + Thomas, the future opium-eater, was a weak and sickly child. His first + years were spent in solitude, and when his elder brother, William, a real + boy, came home, the young author followed in humility mingled with terror + the diversions of that ingenious and pugnacious "son of eternal racket." + De Quincey's mother was a woman of strong character and emotions, as well + as excellent mind, but she was excessively formal, and she seems to have + inspired more awe than affection in her children, to whom she was for all + that deeply devoted. Her notions of conduct in general and of child + rearing in particular were very strict. She took Thomas out of Bath + School, after three years' excellent work there, because he was too much + praised, and kept him for a year at an inferior school at Winkfield in + Wiltshire. + </p> + <p> + In 1800, at the age of fifteen, De Quincey was ready for Oxford; he had + not been praised without reason, for his scholarship was far in advance of + that of ordinary pupils of his years. "That boy," his master at Bath + School had said, "that boy could harangue an Athenian mob better than you + or I could address an English one." He was sent to Manchester Grammar + School, however, in order that after three years' stay he might secure a + scholarship at Brasenose College, Oxford. He remained there—strongly + protesting against a situation which deprived him "of <i>health</i>, of <i>society</i>, + of <i>amusement</i>, of <i>liberty</i>, of <i>congeniality of pursuits</i>"—for + nineteen months, and then ran away. + </p> + <p> + His first plan had been to reach Wordsworth, whose <i>Lyrical Ballads</i> + (1798) had solaced him in fits of melancholy and had awakened in him a + deep reverence for the neglected poet. His timidity preventing this, he + made his way to Chester, where his mother then lived, in the hope of + seeing a sister; was apprehended by the older members of the family; and + through the intercession of his uncle, Colonel Penson, received the + promise of a guinea a week to carry out his later project of a solitary + tramp through Wales. From July to November, 1802, De Quincey then led a + wayfarer's life. [Footnote: For a most interesting account of this period + see the <i>Confessions of an English Opium-Eater</i>, Athenæum Press <i>Selections + from De Quincey</i>, pp. 165-171, and notes.] He soon lost his guinea, + however, by ceasing to keep his family informed of his whereabouts, and + subsisted for a time with great difficulty. Still apparently fearing + pursuit, with a little borrowed money he broke away entirely from his home + by exchanging the solitude of Wales for the greater wilderness of London. + Failing there to raise money on his expected patrimony, he for some time + deliberately clung to a life of degradation and starvation rather than + return to his lawful governors. + </p> + <p> + Discovered by chance by his friends, De Quincey was brought home and + finally allowed (1803) to go to Worcester College, Oxford, on a reduced + income. Here, we are told, "he came to be looked upon as a strange being + who associated with no one." During this time he learned to take opium. He + left, apparently about 1807, without a degree. In the same year he made + the acquaintance of Coleridge and Wordsworth; Lamb he had sought out in + London several years before. + </p> + <p> + His acquaintance with Wordsworth led to his settlement in 1809 at + Grasmere, in the beautiful English Lake District; his home for ten years + was Dove Cottage, which Wordsworth had occupied for several years and + which is now held in trust as a memorial of the poet. De Quincey was + married in 1816, and soon after, his patrimony having been exhausted, he + took up literary work in earnest. + </p> + <p> + In 1821 he went to London to dispose of some translations from German + authors, but was persuaded first to write and publish an account of his + opium experiences, which accordingly appeared in the <i>London Magazine</i> + in that year. This new sensation eclipsed Lamb's <i>Essays of Elia</i>, + which were appearing in the same periodical. The <i>Confessions of an + English Opium-Eater</i> was forthwith published in book form. De Quincey + now made literary acquaintances. Tom Hood found the shrinking author "at + home in a German ocean of literature, in a storm, flooding all the floor, + the tables, and the chairs—billows of books." Richard Woodhouse + speaks of the "depth and reality of his knowledge. ... His conversation + appeared like the elaboration of a mine of results. ... Taylor led him + into political economy, into the Greek and Latin accents, into + antiquities, Roman roads, old castles, the origin and analogy of + languages; upon all these he was informed to considerable minuteness. The + same with regard to Shakespeare's sonnets, Spenser's minor poems, and the + great writers and characters of Elizabeth's age and those of Cromwell's + time." + </p> + <p> + From this time on De Quincey maintained himself by contributing to various + magazines. He soon exchanged London and the Lakes for Edinburgh and its + suburb, Lasswade, where the remainder of his life was spent. <i>Blackwood's + Edinburgh Magazine</i> and its rival <i>Tatt's Magazine</i> received a + large number of contributions. <i>The English Mail-Coach</i> appeared in + 1849 in Blackwood. <i>Joan of Arc</i> had already been published (1847) in + <i>Tait</i>. De Quincey continued to drink laudanum throughout his life,—twice + after 1821 in very great excess. During his last years he nearly completed + a collected edition of his works. He died in Edinburgh on the 8th of + December, 1859. + </p> + <h3> + II. CRITICAL REMARKS + </h3> + <p> + The Opium-Eater had been a weak, lonely, and over-studious child, and he + was a solitary and ill-developed man. His character and his work present + strange contradictions. He is most precise in statement, yet often very + careless of fact; he is most courteous in manner, yet inexcusably + inconsiderate in his behavior. Again, he sets up a high standard of purity + of diction, yet uses slang quite unnecessarily and inappropriately; and + though a great master of style, he is guilty, at times, of digression + within digression until all trace of the original subject is lost. + </p> + <p> + De Quincey divides his writings into three groups: first, that class which + "proposes primarily to amuse the reader, but which, in doing so, may or + may not happen occasionally to reach a higher station, at which the + amusement passes into an impassioned interest." To this class would belong + the <i>Autobiographic Sketches</i> and the <i>Literary Reminiscences</i>. + As a second class he groups "those papers which address themselves purely + to the understanding as an insulated faculty, or do so primarily." These + essays would include, according to Professor Masson's subdivision, (a) + Biographies, such as <i>Shakespeare</i> or <i>Pope</i>—<i>Joan of + Arc</i> falls here, yet has some claim to a place in the first class; (b) + Historical essays, like The <i>Cæsars</i>; (c) Speculative and Theological + essays; (d) Essays in Political Economy and Politics; (e) Papers of + Literary Theory and Criticism, such as the brilliant discussions of <i>Rhetoric, + Style</i>, and <i>Conversation</i>, and the famous <i>On the Knocking at + the Gate in 'Macbeth</i>.' As a third and "far higher" class the author + ranks the <i>Confessions of an English Opium-Eater</i>, and also (but more + emphatically) the <i>Suspiria de Profundis</i>. "On these," he says, "as + modes of impassioned prose ranging under no precedents that I am aware of + in any literature, it is much more difficult to speak justly, whether in a + hostile or a friendly character." + </p> + <p> + Of De Quincey's essays in general it may be said that they bear witness + alike to the diversity of his knowledge and the penetrative power of his + intellect. The wide range of his subjects, however, deprives his papers + when taken together of the weight which might attach to a series of + related discussions. And, remarkable as is De Quincey's aptitude for + analysis and speculation, more than once we have to regret the lack of the + "saving common-sense" possessed by many far less gifted men. His erudition + and insight are always a little in advance of his good judgment. + </p> + <p> + As to the works of the first class, the <i>Reminiscences</i> are defaced + by the shrewish spirit shown in the accounts of Wordsworth and other + friends; nor can we depend upon them as records of fact. But our author + had had exceptional opportunities to observe these famous men and women, + and he possessed no little insight into literature and personality. As to + the <i>Autobiographic Sketches</i>, the handling of events is hopelessly + arbitrary and fragmentary. In truth, De Quincey is drawing an idealized + picture of childhood,—creating a type rather than re-creating a + person; it is a study of a child of talent that we receive from him, and + as such these sketches form one of the most satisfactory products of his + pen. + </p> + <p> + The <i>Confessions</i> as a narrative is related to the Autobiography, + while its poetical passages range it with the <i>Suspiria</i> and the <i>Mail-Coach</i>. + De Quincey seems to have believed that he was creating in such writings a + new literary type of prose poetry or prose phantasy; he had, with his + splendid dreams as subject-matter, lifted prose to heights hitherto scaled + only by the poet. In reality his style owed much to the + seventeenth-century writers, such as Milton and Sir Thomas Browne. He took + part with Coleridge, Lamb, and others in the general revival of interest + in earlier modern English prose, which is a feature of the Romantic + Movement. Still none of his contemporaries wrote as he did; evidently De + Quincey has a distinct quality of his own. Ruskin, in our own day, is like + him, but never the same. + </p> + <p> + Yet De Quincey's prose poetry is a very small portion of his work, and it + is not in this way only that he excels. Mr. Saintsbury has spoken of the + strong appeal that De Quincey makes to boys. [Footnote: "Probably more + boys have in the last forty years been brought to a love of literature + proper by De Quincy than by any other writer whatever."—<i>History + of Nineteenth-Century Literature</i>, p.198.] It is not without + significance that he mentions as especially attractive to the young only + writings with a large narrative element. [Footnote: "To read the <i>Essay + on Murder</i>, the <i>English Mail-Coach</i>, <i>The Spanish Nun</i>, <i>The + Cæsars</i>, and half a score other things at the age of about fifteen or + sixteen is, or ought to be, to fall in love with them."—<i>Essays in + English Literature</i>, 1780-1860, p.307.] Few boys read poetry, whether + in verse or prose, and fewer still criticism or philosophy; to every + normal boy the gate of good literature is the good story. It is the + narrative skill of De Quincey that has secured for him, in preference to + other writers of his class, the favor of youthful readers. + </p> + <p> + It would be too much to say that the talent that attracts the young to him + must needs be the Opium-Eater's grand talent, though the notion is + defensible, seeing that only salient qualities in good writing appeal to + inexperienced readers. I believe, however, that this skill in narration is + De Quincey's most persistent quality,—the golden thread that unites + all his most distinguished and most enduring work. And it is with him a + part of his genius for style. Creative power of the kind that goes to the + making of plots De Quincey had not; he has proved that forever by the + mediocrity of <i>Klosterheim</i>. Give him Bergmann's account of the + Tartar Migration, or the story of the Fighting Nun,—give him the + matter,—and a brilliant narrative will result. Indeed, De Quincey + loved a story for its own sake; he rejoiced to see it extend its winding + course before him; he delighted to follow it, touch it, color it, see it + grow into body and being under his hand. That this enthusiasm should now + and then tend to endanger the integrity of the facts need not surprise us; + as I have said elsewhere, accuracy in these matters is hardly to be + expected of De Quincey. And we can take our pleasure in the skillful + unfolding of the dramatic narrative of the Tartar Flight—we can feel + the author's joy in the scenic possibilities of his theme—even if we + know that here and there an incident appears that is quite in its proper + place—but is unknown to history. + </p> + <p> + In his <i>Confessions</i> the same constructive power bears its part in + the author's triumph. A peculiar end was to be reached in that narrative,—an + end in which the writer had a deep personal interest. What is an + opium-eater? Says a character in a recent work of fiction, of a social + wreck: "If it isn't whisky with him, it's opium; if it isn't opium, it's + whisky." This speech establishes the popular category in which De + Quincey's habit had placed him. Our attention was to be drawn from these + degrading connections. And this is done not merely by the correction of + some widespread fallacies as to the effects of the drug; far more it is + the result of narrative skill. As we follow with ever-increasing sympathy + the lonely and sensitive child, the wandering youth, the neuralgic + patient, into the terrible grasp of opium, who realizes, amid the gorgeous + delights and the awful horrors of the tale, that the writer is after all + the victim of the worst of bad habits? We can hardly praise too highly the + art which even as we look beneath it throws its glamour over us still. + </p> + <p> + Nor is it only in this constructive power, in the selection and + arrangement of details, that De Quincey excels as a narrator; a score of + minor excellences of his style, such as the fine Latin words or the + sweeping periodic sentences, contribute to the effective progress of his + narrative prose. Mr. Lowell has said that "there are no such vistas and + avenues of verse as Milton's." The comparison is somewhat hazardous, still + I should like to venture the parallel claim that there are no such streams + of prose as De Quincey's. The movement of his discourse is that of the + broad river, not in its weight or force perhaps, but in its easy flowing + progress, in its serene, unhurried certainty of its end. To be sure, only + too often the waters overflow their banks and run far afield in alien + channels. Yet, when great power over the instrument of language is joined + to so much constructive skill, the result is narrative art of high + quality,—an achievement that must be in no small measure the solid + basis of De Quincey's fame. + </p> + <h3> + III. BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE + </h3> + <h3> + I. WORKS + </h3> + <p> + 1. <i>The Collected Writings of Thomas de Quincey</i>. New and enlarged + edition by David Masson. Edinburgh: A. and C. Black, 1889-1890. [New York: + The Macmillan Co. 14 vols., with footnotes, a preface to each volume, and + index. Reissued in cheaper form. The standard edition.] + </p> + <p> + 2. <i>The Works of Thomas de Quincey</i>. Riverside Edition. Boston: + Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1877. [12 vols., with notes and index.] + </p> + <p> + 3. <i>Selections from De Quincey.</i> Edited with an Introduction and + Notes, by M. H. Turk. Athenaeum Press Series. Boston, U.S.A., and London: + Ginn and Company, 1902. ["The largest body of selections from De Quincey + recently published.... The selections are <i>The affliction of Childhood, + Introduction to the World of Strife, A Meeting with Lamb, A Meeting with + Coleridge, Recollections of Wordsworth, Confessions, A Portion of + Suspiria, The English Mail-Coach, Murder as one of the Fine Arts, Second + Paper, Joan of Arc,</i> and <i>On the Knocking at the Gate in 'Macbeth.'</i>"] + </p> + <h3> + II. BIOGRAPHY AND CRITICISM + </h3> + <p> + 4. D. MASSON. <i>Thomas De Quincey.</i> English Men of Letters. London. + [New York: Harper. An excellent brief biography. This book, with a good + volume of selections, should go far toward supplying the ordinary + student's needs.] + </p> + <p> + 5. H. S. SALT. DE QUINCEY. Bell's Miniature Series of Great Writers. + London: George Bell and Sons. [A good short life.] 6. A. H. JAPP. <i>Thomas + De Quincey: His Life and Writings.</i> London, 1890. [New York: Scribner. + First edition by "H. A. Page," 1877. The standard life of De Quincey; it + contains valuable communications from De Quincey's daughters, J. Hogg, + Rev. F. Jacox, Professor Masson, and others.] + </p> + <p> + 7. A. H. JAPP. <i>De Quincey Memorials. Being Letters and Other Records, + here first published. With Communications from Coleridge, the Wordsworths, + Hannah More, Professor Wilson, and others.</i> 2 vols. London: W. + Heinemann, 1891. + </p> + <p> + 8. J. HOGG. <i>De Quincey and his Friends, Personal Recollections, + Souvenirs, and Anecdotes</i> [including Woodhouse's <i>Conversations</i>, + Findlay's <i>Personal Recollections</i>, Hodgson's <i>On the Genius of De + Quincey</i>, and a mass of personal notes from a host of friends]. London: + Sampson Low, Marston & Co., 1895. + </p> + <p> + 9. E. T. MASON. <i>Personal Traits of British Authors</i>. New York, 1885. + [4 vols. The volume subtitled <i>Scott, Hogg,</i> etc., contains some + accounts of De Quincey not included by Japp or Hogg.] + </p> + <p> + 10. L. STEPHEN. <i>Hours in a Library</i>. Vol. I. New York, 1892. + </p> + <p> + 11. W. MINTO. <i>Manual of English Prose Literature</i>. Boston, 1889. + [Contains the best general discussion of De Quincey's style.] + </p> + <p> + 12. L. COOPER. <i>The Prose Poetry of Thomas De Quincey</i>. Leipzig, + 1902. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0004" id="link2H_4_0004"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH + </h2> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_SECT" id="link2H_SECT"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + SECTION I—THE GLORY OF MOTION + </h2> + <p> + Some twenty or more years before I matriculated at Oxford, Mr. Palmer, at + that time M.P. for Bath, had accomplished two things, very hard to do on + our little planet, the Earth, however cheap they may be held by eccentric + people in comets: he had invented mail-coaches, and he had married the + daughter of a duke. He was, therefore, just twice as great a man as + Galileo, who did certainly invent (or, which is the same thing, [Footnote: + "<i>The same thing</i>":—Thus, in the calendar of the Church + Festivals, the discovery of the true cross (by Helen, the mother of + Constantine) is recorded (and, one might think, with the express + consciousness of sarcasm) as the <i>Invention</i> of the Cross.] discover) + the satellites of Jupiter, those very next things extant to mail-coaches + in the two capital pretensions of speed and keeping time, but, on the + other hand, who did <i>not</i> marry the daughter of a duke. + </p> + <p> + These mail-coaches, as organised by Mr. Palmer, are entitled to a + circumstantial notice from myself, having had so large a share in + developing the anarchies of my subsequent dreams: an agency which they + accomplished, 1st, through velocity at that time unprecedented—for + they first revealed the glory of motion; 2dly, through grand effects for + the eye between lamplight and the darkness upon solitary roads; 3dly, + through animal beauty and power so often displayed in the class of horses + selected for this mail service; 4thly, through the conscious presence of a + central intellect, that, in the midst of vast distances [Footnote: "Vast + distances":—One case was familiar to mail-coach travellers where two + mails in opposite directions, north and south, starting at the same minute + from points six hundred miles apart, met almost constantly at a particular + bridge which bisected the total distance.]—of storms, of darkness, + of danger—overruled all obstacles into one steady co-operation to a + national result. For my own feeling, this post-office service spoke as by + some mighty orchestra, where a thousand instruments, all disregarding each + other, and so far in danger of discord, yet all obedient as slaves to the + supreme <i>baton</i> of some great leader, terminate in a perfection of + harmony like that of heart, brain, and lungs in a healthy animal + organisation. But, finally, that particular element in this whole + combination which most impressed myself, and through which it is that to + this hour Mr. Palmer's mail-coach system tyrannises over my dreams by + terror and terrific beauty, lay in the awful <i>political</i> mission + which at that time it fulfilled. The mail-coach it was that distributed + over the face of the land, like the opening of apocalyptic vials, the + heart-shaking news of Trafalgar, of Salamanca, of Vittoria, of Waterloo. + These were the harvests that, in the grandeur of their reaping, redeemed + the tears and blood in which they had been sown. Neither was the meanest + peasant so much below the grandeur and the sorrow of the times as to + confound battles such as these, which were gradually moulding the + destinies of Christendom, with the vulgar conflicts of ordinary warfare, + so often no more than gladiatorial trials of national prowess. The + victories of England in this stupendous contest rose of themselves as + natural <i>Te Deums</i> to heaven; and it was felt by the thoughtful that + such victories, at such a crisis of general prostration, were not more + beneficial to ourselves than finally to France, our enemy, and to the + nations of all western or central Europe, through whose pusillanimity it + was that the French domination had prospered. + </p> + <p> + The mail-coach, as the national organ for publishing these mighty events, + thus diffusively influential, became itself a spiritualised and glorified + object to an impassioned heart; and naturally, in the Oxford of that day, + <i>all</i> hearts were impassioned, as being all (or nearly all) in <i>early</i> + manhood. In most universities there is one single college; in Oxford there + were five-and-twenty, all of which were peopled by young men, the <i>élite</i> + of their own generation; not boys, but men: none under eighteen. In some + of these many colleges the custom permitted the student to keep what are + called "short terms"; that is, the four terms of Michaelmas, Lent, Easter, + and Act, were kept by a residence, in the aggregate, of ninety-one days, + or thirteen weeks. Under this interrupted residence, it was possible that + a student might have a reason for going down to his home four times in the + year. This made eight journeys to and fro. But, as these homes lay + dispersed through all the shires of the island, and most of us disdained + all coaches except his Majesty's mail, no city out of London could pretend + to so extensive a connexion with Mr. Palmer's establishment as Oxford. + Three mails, at the least, I remember as passing every day through Oxford, + and benefiting by my personal patronage—viz., the Worcester, the + Gloucester, and the Holyhead mail. Naturally, therefore, it became a point + of some interest with us, whose journeys revolved every six weeks on an + average, to look a little into the executive details of the system. With + some of these Mr. Palmer had no concern; they rested upon bye-laws enacted + by posting-houses for their own benefit, and upon other bye-laws, equally + stern, enacted by the inside passengers for the illustration of their own + haughty exclusiveness. These last were of a nature to rouse our scorn; + from which the transition was not very long to systematic mutiny. Up to + this time, say 1804, or 1805 (the year of Trafalgar), it had been the + fixed assumption of the four inside people (as an old tradition of all + public carriages derived from the reign of Charles II) that they, the + illustrious quaternion, constituted a porcelain variety of the human race, + whose dignity would have been compromised by exchanging one word of + civility with the three miserable delf-ware outsides. Even to have kicked + an outsider might have been held to attaint the foot concerned in that + operation, so that, perhaps, it would have required an act of Parliament + to restore its purity of blood. What words, then, could express the + horror, and the sense of treason, in that case, which <i>had</i> happened, + where all three outsides (the trinity of Pariahs) made a vain attempt to + sit down at the same breakfast-table or dinner-table with the consecrated + four? I myself witnessed such an attempt; and on that occasion a + benevolent old gentleman endeavoured to soothe his three holy associates, + by suggesting that, if the outsides were indicted for this criminal + attempt at the next assizes, the court would regard it as a case of lunacy + or <i>delirium tremens</i> rather than of treason. England owes much of + her grandeur to the depth of the aristocratic element in her social + composition, when pulling against her strong democracy. I am not the man + to laugh at it. But sometimes, undoubtedly, it expressed itself in comic + shapes. The course taken with the infatuated outsiders, in the particular + attempt which I have noticed, was that the waiter, beckoning them away + from the privileged <i>salle-à-manger</i>, sang out, "This way, my good + men," and then enticed these good men away to the kitchen. But that plan + had not always answered. Sometimes, though rarely, cases occurred where + the intruders, being stronger than usual, or more vicious than usual, + resolutely refused to budge, and so far carried their point as to have a + separate table arranged for themselves in a corner of the general room. + Yet, if an Indian screen could be found ample enough to plant them out + from the very eyes of the high table, or <i>dais</i>, it then became + possible to assume as a fiction of law that the three delf fellows, after + all, were not present. They could be ignored by the porcelain men, under + the maxim that objects not appearing and objects not existing are governed + by the same logical construction. [Footnote: <i>De non apparentibus</i>, + etc.] + </p> + <p> + Such being, at that time, the usage of mail-coaches, what was to be done + by us of young Oxford? We, the most aristocratic of people, who were + addicted to the practice of looking down superciliously even upon the + insides themselves as often very questionable characters—were we, by + voluntarily going outside, to court indignities? If our dress and bearing + sheltered us generally from the suspicion of being "raff" (the name at + that period for "snobs" [Footnote: "<i>Snobs</i>," and its antithesis, "<i>nobs</i>," + arose among the internal factions of shoemakers perhaps ten years later. + Possibly enough, the terms may have existed much earlier; but they were + then first made known, picturesquely and effectively, by a trial at some + assizes which happened to fix the public attention.]), we really <i>were</i> + such constructively by the place we assumed. If we did not submit to the + deep shadow of eclipse, we entered at least the skirts of its penumbra. + And the analogy of theatres was valid against us,—where no man can + complain of the annoyances incident to the pit or gallery, having his + instant remedy in paying the higher price of the boxes. But the soundness + of this analogy we disputed. In the case of the theatre, it cannot be + pretended that the inferior situations have any separate attractions, + unless the pit may be supposed to have an advantage for the purposes of + the critic or the dramatic reporter. But the critic or reporter is a + rarity. For most people, the sole benefit is in the price. Now, on the + contrary, the outside of the mail had its own incommunicable advantages. + These we could not forego. The higher price we would willingly have paid, + but not the price connected with the condition of riding inside; which + condition we pronounced insufferable. The air, the freedom of prospect, + the proximity to the horses, the elevation of seat: these were what we + required; but, above all, the certain anticipation of purchasing + occasional opportunities of driving. + </p> + <p> + Such was the difficulty which pressed us; and under the coercion of this + difficulty we instituted a searching inquiry into the true quality and + valuation of the different apartments about the mail. We conducted this + inquiry on metaphysical principles; and it was ascertained satisfactorily + that the roof of the coach, which by some weak men had been called the + attics, and by some the garrets, was in reality the drawing-room; in which + drawing-room the box was the chief ottoman or sofa; whilst it appeared + that the <i>inside</i> which had been traditionally regarded as the only + room tenantable by gentlemen, was, in fact, the coal-cellar in disguise. + </p> + <p> + Great wits jump. The very same idea had not long before struck the + celestial intellect of China. Amongst the presents carried out by our + first embassy to that country was a state-coach. It had been specially + selected as a personal gift by George III; but the exact mode of using it + was an intense mystery to Pekin. The ambassador, indeed (Lord Macartney), + had made some imperfect explanations upon this point; but, as His + Excellency communicated these in a diplomatic whisper at the very moment + of his departure, the celestial intellect was very feebly illuminated, and + it became necessary to call a cabinet council on the grand state question, + "Where was the Emperor to sit?" The hammer-cloth happened to be unusually + gorgeous; and, partly on that consideration, but partly also because the + box offered the most elevated seat, was nearest to the moon, and + undeniably went foremost, it was resolved by acclamation that the box was + the imperial throne, and, for the scoundrel who drove,—he might sit + where he could find a perch. The horses, therefore, being harnessed, + solemnly his imperial majesty ascended his new English throne under a + flourish of trumpets, having the first lord of the treasury on his right + hand, and the chief jester on his left. Pekin gloried in the spectacle; + and in the whole flowery people, constructively present by representation, + there was but one discontented person, and <i>that</i> was the coachman. + This mutinous individual audaciously shouted, "Where am <i>I</i> to sit?" + But the privy council, incensed by his disloyalty, unanimously opened the + door, and kicked him into the inside. He had all the inside places to + himself; but such is the rapacity of ambition that he was still + dissatisfied. "I say," he cried out in an extempore petition addressed to + the Emperor through the window—"I say, how am I to catch hold of the + reins?"—"Anyhow," was the imperial answer; "don't trouble <i>me</i>, + man, in my glory. How catch the reins? Why, through the windows, through + the keyholes—<i>anyhow</i>." Finally this contumacious coachman + lengthened the check-strings into a sort of jury-reins communicating with + the horses; with these he drove as steadily as Pekin had any right to + expect. The Emperor returned after the briefest of circuits; he descended + in great pomp from his throne, with the severest resolution never to + remount it. A public thanksgiving was ordered for his majesty's happy + escape from the disease of a broken neck; and the state-coach was + dedicated thenceforward as a votive offering to the god Fo Fo—whom + the learned more accurately called Fi Fi. + </p> + <p> + A revolution of this same Chinese character did young Oxford of that era + effect in the constitution of mail-coach society. It was a perfect French + Revolution; and we had good reason to say, <i>ça ira</i>. In fact, it soon + became <i>too</i> popular. The "public"—a well-known character, + particularly disagreeable, though slightly respectable, and notorious for + affecting the chief seats in synagogues—had at first loudly opposed + this revolution; but, when the opposition showed itself to be ineffectual, + our disagreeable friend went into it with headlong zeal. At first it was a + sort of race between us; and, as the public is usually from thirty to + fifty years old, naturally we of young Oxford, that averaged about twenty, + had the advantage. Then the public took to bribing, giving fees to + horse-keepers, &c., who hired out their persons as warming-pans on the + box seat. <i>That</i>, you know, was shocking to all moral sensibilities. + Come to bribery, said we, and there is an end to all morality,—Aristotle's, + Zeno's, Cicero's, or anybody's. And, besides, of what use was it? For <i>we</i> + bribed also. And, as our bribes, to those of the public, were as five + shillings to sixpence, here again young Oxford had the advantage. But the + contest was ruinous to the principles of the stables connected with the + mails. This whole corporation was constantly bribed, rebribed, and often + surrebribed; a mail-coach yard was like the hustings in a contested + election; and a horse-keeper, ostler, or helper, was held by the + philosophical at that time to be the most corrupt character in the nation. + </p> + <p> + There was an impression upon the public mind, natural enough from the + continually augmenting velocity of the mail, but quite erroneous, that an + outside seat on this class of carriages was a post of danger. On the + contrary, I maintained that, if a man had become nervous from some gipsy + prediction in his childhood, allocating to a particular moon now + approaching some unknown danger, and he should inquire earnestly, "Whither + can I fly for shelter? Is a prison the safest retreat? or a lunatic + hospital? or the British Museum?" I should have replied, "Oh no; I'll tell + you what to do. Take lodgings for the next forty days on the box of his + Majesty's mail. Nobody can touch you there. If it is by bills at ninety + days after date that you are made unhappy—if noters and protesters + are the sort of wretches whose astrological shadows darken the house of + life—then note you what I vehemently protest: viz., that, no matter + though the sheriff and under-sheriff in every county should be running + after you with his <i>posse</i>, touch a hair of your head he cannot + whilst you keep house and have your legal domicile on the box of the mail. + It is felony to stop the mail; even the sheriff cannot do that. And an <i>extra</i> + touch of the whip to the leaders (no great matter if it grazes the + sheriff) at any time guarantees your safety." In fact, a bedroom in a + quiet house seems a safe enough retreat; yet it is liable to its own + notorious nuisances—to robbers by night, to rats, to fire. But the + mail laughs at these terrors. To robbers, the answer is packed up and + ready for delivery in the barrel of the guard's blunderbuss. Rats again! + there <i>are</i> none about mail-coaches any more than snakes in Von + Troil's Iceland; [Footnote: "<i>Von Troil's Iceland</i>":—The + allusion is to a well-known chapter in Von Troil's work, entitled, + "Concerning the Snakes of Iceland." The entire chapter consists of these + six words—"<i>There art no snakes in Iceland</i>."] except, indeed, + now and then a parliamentary rat, who always hides his shame in what I + have shown to be the "coal-cellar." And, as to fire, I never knew but one + in a mail-coach; which was in the Exeter mail, and caused by an obstinate + sailor bound to Devonport. Jack, making light of the law and the lawgiver + that had set their faces against his offence, insisted on taking up a + forbidden seat [Footnote: "<i>Forbidden seat</i>":—The very sternest + code of rules was enforced upon the mails by the Post-office. Throughout + England, only three outsides were allowed, of whom one was to sit on the + box, and the other two immediately behind the box; none, under any + pretext, to come near the guard; an indispensable caution; since else, + under the guise of a passenger, a robber might by any one of a thousand + advantages—which sometimes are created, but always are favoured, by + the animation of frank social intercourse—have disarmed the guard. + Beyond the Scottish border, the regulation was so far relaxed as to allow + of <i>four</i> outsides, but not relaxed at all as to the mode of placing + them. One, as before, was seated on the box, and the other three on the + front of the roof, with a determinate and ample separation from the little + insulated chair of the guard. This relaxation was conceded by way of + compensating to Scotland her disadvantages in point of population. + England, by the superior density of her population, might always count + upon a large fund of profits in the fractional trips of chance passengers + riding for short distances of two or three stages. In Scotland this chance + counted for much less. And therefore, to make good the deficiency, + Scotland was allowed a compensatory profit upon one <i>extra</i> + passenger.] in the rear of the roof, from which he could exchange his own + yarns with those of the guard. No greater offence was then known to + mail-coaches; it was treason, it was <i>læsa majestas</i>, it was by + tendency arson; and the ashes of Jack's pipe, falling amongst the straw of + the hinder boot, containing the mail-bags, raised a flame which (aided by + the wind of our motion) threatened a revolution in the republic of + letters. Yet even this left the sanctity of the box unviolated. In + dignified repose, the coachman and myself sat on, resting with benign + composure upon our knowledge that the fire would have to burn its way + through four inside passengers before it could reach ourselves. I remarked + to the coachman, with a quotation from Virgil's "Æneid" really too + hackneyed— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Jam proximus ardet + Ucalegon." +</pre> + <p> + But, recollecting that the Virgilian part of the coachman's education + might have been neglected, I interpreted so far as to say that perhaps at + that moment the flames were catching hold of our worthy brother and inside + passenger, Ucalegon. The coachman made no answer,—which is my own + way when a stranger addresses me either in Syriac or in Coptic; but by his + faint sceptical smile he seemed to insinuate that he knew better,—for + that Ucalegon, as it happened, was not in the way-bill, and therefore + could not have been booked. + </p> + <p> + No dignity is perfect which does not at some point ally itself with the + mysterious. The connexion of the mail with the state and the executive + government—a connexion obvious, but yet not strictly defined—gave + to the whole mail establishment an official grandeur which did us service + on the roads, and invested us with seasonable terrors. Not the less + impressive were those terrors because their legal limits were imperfectly + ascertained. Look at those turnpike gates: with what deferential hurry, + with what an obedient start, they fly open at our approach! Look at that + long line of carts and carters ahead, audaciously usurping the very crest + of the road. Ah! traitors, they do not hear us as yet; but, as soon as the + dreadful blast of our horn reaches them with proclamation of our approach, + see with what frenzy of trepidation they fly to their horses' heads, and + deprecate our wrath by the precipitation of their crane-neck quarterings. + Treason they feel to be their crime; each individual carter feels himself + under the ban of confiscation and attainder; his blood is attainted + through six generations; and nothing is wanting but the headsman and his + axe, the block and the sawdust, to close up the vista of his horrors. + What! shall it be within benefit of clergy to delay the king's message on + the high road?—to interrupt the great respirations, ebb and flood, + <i>systole</i> and <i>diastole</i>, of the national intercourse?—to + endanger the safety of tidings running day and night between all nations + and languages? Or can it be fancied, amongst the weakest of men, that the + bodies of the criminals will be given up to their widows for Christian + burial? Now, the doubts which were raised as to our powers did more to + wrap them in terror, by wrapping them in uncertainty, than could have been + effected by the sharpest definitions of the law from the Quarter Sessions. + We, on our parts (we, the collective mail, I mean), did our utmost to + exalt the idea of our privileges by the insolence with which we wielded + them. Whether this insolence rested upon law that gave it a sanction, or + upon conscious power that haughtily dispensed with that sanction, equally + it spoke from a potential station; and the agent, in each particular + insolence of the moment, was viewed reverentially, as one having + authority. + </p> + <p> + Sometimes after breakfast his Majesty's mail would become frisky; and, in + its difficult wheelings amongst the intricacies of early markets, it would + upset an apple-cart, a cart loaded with eggs, &c. Huge was the + affliction and dismay, awful was the smash. I, as far as possible, + endeavoured in such a case to represent the conscience and moral + sensibilities of the mail; and, when wildernesses of eggs were lying + poached under our horses' hoofs, then would I stretch forth my hands in + sorrow, saying (in words too celebrated at that time, from the false + echoes [Footnote: "<i>False echoes</i>":—Yes, false! for the words + ascribed to Napoleon, as breathed to the memory of Desaix, never were + uttered at all. They stand in the same category of theatrical fictions as + the cry of the foundering line-of-battle ship <i>Vengeur</i>, as the vaunt + of General Cambronne at Waterloo, "La Garde meurt, mais ne se rend pas," + or as the repartees of Talleyrand.] of Marengo), "Ah! wherefore have we + not time to weep over you?"—which was evidently impossible, since, + in fact, we had not time to laugh over them. Tied to post-office allowance + in some cases of fifty minutes for eleven miles, could the royal mail + pretend to undertake the offices of sympathy and condolence? Could it be + expected to provide tears for the accidents of the road? If even it seemed + to trample on humanity, it did so, I felt, in discharge of its own more + peremptory duties. + </p> + <p> + Upholding the morality of the mail, <i>a fortiori</i> I upheld its rights; + as a matter of duty, I stretched to the uttermost its privilege of + imperial precedency, and astonished weak minds by the feudal powers which + I hinted to be lurking constructively in the charters of this proud + establishment. Once I remember being on the box of the Holyhead mail, + between Shrewsbury and Oswestry, when a tawdry thing from Birmingham, some + "Tallyho" or "Highflyer," all flaunting with green and gold, came up + alongside of us. What a contrast to our royal simplicity of form and + colour in this plebeian wretch! The single ornament on our dark ground of + chocolate colour was the mighty shield of the imperial arms, but + emblazoned in proportions as modest as a signet-ring bears to a seal of + office. Even this was displayed only on a single panel, whispering, rather + than proclaiming, our relations to the mighty state; whilst the beast from + Birmingham, our green-and-gold friend from false, fleeting, perjured + Brummagem, had as much writing and painting on its sprawling flanks as + would have puzzled a decipherer from the tombs of Luxor. For some time + this Birmingham machine ran along by our side—a piece of familiarity + that already of itself seemed to me sufficiently Jacobinical. But all at + once a movement of the horses announced a desperate intention of leaving + us behind. "Do you see <i>that?</i>" I said to the coachman.—"I + see," was his short answer. He was wide awake,—yet he waited longer + than seemed prudent; for the horses of our audacious opponent had a + disagreeable air of freshness and power. But his motive was loyal; his + wish was that the Birmingham conceit should be full-blown before he froze + it. When <i>that</i> seemed right, he unloosed, or, to speak by a stronger + word, he <i>sprang</i>, his known resources: he slipped our royal horses + like cheetahs, or hunting-leopards, after the affrighted game. How they + could retain such a reserve of fiery power after the work they had + accomplished seemed hard to explain. But on our side, besides the physical + superiority, was a tower of moral strength, namely the king's name, "which + they upon the adverse faction wanted." Passing them without an effort, as + it seemed, we threw them into the rear with so lengthening an interval + between us as proved in itself the bitterest mockery of their presumption; + whilst our guard blew back a shattering blast of triumph that was really + too painfully full of derision. + </p> + <p> + I mention this little incident for its connexion with what followed. A + Welsh rustic, sitting behind me, asked if I had not felt my heart burn + within me during the progress of the race? I said, with philosophic + calmness, <i>No</i>; because we were not racing with a mail, so that no + glory could be gained. In fact, it was sufficiently mortifying that such a + Birmingham thing should dare to challenge us. The Welshman replied that he + didn't see <i>that</i>; for that a cat might look at a king, and a + Brummagem coach might lawfully race the Holyhead mail. "<i>Race</i> us, if + you like," I replied, "though even <i>that</i> has an air of sedition; but + not <i>beat</i> us. This would have been treason; and for its own sake I + am glad that the 'Tallyho' was disappointed." So dissatisfied did the + Welshman seem with this opinion that at last I was obliged to tell him a + very fine story from one of our elder dramatists: viz., that once, in some + far Oriental kingdom, when the sultan of all the land, with his princes, + ladies, and chief omrahs, were flying their falcons, a hawk suddenly flew + at a majestic eagle, and, in defiance of the eagle's natural advantages, + in contempt also of the eagle's traditional royalty, and before the whole + assembled field of astonished spectators from Agra and Lahore, killed the + eagle on the spot. Amazement seized the sultan at the unequal contest, and + burning admiration for its unparalleled result. He commanded that the hawk + should be brought before him; he caressed the bird with enthusiasm; and he + ordered that, for the commemoration of his matchless courage, a diadem of + gold and rubies should be solemnly placed on the hawk's head, but then + that, immediately after this solemn coronation, the bird should be led off + to execution, as the most valiant indeed of traitors, but not the less a + traitor, as having dared to rise rebelliously against his liege lord and + anointed sovereign, the eagle. "Now," said I to the Welshman, "to you and + me, as men of refined sensibilities, how painful it would have been that + this poor Brummagem brute, the 'Tallyho,' in the impossible case of a + victory over us, should have been crowned with Birmingham tinsel, with + paste diamonds and Roman pearls, and then led off to instant execution." + The Welshman doubted if that could be warranted by law. And, when I hinted + at the 6th of Edward Longshanks, chap. 18, for regulating the precedency + of coaches, as being probably the statute relied on for the capital + punishment of such offences, he replied drily that, if the attempt to pass + a mail really were treasonable, it was a pity that the "Tallyho" appeared + to have so imperfect an acquaintance with law. + </p> + <p> + The modern modes of travelling cannot compare with the old mail-coach + system in grandeur and power. They boast of more velocity,—not, + however, as a consciousness, but as a fact of our lifeless knowledge, + resting upon <i>alien</i> evidence: as, for instance, because somebody <i>says</i> + that we have gone fifty miles in the hour, though we are far from feeling + it as a personal experience; or upon the evidence of a result, as that + actually we find ourselves in York four hours after leaving London. Apart + from such an assertion, or such a result, I myself am little aware of the + pace. But, seated on the old mail-coach, we needed no evidence out of + ourselves to indicate the velocity. On this system the word was not <i>magna + loquimur</i>, as upon railways, but <i>vivimus</i>. Yes, "magna <i>vivimus</i>"; + we do not make verbal ostentation of our grandeurs, we realise our + grandeurs in act, and in the very experience of life. The vital experience + of the glad animal sensibilities made doubts impossible on the question of + our speed; we heard our speed, we saw it, we felt it as a thrilling; and + this speed was not the product of blind insensate agencies, that had no + sympathy to give, but was incarnated in the fiery eyeballs of the noblest + amongst brutes, in his dilated nostril, spasmodic muscles, and + thunder-beating hoofs. The sensibility of the horse, uttering itself in + the maniac light of his eye, might be the last vibration of such a + movement; the glory of Salamanca might be the first. But the intervening + links that connected them, that spread the earthquake of battle into the + eyeballs of the horse, were the heart of man and its electric thrillings—kindling + in the rapture of the fiery strife, and then propagating its own tumults + by contagious shouts and gestures to the heart of his servant the horse. + But now, on the new system of travelling, iron tubes and boilers have + disconnected man's heart from the ministers of his locomotion. Nile nor + Trafalgar has power to raise an extra bubble in a steam-kettle. The + galvanic cycle is broken up for ever; man's imperial nature no longer + sends itself forward through the electric sensibility of the horse; the + inter-agencies are gone in the mode of communication between the horse and + his master out of which grew so many aspects of sublimity under accidents + of mists that hid, or sudden blazes that revealed, of mobs that agitated, + or midnight solitudes that awed. Tidings fitted to convulse all nations + must henceforwards travel by culinary process; and the trumpet that once + announced from afar the laurelled mail, heart-shaking when heard screaming + on the wind and proclaiming itself through the darkness to every village + or solitary house on its route, has now given way for ever to the + pot-wallopings of the boiler. Thus have perished multiform openings for + public expressions of interest, scenical yet natural, in great national + tidings,—for revelations of faces and groups that could not offer + themselves amongst the fluctuating mobs of a railway station. The + gatherings of gazers about a laurelled mail had one centre, and + acknowledged one sole interest. But the crowds attending at a railway + station have as little unity as running water, and own as many centres as + there are separate carriages in the train. + </p> + <p> + How else, for example, than as a constant watcher for the dawn, and for + the London mail that in summer months entered about daybreak amongst the + lawny thickets of Maryborough forest, couldst thou, sweet Fanny of the + Bath road, have become the glorified inmate of my dreams? Yet Fanny, as + the loveliest young woman for face and person that perhaps in my whole + life I have beheld, merited the station which even now, from a distance of + forty years, she holds in my dreams; yes, though by links of natural + association she brings along with her a troop of dreadful creatures, + fabulous and not fabulous, that are more abominable to the heart than + Fanny and the dawn are delightful. + </p> + <p> + Miss Fanny of the Bath road, strictly speaking, lived at a mile's distance + from that road, but came so continually to meet the mail that I on my + frequent transits rarely missed her, and naturally connected her image + with the great thoroughfare where only I had ever seen her. Why she came + so punctually I do not exactly know; but I believe with some burden of + commissions, to be executed in Bath, which had gathered to her own + residence as a central rendezvous for converging them. The mail-coachman + who drove the Bath mail and wore the royal livery [Footnote: "Wore the + royal livery":—The general impression was that the royal livery + belonged of right to the mail-coachmen as their professional dress. But + that was an error. To the guard it <i>did</i> belong, I believe, and was + obviously essential as an official warrant, and as a means of instant + identification for his person, in the discharge of his important public + duties. But the coachman, and especially if his place in the series did + not connect him immediately with London and the General Post-Office, + obtained the scarlet coat only as an honorary distinction after long (or, + if not long, trying and special) service.] happened to be Fanny's + grandfather. A good man he was, that loved his beautiful granddaughter, + and, loving her wisely, was vigilant over her deportment in any case where + young Oxford might happen to be concerned. Did my vanity then suggest that + I myself, individually, could fall within the line of his terrors? + Certainly not, as regarded any physical pretensions that I could plead; + for Fanny (as a chance passenger from her own neighbourhood once told me) + counted in her train a hundred and ninety-nine professed admirers, if not + open aspirants to her favour; and probably not one of the whole brigade + but excelled myself in personal advantages. Ulysses even, with the unfair + advantage of his accursed bow, could hardly have undertaken that amount of + suitors. So the danger might have seemed slight—only that woman is + universally aristocratic; it is amongst her nobilities of heart that she + <i>is</i> so. Now, the aristocratic distinctions in my favour might easily + with Miss Fanny have compensated my physical deficiencies. Did I then make + love to Fanny? Why, yes; about as much love as one <i>could</i> make + whilst the mail was changing horses—a process which, ten years + later, did not occupy above eighty seconds; but <i>then</i>,—viz., + about Waterloo—it occupied five times eighty. Now, four hundred + seconds offer a field quite ample enough for whispering into a young + woman's ear a great deal of truth, and (by way of parenthesis) some trifle + of falsehood. Grandpapa did right, therefore, to watch me. And yet, as + happens too often to the grandpapas of earth in a contest with the + admirers of granddaughters, how vainly would he have watched me had I + meditated any evil whispers to Fanny! She, it is my belief, would have + protected herself against any man's evil suggestions. But he, as the + result showed, could not have intercepted the opportunities for such + suggestions. Yet, why not? Was he not active? Was he not blooming? + Blooming he was as Fanny herself. + </p> + <p> + "Say, all our praises why should lords——" + </p> + <p> + Stop, that's not the line. + </p> + <p> + "Say, all our roses why should girls engross?" + </p> + <p> + The coachman showed rosy blossoms on his face deeper even than his + granddaughter's—<i>his</i> being drawn from the ale-cask, Fanny's + from the fountains of the dawn. But, in spite of his blooming face, some + infirmities he had; and one particularly in which he too much resembled a + crocodile. This lay in a monstrous inaptitude for turning round. The + crocodile, I presume, owes that inaptitude to the absurd <i>length</i> of + his back; but in our grandpapa it arose rather from the absurd <i>breadth</i> + of his back, combined, possibly, with some growing stiffness in his legs. + Now, upon this crocodile infirmity of his I planted a human advantage for + tendering my homage to Miss Fanny. In defiance of all his honourable + vigilance, no sooner had he presented to us his mighty Jovian back (what a + field for displaying to mankind his royal scarlet!), whilst inspecting + professionally the buckles, the straps, and the silvery turrets [Footnote: + "<i>Turrets</i>":—As one who loves and venerates Chaucer for his + unrivalled merits of tenderness, of picturesque characterisation, and of + narrative skill, I noticed with great pleasure that the word <i>torrettes</i> + is used by him to designate the little devices through which the reins are + made to pass. This same word, in the same exact sense, I heard uniformly + used by many scores of illustrious mail-coachmen to whose confidential + friendship I had the honour of being admitted in my younger days.] of his + harness, than I raised Miss Fanny's hand to my lips, and, by the mixed + tenderness and respectfulness of my manner, caused her easily to + understand how happy it would make me to rank upon her list as No. 10 or + 12: in which case a few casualties amongst her lovers (and, observe, they + <i>hanged</i> liberally in those days) might have promoted me speedily to + the top of the tree; as, on the other hand, with how much loyalty of + submission I acquiesced by anticipation in her award, supposing that she + should plant me in the very rearward of her favour, as No. 199 + 1. Most + truly I loved this beautiful and ingenuous girl; and, had it not been for + the Bath mail, timing all courtships by post-office allowance, heaven only + knows what might have come of it. People talk of being over head and ears + in love; now, the mail was the cause that I sank only over ears in love,—which, + you know, still left a trifle of brain to overlook the whole conduct of + the affair. + </p> + <p> + Ah, reader! when I look back upon those days, it seems to me that all + things change—all things perish. "Perish the roses and the palms of + kings": perish even the crowns and trophies of Waterloo: thunder and + lightning are not the thunder and lightning which I remember. Roses are + degenerating. The Fannies of our island—though this I say with + reluctance—are not visibly improving; and the Bath road is + notoriously superannuated. Crocodiles, you will say, are stationary. Mr. + Waterton tells me that the crocodile does <i>not change</i>,—that a + cayman, in fact, or an alligator, is just as good for riding upon as he + was in the time of the Pharaohs. <i>That</i> may be; but the reason is + that the crocodile does not live fast—he is a slow coach. I believe + it is generally understood among naturalists that the crocodile is a + blockhead. It is my own impression that the Pharaohs were also blockheads. + Now, as the Pharaohs and the crocodile domineered over Egyptian society, + this accounts for a singular mistake that prevailed through innumerable + generations on the Nile. The crocodile made the ridiculous blunder of + supposing man to be meant chiefly for his own eating. Man, taking a + different view of the subject, naturally met that mistake by another: he + viewed the crocodile as a thing sometimes to worship, but always to run + away from. And this continued till Mr. Waterton [Footnote: "<i>Mr. + Waterton</i>":—Had the reader lived through the last generation, he + would not need to be told that, some thirty or thirty-five years back, Mr. + Waterton, a distinguished country gentleman of ancient family in + Northumberland, publicly mounted and rode in top-boots a savage old + crocodile, that was restive and very impertinent, but all to no purpose. + The crocodile jibbed and tried to kick, but vainly. He was no more able to + throw the squire than Sinbad was to throw the old scoundrel who used his + back without paying for it, until he discovered a mode (slightly immoral, + perhaps, though some think not) of murdering the old fraudulent jockey, + and so circuitously of unhorsing him.] changed the relations between the + animals. The mode of escaping from the reptile he showed to be not by + running away, but by leaping on its back booted and spurred. The two + animals had misunderstood each other. The use of the crocodile has now + been cleared up—viz., to be ridden; and the final cause of man is + that he may improve the health of the crocodile by riding him + a-fox-hunting before breakfast. And it is pretty certain that any + crocodile who has been regularly hunted through the season, and is master + of the weight he carries, will take a six-barred gate now as well as ever + he would have done in the infancy of the pyramids. + </p> + <p> + If, therefore, the crocodile does <i>not</i> change, all things else + undeniably <i>do</i>: even the shadow of the pyramids grows less. And + often the restoration in vision of Fanny and the Bath road makes me too + pathetically sensible of that truth. Out of the darkness, if I happen to + call back the image of Fanny, up rises suddenly from a gulf of forty years + a rose in June; or, if I think for an instant of the rose in June, up + rises the heavenly face of Fanny. One after the other, like the + antiphonies in the choral service, rise Fanny and the rose in June, then + back again the rose in June and Fanny. Then come both together, as in a + chorus—roses and Fannies, Fannies and roses, without end, thick as + blossoms in paradise. Then comes a venerable crocodile, in a royal livery + of scarlet and gold, with sixteen capes; and the crocodile is driving + four-in-hand from the box of the Bath mail. And suddenly we upon the mail + are pulled up by a mighty dial, sculptured with the hours, that mingle + with the heavens and the heavenly host. Then all at once we are arrived at + Marlborough forest, amongst the lovely households [Footnote: "<i>Households</i>":—Roe-deer + do not congregate in herds like the fallow or the red deer, but by + separate families, parents and children; which feature of approximation to + the sanctity of human hearths, added to their comparatively miniature and + graceful proportions, conciliates to them an interest of peculiar + tenderness, supposing even that this beautiful creature is less + characteristically impressed with the grandeurs of savage and forest + life.] of the roe-deer; the deer and their fawns retire into the dewy + thickets; the thickets are rich with roses; once again the roses call up + the sweet countenance of Fanny; and she, being the granddaughter of a + crocodile, awakens a dreadful host of semi-legendary animals—griffins, + dragons, basilisks, sphinxes—till at length the whole vision of + fighting images crowds into one towering armorial shield, a vast + emblazonry of human charities and human loveliness that have perished, but + quartered heraldically with unutterable and demoniac natures, whilst over + all rises, as a surmounting crest, one fair female hand, with the + forefinger pointing, in sweet, sorrowful admonition, upwards to heaven, + where is sculptured the eternal writing which proclaims the frailty of + earth and her children. + </p> + <h3> + GOING DOWN WITH VICTORY + </h3> + <p> + But the grandest chapter of our experience within the whole mail-coach + service was on those occasions when we went down from London with the news + of victory. A period of about ten years stretched from Trafalgar to + Waterloo; the second and third years of which period (1806 and 1807) were + comparatively sterile; but the other nine (from 1805 to 1815 inclusively) + furnished a long succession of victories, the least of which, in such a + contest of Titans, had an inappreciable value of position: partly for its + absolute interference with the plans of our enemy, but still more from its + keeping alive through central Europe the sense of a deep-seated + vulnerability in France. Even to tease the coasts of our enemy, to mortify + them by continual blockades, to insult them by capturing if it were but a + baubling schooner under the eyes of their arrogant armies, repeated from + time to time a sullen proclamation of power lodged in one quarter to which + the hopes of Christendom turned in secret. How much more loudly must this + proclamation have spoken in the audacity [Footnote: "<i>Audacity</i>":—Such + the French accounted it; and it has struck me that Soult would not have + been so popular in London, at the period of her present Majesty's + coronation, or in Manchester, on occasion of his visit to that town, if + they had been aware of the insolence with which he spoke of us in notes + written at intervals from the field of Waterloo. As though it had been + mere felony in our army to look a French one in the face, he said in more + notes than one, dated from two to four P.M. on the field of Waterloo, + "Here are the English—we have them; they are caught <i>en flagrant + délit</i>" Yet no man should have known us better; no man had drunk deeper + from the cup of humiliation than Soult had in 1809, when ejected by us + with headlong violence from Oporto, and pursued through a long line of + wrecks to the frontier of Spain; and subsequently at Albuera, in the + bloodiest of recorded battles, to say nothing of Toulouse, he should have + learned our pretensions.] of having bearded the <i>élite</i> of their + troops, and having beaten them in pitched battles! Five years of life it + was worth paying down for the privilege of an outside place on a + mail-coach, when carrying down the first tidings of any such event. And it + is to be noted that, from our insular situation, and the multitude of our + frigates disposable for the rapid transmission of intelligence, rarely did + any unauthorised rumour steal away a prelibation from the first aroma of + the regular despatches. The government news was generally the earliest + news. + </p> + <p> + From eight P.M. to fifteen or twenty minutes later imagine the mails + assembled on parade in Lombard Street; where, at that time, [Footnote: "<i>At + that time</i>":—I speak of the era previous to Waterloo.] and not in + St. Martin's-le-Grand, was seated the General Post-Office. In what exact + strength we mustered I do not remember; but, from the length of each + separate <i>attelage</i>, we filled the street, though a long one, and + though we were drawn up in double file. On <i>any</i> night the spectacle + was beautiful. The absolute perfection of all the appointments about the + carriages and the harness, their strength, their brilliant cleanliness, + their beautiful simplicity—but, more than all, the royal + magnificence of the horses—were what might first have fixed the + attention. Every carriage on every morning in the year was taken down to + an official inspector for examination: wheels, axles, linchpins, pole, + glasses, lamps, were all critically probed and tested. Every part of every + carriage had been cleaned, every horse had been groomed, with as much + rigour as if they belonged to a private gentleman; and that part of the + spectacle offered itself always. But the night before us is a night of + victory; and, behold! to the ordinary display what a heart-shaking + addition!—horses, men, carriages, all are dressed in laurels and + flowers, oak-leaves and ribbons. The guards, as being officially his + Majesty's servants, and of the coachmen such as are within the privilege + of the post-office, wear the royal liveries of course; and, as it is + summer (for all the <i>land</i> victories were naturally won in summer), + they wear, on this fine evening, these liveries exposed to view, without + any covering of upper coats. Such a costume, and the elaborate arrangement + of the laurels in their hats, dilate their hearts, by giving to them + openly a personal connexion with the great news in which already they have + the general interest of patriotism. That great national sentiment + surmounts and quells all sense of ordinary distinctions. Those passengers + who happen to be gentlemen are now hardly to be distinguished as such + except by dress; for the usual reserve of their manner in speaking to the + attendants has on this night melted away. One heart, one pride, one glory, + connects every man by the transcendent bond of his national blood. The + spectators, who are numerous beyond precedent, express their sympathy with + these fervent feelings by continual hurrahs. Every moment are shouted + aloud by the post-office servants, and summoned to draw up, the great + ancestral names of cities known to history through a thousand years—Lincoln, + Winchester, Portsmouth, Gloucester, Oxford, Bristol, Manchester, York, + Newcastle, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Perth, Stirling, Aberdeen—expressing + the grandeur of the empire by the antiquity of its towns, and the grandeur + of the mail establishment by the diffusive radiation of its separate + missions. Every moment you hear the thunder of lids locked down upon the + mail-bags. That sound to each individual mail is the signal for drawing + off; which process is the finest part of the entire spectacle. Then come + the horses into play. Horses! can these be horses that bound off with the + action and gestures of leopards? What stir!—what sea-like ferment!—what + a thundering of wheels!—what a trampling of hoofs!—what a + sounding of trumpets!—what farewell cheers—what redoubling + peals of brotherly congratulation, connecting the name of the particular + mail—"Liverpool for ever!"—with the name of the particular + victory—"Badajoz for ever!" or "Salamanca for ever!" The + half-slumbering consciousness that all night long, and all the next day—perhaps + for even a longer period—many of these mails, like fire racing along + a train of gunpowder, will be kindling at every instant new successions of + burning joy, has an obscure effect of multiplying the victory itself, by + multiplying to the imagination into infinity the stages of its progressive + diffusion. A fiery arrow seems to be let loose, which from that moment is + destined to travel, without intermission, westwards for three hundred + [Footnote: "<i>Three hundred</i>":—Of necessity, this scale of + measurement, to an American, if he happens to be a thoughtless man, must + sound ludicrous. Accordingly, I remember a case in which an American + writer indulges himself in the luxury of a little fibbing, by ascribing to + an Englishman a pompous account of the Thames, constructed entirely upon + American ideas of grandeur, and concluding in something like these terms:—"And, + sir, arriving at London, this mighty father of rivers attains a breadth of + at least two furlongs, having, in its winding course, traversed the + astonishing distance of one hundred and seventy miles." And this the + candid American thinks it fair to contrast with the scale of the + Mississippi. Now, it is hardly worth while to answer a pure fiction + gravely; else one might say that no Englishman out of Bedlam ever thought + of looking in an island for the rivers of a continent, nor, consequently, + could have thought of looking for the peculiar grandeur of the Thames in + the length of its course, or in the extent of soil which it drains. Yet, + if he <i>had</i> been so absurd, the American might have recollected that + a river, not to be compared with the Thames even as to volume of water—viz., + the Tiber—has contrived to make itself heard of in this world for + twenty-five centuries to an extent not reached as yet by any river, + however corpulent, of his own land. The glory of the Thames is measured by + the destiny of the population to which it ministers, by the commerce which + it supports, by the grandeur of the empire in which, though far from the + largest, it is the most influential stream. Upon some such scale, and not + by a transfer of Columbian standards, is the course of our English mails + to be valued. The American may fancy the effect of his own valuations to + our English ears by supposing the case of a Siberian glorifying his + country in these terms:—"These wretches, sir, in France and England, + cannot march half a mile in any direction without finding a house where + food can be had and lodging; whereas such is the noble desolation of our + magnificent country that in many a direction for a thousand miles I will + engage that a dog shall not find shelter from a snow-storm, nor a wren + find an apology for breakfast."] miles—northwards for six hundred; + and the sympathy of our Lombard Street friends at parting is exalted a + hundredfold by a sort of visionary sympathy with the yet slumbering + sympathies which in so vast a succession we are going to awake. + </p> + <p> + Liberated from the embarrassments of the city, and issuing into the broad + uncrowded avenues of the northern suburbs, we soon begin to enter upon our + natural pace of ten miles an hour. In the broad light of the summer + evening, the sun, perhaps, only just at the point of setting, we are seen + from every storey of every house. Heads of every age crowd to the windows; + young and old understand the language of our victorious symbols; and + rolling volleys of sympathising cheers run along us, behind us, and before + us. The beggar, rearing himself against the wall, forgets his lameness—real + or assumed—thinks not of his whining trade, but stands erect, with + bold exulting smiles, as we pass him. The victory has healed him, and + says, Be thou whole! Women and children, from garrets alike and cellars, + through infinite London, look down or look up with loving eyes upon our + gay ribbons and our martial laurels; sometimes kiss their hands; sometimes + hang out, as signals of affection, pocket-handkerchiefs, aprons, dusters, + anything that, by catching the summer breezes, will express an aerial + jubilation. On the London side of Barnet, to which we draw near within a + few minutes after nine, observe that private carriage which is approaching + us. The weather being so warm, the glasses are all down; and one may read, + as on the stage of a theatre, everything that goes on within. It contains + three ladies—one likely to be "mamma," and two of seventeen or + eighteen, who are probably her daughters. What lovely animation, what + beautiful unpremeditated pantomime, explaining to us every syllable that + passes, in these ingenuous girls! By the sudden start and raising of the + hands on first discovering our laurelled equipage, by the sudden movement + and appeal to the elder lady from both of them, and by the heightened + colour on their animated countenances, we can almost hear them saying, + "See, see! Look at their laurels! Oh, mamma! there has been a great battle + in Spain; and it has been a great victory." In a moment we are on the + point of passing them. We passengers—I on the box, and the two on + the roof behind me—raise our hats to the ladies; the coachman makes + his professional salute with the whip; the guard even, though punctilious + on the matter of his dignity as an officer under the crown, touches his + hat. The ladies move to us, in return, with a winning graciousness of + gesture; all smile on each side in a way that nobody could misunderstand, + and that nothing short of a grand national sympathy could so + instantaneously prompt. Will these ladies say that we are nothing to <i>them</i>? + Oh no; they will not say <i>that</i>. They cannot deny—they do not + deny—that for this night they are our sisters; gentle or simple, + scholar or illiterate servant, for twelve hours to come, we on the outside + have the honour to be their brothers. Those poor women, again, who stop to + gaze upon us with delight at the entrance of Barnet, and seem, by their + air of weariness, to be returning from labour—do you mean to say + that they are washerwomen and charwomen? Oh, my poor friend, you are quite + mistaken. I assure you they stand in a far higher rank; for this one night + they feel themselves by birthright to be daughters of England, and answer + to no humbler title. + </p> + <p> + Every joy, however, even rapturous joy—such is the sad law of earth—may + carry with it grief, or fear of grief, to some. Three miles beyond Barnet, + we see approaching us another private carriage, nearly repeating the + circumstances of the former case. Here, also, the glasses are all down; + here, also, is an elderly lady seated; but the two daughters are missing; + for the single young person sitting by the lady's side seems to be an + attendant—so I judge from her dress, and her air of respectful + reserve. The lady is in mourning; and her countenance expresses sorrow. At + first she does not look up; so that I believe she is not aware of our + approach, until she hears the measured beating of our horses' hoofs. Then + she raises her eyes to settle them painfully on our triumphal equipage. + Our decorations explain the case to her at once; but she beholds them with + apparent anxiety, or even with terror. Some time before this, I, finding + it difficult to hit a flying mark when embarrassed by the coachman's + person and reins intervening, had given to the guard a "Courier" evening + paper, containing the gazette, for the next carriage that might pass. + Accordingly he tossed it in, so folded that the huge capitals expressing + some such legend as GLORIOUS VICTORY might catch the eye at once. To see + the paper, however, at all, interpreted as it was by our ensigns of + triumph, explained everything; and, if the guard were right in thinking + the lady to have received it with a gesture of horror, it could not be + doubtful that she had suffered some deep personal affliction in connexion + with this Spanish war. + </p> + <p> + Here, now, was the case of one who, having formerly suffered, might, + erroneously perhaps, be distressing herself with anticipations of another + similar suffering. That same night, and hardly three hours later, occurred + the reverse case. A poor woman, who too probably would find herself, in a + day or two, to have suffered the heaviest of afflictions by the battle, + blindly allowed herself to express an exultation so unmeasured in the news + and its details as gave to her the appearance which amongst Celtic + Highlanders is called <i>fey</i>. This was at some little town where we + changed horses an hour or two after midnight. Some fair or wake had kept + the people up out of their beds, and had occasioned a partial illumination + of the stalls and booths, presenting an unusual but very impressive + effect. We saw many lights moving about as we drew near; and perhaps the + most striking scene on the whole route was our reception at this place. + The flashing of torches and the beautiful radiance of blue lights + (technically, Bengal lights) upon the heads of our horses; the fine effect + of such a showery and ghostly illumination falling upon our flowers and + glittering laurels [Footnote: "<i>Glittering laurels</i>":—I must + observe that the colour of <i>green</i> suffers almost a spiritual change + and exaltation under the effect of Bengal lights.]; whilst all around + ourselves, that formed a centre of light, the darkness gathered on the + rear and flanks in massy blackness: these optical splendours, together + with the prodigious enthusiasm of the people, composed a picture at once + scenical and affecting, theatrical and holy. As we staid for three or four + minutes, I alighted; and immediately from a dismantled stall in the + street, where no doubt she had been presiding through the earlier part of + the night, advanced eagerly a middle-aged woman. The sight of my newspaper + it was that had drawn her attention upon myself. The victory which we were + carrying down to the provinces on <i>this</i> occasion was the imperfect + one of Talavera—imperfect for its results, such was the virtual + treachery of the Spanish general, Cuesta, but not imperfect in its + ever-memorable heroism. I told her the main outline of the battle. The + agitation of her enthusiasm had been so conspicuous when listening, and + when first applying for information, that I could not but ask her if she + had not some relative in the Peninsular army. Oh yes; her only son was + there. In what regiment? He was a trooper in the 23d Dragoons. My heart + sank within me as she made that answer. This sublime regiment, which an + Englishman should never mention without raising his hat to their memory, + had made the most memorable and effective charge recorded in military + annals. They leaped their horses—<i>over</i> a trench where they + could; <i>into</i> it, and with the result of death or mutilation, when + they could <i>not</i>. What proportion cleared the trench is nowhere + stated. Those who <i>did</i> closed up and went down upon the enemy with + such divinity of fervour (I use the word <i>divinity</i> by design: the + inspiration of God must have prompted this movement for those whom even + then He was calling to His presence) that two results followed. As + regarded the enemy, this 23d Dragoons, not, I believe, originally three + hundred and fifty strong, paralysed a French column six thousand strong, + then ascended the hill, and fixed the gaze of the whole French army. As + regarded themselves, the 23d were supposed at first to have been barely + not annihilated; but eventually, I believe, about one in four survived. + And this, then, was the regiment—a regiment already for some hours + glorified and hallowed to the ear of all London, as lying stretched, by a + large majority, upon one bloody aceldama—in which the young trooper + served whose mother was now talking in a spirit of such joyous enthusiasm. + Did I tell her the truth? Had I the heart to break up her dreams? No. + To-morrow, said I to myself—to-morrow, or the next day, will publish + the worst. For one night more wherefore should she not sleep in peace? + After to-morrow the chances are too many that peace will forsake her + pillow. This brief respite, then, let her owe to <i>my</i> gift and <i>my</i> + forbearance. But, if I told her not of the bloody price that had been + paid, not therefore was I silent on the contributions from her son's + regiment to that day's service and glory. I showed her not the funeral + banners under which the noble regiment was sleeping. I lifted not the + overshadowing laurels from the bloody trench in which horse and rider lay + mangled together. But I told her how these dear children of England, + officers and privates, had leaped their horses over all obstacles as gaily + as hunters to the morning's chase. I told her how they rode their horses + into the midst of death,—saying to myself, but not saying to <i>her</i> + "and laid down their young lives for thee, O mother England! as willingly—poured + out their noble blood as cheerfully—as ever, after a long day's + sport, when infants, they had rested their weary heads upon their mother's + knees, or had sunk to sleep in her arms." Strange it is, yet true, that + she seemed to have no fears for her son's safety, even after this + knowledge that the 23d Dragoons had been memorably engaged; but so much + was she enraptured by the knowledge that <i>his</i> regiment, and + therefore that <i>he</i>, had rendered conspicuous service in the dreadful + conflict—a service which had actually made them, within the last + twelve hours, the foremost topic of conversation in London—so + absolutely was fear swallowed up in joy—that, in the mere simplicity + of her fervent nature, the poor woman threw her arms round my neck, as she + thought of her son, and gave to <i>me</i> the kiss which secretly was + meant for <i>him</i>. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_SECT2" id="link2H_SECT2"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + SECTION II—THE VISION OF SUDDEN DEATH + </h2> + <p> + What is to be taken as the predominant opinion of man, reflective and + philosophic, upon SUDDEN DEATH? It is remarkable that, in different + conditions of society, sudden death has been variously regarded as the + consummation of an earthly career most fervently to be desired, or, again, + as that consummation which is with most horror to be deprecated. Cæsar the + Dictator, at his last dinner-party (<i>coena</i>), on the very evening + before his assassination, when the minutes of his earthly career were + numbered, being asked what death, in <i>his</i> judgment, might be + pronounced the most eligible, replied "That which should be most sudden." + On the other hand, the divine Litany of our English Church, when breathing + forth supplications, as if in some representative character, for the whole + human race prostrate before God, places such a death in the very van of + horrors: "From lightning and tempest; from plague, pestilence, and famine; + from battle and murder, and from SUDDEN DEATH—<i>Good Lord, deliver + us</i>." Sudden death is here made to crown the climax in a grand ascent + of calamities; it is ranked among the last of curses; and yet by the + noblest of Romans it was ranked as the first of blessings. In that + difference most readers will see little more than the essential difference + between Christianity and Paganism. But this, on consideration, I doubt. + The Christian Church may be right in its estimate of sudden death; and it + is a natural feeling, though after all it may also be an infirm one, to + wish for a quiet dismissal from life, as that which <i>seems</i> most + reconcilable with meditation, with penitential retrospects, and with the + humilities of farewell prayer. There does not, however, occur to me any + direct scriptural warrant for this earnest petition of the English Litany, + unless under a special construction of the word "sudden." It seems a + petition indulged rather and conceded to human infirmity than exacted from + human piety. It is not so much a doctrine built upon the eternities of the + Christian system as a plausible opinion built upon special varieties of + physical temperament. Let that, however, be as it may, two remarks suggest + themselves as prudent restraints upon a doctrine which else <i>may</i> + wander, and <i>has</i> wandered, into an uncharitable superstition. The + first is this: that many people are likely to exaggerate the horror of a + sudden death from the disposition to lay a false stress upon words or acts + simply because by an accident they have become <i>final</i> words or acts. + If a man dies, for instance, by some sudden death when he happens to be + intoxicated, such a death is falsely regarded with peculiar horror; as + though the intoxication were suddenly exalted into a blasphemy. But <i>that</i> + is unphilosophic. The man was, or he was not, <i>habitually</i> a + drunkard. If not, if his intoxication were a solitary accident, there can + be no reason for allowing special emphasis to this act simply because + through misfortune it became his final act. Nor, on the other hand, if it + were no accident, but one of his <i>habitual</i> transgressions, will it + be the more habitual or the more a transgression because some sudden + calamity, surprising him, has caused this habitual transgression to be + also a final one. Could the man have had any reason even dimly to foresee + his own sudden death, there would have been a new feature in his act of + intemperance—a feature of presumption and irreverence, as in one + that, having known himself drawing near to the presence of God, should + have suited his demeanour to an expectation so awful. But this is no part + of the case supposed. And the only new element in the man's act is not any + element of special immorality, but simply of special misfortune. + </p> + <p> + The other remark has reference to the meaning of the word <i>sudden</i>. + Very possibly Cæsar and the Christian Church do not differ in the way + supposed,—that is, do not differ by any difference of doctrine as + between Pagan and Christian views of the moral temper appropriate to + death; but perhaps they are contemplating different cases. Both + contemplate a violent death, a <i>Biathanatos</i>—death that is <i>biaios</i>, + or, in other words, death that is brought about, not by internal and + spontaneous change, but by active force having its origin from without. In + this meaning the two authorities agree. Thus far they are in harmony. But + the difference is that the Roman by the word "sudden" means <i>unlingering</i>, + whereas the Christian Litany by "sudden death" means a death <i>without + warning</i>, consequently without any available summons to religious + preparation. The poor mutineer who kneels down to gather into his heart + the bullets from twelve firelocks of his pitying comrades dies by a most + sudden death in Cæsar's sense; one shock, one mighty spasm, one (possibly + <i>not</i> one) groan, and all is over. But, in the sense of the Litany, + the mutineer's death is far from sudden: his offence originally, his + imprisonment, his trial, the interval between his sentence and its + execution, having all furnished him with separate warnings of his fate—having + all summoned him to meet it with solemn preparation. + </p> + <p> + Here at once, in this sharp verbal distinction, we comprehend the faithful + earnestness with which a holy Christian Church pleads on behalf of her + poor departing children that God would vouchsafe to them the last great + privilege and distinction possible on a death-bed, viz., the opportunity + of untroubled preparation for facing this mighty trial. Sudden death, as a + mere variety in the modes of dying where death in some shape is + inevitable, proposes a question of choice which, equally in the Roman and + the Christian sense, will be variously answered according to each man's + variety of temperament. Meantime, one aspect of sudden death there is, one + modification, upon which no doubt can arise, that of all martyrdoms it is + the most agitating—viz., where it surprises a man under + circumstances which offer (or which seem to offer) some hurrying, flying, + inappreciably minute chance of evading it. Sudden as the danger which it + affronts must be any effort by which such an evasion can be accomplished. + Even <i>that</i>, even the sickening necessity for hurrying in extremity + where all hurry seems destined to be vain,—even that anguish is + liable to a hideous exasperation in one particular case: viz., where the + appeal is made not exclusively to the instinct of self-preservation, but + to the conscience, on behalf of some other life besides your own, + accidentally thrown upon <i>your</i> protection. To fail, to collapse in a + service merely your own, might seem comparatively venial; though, in fact, + it is far from venial. But to fail in a case where Providence has suddenly + thrown into your hands the final interests of another,—a fellow + creature shuddering between the gates of life and death: this, to a man of + apprehensive conscience, would mingle the misery of an atrocious + criminality with the misery of a bloody calamity. You are called upon, by + the case supposed, possibly to die, but to die at the very moment when, by + any even partial failure or effeminate collapse of your energies, you will + be self-denounced as a murderer. You had but the twinkling of an eye for + your effort, and that effort might have been unavailing; but to have risen + to the level of such an effort would have rescued you, though not from + dying, yet from dying as a traitor to your final and farewell duty. + </p> + <p> + The situation here contemplated exposes a dreadful ulcer, lurking far down + in the depths of human nature. It is not that men generally are summoned + to face such awful trials. But potentially, and in shadowy outline, such a + trial is moving subterraneously in perhaps all men's natures. Upon the + secret mirror of our dreams such a trial is darkly projected, perhaps, to + every one of us. That dream, so familiar to childhood, of meeting a lion, + and, through languishing prostration in hope and the energies of hope, + that constant sequel of lying down before the lion publishes the secret + frailty of human nature—reveals its deep-seated falsehood to itself—records + its abysmal treachery. Perhaps not one of us escapes that dream; perhaps, + as by some sorrowful doom of man, that dream repeats for every one of us, + through every generation, the original temptation in Eden. Every one of + us, in this dream, has a bait offered to the infirm places of his own + individual will; once again a snare is presented for tempting him into + captivity to a luxury of ruin; once again, as in aboriginal Paradise, the + man falls by his own choice; again, by infinite iteration, the ancient + earth groans to Heaven, through her secret caves, over the weakness of her + child. "Nature, from her seat, sighing through all her works," again + "gives signs of woe that all is lost"; and again the counter-sigh is + repeated to the sorrowing heavens for the endless rebellion against God. + It is not without probability that in the world of dreams every one of us + ratifies for himself the original transgression. In dreams, perhaps under + some secret conflict of the midnight sleeper, lighted up to the + consciousness at the time, but darkened to the memory as soon as all is + finished, each several child of our mysterious race completes for himself + the treason of the aboriginal fall. + </p> + <p> + The incident, so memorable in itself by its features of horror, and so + scenical by its grouping for the eye, which furnished the text for this + reverie upon <i>Sudden Death</i> occurred to myself in the dead of night, + as a solitary spectator, when seated on the box of the Manchester and + Glasgow mail, in the second or third summer after Waterloo. I find it + necessary to relate the circumstances, because they are such as could not + have occurred unless under a singular combination of accidents. In those + days, the oblique and lateral communications with many rural post-offices + were so arranged, either through necessity or through defect of system, as + to make it requisite for the main north-western mail (<i>i.e.</i>, the <i>down</i> + mail) on reaching Manchester to halt for a number of hours; how many, I do + not remember; six or seven, I think; but the result was that, in the + ordinary course, the mail recommenced its journey northwards about + midnight. Wearied with the long detention at a gloomy hotel, I walked out + about eleven o'clock at night for the sake of fresh air; meaning to fall + in with the mail and resume my seat at the post-office. The night, + however, being yet dark, as the moon had scarcely risen, and the streets + being at that hour empty, so as to offer no opportunities for asking the + road, I lost my way, and did not reach the post-office until it was + considerably past midnight; but, to my great relief (as it was important + for me to be in Westmoreland by the morning), I saw in the huge saucer + eyes of the mail, blazing through the gloom, an evidence that my chance + was not yet lost. Past the time it was; but, by some rare accident, the + mail was not even yet ready to start. I ascended to my seat on the box, + where my cloak was still lying as it had lain at the Bridgewater Arms. I + had left it there in imitation of a nautical discoverer, who leaves a bit + of bunting on the shore of his discovery, by way of warning off the ground + the whole human race, and notifying to the Christian and the heathen + worlds, with his best compliments, that he has hoisted his + pocket-handkerchief once and for ever upon that virgin soil: thenceforward + claiming the <i>jus dominii</i> to the top of the atmosphere above it, and + also the right of driving shafts to the centre of the earth below it; so + that all people found after this warning either aloft in upper chambers of + the atmosphere, or groping in subterraneous shafts, or squatting + audaciously on the surface of the soil, will be treated as trespassers—kicked, + that is to say, or decapitated, as circumstances may suggest, by their + very faithful servant, the owner of the said pocket-handkerchief. In the + present case, it is probable that my cloak might not have been respected, + and the <i>jus gentium</i> might have been cruelly violated in my person—for, + in the dark, people commit deeds of darkness, gas being a great ally of + morality; but it so happened that on this night there was no other outside + passenger; and thus the crime, which else was but too probable, missed + fire for want of a criminal. + </p> + <p> + Having mounted the box, I took a small quantity of laudanum, having + already travelled two hundred and fifty miles—viz., from a point + seventy miles beyond London. In the taking of laudanum there was nothing + extraordinary. But by accident it drew upon me the special attention of my + assessor on the box, the coachman. And in <i>that</i> also there was + nothing extraordinary. But by accident, and with great delight, it drew my + own attention to the fact that this coachman was a monster in point of + bulk, and that he had but one eye. In fact, he had been foretold by Virgil + as + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Monstrum horrendum, informe, ingens, cui lumen ademptum." +</pre> + <p> + He answered to the conditions in every one of the items:—1, a + monster he was; 2, dreadful; 3, shapeless; 4, huge; 5, who had lost an + eye. But why should <i>that</i> delight me? Had he been one of the + Calendars in the "Arabian Nights," and had paid down his eye as the price + of his criminal curiosity, what right had <i>I</i> to exult in his + misfortune? I did <i>not</i> exult; I delighted in no man's punishment, + though it were even merited. But these personal distinctions (Nos. 1, 2, + 3, 4, 5) identified in an instant an old friend of mine whom I had known + in the south for some years as the most masterly of mail-coachmen. He was + the man in all Europe that could (if <i>any</i> could) have driven + six-in-hand full gallop over <i>Al Sirat</i>—that dreadful bridge of + Mahomet, with no side battlements, and of <i>extra</i> room not enough for + a razor's edge—leading right across the bottomless gulf. Under this + eminent man, whom in Greek I cognominated Cyclops <i>Diphrélates</i> + (Cyclops the Charioteer), I, and others known to me, studied the + diphrelatic art. Excuse, reader, a word too elegant to be pedantic. As a + pupil, though I paid extra fees, it is to be lamented that I did not stand + high in his esteem. It showed his dogged honesty (though, observe, not his + discernment) that he could not see my merits. Let us excuse his absurdity + in this particular by remembering his want of an eye. Doubtless <i>that</i> + made him blind to my merits. In the art of conversation, however, he + admitted that I had the whip-hand of him. On the present occasion great + joy was at our meeting. But what was Cyclops doing here? Had the medical + men recommended northern air, or how? I collected, from such explanations + as he volunteered, that he had an interest at stake in some suit-at-law + now pending at Lancaster; so that probably he had got himself transferred + to this station for the purpose of connecting with his professional + pursuits an instant readiness for the calls of his lawsuit. + </p> + <p> + Meantime, what are we stopping for? Surely we have now waited long enough. + Oh, this procrastinating mail, and this procrastinating post-office! Can't + they take a lesson upon that subject from <i>me</i>? Some people have + called <i>me</i> procrastinating. Yet you are witness, reader, that I was + here kept waiting for the post-office. Will the post-office lay its hand + on its heart, in its moments of sobriety, and assert that ever it waited + for me? What are they about? The guard tells me that there is a large + extra accumulation of foreign mails this night, owing to irregularities + caused by war, by wind, by weather, in the packet service, which as yet + does not benefit at all by steam. For an <i>extra</i> hour, it seems, the + post-office has been engaged in threshing out the pure wheaten + correspondence of Glasgow, and winnowing it from the chaff of all baser + intermediate towns. But at last all is finished. Sound your horn, guard! + Manchester, good-bye! we've lost an hour by your criminal conduct at the + post-office: which, however, though I do not mean to part with a + serviceable ground of complaint, and one which really <i>is</i> such for + the horses, to me secretly is an advantage, since it compels us to look + sharply for this lost hour amongst the next eight or nine, and to recover + it (if we can) at the rate of one mile extra per hour. Off we are at last, + and at eleven miles an hour; and for the moment I detect no changes in the + energy or in the skill of Cyclops. + </p> + <p> + From Manchester to Kendal, which virtually (though not in law) is the + capital of Westmoreland, there were at this time seven stages of eleven + miles each. The first five of these, counting from Manchester, terminate + in Lancaster; which is therefore fifty-five miles north of Manchester, and + the same distance exactly from Liverpool. The first three stages terminate + in Preston (called, by way of distinction from other towns of that name, + <i>Proud</i> Preston); at which place it is that the separate roads from + Liverpool and from Manchester to the north become confluent. [Footnote: "<i>Confluent</i>":—Suppose + a capital Y (the Pythagorean letter): Lancaster is at the foot of this + letter; Liverpool at the top of the <i>right</i> branch; Manchester at the + top of the <i>left</i>; Proud Preston at the centre, where the two + branches unite. It is thirty-three miles along either of the two branches; + it is twenty-two miles along the stem,—viz., from Preston in the + middle to Lancaster at the root. There's a lesson in geography for the + reader!] Within these first three stages lay the foundation, the progress, + and termination of our night's adventure. During the first stage, I found + out that Cyclops was mortal: he was liable to the shocking affection of + sleep—a thing which previously I had never suspected. If a man + indulges in the vicious habit of sleeping, all the skill in aurigation of + Apollo himself, with the horses of Aurora to execute his notions, avails + him nothing. "Oh, Cyclops!" I exclaimed, "thou art mortal. My friend, thou + snorest." Through the first eleven miles, however, this infirmity—which + I grieve to say that he shared with the whole Pagan Pantheon—betrayed + itself only by brief snatches. On waking up, he made an apology for + himself which, instead of mending matters, laid open a gloomy vista of + coming disasters. The summer assizes, he reminded me, were now going on at + Lancaster: in consequence of which for three nights and three days he had + not lain down on a bed. During the day he was waiting for his own summons + as a witness on the trial in which he was interested, or else, lest he + should be missing at the critical moment, was drinking with the other + witnesses under the pastoral surveillance of the attorneys. During the + night, or that part of it which at sea would form the middle watch, he was + driving. This explanation certainly accounted for his drowsiness, but in a + way which made it much more alarming; since now, after several days' + resistance to this infirmity, at length he was steadily giving way. + Throughout the second stage he grew more and more drowsy. In the second + mile of the third stage he surrendered himself finally and without a + struggle to his perilous temptation. All his past resistance had but + deepened the weight of this final oppression. Seven atmospheres of sleep + rested upon him; and, to consummate the case, our worthy guard, after + singing "Love amongst the Roses" for perhaps thirty times, without + invitation and without applause, had in revenge moodily resigned himself + to slumber—not so deep, doubtless, as the coachman's, but deep + enough for mischief. And thus at last, about ten miles from Preston, it + came about that I found myself left in charge of his Majesty's London and + Glasgow mail, then running at the least twelve miles an hour. + </p> + <p> + What made this negligence less criminal than else it must have been + thought was the condition of the roads at night during the assizes. At + that time, all the law business of populous Liverpool, and also of + populous Manchester, with its vast cincture of populous rural districts, + was called up by ancient usage to the tribunal of Lilliputian Lancaster. + To break up this old traditional usage required, 1, a conflict with + powerful established interests, 2, a large system of new arrangements, and + 3, a new parliamentary statute. But as yet this change was merely in + contemplation. As things were at present, twice in the year [Footnote: "<i>Twice + in the year</i>":—There were at that time only two assizes even in + the most populous counties—viz., the Lent Assizes and the Summer + Assizes.] so vast a body of business rolled northwards from the southern + quarter of the county that for a fortnight at least it occupied the severe + exertions of two judges in its despatch. The consequence of this was that + every horse available for such a service, along the whole line of road, + was exhausted in carrying down the multitudes of people who were parties + to the different suits. By sunset, therefore, it usually happened that, + through utter exhaustion amongst men and horses, the road sank into + profound silence. Except the exhaustion in the vast adjacent county of + York from a contested election, no such silence succeeding to no such + fiery uproar was ever witnessed in England. + </p> + <p> + On this occasion the usual silence and solitude prevailed along the road. + Not a hoof nor a wheel was to be heard. And, to strengthen this false + luxurious confidence in the noiseless roads, it happened also that the + night was one of peculiar solemnity and peace. For my own part, though + slightly alive to the possibilities of peril, I had so far yielded to the + influence of the mighty calm as to sink into a profound reverie. The month + was August; in the middle of which lay my own birthday—a festival to + every thoughtful man suggesting solemn and often sigh-born [Footnote: "<i>Sigh-born</i>":—I + owe the suggestion of this word to an obscure remembrance of a beautiful + phrase in "Giraldus Cambrensis"—viz., <i>suspiriosæ cogitationes</i>.] + thoughts. The county was my own native county—upon which, in its + southern section, more than upon any equal area known to man past or + present, had descended the original curse of labour in its heaviest form, + not mastering the bodies only of men, as of slaves, or criminals in mines, + but working through the fiery will. Upon no equal space of earth was, or + ever had been, the same energy of human power put forth daily. At this + particular season also of the assizes, that dreadful hurricane of flight + and pursuit, as it might have seemed to a stranger, which swept to and + from Lancaster all day long, hunting the county up and down, and regularly + subsiding back into silence about sunset, could not fail (when united with + this permanent distinction of Lancashire as the very metropolis and + citadel of labour) to point the thoughts pathetically upon that + counter-vision of rest, of saintly repose from strife and sorrow, towards + which, as to their secret haven, the profounder aspirations of man's heart + are in solitude continually travelling. Obliquely upon our left we were + nearing the sea; which also must, under the present circumstances, be + repeating the general state of halcyon repose. The sea, the atmosphere, + the light, bore each an orchestral part in this universal lull. Moonlight + and the first timid tremblings of the dawn were by this time blending; and + the blendings were brought into a still more exquisite state of unity by a + slight silvery mist, motionless and dreamy, that covered the woods and + fields, but with a veil of equable transparency. Except the feet of our + own horses,—which, running on a sandy margin of the road, made but + little disturbance,—there was no sound abroad. In the clouds and on + the earth prevailed the same majestic peace; and, in spite of all that the + villain of a schoolmaster has done for the ruin of our sublimer thoughts, + which are the thoughts of our infancy, we still believe in no such + nonsense as a limited atmosphere. Whatever we may swear with our false + feigning lips, in our faithful hearts we still believe, and must for ever + believe, in fields of air traversing the total gulf between earth and the + central heavens. Still, in the confidence of children that tread without + fear every chamber in their father's house, and to whom no door is closed, + we, in that Sabbatic vision which sometimes is revealed for an hour upon + nights like this, ascend with easy steps from the sorrow-stricken fields + of earth upwards to the sandals of God. + </p> + <p> + Suddenly, from thoughts like these I was awakened to a sullen sound, as of + some motion on the distant road. It stole upon the air for a moment; I + listened in awe; but then it died away. Once roused, however, I could not + but observe with alarm the quickened motion of our horses. Ten years' + experience had made my eye learned in the valuing of motion; and I saw + that we were now running thirteen miles an hour. I pretend to no presence + of mind. On the contrary, my fear is that I am miserably and shamefully + deficient in that quality as regards action. The palsy of doubt and + distraction hangs like some guilty weight of dark unfathomed remembrances + upon my energies when the signal is flying for <i>action</i>. But, on the + other hand, this accursed gift I have, as regards <i>thought</i>, that in + the first step towards the possibility of a misfortune I see its total + evolution; in the radix of the series I see too certainly and too + instantly its entire expansion; in the first syllable of the dreadful + sentence I read already the last. It was not that I feared for ourselves. + <i>Us</i> our bulk and impetus charmed against peril in any collision. And + I had ridden through too many hundreds of perils that were frightful to + approach, that were matter of laughter to look back upon, the first face + of which was horror, the parting face a jest—for any anxiety to rest + upon <i>our</i> interests. The mail was not built, I felt assured, nor + bespoke, that could betray <i>me</i> who trusted to its protection. But + any carriage that we could meet would be frail and light in comparison of + ourselves. And I remarked this ominous accident of our situation,—we + were on the wrong side of the road. But then, it may be said, the other + party, if other there was, might also be on the wrong side; and two wrongs + might make a right. <i>That</i> was not likely. The same motive which had + drawn <i>us</i> to the right-hand side of the road—viz., the luxury + of the soft beaten sand as contrasted with the paved centre—would + prove attractive to others. The two adverse carriages would therefore, to + a certainty, be travelling on the same side; and from this side, as not + being ours in law, the crossing over to the other would, of course, be + looked for from <i>us</i>. [Footnote: It is true that, according to the + law of the case as established by legal precedents, all carriages were + required to give way before royal equipages, and therefore before the mail + as one of them. But this only increased the danger, as being a regulation + very imperfectly made known, very unequally enforced, and therefore often + embarrassing the movements on both sides.] Our lamps, still lighted, would + give the impression of vigilance on our part. And every creature that met + us would rely upon <i>us</i> for quartering. [Footnote: "<i>Quartering</i>":—This + is the technical word, and, I presume, derived from the French <i>cartayer</i>, + to evade a rut or any obstacle.] All this, and if the separate links of + the anticipation had been a thousand times more, I saw, not discursively, + or by effort, or by succession, but by one flash of horrid simultaneous + intuition. + </p> + <p> + Under this steady though rapid anticipation of the evil which <i>might</i> + be gathering ahead, ah! what a sullen mystery of fear, what a sigh of woe, + was that which stole upon the air, as again the far-off sound of a wheel + was heard! A whisper it was—a whisper from, perhaps, four miles off—secretly + announcing a ruin that, being foreseen, was not the less inevitable; that, + being known, was not therefore healed. What could be done—who was it + that could do it—to check the storm-flight of these maniacal horses? + Could I not seize the reins from the grasp of the slumbering coachman? + You, reader, think that it would have been in <i>your</i> power to do so. + And I quarrel not with your estimate of yourself. But, from the way in + which the coachman's hand was viced between his upper and lower thigh, + this was impossible. Easy was it? See, then, that bronze equestrian + statue. The cruel rider has kept the bit in his horse's mouth for two + centuries. Unbridle him for a minute, if you please, and wash his mouth + with water. Easy was it? Unhorse me, then, that imperial rider; knock me + those marble feet from those marble stirrups of Charlemagne. + </p> + <p> + The sounds ahead strengthened, and were now too clearly the sounds of + wheels. Who and what could it be? Was it industry in a taxed cart? Was it + youthful gaiety in a gig? Was it sorrow that loitered, or joy that raced? + For as yet the snatches of sound were too intermitting, from distance, to + decipher the character of the motion. Whoever were the travellers, + something must be done to warn them. Upon the other party rests the active + responsibility, but upon <i>us</i>—and, woe is me! that <i>us</i> + was reduced to my frail opium-shattered self—rests the + responsibility of warning. Yet, how should this be accomplished? Might I + not sound the guard's horn? Already, on the first thought, I was making my + way over the roof of the guard's seat. But this, from the accident which I + have mentioned, of the foreign mails being piled upon the roof, was a + difficult and even dangerous attempt to one cramped by nearly three + hundred miles of outside travelling. And, fortunately, before I had lost + much time in the attempt, our frantic horses swept round an angle of the + road which opened upon us that final stage where the collision must be + accomplished and the catastrophe sealed. All was apparently finished. The + court was sitting; the case was heard; the judge had finished; and only + the verdict was yet in arrear. + </p> + <p> + Before us lay an avenue straight as an arrow, six hundred yards, perhaps, + in length; and the umbrageous trees, which rose in a regular line from + either side, meeting high overhead, gave to it the character of a + cathedral aisle. These trees lent a deeper solemnity to the early light; + but there was still light enough to perceive, at the further end of this + Gothic aisle, a frail reedy gig, in which were seated a young man, and by + his side a young lady. Ah, young sir! what are you about? If it is + requisite that you should whisper your communications to this young lady—though + really I see nobody, at an hour and on a road so solitary, likely to + overhear you—is it therefore requisite that you should carry your + lips forward to hers? The little carriage is creeping on at one mile an + hour; and the parties within it, being thus tenderly engaged, are + naturally bending down their heads. Between them and eternity, to all + human calculation, there is but a minute and a half. Oh heavens! what is + it that I shall do? Speaking or acting, what help can I offer? Strange it + is, and to a mere auditor of the tale might seem laughable, that I should + need a suggestion from the "Iliad" to prompt the sole resource that + remained. Yet so it was. Suddenly I remembered the shout of Achilles, and + its effect. But could I pretend to shout like the son of Peleus, aided by + Pallas? No: but then I needed not the shout that should alarm all Asia + militant; such a shout would suffice as might carry terror into the hearts + of two thoughtless young people and one gig-horse. I shouted—and the + young man heard me not. A second time I shouted—and now he heard me, + for now he raised his head. + </p> + <p> + Here, then, all had been done that, by me, <i>could</i> be done; more on + <i>my</i> part was not possible. Mine had been the first step; the second + was for the young man; the third was for God. If, said I, this stranger is + a brave man, and if indeed he loves the young girl at his side—or, + loving her not, if he feels the obligation, pressing upon every man worthy + to be called a man, of doing his utmost for a woman confided to his + protection—he will at least make some effort to save her. If <i>that</i> + fails, he will not perish the more, or by a death more cruel, for having + made it; and he will die as a brave man should, with his face to the + danger, and with his arm about the woman that he sought in vain to save. + But, if he makes no effort,—shrinking without a struggle from his + duty,—he himself will not the less certainly perish for this + baseness of poltroonery. He will die no less: and why not? Wherefore + should we grieve that there is one craven less in the world? No; <i>let</i> + him perish, without a pitying thought of ours wasted upon him; and, in + that case, all our grief will be reserved for the fate of the helpless + girl who now, upon the least shadow of failure in <i>him</i>, must by the + fiercest of translations—must without time for a prayer—must + within seventy seconds stand before the judgment-seat of God. + </p> + <p> + But craven he was not: sudden had been the call upon him, and sudden was + his answer to the call. He saw, he heard, he comprehended, the ruin that + was coming down: already its gloomy shadow darkened above him; and already + he was measuring his strength to deal with it. Ah! what a vulgar thing + does courage seem when we see nations buying it and selling it for a + shilling a-day: ah! what a sublime thing does courage seem when some + fearful summons on the great deeps of life carries a man, as if running + before a hurricane, up to the giddy crest of some tumultuous crisis from + which lie two courses, and a voice says to him audibly, "One way lies + hope; take the other, and mourn for ever!" How grand a triumph if, even + then, amidst the raving of all around him, and the frenzy of the danger, + the man is able to confront his situation—is able to retire for a + moment into solitude with God, and to seek his counsel from <i>Him!</i> + </p> + <p> + For seven seconds, it might be, of his seventy, the stranger settled his + countenance steadfastly upon us, as if to search and value every element + in the conflict before him. For five seconds more of his seventy he sat + immovably, like one that mused on some great purpose. For five more, + perhaps, he sat with eyes upraised, like one that prayed in sorrow, under + some extremity of doubt, for light that should guide him to the better + choice. Then suddenly he rose; stood upright; and, by a powerful strain + upon the reins, raising his horse's fore-feet from the ground, he slewed + him round on the pivot of his hind-legs, so as to plant the little + equipage in a position nearly at right angles to ours. Thus far his + condition was not improved; except as a first step had been taken towards + the possibility of a second. If no more were done, nothing was done; for + the little carriage still occupied the very centre of our path, though in + an altered direction. Yet even now it may not be too late: fifteen of the + seventy seconds may still be unexhausted; and one almighty bound may avail + to clear the ground. Hurry, then, hurry! for the flying moments—<i>they</i> + hurry. Oh, hurry, hurry, my brave young man! for the cruel hoofs of our + horses—<i>they</i> also hurry! Fast are the flying moments, faster + are the hoofs of our horses. But fear not for <i>him</i>, if human energy + can suffice; faithful was he that drove to his terrific duty; faithful was + the horse to <i>his</i> command. One blow, one impulse given with voice + and hand, by the stranger, one rush from the horse, one bound as if in the + act of rising to a fence, landed the docile creature's forefeet upon the + crown or arching centre of the road. The larger half of the little + equipage had then cleared our over-towering shadow: <i>that</i> was + evident even to my own agitated sight. But it mattered little that one + wreck should float off in safety if upon the wreck that perished were + embarked the human freightage. The rear part of the carriage—was <i>that</i> + certainly beyond the line of absolute ruin? What power could answer the + question? Glance of eye, thought of man, wing of angel, which of these had + speed enough to sweep between the question and the answer, and divide the + one from the other? Light does not tread upon the steps of light more + indivisibly than did our all-conquering arrival upon the escaping efforts + of the gig. <i>That</i> must the young man have felt too plainly. His back + was now turned to us; not by sight could he any longer communicate with + the peril; but, by the dreadful rattle of our harness, too truly had his + ear been instructed that all was finished as regarded any effort of <i>his</i>. + Already in resignation he had rested from his struggle; and perhaps in his + heart he was whispering, "Father, which art in heaven, do Thou finish + above what I on earth have attempted." Faster than ever mill-race we ran + past them in our inexorable flight. Oh, raving of hurricanes that must + have sounded in their young ears at the moment of our transit! Even in + that moment the thunder of collision spoke aloud. Either with the + swingle-bar, or with the haunch of our near leader, we had struck the + off-wheel of the little gig; which stood rather obliquely, and not quite + so far advanced as to be accurately parallel with the near-wheel. The + blow, from the fury of our passage, resounded terrifically. I rose in + horror, to gaze upon the ruins we might have caused. From my elevated + station I looked down, and looked back upon the scene; which in a moment + told its own tale, and wrote all its records on my heart for ever. + </p> + <p> + Here was the map of the passion that now had finished. The horse was + planted immovably, with his fore-feet upon the paved crest of the central + road. He of the whole party might be supposed untouched by the passion of + death. The little cany carriage—partly, perhaps, from the violent + torsion of the wheels in its recent movement, partly from the thundering + blow we had given to it—as if it sympathised with human horror, was + all alive with tremblings and shiverings. The young man trembled not, nor + shivered. He sat like a rock. But <i>his</i> was the steadiness of + agitation frozen into rest by horror. As yet he dared not to look round; + for he knew that, if anything remained to do, by him it could no longer be + done. And as yet he knew not for certain if their safety were + accomplished. But the lady— + </p> + <p> + But the lady—! Oh, heavens! will that spectacle ever depart from my + dreams, as she rose and sank upon her seat, sank and rose, threw up her + arms wildly to heaven, clutched at some visionary object in the air, + fainting, praying, raving, despairing? Figure to yourself, reader, the + elements of the case; suffer me to recall before your mind the + circumstances of that unparalleled situation. From the silence and deep + peace of this saintly summer night—from the pathetic blending of + this sweet moonlight, dawnlight, dreamlight—from the manly + tenderness of this flattering, whispering, murmuring love—suddenly + as from the woods and fields—suddenly as from the chambers of the + air opening in revelation—suddenly as from the ground yawning at her + feet, leaped upon her, with the flashing of cataracts, Death the crowned + phantom, with all the equipage of his terrors, and the tiger roar of his + voice. + </p> + <p> + The moments were numbered; the strife was finished; the vision was closed. + In the twinkling of an eye, our flying horses had carried us to the + termination of the umbrageous aisle; at the right angles we wheeled into + our former direction; the turn of the road carried the scene out of my + eyes in an instant, and swept it into my dreams for ever. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_SECT3" id="link2H_SECT3"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + SECTION III—DREAM-FUGUE: + </h2> + <h3> + FOUNDED ON THE PRECEDING THEME OF SUDDEN DEATH + </h3> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Whence the sound + Of instruments, that made melodious chime, + Was heard, of harp and organ; and who moved + Their stops and chords was seen; his volant touch + Instinct through all proportions, low and high, + Fled and pursued transverse the resonant fugue." + <i>Par. Lost</i>, Bk. XI. +</pre> + <p> + <i>Tumultuosissimamente</i> + </p> + <p> + Passion of sudden death! that once in youth I read and interpreted by the + shadows of thy averted signs [Footnote: "<i>Averted signs</i>":—I + read the course and changes of the lady's agony in the succession of her + involuntary gestures; but it must be remembered that I read all this from + the rear, never once catching the lady's full face, and even her profile + imperfectly.]!—rapture of panic taking the shape (which amongst + tombs in churches I have seen) of woman bursting her sepulchral bonds—of + woman's Ionic form bending forward from the ruins of her grave with + arching foot, with eyes upraised, with clasped adoring hands—waiting, + watching, trembling, praying for the trumpet's call to rise from dust for + ever! Ah, vision too fearful of shuddering humanity on the brink of + almighty abysses!—vision that didst start back, that didst reel + away, like a shrivelling scroll from before the wrath of fire racing on + the wings of the wind! Epilepsy so brief of horror, wherefore is it that + thou canst not die? Passing so suddenly into darkness, wherefore is it + that still thou sheddest thy sad funeral blights upon the gorgeous mosaics + of dreams? Fragment of music too passionate, heard once, and heard no + more, what aileth thee, that thy deep rolling chords come up at intervals + through all the worlds of sleep, and after forty years have lost no + element of horror? + </p> + <h3> + I + </h3> + <p> + Lo, it is summer—almighty summer! The everlasting gates of life and + summer are thrown open wide; and on the ocean, tranquil and verdant as a + savannah, the unknown lady from the dreadful vision and I myself are + floating—she upon a fairy pinnace, and I upon an English + three-decker. Both of us are wooing gales of festal happiness within the + domain of our common country, within that ancient watery park, within the + pathless chase of ocean, where England takes her pleasure as a huntress + through winter and summer, from the rising to the setting sun. Ah, what a + wilderness of floral beauty was hidden, or was suddenly revealed, upon the + tropic islands through which the pinnace moved! And upon her deck what a + bevy of human flowers: young women how lovely, young men how noble, that + were dancing together, and slowly drifting towards <i>us</i> amidst music + and incense, amidst blossoms from forests and gorgeous corymbi from + vintages, amidst natural carolling, and the echoes of sweet girlish + laughter. Slowly the pinnace nears us, gaily she hails us, and silently + she disappears beneath the shadow of our mighty bows. But then, as at some + signal from heaven, the music, and the carols, and the sweet echoing of + girlish laughter—all are hushed. What evil has smitten the pinnace, + meeting or overtaking her? Did ruin to our friends couch within our own + dreadful shadow? Was our shadow the shadow of death? I looked over the bow + for an answer, and, behold! the pinnace was dismantled; the revel and the + revellers were found no more; the glory of the vintage was dust; and the + forests with their beauty were left without a witness upon the seas. "But + where," and I turned to our crew—"where are the lovely women that + danced beneath the awning of flowers and clustering corymbi? Whither have + fled the noble young men that danced with <i>them</i>?" Answer there was + none. But suddenly the man at the mast-head, whose countenance darkened + with alarm, cried out, "Sail on the weather beam! Down she comes upon us: + in seventy seconds she also will founder." + </p> + <h3> + II + </h3> + <p> + I looked to the weather side, and the summer had departed. The sea was + rocking, and shaken with gathering wrath. Upon its surface sat mighty + mists, which grouped themselves into arches and long cathedral aisles. + Down one of these, with the fiery pace of a quarrel from a cross-bow, ran + a frigate right athwart our course. "Are they mad?" some voice exclaimed + from our deck. "Do they woo their ruin?" But in a moment, as she was close + upon us, some impulse of a heady current or local vortex gave a wheeling + bias to her course, and off she forged without a shock. As she ran past + us, high aloft amongst the shrouds stood the lady of the pinnace. The + deeps opened ahead in malice to receive her, towering surges of foam ran + after her, the billows were fierce to catch her. But far away she was + borne into desert spaces of the sea: whilst still by sight I followed her, + as she ran before the howling gale, chased by angry sea-birds and by + maddening billows; still I saw her, as at the moment when she ran past us, + standing amongst the shrouds, with her white draperies streaming before + the wind. There she stood, with hair dishevelled, one hand clutched + amongst the tackling—rising, sinking, fluttering, trembling, + praying; there for leagues I saw her as she stood, raising at intervals + one hand to heaven, amidst the fiery crests of the pursuing waves and the + raving of the storm; until at last, upon a sound from afar of malicious + laughter and mockery, all was hidden for ever in driving showers; and + afterwards, but when I knew not, nor how. + </p> + <h3> + III + </h3> + <p> + Sweet funeral bells from some incalculable distance, wailing over the dead + that die before the dawn, awakened me as I slept in a boat moored to some + familiar shore. The morning twilight even then was breaking; and, by the + dusky revelations which it spread, I saw a girl, adorned with a garland of + white roses about her head for some great festival, running along the + solitary strand in extremity of haste. Her running was the running of + panic; and often she looked back as to some dreadful enemy in the rear. + But, when I leaped ashore, and followed on her steps to warn her of a + peril in front, alas! from me she fled as from another peril, and vainly I + shouted to her of quicksands that lay ahead. Faster and faster she ran; + round a promontory of rocks she wheeled out of sight; in an instant I also + wheeled round it, but only to see the treacherous sands gathering above + her head. Already her person was buried; only the fair young head and the + diadem of white roses around it were still visible to the pitying heavens; + and, last of all, was visible one white marble arm. I saw by the early + twilight this fair young head, as it was sinking down to darkness—saw + this marble arm, as it rose above her head and her treacherous grave, + tossing, faltering, rising, clutching, as at some false deceiving hand + stretched out from the clouds—saw this marble arm uttering her dying + hope, and then uttering her dying despair. The head, the diadem, the arm—these + all had sunk; at last over these also the cruel quicksand had closed; and + no memorial of the fair young girl remained on earth, except my own + solitary tears, and the funeral bells from the desert seas, that, rising + again more softly, sang a requiem over the grave of the buried child, and + over her blighted dawn. + </p> + <p> + I sat, and wept in secret the tears that men have ever given to the memory + of those that died before the dawn, and by the treachery of earth, our + mother. But suddenly the tears and funeral bells were hushed by a shout as + of many nations, and by a roar as from some great king's artillery, + advancing rapidly along the valleys, and heard afar by echoes from the + mountains. "Hush!" I said, as I bent my ear earthwards to listen—"hush!—this + either is the very anarchy of strife, or else"—and then I listened + more profoundly, and whispered as I raised my head—"or else, oh + heavens! it is <i>victory</i> that is final, victory that swallows up all + strife." + </p> + <h3> + IV + </h3> + <p> + Immediately, in trance, I was carried over land and sea to some distant + kingdom, and placed upon a triumphal car, amongst companions crowned with + laurel. The darkness of gathering midnight, brooding over all the land, + hid from us the mighty crowds that were weaving restlessly about ourselves + as a centre: we heard them, but saw them not. Tidings had arrived, within + an hour, of a grandeur that measured itself against centuries; too full of + pathos they were, too full of joy, to utter themselves by other language + than by tears, by restless anthems, and <i>Te Deums</i> reverberated from + the choirs and orchestras of earth. These tidings we that sat upon the + laurelled car had it for our privilege to publish amongst all nations. And + already, by signs audible through the darkness, by snortings and + tramplings, our angry horses, that knew no fear or fleshly weariness, + upbraided us with delay. Wherefore <i>was</i> it that we delayed? We + waited for a secret word, that should bear witness to the hope of nations + as now accomplished for ever. At midnight the secret word arrived; which + word was—<i>Waterloo and Recovered Christendom!</i> The dreadful + word shone by its own light; before us it went; high above our leaders' + heads it rode, and spread a golden light over the paths which we + traversed. Every city, at the presence of the secret word, threw open its + gates. The rivers were conscious as we crossed. All the forests, as we ran + along their margins, shivered in homage to the secret word. And the + darkness comprehended it. + </p> + <p> + Two hours after midnight we approached a mighty Minster. Its gates, which + rose to the clouds, were closed. But, when the dreadful word that rode + before us reached them with its golden light, silently they moved back + upon their hinges; and at a flying gallop our equipage entered the grand + aisle of the cathedral. Headlong was our pace; and at every altar, in the + little chapels and oratories to the right hand and left of our course, the + lamps, dying or sickening, kindled anew in sympathy with the secret word + that was flying past. Forty leagues we might have run in the cathedral, + and as yet no strength of morning light had reached us, when before us we + saw the aerial galleries of organ and choir. Every pinnacle of fretwork, + every station of advantage amongst the traceries, was crested by + white-robed choristers that sang deliverance; that wept no more tears, as + once their fathers had wept; but at intervals that sang together to the + generations, saying, + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Chant the deliverer's praise in every tongue," +</pre> + <p> + and receiving answers from afar, + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Such as once in heaven and earth were sung." +</pre> + <p> + And of their chanting was no end; of our headlong pace was neither pause + nor slackening. + </p> + <p> + Thus as we ran like torrents—thus as we swept with bridal rapture + over the Campo Santo [Footnote: "<i>Campo Santo</i>":—It is probable + that most of my readers will be acquainted with the history of the Campo + Santo (or cemetery) at Pisa, composed of earth brought from Jerusalem from + a bed of sanctity as the highest prize which the noble piety of crusaders + could ask or imagine. To readers who are unacquainted with England, or who + (being English) are yet unacquainted with the cathedral cities of England, + it may be right to mention that the graves within-side the cathedrals + often form a flat pavement over which carriages and horses <i>might</i> + run; and perhaps a boyish remembrance of one particular cathedral, across + which I had seen passengers walk and burdens carried, as about two + centuries back they were through the middle of St. Paul's in London, may + have assisted my dream.] of the cathedral graves—suddenly we became + aware of a vast necropolis rising upon the far-off horizon—a city of + sepulchres, built within the saintly cathedral for the warrior dead that + rested from their feuds on earth. Of purple granite was the necropolis; + yet, in the first minute, it lay like a purple stain upon the horizon, so + mighty was the distance. In the second minute it trembled through many + changes, growing into terraces and towers of wondrous altitude, so mighty + was the pace. In the third minute already, with our dreadful gallop, we + were entering its suburbs. Vast sarcophagi rose on every side, having + towers and turrets that, upon the limits of the central aisle, strode + forward with haughty intrusion, that ran back with mighty shadows into + answering recesses. Every sarcophagus showed many bas-reliefs—bas-reliefs + of battles and of battle-fields; battles from forgotten ages, battles from + yesterday; battle-fields that, long since, nature had healed and + reconciled to herself with the sweet oblivion of flowers; battle-fields + that were yet angry and crimson with carnage. Where the terraces ran, + there did <i>we</i> run; where the towers curved, there did <i>we</i> + curve. With the flight of swallows our horses swept round every angle. + Like rivers in flood wheeling round headlands, like hurricanes that ride + into the secrets of forests, faster than ever light unwove the mazes of + darkness, our flying equipage carried earthly passions, kindled warrior + instincts, amongst the dust that lay around us—dust oftentimes of + our noble fathers that had slept in God from Crécy to Trafalgar. And now + had we reached the last sarcophagus, now were we abreast of the last + bas-relief, already had we recovered the arrow-like flight of the + illimitable central aisle, when coming up this aisle to meet us we beheld + afar off a female child, that rode in a carriage as frail as flowers. The + mists which went before her hid the fawns that drew her, but could not + hide the shells and tropic flowers with which she played—but could + not hide the lovely smiles by which she uttered her trust in the mighty + cathedral, and in the cherubim that looked down upon her from the mighty + shafts of its pillars. Face to face she was meeting us; face to face she + rode, as if danger there were none. "Oh, baby!" I exclaimed, "shalt thou + be the ransom for Waterloo? Must we, that carry tidings of great joy to + every people, be messengers of ruin to thee!" In horror I rose at the + thought; but then also, in horror at the thought, rose one that was + sculptured on a bas-relief—a Dying Trumpeter. Solemnly from the + field of battle he rose to his feet; and, unslinging his stony trumpet, + carried it, in his dying anguish, to his stony lips—sounding once, + and yet once again; proclamation that, in <i>thy</i> ears, oh baby! spoke + from the battlements of death. Immediately deep shadows fell between us, + and aboriginal silence. The choir had ceased to sing. The hoofs of our + horses, the dreadful rattle of our harness, the groaning of our wheels, + alarmed the graves no more. By horror the bas-relief had been unlocked + unto life. By horror we, that were so full of life, we men and our horses, + with their fiery fore-legs rising in mid air to their everlasting gallop, + were frozen to a bas-relief. Then a third time the trumpet sounded; the + seals were taken off all pulses; life, and the frenzy of life, tore into + their channels again; again the choir burst forth in sunny grandeur, as + from the muffling of storms and darkness; again the thunderings of our + horses carried temptation into the graves. One cry burst from our lips, as + the clouds, drawing off from the aisle, showed it empty before us.—"Whither + has the infant fled?—is the young child caught up to God?" Lo! afar + off, in a vast recess, rose three mighty windows to the clouds; and on a + level with their summits, at height insuperable to man, rose an altar of + purest alabaster. On its eastern face was trembling a crimson glory. A + glory was it from the reddening dawn that now streamed <i>through</i> the + windows? Was it from the crimson robes of the martyrs painted <i>on</i> + the windows? Was it from the bloody bas-reliefs of earth? There, suddenly, + within that crimson radiance, rose the apparition of a woman's head, and + then of a woman's figure. The child it was—grown up to woman's + height. Clinging to the horns of the altar, voiceless she stood—sinking, + rising, raving, despairing; and behind the volume of incense that, night + and day, streamed upwards from the altar, dimly was seen the fiery font, + and the shadow of that dreadful being who should have baptized her with + the baptism of death. But by her side was kneeling her better angel, that + hid his face with wings; that wept and pleaded for <i>her</i>; that prayed + when <i>she</i> could <i>not</i>; that fought with Heaven by tears for <i>her</i> + deliverance; which also, as he raised his immortal countenance from his + wings, I saw, by the glory in his eye, that from Heaven he had won at + last. + </p> + <h3> + V + </h3> + <p> + Then was completed the passion of the mighty fugue. The golden tubes of + the organ, which as yet had but muttered at intervals—gleaming + amongst clouds and surges of incense—threw up, as from fountains + unfathomable, columns of heart-shattering music. Choir and anti-choir were + filling fast with unknown voices. Thou also, Dying Trumpeter, with thy + love that was victorious, and thy anguish that was finishing, didst enter + the tumult; trumpet and echo—farewell love, and farewell anguish—rang + through the dreadful <i>sanctus</i>. Oh, darkness of the grave! that from + the crimson altar and from the fiery font wert visited and searched by the + effulgence in the angel's eye—were these indeed thy children? Pomps + of life, that, from the burials of centuries, rose again to the voice of + perfect joy, did ye indeed mingle with the festivals of Death? Lo! as I + looked back for seventy leagues through the mighty cathedral, I saw the + quick and the dead that sang together to God, together that sang to the + generations of man. All the hosts of jubilation, like armies that ride in + pursuit, moved with one step. Us, that, with laurelled heads, were passing + from the cathedral, they overtook, and, as with a garment, they wrapped us + round with thunders greater than our own. As brothers we moved together; + to the dawn that advanced, to the stars that fled; rendering thanks to God + in the highest—that, having hid His face through one generation + behind thick clouds of War, once again was ascending, from the Campo Santo + of Waterloo was ascending, in the visions of Peace; rendering thanks for + thee, young girl! whom having overshadowed with His ineffable passion of + death, suddenly did God relent, suffered thy angel to turn aside His arm, + and even in thee, sister unknown! shown to me for a moment only to be + hidden for ever, found an occasion to glorify His goodness. A thousand + times, amongst the phantoms of sleep, have I seen thee entering the gates + of the golden dawn, with the secret word riding before thee, with the + armies of the grave behind thee,—seen thee sinking, rising, raving, + despairing; a thousand times in the worlds of sleep have I seen thee + followed by God's angel through storms, through desert seas, through the + darkness of quicksands, through dreams and the dreadful revelations that + are in dreams; only that at the last, with one sling of His victorious + arm, He might snatch thee back from ruin, and might emblazon in thy + deliverance the endless resurrections of His love! + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0008" id="link2H_4_0008"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + JOAN OF ARC + </h2> + <p> + [Footnote: "<i>Arc</i>":—Modern France, that should know a great + deal better than myself, insists that the name is not D'Arc—<i>i.e.</i>, + of Arc—but <i>Darc</i>. Now it happens sometimes that, if a person + whose position guarantees his access to the best information will content + himself with gloomy dogmatism, striking the table with his fist, and + saying in a terrific voice, "It <i>is</i> so, and there's an end of it," + one bows deferentially, and submits. But, if, unhappily for himself, won + by this docility, he relents too amiably into reasons and arguments, + probably one raises an insurrection against him that may never be crushed; + for in the fields of logic one can skirmish, perhaps, as well as he. Had + he confined himself to dogmatism, he would have intrenched his position in + darkness, and have hidden his own vulnerable points. But coming down to + base reasons he lets in light, and one sees where to plant the blows. Now, + the worshipful reason of modern France for disturbing the old received + spelling is that Jean Hordal, a descendant of La Pucelle's brother, + spelled the name <i>Darc</i> in 1612. But what of that? It is notorious + that what small matter of spelling Providence had thought fit to disburse + amongst man in the seventeenth century was all monopolised by printers; + now, M. Hordal was <i>not</i> a printer.] + </p> + <p> + What is to be thought of <i>her</i>? What is to be thought of the poor + shepherd girl from the hills and forests of Lorraine, that—like the + Hebrew shepherd boy from the hills and forests of Judea—rose + suddenly out of the quiet, out of the safety, out of the religious + inspiration, rooted in deep pastoral solitudes, to a station in the van of + armies, and to the more perilous station at the right hand of kings? The + Hebrew boy inaugurated his patriotic mission by an <i>act</i>, by a + victorious <i>act</i>, such as no man could deny. But so did the girl of + Lorraine, if we read her story as it was read by those who saw her + nearest. Adverse armies bore witness to the boy as no pretender; but so + they did to the gentle girl. Judged by the voices of all who saw them <i>from + a station of good will</i>, both were found true and loyal to any promises + involved in their first acts. Enemies it was that made the difference + between their subsequent fortunes. The boy rose to a splendour and a + noonday prosperity, both personal and public, that rang through the + records of his people, and became a byword among his posterity for a + thousand years, until the sceptre was departing from Judah. The poor, + forsaken girl, on the contrary, drank not herself from that cup of rest + which she had secured for France. She never sang together with the songs + that rose in her native Domrémy as echoes to the departing steps of + invaders. She mingled not in the festal dances at Vaucouleurs which + celebrated in rapture the redemption of France. No! for her voice was then + silent; no! for her feet were dust. Pure, innocent, noble-hearted girl! + whom, from earliest youth, ever I believed in as full of truth and + self-sacrifice, this was amongst the strongest pledges for <i>thy</i> + truth, that never once—no, not for a moment of weakness—didst + thou revel in the vision of coronets and honour from man. Coronets for + thee! Oh, no! Honours, if they come when all is over, are for those that + share thy blood. [Footnote: "<i>Those that share thy blood</i>":—A + collateral relative of Joanna's was subsequently ennobled by the title of + <i>Du Lys</i>.] Daughter of Domrémy, when the gratitude of thy king shall + awaken, thou wilt be sleeping the sleep of the dead. Call her, King of + France, but she will not hear thee. Cite her by the apparitors to come and + receive a robe of honour, but she will be found <i>en contumace</i>. When + the thunders of universal France, as even yet may happen, shall proclaim + the grandeur of the poor shepherd girl that gave up all for her country, + thy ear, young shepherd girl, will have been deaf for five centuries. To + suffer and to do, that was thy portion in this life; that was thy destiny; + and not for a moment was it hidden from thyself. Life, thou saidst, is + short; and the sleep which is in the grave is long; let me use that life, + so transitory, for the glory of those heavenly dreams destined to comfort + the sleep which is so long! This pure creature—pure from every + suspicion of even a visionary self-interest, even as she was pure in + senses more obvious—never once did this holy child, as regarded + herself, relax from her belief in the darkness that was travelling to meet + her. She might not prefigure the very manner of her death; she saw not in + vision, perhaps, the aerial altitude of the fiery scaffold, the spectators + without end, on every road, pouring into Rouen as to a coronation, the + surging smoke, the volleying flames, the hostile faces all around, the + pitying eye that lurked but here and there, until nature and imperishable + truth broke loose from artificial restraints—these might not be + apparent through the mists of the hurrying future. But the voice that + called her to death, <i>that</i> she heard for ever. + </p> + <p> + Great was the throne of France even in those days, and great was He that + sat upon it; but well Joanna knew that not the throne, nor he that sat + upon it, was for <i>her</i>; but, on the contrary, that she was for <i>them</i>; + not she by them, but they by her, should rise from the dust. Gorgeous were + the lilies of France, and for centuries had the privilege to spread their + beauty over land and sea, until, in another century, the wrath of God and + man combined to wither them; but well Joanna knew, early at Domrémy she + had read that bitter truth, that the lilies of France would decorate no + garland for <i>her</i>. Flower nor bud, bell nor blossom, would ever bloom + for <i>her</i>! + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + But stay. What reason is there for taking up this subject of Joanna + precisely in the spring of 1847? Might it not have been left till the + spring of 1947, or, perhaps, left till called for? Yes, but it <i>is</i> + called for, and clamorously. You are aware, reader, that amongst the many + original thinkers whom modern France has produced, one of the reputed + leaders is M. Michelet. All these writers are of a revolutionary cast; not + in a political sense merely, but in all senses; mad, oftentimes, as March + hares; crazy with the laughing gas of recovered liberty; drunk with the + wine cup of their mighty Revolution, snorting, whinnying, throwing up + their heels, like wild horses in the boundless pampas, and running races + of defiance with snipes, or with the winds, or with their own shadows, if + they can find nothing else to challenge. Some time or other, I, that have + leisure to read, may introduce <i>you</i>, that have not, to two or three + dozen of these writers; of whom I can assure you beforehand that they are + often profound, and at intervals are even as impassioned as if they were + come of our best English blood. But now, confining our attention to M. + Michelet, we in England—who know him best by his worst book, the + book against priests, etc.—know him disadvantageously. That book is + a rhapsody of incoherence. But his "History of France" is quite another + thing. A man, in whatsoever craft he sails, cannot stretch away out of + sight when he is linked to the windings of the shore by towing-ropes of + History. Facts, and the consequences of facts, draw the writer back to the + falconer's lure from the giddiest heights of speculation. Here, therefore—in + his "France"—if not always free from flightiness, if now and then + off like a rocket for an airy wheel in the clouds, M. Michelet, with + natural politeness, never forgets that he has left a large audience + waiting for him on earth, and gazing upward in anxiety for his return; + return, therefore, he does. But History, though clear of certain + temptations in one direction, has separate dangers of its own. It is + impossible so to write a history of France, or of England—works + becoming every hour more indispensable to the inevitably political man of + this day—without perilous openings for error. If I, for instance, on + the part of England, should happen to turn my labours into that channel, + and (on the model of Lord Percy going to Chevy Chase) + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "A vow to God should make + My pleasure in the Michelet woods + Three summer days to take," +</pre> + <p> + probably, from simple delirium, I might hunt M. Michelet into <i>delirium + tremens</i>. Two strong angels stand by the side of History, whether + French history or English, as heraldic supporters: the angel of research + on the left hand, that must read millions of dusty parchments, and of + pages blotted with lies; the angel of meditation on the right hand, that + must cleanse these lying records with fire, even as of old the draperies + of <i>asbestos</i> were cleansed, and must quicken them into regenerated + life. Willingly I acknowledge that no man will ever avoid innumerable + errors of detail; with so vast a compass of ground to traverse, this is + impossible; but such errors (though I have a bushel on hand, at M. + Michelet's service) are not the game I chase; it is the bitter and unfair + spirit in which M. Michelet writes against England. Even <i>that</i>, + after all, is but my secondary object; the real one is Joanna, the Pucelle + d'Orléans herself. + </p> + <p> + I am not going to write the history of La Pucelle: to do this, or even + circumstantially to report the history of her persecution and bitter + death, of her struggle with false witnesses and with ensnaring judges, it + would be necessary to have before us <i>all</i> the documents, and + therefore the collection only now forthcoming in Paris. [Footnote: "<i>Only + now forthcoming</i>":—In 1847 <i>began</i> the publication (from + official records) of Joanna's trial. It was interrupted, I fear, by the + convulsions of 1848; and whether even yet finished I do not know.] But <i>my</i> + purpose is narrower. There have been great thinkers, disdaining the + careless judgments of contemporaries, who have thrown themselves boldly on + the judgment of a far posterity, that should have had time to review, to + ponder, to compare. There have been great actors on the stage of tragic + humanity that might, with the same depth of confidence, have appealed from + the levity of compatriot friends—too heartless for the sublime + interest of their story, and too impatient for the labour of sifting its + perplexities—to the magnanimity and justice of enemies. To this + class belongs the Maid of Arc. The ancient Romans were too faithful to the + ideal of grandeur in themselves not to relent, after a generation or two, + before the grandeur of Hannibal. Mithridates, a more doubtful person, yet, + merely for the magic perseverance of his indomitable malice, won from the + same Romans the only real honour that ever he received on earth. And we + English have ever shown the same homage to stubborn enmity. To work + unflinchingly for the ruin of England; to say through life, by word and by + deed, <i>Delenda est Anglia Victrix</i>!—that one purpose of malice, + faithfully pursued, has quartered some people upon our national funds of + homage as by a perpetual annuity. Better than an inheritance of service + rendered to England herself has sometimes proved the most insane hatred to + England. Hyder Ali, even his son Tippoo, though so far inferior, and + Napoleon, have all benefited by this disposition among ourselves to + exaggerate the merit of diabolic enmity. Not one of these men was ever + capable, in a solitary instance, of praising an enemy (what do you say to + <i>that</i>, reader?); and yet in <i>their</i> behalf, we consent to + forget, not their crimes only, but (which is worse) their hideous bigotry + and anti-magnanimous egotism—for nationality it was not. Suffren, + and some half dozen of other French nautical heroes, because rightly they + did us all the mischief they could (which was really great), are names + justly reverenced in England. On the same principle, La Pucelle d'Orléans, + the victorious enemy of England, has been destined to receive her deepest + commemoration from the magnanimous justice of Englishmen. + </p> + <p> + Joanna, as we in England should call her, but according to her own + statement, Jeanne (or, as M. Michelet asserts, Jean [Footnote: "<i>Jean</i>":—M. + Michelet asserts that there was a mystical meaning at that era in calling + a child <i>Jean</i>; it implied a secret commendation of a child, if not a + dedication, to St. John the evangelist, the beloved disciple, the apostle + of love and mysterious visions. But, really, as the name was so + exceedingly common, few people will detect a mystery in calling a <i>boy</i> + by the name of Jack, though it <i>does</i> seem mysterious to call a girl + Jack. It may be less so in France, where a beautiful practice has always + prevailed of giving a boy his mother's name—preceded and + strengthened by a male name, as <i>Charles Anne</i>, <i>Victor Victoire</i>. + In cases where a mother's memory has been unusually dear to a son, this + vocal memento of her, locked into the circle of his own name, gives to it + the tenderness of a testamentary relic, or a funeral ring. I presume, + therefore, that La Pucelle must have borne the baptismal name of Jeanne + Jean; the latter with no reference, perhaps, to so sublime a person as St. + John, but simply to some relative.]) D'Arc was born at Domrémy, a village + on the marches of Lorraine and Champagne, and dependent upon the town of + Vaucouleurs. I have called her a Lorrainer, not simply because the word is + prettier, but because Champagne too odiously reminds us English of what + are for <i>us</i> imaginary wines—which, undoubtedly, La Pucelle + tasted as rarely as we English: we English, because the champagne of + London is chiefly grown in Devonshire; La Pucelle, because the champagne + of Champagne never, by any chance, flowed into the fountain of Domrémy, + from which only she drank. M. Michelet will have her to be a <i>Champenoise</i>, + and for no better reason than that she "took after her father," who + happened to be a <i>Champenois</i>. + </p> + <p> + These disputes, however, turn on refinements too nice. Domrémy stood upon + the frontiers, and, like other frontiers, produced a <i>mixed</i> race, + representing the <i>cis</i> and the <i>trans</i>. A river (it is true) + formed the boundary line at this point—the river Meuse; and <i>that</i>, + in old days, might have divided the populations; but in these days it did + not; there were bridges, there were ferries, and weddings crossed from the + right bank to the left. Here lay two great roads, not so much for + travellers that were few, as for armies that were too many by half. These + two roads, one of which was the great highroad between France and Germany, + <i>decussated</i> at this very point; which is a learned way of saying + that they formed a St. Andrew's Cross, or letter X. I hope the compositor + will choose a good large X; in which case the point of intersection, the + <i>locus</i> of conflux and intersection for these four diverging arms, + will finish the reader's geographical education, by showing him to a + hair's-breadth where it was that Domrémy stood. These roads, so grandly + situated, as great trunk arteries between two mighty realms,[Footnote: And + reminding one of that inscription, so justly admired by Paul Richter, + which a Russian Czarina placed on a guide-post near Moscow: <i>This is the + road that leads to Constantinople.</i>] and haunted for ever by wars or + rumours of wars, decussated (for anything I know to the contrary) + absolutely under Joanna's bedroom window; one rolling away to the right, + past M. D'Arc's old barn, and the other unaccountably preferring to sweep + round that odious man's pig-sty to the left. + </p> + <p> + On whichever side of the border chance had thrown Joanna, the same love to + France would have been nurtured. For it is a strange fact, noticed by M. + Michelet and others, that the Dukes of Bar and Lorraine had for + generations pursued the policy of eternal warfare with France on their own + account, yet also of eternal amity and league with France in case anybody + else presumed to attack her. Let peace settle upon France, and before long + you might rely upon seeing the little vixen Lorraine flying at the throat + of France. Let France be assailed by a formidable enemy, and instantly you + saw a Duke of Lorraine insisting on having his own throat cut in support + of France; which favour accordingly was cheerfully granted to him in three + great successive battles: twice by the English, viz., at Crécy and + Agincourt, once by the Sultan at Nicopolis. + </p> + <p> + This sympathy with France during great eclipses, in those that during + ordinary seasons were always teasing her with brawls and guerilla inroads, + strengthened the natural piety to France of those that were confessedly + the children of her own house. The outposts of France, as one may call the + great frontier provinces, were of all localities the most devoted to the + Fleurs de Lys. To witness, at any great crisis, the generous devotion to + these lilies of the little fiery cousin that in gentler weather was for + ever tilting at the breast of France, could not but fan the zeal of + France's legitimate daughters; while to occupy a post of honour on the + frontiers against an old hereditary enemy of France would naturally + stimulate this zeal by a sentiment of martial pride, by a sense of danger + always threatening, and of hatred always smouldering. That great + four-headed road was a perpetual memento to patriotic ardour. To say "This + way lies the road to Paris, and that other way to Aix-la-Chapelle; this to + Prague, that to Vienna," nourished the warfare of the heart by daily + ministrations of sense. The eye that watched for the gleams of lance or + helmet from the hostile frontier, the ear that listened for the groaning + of wheels, made the highroad itself, with its relations to centres so + remote, into a manual of patriotic duty. + </p> + <p> + The situation, therefore, <i>locally</i>, of Joanna was full of profound + suggestions to a heart that listened for the stealthy steps of change and + fear that too surely were in motion. But, if the place were grand, the + time, the burden of the time, was far more so. The air overhead in its + upper chambers was <i>hurtling</i> with the obscure sound; was dark with + sullen fermenting of storms that had been gathering for a hundred and + thirty years. The battle of Agincourt in Joanna's childhood had reopened + the wounds of France. Crécy and Poictiers, those withering overthrows for + the chivalry of France, had, before Agincourt occurred, been tranquilised + by more than half a century; but this resurrection of their trumpet wails + made the whole series of battles and endless skirmishes take their + stations as parts in one drama. The graves that had closed sixty years ago + seemed to fly open in sympathy with a sorrow that echoed their own. The + monarchy of France laboured in extremity, rocked and reeled like a ship + fighting with the darkness of monsoons. The madness of the poor king + (Charles VI), falling in at such a crisis, like the case of women + labouring in child-birth during the storming of a city, trebled the + awfulness of the time. Even the wild story of the incident which had + immediately occasioned the explosion of this madness—the case of a + man unknown, gloomy, and perhaps maniacal himself, coming out of a forest + at noonday, laying his hand upon the bridle of the king's horse, checking + him for a moment to say, "Oh, king, thou art betrayed," and then + vanishing, no man knew whither, as he had appeared for no man knew what—fell + in with the universal prostration of mind that laid France on her knees, + as before the slow unweaving of some ancient prophetic doom. The famines, + the extraordinary diseases, the insurrections of the peasantry up and down + Europe—these were chords struck from the same mysterious harp; but + these were transitory chords. There had been others of deeper and more + ominous sound. The termination of the Crusades, the destruction of the + Templars, the Papal interdicts, the tragedies caused or suffered by the + house of Anjou, and by the Emperor—these were full of a more + permanent significance. But, since then, the colossal figure of feudalism + was seen standing, as it were on tiptoe, at Crécy, for flight from earth: + that was a revolution unparalleled; yet <i>that</i> was a trifle by + comparison with the more fearful revolutions that were mining below the + Church. By her own internal schisms, by the abominable spectacle of a + double Pope—so that no man, except through political bias, could + even guess which was Heaven's vicegerent, and which the creature of Hell—the + Church was rehearsing, as in still earlier forms she had already + rehearsed, those vast rents in her foundations which no man should ever + heal. + </p> + <p> + These were the loftiest peaks of the cloudland in the skies that to the + scientific gazer first caught the colors of the <i>new</i> morning in + advance. But the whole vast range alike of sweeping glooms overhead dwelt + upon all meditative minds, even upon those that could not distinguish the + tendencies nor decipher the forms. It was, therefore, not her own age + alone, as affected by its immediate calamities, that lay with such weight + upon Joanna's mind, but her own age as one section in a vast mysterious + drama, unweaving through a century back, and drawing nearer continually to + some dreadful crisis. Cataracts and rapids were heard roaring ahead; and + signs were seen far back, by help of old men's memories, which answered + secretly to signs now coming forward on the eye, even as locks answer to + keys. It was not wonderful that in such a haunted solitude, with such a + haunted heart, Joanna should see angelic visions, and hear angelic voices. + These voices whispered to her for ever the duty, self-imposed, of + delivering France. Five years she listened to these monitory voices with + internal struggles. At length she could resist no longer. Doubt gave way; + and she left her home for ever in order to present herself at the + dauphin's court. The education of this poor girl was mean according to the + present standard: was ineffably grand, according to a purer philosophic + standard: and only not good for our age because for us it would be + unattainable. She read nothing, for she could not read; but she had heard + others read parts of the Roman martyrology. She wept in sympathy with the + sad "Misereres" of the Romish Church; she rose to heaven with the glad + triumphant "Te Deums" of Rome; she drew her comfort and her vital strength + from the rites of the same Church. But, next after these spiritual + advantages, she owed most to the advantages of her situation. The fountain + of Domrémy was on the brink of a boundless forest; and it was haunted to + that degree by fairies that the parish priest (<i>curé</i>) was obliged to + read mass there once a year, in order to keep them in any decent bounds. + Fairies are important, even in a statistical view: certain weeds mark + poverty in the soil; fairies mark its solitude. As surely as the wolf + retires before cities does the fairy sequester herself from the haunts of + the licensed victualer. A village is too much for her nervous delicacy; at + most, she can tolerate a distant view of a hamlet. We may judge, + therefore, by the uneasiness and extra trouble which they gave to the + parson, in what strength the fairies mustered at Domrémy, and, by a + satisfactory consequence, how thinly sown with men and women must have + been that region even in its inhabited spots. But the forests of Domrémy—those + were the glories of the land: for in them abode mysterious powers and + ancient secrets that towered into tragic strength. "Abbeys there were, and + abbey windows"—"like Moorish temples of the Hindoos"—that + exercised even princely power both in Lorraine and in the German Diets. + These had their sweet bells that pierced the forests for many a league at + matins or vespers, and each its own dreamy legend. Few enough, and + scattered enough, were these abbeys, so as in no degree to disturb the + deep solitude of the region; yet many enough to spread a network or awning + of Christian sanctity over what else might have seemed a heathen + wilderness. This sort of religious talisman being secured, a man the most + afraid of ghosts (like myself, suppose, or the reader) becomes armed into + courage to wander for days in their sylvan recesses. The mountains of the + Vosges, on the eastern frontier of France, have never attracted much + notice from Europe, except in 1813-14 for a few brief months, when they + fell within Napoleon's line of defence against the Allies. But they are + interesting for this among other features, that they do not, like some + loftier ranges, repel woods; the forests and the hills are on sociable + terms. "Live and let live" is their motto. For this reason, in part, these + tracts in Lorraine were a favourite hunting-ground with the Carlovingian + princes. About six hundred years before Joanna's childhood, Charlemagne + was known to have hunted there. That, of itself, was a grand incident in + the traditions of a forest or a chase. In these vast forests, also, were + to be found (if anywhere to be found) those mysterious fawns that tempted + solitary hunters into visionary and perilous pursuits. Here was seen (if + anywhere seen) that ancient stag who was already nine hundred years old, + but possibly a hundred or two more, when met by Charlemagne; and the thing + was put beyond doubt by the inscription upon his golden collar. I believe + Charlemagne knighted the stag; and, if ever he is met again by a king, he + ought to be made an earl, or, being upon the marches of France, a marquis. + Observe, I don't absolutely vouch for all these things: my own opinion + varies. On a fine breezy forenoon I am audaciously sceptical; but as + twilight sets in my credulity grows steadily, till it becomes equal to + anything that could be desired. And I have heard candid sportsmen declare + that, outside of these very forests, they laughed loudly at all the dim + tales connected with their haunted solitudes, but, on reaching a spot + notoriously eighteen miles deep within them, they agreed with Sir Roger de + Coverley that a good deal might be said on both sides. + </p> + <p> + Such traditions, or any others that (like the stag) connect distant + generations with each other, are, for that cause, sublime; and the sense + of the shadowy, connected with such appearances that reveal themselves or + not according to circumstances, leaves a colouring of sanctity over + ancient forests, even in those minds that utterly reject the legend as a + fact. + </p> + <p> + But, apart from all distinct stories of that order, in any solitary + frontier between two great empires—as here, for instance, or in the + desert between Syria and the Euphrates—there is an inevitable + tendency, in minds of any deep sensibility, to people the solitudes with + phantom images of powers that were of old so vast. Joanna, therefore, in + her quiet occupation of a shepherdess, would be led continually to brood + over the political condition of her country by the traditions of the past + no less than by the mementoes of the local present. + </p> + <p> + M. Michelet, indeed, says that La Pucelle was not a shepherdess. I beg his + pardon; she was. What he rests upon I guess pretty well: it is the + evidence of a woman called Haumette, the most confidential friend of + Joanna. Now, she is a good witness, and a good girl, and I like her; for + she makes a natural and affectionate report of Joanna's ordinary life. But + still, however good she may be as a witness, Joanna is better; and she, + when speaking to the dauphin, calls herself in the Latin report <i>Bergereta</i>. + Even Haumette confesses that Joanna tended sheep in her girlhood. And I + believe that, if Miss Haumette were taking coffee along with me this very + evening (February 12, 1847)—in which there would be no subject for + scandal or for maiden blushes, because I am an intense philosopher, and + Miss H. would be hard upon 450 years old—she would admit the + following comment upon her evidence to be right. A Frenchman, about forty + years ago—M. Simond, in his "Travels"—mentions accidentally + the following hideous scene as one steadily observed and watched by + himself in chivalrous France not very long before the French Revolution: A + peasant was plowing; and the team that drew his plow was a donkey and a + woman. Both were regularly harnessed; both pulled alike. This is bad + enough; but the Frenchman adds that, in distributing his lashes, the + peasant was obviously desirous of being impartial; or, if either of the + yokefellows had a right to complain, certainly it was not the donkey. Now, + in any country where such degradation of females could be tolerated by the + state of manners, a woman of delicacy would shrink from acknowledging, + either for herself or her friend, that she had ever been addicted to any + mode of labour not strictly domestic; because, if once owning herself a + prædial servant, she would be sensible that this confession extended by + probability in the hearer's thoughts to the having incurred indignities of + this horrible kind. Haumette clearly thinks it more dignified for Joanna + to have been darning the stockings of her horny-hoofed father, M. D'Arc, + than keeping sheep, lest she might then be suspected of having ever done + something worse. But, luckily, there was no danger of <i>that</i>: Joanna + never was in service; and my opinion is that her father should have mended + his own stockings, since probably he was the party to make the holes in + them, as many a better man than D'Arc does—meaning by <i>that</i> + not myself, because, though probably a better man than D'Arc, I protest + against doing anything of the kind. If I lived even with Friday in Juan + Fernandez, either Friday must do all the darning, or else it must go + undone. The better men that I meant were the sailors in the British navy, + every man of whom mends his own stockings. Who else is to do it? Do you + suppose, reader, that the junior lords of the admiralty are under articles + to darn for the navy? + </p> + <p> + The reason, meantime, for my systematic hatred of D'Arc is this: There was + a story current in France before the Revolution, framed to ridicule the + pauper aristocracy, who happened to have long pedigrees and short rent + rolls: viz., that a head of such a house, dating from the Crusades, was + overheard saying to his son, a Chevalier of St. Louis, "<i>Chevalier, + as-tu donné au cochon à manger</i>?" Now, it is clearly made out by the + surviving evidence that D'Arc would much have preferred continuing to say, + "<i>Ma fille, as-tu donné au cochon à manger</i>?" to saying, "<i>Pucelle + d'Orléans, as-tu sauvé les fleurs-de-lys</i>?" There is an old English + copy of verses which argues thus: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "If the man that turnips cries + Cry not when his father dies, + Then 'tis plain the man had rather + Have a turnip than his father." +</pre> + <p> + I cannot say that the logic of these verses was ever <i>entirely</i> to my + satisfaction. I do not see my way through it as clearly as could be + wished. But I see my way most clearly through D'Arc; and the result is—that + he would greatly have preferred not merely a turnip to his father, but the + saving a pound or so of bacon to saving the Oriflamme of France. + </p> + <p> + It is probable (as M. Michelet suggests) that the title of Virgin or + Pucelle had in itself, and apart from the miraculous stories about her, a + secret power over the rude soldiery and partisan chiefs of that period; + for in such a person they saw a representative manifestation of the Virgin + Mary, who, in a course of centuries, had grown steadily upon the popular + heart. + </p> + <p> + As to Joanna's supernatural detection of the dauphin (Charles VII) among + three hundred lords and knights, I am surprised at the credulity which + could ever lend itself to that theatrical juggle. Who admires more than + myself the sublime enthusiasm, the rapturous faith in herself, of this + pure creature? But I am far from admiring stage artifices which not La + Pucelle, but the court, must have arranged; nor can surrender myself to + the conjurer's legerdemain, such as may be seen every day for a shilling. + Southey's "Joan of Arc" was published in 1796. Twenty years after, talking + with Southey, I was surprised to find him still owning a secret bias in + favor of Joan, founded on her detection of the dauphin. The story, for the + benefit of the reader new to the case, was this: La Pucelle was first made + known to the dauphin, and presented to his court, at Chinon; and here came + her first trial. By way of testing her supernatural pretensions, she was + to find out the royal personage amongst the whole ark of clean and unclean + creatures. Failing in this <i>coup d'essai</i>, she would not simply + disappoint many a beating heart in the glittering crowd that on different + motives yearned for her success, but she would ruin herself, and, as the + oracle within had told her, would, by ruining herself, ruin France. Our + own Sovereign Lady Victoria rehearses annually a trial not so severe in + degree, but the same in kind. She "pricks" for sheriffs. Joanna pricked + for a king. But observe the difference: our own Lady pricks for two men + out of three; Joanna for one man out of three hundred. Happy Lady of the + Islands and the Orient!—she <i>can</i> go astray in her choice only + by one-half: to the extent of one-half she <i>must</i> have the + satisfaction of being right. And yet, even with these tight limits to the + misery of a boundless discretion, permit me, Liege Lady, with all loyalty, + to submit that now and then you prick with your pin the wrong man. But the + poor child from Domremy, shrinking under the gaze of a dazzling court—not + <i>because</i> dazzling (for in visions she had seen those that were more + so), but because some of them wore a scoffing smile on their features—how + should <i>she</i> throw her line into so deep a river to angle for a king, + where many a gay creature was sporting that masqueraded as kings in dress! + Nay, even more than any true king would have done: for, in Southey's + version of the story, the dauphin says, by way of trying the virgin's + magnetic sympathy with royalty, + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "On the throne, + I the while mingling with the menial throng, + Some courtier shall be seated." +</pre> + <p> + This usurper is even crowned: "the jeweled crown shines on a menial's + head." But, really, that is "<i>un peu fort</i>"; and the mob of + spectators might raise a scruple whether our friend the jackdaw upon the + throne, and the dauphin himself, were not grazing the shins of treason. + For the dauphin could not lend more than belonged to him. According to the + popular notion, he had no crown for himself; consequently none to lend, on + any pretence whatever, until the consecrated Maid should take him to + Rheims. This was the <i>popular</i> notion in France. But certainly it was + the dauphin's interest to support the popular notion, as he meant to use + the services of Joanna. For if he were king already, what was it that she + could do for him beyond Orleans? That is to say, what more than a merely + <i>military</i> service could she render him? And, above all, if he were + king without a coronation, and without the oil from the sacred ampulla, + what advantage was yet open to him by celerity above his competitor, the + English boy? Now was to be a race for a coronation: he that should win <i>that</i> + race carried the superstition of France along with him: he that should + first be drawn from the ovens of Rheims was under that superstition baked + into a king. + </p> + <p> + La Pucelle, before she could be allowed to practise as a warrior, was put + through her manual and platoon exercise, as a pupil in divinity, at the + bar of six eminent men in wigs. According to Southey (v. 393, bk. iii., in + the original edition of his "Joan of Arc,") she "appalled the doctors." + It's not easy to do <i>that</i>: but they had some reason to feel + bothered, as that surgeon would assuredly feel bothered who, upon + proceeding to dissect a subject, should find the subject retaliating as a + dissector upon himself, especially if Joanna ever made the speech to them + which occupies v. 354-391, bk. iii. It is a double impossibility: 1st, + because a piracy from Tindal's "Christianity as old as the Creation"—a + piracy <i>a parte ante</i>, and by three centuries; 2d, it is quite + contrary to the evidence on Joanna's trial. Southey's "Joan" of A.D. 1796 + (Cottle, Bristol) tells the doctors, among other secrets, that she never + in her life attended—1st, Mass; nor 2d, the Sacramental Table; nor + 3d, Confession. In the meantime, all this deistical confession of + Joanna's, besides being suicidal for the interest of her cause, is opposed + to the depositions upon <i>both</i> trials. The very best witness called + from first to last deposes that Joanna attended these rites of her Church + even too often; was taxed with doing so; and, by blushing, owned the + charge as a fact, though certainly not as a fault. Joanna was a girl of + natural piety, that saw God in forests and hills and fountains, but did + not the less seek him in chapels and consecrated oratories. + </p> + <p> + This peasant girl was self-educated through her own natural + meditativeness. If the reader turns to that divine passage in "Paradise + Regained" which Milton has put into the mouth of our Saviour when first + entering the wilderness, and musing upon the tendency of those great + impulses growing within himself——- + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Oh, what a multitude of thoughts at once + Awakened in me swarm, while I consider + What from within I feel myself, and hear + What from without comes often to my ears, + Ill sorting with my present state compared! + When I was yet a child, no childish play + To me was pleasing; all my mind was set + Serious to learn and know, and thence to do, + What might be public good; myself I thought + Born to that end——" +</pre> + <p> + he will have some notion of the vast reveries which brooded over the heart + of Joanna in early girlhood, when the wings were budding that should carry + her from Orleans to Rheims; when the golden chariot was dimly revealing + itself that should carry her from the kingdom of <i>France Delivered</i> + to the Eternal Kingdom. + </p> + <p> + It is not requisite for the honour of Joanna, nor is there in this place + room, to pursue her brief career of <i>action.</i> That, though wonderful, + forms the earthly part of her story; the spiritual part is the saintly + passion of her imprisonment, trial, and execution. It is unfortunate, + therefore, for Southey's "Joan of Arc" (which, however, should always be + regarded as a <i>juvenile</i> effort), that precisely when her real glory + begins the poem ends. But this limitation of the interest grew, no doubt, + from the constraint inseparably attached to the law of epic unity. + Joanna's history bisects into two opposite hemispheres, and both could not + have been presented to the eye in one poem, unless by sacrificing all + unity of theme, or else by involving the earlier half, as a narrative + episode, in the latter; which, however, might have been done, for it might + have been communicated to a fellow-prisoner, or a confessor, by Joanna + herself. It is sufficient, as concerns <i>this</i> section of Joanna's + life, to say that she fulfilled, to the height of her promises, the + restoration of the prostrate throne. France had become a province of + England, and for the ruin of both, if such a yoke could be maintained. + Dreadful pecuniary exhaustion caused the English energy to droop; and that + critical opening La Pucelle used with a corresponding felicity of audacity + and suddenness (that were in themselves portentous) for introducing the + wedge of French native resources, for rekindling the national pride, and + for planting the dauphin once more upon his feet. When Joanna appeared, he + had been on the point of giving up the struggle with the English, + distressed as they were, and of flying to the south of France. She taught + him to blush for such abject counsels. She liberated Orleans, that great + city, so decisive by its fate for the issue of the war, and then + beleaguered by the English with an elaborate application of engineering + skill unprecedented in Europe. Entering the city after sunset on the 29th + of April, she sang mass on Sunday, May 8th, for the entire disappearance + of the besieging force. On the 29th of June she fought and gained over the + English the decisive battle of Patay; on the 9th of July she took Troyes + by a <i>coup-de-main</i> from a mixed garrison of English and Burgundians; + on the 15th of that month she carried the dauphin into Rheims; on Sunday + the 17th she crowned him; and there she rested from her labour of triumph. + All that was to be <i>done</i> she had now accomplished; what remained was—to + <i>suffer</i>. + </p> + <p> + All this forward movement was her own; excepting one man, the whole + council was against her. Her enemies were all that drew power from earth. + Her supporters were her own strong enthusiasm, and the headlong contagion + by which she carried this sublime frenzy into the hearts of women, of + soldiers, and of all who lived by labour. Henceforward she was thwarted; + and the worst error that she committed was to lend the sanction of her + presence to counsels which she had ceased to approve. But she had now + accomplished the capital objects which her own visions had dictated. These + involved all the rest. Errors were now less important; and doubtless it + had now become more difficult for herself to pronounce authentically what + <i>were</i> errors. The noble girl had achieved, as by a rapture of + motion, the capital end of clearing out a free space around her sovereign, + giving him the power to move his arms with effect, and, secondly, the + inappreciable end of winning for that sovereign what seemed to all France + the heavenly ratification of his rights, by crowning him with the ancient + solemnities. She had made it impossible for the English now to step before + her. They were caught in an irretrievable blunder, owing partly to discord + among the uncles of Henry VI, partly to a want of funds, but partly to the + very impossibility which they believed to press with tenfold force upon + any French attempt to forestall theirs. They laughed at such a thought; + and, while they laughed, <i>she</i> did it. Henceforth the single redress + for the English of this capital oversight, but which never <i>could</i> + have redressed it effectually, was to vitiate and taint the coronation of + Charles VII as the work of a witch. That policy, and not malice (as M. + Michelet is so happy to believe), was the moving principle in the + subsequent prosecution of Joanna. Unless they unhinged the force of the + first coronation in the popular mind by associating it with power given + from hell, they felt that the sceptre of the invader was broken. + </p> + <p> + But she, the child that, at nineteen, had wrought wonders so great for + France, was she not elated? Did she not lose, as men so often <i>have</i> + lost, all sobriety of mind when standing upon the pinnacle of success so + giddy? Let her enemies declare. During the progress of her movement, and + in the centre of ferocious struggles, she had manifested the temper of her + feelings by the pity which she had everywhere expressed for the suffering + enemy. She forwarded to the English leaders a touching invitation to unite + with the French, as brothers, in a common crusade against infidels—thus + opening the road for a soldierly retreat. She interposed to protect the + captive or the wounded; she mourned over the excesses of her countrymen; + she threw herself off her horse to kneel by the dying English soldier, and + to comfort him with such ministrations, physical or spiritual, as his + situation allowed. "Nolebat," says the evidence, "uti ense suo, aut + quemquam interficere." She sheltered the English that invoked her aid in + her own quarters. She wept as she beheld, stretched on the field of + battle, so many brave enemies that had died without confession. And, as + regarded herself, her elation expressed itself thus: on the day when she + had finished her work, she wept; for she knew that, when her <i>triumphal</i> + task was done, her end must be approaching. Her aspirations pointed only + to a place which seemed to her more than usually full of natural piety, as + one in which it would give her pleasure to die. And she uttered, between + smiles and tears, as a wish that inexpressibly fascinated her heart, and + yet was half fantastic, a broken prayer that God would return her to the + solitudes from which he had drawn her, and suffer her to become a + shepherdess once more. It was a natural prayer, because nature has laid a + necessity upon every human heart to seek for rest and to shrink from + torment. Yet, again, it was a half-fantastic prayer, because, from + childhood upward, visions that she had no power to mistrust, and the + voices which sounded in her ear for ever, had long since persuaded her + mind that for <i>her</i> no such prayer could be granted. Too well she + felt that her mission must be worked out to the end, and that the end was + now at hand. All went wrong from this time. She herself had created the <i>funds</i> + out of which the French restoration should grow; but she was not suffered + to witness their development or their prosperous application. More than + one military plan was entered upon which she did not approve. But she + still continued to expose her person as before. Severe wounds had not + taught her caution. And at length, in a sortie from Compiègne (whether + through treacherous collusion on the part of her own friends is doubtful + to this day), she was made prisoner by the Burgundians, and finally + surrendered to the English. + </p> + <p> + Now came her trial. This trial, moving of course under English influence, + was conducted in chief by the Bishop of Beauvais. He was a Frenchman, sold + to English interests, and hoping, by favour of the English leaders, to + reach the highest preferment. "Bishop that art, Archbishop that shalt be, + Cardinal that mayest be," were the words that sounded continually in his + ear; and doubtless a whisper of visions still higher, of a triple crown, + and feet upon the necks of kings, sometimes stole into his heart. M. + Michelet is anxious to keep us in mind that this bishop was but an agent + of the English. True. But it does not better the case for his countryman + that, being an accomplice in the crime, making himself the leader in the + persecution against the helpless girl, he was willing to be all this in + the spirit, and with the conscious vileness of a cat's-paw. Never from the + foundations of the earth was there such a trial as this, if it were laid + open in all its beauty of defence and all its hellishness of attack. Oh, + child of France! shepherdess, peasant girl! trodden under foot by all + around thee, how I honour thy flashing intellect, quick as God's + lightning, and true as God's lightning to its mark, that ran before France + and laggard Europe by many a century, confounding the malice of the + ensnarer, and making dumb the oracles of falsehood! Is it not scandalous, + is it not humiliating to civilization, that, even at this day, France + exhibits the horrid spectacle of judges examining the prisoner against + himself; seducing him, by fraud, into treacherous conclusions against his + own head; using the terrors of their power for extorting confessions from + the frailty of hope; nay (which is worse), using the blandishments of + condescension and snaky kindness for thawing into compliances of gratitude + those whom they had failed to freeze into terror? Wicked judges! barbarian + jurisprudence!—that, sitting in your own conceit on the summits of + social wisdom, have yet failed to learn the first principles of criminal + justice—sit ye humbly and with docility at the feet of this girl + from Domrémy, that tore your webs of cruelty into shreds and dust. "Would + you examine me as a witness against myself?" was the question by which + many times she defied their arts. Continually she showed that their + interrogations were irrelevant to any business before the court, or that + entered into the ridiculous charges against her. General questions were + proposed to her on points of casuistical divinity; two-edged questions, + which not one of themselves could have answered, without, on the one side, + landing himself in heresy (as then interpreted), or, on the other, in some + presumptuous expression of self-esteem. Next came a wretched Dominican, + that pressed her with an objection, which, if applied to the Bible, would + tax every one of its miracles with unsoundness. The monk had the excuse of + never having read the Bible. M. Michelet has no such excuse; and it makes + one blush for him, as a philosopher, to find him describing such an + argument as "weighty," whereas it is but a varied expression of rude + Mahometan metaphysics. Her answer to this, if there were room to place the + whole in a clear light, was as shattering as it was rapid. Another thought + to entrap her by asking what language the angelic visitors of her solitude + had talked—as though heavenly counsels could want polyglot + interpreters for every word, or that God needed language at all in + whispering thoughts to a human heart. Then came a worse devil, who asked + her whether the Archangel Michael had appeared naked. Not comprehending + the vile insinuation, Joanna, whose poverty suggested to her simplicity + that it might be the <i>costliness</i> of suitable robes which caused the + demur, asked them if they fancied God, who clothed the flowers of the + valleys, unable to find raiment for his servants. The answer of Joanna + moves a smile of tenderness, but the disappointment of her judges makes + one laugh exultingly. Others succeeded by troops, who upbraided her with + leaving her father; as if that greater Father, whom she believed herself + to have been serving, did not retain the power of dispensing with his own + rules, or had not said that for a less cause than martyrdom man and woman + should leave both father and mother. + </p> + <p> + On Easter Sunday, when the trial had been long proceeding, the poor girl + fell so ill as to cause a belief that she had been poisoned. It was not + poison. Nobody had any interest in hastening a death so certain. M. + Michelet, whose sympathies with all feelings are so quick that one would + gladly see them always as justly directed, reads the case most truly. + Joanna had a twofold malady. She was visited by a paroxysm of the + complaint called <i>homesickness</i>. The cruel nature of her + imprisonment, and its length, could not but point her solitary thoughts, + in darkness and in chains (for chained she was), to Domrémy. And the + season, which was the most heavenly period of the spring, added stings to + this yearning. That was one of her maladies—<i>nostalgia</i>, as + medicine calls it; the other was weariness and exhaustion from daily + combats with malice. She saw that everybody hated her and thirsted for her + blood; nay, many kind-hearted creatures that would have pitied her + profoundly, as regarded all political charges, had their natural feelings + warped by the belief that she had dealings with fiendish powers. She knew + she was to die; that was <i>not</i> the misery! the misery was that this + consummation could not be reached without so much intermediate strife, as + if she were contending for some chance (where chance was none) of + happiness, or were dreaming for a moment of escaping the inevitable. Why, + then, <i>did</i> she contend? Knowing that she would reap nothing from + answering her persecutors, why did she not retire by silence from the + superfluous contest? It was because her quick and eager loyalty to truth + would not suffer her to see it darkened by frauds which <i>she</i> could + expose, but others, even of candid listeners, perhaps, could not; it was + through that imperishable grandeur of soul which taught her to submit + meekly and without a struggle to her punishment, but taught her <i>not</i> + to submit—no, not for a moment—to calumny as to facts, or to + misconstruction as to motives. Besides, there were secretaries all around + the court taking down her words. That was meant for no good to <i>her</i>. + But the end does not always correspond to the meaning. And Joanna might + say to herself, "These words that will be used against me to-morrow and + the next day, perhaps, in some nobler generation, may rise again for my + justification." Yes, Joanna, they <i>are</i> rising even now in Paris, and + for more than justification! + </p> + <p> + Woman, sister, there are some things which you do not execute as well as + your brother, man; no, nor ever will. Pardon me if I doubt whether you + will ever produce a great poet from your choirs, or a Mozart, or a + Phidias, or a Michael Angelo, or a great philosopher, or a great scholar. + By which last is meant—not one who depends simply on an infinite + memory, but also on an infinite and electrical power of combination; + bringing together from the four winds, like the angel of the resurrection, + what else were dust from dead men's bones, into the unity of breathing + life. If you <i>can</i> create yourselves into any of these great + creators, why have you not? + </p> + <p> + Yet, sister woman, though I cannot consent to find a Mozart or a Michael + Angelo in your sex, cheerfully, and with the love that burns in depths of + admiration, I acknowledge that you can do one thing as well as the best of + us men—a greater thing than even Milton is known to have done, or + Michael Angelo; you can die grandly, and as goddesses would die, were + goddesses mortal. If any distant worlds (which <i>may</i> be the case) are + so far ahead of us Tellurians in optical resources as to see distinctly + through their telescopes all that we do on earth, what is the grandest + sight to which we ever treat them? St. Peter's at Rome, do you fancy, on + Easter Sunday, or Luxor, or perhaps the Himalayas? Oh, no! my friend; + suggest something better; these are baubles to <i>them</i>; they see in + other worlds, in their own, far better toys of the same kind. These, take + my word for it, are nothing. Do you give it up? The finest thing, then, we + have to show them is a scaffold on the morning of execution. I assure you + there is a strong muster in those far telescopic worlds, on any such + morning, of those who happen to find themselves occupying the right + hemisphere for a peep at <i>us</i>. How, then, if it be announced in some + such telescopic world by those who make a livelihood of catching glimpses + at our newspapers, whose language they have long since deciphered, that + the poor victim in the morning's sacrifice is a woman? How, if it be + published in that distant world that the sufferer wears upon her head, in + the eyes of many, the garlands of martyrdom? How, if it should be some + Marie Antoinette, the widowed queen, coming forward on the scaffold, and + presenting to the morning air her head, turned gray by sorrow—daughter + of Caesars kneeling down humbly to kiss the guillotine, as one that + worships death? How, if it were the noble Charlotte Corday, that in the + bloom of youth, that with the loveliest of persons, that with homage + waiting upon her smiles wherever she turned her face to scatter them—homage + that followed those smiles as surely as the carols of birds, after showers + in spring, follow the reappearing sun and the racing of sunbeams over the + hills—yet thought all these things cheaper than the dust upon her + sandals, in comparison of deliverance from hell for her dear suffering + France! Ah! these were spectacles indeed for those sympathising people in + distant worlds; and some, perhaps, would suffer a sort of martyrdom + themselves, because they could not testify their wrath, could not bear + witness to the strength of love and to the fury of hatred that burned + within them at such scenes, could not gather into golden urns some of that + glorious dust which rested in the catacombs of earth. + </p> + <p> + On the Wednesday after Trinity Sunday in 1431, being then about nineteen + years of age, the Maid of Arc underwent her martyrdom. She was conducted + before mid-day, guarded by eight hundred spearmen, to a platform of + prodigious height, constructed of wooden billets supported by occasional + walls of lath and plaster, and traversed by hollow spaces in every + direction for the creation of air currents. The pile "struck terror," says + M. Michelet, "by its height"; and, as usual, the English purpose in this + is viewed as one of pure malignity. But there are two ways of explaining + all that. It is probable that the purpose was merciful. On the + circumstances of the execution I shall not linger. Yet, to mark the almost + fatal felicity of M. Michelet in finding out whatever may injure the + English name, at a moment when every reader will be interested in Joanna's + personal appearance, it is really edifying to notice the ingenuity by + which he draws into light from a dark corner a very unjust account of it, + and neglects, though lying upon the highroad, a very pleasing one. Both + are from English pens. Grafton, a chronicler, but little read, being a + stiff-necked John Bull, thought fit to say that no wonder Joanna should be + a virgin, since her "foule face" was a satisfactory solution of that + particular merit. Holinshead, on the other hand, a chronicler somewhat + later, every way more important, and at one time universally read, has + given a very pleasing testimony to the interesting character of Joanna's + person and engaging manners. Neither of these men lived till the following + century, so that personally this evidence is none at all. Grafton sullenly + and carelessly believed as he wished to believe; Holinshead took pains to + inquire, and reports undoubtedly the general impression of France. But I + cite the case as illustrating M. Michelet's candour. [Footnote: Amongst + the many ebullitions of M. Michelet's fury against us poor English are + four which will be likely to amuse the reader; and they are the more + conspicuous in collision with the justice which he sometimes does us, and + the very indignant admiration which, under some aspects, he grants to us. + 1. Our English literature he admires with some gnashing of teeth. He + pronounces it "fine and sombre," but, I lament to add, "skeptical, Judaic, + Satanic—in a word, antichristian." That Lord Byron should figure as + a member of this diabolical corporation will not surprise men. It <i>will</i> + surprise them to hear that Milton is one of its Satanic leaders. Many are + the generous and eloquent Frenchmen, besides Chateaubriand, who have, in + the course of the last thirty years, nobly suspended their own burning + nationality, in order to render a more rapturous homage at the feet of + Milton; and some of them have raised Milton almost to a level with angelic + natures. Not one of them has thought of looking for him <i>below</i> the + earth. As to Shakspere, M. Michelet detects in him a most extraordinary + mare's nest. It is this: he does "not recollect to have seen the name of + God" in any part of his works. On reading such words, it is natural to rub + one's eyes, and suspect that all one has ever seen in this world may have + been a pure ocular delusion. In particular, I begin myself to suspect that + the word "<i>la gloire</i>" never occurs in any Parisian journal. "The + great English nation," says M. Michelet, "has one immense profound vice"—to + wit, "pride." Why, really, that may be true; but we have a neighbour not + absolutely clear of an "immense profound vice," as like ours in colour and + shape as cherry to cherry. In short, M. Michelet thinks us, by fits and + starts, admirable—only that we are detestable; and he would adore + some of our authors, were it not that so intensely he could have wished to + kick them. + </p> + <p> + 2. M. Michelet thinks to lodge an arrow in our sides by a very odd remark + upon Thomas à Kempis: which is, that a man of any conceivable European + blood—a Finlander, suppose, or a Zantiote—might have written + Tom; only not an Englishman. Whether an Englishman could have forged Tom + must remain a matter of doubt, unless the thing had been tried long ago. + That problem was intercepted for ever by Tom's perverseness in choosing to + manufacture himself. Yet, since nobody is better aware than M. Michelet + that this very point of Kempis <i>having</i> manufactured Kempis is + furiously and hopelessly litigated, three or four nations claiming to have + forged his work for him, the shocking old doubt will raise its snaky head + once more—whether this forger, who rests in so much darkness, might + not, after all, be of English blood. Tom, it may be feared, is known to + modern English literature chiefly by an irreverent mention of his name in + a line of Peter Pindar's (Dr Wolcot) fifty years back, where he is + described as + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Kempis Tom, + Who clearly shows the way to Kingdom Come" +</pre> + <p> + Few in these days can have read him, unless in the Methodist version of + John Wesley Among those few, however, happens to be myself, which arose + from the accident of having, when a boy of eleven, received a copy of the + "De Imitatione Christi" as a bequest from a relation who died very young, + from which cause, and from the external prettiness of the book—being + a Glasgow reprint by the celebrated Foulis, and gaily bound—I was + induced to look into it, and finally read it many times over, partly out + of some sympathy which, even in those days, I had with its simplicity and + devotional fervour, but much more from the savage delight I found in + laughing at Tom's Latinity that, I freely grant to M Michelet, is + inimitable. Yet, after all, it is not certain whether the original <i>was</i> + Latin. But, however that may have been, if it is possible that M Michelet + [Footnote: "<i>If M. Michelet can be accurate</i>"—However, on + consideration, this statement does not depend on Michelet. The + bibliographer Barbier has absolutely <i>specified</i> sixty in a separate + dissertation, <i>soixante traductions</i> among those even that have not + escaped the search. The Italian translations are said to be thirty. As to + mere editions, not counting the early MSS. for half a century before + printing was introduced, those in Latin amount to 2000, and those in + French to 1000. Meantime it is very clear to me that this astonishing + popularity so entirely unparalleled in literature, could not have existed + except in Roman Catholic times, nor subsequently have lingered in any + Protestant land. It was the denial of Scripture fountains to thirsty lands + which made this slender rill of Scripture truth so passionately welcome.] + can be accurate in saying that there are no less than sixty French + versions (not editions, observe, but separate versions) existing of the + "De Imitatione," how prodigious must have been the adaptation of the book + to the religious heart of the fifteenth century! Excepting the Bible, but + excepting <i>that</i> only in Protestant lands, no book known to man has + had the same distinction. It is the most marvellous bibliographical fact + on record. + </p> + <p> + 3. Our English girls, it seems, are as faulty in one way as we English + males in another. None of us men could have written the <i>Opera Omnia</i> + of Mr. à Kempis; neither could any of our girls have assumed male attire + like La Pucelle. But why? Because, says Michelet, English girls and German + think so much of an indecorum. Well, that is a good fault, generally + speaking. But M. Michelet ought to have remembered a fact in the + martyrologies which justifies both parties—the French heroine for + doing, and the general choir of English girls for <i>not</i> doing. A + female saint, specially renowned in France, had, for a reason as weighty + as Joanna's—viz., expressly to shield her modesty among men—worn + a male military harness. That reason and that example authorised La + Pucelle; but our English girls, as a body, have seldom any such reason, + and certainly no such saintly example, to plead. This excuses <i>them</i>. + Yet, still, if it is indispensable to the national character that our + young women should now and then trespass over the frontier of decorum, it + then becomes a patriotic duty in me to assure M. Michelet that we <i>have</i> + such ardent females among us, and in a long series; some detected in naval + hospitals when too sick to remember their disguise; some on fields of + battle; multitudes never detected at all; some only suspected; and others + discharged without noise by war offices and other absurd people. In our + navy, both royal and commercial, and generally from deep remembrances of + slighted love, women have sometimes served in disguise for many years, + taking contentedly their daily allowance of burgoo, biscuit, or + cannon-balls—anything, in short, digestible or indigestible, that it + might please Providence to send. One thing, at least, is to their credit: + never any of these poor masks, with their deep silent remembrances, have + been detected through murmuring, or what is nautically understood by + "skulking." So, for once, M. Michelet has an <i>erratum</i> to enter upon + the fly-leaf of his book in presentation copies. + </p> + <p> + 4. But the last of these ebullitions is the most lively. We English, at + Orleans, and after Orleans (which is not quite so extraordinary, if all + were told), fled before the Maid of Arc. Yes, says M. Michelet, you <i>did</i>: + deny it, if you can. Deny it, <i>mon cher</i>? I don't mean to deny it. + Running away, in many cases, is a thing so excellent that no philosopher + would, at times, condescend to adopt any other step. All of us nations in + Europe, without one exception, have shown our philosophy in that way at + times. Even people "<i>qui ne se rendent pas</i>" have deigned both to run + and to shout, "<i>Sauve qui peut</i>!" at odd times of sunset; though, for + my part, I have no pleasure in recalling unpleasant remembrances to brave + men; and yet, really, being so philosophic, they ought <i>not</i> to be + unpleasant. But the amusing feature in M. Michelet's reproach is the way + in which he <i>improves</i> and varies against us the charge of running, + as if he were singing a catch. Listen to him: They "<i>showed their backs</i>" + did these English. (Hip, hip, hurrah! three times three!) "<i>Behind good + walls they let themselves be taken</i>." (Hip, hip! nine times nine!) They + "<i>ran as fast as their legs could carry them</i>" (Hurrah! twenty-seven + times twenty-seven!) They "<i>ran before a girl</i>"; they did. (Hurrah! + eighty-one times eighty-one!) This reminds one of criminal indictments on + the old model in English courts, where (for fear the prisoner should + escape) the crown lawyer varied the charge perhaps through forty counts. + The law laid its guns so as to rake the accused at every possible angle. + While the indictment was reading, he seemed a monster of crime in his own + eyes; and yet, after all, the poor fellow had but committed one offence, + and not always <i>that</i>. N. B.—Not having the French original at + hand, I make my quotations from a friend's copy of Mr. Walter Kelly's + translation; which seems to me faithful, spirited, and idiomatically + English—liable, in fact, only to the single reproach of occasional + provincialisms.] + </p> + <p> + The circumstantial incidents of the execution, unless with more space than + I can now command, I should be unwilling to relate. I should fear to + injure, by imperfect report, a martyrdom which to myself appears so + unspeakably grand. Yet, for a purpose, pointing not at Joanna, but at M. + Michelet—viz, to convince him that an Englishman is capable of + thinking more highly of La Pucelle than even her admiring countrymen—I + shall, in parting, allude to one or two traits in Joanna's demeanour on + the scaffold, and to one or two in that of the bystanders, which authorise + me in questioning an opinion of his upon this martyr's firmness. The + reader ought to be reminded that Joanna D'Arc was subjected to an + unusually unfair trial of opinion. Any of the elder Christian martyrs had + not much to fear of <i>personal</i> rancour. The martyr was chiefly + regarded as the enemy of Cæsar; at times, also, where any knowledge of the + Christian faith and morals existed, with the enmity that arises + spontaneously in the worldly against the spiritual. But the martyr, though + disloyal, was not supposed to be therefore anti-national; and still less + was <i>individually</i> hateful. What was hated (if anything) belonged to + his class, not to himself separately. Now, Joanna, if hated at all, was + hated personally, and in Rouen on national grounds. Hence there would be a + certainty of calumny arising against <i>her</i> such as would not affect + martyrs in general. That being the case, it would follow of necessity that + some people would impute to her a willingness to recant. No innocence + could escape <i>that</i>. Now, had she really testified this willingness + on the scaffold, it would have argued nothing at all but the weakness of a + genial nature shrinking from the instant approach of torment. And those + will often pity that weakness most who, in their own persons, would yield + to it least. Meantime, there never was a calumny uttered that drew less + support from the recorded circumstances. It rests upon no <i>positive</i> + testimony, and it has a weight of contradicting testimony to stem. And + yet, strange to say, M, Michelet, who at times seems to admire the Maid of + Arc as much as I do, is the one sole writer among her <i>friends</i> who + lends some countenance to this odious slander. His words are that, if she + did not utter this word <i>recant</i> with her lips, she uttered it in her + heart. "Whether she <i>said</i> the word is uncertain; but I affirm that + she <i>thought</i> it." + </p> + <p> + Now, I affirm that she did not; not in any sense of the word "<i>thought</i>" + applicable to the case. Here is France calumniating La Pucelle; here is + England defending her. M. Michelet can only mean that, on <i>a priori</i> + principles, every woman must be presumed liable to such a weakness; that + Joanna was a woman; <i>ergo</i>, that she was liable to such a weakness. + That is, he only supposes her to have uttered the word by an argument + which presumes it impossible for anybody to have done otherwise. I, on the + contrary, throw the onus of the argument not on presumable tendencies of + nature, but on the known facts of that morning's execution, as recorded by + multitudes. What else, I demand, than mere weight of metal, absolute + nobility of deportment, broke the vast line of battle then arrayed against + her? What else but her meek, saintly demeanour won, from the enemies that + till now had believed her a witch, tears of rapturous admiration? "Ten + thousand men," says M. Michelet himself—"ten thousand men wept"; and + of these ten thousand the majority were political enemies knitted together + by cords of superstition. What else was it but her constancy, united with + her angelic gentleness, that drove the fanatic English soldier—who + had sworn to throw a fagot on her scaffold as <i>his</i> tribute of + abhorrence, that <i>did</i> so, that fulfilled his vow—suddenly to + turn away a penitent for life, saying everywhere that he had seen a dove + rising upon wings to heaven from the ashes where she had stood? What else + drove the executioner to kneel at every shrine for pardon to <i>his</i> + share in the tragedy? And, if all this were insufficient, then I cite the + closing act of her life as valid on her behalf, were all other testimonies + against her. The executioner had been directed to apply his torch from + below. He did so. The fiery smoke rose upward in billowing volumes. A + Dominican monk was then standing almost at her side. Wrapped up in his + sublime office, he saw not the danger, but still persisted in his prayers. + Even then, when the last enemy was racing up the fiery stairs to seize + her, even at that moment did this noblest of girls think only for <i>him</i>, + the one friend that would not forsake her, and not for herself; bidding + him with her last breath to care for his own preservation, but to leave <i>her</i> + to God. That girl, whose latest breath ascended in this sublime expression + of self-oblivion, did not utter the word <i>recant</i> either with her + lips or in her heart. No; she did not, though one should rise from the + dead to swear it. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Bishop of Beauvais! thy victim died in fire upon a scaffold—thou + upon a down bed. But, for the departing minutes of life, both are + oftentimes alike. At the farewell crisis, when the gates of death are + opening, and flesh is resting from its struggles, oftentimes the tortured + and the torturer have the same truce from carnal torment; both sink + together into sleep; together both sometimes kindle into dreams. When the + mortal mists were gathering fast upon you two, bishop and shepherd girl—when + the pavilions of life were closing up their shadowy curtains about you—let + us try, through the gigantic glooms, to decipher the flying features of + your separate visions. + </p> + <p> + The shepherd girl that had delivered France—she, from her dungeon, + she, from her baiting at the stake, she, from her duel with fire, as she + entered her last dream—saw Domrémy, saw the fountain of Domrémy, saw + the pomp of forests in which her childhood had wandered. That Easter + festival which man had denied to her languishing heart—that + resurrection of springtime, which the darkness of dungeons had intercepted + from <i>her</i>, hungering after the glorious liberty of forests—were + by God given back into her hands as jewels that had been stolen from her + by robbers. With those, perhaps (for the minutes of dreams can stretch + into ages), was given back to her by God the bliss of childhood. By + special privilege for <i>her</i> might be created, in this farewell dream, + a second childhood, innocent as the first; but not, like <i>that</i>, sad + with the gloom of a fearful mission in the rear. This mission had now been + fulfilled. The storm was weathered; the skirts even of that mighty storm + were drawing off. The blood that she was to reckon for had been exacted; + the tears that she was to shed in secret had been paid to the last. The + hatred to herself in all eyes had been faced steadily, had been suffered, + had been survived. And in her last fight upon the scaffold she had + triumphed gloriously; victoriously she had tasted the stings of death. For + all, except this comfort from her farewell dream, she had died—died + amid the tears of ten thousand enemies—died amid the drums and + trumpets of armies—died amid peals redoubling upon peals, volleys + upon volleys, from the saluting clarions of martyrs. + </p> + <p> + Bishop of Beauvais! because the guilt-burdened man is in dreams haunted + and waylaid by the most frightful of his crimes, and because upon that + fluctuating mirror—rising (like the mocking mirrors of <i>mirage</i> + in Arabian deserts) from the fens of death-most of all are reflected the + sweet countenances which the man has laid in ruins; therefore I know, + bishop, that you also, entering your final dream, saw Domrémy. That + fountain, of which the witnesses spoke so much, showed itself to your eyes + in pure morning dews; but neither dews, nor the holy dawn, could cleanse + away the bright spots of innocent blood upon its surface. By the fountain, + bishop, you saw a woman seated, that hid her face. But, as <i>you</i> draw + near, the woman raises her wasted features. Would Domrémy know them again + for the features of her child? Ah, but <i>you</i> know them, bishop, well! + Oh, mercy! what a groan was <i>that</i> which the servants, waiting + outside the bishop's dream at his bedside, heard from his labouring heart, + as at this moment he turned away from the fountain and the woman, seeking + rest in the forests afar off. Yet not <i>so</i> to escape the woman, whom + once again he must behold before he dies. In the forests to which he prays + for pity, will he find a respite? What a tumult, what a gathering of feet + is there! In glades where only wild deer should run armies and nations are + assembling; towering in the fluctuating crowd are phantoms that belong to + departed hours. There is the great English Prince, Regent of France. There + is my Lord of Winchester, the princely cardinal, that died and made no + sign. There is the bishop of Beauvais, clinging to the shelter of + thickets. What building is that which hands so rapid are raising? Is it a + martyr's scaffold? Will they burn the child of Domrémy a second time? No; + it is a tribunal that rises to the clouds; and two nations stand around + it, waiting for a trial. Shall my Lord of Beauvais sit again upon the + judgment-seat, and again number the hours for the innocent? Ah, no! he is + the prisoner at the bar. Already all is waiting: the mighty audience is + gathered, the Court is hurrying to their seats, the witnesses are arrayed, + the trumpets are sounding, the judge is taking his place. Oh, but this is + sudden! My lord, have you no counsel? "Counsel I have none; in heaven + above, or on earth beneath, counsellor there is none now that would take a + brief from <i>me</i>: all are silent." Is it, indeed, come to this? Alas! + the time is short, the tumult is wondrous, the crowd stretches away into + infinity; but yet I will search in it for somebody to take your brief; I + know of somebody that will be your counsel. Who is this that cometh from + Domrémy? Who is she in bloody coronation robes from Rheims? Who is she + that cometh with blackened flesh from walking the furnaces of Rouen? This + is she, the shepherd girl, counsellor that had none for herself, whom I + choose, bishop, for yours. She it is, I engage, that shall take my lord's + brief. She it is, bishop, that would plead for you; yes, bishop, <i>she</i>—when + heaven and earth are silent. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_NOTE" id="link2H_NOTE"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + NOTES + </h2> + <h3> + THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH + </h3> + <p> + "In October 1849 there appeared in <i>Blackwood's Magazine</i> an article + entitled <i>The English Mail-Coach, or the Glory of Motion</i>. There was + no intimation that it was to be continued; but in December 1849 there + followed in the same magazine an article in two sections, headed by a + paragraph explaining that it was by the author of the previous article in + the October number, and was to be taken in connexion with that article. + One of the sections of this second article was entitled <i>The Vision of + Sudden Death</i>, and the other <i>Dream-Fugue on the above theme of + Sudden Death</i>. When De Quincey revised the papers in 1854 for + republication in volume iv of the Collective Edition of his writings, he + brought the whole under the one general title of <i>The English Mail-Coach</i>, + dividing the text, as at present, into three sections or chapters, the + first with the sub-title <i>The Glory of Motion</i>, the second with the + sub-title <i>The Vision of Sudden Death</i>, and the third with the + sub-title <i>Dream-Fugue, founded on the preceding theme of Sudden Death</i>. + Great care was bestowed on the revision. Passages that had appeared in the + magazine articles were omitted; new sentences were inserted; and the + language was retouched throughout."—MASSON. Cf. as to the revision, + Professor Dowden's article, "How De Quincey worked," <i>Saturday Review</i>, + Feb. 23, 1895. This selection is found in <i>Works</i>, Masson's ed., Vol. + XIII, pp. 270-327; Riverside ed., Vol. I, pp. 517-582. + </p> + <p> + 1 6 HE HAD MARRIED THE DAUGHTER OF A DUKE: "Mr. John Palmer, a native of + Bath, and from about 1768 the energetic proprietor of the Theatre Royal in + that city, had been led, by the wretched state in those days of the means + of intercommunication between Bath and London, wand his own consequent + difficulties in arranging for a punctual succession of good actors at his + theatre, to turn his attention to the improvement of the whole system of + Post-Office conveyance, and of locomotive machinery generally, in the + British Islands. The result was a scheme for superseding, on the great + roads at least, the then existing system of sluggish and irregular + stage-coaches, the property of private persons and companies, by a new + system of government coaches, in connexion with the Post-Office, carrying + the mails and also a regulated number of passengers, with clockwork + precision, at a rate of comparative speed, which he hoped should + ultimately be not less than ten miles an hour. The opposition to the + scheme was, of course, enormous; coach proprietors, innkeepers, the + Post-Office officials themselves, were all against Mr. Palmer; he was + voted a crazy enthusiast and a public bore. Pitt, however, when the scheme + was submitted to him, recognized its feasibility; on the 8th of August + 1784 the first mail-coach on Mr. Palmer's plan started from London at 8 + o'clock in the morning and reached Bristol at 11 o'clock at night; and + from that day the success of the new system was assured.—Mr. Palmer + himself, having been appointed Surveyor and Comptroller-General of the + Post-Office, took rank as an eminent and wealthy public man, M. P. for + Bath and what not, and lived till 1818. De Quincey makes it one of his + distinctions that he "had married the daughter of a duke," and in a + footnote to that paragraph he gives the lady's name as "Lady Madeline + Gordon." From an old Debrett, however, I learn that Lady Madelina Gordon, + second daughter of Alexander, fourth Duke of Gordon, was first married, on + the 3d of April 1789, to Sir Robert Sinclair, Bart., and next, on the 25th + of November 1805, to <i>Charles Palmer, of Lockley Park, Berks, Esq.</i> + If Debrett is right, her second husband was not John Palmer of Mail-Coach + celebrity, and De Quincey is wrong."—MASSON. + </p> + <p> + 1 (footnote) INVENTION OF THE CROSS: Concerning the <i>Inventio sanctae + crucis</i>, see Smith, <i>Dictionary of Christian Antiquities</i>, Vol. I, + p. 503. + </p> + <p> + 2 4 NATIONAL RESULT: Cf. De Quincey's paper on <i>Travelling, Works,</i> + Riverside ed., Vol. II, especially pp. 313-314; Masson's ed., Vol. I, + especially pp. 270-271. + </p> + <p> + 3 13 THE FOUR TERMS OF MICHAELMAS, LENT, EASTER, AND ACT: These might be + called respectively the autumn, winter, spring, and summer terms. + Michaelmas, the feast of St. Michael and All Angels, is on September 29. + Hilary and Trinity are other names for Lent term and Act term + respectively. Act term is the last term of the academic year; its name is + that originally given to a disputation for a Master's degree; such + disputations took place at the end of the year generally, and hence gave a + name to the summer term. Although the rules concerning residence at Oxford + are more stringent than in De Quincey's time, only eighteen weeks' + residence is required during the year, six in Michaelmas, six in Lent, and + six in Easter and Act. + </p> + <p> + 3 17 GOING DOWN: Cf. "Going down with victory," i.e. from London into the + country. + </p> + <p> + 3 30 POSTING-HOUSES: inns where relays of horses were furnished for + coaches and carriages. Cf. De Quincey on <i>Travelling, loc. cit.</i> + </p> + <p> + 4 3 AN OLD TRADITION... from the reign of Charles II: Then no one sat + outside; later, outside places were taken by servants, and were quite + cheap. + </p> + <p> + 4 9 ATTAINT THE FOOT: The word is used in its legal sense. The blood of + one convicted of high treason is "attaint," and his deprivations extend to + his descendants, unless Parliament remove the attainder. + </p> + <p> + 4 14 PARIAHS: The fate of social outcasts seems to have taken early and + strong hold upon De Quincey's mind; one of the <i>Suspiria</i> was to have + enlarged upon this theme. Strictly speaking, the Pariahs is that one of + the lower castes of Hindoo society of which foreigners have seen most; it + is not in all districts the lowest caste, however. + </p> + <p> + 5 6 OBJECTS NOT APPEARING, ETC.: <i>De non apparentibus et non + existentibus eadem est lex</i>, a Roman legal phrase. + </p> + <p> + 5 16 "SNOBS": Apparently snob originally meant "shoemaker"; then, in + university cant, a "townsman" as opposed to a "gownsman." Cf. <i>Gradus ad + Cantabrigiam</i> (1824), quoted in <i>Century Dictionary</i>: "<i>Snobs</i>.—A + term applied indiscriminately to all who have not the honour of being + members of the university; but in a more particular manner to the + 'profanum vulgus,' the tag-rag and bob-tail, who vegetate on the sedgy + banks of Camus." This use is in De Quincey's mind. Later, in the strikes + of that time, the workmen who accepted lower wages were called <i>snobs</i>; + those who held out for higher, <i>nobs</i>. + </p> + <p> + 7 33 FO FO... FI FI: "This paragraph is a caricature of a story told in + Staunton's Account of the Earl of Macartney's Embassy to China in 1792."—MASSON. + </p> + <p> + 8 4 ÇA IRA ("This will do," "This is the go"): "a proverb of the French + Revolutionists when they were hanging the aristocrats in the streets, + &c., and the burden of one of the most popular revolutionary songs, + 'Ça ira, ça ira, ça ira.'"—MASSON. + </p> + <p> + 8 18 ALL MORALITY,—ARISTOTLE'S, ZENO'S, CICERO'S: Each of these + three has a high place in the history of ethical teaching. Aristotle wrote + the so-called <i>Nicomachean Ethics</i>. According to his teaching, + "ethical virtue is that permanent direction of the will which guards the + mean [<i>to méson</i>] proper for us... Bravery is the mean between + cowardice and temerity; temperance, the mean between inordinate desire and + stupid indifference; etc." (Ueberweg, <i>History of Philosophy</i>, Vol. + I, p. 169). Zeno, who died about 264 B.C., founded about 308 the Stoic + sect, which took its name from the "Painted Porch" (<i>Stoa poklae</i>) in + the Agora at Athens, where the master taught. The Stoics held that men + should be free from passion, and undisturbed by joy or grief, submitting + themselves uncomplainingly to their fate. Such austere views are, of + course, as far as possible removed from those of the Eudæmonist, who + sought happiness as the end of life. Cicero was the author of De Officiis, + "Of Duties." + </p> + <p> + 9 9 ASTROLOGICAL SHADOWS: misfortunes due to being born under an unlucky + star; house of life is also an astrological term. + </p> + <p> + 9 24 VON TROIL'S ICELAND: The Letters on Iceland (Pinkerton's Voyages and + Travels, Vol. I, p. 621), containing Observations ... made during a Voyage + undertaken in the year 1772, by Uno Von Troil, D.D., of Stockholm, + contains no chapter of the kind. Such a chapter had appeared, however, in + N. Horrebow's (Danish, 1758) Natural History of Iceland: "Chap. LXXII. + Concerning snakes. No snakes of any kind are to be met with throughout the + whole island." In Boswell's Johnson, Vol. IV, p. 314, Temple ed., there is + a much more correct allusion, which may have been in De Quincey's mind: + "Langton said very well to me afterwards, that he could repeat Johnson's + conversation before dinner, as Johnson had said that he could repeat a + complete chapter of The Natural History of Iceland, from the Danish of + Horrebow, the whole of which was exactly thus: 'Chap. LXXII. Concerning + Snakes. There are no snakes to be met with throughout the whole island.'" + </p> + <p> + 9 25 A PARLIAMENTARY RAT: one who deserts his own party when it is losing. + </p> + <p> + 10 16 "JAM PROXIMUS," etc.: Æneid, II, lines 311-312: "Now next (to + Deiphobus' house) Ucalegon (i.e. his house) blazes!" + </p> + <p> + 11 27 QUARTERINGS: See p. 47, footnote, and note 47 2. + </p> + <p> + 11 32 WITHIN BENEFIT OF CLERGY: Benefit of clergy was, under old English + law, the right of clerics, afterward extended to all who could read, to + plead exemption from trial before a secular judge. This privilege was + first legally recognized in 1274, and was not wholly abolished until 1827. + </p> + <p> + 12 9 QUARTER SESSIONS: This court is held in England in the counties by + justices of the peace for the trial of minor criminal offenses and to + administer the poor laws, etc. + </p> + <p> + 12 26 FALSE ECHOES OF MARENGO: General Desaix was shot through the heart + at the battle of Marengo (June 14, 1800); he died without a word, and his + body was found by Rovigo (cf. Memoirs of the Duke of Rovigo, London, 1835, + Vol. I, p. 181), "stripped of his clothes, and surrounded by other naked + bodies." Napoleon, however, published three different versions of an + heroic and devoted message from Desaix to himself, the original version + being: "Go, tell the First Consul that I die with this regret,—that + I have not done enough for posterity." (Cf. Lanfrey, History of Napoleon + the First, 2d ed., London, 1886, Vol. II, p. 39.) Napoleon himself was + credited likewise with the words De Quincey adopts. "Why is it not + permitted me to weep" is one version (Bussey, <i>History of Napoleon</i>, + London, 1840, Vol. I, p. 302). Cf. Hazlitt, <i>Life of Napoleon</i>, 2d + ed., London, 1852, Vol. II, p. 317, footnote. + </p> + <p> + 12 (footnote) THE CRY OF THE FOUNDERING LINE-OF-BATTLE SHIP "VENGEUR": On + the 1st of June, 1794, the English fleet under Lord Howe defeated the + French under Villaret-Joyeuse, taking six ships and sinking a seventh, the + <i>Vengeur</i>. This ship sank, as a matter of fact, with part of her crew + on board, imploring kid which there was not time to give them. Some two + hundred and fifty men had been taken off by the English; the rest were + lost. On the 9th of July Barrere published a report setting forth "how the + <i>Vengeur</i>, ... being entirely disabled, ... refused to strike, though + sinking; how the enemies fired on her, but she returned their fire, shot + aloft all her tricolor streamers, shouted <i>Vive la République</i>, ... + and so, in this mad whirlwind of fire and shouting and invincible despair, + went down into the ocean depths; <i>Vive la République</i> and a universal + volley from the upper deck being the last sounds she made." Cf. Carlyle, + <i>Sinking of the Vengeur</i>, and <i>French Revolution, Book</i> XVIII, + Chap. VI. + </p> + <p> + 12 (footnote) LA GARDE MEURT, ETC.: "This phrase, attributed to Cambronne, + who was made prisoner at Waterloo, was vehemently denied by him. It was + invented by Rougemont, a prolific author of <i>mots</i>, two days after + the battle, in the <i>Indépendant</i>."—Fournier's <i>L'Esprit dans + l'Histoire</i>, trans. Bartlett, <i>Familiar Quotations</i>, p. 661. + </p> + <p> + 13 25 BRUMMAGEM: Birmingham became early the chief place of manufacture of + cheap wares. Hence the name <i>Brummagem</i>, a vulgar pronunciation of + the name of the city, has become in England a common name for cheap, + tawdry jewelry. Cf. also Shakespeare, Richard III, Act I, sc. iv, 1. 55: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + False, fleeting, perjured Clarence. +</pre> + <p> + 13 27 LUXOR occupies part of the site of ancient Thebes, capital of Egypt; + its antiquities are famous. + </p> + <p> + 14 9 BUT ON OUR SIDE... WAS A TOWER OF MORAL STRENGTH, ETC.: Cf. + Shakespeare, <i>Richard</i> III, Act V, sc. in, 11. 12-13: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Besides, the king's name is a tower of strength, + Which they upon the adverse party want. +</pre> + <p> + 14 20 FELT MY HEART BURN WITHIN ME: Cf. Luke xxiv. 32. + </p> + <p> + 14 32 A VERY FINE STORY FROM ONE OF OUR ELDER DRAMATISTS: The dramatist in + question has not been identified. I am indebted indirectly to Professor W. + Strunk, Jr., of Cornell University, for reference to Johann Caius' Of + English Dogs, translated by A. Fleming, in Arber's English Garner, + original edition, Vol. III, p. 253 (new edition, Social England + Illustrated, pp. 28-29), where, after telling how Henry the Seventh, + perceiving that four mastiffs could overcome a lion, ordered the dogs all + hanged, the writer continues: "I read an history answerable to this, of + the selfsame HENRY, who having a notable and an excellent fair falcon, it + fortuned that the King's Falconers, in the presence and hearing of his + Grace, highly commended his Majesty's Falcon, saying, that it feared not + to intermeddle with an eagle, it was so venturous and so mighty a bird; + which when the king heard, he charged that the falcon should be killed + without delay: for the selfsame reason, as it may seem, which was + rehearsed in the conclusion of the former history concerning the same + king." + </p> + <p> + 15 l OMRAHS... FROM AGRA AND LAHORE: There seems to be a reminiscence here + of Wordsworth's Prelude, Book X, 11. 18-20: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + The Great Mogul, when he + Erewhile went forth from Agra or Lahore, + Rajahs and Omrahs in his train. +</pre> + <p> + Omrah, which is not found in Century Dictionary, is itself really plural + of Arabic amir (ameer), a commander, nobleman. + </p> + <p> + 15 23 THE 6TH OF EDWARD LONGSHANKS: a De Quinceyan jest, of course. This + wrould refer to a law of the sixth year of Edward I, or 1278, but there + are but fifteen chapters in the laws of that year. + </p> + <p> + 16 8 NOT MAGNA LOQUIMUR,... BUT VIVIMUS: not "we speak great things," but + "we live" them. + </p> + <p> + 17 21 MARLBOROUGH FOREST is twenty-seven miles east of Bath, where De + Quincey attended school. + </p> + <p> + 18 18 ULYSSES, ETC.: The allusion is, of course, to the slaughter of the + suitors of Penelope, his wife, by Ulysses, after his return. Cf. Odyssey, + Books XXI-XXII. + </p> + <p> + 19 3 ABOUT WATERLOO: i.e. about 1815. This phrase is one of many that + indicate the deep impression made by this event upon the English mind. Cf. + p. 58. + </p> + <p> + 19 17 "SAY, ALL OUR PRAISES," ETC.: Cf. Pope, Moral Essays: Epistle III, + Of the Use of Riches, II. 249-250: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + But all our praises why should lords engross, + Rise, honest Muse! and sing the Man of Ross. +</pre> + <p> + 20 3 TURRETS: "Tourettes fyled rounde" appears in Chaucer's Knight's Tale, + 1. 1294, where it means the ring on a dog's collar through which the leash + was passed. Skeat explains <i>torets</i> as "probably eyes in which rings + will turn round, because each eye is a little larger than the thickness of + the ring." Cf. Chaucer's <i>Treatise on the Astrolabe</i>, Part I, sec. 2, + "This ring renneth in a maner turet," "this ring runs in a kind of eye." + But Chaucer does not refer to harness. + </p> + <p> + 21 2 MR. WATERTON TELLS ME: Charles Waterton, the naturalist, was born in + 1782 and died in 1865. His <i>Wanderings in South America</i> was + published in 1825. + </p> + <p> + 23 11 EARTH AND HER CHILDREN: This paragraph is about one fifth of the + length of the corresponding paragraph as it appeared in <i>Blackwood</i>. + For the longer version see Masson's ed., Vol. XIII, p. 289, note 2. + </p> + <p> + 24 14 THE GENERAL POST-OFFICE: The present office was opened Sept. 23, + 1829. St. Martin's-le-Grand is a church within the "city" of London, so + named to distinguish it from St. Martin's-in-the-Fields, which faces what + is now Trafalgar Square, and is, as the name indicates, outside the + "city." The street takes its name from the church. + </p> + <p> + 28 10 BARNET is a Hertfordshire village, eleven miles north of London. + </p> + <p> + 29 33 A "COURIER" EVENING PAPER, CONTAINING THE GAZETTE: A gazette was + originally one of the three official papers of the kingdom; afterwards any + official announcement, as this of a great victory. + </p> + <p> + 30 17 FEY: This is not a Celtic word; it is the Anglo-Saxon <i>faege</i> + retained in Lowland Scotch, which is the most northerly English dialect. + The word appears frequently in descriptions of battles, the Anglo-Saxon + fatalistic philosophy teaching that, certain warriors entered the conflict + <i>faege</i>, "doomed." Now the meaning is altered slightly: "You are + surely fey," would be said in Scotland, as Professor Masson remarks, to a + person observed to be in extravagantly high spirits, or in any mood + surprisingly beyond the bounds of his ordinary temperament,—the + notion being that the excitement is supernatural, and a presage of his + approaching death, or of some other calamity about to befall him. + </p> + <p> + 31 27 THE INSPIRATION OF GOD, ETC.: This is an indication—more + interesting than agreeable, perhaps—of the heights to which the + martial ardor of De Quincey's toryism rises. + </p> + <p> + 33 13 CÆSAR THE DICTATOR, AT HIS LAST DINNER-PARTY, ETC.: related by + Suetonius in his life of Julius Cæsar, Chap. LXXXVII: "The day before he + died, some discourse occurring at dinner in M. Lepidus' house upon that + subject, which was the most agreeable way of dying, he expressed his + preference for what is sudden and unexpected" (repentinum inopinatumque + praetulerat). The story is told by Plutarch and Appian also. + </p> + <p> + 35 13 <i>BIATHANATOS</i>: "De Quincey has evidently taken this from John + Donne's treatise: <i>BIATHANATOS, A Declaration of that Paradoxe or + Thesis, That Self-homicide is not so naturally Sin, that it may never be + otherwise</i>, 1644. See his paper on <i>Suicide, etc.</i>, Masson's ed., + VIII, 398 [Riverside, IX, 209]. But not even Donne's precedent justifies + the word formation. The only acknowledged compounds are <i>biaio-thanasia</i>, + 'violent death,' and <i>biaio-thanatos</i>, 'dying a violent death.' Even + <i>bia thanatos</i>, 'death by violence,' is not classical."—HART. + But the form <i>biathanatos</i> is older than Donne and is said to be + common in MSS. It should be further remarked that neither of the two + compounds cited is classical. As to De Quincey's interpretation of Cæsar's + meaning here, cf. Merivale's <i>History of the Romans under the Empire</i>, + Chap. XXI, where he translates Cæsar's famous reply: "That which is least + expected." Cf. also Shakespeare, <i>Julius Cæsar</i>, Act II, sc. ii, 1. + 33. + </p> + <p> + 37 25 "NATURE, FROM HER SEAT," ETC.: Cf. Milton's <i>Paradise Lost</i>, + Book IX, 11. 780-784: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + So saying, her rash hand in evil hour + Forth reaching to the fruit, she pluck'd, she eat: + Earth felt the wound, and Nature from her seat + Sighing through all her works gave signs of woe, + That all was lost. +</pre> + <p> + 38 2 SO SCENICAL, ETC.: De Quincey's love for effects of this sort appears + everywhere. Cf. the opening paragraphs of the <i>Revolt of the Tartars</i>, + Masson's ed., Vol. VII; Riverside ed., Vol. XII. + </p> + <p> + 39 4 JUS DOMINII: "the law of ownership," a legal term. + </p> + <p> + 39 14 JUS GENTIUM: "the law of nations," a legal term. + </p> + <p> + 39 30 "MONSTRUM HORRENDUM," ETC..: <i>Æneid</i>, III, 658. Polyphemus, one + of the Cyclopes, whose eye was put out by Ulysses, is meant. Cf. <i>Odyssey</i>, + IX, 371 et seq.; <i>Æneid</i>, III, 630 <i>et seq</i>. + </p> + <p> + 40 1 ONE OF THE CALENDARS, ETC.: The histories of the three Calenders, + sons of kings, will be found in most selections from the <i>Arabian Nights</i>. + A Calender is one of an order of Dervishes founded in the fourteenth + century by an Andalusian Arab; they are wanderers who preach in market + places and live by alms. + </p> + <p> + 40 10 AL SIRAT: According to Mahometan teaching this bridge over Hades was + in width as a sword's edge. Over it souls must pass to Paradise. + </p> + <p> + 40 12 UNDER THIS EMINENT MAN, ETC.: For these two sentences the original + in <i>Blackwood</i> had this, with its addition of good De Quinceyan + doctrine: "I used to call him <i>Cyclops Mastigophorus</i>, Cyclops the + Whip-bearer, until I observed that his skill made whips useless, except to + fetch off an impertinent fly from a leader's head, upon which I changed + his Grecian name to <i>Cyclops Diphrelates</i> (Cyclops the Charioteer). + I, and others known to me, studied under him the diphrelatic art. Excuse, + reader, a word too elegant to be pedantic. And also take this remark from + me as a <i>gage d'amitié</i>—that no word ever was or <i>can</i> be + pedantic which, by supporting a distinction, supports the accuracy of + logic, or which fills up a chasm for the understanding." + </p> + <p> + 41 1 SOME PEOPLE HAVE CALLED ME PROCRASTINATING: Cf. Page's (Japp's) <i>Life</i>, + Chap. XIX, and Japp's <i>De Quincey Memorials</i>, Vol. II, pp. 45,47,49- + 42 11 THE WHOLE PAGAN PANTHEON: i.e. all the gods put together; from the + Greek <i>Pantheion</i>, a temple dedicated to all the gods. + </p> + <p> + 43 2 SEVEN ATMOSPHERES OF SLEEP, ETC.: Professor Hart suggests that De + Quincey is here "indulging in jocular arithmetic. The three nights plus + the three days, plus the present night, equal seven." Dr. Cooper compares + with this a reference to the Seven Sleepers of Ephesus. But it seems + doubtful whether any explanation is necessary. + </p> + <p> + 43 17 LILLIPUTIAN LANCASTER: the county town of Lancashire, in which + Liverpool and Manchester, towns of recent and far greater growth, are + situated. + </p> + <p> + 44 (footnote) "Giraldus Cambrensis," or Gerald de Barry (1146-1220), was a + Welsh historian; one of his chief works is the <i>Itinerarium Cambrica</i>, + or Voyage in Wales. + </p> + <p> + 47 2 QUARTERING: De Quincey's derivation of this word in his footnote is + correct, but its use in this French sense is not common. De Quincey, + however, has it above, p. 11. + </p> + <p> + 49 8 THE SHOUT OF ACHILLES: Cf. Homer, <i>Iliad</i>, XVIII, 217 <i>et seq</i>. + </p> + <p> + 50 10 BUYING IT, ETC.: De Quincey refers, no doubt, to the pay of common + soldiers and to the practice of employing mercenaries. + </p> + <p> + 52 1 FASTER THAN EVER MILL-RACE, ETC.: the change in the wording of this + sentence in De Quincey's revision is, as Masson remarks, particularly + characteristic of his sense of melody; it read in <i>Blackwood</i>, "We + ran past them faster than ever mill-race in our inexorable flight." + </p> + <p> + 52 15 HERE WAS THE MAP, ETC.: This sentence is an addition in the reprint. + Masson remarks "how artistically it causes the due pause between the + horror as still in rush of transaction and the backward look at the wreck + when the crash was past." + </p> + <p> + 53 18 "WHENCE THE SOUND," ETC.: <i>Paradise Lost</i>, Book XI, 11. + 558-563. + </p> + <p> + 54 3 WOMAN'S IONIC FORM: In thus using the word Ionic, De Quincey + doubtless has in mind the character of Ionic architecture, with its tall + and graceful column, differing from the severity of the Doric on the one + hand and from the floridity of the Corinthian on the other. Probably he is + thinking of a caryatid. Cf. the following version of the old story of the + origin of the styles of Greek architecture in Vitruvius, IV, Chap. I + (Gwilt's translation), quoted by Hart: "They measured a man's foot, and + finding its length the sixth part of his height, they gave the column a + similar proportion, that is, they made its height six times the thickness + of the shaft measured at the base. Thus the Doric order obtained its + proportion, its strength, and its beauty from the human figure. With a + similar feeling they afterward built the Temple of Diana. But in that, + seeking a new proportion, they used the female figure as a standard; and + for the purpose of producing a more lofty effect they first made it eight + times its thickness in height. Under it they placed a base, after the + manner of a shoe to the foot; they also added volutes to its capital, like + graceful curling hair hanging on each side, and the front they ornamented + with <i>cymatia</i> and festoons in the place of hair. On the shafts they + sunk channels, which bear a resemblance to the folds of a matronal + garment. Thus two orders were invented, one of a masculine character, + without ornament, the other bearing a character which resembled the + delicacy, ornament, and proportion of a female. The successors of these + people, improving in taste, and preferring a more slender proportion, + assigned seven diameters to the height of the Doric column, and eight and + a half to the Ionic." + </p> + <p> + 55 3 CORYMBI: clusters of fruit or flowers. + </p> + <p> + 55 28 QUARREL: the bolt of a crossbow, an arrow having a square, or + four-edged head (from Middle Latin <i>quadrellus</i>, diminutive of <i>quadrum</i>, + a square). + </p> + <p> + 58 20 WATERLOO AND RECOVERED CHRISTENDOM! Cf. note 19 3. + </p> + <p> + 61 20 THEN A THIRD TIME THE TRUMPET SOUNDED: There are throughout this + passage, as Dr. Cooper remarks, many reminiscences of the language of the + Book of Revelation. Cf. this with Revelation viii. 10; cf. 61 28 with + Revelation xii. 5, and 62 5 with ix. 13. + </p> + <p> + 63 29 THE ENDLESS RESURRECTIONS OF HIS LOVE: The following, which Masson + prints as a postscript, was a part of De Quincey's introduction to the + volume of the Collective Edition containing this piece: + </p> + <p> + "'THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH.'—This little paper, according to my + original intention, formed part of the 'Suspiria de Profundis'; from + which, for a momentary purpose, I did not scruple to detach it, and to + publish it apart, as sufficiently intelligible even when dislocated from + its place in a larger whole. To my surprise, however, one or two critics, + not carelessly in conversation, but deliberately in print, professed their + inability to apprehend the meaning of the whole, or to follow the links of + the connexion between its several parts. I am myself as little able to + understand where the difficulty lies, or to detect any lurking obscurity, + as these critics found themselves to unravel my logic. Possibly I may not + be an indifferent and neutral judge in such a case. I will therefore + sketch a brief abstract of the little paper according to my original + design, and then leave the reader to judge how far this design is kept in + sight through the actual execution. + </p> + <p> + "Thirty-seven years ago, or rather more, accident made me, in the dead of + night, and of a night memorably solemn, the solitary witness of an + appalling scene, which threatened instant death in a shape the most + terrific to two young people whom I had no means of assisting, except in + so far as I was able to give them a most hurried warning of their danger; + but even <i>that</i> not until they stood within the very shadow of the + catastrophe, being divided from the most frightful of deaths by scarcely + more, if more at all, than seventy seconds. + </p> + <p> + "Such was the scene, such in its outline, from which the whole of this + paper radiates as a natural expansion. This scene is circumstantially + narrated in Section the Second, entitled 'The Vision of Sudden Death.' + </p> + <p> + "But a movement of horror, and of spontaneous recoil from this dreadful + scene, naturally carried the whole of that scene, raised and idealised, + into my dreams, and very soon into a rolling succession of dreams. The + actual scene, as looked down upon from the box of the mail, was + transformed into a dream, as tumultuous and changing as a musical fugue. + This troubled dream is circumstantially reported in Section the Third, + entitled 'Dream-Fugue on the theme of Sudden Death.' What I had beheld + from my seat upon the mail,—the scenical strife of action and + passion, of anguish and fear, as I had there witnessed them moving in + ghostly silence,—this duel between life and death narrowing itself + to a point of such exquisite evanescence as the collision neared; all + these elements of the scene blended, under the law of association, with + the previous and permanent features of distinction investing the mail + itself; which features at that time lay—1st, in velocity + unprecedented, 2dly, in the power and beauty of the horses, 3dly, in the + official connexion with the government of a great nation, and, 4thly, in + the function, almost a consecrated function, of publishing and diffusing + through the land the great political events, and especially the great + battles, during a conflict of unparalleled grandeur. These honorary + distinctions are all described circumstantially in the First or + introductory Section ('The Glory of Motion'). The three first were + distinctions maintained at all times; but the fourth and grandest belonged + exclusively to the war with Napoleon; and this it was which most naturally + introduced Waterloo into the dream. Waterloo, I understand, was the + particular feature of the 'Dream-Fugue' which my censors were least able + to account for. Yet surely Waterloo, which, in common with every other + great battle, it had been our special privilege to publish over all the + land, most naturally entered the dream under the licence of our privilege. + If not—if there be anything amiss—let the Dream be + responsible. The Dream is a law to itself; and as well quarrel with a + rainbow for showing, or for <i>not</i> showing, a secondary arch. So far + as I know, every element in the shifting movements of the Dream derived + itself either primarily from the incidents of the actual scene, or from + secondary features associated with the mail. For example, the cathedral + aisle derived itself from the mimic combination of features which grouped + themselves together at the point of approaching collision—viz. an + arrow-like section of the road, six hundred yards long, under the solemn + lights described, with lofty trees meeting overhead in arches. The guard's + horn, again—a humble instrument in itself—was yet glorified as + the organ of publication for so many great national events. And the + incident of the Dying Trumpeter, who rises from a marble bas-relief, and + carries a marble trumpet to his marble lips for the purpose of warning the + female infant, was doubtless secretly suggested by my own imperfect effort + to seize the guard's horn, and to blow the warning blast. But the Dream + knows best; and the Dream, I say again, is the responsible party." + </p> + <h3> + JOAN OF ARC + </h3> + <p> + This article appeared originally in <i>Taifs Magazine</i> for March and + August, 1847; it was reprinted by De Quincey in 1854 in the third volume + of his <i>Collected Writings</i>. It is found in <i>Works</i>, Masson's + ed., Vol. V, pp. 384-416; Riverside ed., Vol. VI, pp. 178-215. + </p> + <p> + 64 10 LORRAINE, now in great part in the possession of Germany, is the + district in which Domrémy, Joan's birthplace, is situated. + </p> + <p> + 65 14 VAUCOULEURS: a town near Domrémy; cf. p. 70. + </p> + <p> + 65 28 EN CONTUMACE: "in contumacy," a legal term applied to one who, when + summoned to court, fails to appear. + </p> + <p> + 66 13 ROUEN: the city in Normandy where Joan was burned at the stake. + </p> + <p> + 66 25 THE LILIES OF FRANCE: the royal emblem of France from very early + times until the Revolution of 1789, when "the wrath of God and man + combined to wither them." + </p> + <p> + 67 5 M. MICHELET: Jules Michelet (1798-1874) is said to have spent forty + years in the preparation of his great work, the <i>History of France</i>. + Cf. the same, translated by G. H. Smith, 2 vols., Appleton, Vol. II, pp. + 119-169; or <i>Joan of Arc</i>, from Michelet's <i>History of France</i>, + translated by O. W. Wight, New York, 1858. + </p> + <p> + 67 8 RECOVERED LIBERTY: The Revolution of 1830 had expelled the restored + Bourbon kings. + </p> + <p> + 67 20 THE BOOK AGAINST PRIESTS: Michelet's lectures as professor of + history in the Collège de France, in which he attacked the Jesuits, were + published as follows: <i>Des Jésuites</i>, 1843; <i>Du Prêtre, de la Femme + et de la Famille</i>, 1844; <i>Du Peuple</i>, 1845. To the second De + Quincey apparently refers. + </p> + <p> + 67 26 BACK TO THE FALCONER'S LURE: The lure was a decoy used to recall the + hawk to its perch,—sometimes a dead pigeon, sometimes an artificial + bird, with some meat attached. + </p> + <p> + 68 6 ON THE MODEL OF LORD PERCY: These lines, as Professor Hart notes, in + Percy's Folio, ed. Hales and Furnivall, Vol. II, p. 7, run: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + The stout Erle of Northumberland + a vow to God did make, + his pleasure in the Scottish woods + 3 som<i>m</i>ers days to take. +</pre> + <p> + 68 27 PUCELLE D'ORLÉANS: Maid of Orleans (the city on the Loire which Joan + saved). + </p> + <p> + 69 1 THE COLLECTION, ETC.: The work meant is Quicherat, <i>Procès de + Condamnation et Réhabilitation de Jeanne d'Arc</i>, 5 vols., Paris, + 1841-1849. Cf. De Quincey's note. + </p> + <p> + 69 21 DELENDA EST ANGLIA VICTRIX! "Victorious England must be destroyed!" + Cf. <i>Delenda est Carthago</i>! "Carthage must be destroyed!" <i>Delenda + est Karthago</i> is the version of Florus (II, 15) of the words used by + Cato the Censor, just before the Third Punic War, whenever he was called + upon to record his vote in the Senate on any subject under discussion. + </p> + <p> + 69 27 HYDER ALI (1702-1782), a Mahometan adventurer, made himself + maharajah of Mysore and gave the English in India serious trouble; he was + defeated in 1782 by Sir Eyre Coote. Tippoo Sahib, his son and successor, + proved less dangerous and was finally killed at Seringapatam in 1799. + </p> + <p> + 70 4 NATIONALITY IT WAS NOT: i.e. nationalism—patriotism—it + was not. Cf. <i>Revolt of the Tartars</i>, Riverside ed., Vol. XII, p. 4; + Masson's ed., Vol. VII, p. 370, where De Quincey speaks of the Torgod as + "tribes whose native ferocity was exasperated by debasing forms of + superstition, and by a nationality as well as an inflated conceit of their + own merit absolutely unparalleled." Cf. also footnote, p. 94. + </p> + <p> + 70 4 SUFFREN: the great French admiral who in 1780-1781 inflicted so much + loss upon the British. + </p> + <p> + 70 10 MAGNANIMOUS JUSTICE OF ENGLISHMEN: As Professor Hart observes, the + treatment of Joan in <i>Henry VI</i> is hardly magnanimous. + </p> + <p> + 71 29 THAT ODIOUS MAN: Cf. pp. 79-80. + </p> + <p> + 72 12 THREE GREAT SUCCESSIVE BATTLES: Rudolf of Lorraine fell at Crécy + (1346); Frederick of Lorraine at Agincourt (1415); the battle of + Nicopolis, which sacrificed the third Lorrainer, took place in 1396. + </p> + <p> + 73 24 CHARLES VI (1368-1422) had killed several men during his first fit + of insanity. He was for the rest of his life wholly unfit to govern. He + declared Henry V of England, the conqueror of Agincourt, his successor, + thus disinheriting the Dauphin, his son. + </p> + <p> + 74 2 THE FAMINES, ETC.: Horrible famines occurred in France and England in + 1315, 1336, and 1353. Such insurrections as Wat Tyler's, in 1381, are + probably in De Quincey's mind. + </p> + <p> + 74 6 THE TERMINATION OF THE CRUSADES: The Crusades came to an end about + 1271. "The ulterior results of the crusades," concludes Cox in <i>Encyclopedia + Britannica</i>, "were the breaking up of the feudal system, the abolition + of serfdom, the supremacy of a common law over the independent + jurisdiction of chiefs who claimed the right of private wars." + </p> + <p> + 74 7 THE DESTRUCTION OF THE TEMPLARS: This most famous of the military + orders, founded in the twelfth century for the defense of the Latin + kingdom of Jerusalem, having grown so powerful as to be greatly feared, + was suppressed at the beginning of the fourteenth century. + </p> + <p> + 74 7 THE PAPAL INTERDICTS: "De Quincey has probably in mind such an + interdict as that pronounced in 1200, by Innocent III, against France. All + ecclesiastical functions were suspended and the land was in desolation."—HART. + England was put under interdict several times, as in 1170 (for the murder + of Becket) and 1208. + </p> + <p> + 74 8 THE TRAGEDIES CAUSED OR SUFFERED BY THE HOUSE OF ANJOU, AND BY THE + EMPEROR: "The Emperor is Konradin, the last of the Hohenstaufen, beheaded + by Charles of Anjou at Naples, 1268. The subsequent cruelties of Charles + in Sicily caused the popular uprising known as the Sicilian Vespers, 1282, + in which many thousands of Frenchmen were assassinated."—HART. + </p> + <p> + 74 10 THE COLOSSAL FIGURE OF FEUDALISM, ETC.: The English yeomen at Crecy, + overpowering the mounted knights of France, took from feudalism its chief + support,—the superiority of the mounted knight to the unmounted + yeoman. Cf. Green, <i>History of the English People</i>, Book IV, Chap. + II. + </p> + <p> + 74 15 THE ABOMINABLE SPECTACLE OF A DOUBLE POPE: For thirty-eight years + this paradoxical state of things endured. + </p> + <p> + 75 15 THE ROMAN MARTYROLOGY: a list of the martyrs of the Church, arranged + according to the order of their festivals, and with accounts of their + lives and sufferings. + </p> + <p> + 76 4 "ABBEYS THERE WERE," ETC.: Cf. Wordsworth, <i>Peter Bell</i>, Part + Second: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Temples like those among the Hindoos, + And mosques, and spires, and abbey windows, + And castles all with ivy green. +</pre> + <p> + 76 17 THE VOSGES ... HAVE NEVER ATTRACTED MUCH NOTICE, ETC.: They came + into like prominence after De Quincey's day in the Franco-Prussian War of + 1870. + </p> + <p> + 76 31 THOSE MYSTERIOUS FAWNS, ETC.: In some of the romances of the Middle + Ages, especially those containing Celtic material, a knight, while + hunting, is led by his pursuit of a white fawn (or a white stag or boar) + to a <i>fee</i> (i.e. an inhabitant of the "Happy Other-world") or into + the confines of the "Happy Other-world" itself. Sometimes, as in the <i>Guigemar</i> + of Marie de France, the knight passes on to a series of adventures in + consequence of his meeting with the white fawn. I owe this note to the + kindness of Mr. S. W. Kinney, A.M., of Baltimore. + </p> + <p> + 76 33 THAT ANCIENT STAG: See <i>Englische Studien,</i> Vol. V, p. 16, + where additions are made to the following account from Hardwicke's <i>Traditions, + Superstitions, and Folk-Lore,</i> Manchester and London, 1872, p. 154: + </p> + <p> + This chasing of the white doe or the white hart by the spectre huntsman + has assumed various forms. According to Aristotle a white hart was killed + by Agathocles, King of Sicily, which a thousand years beforehand had been + consecrated to Diana by Diomedes. Alexander the Great is said by Pliny to + have caught a white stag, placed a collar of gold about its neck, and + afterwards set it free. Succeeding heroes have in after days been + announced as the capturers of this famous white hart. Julius Caesar took + the place of Alexander, and Charlemagne caught a white hart at both + Magdeburg, and in the Holstein woods. In 1172 William [Henry] the Lion is + reported to have accomplished a similar feat, according to a Latin + inscription on the walls of Lubeck Cathedral. Tradition says the white + hart has been caught on Rothwell Hay Common, in Yorkshire, and in Windsor + Forest. + </p> + <p> + This reference I owe indirectly to Professor J. M. Manly, of Chicago. + </p> + <p> + 77 4 OR, BEING UPON THE MARCHES OF FRANCE, A MARQUIS: <i>Marquis</i> is + derived from <i>march,</i> and was originally the title of the guardian of + the frontier, or march. + </p> + <p> + 77 13 AGREED WITH SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY THAT A GOOD DEAL MIGHT BE SAID ON + BOTH SIDES: This expression, as has been pointed out to me, is from the + middle of <i>Spectator</i> No. 122, where Sir Roger, having been appealed + to on a question of fishing privileges, replied, "with an air of a man who + would not give his judgment rashly, that much might be said on both + sides." It is likely, however, that De Quincey may have connected it in + his mind with the discussion of witchcraft at the beginning of <i>Spectator</i> + No. 117, where Addison balances the grounds for belief and unbelief + somewhat as De Quincey does here. + </p> + <p> + 78 7 BERGERETA: a very late Latin form of French <i>bergerette,</i> "a + shepherdess." + </p> + <p> + 78 15 M. SIMOND, IN HIS "TRAVELS": The reference is to <i>Journal of a + Tour and Residence in Great Britain during the years 1810 and 1811,</i> by + Louis Simond, 2d ed. (Edinburgh, 1817), to which is added an appendix on + France, written in December, 1815, and October, 1816. De Quincey refers to + this story with horror several times, but such scenes are not yet wholly + unknown. + </p> + <p> + 79 21 A CHEVALIER OF ST. LOUIS: The French order of St. Louis was founded + by Louis XIV in 1693 for military service. After its discontinuance at the + Revolution this order was reinstated in 1814; but no knights have been + created since 1830. "Chevalier" is the lowest rank in such an order; it is + here erroneously used by De Quincey as a title of address. + </p> + <p> + 79 22 "CHEVALIER, AS-TU DONNÉ," etc.: "Chevalier, have you fed the hog?" + "MA FILLE," ETC.: "My daughter, have you," etc. "PUCELLE," ETC.: "Maid of + Orleans, have you saved the lilies (i.e. France)?" + </p> + <p> + 79 28 IF THE MAN THAT TURNIPS CRIES: Cf. <i>Johnsoniana</i>, ed. R. + Napier, London, 1884, where, in <i>Anecdotes of Johnson</i>, by Mrs. + Piozzi, p. 29, is found: "'T is a mere play of words (added he)"—Johnson + is speaking of certain "verses by Lopez de Vega"—"and you might as + well say, that + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "If the man who turnips cries, + Cry not when his father dies, + 'T is a proof that he had rather + Have a turnip than his father." +</pre> + <p> + This reference is given in Bartlett's <i>Familiar Quotations</i>. + </p> + <p> + 80 4 THE ORIFLAMME OF FRANCE: the red banner of St. Denis, preserved in + the abbey of that name, near Paris, and borne before the French king as a + consecrated flag. + </p> + <p> + 80 22 TWENTY YEARS AFTER, TALKING WITH SOUTHEY: In 1816 De Quincey was a + resident of Grasmere; Southey lived for many years at Keswick, a few miles + away; they met first in 1807. For De Quincey's estimate of Southey's <i>Joan + of Arc</i>, see <i>Works</i>, Riverside ed., Vol. VI, pp. 262-266; + Masson's ed., Vol. V, pp. 238-242. + </p> + <p> + 80 28 CHINON is a little town near Tours. + </p> + <p> + 81 3 SHE "PRICKS" FOR SHERIFFS: The old custom was to prick with a pin the + names of those chosen by the sovereign for sheriffs. + </p> + <p> + 82 9 AMPULLA: the flask containing the sacred oil used at coronations. + </p> + <p> + 82 10 THE ENGLISH BOY: Henry VI was nine months old when he was proclaimed + king of England and France in 1422, Charles VI of France, and Henry V, his + legal heir, having both died in that year. Henry's mother was the eldest + daughter of Charles VI. + </p> + <p> + 82 13 DRAWN FROM THE OVENS OF RHEIMS: Rheims, where the kings of France + were crowned, was famous for its biscuits and gingerbread. + </p> + <p> + 82 26 TINDAL'S "CHRISTIANITY AS OLD AS THE CREATION": Matthew Tindal + (1657-1732) published this work in 1732; its greatest interest lies in the + fact that to this book more than to any other Butler's <i>Analogy</i> was + a reply. Tindal's argument was that natural religion, as taught by the + deists, was complete; that no revelation was necessary. A life according + to nature is all that the best religion can teach. Such doctrine as this + Joan preached in the speech ascribed to her. + </p> + <p> + 82 27 A PARTE ANTE: "from the part gone before"; Joan's speech being three + centuries earlier than the book from which it was taken. + </p> + <p> + 83 9 THAT DIVINE PASSAGE IN "PARADISE REGAINED": from Book I, II. 196-205. + </p> + <p> + 84 34 PATAY IS NEAR ORLEANS: Troyes was the capital of the old province of + Champagne. + </p> + <p> + 86 25 "NOLEBAT," ETC.: "She would not use her sword or kill any one." + </p> + <p> + 87 24 MADE PRISONER BY THE BURGUNDIANS: The English have accused the + French officers of conniving at Joan's capture through jealousy of her + successes. Compiègne is fifty miles northeast of Paris. + </p> + <p> + 87 27 BISHOP OF BEAUVAIS: Beauvais is forty-three miles northwest of + Paris, in Normandy. This bishop, Pierre Cauchon, rector of the University + at Paris, was devoted to the English party. + </p> + <p> + 87 30 "BISHOP THAT ART," ETC.: Cf. Shakespeare's <i>Macbeth</i>, Act I, + sc. v, 1. 13. + </p> + <p> + 87 33 A TRIPLE CROWN: The papacy is meant, of course. The pope's tiara is + a tall cap of golden cloth, encircled by three coronets. + </p> + <p> + 88 17 JUDGES EXAMINING THE PRISONER: The judge in France questions a + prisoner minutely when he is first taken, before he is remanded for trial. + De Quincey displays here his inveterate prejudice against the French; but + this practice is widely regarded as the vital error of French criminal + procedure., + </p> + <p> + 89 5 A WRETCHED DOMINICAN: a member of the order of mendicant friars + established in France by Domingo de Guzman in 1216. Their official name + was Fratres Predicatores, "Preaching Friars," and their chief objects were + preaching and instruction. Their influence was very great until the rise + of the Jesuit order in the sixteenth century. The Dominicans Le Maitre and + Graverent (the Grand Inquisitor) both took part in the prosecution. + </p> + <p> + 89 31 FOR A LESS CAUSE THAN MARTYRDOM: Cf. Genesis ii. 24. + </p> + <p> + 91 14 FROM THE FOUR WINDS: There may be a reminiscence here of Ezekiel + xxxvii. 1-10, especially verse 9: "Come from the four winds, O breath, and + breathe upon these slain, that they may live." + </p> + <p> + 91 30 LUXOR. See note 13 27. + </p> + <p> + 92 15 DAUGHTER OF CÆSARS: She was the daughter of the German emperor, + Francis I, whose sovereignty, as the name "Holy Roman Empire" shows, was + supposed to continue that of the ancient Roman emperors. + </p> + <p> + 92 17 CHARLOTTE CORDAY (1768-93) murdered the revolutionist Marat in the + belief that the good of France required it; two days later she paid the + penalty, as she had expected, with her life. + </p> + <p> + 93 18 GRAFTON, A CHRONICLER: Richard Grafton died about 1572. He was + printer to Edward VI. His chronicle was published in 1569. + </p> + <p> + 93 20 "FOULE FACE": <i>Foule</i> formerly meant "ugly." + </p> + <p> + 9321 HOLINSHEAD: Raphael Holinshed died about 1580. His great work, <i>Chronicles + of England, Scotland, and Ireland</i>, was used by Shakespeare as the + source of several plays. He writes of Joan: "Of favor [appearance] was she + counted likesome; of person stronglie made, and manlie; of courage, great, + hardie, and stout withall." + </p> + <p> + 94 (footnote) SATANIC: This epithet was applied to the work of some of his + contemporaries by Southey in the preface to his <i>Vision of Judgement</i>, + 1821. It has been generally assumed that Byron and Shelley are meant. See + Introduction to Byron's <i>Vision of Judgment</i> in the new Murray + edition of Byron, Vol. IV. + </p> + <p> + 96 (footnote) BURGOO: a thick oatmeal gruel or porridge used by seamen. + According to the <i>New English Dictionary</i> the derivation is unknown; + but in the <i>Athenaeum</i>, Oct. 6, 1888, quoted by Hart, the word is + explained as a corruption of Arabic <i>burghul</i>. + </p> + <p> + 101 30 ENGLISH PRINCE, REGENT OF FRANCE: John, Duke of Bedford, uncle of + Henry VI. "In genius for war as in political capacity," says J. R. Green, + "John was hardly inferior to Henry [the Fifth, his brother] himself" (<i>A + History of the English People</i>, Book IV, Chap. VI). + </p> + <p> + 101 31 MY LORD OF WINCHESTER: Henry Beaufort, Bishop of Winchester, + half-brother of Henry IV. He was the most prominent English prelate of his + time and was the only Englishman in the Court that condemned Joan. As to + the story of his death, to which De Quincey alludes, see Shakespeare, 2 + Henry VI, Act III, sc. in. Beaufort became cardinal in 1426. + </p> + <p> + 102 17 WHO IS THIS THAT COMETH FROM DOMRÉMY? This is an evident imitation + of the famous passage from Isaiah Ixiii. I: "Who is this that cometh from + Edom, with dyed garments from Bozrah?" "Bloody coronation robes" is rather + obscure, but probably refers to the fact that Joan had shed her own blood + to bring about the coronation of her sovereign; she is supposed to have + appeared in armor at the actual coronation ceremony, and this armor might + with reason be imagined as "bloody." + </p> + <p> + 102 22 SHE ... SHALL TAKE MY LORD'S BRIEF: that is, she shall act as the + bishop's counsel. In the case of Beauvais, as in that of Winchester, it + must be remembered that in all monarchical countries the bishops are + "lords spiritual," on an equality with the greater secular nobles, the + "lords temporal." + </p> + <div style="height: 6em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc, by +Thomas de Quincey + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ENGLISH MAIL-COACH *** + +***** This file should be named 6359-h.htm or 6359-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/6/3/5/6359/ + + +Text file produced by Anne Soulard, Charles Franks and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + +HTML file produced by David Widger + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc + +Author: Thomas de Quincey + +Commentator: Milton Haight Turk + +Editor: Milton Haight Turk + + +Release Date: August, 2004 [EBook #6359] +This file was first posted on December 1, 2002 +Last Updated: June 14, 2013 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ENGLISH MAIL-COACH *** + + + + +Produced by Anne Soulard, Charles Franks and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + + + + + + + + +THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH + +AND + +JOAN OF ARC + +By Thomas De Quincey + +Edited With Introduction And Notes By Milton Haight Turk, Ph.D. + + + + +TO CHARLES DEACON CREE + +THIS LITTLE VOLUME IS AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED + +_Glencairn, Kilmacolm, Scotland June 27, 1905_ + + + + +PREFACE + + +Some portions of this Introduction have been taken from the Athenaeum +Press _Selections from De Quincey_; many of the notes have also been +transferred from that volume. A number of the new notes I owe to a +review of the _Selections_ by Dr. Lane Cooper, of Cornell University. +I wish also to thank for many favors the Committee and officers of the +Glasgow University Library. + +If a word by way of suggestion to teachers be pertinent, I would venture +to remark that the object of the teacher of literature is, of course, +only to fulfill the desire of the author--to make clear his facts and +to bring home his ideas in all their power and beauty. Introductions +and notes are only means to this end. Teachers, I think, sometimes lose +sight of this fact; I know it is fatally easy for students to forget it. +That teacher will have rendered a great service who has kept his pupils +alive to the real aim of their studies,--to know the author, not to know +of him. + +M.H.T + + + + +CONTENTS + + +INTRODUCTION I. LIFE II. CRITICAL REMARKS III. BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE + +SELECTIONS THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH + JOAN OF ARC + +NOTES + + + + +INTRODUCTION + +I. LIFE + + +Thomas de Quincey was born in Manchester on the 15th of August, 1785. +His father was a man of high character and great taste for literature as +well as a successful man of business; he died, most unfortunately, when +Thomas was quite young. Very soon after our author's birth the family +removed to The Farm, and later to Greenhay, a larger country place near +Manchester. In 1796 De Quincey's mother, now for some years a widow, +removed to Bath and placed him in the grammar school there. + +Thomas, the future opium-eater, was a weak and sickly child. His first +years were spent in solitude, and when his elder brother, William, a +real boy, came home, the young author followed in humility mingled with +terror the diversions of that ingenious and pugnacious "son of eternal +racket." De Quincey's mother was a woman of strong character and +emotions, as well as excellent mind, but she was excessively formal, and +she seems to have inspired more awe than affection in her children, +to whom she was for all that deeply devoted. Her notions of conduct in +general and of child rearing in particular were very strict. She took +Thomas out of Bath School, after three years' excellent work there, +because he was too much praised, and kept him for a year at an inferior +school at Winkfield in Wiltshire. + +In 1800, at the age of fifteen, De Quincey was ready for Oxford; he had +not been praised without reason, for his scholarship was far in advance +of that of ordinary pupils of his years. "That boy," his master at Bath +School had said, "that boy could harangue an Athenian mob better than +you or I could address an English one." He was sent to Manchester +Grammar School, however, in order that after three years' stay he +might secure a scholarship at Brasenose College, Oxford. He remained +there--strongly protesting against a situation which deprived him "of +_health_, of _society_, of _amusement_, of _liberty_, of _congeniality +of pursuits_"--for nineteen months, and then ran away. + +His first plan had been to reach Wordsworth, whose _Lyrical Ballads_ +(1798) had solaced him in fits of melancholy and had awakened in him a +deep reverence for the neglected poet. His timidity preventing this, +he made his way to Chester, where his mother then lived, in the hope of +seeing a sister; was apprehended by the older members of the family; +and through the intercession of his uncle, Colonel Penson, received the +promise of a guinea a week to carry out his later project of a solitary +tramp through Wales. From July to November, 1802, De Quincey then led +a wayfarer's life. [Footnote: For a most interesting account of this +period see the _Confessions of an English Opium-Eater_, Athenaeum Press +_Selections from De Quincey_, pp. 165-171, and notes.] He soon lost +his guinea, however, by ceasing to keep his family informed of his +whereabouts, and subsisted for a time with great difficulty. Still +apparently fearing pursuit, with a little borrowed money he broke away +entirely from his home by exchanging the solitude of Wales for the +greater wilderness of London. Failing there to raise money on his +expected patrimony, he for some time deliberately clung to a life of +degradation and starvation rather than return to his lawful governors. + +Discovered by chance by his friends, De Quincey was brought home and +finally allowed (1803) to go to Worcester College, Oxford, on a reduced +income. Here, we are told, "he came to be looked upon as a strange being +who associated with no one." During this time he learned to take opium. +He left, apparently about 1807, without a degree. In the same year he +made the acquaintance of Coleridge and Wordsworth; Lamb he had sought +out in London several years before. + +His acquaintance with Wordsworth led to his settlement in 1809 at +Grasmere, in the beautiful English Lake District; his home for ten years +was Dove Cottage, which Wordsworth had occupied for several years and +which is now held in trust as a memorial of the poet. De Quincey was +married in 1816, and soon after, his patrimony having been exhausted, he +took up literary work in earnest. + +In 1821 he went to London to dispose of some translations from German +authors, but was persuaded first to write and publish an account of his +opium experiences, which accordingly appeared in the _London Magazine_ +in that year. This new sensation eclipsed Lamb's _Essays of Elia_, which +were appearing in the same periodical. The _Confessions of an English +Opium-Eater_ was forthwith published in book form. De Quincey now made +literary acquaintances. Tom Hood found the shrinking author "at home in +a German ocean of literature, in a storm, flooding all the floor, the +tables, and the chairs--billows of books." Richard Woodhouse speaks of +the "depth and reality of his knowledge. ... His conversation appeared +like the elaboration of a mine of results. ... Taylor led him into +political economy, into the Greek and Latin accents, into antiquities, +Roman roads, old castles, the origin and analogy of languages; upon all +these he was informed to considerable minuteness. The same with regard +to Shakespeare's sonnets, Spenser's minor poems, and the great writers +and characters of Elizabeth's age and those of Cromwell's time." + +From this time on De Quincey maintained himself by contributing to +various magazines. He soon exchanged London and the Lakes for Edinburgh +and its suburb, Lasswade, where the remainder of his life was spent. +_Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine_ and its rival _Tatt's Magazine_ +received a large number of contributions. _The English Mail-Coach_ +appeared in 1849 in Blackwood. _Joan of Arc_ had already been published +(1847) in _Tait_. De Quincey continued to drink laudanum throughout his +life,--twice after 1821 in very great excess. During his last years he +nearly completed a collected edition of his works. He died in Edinburgh +on the 8th of December, 1859. + + +II. CRITICAL REMARKS + + +The Opium-Eater had been a weak, lonely, and over-studious child, and he +was a solitary and ill-developed man. His character and his work present +strange contradictions. He is most precise in statement, yet often +very careless of fact; he is most courteous in manner, yet inexcusably +inconsiderate in his behavior. Again, he sets up a high standard +of purity of diction, yet uses slang quite unnecessarily and +inappropriately; and though a great master of style, he is guilty, at +times, of digression within digression until all trace of the original +subject is lost. + +De Quincey divides his writings into three groups: first, that class +which "proposes primarily to amuse the reader, but which, in doing so, +may or may not happen occasionally to reach a higher station, at which +the amusement passes into an impassioned interest." To this class would +belong the _Autobiographic Sketches_ and the _Literary Reminiscences_. +As a second class he groups "those papers which address themselves +purely to the understanding as an insulated faculty, or do so +primarily." These essays would include, according to Professor Masson's +subdivision, (a) Biographies, such as _Shakespeare_ or _Pope_--_Joan of +Arc_ falls here, yet has some claim to a place in the first class; (b) +Historical essays, like The _Caesars_; (c) Speculative and Theological +essays; (d) Essays in Political Economy and Politics; (e) Papers of +Literary Theory and Criticism, such as the brilliant discussions of +_Rhetoric, Style_, and _Conversation_, and the famous _On the Knocking +at the Gate in 'Macbeth_.' As a third and "far higher" class the author +ranks the _Confessions of an English Opium-Eater_, and also (but more +emphatically) the _Suspiria de Profundis_. "On these," he says, "as +modes of impassioned prose ranging under no precedents that I am aware +of in any literature, it is much more difficult to speak justly, whether +in a hostile or a friendly character." + +Of De Quincey's essays in general it may be said that they bear witness +alike to the diversity of his knowledge and the penetrative power of his +intellect. The wide range of his subjects, however, deprives his papers +when taken together of the weight which might attach to a series of +related discussions. And, remarkable as is De Quincey's aptitude for +analysis and speculation, more than once we have to regret the lack of +the "saving common-sense" possessed by many far less gifted men. +His erudition and insight are always a little in advance of his good +judgment. + +As to the works of the first class, the _Reminiscences_ are defaced +by the shrewish spirit shown in the accounts of Wordsworth and other +friends; nor can we depend upon them as records of fact. But our author +had had exceptional opportunities to observe these famous men and women, +and he possessed no little insight into literature and personality. As +to the _Autobiographic Sketches_, the handling of events is hopelessly +arbitrary and fragmentary. In truth, De Quincey is drawing an idealized +picture of childhood,--creating a type rather than re-creating a person; +it is a study of a child of talent that we receive from him, and as such +these sketches form one of the most satisfactory products of his pen. + +The _Confessions_ as a narrative is related to the Autobiography, while +its poetical passages range it with the _Suspiria_ and the _Mail-Coach_. +De Quincey seems to have believed that he was creating in such writings +a new literary type of prose poetry or prose phantasy; he had, with +his splendid dreams as subject-matter, lifted prose to heights +hitherto scaled only by the poet. In reality his style owed much to the +seventeenth-century writers, such as Milton and Sir Thomas Browne. He +took part with Coleridge, Lamb, and others in the general revival of +interest in earlier modern English prose, which is a feature of the +Romantic Movement. Still none of his contemporaries wrote as he did; +evidently De Quincey has a distinct quality of his own. Ruskin, in our +own day, is like him, but never the same. + +Yet De Quincey's prose poetry is a very small portion of his work, and +it is not in this way only that he excels. Mr. Saintsbury has spoken of +the strong appeal that De Quincey makes to boys. [Footnote: "Probably +more boys have in the last forty years been brought to a love +of literature proper by De Quincy than by any other writer +whatever."--_History of Nineteenth-Century Literature_, p.198.] It is +not without significance that he mentions as especially attractive to +the young only writings with a large narrative element. [Footnote: "To +read the _Essay on Murder_, the _English Mail-Coach_, _The Spanish Nun_, +_The Caesars_, and half a score other things at the age of about fifteen +or sixteen is, or ought to be, to fall in love with them."--_Essays in +English Literature_, 1780-1860, p.307.] Few boys read poetry, whether in +verse or prose, and fewer still criticism or philosophy; to every normal +boy the gate of good literature is the good story. It is the narrative +skill of De Quincey that has secured for him, in preference to other +writers of his class, the favor of youthful readers. + +It would be too much to say that the talent that attracts the young to +him must needs be the Opium-Eater's grand talent, though the notion is +defensible, seeing that only salient qualities in good writing appeal to +inexperienced readers. I believe, however, that this skill in narration +is De Quincey's most persistent quality,--the golden thread that unites +all his most distinguished and most enduring work. And it is with him +a part of his genius for style. Creative power of the kind that goes to +the making of plots De Quincey had not; he has proved that forever by +the mediocrity of _Klosterheim_. Give him Bergmann's account of the +Tartar Migration, or the story of the Fighting Nun,--give him the +matter,--and a brilliant narrative will result. Indeed, De Quincey +loved a story for its own sake; he rejoiced to see it extend its winding +course before him; he delighted to follow it, touch it, color it, see it +grow into body and being under his hand. That this enthusiasm should now +and then tend to endanger the integrity of the facts need not surprise +us; as I have said elsewhere, accuracy in these matters is hardly to +be expected of De Quincey. And we can take our pleasure in the skillful +unfolding of the dramatic narrative of the Tartar Flight--we can feel +the author's joy in the scenic possibilities of his theme--even if we +know that here and there an incident appears that is quite in its proper +place--but is unknown to history. + +In his _Confessions_ the same constructive power bears its part in +the author's triumph. A peculiar end was to be reached in that +narrative,--an end in which the writer had a deep personal interest. +What is an opium-eater? Says a character in a recent work of fiction, +of a social wreck: "If it isn't whisky with him, it's opium; if it isn't +opium, it's whisky." This speech establishes the popular category in +which De Quincey's habit had placed him. Our attention was to be drawn +from these degrading connections. And this is done not merely by the +correction of some widespread fallacies as to the effects of the +drug; far more it is the result of narrative skill. As we follow with +ever-increasing sympathy the lonely and sensitive child, the wandering +youth, the neuralgic patient, into the terrible grasp of opium, who +realizes, amid the gorgeous delights and the awful horrors of the tale, +that the writer is after all the victim of the worst of bad habits? We +can hardly praise too highly the art which even as we look beneath it +throws its glamour over us still. + +Nor is it only in this constructive power, in the selection and +arrangement of details, that De Quincey excels as a narrator; a score +of minor excellences of his style, such as the fine Latin words or the +sweeping periodic sentences, contribute to the effective progress of his +narrative prose. Mr. Lowell has said that "there are no such vistas and +avenues of verse as Milton's." The comparison is somewhat hazardous, +still I should like to venture the parallel claim that there are no such +streams of prose as De Quincey's. The movement of his discourse is that +of the broad river, not in its weight or force perhaps, but in its easy +flowing progress, in its serene, unhurried certainty of its end. To be +sure, only too often the waters overflow their banks and run far afield +in alien channels. Yet, when great power over the instrument of language +is joined to so much constructive skill, the result is narrative art of +high quality,--an achievement that must be in no small measure the solid +basis of De Quincey's fame. + + +III. BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE + +I. WORKS + + +1. _The Collected Writings of Thomas de Quincey_. New and enlarged +edition by David Masson. Edinburgh: A. and C. Black, 1889-1890. [New +York: The Macmillan Co. 14 vols., with footnotes, a preface to each +volume, and index. Reissued in cheaper form. The standard edition.] + +2. _The Works of Thomas de Quincey_. Riverside Edition. Boston: +Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1877. [12 vols., with notes and index.] + +3. _Selections from De Quincey._ Edited with an Introduction and Notes, +by M. H. Turk. Athenaeum Press Series. Boston, U.S.A., and London: Ginn +and Company, 1902. ["The largest body of selections from De Quincey +recently published.... The selections are _The affliction of Childhood, +Introduction to the World of Strife, A Meeting with Lamb, A Meeting +with Coleridge, Recollections of Wordsworth, Confessions, A Portion of +Suspiria, The English Mail-Coach, Murder as one of the Fine Arts, Second +Paper, Joan of Arc,_ and _On the Knocking at the Gate in 'Macbeth.'_"] + + +II. BIOGRAPHY AND CRITICISM + + +4. D. MASSON. _Thomas De Quincey._ English Men of Letters. London. +[New York: Harper. An excellent brief biography. This book, with a +good volume of selections, should go far toward supplying the ordinary +student's needs.] + +5. H. S. SALT. DE QUINCEY. Bell's Miniature Series of Great Writers. +London: George Bell and Sons. [A good short life.] 6. A. H. JAPP. +_Thomas De Quincey: His Life and Writings._ London, 1890. [New York: +Scribner. First edition by "H. A. Page," 1877. The standard life of +De Quincey; it contains valuable communications from De Quincey's +daughters, J. Hogg, Rev. F. Jacox, Professor Masson, and others.] + +7. A. H. JAPP. _De Quincey Memorials. Being Letters and Other +Records, here first published. With Communications from Coleridge, the +Wordsworths, Hannah More, Professor Wilson, and others._ 2 vols. London: +W. Heinemann, 1891. + +8. J. HOGG. _De Quincey and his Friends, Personal Recollections, +Souvenirs, and Anecdotes_ [including Woodhouse's _Conversations_, +Findlay's _Personal Recollections_, Hodgson's _On the Genius of De +Quincey_, and a mass of personal notes from a host of friends]. London: +Sampson Low, Marston & Co., 1895. + +9. E. T. MASON. _Personal Traits of British Authors_. New York, 1885. [4 +vols. The volume subtitled _Scott, Hogg,_ etc., contains some accounts +of De Quincey not included by Japp or Hogg.] + +10. L. STEPHEN. _Hours in a Library_. Vol. I. New York, 1892. + +11. W. MINTO. _Manual of English Prose Literature_. Boston, 1889. +[Contains the best general discussion of De Quincey's style.] + +12. L. COOPER. _The Prose Poetry of Thomas De Quincey_. Leipzig, 1902. + + + + +THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH + +SECTION I--THE GLORY OF MOTION + + +Some twenty or more years before I matriculated at Oxford, Mr. Palmer, +at that time M.P. for Bath, had accomplished two things, very hard to +do on our little planet, the Earth, however cheap they may be held by +eccentric people in comets: he had invented mail-coaches, and he had +married the daughter of a duke. He was, therefore, just twice as great +a man as Galileo, who did certainly invent (or, which is the same thing, +[Footnote: "_The same thing_":--Thus, in the calendar of the Church +Festivals, the discovery of the true cross (by Helen, the mother +of Constantine) is recorded (and, one might think, with the express +consciousness of sarcasm) as the _Invention_ of the Cross.] discover) +the satellites of Jupiter, those very next things extant to mail-coaches +in the two capital pretensions of speed and keeping time, but, on the +other hand, who did _not_ marry the daughter of a duke. + +These mail-coaches, as organised by Mr. Palmer, are entitled to a +circumstantial notice from myself, having had so large a share in +developing the anarchies of my subsequent dreams: an agency which they +accomplished, 1st, through velocity at that time unprecedented--for they +first revealed the glory of motion; 2dly, through grand effects for +the eye between lamplight and the darkness upon solitary roads; 3dly, +through animal beauty and power so often displayed in the class of +horses selected for this mail service; 4thly, through the conscious +presence of a central intellect, that, in the midst of vast distances +[Footnote: "Vast distances":--One case was familiar to mail-coach +travellers where two mails in opposite directions, north and south, +starting at the same minute from points six hundred miles apart, met +almost constantly at a particular bridge which bisected the total +distance.]--of storms, of darkness, of danger--overruled all obstacles +into one steady co-operation to a national result. For my own feeling, +this post-office service spoke as by some mighty orchestra, where a +thousand instruments, all disregarding each other, and so far in danger +of discord, yet all obedient as slaves to the supreme _baton_ of some +great leader, terminate in a perfection of harmony like that of heart, +brain, and lungs in a healthy animal organisation. But, finally, that +particular element in this whole combination which most impressed +myself, and through which it is that to this hour Mr. Palmer's +mail-coach system tyrannises over my dreams by terror and terrific +beauty, lay in the awful _political_ mission which at that time it +fulfilled. The mail-coach it was that distributed over the face of the +land, like the opening of apocalyptic vials, the heart-shaking news +of Trafalgar, of Salamanca, of Vittoria, of Waterloo. These were the +harvests that, in the grandeur of their reaping, redeemed the tears and +blood in which they had been sown. Neither was the meanest peasant +so much below the grandeur and the sorrow of the times as to confound +battles such as these, which were gradually moulding the destinies of +Christendom, with the vulgar conflicts of ordinary warfare, so often +no more than gladiatorial trials of national prowess. The victories of +England in this stupendous contest rose of themselves as natural _Te +Deums_ to heaven; and it was felt by the thoughtful that such victories, +at such a crisis of general prostration, were not more beneficial to +ourselves than finally to France, our enemy, and to the nations of all +western or central Europe, through whose pusillanimity it was that the +French domination had prospered. + +The mail-coach, as the national organ for publishing these mighty +events, thus diffusively influential, became itself a spiritualised and +glorified object to an impassioned heart; and naturally, in the Oxford +of that day, _all_ hearts were impassioned, as being all (or nearly all) +in _early_ manhood. In most universities there is one single college; +in Oxford there were five-and-twenty, all of which were peopled by young +men, the _elite_ of their own generation; not boys, but men: none +under eighteen. In some of these many colleges the custom permitted the +student to keep what are called "short terms"; that is, the four terms +of Michaelmas, Lent, Easter, and Act, were kept by a residence, in the +aggregate, of ninety-one days, or thirteen weeks. Under this interrupted +residence, it was possible that a student might have a reason for going +down to his home four times in the year. This made eight journeys to +and fro. But, as these homes lay dispersed through all the shires of the +island, and most of us disdained all coaches except his Majesty's mail, +no city out of London could pretend to so extensive a connexion with Mr. +Palmer's establishment as Oxford. Three mails, at the least, I remember +as passing every day through Oxford, and benefiting by my personal +patronage--viz., the Worcester, the Gloucester, and the Holyhead mail. +Naturally, therefore, it became a point of some interest with us, whose +journeys revolved every six weeks on an average, to look a little into +the executive details of the system. With some of these Mr. Palmer had +no concern; they rested upon bye-laws enacted by posting-houses for +their own benefit, and upon other bye-laws, equally stern, enacted +by the inside passengers for the illustration of their own haughty +exclusiveness. These last were of a nature to rouse our scorn; from +which the transition was not very long to systematic mutiny. Up to this +time, say 1804, or 1805 (the year of Trafalgar), it had been the fixed +assumption of the four inside people (as an old tradition of all +public carriages derived from the reign of Charles II) that they, the +illustrious quaternion, constituted a porcelain variety of the human +race, whose dignity would have been compromised by exchanging one word +of civility with the three miserable delf-ware outsides. Even to have +kicked an outsider might have been held to attaint the foot concerned +in that operation, so that, perhaps, it would have required an act +of Parliament to restore its purity of blood. What words, then, could +express the horror, and the sense of treason, in that case, which _had_ +happened, where all three outsides (the trinity of Pariahs) made a vain +attempt to sit down at the same breakfast-table or dinner-table with +the consecrated four? I myself witnessed such an attempt; and on that +occasion a benevolent old gentleman endeavoured to soothe his three holy +associates, by suggesting that, if the outsides were indicted for this +criminal attempt at the next assizes, the court would regard it as a +case of lunacy or _delirium tremens_ rather than of treason. England +owes much of her grandeur to the depth of the aristocratic element in +her social composition, when pulling against her strong democracy. I +am not the man to laugh at it. But sometimes, undoubtedly, it expressed +itself in comic shapes. The course taken with the infatuated outsiders, +in the particular attempt which I have noticed, was that the waiter, +beckoning them away from the privileged _salle-a-manger_, sang out, +"This way, my good men," and then enticed these good men away to the +kitchen. But that plan had not always answered. Sometimes, though +rarely, cases occurred where the intruders, being stronger than usual, +or more vicious than usual, resolutely refused to budge, and so far +carried their point as to have a separate table arranged for themselves +in a corner of the general room. Yet, if an Indian screen could be found +ample enough to plant them out from the very eyes of the high table, or +_dais_, it then became possible to assume as a fiction of law that the +three delf fellows, after all, were not present. They could be ignored +by the porcelain men, under the maxim that objects not appearing and +objects not existing are governed by the same logical construction. +[Footnote: _De non apparentibus_, etc.] + +Such being, at that time, the usage of mail-coaches, what was to be done +by us of young Oxford? We, the most aristocratic of people, who were +addicted to the practice of looking down superciliously even upon the +insides themselves as often very questionable characters--were we, +by voluntarily going outside, to court indignities? If our dress and +bearing sheltered us generally from the suspicion of being "raff" +(the name at that period for "snobs" [Footnote: "_Snobs_," and its +antithesis, "_nobs_," arose among the internal factions of shoemakers +perhaps ten years later. Possibly enough, the terms may have existed +much earlier; but they were then first made known, picturesquely and +effectively, by a trial at some assizes which happened to fix the public +attention.]), we really _were_ such constructively by the place we +assumed. If we did not submit to the deep shadow of eclipse, we entered +at least the skirts of its penumbra. And the analogy of theatres was +valid against us,--where no man can complain of the annoyances incident +to the pit or gallery, having his instant remedy in paying the higher +price of the boxes. But the soundness of this analogy we disputed. +In the case of the theatre, it cannot be pretended that the inferior +situations have any separate attractions, unless the pit may be supposed +to have an advantage for the purposes of the critic or the dramatic +reporter. But the critic or reporter is a rarity. For most people, the +sole benefit is in the price. Now, on the contrary, the outside of the +mail had its own incommunicable advantages. These we could not forego. +The higher price we would willingly have paid, but not the price +connected with the condition of riding inside; which condition we +pronounced insufferable. The air, the freedom of prospect, the proximity +to the horses, the elevation of seat: these were what we required; +but, above all, the certain anticipation of purchasing occasional +opportunities of driving. + +Such was the difficulty which pressed us; and under the coercion of this +difficulty we instituted a searching inquiry into the true quality and +valuation of the different apartments about the mail. We conducted +this inquiry on metaphysical principles; and it was ascertained +satisfactorily that the roof of the coach, which by some weak men had +been called the attics, and by some the garrets, was in reality the +drawing-room; in which drawing-room the box was the chief ottoman or +sofa; whilst it appeared that the _inside_ which had been traditionally +regarded as the only room tenantable by gentlemen, was, in fact, the +coal-cellar in disguise. + +Great wits jump. The very same idea had not long before struck the +celestial intellect of China. Amongst the presents carried out by our +first embassy to that country was a state-coach. It had been specially +selected as a personal gift by George III; but the exact mode of +using it was an intense mystery to Pekin. The ambassador, indeed (Lord +Macartney), had made some imperfect explanations upon this point; but, +as His Excellency communicated these in a diplomatic whisper at the +very moment of his departure, the celestial intellect was very feebly +illuminated, and it became necessary to call a cabinet council on the +grand state question, "Where was the Emperor to sit?" The hammer-cloth +happened to be unusually gorgeous; and, partly on that consideration, +but partly also because the box offered the most elevated seat, was +nearest to the moon, and undeniably went foremost, it was resolved by +acclamation that the box was the imperial throne, and, for the scoundrel +who drove,--he might sit where he could find a perch. The horses, +therefore, being harnessed, solemnly his imperial majesty ascended his +new English throne under a flourish of trumpets, having the first lord +of the treasury on his right hand, and the chief jester on his left. +Pekin gloried in the spectacle; and in the whole flowery people, +constructively present by representation, there was but one discontented +person, and _that_ was the coachman. This mutinous individual +audaciously shouted, "Where am _I_ to sit?" But the privy council, +incensed by his disloyalty, unanimously opened the door, and kicked him +into the inside. He had all the inside places to himself; but such is +the rapacity of ambition that he was still dissatisfied. "I say," he +cried out in an extempore petition addressed to the Emperor through the +window--"I say, how am I to catch hold of the reins?"--"Anyhow," was the +imperial answer; "don't trouble _me_, man, in my glory. How catch +the reins? Why, through the windows, through the keyholes--_anyhow_." +Finally this contumacious coachman lengthened the check-strings into a +sort of jury-reins communicating with the horses; with these he drove +as steadily as Pekin had any right to expect. The Emperor returned after +the briefest of circuits; he descended in great pomp from his throne, +with the severest resolution never to remount it. A public thanksgiving +was ordered for his majesty's happy escape from the disease of a broken +neck; and the state-coach was dedicated thenceforward as a votive +offering to the god Fo Fo--whom the learned more accurately called Fi +Fi. + +A revolution of this same Chinese character did young Oxford of that +era effect in the constitution of mail-coach society. It was a perfect +French Revolution; and we had good reason to say, _ca ira_. In fact, +it soon became _too_ popular. The "public"--a well-known character, +particularly disagreeable, though slightly respectable, and notorious +for affecting the chief seats in synagogues--had at first loudly +opposed this revolution; but, when the opposition showed itself to be +ineffectual, our disagreeable friend went into it with headlong zeal. +At first it was a sort of race between us; and, as the public is usually +from thirty to fifty years old, naturally we of young Oxford, that +averaged about twenty, had the advantage. Then the public took to +bribing, giving fees to horse-keepers, &c., who hired out their persons +as warming-pans on the box seat. _That_, you know, was shocking to all +moral sensibilities. Come to bribery, said we, and there is an end +to all morality,--Aristotle's, Zeno's, Cicero's, or anybody's. And, +besides, of what use was it? For _we_ bribed also. And, as our bribes, +to those of the public, were as five shillings to sixpence, here again +young Oxford had the advantage. But the contest was ruinous to +the principles of the stables connected with the mails. This whole +corporation was constantly bribed, rebribed, and often surrebribed; a +mail-coach yard was like the hustings in a contested election; and a +horse-keeper, ostler, or helper, was held by the philosophical at that +time to be the most corrupt character in the nation. + +There was an impression upon the public mind, natural enough from the +continually augmenting velocity of the mail, but quite erroneous, that +an outside seat on this class of carriages was a post of danger. On the +contrary, I maintained that, if a man had become nervous from some +gipsy prediction in his childhood, allocating to a particular moon +now approaching some unknown danger, and he should inquire earnestly, +"Whither can I fly for shelter? Is a prison the safest retreat? or a +lunatic hospital? or the British Museum?" I should have replied, "Oh no; +I'll tell you what to do. Take lodgings for the next forty days on the +box of his Majesty's mail. Nobody can touch you there. If it is by +bills at ninety days after date that you are made unhappy--if noters and +protesters are the sort of wretches whose astrological shadows darken +the house of life--then note you what I vehemently protest: viz., that, +no matter though the sheriff and under-sheriff in every county should be +running after you with his _posse_, touch a hair of your head he cannot +whilst you keep house and have your legal domicile on the box of the +mail. It is felony to stop the mail; even the sheriff cannot do that. +And an _extra_ touch of the whip to the leaders (no great matter if +it grazes the sheriff) at any time guarantees your safety." In fact, a +bedroom in a quiet house seems a safe enough retreat; yet it is liable +to its own notorious nuisances--to robbers by night, to rats, to fire. +But the mail laughs at these terrors. To robbers, the answer is packed +up and ready for delivery in the barrel of the guard's blunderbuss. Rats +again! there _are_ none about mail-coaches any more than snakes in Von +Troil's Iceland; [Footnote: "_Von Troil's Iceland_":--The allusion is +to a well-known chapter in Von Troil's work, entitled, "Concerning +the Snakes of Iceland." The entire chapter consists of these six +words--"_There art no snakes in Iceland_."] except, indeed, now and then +a parliamentary rat, who always hides his shame in what I have shown +to be the "coal-cellar." And, as to fire, I never knew but one in a +mail-coach; which was in the Exeter mail, and caused by an obstinate +sailor bound to Devonport. Jack, making light of the law and the +lawgiver that had set their faces against his offence, insisted on +taking up a forbidden seat [Footnote: "_Forbidden seat_":--The very +sternest code of rules was enforced upon the mails by the Post-office. +Throughout England, only three outsides were allowed, of whom one was +to sit on the box, and the other two immediately behind the box; none, +under any pretext, to come near the guard; an indispensable caution; +since else, under the guise of a passenger, a robber might by any one +of a thousand advantages--which sometimes are created, but always are +favoured, by the animation of frank social intercourse--have disarmed +the guard. Beyond the Scottish border, the regulation was so far relaxed +as to allow of _four_ outsides, but not relaxed at all as to the mode of +placing them. One, as before, was seated on the box, and the other three +on the front of the roof, with a determinate and ample separation from +the little insulated chair of the guard. This relaxation was conceded +by way of compensating to Scotland her disadvantages in point of +population. England, by the superior density of her population, might +always count upon a large fund of profits in the fractional trips of +chance passengers riding for short distances of two or three stages. In +Scotland this chance counted for much less. And therefore, to make good +the deficiency, Scotland was allowed a compensatory profit upon one +_extra_ passenger.] in the rear of the roof, from which he could +exchange his own yarns with those of the guard. No greater offence was +then known to mail-coaches; it was treason, it was _laesa majestas_, it +was by tendency arson; and the ashes of Jack's pipe, falling amongst the +straw of the hinder boot, containing the mail-bags, raised a flame +which (aided by the wind of our motion) threatened a revolution in +the republic of letters. Yet even this left the sanctity of the box +unviolated. In dignified repose, the coachman and myself sat on, resting +with benign composure upon our knowledge that the fire would have +to burn its way through four inside passengers before it could reach +ourselves. I remarked to the coachman, with a quotation from Virgil's +"AEneid" really too hackneyed-- + + "Jam proximus ardet + Ucalegon." + +But, recollecting that the Virgilian part of the coachman's education +might have been neglected, I interpreted so far as to say that perhaps +at that moment the flames were catching hold of our worthy brother and +inside passenger, Ucalegon. The coachman made no answer,--which is my +own way when a stranger addresses me either in Syriac or in Coptic; +but by his faint sceptical smile he seemed to insinuate that he knew +better,--for that Ucalegon, as it happened, was not in the way-bill, and +therefore could not have been booked. + +No dignity is perfect which does not at some point ally itself with the +mysterious. The connexion of the mail with the state and the executive +government--a connexion obvious, but yet not strictly defined--gave to +the whole mail establishment an official grandeur which did us service +on the roads, and invested us with seasonable terrors. Not the +less impressive were those terrors because their legal limits were +imperfectly ascertained. Look at those turnpike gates: with what +deferential hurry, with what an obedient start, they fly open at our +approach! Look at that long line of carts and carters ahead, audaciously +usurping the very crest of the road. Ah! traitors, they do not hear us +as yet; but, as soon as the dreadful blast of our horn reaches them with +proclamation of our approach, see with what frenzy of trepidation they +fly to their horses' heads, and deprecate our wrath by the precipitation +of their crane-neck quarterings. Treason they feel to be their crime; +each individual carter feels himself under the ban of confiscation and +attainder; his blood is attainted through six generations; and nothing +is wanting but the headsman and his axe, the block and the sawdust, to +close up the vista of his horrors. What! shall it be within benefit of +clergy to delay the king's message on the high road?--to interrupt the +great respirations, ebb and flood, _systole_ and _diastole_, of the +national intercourse?--to endanger the safety of tidings running day and +night between all nations and languages? Or can it be fancied, amongst +the weakest of men, that the bodies of the criminals will be given up to +their widows for Christian burial? Now, the doubts which were raised +as to our powers did more to wrap them in terror, by wrapping them in +uncertainty, than could have been effected by the sharpest definitions +of the law from the Quarter Sessions. We, on our parts (we, the +collective mail, I mean), did our utmost to exalt the idea of our +privileges by the insolence with which we wielded them. Whether this +insolence rested upon law that gave it a sanction, or upon conscious +power that haughtily dispensed with that sanction, equally it spoke from +a potential station; and the agent, in each particular insolence of the +moment, was viewed reverentially, as one having authority. + +Sometimes after breakfast his Majesty's mail would become frisky; and, +in its difficult wheelings amongst the intricacies of early markets, +it would upset an apple-cart, a cart loaded with eggs, &c. Huge was +the affliction and dismay, awful was the smash. I, as far as possible, +endeavoured in such a case to represent the conscience and moral +sensibilities of the mail; and, when wildernesses of eggs were lying +poached under our horses' hoofs, then would I stretch forth my hands +in sorrow, saying (in words too celebrated at that time, from the false +echoes [Footnote: "_False echoes_":--Yes, false! for the words ascribed +to Napoleon, as breathed to the memory of Desaix, never were uttered at +all. They stand in the same category of theatrical fictions as the cry +of the foundering line-of-battle ship _Vengeur_, as the vaunt of General +Cambronne at Waterloo, "La Garde meurt, mais ne se rend pas," or as the +repartees of Talleyrand.] of Marengo), "Ah! wherefore have we not time +to weep over you?"--which was evidently impossible, since, in fact, we +had not time to laugh over them. Tied to post-office allowance in some +cases of fifty minutes for eleven miles, could the royal mail pretend to +undertake the offices of sympathy and condolence? Could it be expected +to provide tears for the accidents of the road? If even it seemed to +trample on humanity, it did so, I felt, in discharge of its own more +peremptory duties. + +Upholding the morality of the mail, _a fortiori_ I upheld its rights; as +a matter of duty, I stretched to the uttermost its privilege of imperial +precedency, and astonished weak minds by the feudal powers which I +hinted to be lurking constructively in the charters of this proud +establishment. Once I remember being on the box of the Holyhead mail, +between Shrewsbury and Oswestry, when a tawdry thing from Birmingham, +some "Tallyho" or "Highflyer," all flaunting with green and gold, came +up alongside of us. What a contrast to our royal simplicity of form and +colour in this plebeian wretch! The single ornament on our dark ground +of chocolate colour was the mighty shield of the imperial arms, but +emblazoned in proportions as modest as a signet-ring bears to a seal +of office. Even this was displayed only on a single panel, whispering, +rather than proclaiming, our relations to the mighty state; whilst the +beast from Birmingham, our green-and-gold friend from false, fleeting, +perjured Brummagem, had as much writing and painting on its sprawling +flanks as would have puzzled a decipherer from the tombs of Luxor. For +some time this Birmingham machine ran along by our side--a piece +of familiarity that already of itself seemed to me sufficiently +Jacobinical. But all at once a movement of the horses announced a +desperate intention of leaving us behind. "Do you see _that?_" I said to +the coachman.--"I see," was his short answer. He was wide awake,--yet +he waited longer than seemed prudent; for the horses of our audacious +opponent had a disagreeable air of freshness and power. But his motive +was loyal; his wish was that the Birmingham conceit should be full-blown +before he froze it. When _that_ seemed right, he unloosed, or, to speak +by a stronger word, he _sprang_, his known resources: he slipped our +royal horses like cheetahs, or hunting-leopards, after the affrighted +game. How they could retain such a reserve of fiery power after the work +they had accomplished seemed hard to explain. But on our side, besides +the physical superiority, was a tower of moral strength, namely the +king's name, "which they upon the adverse faction wanted." Passing them +without an effort, as it seemed, we threw them into the rear with so +lengthening an interval between us as proved in itself the bitterest +mockery of their presumption; whilst our guard blew back a shattering +blast of triumph that was really too painfully full of derision. + +I mention this little incident for its connexion with what followed. A +Welsh rustic, sitting behind me, asked if I had not felt my heart burn +within me during the progress of the race? I said, with philosophic +calmness, _No_; because we were not racing with a mail, so that no glory +could be gained. In fact, it was sufficiently mortifying that such a +Birmingham thing should dare to challenge us. The Welshman replied +that he didn't see _that_; for that a cat might look at a king, and a +Brummagem coach might lawfully race the Holyhead mail. "_Race_ us, if +you like," I replied, "though even _that_ has an air of sedition; but +not _beat_ us. This would have been treason; and for its own sake I +am glad that the 'Tallyho' was disappointed." So dissatisfied did the +Welshman seem with this opinion that at last I was obliged to tell him +a very fine story from one of our elder dramatists: viz., that once, +in some far Oriental kingdom, when the sultan of all the land, with his +princes, ladies, and chief omrahs, were flying their falcons, a hawk +suddenly flew at a majestic eagle, and, in defiance of the eagle's +natural advantages, in contempt also of the eagle's traditional royalty, +and before the whole assembled field of astonished spectators from Agra +and Lahore, killed the eagle on the spot. Amazement seized the sultan at +the unequal contest, and burning admiration for its unparalleled result. +He commanded that the hawk should be brought before him; he caressed the +bird with enthusiasm; and he ordered that, for the commemoration of his +matchless courage, a diadem of gold and rubies should be solemnly +placed on the hawk's head, but then that, immediately after this solemn +coronation, the bird should be led off to execution, as the most valiant +indeed of traitors, but not the less a traitor, as having dared to rise +rebelliously against his liege lord and anointed sovereign, the eagle. +"Now," said I to the Welshman, "to you and me, as men of refined +sensibilities, how painful it would have been that this poor Brummagem +brute, the 'Tallyho,' in the impossible case of a victory over us, +should have been crowned with Birmingham tinsel, with paste diamonds +and Roman pearls, and then led off to instant execution." The Welshman +doubted if that could be warranted by law. And, when I hinted at the +6th of Edward Longshanks, chap. 18, for regulating the precedency +of coaches, as being probably the statute relied on for the capital +punishment of such offences, he replied drily that, if the attempt to +pass a mail really were treasonable, it was a pity that the "Tallyho" +appeared to have so imperfect an acquaintance with law. + +The modern modes of travelling cannot compare with the old mail-coach +system in grandeur and power. They boast of more velocity,--not, +however, as a consciousness, but as a fact of our lifeless knowledge, +resting upon _alien_ evidence: as, for instance, because somebody +_says_ that we have gone fifty miles in the hour, though we are far from +feeling it as a personal experience; or upon the evidence of a result, +as that actually we find ourselves in York four hours after leaving +London. Apart from such an assertion, or such a result, I myself am +little aware of the pace. But, seated on the old mail-coach, we needed +no evidence out of ourselves to indicate the velocity. On this system +the word was not _magna loquimur_, as upon railways, but _vivimus_. Yes, +"magna _vivimus_"; we do not make verbal ostentation of our grandeurs, +we realise our grandeurs in act, and in the very experience of life. The +vital experience of the glad animal sensibilities made doubts impossible +on the question of our speed; we heard our speed, we saw it, we felt it +as a thrilling; and this speed was not the product of blind insensate +agencies, that had no sympathy to give, but was incarnated in the +fiery eyeballs of the noblest amongst brutes, in his dilated nostril, +spasmodic muscles, and thunder-beating hoofs. The sensibility of the +horse, uttering itself in the maniac light of his eye, might be the last +vibration of such a movement; the glory of Salamanca might be the +first. But the intervening links that connected them, that spread the +earthquake of battle into the eyeballs of the horse, were the heart of +man and its electric thrillings--kindling in the rapture of the fiery +strife, and then propagating its own tumults by contagious shouts and +gestures to the heart of his servant the horse. But now, on the new +system of travelling, iron tubes and boilers have disconnected man's +heart from the ministers of his locomotion. Nile nor Trafalgar has power +to raise an extra bubble in a steam-kettle. The galvanic cycle is +broken up for ever; man's imperial nature no longer sends itself forward +through the electric sensibility of the horse; the inter-agencies are +gone in the mode of communication between the horse and his master out +of which grew so many aspects of sublimity under accidents of mists that +hid, or sudden blazes that revealed, of mobs that agitated, or midnight +solitudes that awed. Tidings fitted to convulse all nations must +henceforwards travel by culinary process; and the trumpet that once +announced from afar the laurelled mail, heart-shaking when heard +screaming on the wind and proclaiming itself through the darkness to +every village or solitary house on its route, has now given way for +ever to the pot-wallopings of the boiler. Thus have perished multiform +openings for public expressions of interest, scenical yet natural, in +great national tidings,--for revelations of faces and groups that could +not offer themselves amongst the fluctuating mobs of a railway station. +The gatherings of gazers about a laurelled mail had one centre, and +acknowledged one sole interest. But the crowds attending at a railway +station have as little unity as running water, and own as many centres +as there are separate carriages in the train. + +How else, for example, than as a constant watcher for the dawn, and for +the London mail that in summer months entered about daybreak amongst the +lawny thickets of Maryborough forest, couldst thou, sweet Fanny of the +Bath road, have become the glorified inmate of my dreams? Yet Fanny, as +the loveliest young woman for face and person that perhaps in my whole +life I have beheld, merited the station which even now, from a distance +of forty years, she holds in my dreams; yes, though by links of natural +association she brings along with her a troop of dreadful creatures, +fabulous and not fabulous, that are more abominable to the heart than +Fanny and the dawn are delightful. + +Miss Fanny of the Bath road, strictly speaking, lived at a mile's +distance from that road, but came so continually to meet the mail that +I on my frequent transits rarely missed her, and naturally connected her +image with the great thoroughfare where only I had ever seen her. Why +she came so punctually I do not exactly know; but I believe with some +burden of commissions, to be executed in Bath, which had gathered to +her own residence as a central rendezvous for converging them. The +mail-coachman who drove the Bath mail and wore the royal livery +[Footnote: "Wore the royal livery":--The general impression was that +the royal livery belonged of right to the mail-coachmen as their +professional dress. But that was an error. To the guard it _did_ belong, +I believe, and was obviously essential as an official warrant, and as a +means of instant identification for his person, in the discharge of his +important public duties. But the coachman, and especially if his place +in the series did not connect him immediately with London and the +General Post-Office, obtained the scarlet coat only as an honorary +distinction after long (or, if not long, trying and special) service.] +happened to be Fanny's grandfather. A good man he was, that loved his +beautiful granddaughter, and, loving her wisely, was vigilant over her +deportment in any case where young Oxford might happen to be concerned. +Did my vanity then suggest that I myself, individually, could fall +within the line of his terrors? Certainly not, as regarded any physical +pretensions that I could plead; for Fanny (as a chance passenger from +her own neighbourhood once told me) counted in her train a hundred and +ninety-nine professed admirers, if not open aspirants to her favour; and +probably not one of the whole brigade but excelled myself in personal +advantages. Ulysses even, with the unfair advantage of his accursed bow, +could hardly have undertaken that amount of suitors. So the danger might +have seemed slight--only that woman is universally aristocratic; it is +amongst her nobilities of heart that she _is_ so. Now, the aristocratic +distinctions in my favour might easily with Miss Fanny have compensated +my physical deficiencies. Did I then make love to Fanny? Why, yes; about +as much love as one _could_ make whilst the mail was changing horses--a +process which, ten years later, did not occupy above eighty seconds; but +_then_,--viz., about Waterloo--it occupied five times eighty. Now, four +hundred seconds offer a field quite ample enough for whispering into +a young woman's ear a great deal of truth, and (by way of parenthesis) +some trifle of falsehood. Grandpapa did right, therefore, to watch me. +And yet, as happens too often to the grandpapas of earth in a contest +with the admirers of granddaughters, how vainly would he have watched me +had I meditated any evil whispers to Fanny! She, it is my belief, would +have protected herself against any man's evil suggestions. But he, as +the result showed, could not have intercepted the opportunities for +such suggestions. Yet, why not? Was he not active? Was he not blooming? +Blooming he was as Fanny herself. + +"Say, all our praises why should lords----" + +Stop, that's not the line. + +"Say, all our roses why should girls engross?" + +The coachman showed rosy blossoms on his face deeper even than his +granddaughter's--_his_ being drawn from the ale-cask, Fanny's from +the fountains of the dawn. But, in spite of his blooming face, some +infirmities he had; and one particularly in which he too much resembled +a crocodile. This lay in a monstrous inaptitude for turning round. The +crocodile, I presume, owes that inaptitude to the absurd _length_ of his +back; but in our grandpapa it arose rather from the absurd _breadth_ of +his back, combined, possibly, with some growing stiffness in his legs. +Now, upon this crocodile infirmity of his I planted a human advantage +for tendering my homage to Miss Fanny. In defiance of all his honourable +vigilance, no sooner had he presented to us his mighty Jovian back (what +a field for displaying to mankind his royal scarlet!), whilst inspecting +professionally the buckles, the straps, and the silvery turrets +[Footnote: "_Turrets_":--As one who loves and venerates Chaucer for his +unrivalled merits of tenderness, of picturesque characterisation, and of +narrative skill, I noticed with great pleasure that the word _torrettes_ +is used by him to designate the little devices through which the reins +are made to pass. This same word, in the same exact sense, I heard +uniformly used by many scores of illustrious mail-coachmen to whose +confidential friendship I had the honour of being admitted in my younger +days.] of his harness, than I raised Miss Fanny's hand to my lips, and, +by the mixed tenderness and respectfulness of my manner, caused her +easily to understand how happy it would make me to rank upon her list +as No. 10 or 12: in which case a few casualties amongst her lovers (and, +observe, they _hanged_ liberally in those days) might have promoted me +speedily to the top of the tree; as, on the other hand, with how +much loyalty of submission I acquiesced by anticipation in her award, +supposing that she should plant me in the very rearward of her favour, +as No. 199 + 1. Most truly I loved this beautiful and ingenuous girl; +and, had it not been for the Bath mail, timing all courtships by +post-office allowance, heaven only knows what might have come of it. +People talk of being over head and ears in love; now, the mail was the +cause that I sank only over ears in love,--which, you know, still left a +trifle of brain to overlook the whole conduct of the affair. + +Ah, reader! when I look back upon those days, it seems to me that all +things change--all things perish. "Perish the roses and the palms of +kings": perish even the crowns and trophies of Waterloo: thunder and +lightning are not the thunder and lightning which I remember. Roses +are degenerating. The Fannies of our island--though this I say with +reluctance--are not visibly improving; and the Bath road is notoriously +superannuated. Crocodiles, you will say, are stationary. Mr. Waterton +tells me that the crocodile does _not change_,--that a cayman, in fact, +or an alligator, is just as good for riding upon as he was in the time +of the Pharaohs. _That_ may be; but the reason is that the crocodile +does not live fast--he is a slow coach. I believe it is generally +understood among naturalists that the crocodile is a blockhead. It is +my own impression that the Pharaohs were also blockheads. Now, as +the Pharaohs and the crocodile domineered over Egyptian society, this +accounts for a singular mistake that prevailed through innumerable +generations on the Nile. The crocodile made the ridiculous blunder of +supposing man to be meant chiefly for his own eating. Man, taking a +different view of the subject, naturally met that mistake by another: he +viewed the crocodile as a thing sometimes to worship, but always to +run away from. And this continued till Mr. Waterton [Footnote: "_Mr. +Waterton_":--Had the reader lived through the last generation, he would +not need to be told that, some thirty or thirty-five years back, +Mr. Waterton, a distinguished country gentleman of ancient family in +Northumberland, publicly mounted and rode in top-boots a savage old +crocodile, that was restive and very impertinent, but all to no purpose. +The crocodile jibbed and tried to kick, but vainly. He was no more able +to throw the squire than Sinbad was to throw the old scoundrel who used +his back without paying for it, until he discovered a mode (slightly +immoral, perhaps, though some think not) of murdering the old fraudulent +jockey, and so circuitously of unhorsing him.] changed the relations +between the animals. The mode of escaping from the reptile he showed to +be not by running away, but by leaping on its back booted and spurred. +The two animals had misunderstood each other. The use of the crocodile +has now been cleared up--viz., to be ridden; and the final cause of +man is that he may improve the health of the crocodile by riding him +a-fox-hunting before breakfast. And it is pretty certain that any +crocodile who has been regularly hunted through the season, and is +master of the weight he carries, will take a six-barred gate now as well +as ever he would have done in the infancy of the pyramids. + +If, therefore, the crocodile does _not_ change, all things else +undeniably _do_: even the shadow of the pyramids grows less. And often +the restoration in vision of Fanny and the Bath road makes me too +pathetically sensible of that truth. Out of the darkness, if I happen +to call back the image of Fanny, up rises suddenly from a gulf of forty +years a rose in June; or, if I think for an instant of the rose in +June, up rises the heavenly face of Fanny. One after the other, like the +antiphonies in the choral service, rise Fanny and the rose in June, then +back again the rose in June and Fanny. Then come both together, as in +a chorus--roses and Fannies, Fannies and roses, without end, thick +as blossoms in paradise. Then comes a venerable crocodile, in a royal +livery of scarlet and gold, with sixteen capes; and the crocodile is +driving four-in-hand from the box of the Bath mail. And suddenly we upon +the mail are pulled up by a mighty dial, sculptured with the hours, that +mingle with the heavens and the heavenly host. Then all at once we are +arrived at Marlborough forest, amongst the lovely households [Footnote: +"_Households_":--Roe-deer do not congregate in herds like the fallow +or the red deer, but by separate families, parents and children; which +feature of approximation to the sanctity of human hearths, added to +their comparatively miniature and graceful proportions, conciliates +to them an interest of peculiar tenderness, supposing even that this +beautiful creature is less characteristically impressed with the +grandeurs of savage and forest life.] of the roe-deer; the deer and +their fawns retire into the dewy thickets; the thickets are rich with +roses; once again the roses call up the sweet countenance of Fanny; and +she, being the granddaughter of a crocodile, awakens a dreadful host of +semi-legendary animals--griffins, dragons, basilisks, sphinxes--till +at length the whole vision of fighting images crowds into one towering +armorial shield, a vast emblazonry of human charities and human +loveliness that have perished, but quartered heraldically with +unutterable and demoniac natures, whilst over all rises, as a +surmounting crest, one fair female hand, with the forefinger pointing, +in sweet, sorrowful admonition, upwards to heaven, where is sculptured +the eternal writing which proclaims the frailty of earth and her +children. + + +GOING DOWN WITH VICTORY + + +But the grandest chapter of our experience within the whole mail-coach +service was on those occasions when we went down from London with the +news of victory. A period of about ten years stretched from Trafalgar +to Waterloo; the second and third years of which period (1806 and +1807) were comparatively sterile; but the other nine (from 1805 to 1815 +inclusively) furnished a long succession of victories, the least of +which, in such a contest of Titans, had an inappreciable value of +position: partly for its absolute interference with the plans of our +enemy, but still more from its keeping alive through central Europe the +sense of a deep-seated vulnerability in France. Even to tease the coasts +of our enemy, to mortify them by continual blockades, to insult them +by capturing if it were but a baubling schooner under the eyes of their +arrogant armies, repeated from time to time a sullen proclamation of +power lodged in one quarter to which the hopes of Christendom turned in +secret. How much more loudly must this proclamation have spoken in the +audacity [Footnote: "_Audacity_":--Such the French accounted it; and it +has struck me that Soult would not have been so popular in London, at +the period of her present Majesty's coronation, or in Manchester, +on occasion of his visit to that town, if they had been aware of the +insolence with which he spoke of us in notes written at intervals from +the field of Waterloo. As though it had been mere felony in our army +to look a French one in the face, he said in more notes than one, +dated from two to four P.M. on the field of Waterloo, "Here are the +English--we have them; they are caught _en flagrant delit_" Yet no man +should have known us better; no man had drunk deeper from the cup of +humiliation than Soult had in 1809, when ejected by us with headlong +violence from Oporto, and pursued through a long line of wrecks to the +frontier of Spain; and subsequently at Albuera, in the bloodiest of +recorded battles, to say nothing of Toulouse, he should have learned our +pretensions.] of having bearded the _elite_ of their troops, and having +beaten them in pitched battles! Five years of life it was worth paying +down for the privilege of an outside place on a mail-coach, when +carrying down the first tidings of any such event. And it is to be noted +that, from our insular situation, and the multitude of our frigates +disposable for the rapid transmission of intelligence, rarely did any +unauthorised rumour steal away a prelibation from the first aroma of the +regular despatches. The government news was generally the earliest news. + +From eight P.M. to fifteen or twenty minutes later imagine the mails +assembled on parade in Lombard Street; where, at that time, [Footnote: +"_At that time_":--I speak of the era previous to Waterloo.] and not in +St. Martin's-le-Grand, was seated the General Post-Office. In what exact +strength we mustered I do not remember; but, from the length of each +separate _attelage_, we filled the street, though a long one, and +though we were drawn up in double file. On _any_ night the spectacle +was beautiful. The absolute perfection of all the appointments about the +carriages and the harness, their strength, their brilliant cleanliness, +their beautiful simplicity--but, more than all, the royal magnificence +of the horses--were what might first have fixed the attention. Every +carriage on every morning in the year was taken down to an official +inspector for examination: wheels, axles, linchpins, pole, glasses, +lamps, were all critically probed and tested. Every part of every +carriage had been cleaned, every horse had been groomed, with as much +rigour as if they belonged to a private gentleman; and that part of the +spectacle offered itself always. But the night before us is a night +of victory; and, behold! to the ordinary display what a heart-shaking +addition!--horses, men, carriages, all are dressed in laurels and +flowers, oak-leaves and ribbons. The guards, as being officially his +Majesty's servants, and of the coachmen such as are within the privilege +of the post-office, wear the royal liveries of course; and, as it is +summer (for all the _land_ victories were naturally won in summer), they +wear, on this fine evening, these liveries exposed to view, without any +covering of upper coats. Such a costume, and the elaborate arrangement +of the laurels in their hats, dilate their hearts, by giving to them +openly a personal connexion with the great news in which already they +have the general interest of patriotism. That great national sentiment +surmounts and quells all sense of ordinary distinctions. Those +passengers who happen to be gentlemen are now hardly to be distinguished +as such except by dress; for the usual reserve of their manner in +speaking to the attendants has on this night melted away. One heart, +one pride, one glory, connects every man by the transcendent bond of +his national blood. The spectators, who are numerous beyond precedent, +express their sympathy with these fervent feelings by continual hurrahs. +Every moment are shouted aloud by the post-office servants, and summoned +to draw up, the great ancestral names of cities known to history through +a thousand years--Lincoln, Winchester, Portsmouth, Gloucester, Oxford, +Bristol, Manchester, York, Newcastle, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Perth, +Stirling, Aberdeen--expressing the grandeur of the empire by the +antiquity of its towns, and the grandeur of the mail establishment by +the diffusive radiation of its separate missions. Every moment you hear +the thunder of lids locked down upon the mail-bags. That sound to each +individual mail is the signal for drawing off; which process is the +finest part of the entire spectacle. Then come the horses into play. +Horses! can these be horses that bound off with the action and gestures +of leopards? What stir!--what sea-like ferment!--what a thundering of +wheels!--what a trampling of hoofs!--what a sounding of trumpets!--what +farewell cheers--what redoubling peals of brotherly congratulation, +connecting the name of the particular mail--"Liverpool for ever!"--with +the name of the particular victory--"Badajoz for ever!" or "Salamanca +for ever!" The half-slumbering consciousness that all night long, and +all the next day--perhaps for even a longer period--many of these mails, +like fire racing along a train of gunpowder, will be kindling at +every instant new successions of burning joy, has an obscure effect of +multiplying the victory itself, by multiplying to the imagination into +infinity the stages of its progressive diffusion. A fiery arrow seems +to be let loose, which from that moment is destined to travel, +without intermission, westwards for three hundred [Footnote: "_Three +hundred_":--Of necessity, this scale of measurement, to an American, if +he happens to be a thoughtless man, must sound ludicrous. Accordingly, +I remember a case in which an American writer indulges himself in the +luxury of a little fibbing, by ascribing to an Englishman a pompous +account of the Thames, constructed entirely upon American ideas of +grandeur, and concluding in something like these terms:--"And, sir, +arriving at London, this mighty father of rivers attains a breadth of +at least two furlongs, having, in its winding course, traversed the +astonishing distance of one hundred and seventy miles." And this +the candid American thinks it fair to contrast with the scale of the +Mississippi. Now, it is hardly worth while to answer a pure fiction +gravely; else one might say that no Englishman out of Bedlam ever +thought of looking in an island for the rivers of a continent, nor, +consequently, could have thought of looking for the peculiar grandeur of +the Thames in the length of its course, or in the extent of soil which +it drains. Yet, if he _had_ been so absurd, the American might have +recollected that a river, not to be compared with the Thames even as to +volume of water--viz., the Tiber--has contrived to make itself heard of +in this world for twenty-five centuries to an extent not reached as +yet by any river, however corpulent, of his own land. The glory of +the Thames is measured by the destiny of the population to which it +ministers, by the commerce which it supports, by the grandeur of the +empire in which, though far from the largest, it is the most influential +stream. Upon some such scale, and not by a transfer of Columbian +standards, is the course of our English mails to be valued. The American +may fancy the effect of his own valuations to our English ears by +supposing the case of a Siberian glorifying his country in these +terms:--"These wretches, sir, in France and England, cannot march half a +mile in any direction without finding a house where food can be had and +lodging; whereas such is the noble desolation of our magnificent country +that in many a direction for a thousand miles I will engage that a dog +shall not find shelter from a snow-storm, nor a wren find an apology for +breakfast."] miles--northwards for six hundred; and the sympathy of our +Lombard Street friends at parting is exalted a hundredfold by a sort of +visionary sympathy with the yet slumbering sympathies which in so vast a +succession we are going to awake. + +Liberated from the embarrassments of the city, and issuing into the +broad uncrowded avenues of the northern suburbs, we soon begin to enter +upon our natural pace of ten miles an hour. In the broad light of the +summer evening, the sun, perhaps, only just at the point of setting, we +are seen from every storey of every house. Heads of every age crowd to +the windows; young and old understand the language of our victorious +symbols; and rolling volleys of sympathising cheers run along us, behind +us, and before us. The beggar, rearing himself against the wall, forgets +his lameness--real or assumed--thinks not of his whining trade, but +stands erect, with bold exulting smiles, as we pass him. The victory has +healed him, and says, Be thou whole! Women and children, from garrets +alike and cellars, through infinite London, look down or look up with +loving eyes upon our gay ribbons and our martial laurels; sometimes +kiss their hands; sometimes hang out, as signals of affection, +pocket-handkerchiefs, aprons, dusters, anything that, by catching the +summer breezes, will express an aerial jubilation. On the London side of +Barnet, to which we draw near within a few minutes after nine, observe +that private carriage which is approaching us. The weather being so +warm, the glasses are all down; and one may read, as on the stage of a +theatre, everything that goes on within. It contains three ladies--one +likely to be "mamma," and two of seventeen or eighteen, who are probably +her daughters. What lovely animation, what beautiful unpremeditated +pantomime, explaining to us every syllable that passes, in these +ingenuous girls! By the sudden start and raising of the hands on first +discovering our laurelled equipage, by the sudden movement and appeal to +the elder lady from both of them, and by the heightened colour on their +animated countenances, we can almost hear them saying, "See, see! Look +at their laurels! Oh, mamma! there has been a great battle in Spain; and +it has been a great victory." In a moment we are on the point of passing +them. We passengers--I on the box, and the two on the roof behind +me--raise our hats to the ladies; the coachman makes his professional +salute with the whip; the guard even, though punctilious on the matter +of his dignity as an officer under the crown, touches his hat. The +ladies move to us, in return, with a winning graciousness of gesture; +all smile on each side in a way that nobody could misunderstand, and +that nothing short of a grand national sympathy could so instantaneously +prompt. Will these ladies say that we are nothing to _them_? Oh no; they +will not say _that_. They cannot deny--they do not deny--that for this +night they are our sisters; gentle or simple, scholar or illiterate +servant, for twelve hours to come, we on the outside have the honour +to be their brothers. Those poor women, again, who stop to gaze upon +us with delight at the entrance of Barnet, and seem, by their air of +weariness, to be returning from labour--do you mean to say that they are +washerwomen and charwomen? Oh, my poor friend, you are quite mistaken. I +assure you they stand in a far higher rank; for this one night they feel +themselves by birthright to be daughters of England, and answer to no +humbler title. + +Every joy, however, even rapturous joy--such is the sad law of +earth--may carry with it grief, or fear of grief, to some. Three miles +beyond Barnet, we see approaching us another private carriage, nearly +repeating the circumstances of the former case. Here, also, the glasses +are all down; here, also, is an elderly lady seated; but the two +daughters are missing; for the single young person sitting by the lady's +side seems to be an attendant--so I judge from her dress, and her air +of respectful reserve. The lady is in mourning; and her countenance +expresses sorrow. At first she does not look up; so that I believe she +is not aware of our approach, until she hears the measured beating of +our horses' hoofs. Then she raises her eyes to settle them painfully on +our triumphal equipage. Our decorations explain the case to her at once; +but she beholds them with apparent anxiety, or even with terror. Some +time before this, I, finding it difficult to hit a flying mark when +embarrassed by the coachman's person and reins intervening, had given +to the guard a "Courier" evening paper, containing the gazette, for the +next carriage that might pass. Accordingly he tossed it in, so folded +that the huge capitals expressing some such legend as GLORIOUS VICTORY +might catch the eye at once. To see the paper, however, at all, +interpreted as it was by our ensigns of triumph, explained everything; +and, if the guard were right in thinking the lady to have received it +with a gesture of horror, it could not be doubtful that she had suffered +some deep personal affliction in connexion with this Spanish war. + +Here, now, was the case of one who, having formerly suffered, might, +erroneously perhaps, be distressing herself with anticipations of +another similar suffering. That same night, and hardly three hours +later, occurred the reverse case. A poor woman, who too probably +would find herself, in a day or two, to have suffered the heaviest +of afflictions by the battle, blindly allowed herself to express an +exultation so unmeasured in the news and its details as gave to her the +appearance which amongst Celtic Highlanders is called _fey_. This was at +some little town where we changed horses an hour or two after midnight. +Some fair or wake had kept the people up out of their beds, and had +occasioned a partial illumination of the stalls and booths, presenting +an unusual but very impressive effect. We saw many lights moving about +as we drew near; and perhaps the most striking scene on the whole +route was our reception at this place. The flashing of torches and the +beautiful radiance of blue lights (technically, Bengal lights) upon +the heads of our horses; the fine effect of such a showery and ghostly +illumination falling upon our flowers and glittering laurels [Footnote: +"_Glittering laurels_":--I must observe that the colour of _green_ +suffers almost a spiritual change and exaltation under the effect of +Bengal lights.]; whilst all around ourselves, that formed a centre of +light, the darkness gathered on the rear and flanks in massy blackness: +these optical splendours, together with the prodigious enthusiasm of the +people, composed a picture at once scenical and affecting, theatrical +and holy. As we staid for three or four minutes, I alighted; and +immediately from a dismantled stall in the street, where no doubt she +had been presiding through the earlier part of the night, advanced +eagerly a middle-aged woman. The sight of my newspaper it was that had +drawn her attention upon myself. The victory which we were carrying +down to the provinces on _this_ occasion was the imperfect one of +Talavera--imperfect for its results, such was the virtual treachery of +the Spanish general, Cuesta, but not imperfect in its ever-memorable +heroism. I told her the main outline of the battle. The agitation of +her enthusiasm had been so conspicuous when listening, and when first +applying for information, that I could not but ask her if she had not +some relative in the Peninsular army. Oh yes; her only son was there. +In what regiment? He was a trooper in the 23d Dragoons. My heart sank +within me as she made that answer. This sublime regiment, which an +Englishman should never mention without raising his hat to their memory, +had made the most memorable and effective charge recorded in military +annals. They leaped their horses--_over_ a trench where they could; +_into_ it, and with the result of death or mutilation, when they could +_not_. What proportion cleared the trench is nowhere stated. Those +who _did_ closed up and went down upon the enemy with such divinity of +fervour (I use the word _divinity_ by design: the inspiration of God +must have prompted this movement for those whom even then He was calling +to His presence) that two results followed. As regarded the enemy, this +23d Dragoons, not, I believe, originally three hundred and fifty strong, +paralysed a French column six thousand strong, then ascended the hill, +and fixed the gaze of the whole French army. As regarded themselves, +the 23d were supposed at first to have been barely not annihilated; but +eventually, I believe, about one in four survived. And this, then, was +the regiment--a regiment already for some hours glorified and hallowed +to the ear of all London, as lying stretched, by a large majority, upon +one bloody aceldama--in which the young trooper served whose mother was +now talking in a spirit of such joyous enthusiasm. Did I tell her the +truth? Had I the heart to break up her dreams? No. To-morrow, said I +to myself--to-morrow, or the next day, will publish the worst. For one +night more wherefore should she not sleep in peace? After to-morrow +the chances are too many that peace will forsake her pillow. This brief +respite, then, let her owe to _my_ gift and _my_ forbearance. But, if I +told her not of the bloody price that had been paid, not therefore was +I silent on the contributions from her son's regiment to that day's +service and glory. I showed her not the funeral banners under which the +noble regiment was sleeping. I lifted not the overshadowing laurels from +the bloody trench in which horse and rider lay mangled together. But I +told her how these dear children of England, officers and privates, +had leaped their horses over all obstacles as gaily as hunters to the +morning's chase. I told her how they rode their horses into the midst of +death,--saying to myself, but not saying to _her_ "and laid down their +young lives for thee, O mother England! as willingly--poured out their +noble blood as cheerfully--as ever, after a long day's sport, when +infants, they had rested their weary heads upon their mother's knees, or +had sunk to sleep in her arms." Strange it is, yet true, that she seemed +to have no fears for her son's safety, even after this knowledge +that the 23d Dragoons had been memorably engaged; but so much was she +enraptured by the knowledge that _his_ regiment, and therefore that +_he_, had rendered conspicuous service in the dreadful conflict--a +service which had actually made them, within the last twelve hours, +the foremost topic of conversation in London--so absolutely was fear +swallowed up in joy--that, in the mere simplicity of her fervent nature, +the poor woman threw her arms round my neck, as she thought of her son, +and gave to _me_ the kiss which secretly was meant for _him_. + + +SECTION II--THE VISION OF SUDDEN DEATH + + +What is to be taken as the predominant opinion of man, reflective and +philosophic, upon SUDDEN DEATH? It is remarkable that, in different +conditions of society, sudden death has been variously regarded as the +consummation of an earthly career most fervently to be desired, or, +again, as that consummation which is with most horror to be deprecated. +Caesar the Dictator, at his last dinner-party (_coena_), on the very +evening before his assassination, when the minutes of his earthly career +were numbered, being asked what death, in _his_ judgment, might be +pronounced the most eligible, replied "That which should be most +sudden." On the other hand, the divine Litany of our English Church, +when breathing forth supplications, as if in some representative +character, for the whole human race prostrate before God, places such +a death in the very van of horrors: "From lightning and tempest; from +plague, pestilence, and famine; from battle and murder, and from SUDDEN +DEATH--_Good Lord, deliver us_." Sudden death is here made to crown the +climax in a grand ascent of calamities; it is ranked among the last of +curses; and yet by the noblest of Romans it was ranked as the first of +blessings. In that difference most readers will see little more than +the essential difference between Christianity and Paganism. But this, +on consideration, I doubt. The Christian Church may be right in its +estimate of sudden death; and it is a natural feeling, though after all +it may also be an infirm one, to wish for a quiet dismissal from +life, as that which _seems_ most reconcilable with meditation, with +penitential retrospects, and with the humilities of farewell prayer. +There does not, however, occur to me any direct scriptural warrant for +this earnest petition of the English Litany, unless under a special +construction of the word "sudden." It seems a petition indulged rather +and conceded to human infirmity than exacted from human piety. It is not +so much a doctrine built upon the eternities of the Christian system +as a plausible opinion built upon special varieties of physical +temperament. Let that, however, be as it may, two remarks suggest +themselves as prudent restraints upon a doctrine which else _may_ +wander, and _has_ wandered, into an uncharitable superstition. The +first is this: that many people are likely to exaggerate the horror of +a sudden death from the disposition to lay a false stress upon words +or acts simply because by an accident they have become _final_ words or +acts. If a man dies, for instance, by some sudden death when he happens +to be intoxicated, such a death is falsely regarded with peculiar +horror; as though the intoxication were suddenly exalted into a +blasphemy. But _that_ is unphilosophic. The man was, or he was not, +_habitually_ a drunkard. If not, if his intoxication were a solitary +accident, there can be no reason for allowing special emphasis to this +act simply because through misfortune it became his final act. Nor, +on the other hand, if it were no accident, but one of his _habitual_ +transgressions, will it be the more habitual or the more a transgression +because some sudden calamity, surprising him, has caused this habitual +transgression to be also a final one. Could the man have had any reason +even dimly to foresee his own sudden death, there would have been a +new feature in his act of intemperance--a feature of presumption and +irreverence, as in one that, having known himself drawing near to the +presence of God, should have suited his demeanour to an expectation +so awful. But this is no part of the case supposed. And the only new +element in the man's act is not any element of special immorality, but +simply of special misfortune. + +The other remark has reference to the meaning of the word _sudden_. +Very possibly Caesar and the Christian Church do not differ in the way +supposed,--that is, do not differ by any difference of doctrine as +between Pagan and Christian views of the moral temper appropriate +to death; but perhaps they are contemplating different cases. Both +contemplate a violent death, a _Biathanatos_--death that is _biaios_, +or, in other words, death that is brought about, not by internal and +spontaneous change, but by active force having its origin from without. +In this meaning the two authorities agree. Thus far they are in +harmony. But the difference is that the Roman by the word "sudden" means +_unlingering_, whereas the Christian Litany by "sudden death" means a +death _without warning_, consequently without any available summons to +religious preparation. The poor mutineer who kneels down to gather into +his heart the bullets from twelve firelocks of his pitying comrades dies +by a most sudden death in Caesar's sense; one shock, one mighty spasm, +one (possibly _not_ one) groan, and all is over. But, in the sense +of the Litany, the mutineer's death is far from sudden: his offence +originally, his imprisonment, his trial, the interval between his +sentence and its execution, having all furnished him with separate +warnings of his fate--having all summoned him to meet it with solemn +preparation. + +Here at once, in this sharp verbal distinction, we comprehend the +faithful earnestness with which a holy Christian Church pleads on behalf +of her poor departing children that God would vouchsafe to them the +last great privilege and distinction possible on a death-bed, viz., +the opportunity of untroubled preparation for facing this mighty trial. +Sudden death, as a mere variety in the modes of dying where death in +some shape is inevitable, proposes a question of choice which, equally +in the Roman and the Christian sense, will be variously answered +according to each man's variety of temperament. Meantime, one aspect of +sudden death there is, one modification, upon which no doubt can +arise, that of all martyrdoms it is the most agitating--viz., where it +surprises a man under circumstances which offer (or which seem to offer) +some hurrying, flying, inappreciably minute chance of evading it. Sudden +as the danger which it affronts must be any effort by which such an +evasion can be accomplished. Even _that_, even the sickening necessity +for hurrying in extremity where all hurry seems destined to be +vain,--even that anguish is liable to a hideous exasperation in one +particular case: viz., where the appeal is made not exclusively to the +instinct of self-preservation, but to the conscience, on behalf of some +other life besides your own, accidentally thrown upon _your_ protection. +To fail, to collapse in a service merely your own, might seem +comparatively venial; though, in fact, it is far from venial. But to +fail in a case where Providence has suddenly thrown into your hands the +final interests of another,--a fellow creature shuddering between the +gates of life and death: this, to a man of apprehensive conscience, +would mingle the misery of an atrocious criminality with the misery of a +bloody calamity. You are called upon, by the case supposed, possibly to +die, but to die at the very moment when, by any even partial failure or +effeminate collapse of your energies, you will be self-denounced as a +murderer. You had but the twinkling of an eye for your effort, and that +effort might have been unavailing; but to have risen to the level of +such an effort would have rescued you, though not from dying, yet from +dying as a traitor to your final and farewell duty. + +The situation here contemplated exposes a dreadful ulcer, lurking far +down in the depths of human nature. It is not that men generally are +summoned to face such awful trials. But potentially, and in shadowy +outline, such a trial is moving subterraneously in perhaps all men's +natures. Upon the secret mirror of our dreams such a trial is darkly +projected, perhaps, to every one of us. That dream, so familiar to +childhood, of meeting a lion, and, through languishing prostration in +hope and the energies of hope, that constant sequel of lying down before +the lion publishes the secret frailty of human nature--reveals its +deep-seated falsehood to itself--records its abysmal treachery. Perhaps +not one of us escapes that dream; perhaps, as by some sorrowful doom of +man, that dream repeats for every one of us, through every generation, +the original temptation in Eden. Every one of us, in this dream, has a +bait offered to the infirm places of his own individual will; once again +a snare is presented for tempting him into captivity to a luxury of +ruin; once again, as in aboriginal Paradise, the man falls by his +own choice; again, by infinite iteration, the ancient earth groans +to Heaven, through her secret caves, over the weakness of her child. +"Nature, from her seat, sighing through all her works," again "gives +signs of woe that all is lost"; and again the counter-sigh is repeated +to the sorrowing heavens for the endless rebellion against God. It is +not without probability that in the world of dreams every one of us +ratifies for himself the original transgression. In dreams, perhaps +under some secret conflict of the midnight sleeper, lighted up to the +consciousness at the time, but darkened to the memory as soon as all +is finished, each several child of our mysterious race completes for +himself the treason of the aboriginal fall. + +The incident, so memorable in itself by its features of horror, and so +scenical by its grouping for the eye, which furnished the text for this +reverie upon _Sudden Death_ occurred to myself in the dead of night, +as a solitary spectator, when seated on the box of the Manchester and +Glasgow mail, in the second or third summer after Waterloo. I find it +necessary to relate the circumstances, because they are such as could +not have occurred unless under a singular combination of accidents. +In those days, the oblique and lateral communications with many rural +post-offices were so arranged, either through necessity or through +defect of system, as to make it requisite for the main north-western +mail (_i.e._, the _down_ mail) on reaching Manchester to halt for a +number of hours; how many, I do not remember; six or seven, I think; but +the result was that, in the ordinary course, the mail recommenced its +journey northwards about midnight. Wearied with the long detention at a +gloomy hotel, I walked out about eleven o'clock at night for the sake +of fresh air; meaning to fall in with the mail and resume my seat at +the post-office. The night, however, being yet dark, as the moon had +scarcely risen, and the streets being at that hour empty, so as to offer +no opportunities for asking the road, I lost my way, and did not reach +the post-office until it was considerably past midnight; but, to my +great relief (as it was important for me to be in Westmoreland by the +morning), I saw in the huge saucer eyes of the mail, blazing through +the gloom, an evidence that my chance was not yet lost. Past the time +it was; but, by some rare accident, the mail was not even yet ready to +start. I ascended to my seat on the box, where my cloak was still lying +as it had lain at the Bridgewater Arms. I had left it there in imitation +of a nautical discoverer, who leaves a bit of bunting on the shore of +his discovery, by way of warning off the ground the whole human race, +and notifying to the Christian and the heathen worlds, with his best +compliments, that he has hoisted his pocket-handkerchief once and for +ever upon that virgin soil: thenceforward claiming the _jus dominii_ to +the top of the atmosphere above it, and also the right of driving shafts +to the centre of the earth below it; so that all people found after this +warning either aloft in upper chambers of the atmosphere, or groping +in subterraneous shafts, or squatting audaciously on the surface of +the soil, will be treated as trespassers--kicked, that is to say, +or decapitated, as circumstances may suggest, by their very faithful +servant, the owner of the said pocket-handkerchief. In the present case, +it is probable that my cloak might not have been respected, and the +_jus gentium_ might have been cruelly violated in my person--for, in +the dark, people commit deeds of darkness, gas being a great ally of +morality; but it so happened that on this night there was no other +outside passenger; and thus the crime, which else was but too probable, +missed fire for want of a criminal. + +Having mounted the box, I took a small quantity of laudanum, having +already travelled two hundred and fifty miles--viz., from a point +seventy miles beyond London. In the taking of laudanum there was nothing +extraordinary. But by accident it drew upon me the special attention +of my assessor on the box, the coachman. And in _that_ also there was +nothing extraordinary. But by accident, and with great delight, it drew +my own attention to the fact that this coachman was a monster in point +of bulk, and that he had but one eye. In fact, he had been foretold by +Virgil as + + "Monstrum horrendum, informe, ingens, cui lumen ademptum." + +He answered to the conditions in every one of the items:--1, a monster +he was; 2, dreadful; 3, shapeless; 4, huge; 5, who had lost an eye. But +why should _that_ delight me? Had he been one of the Calendars in the +"Arabian Nights," and had paid down his eye as the price of his criminal +curiosity, what right had _I_ to exult in his misfortune? I did _not_ +exult; I delighted in no man's punishment, though it were even merited. +But these personal distinctions (Nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5) identified in an +instant an old friend of mine whom I had known in the south for some +years as the most masterly of mail-coachmen. He was the man in all +Europe that could (if _any_ could) have driven six-in-hand full +gallop over _Al Sirat_--that dreadful bridge of Mahomet, with no side +battlements, and of _extra_ room not enough for a razor's edge--leading +right across the bottomless gulf. Under this eminent man, whom in Greek +I cognominated Cyclops _Diphrelates_ (Cyclops the Charioteer), I, and +others known to me, studied the diphrelatic art. Excuse, reader, a word +too elegant to be pedantic. As a pupil, though I paid extra fees, it is +to be lamented that I did not stand high in his esteem. It showed his +dogged honesty (though, observe, not his discernment) that he could +not see my merits. Let us excuse his absurdity in this particular by +remembering his want of an eye. Doubtless _that_ made him blind to my +merits. In the art of conversation, however, he admitted that I had the +whip-hand of him. On the present occasion great joy was at our meeting. +But what was Cyclops doing here? Had the medical men recommended +northern air, or how? I collected, from such explanations as he +volunteered, that he had an interest at stake in some suit-at-law now +pending at Lancaster; so that probably he had got himself transferred +to this station for the purpose of connecting with his professional +pursuits an instant readiness for the calls of his lawsuit. + +Meantime, what are we stopping for? Surely we have now waited long +enough. Oh, this procrastinating mail, and this procrastinating +post-office! Can't they take a lesson upon that subject from _me_? Some +people have called _me_ procrastinating. Yet you are witness, reader, +that I was here kept waiting for the post-office. Will the post-office +lay its hand on its heart, in its moments of sobriety, and assert that +ever it waited for me? What are they about? The guard tells me that +there is a large extra accumulation of foreign mails this night, owing +to irregularities caused by war, by wind, by weather, in the packet +service, which as yet does not benefit at all by steam. For an _extra_ +hour, it seems, the post-office has been engaged in threshing out the +pure wheaten correspondence of Glasgow, and winnowing it from the chaff +of all baser intermediate towns. But at last all is finished. Sound your +horn, guard! Manchester, good-bye! we've lost an hour by your criminal +conduct at the post-office: which, however, though I do not mean to part +with a serviceable ground of complaint, and one which really _is_ such +for the horses, to me secretly is an advantage, since it compels us to +look sharply for this lost hour amongst the next eight or nine, and to +recover it (if we can) at the rate of one mile extra per hour. Off we +are at last, and at eleven miles an hour; and for the moment I detect no +changes in the energy or in the skill of Cyclops. + +From Manchester to Kendal, which virtually (though not in law) is the +capital of Westmoreland, there were at this time seven stages of eleven +miles each. The first five of these, counting from Manchester, terminate +in Lancaster; which is therefore fifty-five miles north of Manchester, +and the same distance exactly from Liverpool. The first three stages +terminate in Preston (called, by way of distinction from other towns +of that name, _Proud_ Preston); at which place it is that the separate +roads from Liverpool and from Manchester to the north become confluent. +[Footnote: "_Confluent_":--Suppose a capital Y (the Pythagorean letter): +Lancaster is at the foot of this letter; Liverpool at the top of the +_right_ branch; Manchester at the top of the _left_; Proud Preston at +the centre, where the two branches unite. It is thirty-three miles +along either of the two branches; it is twenty-two miles along the +stem,--viz., from Preston in the middle to Lancaster at the root. +There's a lesson in geography for the reader!] Within these first three +stages lay the foundation, the progress, and termination of our night's +adventure. During the first stage, I found out that Cyclops was +mortal: he was liable to the shocking affection of sleep--a thing which +previously I had never suspected. If a man indulges in the vicious habit +of sleeping, all the skill in aurigation of Apollo himself, with the +horses of Aurora to execute his notions, avails him nothing. "Oh, +Cyclops!" I exclaimed, "thou art mortal. My friend, thou snorest." +Through the first eleven miles, however, this infirmity--which I grieve +to say that he shared with the whole Pagan Pantheon--betrayed itself +only by brief snatches. On waking up, he made an apology for himself +which, instead of mending matters, laid open a gloomy vista of coming +disasters. The summer assizes, he reminded me, were now going on at +Lancaster: in consequence of which for three nights and three days he +had not lain down on a bed. During the day he was waiting for his own +summons as a witness on the trial in which he was interested, or else, +lest he should be missing at the critical moment, was drinking with the +other witnesses under the pastoral surveillance of the attorneys. During +the night, or that part of it which at sea would form the middle watch, +he was driving. This explanation certainly accounted for his drowsiness, +but in a way which made it much more alarming; since now, after several +days' resistance to this infirmity, at length he was steadily giving +way. Throughout the second stage he grew more and more drowsy. In +the second mile of the third stage he surrendered himself finally and +without a struggle to his perilous temptation. All his past resistance +had but deepened the weight of this final oppression. Seven atmospheres +of sleep rested upon him; and, to consummate the case, our worthy guard, +after singing "Love amongst the Roses" for perhaps thirty times, without +invitation and without applause, had in revenge moodily resigned himself +to slumber--not so deep, doubtless, as the coachman's, but deep enough +for mischief. And thus at last, about ten miles from Preston, it came +about that I found myself left in charge of his Majesty's London and +Glasgow mail, then running at the least twelve miles an hour. + +What made this negligence less criminal than else it must have been +thought was the condition of the roads at night during the assizes. +At that time, all the law business of populous Liverpool, and also of +populous Manchester, with its vast cincture of populous rural districts, +was called up by ancient usage to the tribunal of Lilliputian Lancaster. +To break up this old traditional usage required, 1, a conflict with +powerful established interests, 2, a large system of new arrangements, +and 3, a new parliamentary statute. But as yet this change was merely in +contemplation. As things were at present, twice in the year [Footnote: +"_Twice in the year_":--There were at that time only two assizes even +in the most populous counties--viz., the Lent Assizes and the Summer +Assizes.] so vast a body of business rolled northwards from the southern +quarter of the county that for a fortnight at least it occupied the +severe exertions of two judges in its despatch. The consequence of this +was that every horse available for such a service, along the whole line +of road, was exhausted in carrying down the multitudes of people who +were parties to the different suits. By sunset, therefore, it usually +happened that, through utter exhaustion amongst men and horses, the road +sank into profound silence. Except the exhaustion in the vast adjacent +county of York from a contested election, no such silence succeeding to +no such fiery uproar was ever witnessed in England. + +On this occasion the usual silence and solitude prevailed along the +road. Not a hoof nor a wheel was to be heard. And, to strengthen this +false luxurious confidence in the noiseless roads, it happened also +that the night was one of peculiar solemnity and peace. For my own +part, though slightly alive to the possibilities of peril, I had so far +yielded to the influence of the mighty calm as to sink into a profound +reverie. The month was August; in the middle of which lay my own +birthday--a festival to every thoughtful man suggesting solemn and often +sigh-born [Footnote: "_Sigh-born_":--I owe the suggestion of this +word to an obscure remembrance of a beautiful phrase in "Giraldus +Cambrensis"--viz., _suspiriosae cogitationes_.] thoughts. The county was +my own native county--upon which, in its southern section, more than +upon any equal area known to man past or present, had descended the +original curse of labour in its heaviest form, not mastering the bodies +only of men, as of slaves, or criminals in mines, but working through +the fiery will. Upon no equal space of earth was, or ever had been, the +same energy of human power put forth daily. At this particular season +also of the assizes, that dreadful hurricane of flight and pursuit, as +it might have seemed to a stranger, which swept to and from Lancaster +all day long, hunting the county up and down, and regularly subsiding +back into silence about sunset, could not fail (when united with this +permanent distinction of Lancashire as the very metropolis and citadel +of labour) to point the thoughts pathetically upon that counter-vision +of rest, of saintly repose from strife and sorrow, towards which, as +to their secret haven, the profounder aspirations of man's heart are in +solitude continually travelling. Obliquely upon our left we were nearing +the sea; which also must, under the present circumstances, be repeating +the general state of halcyon repose. The sea, the atmosphere, the light, +bore each an orchestral part in this universal lull. Moonlight and the +first timid tremblings of the dawn were by this time blending; and the +blendings were brought into a still more exquisite state of unity by a +slight silvery mist, motionless and dreamy, that covered the woods and +fields, but with a veil of equable transparency. Except the feet of +our own horses,--which, running on a sandy margin of the road, made but +little disturbance,--there was no sound abroad. In the clouds and on the +earth prevailed the same majestic peace; and, in spite of all that +the villain of a schoolmaster has done for the ruin of our sublimer +thoughts, which are the thoughts of our infancy, we still believe in no +such nonsense as a limited atmosphere. Whatever we may swear with our +false feigning lips, in our faithful hearts we still believe, and must +for ever believe, in fields of air traversing the total gulf between +earth and the central heavens. Still, in the confidence of children that +tread without fear every chamber in their father's house, and to whom no +door is closed, we, in that Sabbatic vision which sometimes is revealed +for an hour upon nights like this, ascend with easy steps from the +sorrow-stricken fields of earth upwards to the sandals of God. + +Suddenly, from thoughts like these I was awakened to a sullen sound, as +of some motion on the distant road. It stole upon the air for a moment; +I listened in awe; but then it died away. Once roused, however, I could +not but observe with alarm the quickened motion of our horses. Ten +years' experience had made my eye learned in the valuing of motion; and +I saw that we were now running thirteen miles an hour. I pretend to no +presence of mind. On the contrary, my fear is that I am miserably and +shamefully deficient in that quality as regards action. The palsy of +doubt and distraction hangs like some guilty weight of dark unfathomed +remembrances upon my energies when the signal is flying for _action_. +But, on the other hand, this accursed gift I have, as regards _thought_, +that in the first step towards the possibility of a misfortune I see its +total evolution; in the radix of the series I see too certainly and too +instantly its entire expansion; in the first syllable of the dreadful +sentence I read already the last. It was not that I feared for +ourselves. _Us_ our bulk and impetus charmed against peril in any +collision. And I had ridden through too many hundreds of perils that +were frightful to approach, that were matter of laughter to look back +upon, the first face of which was horror, the parting face a jest--for +any anxiety to rest upon _our_ interests. The mail was not built, I +felt assured, nor bespoke, that could betray _me_ who trusted to its +protection. But any carriage that we could meet would be frail and light +in comparison of ourselves. And I remarked this ominous accident of our +situation,--we were on the wrong side of the road. But then, it may be +said, the other party, if other there was, might also be on the wrong +side; and two wrongs might make a right. _That_ was not likely. The same +motive which had drawn _us_ to the right-hand side of the road--viz., +the luxury of the soft beaten sand as contrasted with the paved +centre--would prove attractive to others. The two adverse carriages +would therefore, to a certainty, be travelling on the same side; and +from this side, as not being ours in law, the crossing over to the other +would, of course, be looked for from _us_. [Footnote: It is true that, +according to the law of the case as established by legal precedents, +all carriages were required to give way before royal equipages, and +therefore before the mail as one of them. But this only increased +the danger, as being a regulation very imperfectly made known, very +unequally enforced, and therefore often embarrassing the movements on +both sides.] Our lamps, still lighted, would give the impression of +vigilance on our part. And every creature that met us would rely upon +_us_ for quartering. [Footnote: "_Quartering_":--This is the technical +word, and, I presume, derived from the French _cartayer_, to evade a +rut or any obstacle.] All this, and if the separate links of the +anticipation had been a thousand times more, I saw, not discursively, +or by effort, or by succession, but by one flash of horrid simultaneous +intuition. + +Under this steady though rapid anticipation of the evil which _might_ be +gathering ahead, ah! what a sullen mystery of fear, what a sigh of woe, +was that which stole upon the air, as again the far-off sound of a +wheel was heard! A whisper it was--a whisper from, perhaps, four miles +off--secretly announcing a ruin that, being foreseen, was not the less +inevitable; that, being known, was not therefore healed. What could be +done--who was it that could do it--to check the storm-flight of these +maniacal horses? Could I not seize the reins from the grasp of the +slumbering coachman? You, reader, think that it would have been in +_your_ power to do so. And I quarrel not with your estimate of yourself. +But, from the way in which the coachman's hand was viced between his +upper and lower thigh, this was impossible. Easy was it? See, then, +that bronze equestrian statue. The cruel rider has kept the bit in +his horse's mouth for two centuries. Unbridle him for a minute, if you +please, and wash his mouth with water. Easy was it? Unhorse me, then, +that imperial rider; knock me those marble feet from those marble +stirrups of Charlemagne. + +The sounds ahead strengthened, and were now too clearly the sounds of +wheels. Who and what could it be? Was it industry in a taxed cart? Was +it youthful gaiety in a gig? Was it sorrow that loitered, or joy that +raced? For as yet the snatches of sound were too intermitting, from +distance, to decipher the character of the motion. Whoever were the +travellers, something must be done to warn them. Upon the other party +rests the active responsibility, but upon _us_--and, woe is me! +that _us_ was reduced to my frail opium-shattered self--rests the +responsibility of warning. Yet, how should this be accomplished? Might I +not sound the guard's horn? Already, on the first thought, I was making +my way over the roof of the guard's seat. But this, from the accident +which I have mentioned, of the foreign mails being piled upon the roof, +was a difficult and even dangerous attempt to one cramped by nearly +three hundred miles of outside travelling. And, fortunately, before I +had lost much time in the attempt, our frantic horses swept round +an angle of the road which opened upon us that final stage where the +collision must be accomplished and the catastrophe sealed. All was +apparently finished. The court was sitting; the case was heard; the +judge had finished; and only the verdict was yet in arrear. + +Before us lay an avenue straight as an arrow, six hundred yards, +perhaps, in length; and the umbrageous trees, which rose in a regular +line from either side, meeting high overhead, gave to it the character +of a cathedral aisle. These trees lent a deeper solemnity to the early +light; but there was still light enough to perceive, at the further end +of this Gothic aisle, a frail reedy gig, in which were seated a young +man, and by his side a young lady. Ah, young sir! what are you about? +If it is requisite that you should whisper your communications to this +young lady--though really I see nobody, at an hour and on a road so +solitary, likely to overhear you--is it therefore requisite that you +should carry your lips forward to hers? The little carriage is creeping +on at one mile an hour; and the parties within it, being thus tenderly +engaged, are naturally bending down their heads. Between them and +eternity, to all human calculation, there is but a minute and a half. Oh +heavens! what is it that I shall do? Speaking or acting, what help can +I offer? Strange it is, and to a mere auditor of the tale might seem +laughable, that I should need a suggestion from the "Iliad" to prompt +the sole resource that remained. Yet so it was. Suddenly I remembered +the shout of Achilles, and its effect. But could I pretend to shout like +the son of Peleus, aided by Pallas? No: but then I needed not the shout +that should alarm all Asia militant; such a shout would suffice as might +carry terror into the hearts of two thoughtless young people and one +gig-horse. I shouted--and the young man heard me not. A second time I +shouted--and now he heard me, for now he raised his head. + +Here, then, all had been done that, by me, _could_ be done; more on _my_ +part was not possible. Mine had been the first step; the second was for +the young man; the third was for God. If, said I, this stranger is a +brave man, and if indeed he loves the young girl at his side--or, loving +her not, if he feels the obligation, pressing upon every man worthy +to be called a man, of doing his utmost for a woman confided to his +protection--he will at least make some effort to save her. If _that_ +fails, he will not perish the more, or by a death more cruel, for having +made it; and he will die as a brave man should, with his face to the +danger, and with his arm about the woman that he sought in vain to +save. But, if he makes no effort,--shrinking without a struggle from his +duty,--he himself will not the less certainly perish for this baseness +of poltroonery. He will die no less: and why not? Wherefore should we +grieve that there is one craven less in the world? No; _let_ him perish, +without a pitying thought of ours wasted upon him; and, in that case, +all our grief will be reserved for the fate of the helpless girl who +now, upon the least shadow of failure in _him_, must by the fiercest +of translations--must without time for a prayer--must within seventy +seconds stand before the judgment-seat of God. + +But craven he was not: sudden had been the call upon him, and sudden was +his answer to the call. He saw, he heard, he comprehended, the ruin +that was coming down: already its gloomy shadow darkened above him; and +already he was measuring his strength to deal with it. Ah! what a vulgar +thing does courage seem when we see nations buying it and selling it for +a shilling a-day: ah! what a sublime thing does courage seem when some +fearful summons on the great deeps of life carries a man, as if running +before a hurricane, up to the giddy crest of some tumultuous crisis from +which lie two courses, and a voice says to him audibly, "One way lies +hope; take the other, and mourn for ever!" How grand a triumph if, even +then, amidst the raving of all around him, and the frenzy of the danger, +the man is able to confront his situation--is able to retire for a +moment into solitude with God, and to seek his counsel from _Him!_ + +For seven seconds, it might be, of his seventy, the stranger settled his +countenance steadfastly upon us, as if to search and value every element +in the conflict before him. For five seconds more of his seventy he sat +immovably, like one that mused on some great purpose. For five more, +perhaps, he sat with eyes upraised, like one that prayed in sorrow, +under some extremity of doubt, for light that should guide him to the +better choice. Then suddenly he rose; stood upright; and, by a powerful +strain upon the reins, raising his horse's fore-feet from the ground, +he slewed him round on the pivot of his hind-legs, so as to plant the +little equipage in a position nearly at right angles to ours. Thus far +his condition was not improved; except as a first step had been taken +towards the possibility of a second. If no more were done, nothing was +done; for the little carriage still occupied the very centre of our +path, though in an altered direction. Yet even now it may not be too +late: fifteen of the seventy seconds may still be unexhausted; and one +almighty bound may avail to clear the ground. Hurry, then, hurry! for +the flying moments--_they_ hurry. Oh, hurry, hurry, my brave young +man! for the cruel hoofs of our horses--_they_ also hurry! Fast are the +flying moments, faster are the hoofs of our horses. But fear not for +_him_, if human energy can suffice; faithful was he that drove to his +terrific duty; faithful was the horse to _his_ command. One blow, one +impulse given with voice and hand, by the stranger, one rush from the +horse, one bound as if in the act of rising to a fence, landed the +docile creature's forefeet upon the crown or arching centre of the +road. The larger half of the little equipage had then cleared our +over-towering shadow: _that_ was evident even to my own agitated sight. +But it mattered little that one wreck should float off in safety if upon +the wreck that perished were embarked the human freightage. The rear +part of the carriage--was _that_ certainly beyond the line of absolute +ruin? What power could answer the question? Glance of eye, thought of +man, wing of angel, which of these had speed enough to sweep between the +question and the answer, and divide the one from the other? Light +does not tread upon the steps of light more indivisibly than did our +all-conquering arrival upon the escaping efforts of the gig. _That_ must +the young man have felt too plainly. His back was now turned to us; not +by sight could he any longer communicate with the peril; but, by the +dreadful rattle of our harness, too truly had his ear been instructed +that all was finished as regarded any effort of _his_. Already in +resignation he had rested from his struggle; and perhaps in his heart he +was whispering, "Father, which art in heaven, do Thou finish above what +I on earth have attempted." Faster than ever mill-race we ran past +them in our inexorable flight. Oh, raving of hurricanes that must have +sounded in their young ears at the moment of our transit! Even in +that moment the thunder of collision spoke aloud. Either with the +swingle-bar, or with the haunch of our near leader, we had struck the +off-wheel of the little gig; which stood rather obliquely, and not quite +so far advanced as to be accurately parallel with the near-wheel. The +blow, from the fury of our passage, resounded terrifically. I rose in +horror, to gaze upon the ruins we might have caused. From my elevated +station I looked down, and looked back upon the scene; which in a moment +told its own tale, and wrote all its records on my heart for ever. + +Here was the map of the passion that now had finished. The horse was +planted immovably, with his fore-feet upon the paved crest of the +central road. He of the whole party might be supposed untouched by the +passion of death. The little cany carriage--partly, perhaps, from the +violent torsion of the wheels in its recent movement, partly from the +thundering blow we had given to it--as if it sympathised with human +horror, was all alive with tremblings and shiverings. The young man +trembled not, nor shivered. He sat like a rock. But _his_ was the +steadiness of agitation frozen into rest by horror. As yet he dared not +to look round; for he knew that, if anything remained to do, by him it +could no longer be done. And as yet he knew not for certain if their +safety were accomplished. But the lady-- + +But the lady--! Oh, heavens! will that spectacle ever depart from my +dreams, as she rose and sank upon her seat, sank and rose, threw up her +arms wildly to heaven, clutched at some visionary object in the air, +fainting, praying, raving, despairing? Figure to yourself, reader, +the elements of the case; suffer me to recall before your mind the +circumstances of that unparalleled situation. From the silence and deep +peace of this saintly summer night--from the pathetic blending of this +sweet moonlight, dawnlight, dreamlight--from the manly tenderness of +this flattering, whispering, murmuring love--suddenly as from the +woods and fields--suddenly as from the chambers of the air opening in +revelation--suddenly as from the ground yawning at her feet, leaped upon +her, with the flashing of cataracts, Death the crowned phantom, with all +the equipage of his terrors, and the tiger roar of his voice. + +The moments were numbered; the strife was finished; the vision was +closed. In the twinkling of an eye, our flying horses had carried us to +the termination of the umbrageous aisle; at the right angles we wheeled +into our former direction; the turn of the road carried the scene out of +my eyes in an instant, and swept it into my dreams for ever. + + +SECTION III--DREAM-FUGUE: + +FOUNDED ON THE PRECEDING THEME OF SUDDEN DEATH + + "Whence the sound + Of instruments, that made melodious chime, + Was heard, of harp and organ; and who moved + Their stops and chords was seen; his volant touch + Instinct through all proportions, low and high, + Fled and pursued transverse the resonant fugue." + _Par. Lost_, Bk. XI. + +_Tumultuosissimamente_ + + +Passion of sudden death! that once in youth I read and interpreted by +the shadows of thy averted signs [Footnote: "_Averted signs_":--I read +the course and changes of the lady's agony in the succession of her +involuntary gestures; but it must be remembered that I read all this +from the rear, never once catching the lady's full face, and even her +profile imperfectly.]!--rapture of panic taking the shape (which +amongst tombs in churches I have seen) of woman bursting her sepulchral +bonds--of woman's Ionic form bending forward from the ruins of her +grave with arching foot, with eyes upraised, with clasped adoring +hands--waiting, watching, trembling, praying for the trumpet's call to +rise from dust for ever! Ah, vision too fearful of shuddering humanity +on the brink of almighty abysses!--vision that didst start back, that +didst reel away, like a shrivelling scroll from before the wrath of fire +racing on the wings of the wind! Epilepsy so brief of horror, wherefore +is it that thou canst not die? Passing so suddenly into darkness, +wherefore is it that still thou sheddest thy sad funeral blights upon +the gorgeous mosaics of dreams? Fragment of music too passionate, heard +once, and heard no more, what aileth thee, that thy deep rolling chords +come up at intervals through all the worlds of sleep, and after forty +years have lost no element of horror? + + +I + + +Lo, it is summer--almighty summer! The everlasting gates of life and +summer are thrown open wide; and on the ocean, tranquil and verdant as +a savannah, the unknown lady from the dreadful vision and I myself are +floating--she upon a fairy pinnace, and I upon an English three-decker. +Both of us are wooing gales of festal happiness within the domain of +our common country, within that ancient watery park, within the pathless +chase of ocean, where England takes her pleasure as a huntress through +winter and summer, from the rising to the setting sun. Ah, what a +wilderness of floral beauty was hidden, or was suddenly revealed, upon +the tropic islands through which the pinnace moved! And upon her deck +what a bevy of human flowers: young women how lovely, young men how +noble, that were dancing together, and slowly drifting towards _us_ +amidst music and incense, amidst blossoms from forests and gorgeous +corymbi from vintages, amidst natural carolling, and the echoes of sweet +girlish laughter. Slowly the pinnace nears us, gaily she hails us, and +silently she disappears beneath the shadow of our mighty bows. But then, +as at some signal from heaven, the music, and the carols, and the sweet +echoing of girlish laughter--all are hushed. What evil has smitten the +pinnace, meeting or overtaking her? Did ruin to our friends couch within +our own dreadful shadow? Was our shadow the shadow of death? I looked +over the bow for an answer, and, behold! the pinnace was dismantled; the +revel and the revellers were found no more; the glory of the vintage was +dust; and the forests with their beauty were left without a witness upon +the seas. "But where," and I turned to our crew--"where are the lovely +women that danced beneath the awning of flowers and clustering corymbi? +Whither have fled the noble young men that danced with _them_?" Answer +there was none. But suddenly the man at the mast-head, whose countenance +darkened with alarm, cried out, "Sail on the weather beam! Down she +comes upon us: in seventy seconds she also will founder." + + +II + + +I looked to the weather side, and the summer had departed. The sea was +rocking, and shaken with gathering wrath. Upon its surface sat mighty +mists, which grouped themselves into arches and long cathedral aisles. +Down one of these, with the fiery pace of a quarrel from a cross-bow, +ran a frigate right athwart our course. "Are they mad?" some voice +exclaimed from our deck. "Do they woo their ruin?" But in a moment, as +she was close upon us, some impulse of a heady current or local vortex +gave a wheeling bias to her course, and off she forged without a shock. +As she ran past us, high aloft amongst the shrouds stood the lady of +the pinnace. The deeps opened ahead in malice to receive her, towering +surges of foam ran after her, the billows were fierce to catch her. But +far away she was borne into desert spaces of the sea: whilst still by +sight I followed her, as she ran before the howling gale, chased by +angry sea-birds and by maddening billows; still I saw her, as at the +moment when she ran past us, standing amongst the shrouds, with her +white draperies streaming before the wind. There she stood, with hair +dishevelled, one hand clutched amongst the tackling--rising, sinking, +fluttering, trembling, praying; there for leagues I saw her as she +stood, raising at intervals one hand to heaven, amidst the fiery crests +of the pursuing waves and the raving of the storm; until at last, upon +a sound from afar of malicious laughter and mockery, all was hidden for +ever in driving showers; and afterwards, but when I knew not, nor how. + + +III + + +Sweet funeral bells from some incalculable distance, wailing over the +dead that die before the dawn, awakened me as I slept in a boat moored +to some familiar shore. The morning twilight even then was breaking; +and, by the dusky revelations which it spread, I saw a girl, adorned +with a garland of white roses about her head for some great festival, +running along the solitary strand in extremity of haste. Her running +was the running of panic; and often she looked back as to some dreadful +enemy in the rear. But, when I leaped ashore, and followed on her steps +to warn her of a peril in front, alas! from me she fled as from another +peril, and vainly I shouted to her of quicksands that lay ahead. Faster +and faster she ran; round a promontory of rocks she wheeled out of +sight; in an instant I also wheeled round it, but only to see the +treacherous sands gathering above her head. Already her person was +buried; only the fair young head and the diadem of white roses around it +were still visible to the pitying heavens; and, last of all, was visible +one white marble arm. I saw by the early twilight this fair young head, +as it was sinking down to darkness--saw this marble arm, as it rose +above her head and her treacherous grave, tossing, faltering, rising, +clutching, as at some false deceiving hand stretched out from the +clouds--saw this marble arm uttering her dying hope, and then uttering +her dying despair. The head, the diadem, the arm--these all had sunk; at +last over these also the cruel quicksand had closed; and no memorial of +the fair young girl remained on earth, except my own solitary tears, and +the funeral bells from the desert seas, that, rising again more softly, +sang a requiem over the grave of the buried child, and over her blighted +dawn. + +I sat, and wept in secret the tears that men have ever given to the +memory of those that died before the dawn, and by the treachery of +earth, our mother. But suddenly the tears and funeral bells were hushed +by a shout as of many nations, and by a roar as from some great king's +artillery, advancing rapidly along the valleys, and heard afar by echoes +from the mountains. "Hush!" I said, as I bent my ear earthwards to +listen--"hush!--this either is the very anarchy of strife, or else"--and +then I listened more profoundly, and whispered as I raised my head--"or +else, oh heavens! it is _victory_ that is final, victory that swallows +up all strife." + + +IV + + +Immediately, in trance, I was carried over land and sea to some distant +kingdom, and placed upon a triumphal car, amongst companions crowned +with laurel. The darkness of gathering midnight, brooding over all the +land, hid from us the mighty crowds that were weaving restlessly about +ourselves as a centre: we heard them, but saw them not. Tidings had +arrived, within an hour, of a grandeur that measured itself against +centuries; too full of pathos they were, too full of joy, to utter +themselves by other language than by tears, by restless anthems, and +_Te Deums_ reverberated from the choirs and orchestras of earth. These +tidings we that sat upon the laurelled car had it for our privilege to +publish amongst all nations. And already, by signs audible through the +darkness, by snortings and tramplings, our angry horses, that knew no +fear or fleshly weariness, upbraided us with delay. Wherefore _was_ it +that we delayed? We waited for a secret word, that should bear witness +to the hope of nations as now accomplished for ever. At midnight +the secret word arrived; which word was--_Waterloo and Recovered +Christendom!_ The dreadful word shone by its own light; before us it +went; high above our leaders' heads it rode, and spread a golden light +over the paths which we traversed. Every city, at the presence of the +secret word, threw open its gates. The rivers were conscious as we +crossed. All the forests, as we ran along their margins, shivered in +homage to the secret word. And the darkness comprehended it. + +Two hours after midnight we approached a mighty Minster. Its gates, +which rose to the clouds, were closed. But, when the dreadful word that +rode before us reached them with its golden light, silently they moved +back upon their hinges; and at a flying gallop our equipage entered the +grand aisle of the cathedral. Headlong was our pace; and at every altar, +in the little chapels and oratories to the right hand and left of our +course, the lamps, dying or sickening, kindled anew in sympathy with the +secret word that was flying past. Forty leagues we might have run in the +cathedral, and as yet no strength of morning light had reached us, when +before us we saw the aerial galleries of organ and choir. Every pinnacle +of fretwork, every station of advantage amongst the traceries, was +crested by white-robed choristers that sang deliverance; that wept no +more tears, as once their fathers had wept; but at intervals that sang +together to the generations, saying, + + "Chant the deliverer's praise in every tongue," + +and receiving answers from afar, + + "Such as once in heaven and earth were sung." + +And of their chanting was no end; of our headlong pace was neither pause +nor slackening. + +Thus as we ran like torrents--thus as we swept with bridal rapture over +the Campo Santo [Footnote: "_Campo Santo_":--It is probable that most +of my readers will be acquainted with the history of the Campo Santo (or +cemetery) at Pisa, composed of earth brought from Jerusalem from a bed +of sanctity as the highest prize which the noble piety of crusaders +could ask or imagine. To readers who are unacquainted with England, or +who (being English) are yet unacquainted with the cathedral cities of +England, it may be right to mention that the graves within-side the +cathedrals often form a flat pavement over which carriages and horses +_might_ run; and perhaps a boyish remembrance of one particular +cathedral, across which I had seen passengers walk and burdens carried, +as about two centuries back they were through the middle of St. +Paul's in London, may have assisted my dream.] of the cathedral +graves--suddenly we became aware of a vast necropolis rising upon +the far-off horizon--a city of sepulchres, built within the saintly +cathedral for the warrior dead that rested from their feuds on earth. Of +purple granite was the necropolis; yet, in the first minute, it lay +like a purple stain upon the horizon, so mighty was the distance. In the +second minute it trembled through many changes, growing into terraces +and towers of wondrous altitude, so mighty was the pace. In the third +minute already, with our dreadful gallop, we were entering its suburbs. +Vast sarcophagi rose on every side, having towers and turrets that, upon +the limits of the central aisle, strode forward with haughty intrusion, +that ran back with mighty shadows into answering recesses. Every +sarcophagus showed many bas-reliefs--bas-reliefs of battles and of +battle-fields; battles from forgotten ages, battles from yesterday; +battle-fields that, long since, nature had healed and reconciled to +herself with the sweet oblivion of flowers; battle-fields that were yet +angry and crimson with carnage. Where the terraces ran, there did _we_ +run; where the towers curved, there did _we_ curve. With the flight +of swallows our horses swept round every angle. Like rivers in flood +wheeling round headlands, like hurricanes that ride into the secrets of +forests, faster than ever light unwove the mazes of darkness, our flying +equipage carried earthly passions, kindled warrior instincts, amongst +the dust that lay around us--dust oftentimes of our noble fathers that +had slept in God from Crecy to Trafalgar. And now had we reached the +last sarcophagus, now were we abreast of the last bas-relief, already +had we recovered the arrow-like flight of the illimitable central aisle, +when coming up this aisle to meet us we beheld afar off a female child, +that rode in a carriage as frail as flowers. The mists which went before +her hid the fawns that drew her, but could not hide the shells and +tropic flowers with which she played--but could not hide the lovely +smiles by which she uttered her trust in the mighty cathedral, and in +the cherubim that looked down upon her from the mighty shafts of its +pillars. Face to face she was meeting us; face to face she rode, as +if danger there were none. "Oh, baby!" I exclaimed, "shalt thou be the +ransom for Waterloo? Must we, that carry tidings of great joy to every +people, be messengers of ruin to thee!" In horror I rose at the thought; +but then also, in horror at the thought, rose one that was sculptured +on a bas-relief--a Dying Trumpeter. Solemnly from the field of battle he +rose to his feet; and, unslinging his stony trumpet, carried it, in his +dying anguish, to his stony lips--sounding once, and yet once again; +proclamation that, in _thy_ ears, oh baby! spoke from the battlements of +death. Immediately deep shadows fell between us, and aboriginal silence. +The choir had ceased to sing. The hoofs of our horses, the dreadful +rattle of our harness, the groaning of our wheels, alarmed the graves +no more. By horror the bas-relief had been unlocked unto life. By horror +we, that were so full of life, we men and our horses, with their fiery +fore-legs rising in mid air to their everlasting gallop, were frozen +to a bas-relief. Then a third time the trumpet sounded; the seals were +taken off all pulses; life, and the frenzy of life, tore into their +channels again; again the choir burst forth in sunny grandeur, as from +the muffling of storms and darkness; again the thunderings of our horses +carried temptation into the graves. One cry burst from our lips, as the +clouds, drawing off from the aisle, showed it empty before us.--"Whither +has the infant fled?--is the young child caught up to God?" Lo! afar +off, in a vast recess, rose three mighty windows to the clouds; and on a +level with their summits, at height insuperable to man, rose an altar of +purest alabaster. On its eastern face was trembling a crimson glory. +A glory was it from the reddening dawn that now streamed _through_ the +windows? Was it from the crimson robes of the martyrs painted _on_ the +windows? Was it from the bloody bas-reliefs of earth? There, suddenly, +within that crimson radiance, rose the apparition of a woman's head, and +then of a woman's figure. The child it was--grown up to woman's height. +Clinging to the horns of the altar, voiceless she stood--sinking, +rising, raving, despairing; and behind the volume of incense that, night +and day, streamed upwards from the altar, dimly was seen the fiery font, +and the shadow of that dreadful being who should have baptized her with +the baptism of death. But by her side was kneeling her better angel, +that hid his face with wings; that wept and pleaded for _her_; that +prayed when _she_ could _not_; that fought with Heaven by tears for +_her_ deliverance; which also, as he raised his immortal countenance +from his wings, I saw, by the glory in his eye, that from Heaven he had +won at last. + + +V + + +Then was completed the passion of the mighty fugue. The golden tubes of +the organ, which as yet had but muttered at intervals--gleaming amongst +clouds and surges of incense--threw up, as from fountains unfathomable, +columns of heart-shattering music. Choir and anti-choir were filling +fast with unknown voices. Thou also, Dying Trumpeter, with thy love +that was victorious, and thy anguish that was finishing, didst enter +the tumult; trumpet and echo--farewell love, and farewell anguish--rang +through the dreadful _sanctus_. Oh, darkness of the grave! that from the +crimson altar and from the fiery font wert visited and searched by the +effulgence in the angel's eye--were these indeed thy children? Pomps of +life, that, from the burials of centuries, rose again to the voice of +perfect joy, did ye indeed mingle with the festivals of Death? Lo! as I +looked back for seventy leagues through the mighty cathedral, I saw the +quick and the dead that sang together to God, together that sang to the +generations of man. All the hosts of jubilation, like armies that ride +in pursuit, moved with one step. Us, that, with laurelled heads, were +passing from the cathedral, they overtook, and, as with a garment, they +wrapped us round with thunders greater than our own. As brothers we +moved together; to the dawn that advanced, to the stars that fled; +rendering thanks to God in the highest--that, having hid His face +through one generation behind thick clouds of War, once again was +ascending, from the Campo Santo of Waterloo was ascending, in the +visions of Peace; rendering thanks for thee, young girl! whom having +overshadowed with His ineffable passion of death, suddenly did God +relent, suffered thy angel to turn aside His arm, and even in thee, +sister unknown! shown to me for a moment only to be hidden for ever, +found an occasion to glorify His goodness. A thousand times, amongst +the phantoms of sleep, have I seen thee entering the gates of the golden +dawn, with the secret word riding before thee, with the armies of the +grave behind thee,--seen thee sinking, rising, raving, despairing; a +thousand times in the worlds of sleep have I seen thee followed by +God's angel through storms, through desert seas, through the darkness +of quicksands, through dreams and the dreadful revelations that are in +dreams; only that at the last, with one sling of His victorious arm, He +might snatch thee back from ruin, and might emblazon in thy deliverance +the endless resurrections of His love! + + + + +JOAN OF ARC + + +[Footnote: "_Arc_":--Modern France, that should know a great +deal better than myself, insists that the name is not D'Arc--_i.e._, +of Arc--but _Darc_. Now it happens sometimes that, if a person whose +position guarantees his access to the best information will content +himself with gloomy dogmatism, striking the table with his fist, and +saying in a terrific voice, "It _is_ so, and there's an end of it," one +bows deferentially, and submits. But, if, unhappily for himself, won +by this docility, he relents too amiably into reasons and arguments, +probably one raises an insurrection against him that may never be +crushed; for in the fields of logic one can skirmish, perhaps, as well +as he. Had he confined himself to dogmatism, he would have intrenched +his position in darkness, and have hidden his own vulnerable points. +But coming down to base reasons he lets in light, and one sees where +to plant the blows. Now, the worshipful reason of modern France for +disturbing the old received spelling is that Jean Hordal, a descendant +of La Pucelle's brother, spelled the name _Darc_ in 1612. But what of +that? It is notorious that what small matter of spelling Providence had +thought fit to disburse amongst man in the seventeenth century was all +monopolised by printers; now, M. Hordal was _not_ a printer.] + + +What is to be thought of _her_? What is to be thought of the poor +shepherd girl from the hills and forests of Lorraine, that--like the +Hebrew shepherd boy from the hills and forests of Judea--rose suddenly +out of the quiet, out of the safety, out of the religious inspiration, +rooted in deep pastoral solitudes, to a station in the van of armies, +and to the more perilous station at the right hand of kings? The Hebrew +boy inaugurated his patriotic mission by an _act_, by a victorious +_act_, such as no man could deny. But so did the girl of Lorraine, if +we read her story as it was read by those who saw her nearest. Adverse +armies bore witness to the boy as no pretender; but so they did to the +gentle girl. Judged by the voices of all who saw them _from a station of +good will_, both were found true and loyal to any promises involved in +their first acts. Enemies it was that made the difference between +their subsequent fortunes. The boy rose to a splendour and a noonday +prosperity, both personal and public, that rang through the records +of his people, and became a byword among his posterity for a thousand +years, until the sceptre was departing from Judah. The poor, forsaken +girl, on the contrary, drank not herself from that cup of rest which she +had secured for France. She never sang together with the songs that rose +in her native Domremy as echoes to the departing steps of invaders. +She mingled not in the festal dances at Vaucouleurs which celebrated in +rapture the redemption of France. No! for her voice was then silent; no! +for her feet were dust. Pure, innocent, noble-hearted girl! whom, from +earliest youth, ever I believed in as full of truth and self-sacrifice, +this was amongst the strongest pledges for _thy_ truth, that never +once--no, not for a moment of weakness--didst thou revel in the vision +of coronets and honour from man. Coronets for thee! Oh, no! Honours, +if they come when all is over, are for those that share thy blood. +[Footnote: "_Those that share thy blood_":--A collateral relative of +Joanna's was subsequently ennobled by the title of _Du Lys_.] Daughter +of Domremy, when the gratitude of thy king shall awaken, thou wilt be +sleeping the sleep of the dead. Call her, King of France, but she will +not hear thee. Cite her by the apparitors to come and receive a robe +of honour, but she will be found _en contumace_. When the thunders of +universal France, as even yet may happen, shall proclaim the grandeur of +the poor shepherd girl that gave up all for her country, thy ear, young +shepherd girl, will have been deaf for five centuries. To suffer and to +do, that was thy portion in this life; that was thy destiny; and not for +a moment was it hidden from thyself. Life, thou saidst, is short; +and the sleep which is in the grave is long; let me use that life, so +transitory, for the glory of those heavenly dreams destined to comfort +the sleep which is so long! This pure creature--pure from every +suspicion of even a visionary self-interest, even as she was pure +in senses more obvious--never once did this holy child, as regarded +herself, relax from her belief in the darkness that was travelling to +meet her. She might not prefigure the very manner of her death; she saw +not in vision, perhaps, the aerial altitude of the fiery scaffold, +the spectators without end, on every road, pouring into Rouen as to a +coronation, the surging smoke, the volleying flames, the hostile faces +all around, the pitying eye that lurked but here and there, until nature +and imperishable truth broke loose from artificial restraints--these +might not be apparent through the mists of the hurrying future. But the +voice that called her to death, _that_ she heard for ever. + +Great was the throne of France even in those days, and great was He that +sat upon it; but well Joanna knew that not the throne, nor he that sat +upon it, was for _her_; but, on the contrary, that she was for _them_; +not she by them, but they by her, should rise from the dust. Gorgeous +were the lilies of France, and for centuries had the privilege to spread +their beauty over land and sea, until, in another century, the wrath +of God and man combined to wither them; but well Joanna knew, early at +Domremy she had read that bitter truth, that the lilies of France would +decorate no garland for _her_. Flower nor bud, bell nor blossom, would +ever bloom for _her_! + + * * * * * + +But stay. What reason is there for taking up this subject of Joanna +precisely in the spring of 1847? Might it not have been left till the +spring of 1947, or, perhaps, left till called for? Yes, but it _is_ +called for, and clamorously. You are aware, reader, that amongst the +many original thinkers whom modern France has produced, one of the +reputed leaders is M. Michelet. All these writers are of a revolutionary +cast; not in a political sense merely, but in all senses; mad, +oftentimes, as March hares; crazy with the laughing gas of recovered +liberty; drunk with the wine cup of their mighty Revolution, snorting, +whinnying, throwing up their heels, like wild horses in the boundless +pampas, and running races of defiance with snipes, or with the winds, or +with their own shadows, if they can find nothing else to challenge. Some +time or other, I, that have leisure to read, may introduce _you_, that +have not, to two or three dozen of these writers; of whom I can assure +you beforehand that they are often profound, and at intervals are even +as impassioned as if they were come of our best English blood. But now, +confining our attention to M. Michelet, we in England--who know him +best by his worst book, the book against priests, etc.--know him +disadvantageously. That book is a rhapsody of incoherence. But his +"History of France" is quite another thing. A man, in whatsoever craft +he sails, cannot stretch away out of sight when he is linked to the +windings of the shore by towing-ropes of History. Facts, and the +consequences of facts, draw the writer back to the falconer's lure +from the giddiest heights of speculation. Here, therefore--in his +"France"--if not always free from flightiness, if now and then off like +a rocket for an airy wheel in the clouds, M. Michelet, with natural +politeness, never forgets that he has left a large audience waiting +for him on earth, and gazing upward in anxiety for his return; return, +therefore, he does. But History, though clear of certain temptations in +one direction, has separate dangers of its own. It is impossible so to +write a history of France, or of England--works becoming every hour +more indispensable to the inevitably political man of this day--without +perilous openings for error. If I, for instance, on the part of England, +should happen to turn my labours into that channel, and (on the model of +Lord Percy going to Chevy Chase) + + "A vow to God should make + My pleasure in the Michelet woods + Three summer days to take," + +probably, from simple delirium, I might hunt M. Michelet into _delirium +tremens_. Two strong angels stand by the side of History, whether French +history or English, as heraldic supporters: the angel of research on +the left hand, that must read millions of dusty parchments, and of pages +blotted with lies; the angel of meditation on the right hand, that must +cleanse these lying records with fire, even as of old the draperies of +_asbestos_ were cleansed, and must quicken them into regenerated life. +Willingly I acknowledge that no man will ever avoid innumerable errors +of detail; with so vast a compass of ground to traverse, this is +impossible; but such errors (though I have a bushel on hand, at M. +Michelet's service) are not the game I chase; it is the bitter and +unfair spirit in which M. Michelet writes against England. Even _that_, +after all, is but my secondary object; the real one is Joanna, the +Pucelle d'Orleans herself. + +I am not going to write the history of La Pucelle: to do this, or even +circumstantially to report the history of her persecution and bitter +death, of her struggle with false witnesses and with ensnaring judges, +it would be necessary to have before us _all_ the documents, and +therefore the collection only now forthcoming in Paris. [Footnote: +"_Only now forthcoming_":--In 1847 _began_ the publication (from +official records) of Joanna's trial. It was interrupted, I fear, by the +convulsions of 1848; and whether even yet finished I do not know.] But +_my_ purpose is narrower. There have been great thinkers, disdaining the +careless judgments of contemporaries, who have thrown themselves boldly +on the judgment of a far posterity, that should have had time to review, +to ponder, to compare. There have been great actors on the stage of +tragic humanity that might, with the same depth of confidence, have +appealed from the levity of compatriot friends--too heartless for the +sublime interest of their story, and too impatient for the labour of +sifting its perplexities--to the magnanimity and justice of enemies. To +this class belongs the Maid of Arc. The ancient Romans were too faithful +to the ideal of grandeur in themselves not to relent, after a generation +or two, before the grandeur of Hannibal. Mithridates, a more doubtful +person, yet, merely for the magic perseverance of his indomitable +malice, won from the same Romans the only real honour that ever he +received on earth. And we English have ever shown the same homage to +stubborn enmity. To work unflinchingly for the ruin of England; to say +through life, by word and by deed, _Delenda est Anglia Victrix_!--that +one purpose of malice, faithfully pursued, has quartered some people +upon our national funds of homage as by a perpetual annuity. Better +than an inheritance of service rendered to England herself has sometimes +proved the most insane hatred to England. Hyder Ali, even his son +Tippoo, though so far inferior, and Napoleon, have all benefited by this +disposition among ourselves to exaggerate the merit of diabolic enmity. +Not one of these men was ever capable, in a solitary instance, of +praising an enemy (what do you say to _that_, reader?); and yet in +_their_ behalf, we consent to forget, not their crimes only, but (which +is worse) their hideous bigotry and anti-magnanimous egotism--for +nationality it was not. Suffren, and some half dozen of other French +nautical heroes, because rightly they did us all the mischief they could +(which was really great), are names justly reverenced in England. On the +same principle, La Pucelle d'Orleans, the victorious enemy of England, +has been destined to receive her deepest commemoration from the +magnanimous justice of Englishmen. + +Joanna, as we in England should call her, but according to her +own statement, Jeanne (or, as M. Michelet asserts, Jean [Footnote: +"_Jean_":--M. Michelet asserts that there was a mystical meaning at that +era in calling a child _Jean_; it implied a secret commendation of a +child, if not a dedication, to St. John the evangelist, the beloved +disciple, the apostle of love and mysterious visions. But, really, as +the name was so exceedingly common, few people will detect a mystery in +calling a _boy_ by the name of Jack, though it _does_ seem mysterious +to call a girl Jack. It may be less so in France, where a beautiful +practice has always prevailed of giving a boy his mother's +name--preceded and strengthened by a male name, as _Charles Anne_, +_Victor Victoire_. In cases where a mother's memory has been unusually +dear to a son, this vocal memento of her, locked into the circle of +his own name, gives to it the tenderness of a testamentary relic, or a +funeral ring. I presume, therefore, that La Pucelle must have borne the +baptismal name of Jeanne Jean; the latter with no reference, perhaps, +to so sublime a person as St. John, but simply to some relative.]) D'Arc +was born at Domremy, a village on the marches of Lorraine and Champagne, +and dependent upon the town of Vaucouleurs. I have called her a +Lorrainer, not simply because the word is prettier, but because +Champagne too odiously reminds us English of what are for _us_ imaginary +wines--which, undoubtedly, La Pucelle tasted as rarely as we English: we +English, because the champagne of London is chiefly grown in Devonshire; +La Pucelle, because the champagne of Champagne never, by any chance, +flowed into the fountain of Domremy, from which only she drank. M. +Michelet will have her to be a _Champenoise_, and for no better +reason than that she "took after her father," who happened to be a +_Champenois_. + +These disputes, however, turn on refinements too nice. Domremy stood +upon the frontiers, and, like other frontiers, produced a _mixed_ race, +representing the _cis_ and the _trans_. A river (it is true) formed the +boundary line at this point--the river Meuse; and _that_, in old days, +might have divided the populations; but in these days it did not; there +were bridges, there were ferries, and weddings crossed from the right +bank to the left. Here lay two great roads, not so much for travellers +that were few, as for armies that were too many by half. These two +roads, one of which was the great highroad between France and Germany, +_decussated_ at this very point; which is a learned way of saying that +they formed a St. Andrew's Cross, or letter X. I hope the compositor +will choose a good large X; in which case the point of intersection, the +_locus_ of conflux and intersection for these four diverging arms, +will finish the reader's geographical education, by showing him to a +hair's-breadth where it was that Domremy stood. These roads, so grandly +situated, as great trunk arteries between two mighty realms,[Footnote: +And reminding one of that inscription, so justly admired by Paul +Richter, which a Russian Czarina placed on a guide-post near Moscow: +_This is the road that leads to Constantinople._] and haunted for ever +by wars or rumours of wars, decussated (for anything I know to the +contrary) absolutely under Joanna's bedroom window; one rolling away +to the right, past M. D'Arc's old barn, and the other unaccountably +preferring to sweep round that odious man's pig-sty to the left. + +On whichever side of the border chance had thrown Joanna, the same love +to France would have been nurtured. For it is a strange fact, noticed +by M. Michelet and others, that the Dukes of Bar and Lorraine had for +generations pursued the policy of eternal warfare with France on their +own account, yet also of eternal amity and league with France in case +anybody else presumed to attack her. Let peace settle upon France, and +before long you might rely upon seeing the little vixen Lorraine flying +at the throat of France. Let France be assailed by a formidable enemy, +and instantly you saw a Duke of Lorraine insisting on having his own +throat cut in support of France; which favour accordingly was cheerfully +granted to him in three great successive battles: twice by the English, +viz., at Crecy and Agincourt, once by the Sultan at Nicopolis. + +This sympathy with France during great eclipses, in those that during +ordinary seasons were always teasing her with brawls and guerilla +inroads, strengthened the natural piety to France of those that were +confessedly the children of her own house. The outposts of France, as +one may call the great frontier provinces, were of all localities the +most devoted to the Fleurs de Lys. To witness, at any great crisis, the +generous devotion to these lilies of the little fiery cousin that in +gentler weather was for ever tilting at the breast of France, could not +but fan the zeal of France's legitimate daughters; while to occupy +a post of honour on the frontiers against an old hereditary enemy of +France would naturally stimulate this zeal by a sentiment of martial +pride, by a sense of danger always threatening, and of hatred always +smouldering. That great four-headed road was a perpetual memento to +patriotic ardour. To say "This way lies the road to Paris, and that +other way to Aix-la-Chapelle; this to Prague, that to Vienna," nourished +the warfare of the heart by daily ministrations of sense. The eye that +watched for the gleams of lance or helmet from the hostile frontier, the +ear that listened for the groaning of wheels, made the highroad itself, +with its relations to centres so remote, into a manual of patriotic +duty. + +The situation, therefore, _locally_, of Joanna was full of profound +suggestions to a heart that listened for the stealthy steps of change +and fear that too surely were in motion. But, if the place were grand, +the time, the burden of the time, was far more so. The air overhead in +its upper chambers was _hurtling_ with the obscure sound; was dark with +sullen fermenting of storms that had been gathering for a hundred and +thirty years. The battle of Agincourt in Joanna's childhood had reopened +the wounds of France. Crecy and Poictiers, those withering overthrows +for the chivalry of France, had, before Agincourt occurred, been +tranquilised by more than half a century; but this resurrection of their +trumpet wails made the whole series of battles and endless skirmishes +take their stations as parts in one drama. The graves that had closed +sixty years ago seemed to fly open in sympathy with a sorrow that echoed +their own. The monarchy of France laboured in extremity, rocked and +reeled like a ship fighting with the darkness of monsoons. The madness +of the poor king (Charles VI), falling in at such a crisis, like the +case of women labouring in child-birth during the storming of a city, +trebled the awfulness of the time. Even the wild story of the incident +which had immediately occasioned the explosion of this madness--the case +of a man unknown, gloomy, and perhaps maniacal himself, coming out of a +forest at noonday, laying his hand upon the bridle of the king's horse, +checking him for a moment to say, "Oh, king, thou art betrayed," and +then vanishing, no man knew whither, as he had appeared for no man knew +what--fell in with the universal prostration of mind that laid France on +her knees, as before the slow unweaving of some ancient prophetic +doom. The famines, the extraordinary diseases, the insurrections of the +peasantry up and down Europe--these were chords struck from the same +mysterious harp; but these were transitory chords. There had been others +of deeper and more ominous sound. The termination of the Crusades, the +destruction of the Templars, the Papal interdicts, the tragedies caused +or suffered by the house of Anjou, and by the Emperor--these were full +of a more permanent significance. But, since then, the colossal figure +of feudalism was seen standing, as it were on tiptoe, at Crecy, for +flight from earth: that was a revolution unparalleled; yet _that_ was a +trifle by comparison with the more fearful revolutions that were +mining below the Church. By her own internal schisms, by the abominable +spectacle of a double Pope--so that no man, except through political +bias, could even guess which was Heaven's vicegerent, and which the +creature of Hell--the Church was rehearsing, as in still earlier forms +she had already rehearsed, those vast rents in her foundations which no +man should ever heal. + +These were the loftiest peaks of the cloudland in the skies that to +the scientific gazer first caught the colors of the _new_ morning in +advance. But the whole vast range alike of sweeping glooms overhead +dwelt upon all meditative minds, even upon those that could not +distinguish the tendencies nor decipher the forms. It was, therefore, +not her own age alone, as affected by its immediate calamities, that lay +with such weight upon Joanna's mind, but her own age as one section in +a vast mysterious drama, unweaving through a century back, and drawing +nearer continually to some dreadful crisis. Cataracts and rapids were +heard roaring ahead; and signs were seen far back, by help of old men's +memories, which answered secretly to signs now coming forward on the +eye, even as locks answer to keys. It was not wonderful that in such a +haunted solitude, with such a haunted heart, Joanna should see angelic +visions, and hear angelic voices. These voices whispered to her for ever +the duty, self-imposed, of delivering France. Five years she listened +to these monitory voices with internal struggles. At length she could +resist no longer. Doubt gave way; and she left her home for ever in +order to present herself at the dauphin's court. The education of this +poor girl was mean according to the present standard: was ineffably +grand, according to a purer philosophic standard: and only not good for +our age because for us it would be unattainable. She read nothing, for +she could not read; but she had heard others read parts of the Roman +martyrology. She wept in sympathy with the sad "Misereres" of the Romish +Church; she rose to heaven with the glad triumphant "Te Deums" of Rome; +she drew her comfort and her vital strength from the rites of the same +Church. But, next after these spiritual advantages, she owed most to the +advantages of her situation. The fountain of Domremy was on the brink +of a boundless forest; and it was haunted to that degree by fairies that +the parish priest (_cure_) was obliged to read mass there once a year, +in order to keep them in any decent bounds. Fairies are important, even +in a statistical view: certain weeds mark poverty in the soil; fairies +mark its solitude. As surely as the wolf retires before cities does the +fairy sequester herself from the haunts of the licensed victualer. A +village is too much for her nervous delicacy; at most, she can tolerate +a distant view of a hamlet. We may judge, therefore, by the uneasiness +and extra trouble which they gave to the parson, in what strength the +fairies mustered at Domremy, and, by a satisfactory consequence, how +thinly sown with men and women must have been that region even in its +inhabited spots. But the forests of Domremy--those were the glories of +the land: for in them abode mysterious powers and ancient secrets +that towered into tragic strength. "Abbeys there were, and abbey +windows"--"like Moorish temples of the Hindoos"--that exercised even +princely power both in Lorraine and in the German Diets. These had their +sweet bells that pierced the forests for many a league at matins or +vespers, and each its own dreamy legend. Few enough, and scattered +enough, were these abbeys, so as in no degree to disturb the deep +solitude of the region; yet many enough to spread a network or awning +of Christian sanctity over what else might have seemed a heathen +wilderness. This sort of religious talisman being secured, a man the +most afraid of ghosts (like myself, suppose, or the reader) becomes +armed into courage to wander for days in their sylvan recesses. The +mountains of the Vosges, on the eastern frontier of France, have never +attracted much notice from Europe, except in 1813-14 for a few brief +months, when they fell within Napoleon's line of defence against the +Allies. But they are interesting for this among other features, that +they do not, like some loftier ranges, repel woods; the forests and the +hills are on sociable terms. "Live and let live" is their motto. +For this reason, in part, these tracts in Lorraine were a favourite +hunting-ground with the Carlovingian princes. About six hundred years +before Joanna's childhood, Charlemagne was known to have hunted there. +That, of itself, was a grand incident in the traditions of a forest or a +chase. In these vast forests, also, were to be found (if anywhere to +be found) those mysterious fawns that tempted solitary hunters into +visionary and perilous pursuits. Here was seen (if anywhere seen) that +ancient stag who was already nine hundred years old, but possibly a +hundred or two more, when met by Charlemagne; and the thing was put +beyond doubt by the inscription upon his golden collar. I believe +Charlemagne knighted the stag; and, if ever he is met again by a king, +he ought to be made an earl, or, being upon the marches of France, a +marquis. Observe, I don't absolutely vouch for all these things: my own +opinion varies. On a fine breezy forenoon I am audaciously sceptical; +but as twilight sets in my credulity grows steadily, till it becomes +equal to anything that could be desired. And I have heard candid +sportsmen declare that, outside of these very forests, they laughed +loudly at all the dim tales connected with their haunted solitudes, but, +on reaching a spot notoriously eighteen miles deep within them, they +agreed with Sir Roger de Coverley that a good deal might be said on both +sides. + +Such traditions, or any others that (like the stag) connect distant +generations with each other, are, for that cause, sublime; and the sense +of the shadowy, connected with such appearances that reveal themselves +or not according to circumstances, leaves a colouring of sanctity over +ancient forests, even in those minds that utterly reject the legend as a +fact. + +But, apart from all distinct stories of that order, in any solitary +frontier between two great empires--as here, for instance, or in the +desert between Syria and the Euphrates--there is an inevitable tendency, +in minds of any deep sensibility, to people the solitudes with phantom +images of powers that were of old so vast. Joanna, therefore, in her +quiet occupation of a shepherdess, would be led continually to brood +over the political condition of her country by the traditions of the +past no less than by the mementoes of the local present. + +M. Michelet, indeed, says that La Pucelle was not a shepherdess. I beg +his pardon; she was. What he rests upon I guess pretty well: it is the +evidence of a woman called Haumette, the most confidential friend of +Joanna. Now, she is a good witness, and a good girl, and I like her; for +she makes a natural and affectionate report of Joanna's ordinary life. +But still, however good she may be as a witness, Joanna is better; and +she, when speaking to the dauphin, calls herself in the Latin report +_Bergereta_. Even Haumette confesses that Joanna tended sheep in her +girlhood. And I believe that, if Miss Haumette were taking coffee along +with me this very evening (February 12, 1847)--in which there would be +no subject for scandal or for maiden blushes, because I am an intense +philosopher, and Miss H. would be hard upon 450 years old--she would +admit the following comment upon her evidence to be right. A +Frenchman, about forty years ago--M. Simond, in his "Travels"--mentions +accidentally the following hideous scene as one steadily observed and +watched by himself in chivalrous France not very long before the French +Revolution: A peasant was plowing; and the team that drew his plow was +a donkey and a woman. Both were regularly harnessed; both pulled alike. +This is bad enough; but the Frenchman adds that, in distributing his +lashes, the peasant was obviously desirous of being impartial; or, if +either of the yokefellows had a right to complain, certainly it was not +the donkey. Now, in any country where such degradation of females could +be tolerated by the state of manners, a woman of delicacy would shrink +from acknowledging, either for herself or her friend, that she had ever +been addicted to any mode of labour not strictly domestic; because, if +once owning herself a praedial servant, she would be sensible that this +confession extended by probability in the hearer's thoughts to the +having incurred indignities of this horrible kind. Haumette clearly +thinks it more dignified for Joanna to have been darning the stockings +of her horny-hoofed father, M. D'Arc, than keeping sheep, lest she might +then be suspected of having ever done something worse. But, luckily, +there was no danger of _that_: Joanna never was in service; and my +opinion is that her father should have mended his own stockings, since +probably he was the party to make the holes in them, as many a better +man than D'Arc does--meaning by _that_ not myself, because, though +probably a better man than D'Arc, I protest against doing anything of +the kind. If I lived even with Friday in Juan Fernandez, either Friday +must do all the darning, or else it must go undone. The better men that +I meant were the sailors in the British navy, every man of whom mends +his own stockings. Who else is to do it? Do you suppose, reader, that +the junior lords of the admiralty are under articles to darn for the +navy? + +The reason, meantime, for my systematic hatred of D'Arc is this: There +was a story current in France before the Revolution, framed to ridicule +the pauper aristocracy, who happened to have long pedigrees and short +rent rolls: viz., that a head of such a house, dating from the Crusades, +was overheard saying to his son, a Chevalier of St. Louis, "_Chevalier, +as-tu donne au cochon a manger_?" Now, it is clearly made out by the +surviving evidence that D'Arc would much have preferred continuing to +say, "_Ma fille, as-tu donne au cochon a manger_?" to saying, "_Pucelle +d'Orleans, as-tu sauve les fleurs-de-lys_?" There is an old English copy +of verses which argues thus: + + "If the man that turnips cries + Cry not when his father dies, + Then 'tis plain the man had rather + Have a turnip than his father." + +I cannot say that the logic of these verses was ever _entirely_ to my +satisfaction. I do not see my way through it as clearly as could be +wished. But I see my way most clearly through D'Arc; and the result +is--that he would greatly have preferred not merely a turnip to his +father, but the saving a pound or so of bacon to saving the Oriflamme of +France. + +It is probable (as M. Michelet suggests) that the title of Virgin or +Pucelle had in itself, and apart from the miraculous stories about +her, a secret power over the rude soldiery and partisan chiefs of that +period; for in such a person they saw a representative manifestation of +the Virgin Mary, who, in a course of centuries, had grown steadily upon +the popular heart. + +As to Joanna's supernatural detection of the dauphin (Charles VII) among +three hundred lords and knights, I am surprised at the credulity which +could ever lend itself to that theatrical juggle. Who admires more than +myself the sublime enthusiasm, the rapturous faith in herself, of this +pure creature? But I am far from admiring stage artifices which not La +Pucelle, but the court, must have arranged; nor can surrender myself +to the conjurer's legerdemain, such as may be seen every day for a +shilling. Southey's "Joan of Arc" was published in 1796. Twenty years +after, talking with Southey, I was surprised to find him still owning a +secret bias in favor of Joan, founded on her detection of the dauphin. +The story, for the benefit of the reader new to the case, was this: La +Pucelle was first made known to the dauphin, and presented to his +court, at Chinon; and here came her first trial. By way of testing +her supernatural pretensions, she was to find out the royal personage +amongst the whole ark of clean and unclean creatures. Failing in this +_coup d'essai_, she would not simply disappoint many a beating heart in +the glittering crowd that on different motives yearned for her success, +but she would ruin herself, and, as the oracle within had told her, +would, by ruining herself, ruin France. Our own Sovereign Lady Victoria +rehearses annually a trial not so severe in degree, but the same in +kind. She "pricks" for sheriffs. Joanna pricked for a king. But observe +the difference: our own Lady pricks for two men out of three; Joanna +for one man out of three hundred. Happy Lady of the Islands and the +Orient!--she _can_ go astray in her choice only by one-half: to the +extent of one-half she _must_ have the satisfaction of being right. +And yet, even with these tight limits to the misery of a boundless +discretion, permit me, Liege Lady, with all loyalty, to submit that now +and then you prick with your pin the wrong man. But the poor child from +Domremy, shrinking under the gaze of a dazzling court--not _because_ +dazzling (for in visions she had seen those that were more so), but +because some of them wore a scoffing smile on their features--how should +_she_ throw her line into so deep a river to angle for a king, where +many a gay creature was sporting that masqueraded as kings in dress! +Nay, even more than any true king would have done: for, in Southey's +version of the story, the dauphin says, by way of trying the virgin's +magnetic sympathy with royalty, + + "On the throne, + I the while mingling with the menial throng, + Some courtier shall be seated." + +This usurper is even crowned: "the jeweled crown shines on a menial's +head." But, really, that is "_un peu fort_"; and the mob of spectators +might raise a scruple whether our friend the jackdaw upon the throne, +and the dauphin himself, were not grazing the shins of treason. For +the dauphin could not lend more than belonged to him. According to the +popular notion, he had no crown for himself; consequently none to lend, +on any pretence whatever, until the consecrated Maid should take him to +Rheims. This was the _popular_ notion in France. But certainly it was +the dauphin's interest to support the popular notion, as he meant to use +the services of Joanna. For if he were king already, what was it that +she could do for him beyond Orleans? That is to say, what more than a +merely _military_ service could she render him? And, above all, if he +were king without a coronation, and without the oil from the sacred +ampulla, what advantage was yet open to him by celerity above his +competitor, the English boy? Now was to be a race for a coronation: he +that should win _that_ race carried the superstition of France along +with him: he that should first be drawn from the ovens of Rheims was +under that superstition baked into a king. + +La Pucelle, before she could be allowed to practise as a warrior, was +put through her manual and platoon exercise, as a pupil in divinity, at +the bar of six eminent men in wigs. According to Southey (v. 393, bk. +iii., in the original edition of his "Joan of Arc,") she "appalled the +doctors." It's not easy to do _that_: but they had some reason to +feel bothered, as that surgeon would assuredly feel bothered who, upon +proceeding to dissect a subject, should find the subject retaliating as +a dissector upon himself, especially if Joanna ever made the speech to +them which occupies v. 354-391, bk. iii. It is a double impossibility: +1st, because a piracy from Tindal's "Christianity as old as the +Creation"--a piracy _a parte ante_, and by three centuries; 2d, it is +quite contrary to the evidence on Joanna's trial. Southey's "Joan" of +A.D. 1796 (Cottle, Bristol) tells the doctors, among other secrets, +that she never in her life attended--1st, Mass; nor 2d, the Sacramental +Table; nor 3d, Confession. In the meantime, all this deistical +confession of Joanna's, besides being suicidal for the interest of her +cause, is opposed to the depositions upon _both_ trials. The very best +witness called from first to last deposes that Joanna attended these +rites of her Church even too often; was taxed with doing so; and, by +blushing, owned the charge as a fact, though certainly not as a fault. +Joanna was a girl of natural piety, that saw God in forests and hills +and fountains, but did not the less seek him in chapels and consecrated +oratories. + +This peasant girl was self-educated through her own natural +meditativeness. If the reader turns to that divine passage in "Paradise +Regained" which Milton has put into the mouth of our Saviour when first +entering the wilderness, and musing upon the tendency of those great +impulses growing within himself----- + + "Oh, what a multitude of thoughts at once + Awakened in me swarm, while I consider + What from within I feel myself, and hear + What from without comes often to my ears, + Ill sorting with my present state compared! + When I was yet a child, no childish play + To me was pleasing; all my mind was set + Serious to learn and know, and thence to do, + What might be public good; myself I thought + Born to that end----" + +he will have some notion of the vast reveries which brooded over the +heart of Joanna in early girlhood, when the wings were budding that +should carry her from Orleans to Rheims; when the golden chariot was +dimly revealing itself that should carry her from the kingdom of _France +Delivered_ to the Eternal Kingdom. + +It is not requisite for the honour of Joanna, nor is there in this place +room, to pursue her brief career of _action._ That, though wonderful, +forms the earthly part of her story; the spiritual part is the saintly +passion of her imprisonment, trial, and execution. It is unfortunate, +therefore, for Southey's "Joan of Arc" (which, however, should always +be regarded as a _juvenile_ effort), that precisely when her real glory +begins the poem ends. But this limitation of the interest grew, no +doubt, from the constraint inseparably attached to the law of epic +unity. Joanna's history bisects into two opposite hemispheres, and +both could not have been presented to the eye in one poem, unless by +sacrificing all unity of theme, or else by involving the earlier half, +as a narrative episode, in the latter; which, however, might have been +done, for it might have been communicated to a fellow-prisoner, or +a confessor, by Joanna herself. It is sufficient, as concerns _this_ +section of Joanna's life, to say that she fulfilled, to the height of +her promises, the restoration of the prostrate throne. France had become +a province of England, and for the ruin of both, if such a yoke could be +maintained. Dreadful pecuniary exhaustion caused the English energy to +droop; and that critical opening La Pucelle used with a corresponding +felicity of audacity and suddenness (that were in themselves portentous) +for introducing the wedge of French native resources, for rekindling the +national pride, and for planting the dauphin once more upon his feet. +When Joanna appeared, he had been on the point of giving up the struggle +with the English, distressed as they were, and of flying to the south of +France. She taught him to blush for such abject counsels. She liberated +Orleans, that great city, so decisive by its fate for the issue of the +war, and then beleaguered by the English with an elaborate application +of engineering skill unprecedented in Europe. Entering the city after +sunset on the 29th of April, she sang mass on Sunday, May 8th, for the +entire disappearance of the besieging force. On the 29th of June she +fought and gained over the English the decisive battle of Patay; on the +9th of July she took Troyes by a _coup-de-main_ from a mixed garrison +of English and Burgundians; on the 15th of that month she carried the +dauphin into Rheims; on Sunday the 17th she crowned him; and there she +rested from her labour of triumph. All that was to be _done_ she had now +accomplished; what remained was--to _suffer_. + +All this forward movement was her own; excepting one man, the whole +council was against her. Her enemies were all that drew power from +earth. Her supporters were her own strong enthusiasm, and the headlong +contagion by which she carried this sublime frenzy into the hearts of +women, of soldiers, and of all who lived by labour. Henceforward she +was thwarted; and the worst error that she committed was to lend the +sanction of her presence to counsels which she had ceased to approve. +But she had now accomplished the capital objects which her own visions +had dictated. These involved all the rest. Errors were now less +important; and doubtless it had now become more difficult for herself to +pronounce authentically what _were_ errors. The noble girl had achieved, +as by a rapture of motion, the capital end of clearing out a free space +around her sovereign, giving him the power to move his arms with effect, +and, secondly, the inappreciable end of winning for that sovereign +what seemed to all France the heavenly ratification of his rights, by +crowning him with the ancient solemnities. She had made it impossible +for the English now to step before her. They were caught in an +irretrievable blunder, owing partly to discord among the uncles of Henry +VI, partly to a want of funds, but partly to the very impossibility +which they believed to press with tenfold force upon any French attempt +to forestall theirs. They laughed at such a thought; and, while they +laughed, _she_ did it. Henceforth the single redress for the English +of this capital oversight, but which never _could_ have redressed it +effectually, was to vitiate and taint the coronation of Charles VII as +the work of a witch. That policy, and not malice (as M. Michelet is +so happy to believe), was the moving principle in the subsequent +prosecution of Joanna. Unless they unhinged the force of the first +coronation in the popular mind by associating it with power given from +hell, they felt that the sceptre of the invader was broken. + +But she, the child that, at nineteen, had wrought wonders so great for +France, was she not elated? Did she not lose, as men so often _have_ +lost, all sobriety of mind when standing upon the pinnacle of success so +giddy? Let her enemies declare. During the progress of her movement, and +in the centre of ferocious struggles, she had manifested the temper +of her feelings by the pity which she had everywhere expressed for +the suffering enemy. She forwarded to the English leaders a touching +invitation to unite with the French, as brothers, in a common crusade +against infidels--thus opening the road for a soldierly retreat. She +interposed to protect the captive or the wounded; she mourned over the +excesses of her countrymen; she threw herself off her horse to kneel by +the dying English soldier, and to comfort him with such ministrations, +physical or spiritual, as his situation allowed. "Nolebat," says the +evidence, "uti ense suo, aut quemquam interficere." She sheltered +the English that invoked her aid in her own quarters. She wept as she +beheld, stretched on the field of battle, so many brave enemies that had +died without confession. And, as regarded herself, her elation expressed +itself thus: on the day when she had finished her work, she wept; for +she knew that, when her _triumphal_ task was done, her end must be +approaching. Her aspirations pointed only to a place which seemed to her +more than usually full of natural piety, as one in which it would give +her pleasure to die. And she uttered, between smiles and tears, as +a wish that inexpressibly fascinated her heart, and yet was half +fantastic, a broken prayer that God would return her to the solitudes +from which he had drawn her, and suffer her to become a shepherdess once +more. It was a natural prayer, because nature has laid a necessity upon +every human heart to seek for rest and to shrink from torment. Yet, +again, it was a half-fantastic prayer, because, from childhood upward, +visions that she had no power to mistrust, and the voices which sounded +in her ear for ever, had long since persuaded her mind that for _her_ no +such prayer could be granted. Too well she felt that her mission must be +worked out to the end, and that the end was now at hand. All went wrong +from this time. She herself had created the _funds_ out of which the +French restoration should grow; but she was not suffered to witness +their development or their prosperous application. More than one +military plan was entered upon which she did not approve. But she still +continued to expose her person as before. Severe wounds had not taught +her caution. And at length, in a sortie from Compiegne (whether through +treacherous collusion on the part of her own friends is doubtful to this +day), she was made prisoner by the Burgundians, and finally surrendered +to the English. + +Now came her trial. This trial, moving of course under English +influence, was conducted in chief by the Bishop of Beauvais. He was +a Frenchman, sold to English interests, and hoping, by favour of the +English leaders, to reach the highest preferment. "Bishop that art, +Archbishop that shalt be, Cardinal that mayest be," were the words that +sounded continually in his ear; and doubtless a whisper of visions still +higher, of a triple crown, and feet upon the necks of kings, sometimes +stole into his heart. M. Michelet is anxious to keep us in mind that +this bishop was but an agent of the English. True. But it does not +better the case for his countryman that, being an accomplice in the +crime, making himself the leader in the persecution against the +helpless girl, he was willing to be all this in the spirit, and with +the conscious vileness of a cat's-paw. Never from the foundations of the +earth was there such a trial as this, if it were laid open in all +its beauty of defence and all its hellishness of attack. Oh, child of +France! shepherdess, peasant girl! trodden under foot by all around +thee, how I honour thy flashing intellect, quick as God's lightning, and +true as God's lightning to its mark, that ran before France and laggard +Europe by many a century, confounding the malice of the ensnarer, and +making dumb the oracles of falsehood! Is it not scandalous, is it not +humiliating to civilization, that, even at this day, France exhibits +the horrid spectacle of judges examining the prisoner against himself; +seducing him, by fraud, into treacherous conclusions against his own +head; using the terrors of their power for extorting confessions from +the frailty of hope; nay (which is worse), using the blandishments +of condescension and snaky kindness for thawing into compliances of +gratitude those whom they had failed to freeze into terror? Wicked +judges! barbarian jurisprudence!--that, sitting in your own conceit +on the summits of social wisdom, have yet failed to learn the first +principles of criminal justice--sit ye humbly and with docility at the +feet of this girl from Domremy, that tore your webs of cruelty into +shreds and dust. "Would you examine me as a witness against myself?" was +the question by which many times she defied their arts. Continually she +showed that their interrogations were irrelevant to any business before +the court, or that entered into the ridiculous charges against her. +General questions were proposed to her on points of casuistical +divinity; two-edged questions, which not one of themselves could have +answered, without, on the one side, landing himself in heresy (as then +interpreted), or, on the other, in some presumptuous expression of +self-esteem. Next came a wretched Dominican, that pressed her with an +objection, which, if applied to the Bible, would tax every one of its +miracles with unsoundness. The monk had the excuse of never having read +the Bible. M. Michelet has no such excuse; and it makes one blush +for him, as a philosopher, to find him describing such an argument +as "weighty," whereas it is but a varied expression of rude Mahometan +metaphysics. Her answer to this, if there were room to place the whole +in a clear light, was as shattering as it was rapid. Another thought to +entrap her by asking what language the angelic visitors of her solitude +had talked--as though heavenly counsels could want polyglot interpreters +for every word, or that God needed language at all in whispering +thoughts to a human heart. Then came a worse devil, who asked her +whether the Archangel Michael had appeared naked. Not comprehending the +vile insinuation, Joanna, whose poverty suggested to her simplicity that +it might be the _costliness_ of suitable robes which caused the demur, +asked them if they fancied God, who clothed the flowers of the valleys, +unable to find raiment for his servants. The answer of Joanna moves +a smile of tenderness, but the disappointment of her judges makes one +laugh exultingly. Others succeeded by troops, who upbraided her with +leaving her father; as if that greater Father, whom she believed herself +to have been serving, did not retain the power of dispensing with his +own rules, or had not said that for a less cause than martyrdom man and +woman should leave both father and mother. + +On Easter Sunday, when the trial had been long proceeding, the poor girl +fell so ill as to cause a belief that she had been poisoned. It was +not poison. Nobody had any interest in hastening a death so certain. M. +Michelet, whose sympathies with all feelings are so quick that one would +gladly see them always as justly directed, reads the case most truly. +Joanna had a twofold malady. She was visited by a paroxysm of the +complaint called _homesickness_. The cruel nature of her imprisonment, +and its length, could not but point her solitary thoughts, in darkness +and in chains (for chained she was), to Domremy. And the season, +which was the most heavenly period of the spring, added stings to this +yearning. That was one of her maladies--_nostalgia_, as medicine calls +it; the other was weariness and exhaustion from daily combats with +malice. She saw that everybody hated her and thirsted for her blood; +nay, many kind-hearted creatures that would have pitied her profoundly, +as regarded all political charges, had their natural feelings warped by +the belief that she had dealings with fiendish powers. She knew she was +to die; that was _not_ the misery! the misery was that this consummation +could not be reached without so much intermediate strife, as if she were +contending for some chance (where chance was none) of happiness, or were +dreaming for a moment of escaping the inevitable. Why, then, _did_ +she contend? Knowing that she would reap nothing from answering her +persecutors, why did she not retire by silence from the superfluous +contest? It was because her quick and eager loyalty to truth would not +suffer her to see it darkened by frauds which _she_ could expose, but +others, even of candid listeners, perhaps, could not; it was through +that imperishable grandeur of soul which taught her to submit meekly +and without a struggle to her punishment, but taught her _not_ +to submit--no, not for a moment--to calumny as to facts, or to +misconstruction as to motives. Besides, there were secretaries all +around the court taking down her words. That was meant for no good to +_her_. But the end does not always correspond to the meaning. And +Joanna might say to herself, "These words that will be used against me +to-morrow and the next day, perhaps, in some nobler generation, may rise +again for my justification." Yes, Joanna, they _are_ rising even now in +Paris, and for more than justification! + +Woman, sister, there are some things which you do not execute as well as +your brother, man; no, nor ever will. Pardon me if I doubt whether +you will ever produce a great poet from your choirs, or a Mozart, or +a Phidias, or a Michael Angelo, or a great philosopher, or a great +scholar. By which last is meant--not one who depends simply on an +infinite memory, but also on an infinite and electrical power of +combination; bringing together from the four winds, like the angel of +the resurrection, what else were dust from dead men's bones, into the +unity of breathing life. If you _can_ create yourselves into any of +these great creators, why have you not? + +Yet, sister woman, though I cannot consent to find a Mozart or a Michael +Angelo in your sex, cheerfully, and with the love that burns in depths +of admiration, I acknowledge that you can do one thing as well as the +best of us men--a greater thing than even Milton is known to have done, +or Michael Angelo; you can die grandly, and as goddesses would die, were +goddesses mortal. If any distant worlds (which _may_ be the case) are +so far ahead of us Tellurians in optical resources as to see distinctly +through their telescopes all that we do on earth, what is the grandest +sight to which we ever treat them? St. Peter's at Rome, do you fancy, +on Easter Sunday, or Luxor, or perhaps the Himalayas? Oh, no! my friend; +suggest something better; these are baubles to _them_; they see in other +worlds, in their own, far better toys of the same kind. These, take my +word for it, are nothing. Do you give it up? The finest thing, then, we +have to show them is a scaffold on the morning of execution. I assure +you there is a strong muster in those far telescopic worlds, on any +such morning, of those who happen to find themselves occupying the right +hemisphere for a peep at _us_. How, then, if it be announced in some +such telescopic world by those who make a livelihood of catching +glimpses at our newspapers, whose language they have long since +deciphered, that the poor victim in the morning's sacrifice is a woman? +How, if it be published in that distant world that the sufferer wears +upon her head, in the eyes of many, the garlands of martyrdom? How, if +it should be some Marie Antoinette, the widowed queen, coming forward on +the scaffold, and presenting to the morning air her head, turned gray by +sorrow--daughter of Caesars kneeling down humbly to kiss the guillotine, +as one that worships death? How, if it were the noble Charlotte Corday, +that in the bloom of youth, that with the loveliest of persons, that +with homage waiting upon her smiles wherever she turned her face to +scatter them--homage that followed those smiles as surely as the carols +of birds, after showers in spring, follow the reappearing sun and the +racing of sunbeams over the hills--yet thought all these things cheaper +than the dust upon her sandals, in comparison of deliverance from hell +for her dear suffering France! Ah! these were spectacles indeed for +those sympathising people in distant worlds; and some, perhaps, would +suffer a sort of martyrdom themselves, because they could not testify +their wrath, could not bear witness to the strength of love and to the +fury of hatred that burned within them at such scenes, could not +gather into golden urns some of that glorious dust which rested in the +catacombs of earth. + +On the Wednesday after Trinity Sunday in 1431, being then about nineteen +years of age, the Maid of Arc underwent her martyrdom. She was conducted +before mid-day, guarded by eight hundred spearmen, to a platform of +prodigious height, constructed of wooden billets supported by occasional +walls of lath and plaster, and traversed by hollow spaces in every +direction for the creation of air currents. The pile "struck terror," +says M. Michelet, "by its height"; and, as usual, the English purpose +in this is viewed as one of pure malignity. But there are two ways of +explaining all that. It is probable that the purpose was merciful. On +the circumstances of the execution I shall not linger. Yet, to mark the +almost fatal felicity of M. Michelet in finding out whatever may injure +the English name, at a moment when every reader will be interested +in Joanna's personal appearance, it is really edifying to notice the +ingenuity by which he draws into light from a dark corner a very unjust +account of it, and neglects, though lying upon the highroad, a very +pleasing one. Both are from English pens. Grafton, a chronicler, but +little read, being a stiff-necked John Bull, thought fit to say that +no wonder Joanna should be a virgin, since her "foule face" was a +satisfactory solution of that particular merit. Holinshead, on the other +hand, a chronicler somewhat later, every way more important, and at +one time universally read, has given a very pleasing testimony to the +interesting character of Joanna's person and engaging manners. Neither +of these men lived till the following century, so that personally this +evidence is none at all. Grafton sullenly and carelessly believed as +he wished to believe; Holinshead took pains to inquire, and reports +undoubtedly the general impression of France. But I cite the case +as illustrating M. Michelet's candour. [Footnote: Amongst the many +ebullitions of M. Michelet's fury against us poor English are four which +will be likely to amuse the reader; and they are the more conspicuous +in collision with the justice which he sometimes does us, and the very +indignant admiration which, under some aspects, he grants to us. 1. Our +English literature he admires with some gnashing of teeth. He pronounces +it "fine and sombre," but, I lament to add, "skeptical, Judaic, +Satanic--in a word, antichristian." That Lord Byron should figure as a +member of this diabolical corporation will not surprise men. It _will_ +surprise them to hear that Milton is one of its Satanic leaders. Many +are the generous and eloquent Frenchmen, besides Chateaubriand, who +have, in the course of the last thirty years, nobly suspended their own +burning nationality, in order to render a more rapturous homage at the +feet of Milton; and some of them have raised Milton almost to a level +with angelic natures. Not one of them has thought of looking for him +_below_ the earth. As to Shakspere, M. Michelet detects in him a most +extraordinary mare's nest. It is this: he does "not recollect to have +seen the name of God" in any part of his works. On reading such words, +it is natural to rub one's eyes, and suspect that all one has ever seen +in this world may have been a pure ocular delusion. In particular, I +begin myself to suspect that the word "_la gloire_" never occurs in any +Parisian journal. "The great English nation," says M. Michelet, "has one +immense profound vice"--to wit, "pride." Why, really, that may be true; +but we have a neighbour not absolutely clear of an "immense profound +vice," as like ours in colour and shape as cherry to cherry. In short, +M. Michelet thinks us, by fits and starts, admirable--only that we are +detestable; and he would adore some of our authors, were it not that so +intensely he could have wished to kick them. + +2. M. Michelet thinks to lodge an arrow in our sides by a very odd +remark upon Thomas a Kempis: which is, that a man of any conceivable +European blood--a Finlander, suppose, or a Zantiote--might have written +Tom; only not an Englishman. Whether an Englishman could have forged Tom +must remain a matter of doubt, unless the thing had been tried long ago. +That problem was intercepted for ever by Tom's perverseness in choosing +to manufacture himself. Yet, since nobody is better aware than M. +Michelet that this very point of Kempis _having_ manufactured Kempis is +furiously and hopelessly litigated, three or four nations claiming to +have forged his work for him, the shocking old doubt will raise +its snaky head once more--whether this forger, who rests in so much +darkness, might not, after all, be of English blood. Tom, it may be +feared, is known to modern English literature chiefly by an irreverent +mention of his name in a line of Peter Pindar's (Dr Wolcot) fifty years +back, where he is described as + + "Kempis Tom, + Who clearly shows the way to Kingdom Come" + +Few in these days can have read him, unless in the Methodist version of +John Wesley Among those few, however, happens to be myself, which arose +from the accident of having, when a boy of eleven, received a copy of +the "De Imitatione Christi" as a bequest from a relation who died +very young, from which cause, and from the external prettiness of +the book--being a Glasgow reprint by the celebrated Foulis, and gaily +bound--I was induced to look into it, and finally read it many times +over, partly out of some sympathy which, even in those days, I had with +its simplicity and devotional fervour, but much more from the savage +delight I found in laughing at Tom's Latinity that, I freely grant to M +Michelet, is inimitable. Yet, after all, it is not certain whether the +original _was_ Latin. But, however that may have been, if it is possible +that M Michelet [Footnote: "_If M. Michelet can be accurate_"--However, +on consideration, this statement does not depend on Michelet. The +bibliographer Barbier has absolutely _specified_ sixty in a separate +dissertation, _soixante traductions_ among those even that have not +escaped the search. The Italian translations are said to be thirty. As +to mere editions, not counting the early MSS. for half a century before +printing was introduced, those in Latin amount to 2000, and those in +French to 1000. Meantime it is very clear to me that this astonishing +popularity so entirely unparalleled in literature, could not have +existed except in Roman Catholic times, nor subsequently have lingered +in any Protestant land. It was the denial of Scripture fountains +to thirsty lands which made this slender rill of Scripture truth so +passionately welcome.] can be accurate in saying that there are no +less than sixty French versions (not editions, observe, but separate +versions) existing of the "De Imitatione," how prodigious must have +been the adaptation of the book to the religious heart of the fifteenth +century! Excepting the Bible, but excepting _that_ only in Protestant +lands, no book known to man has had the same distinction. It is the most +marvellous bibliographical fact on record. + +3. Our English girls, it seems, are as faulty in one way as we English +males in another. None of us men could have written the _Opera Omnia_ +of Mr. a Kempis; neither could any of our girls have assumed male attire +like La Pucelle. But why? Because, says Michelet, English girls and +German think so much of an indecorum. Well, that is a good fault, +generally speaking. But M. Michelet ought to have remembered a fact in +the martyrologies which justifies both parties--the French heroine for +doing, and the general choir of English girls for _not_ doing. A female +saint, specially renowned in France, had, for a reason as weighty as +Joanna's--viz., expressly to shield her modesty among men--worn a male +military harness. That reason and that example authorised La Pucelle; +but our English girls, as a body, have seldom any such reason, and +certainly no such saintly example, to plead. This excuses _them_. Yet, +still, if it is indispensable to the national character that our young +women should now and then trespass over the frontier of decorum, it then +becomes a patriotic duty in me to assure M. Michelet that we _have_ such +ardent females among us, and in a long series; some detected in naval +hospitals when too sick to remember their disguise; some on fields +of battle; multitudes never detected at all; some only suspected; and +others discharged without noise by war offices and other absurd +people. In our navy, both royal and commercial, and generally from deep +remembrances of slighted love, women have sometimes served in disguise +for many years, taking contentedly their daily allowance of +burgoo, biscuit, or cannon-balls--anything, in short, digestible or +indigestible, that it might please Providence to send. One thing, at +least, is to their credit: never any of these poor masks, with their +deep silent remembrances, have been detected through murmuring, or what +is nautically understood by "skulking." So, for once, M. Michelet has an +_erratum_ to enter upon the fly-leaf of his book in presentation copies. + +4. But the last of these ebullitions is the most lively. We English, at +Orleans, and after Orleans (which is not quite so extraordinary, if +all were told), fled before the Maid of Arc. Yes, says M. Michelet, you +_did_: deny it, if you can. Deny it, _mon cher_? I don't mean to +deny it. Running away, in many cases, is a thing so excellent that no +philosopher would, at times, condescend to adopt any other step. All of +us nations in Europe, without one exception, have shown our philosophy +in that way at times. Even people "_qui ne se rendent pas_" have deigned +both to run and to shout, "_Sauve qui peut_!" at odd times of sunset; +though, for my part, I have no pleasure in recalling unpleasant +remembrances to brave men; and yet, really, being so philosophic, they +ought _not_ to be unpleasant. But the amusing feature in M. Michelet's +reproach is the way in which he _improves_ and varies against us the +charge of running, as if he were singing a catch. Listen to him: They +"_showed their backs_" did these English. (Hip, hip, hurrah! three times +three!) "_Behind good walls they let themselves be taken_." (Hip, hip! +nine times nine!) They "_ran as fast as their legs could carry them_" +(Hurrah! twenty-seven times twenty-seven!) They "_ran before a girl_"; +they did. (Hurrah! eighty-one times eighty-one!) This reminds one of +criminal indictments on the old model in English courts, where (for fear +the prisoner should escape) the crown lawyer varied the charge perhaps +through forty counts. The law laid its guns so as to rake the accused +at every possible angle. While the indictment was reading, he seemed a +monster of crime in his own eyes; and yet, after all, the poor fellow +had but committed one offence, and not always _that_. N. B.--Not having +the French original at hand, I make my quotations from a friend's copy +of Mr. Walter Kelly's translation; which seems to me faithful, spirited, +and idiomatically English--liable, in fact, only to the single reproach +of occasional provincialisms.] + +The circumstantial incidents of the execution, unless with more space +than I can now command, I should be unwilling to relate. I should fear +to injure, by imperfect report, a martyrdom which to myself appears so +unspeakably grand. Yet, for a purpose, pointing not at Joanna, but at M. +Michelet--viz, to convince him that an Englishman is capable of thinking +more highly of La Pucelle than even her admiring countrymen--I shall, +in parting, allude to one or two traits in Joanna's demeanour on the +scaffold, and to one or two in that of the bystanders, which authorise +me in questioning an opinion of his upon this martyr's firmness. The +reader ought to be reminded that Joanna D'Arc was subjected to an +unusually unfair trial of opinion. Any of the elder Christian martyrs +had not much to fear of _personal_ rancour. The martyr was chiefly +regarded as the enemy of Caesar; at times, also, where any knowledge +of the Christian faith and morals existed, with the enmity that arises +spontaneously in the worldly against the spiritual. But the martyr, +though disloyal, was not supposed to be therefore anti-national; and +still less was _individually_ hateful. What was hated (if anything) +belonged to his class, not to himself separately. Now, Joanna, if hated +at all, was hated personally, and in Rouen on national grounds. Hence +there would be a certainty of calumny arising against _her_ such as +would not affect martyrs in general. That being the case, it would +follow of necessity that some people would impute to her a willingness +to recant. No innocence could escape _that_. Now, had she really +testified this willingness on the scaffold, it would have argued nothing +at all but the weakness of a genial nature shrinking from the instant +approach of torment. And those will often pity that weakness most who, +in their own persons, would yield to it least. Meantime, there never +was a calumny uttered that drew less support from the recorded +circumstances. It rests upon no _positive_ testimony, and it has a +weight of contradicting testimony to stem. And yet, strange to say, M, +Michelet, who at times seems to admire the Maid of Arc as much as I do, +is the one sole writer among her _friends_ who lends some countenance to +this odious slander. His words are that, if she did not utter this word +_recant_ with her lips, she uttered it in her heart. "Whether she _said_ +the word is uncertain; but I affirm that she _thought_ it." + +Now, I affirm that she did not; not in any sense of the word "_thought_" +applicable to the case. Here is France calumniating La Pucelle; here +is England defending her. M. Michelet can only mean that, on _a priori_ +principles, every woman must be presumed liable to such a weakness; that +Joanna was a woman; _ergo_, that she was liable to such a weakness. That +is, he only supposes her to have uttered the word by an argument which +presumes it impossible for anybody to have done otherwise. I, on the +contrary, throw the onus of the argument not on presumable tendencies of +nature, but on the known facts of that morning's execution, as recorded +by multitudes. What else, I demand, than mere weight of metal, absolute +nobility of deportment, broke the vast line of battle then arrayed +against her? What else but her meek, saintly demeanour won, from the +enemies that till now had believed her a witch, tears of rapturous +admiration? "Ten thousand men," says M. Michelet himself--"ten thousand +men wept"; and of these ten thousand the majority were political enemies +knitted together by cords of superstition. What else was it but her +constancy, united with her angelic gentleness, that drove the fanatic +English soldier--who had sworn to throw a fagot on her scaffold as _his_ +tribute of abhorrence, that _did_ so, that fulfilled his vow--suddenly +to turn away a penitent for life, saying everywhere that he had seen +a dove rising upon wings to heaven from the ashes where she had stood? +What else drove the executioner to kneel at every shrine for pardon to +_his_ share in the tragedy? And, if all this were insufficient, then I +cite the closing act of her life as valid on her behalf, were all other +testimonies against her. The executioner had been directed to apply his +torch from below. He did so. The fiery smoke rose upward in billowing +volumes. A Dominican monk was then standing almost at her side. Wrapped +up in his sublime office, he saw not the danger, but still persisted +in his prayers. Even then, when the last enemy was racing up the fiery +stairs to seize her, even at that moment did this noblest of girls think +only for _him_, the one friend that would not forsake her, and not +for herself; bidding him with her last breath to care for his own +preservation, but to leave _her_ to God. That girl, whose latest breath +ascended in this sublime expression of self-oblivion, did not utter the +word _recant_ either with her lips or in her heart. No; she did not, +though one should rise from the dead to swear it. + + * * * * * + +Bishop of Beauvais! thy victim died in fire upon a scaffold--thou upon +a down bed. But, for the departing minutes of life, both are oftentimes +alike. At the farewell crisis, when the gates of death are opening, and +flesh is resting from its struggles, oftentimes the tortured and the +torturer have the same truce from carnal torment; both sink together +into sleep; together both sometimes kindle into dreams. When the mortal +mists were gathering fast upon you two, bishop and shepherd girl--when +the pavilions of life were closing up their shadowy curtains about +you--let us try, through the gigantic glooms, to decipher the flying +features of your separate visions. + +The shepherd girl that had delivered France--she, from her dungeon, +she, from her baiting at the stake, she, from her duel with fire, as she +entered her last dream--saw Domremy, saw the fountain of Domremy, saw +the pomp of forests in which her childhood had wandered. That +Easter festival which man had denied to her languishing heart--that +resurrection of springtime, which the darkness of dungeons had +intercepted from _her_, hungering after the glorious liberty of +forests--were by God given back into her hands as jewels that had been +stolen from her by robbers. With those, perhaps (for the minutes of +dreams can stretch into ages), was given back to her by God the bliss +of childhood. By special privilege for _her_ might be created, in this +farewell dream, a second childhood, innocent as the first; but not, +like _that_, sad with the gloom of a fearful mission in the rear. This +mission had now been fulfilled. The storm was weathered; the skirts even +of that mighty storm were drawing off. The blood that she was to reckon +for had been exacted; the tears that she was to shed in secret had +been paid to the last. The hatred to herself in all eyes had been faced +steadily, had been suffered, had been survived. And in her last fight +upon the scaffold she had triumphed gloriously; victoriously she had +tasted the stings of death. For all, except this comfort from her +farewell dream, she had died--died amid the tears of ten thousand +enemies--died amid the drums and trumpets of armies--died amid peals +redoubling upon peals, volleys upon volleys, from the saluting clarions +of martyrs. + +Bishop of Beauvais! because the guilt-burdened man is in dreams haunted +and waylaid by the most frightful of his crimes, and because upon that +fluctuating mirror--rising (like the mocking mirrors of _mirage_ in +Arabian deserts) from the fens of death-most of all are reflected the +sweet countenances which the man has laid in ruins; therefore I know, +bishop, that you also, entering your final dream, saw Domremy. That +fountain, of which the witnesses spoke so much, showed itself to your +eyes in pure morning dews; but neither dews, nor the holy dawn, could +cleanse away the bright spots of innocent blood upon its surface. By +the fountain, bishop, you saw a woman seated, that hid her face. But, +as _you_ draw near, the woman raises her wasted features. Would Domremy +know them again for the features of her child? Ah, but _you_ know them, +bishop, well! Oh, mercy! what a groan was _that_ which the servants, +waiting outside the bishop's dream at his bedside, heard from his +labouring heart, as at this moment he turned away from the fountain and +the woman, seeking rest in the forests afar off. Yet not _so_ to escape +the woman, whom once again he must behold before he dies. In the forests +to which he prays for pity, will he find a respite? What a tumult, what +a gathering of feet is there! In glades where only wild deer should run +armies and nations are assembling; towering in the fluctuating crowd +are phantoms that belong to departed hours. There is the great English +Prince, Regent of France. There is my Lord of Winchester, the princely +cardinal, that died and made no sign. There is the bishop of Beauvais, +clinging to the shelter of thickets. What building is that which hands +so rapid are raising? Is it a martyr's scaffold? Will they burn the +child of Domremy a second time? No; it is a tribunal that rises to the +clouds; and two nations stand around it, waiting for a trial. Shall my +Lord of Beauvais sit again upon the judgment-seat, and again number the +hours for the innocent? Ah, no! he is the prisoner at the bar. Already +all is waiting: the mighty audience is gathered, the Court is hurrying +to their seats, the witnesses are arrayed, the trumpets are sounding, +the judge is taking his place. Oh, but this is sudden! My lord, have you +no counsel? "Counsel I have none; in heaven above, or on earth beneath, +counsellor there is none now that would take a brief from _me_: all +are silent." Is it, indeed, come to this? Alas! the time is short, the +tumult is wondrous, the crowd stretches away into infinity; but yet I +will search in it for somebody to take your brief; I know of somebody +that will be your counsel. Who is this that cometh from Domremy? Who is +she in bloody coronation robes from Rheims? Who is she that cometh with +blackened flesh from walking the furnaces of Rouen? This is she, the +shepherd girl, counsellor that had none for herself, whom I choose, +bishop, for yours. She it is, I engage, that shall take my lord's brief. +She it is, bishop, that would plead for you; yes, bishop, _she_--when +heaven and earth are silent. + + + + +NOTES + +THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH + + +"In October 1849 there appeared in _Blackwood's Magazine_ an article +entitled _The English Mail-Coach, or the Glory of Motion_. There was +no intimation that it was to be continued; but in December 1849 there +followed in the same magazine an article in two sections, headed by a +paragraph explaining that it was by the author of the previous article +in the October number, and was to be taken in connexion with that +article. One of the sections of this second article was entitled _The +Vision of Sudden Death_, and the other _Dream-Fugue on the above +theme of Sudden Death_. When De Quincey revised the papers in 1854 for +republication in volume iv of the Collective Edition of his writings, +he brought the whole under the one general title of _The English +Mail-Coach_, dividing the text, as at present, into three sections or +chapters, the first with the sub-title _The Glory of Motion_, the second +with the sub-title _The Vision of Sudden Death_, and the third with the +sub-title _Dream-Fugue, founded on the preceding theme of Sudden Death_. +Great care was bestowed on the revision. Passages that had appeared in +the magazine articles were omitted; new sentences were inserted; and +the language was retouched throughout."--MASSON. Cf. as to the revision, +Professor Dowden's article, "How De Quincey worked," _Saturday Review_, +Feb. 23, 1895. This selection is found in _Works_, Masson's ed., Vol. +XIII, pp. 270-327; Riverside ed., Vol. I, pp. 517-582. + +1 6 HE HAD MARRIED THE DAUGHTER OF A DUKE: "Mr. John Palmer, a native of +Bath, and from about 1768 the energetic proprietor of the Theatre Royal +in that city, had been led, by the wretched state in those days of +the means of intercommunication between Bath and London, wand his own +consequent difficulties in arranging for a punctual succession of good +actors at his theatre, to turn his attention to the improvement of the +whole system of Post-Office conveyance, and of locomotive machinery +generally, in the British Islands. The result was a scheme for +superseding, on the great roads at least, the then existing system of +sluggish and irregular stage-coaches, the property of private persons +and companies, by a new system of government coaches, in connexion +with the Post-Office, carrying the mails and also a regulated number of +passengers, with clockwork precision, at a rate of comparative speed, +which he hoped should ultimately be not less than ten miles an hour. The +opposition to the scheme was, of course, enormous; coach proprietors, +innkeepers, the Post-Office officials themselves, were all against +Mr. Palmer; he was voted a crazy enthusiast and a public bore. +Pitt, however, when the scheme was submitted to him, recognized its +feasibility; on the 8th of August 1784 the first mail-coach on Mr. +Palmer's plan started from London at 8 o'clock in the morning and +reached Bristol at 11 o'clock at night; and from that day the success of +the new system was assured.--Mr. Palmer himself, having been appointed +Surveyor and Comptroller-General of the Post-Office, took rank as an +eminent and wealthy public man, M. P. for Bath and what not, and lived +till 1818. De Quincey makes it one of his distinctions that he "had +married the daughter of a duke," and in a footnote to that paragraph he +gives the lady's name as "Lady Madeline Gordon." From an old Debrett, +however, I learn that Lady Madelina Gordon, second daughter of +Alexander, fourth Duke of Gordon, was first married, on the 3d of April +1789, to Sir Robert Sinclair, Bart., and next, on the 25th of November +1805, to _Charles Palmer, of Lockley Park, Berks, Esq._ If Debrett is +right, her second husband was not John Palmer of Mail-Coach celebrity, +and De Quincey is wrong."--MASSON. + +1 (footnote) INVENTION OF THE CROSS: Concerning the _Inventio sanctae +crucis_, see Smith, _Dictionary of Christian Antiquities_, Vol. I, p. +503. + +2 4 NATIONAL RESULT: Cf. De Quincey's paper on _Travelling, Works,_ +Riverside ed., Vol. II, especially pp. 313-314; Masson's ed., Vol. I, +especially pp. 270-271. + +3 13 THE FOUR TERMS OF MICHAELMAS, LENT, EASTER, AND ACT: These might +be called respectively the autumn, winter, spring, and summer terms. +Michaelmas, the feast of St. Michael and All Angels, is on September +29. Hilary and Trinity are other names for Lent term and Act term +respectively. Act term is the last term of the academic year; its name +is that originally given to a disputation for a Master's degree; such +disputations took place at the end of the year generally, and hence gave +a name to the summer term. Although the rules concerning residence +at Oxford are more stringent than in De Quincey's time, only eighteen +weeks' residence is required during the year, six in Michaelmas, six in +Lent, and six in Easter and Act. + +3 17 GOING DOWN: Cf. "Going down with victory," i.e. from London into +the country. + +3 30 POSTING-HOUSES: inns where relays of horses were furnished for +coaches and carriages. Cf. De Quincey on _Travelling, loc. cit._ + +4 3 AN OLD TRADITION... from the reign of Charles II: Then no one sat +outside; later, outside places were taken by servants, and were quite +cheap. + +4 9 ATTAINT THE FOOT: The word is used in its legal sense. The blood of +one convicted of high treason is "attaint," and his deprivations extend +to his descendants, unless Parliament remove the attainder. + +4 14 PARIAHS: The fate of social outcasts seems to have taken early and +strong hold upon De Quincey's mind; one of the _Suspiria_ was to have +enlarged upon this theme. Strictly speaking, the Pariahs is that one of +the lower castes of Hindoo society of which foreigners have seen most; +it is not in all districts the lowest caste, however. + +5 6 OBJECTS NOT APPEARING, ETC.: _De non apparentibus et non +existentibus eadem est lex_, a Roman legal phrase. + +5 16 "SNOBS": Apparently snob originally meant "shoemaker"; then, in +university cant, a "townsman" as opposed to a "gownsman." Cf. _Gradus ad +Cantabrigiam_ (1824), quoted in _Century Dictionary_: "_Snobs_.--A term +applied indiscriminately to all who have not the honour of being members +of the university; but in a more particular manner to the 'profanum +vulgus,' the tag-rag and bob-tail, who vegetate on the sedgy banks of +Camus." This use is in De Quincey's mind. Later, in the strikes of that +time, the workmen who accepted lower wages were called _snobs_; those +who held out for higher, _nobs_. + +7 33 FO FO... FI FI: "This paragraph is a caricature of a story told +in Staunton's Account of the Earl of Macartney's Embassy to China in +1792."--MASSON. + +8 4 CA IRA ("This will do," "This is the go"): "a proverb of the French +Revolutionists when they were hanging the aristocrats in the streets, +&c., and the burden of one of the most popular revolutionary songs, 'Ca +ira, ca ira, ca ira.'"--MASSON. + +8 18 ALL MORALITY,--ARISTOTLE'S, ZENO'S, CICERO'S: Each of these three +has a high place in the history of ethical teaching. Aristotle wrote +the so-called _Nicomachean Ethics_. According to his teaching, "ethical +virtue is that permanent direction of the will which guards the mean +[_to meson_] proper for us... Bravery is the mean between cowardice +and temerity; temperance, the mean between inordinate desire and stupid +indifference; etc." (Ueberweg, _History of Philosophy_, Vol. I, p. 169). +Zeno, who died about 264 B.C., founded about 308 the Stoic sect, which +took its name from the "Painted Porch" (_Stoa poklae_) in the Agora at +Athens, where the master taught. The Stoics held that men should be free +from passion, and undisturbed by joy or grief, submitting themselves +uncomplainingly to their fate. Such austere views are, of course, as far +as possible removed from those of the Eudaemonist, who sought happiness +as the end of life. Cicero was the author of De Officiis, "Of Duties." + +9 9 ASTROLOGICAL SHADOWS: misfortunes due to being born under an unlucky +star; house of life is also an astrological term. + +9 24 VON TROIL'S ICELAND: The Letters on Iceland (Pinkerton's Voyages +and Travels, Vol. I, p. 621), containing Observations ... made during +a Voyage undertaken in the year 1772, by Uno Von Troil, D.D., of +Stockholm, contains no chapter of the kind. Such a chapter had appeared, +however, in N. Horrebow's (Danish, 1758) Natural History of Iceland: +"Chap. LXXII. Concerning snakes. No snakes of any kind are to be met +with throughout the whole island." In Boswell's Johnson, Vol. IV, p. +314, Temple ed., there is a much more correct allusion, which may have +been in De Quincey's mind: "Langton said very well to me afterwards, +that he could repeat Johnson's conversation before dinner, as Johnson +had said that he could repeat a complete chapter of The Natural History +of Iceland, from the Danish of Horrebow, the whole of which was exactly +thus: 'Chap. LXXII. Concerning Snakes. There are no snakes to be met +with throughout the whole island.'" + +9 25 A PARLIAMENTARY RAT: one who deserts his own party when it is +losing. + +10 16 "JAM PROXIMUS," etc.: AEneid, II, lines 311-312: "Now next (to +Deiphobus' house) Ucalegon (i.e. his house) blazes!" + +11 27 QUARTERINGS: See p. 47, footnote, and note 47 2. + +11 32 WITHIN BENEFIT OF CLERGY: Benefit of clergy was, under old English +law, the right of clerics, afterward extended to all who could read, to +plead exemption from trial before a secular judge. This privilege was +first legally recognized in 1274, and was not wholly abolished until +1827. + +12 9 QUARTER SESSIONS: This court is held in England in the counties by +justices of the peace for the trial of minor criminal offenses and to +administer the poor laws, etc. + +12 26 FALSE ECHOES OF MARENGO: General Desaix was shot through the heart +at the battle of Marengo (June 14, 1800); he died without a word, and +his body was found by Rovigo (cf. Memoirs of the Duke of Rovigo, London, +1835, Vol. I, p. 181), "stripped of his clothes, and surrounded by other +naked bodies." Napoleon, however, published three different versions +of an heroic and devoted message from Desaix to himself, the original +version being: "Go, tell the First Consul that I die with this +regret,--that I have not done enough for posterity." (Cf. Lanfrey, +History of Napoleon the First, 2d ed., London, 1886, Vol. II, p. 39.) +Napoleon himself was credited likewise with the words De Quincey adopts. +"Why is it not permitted me to weep" is one version (Bussey, _History +of Napoleon_, London, 1840, Vol. I, p. 302). Cf. Hazlitt, _Life of +Napoleon_, 2d ed., London, 1852, Vol. II, p. 317, footnote. + +12 (footnote) THE CRY OF THE FOUNDERING LINE-OF-BATTLE SHIP "VENGEUR": +On the 1st of June, 1794, the English fleet under Lord Howe defeated the +French under Villaret-Joyeuse, taking six ships and sinking a seventh, +the _Vengeur_. This ship sank, as a matter of fact, with part of her +crew on board, imploring kid which there was not time to give them. Some +two hundred and fifty men had been taken off by the English; the rest +were lost. On the 9th of July Barrere published a report setting forth +"how the _Vengeur_, ... being entirely disabled, ... refused to strike, +though sinking; how the enemies fired on her, but she returned +their fire, shot aloft all her tricolor streamers, shouted _Vive la +Republique_, ... and so, in this mad whirlwind of fire and shouting +and invincible despair, went down into the ocean depths; _Vive la +Republique_ and a universal volley from the upper deck being the last +sounds she made." Cf. Carlyle, _Sinking of the Vengeur_, and _French +Revolution, Book_ XVIII, Chap. VI. + +12 (footnote) LA GARDE MEURT, ETC.: "This phrase, attributed to +Cambronne, who was made prisoner at Waterloo, was vehemently denied by +him. It was invented by Rougemont, a prolific author of _mots_, two +days after the battle, in the _Independant_."--Fournier's _L'Esprit dans +l'Histoire_, trans. Bartlett, _Familiar Quotations_, p. 661. + +13 25 BRUMMAGEM: Birmingham became early the chief place of manufacture +of cheap wares. Hence the name _Brummagem_, a vulgar pronunciation of +the name of the city, has become in England a common name for cheap, +tawdry jewelry. Cf. also Shakespeare, Richard III, Act I, sc. iv, 1. 55: + + False, fleeting, perjured Clarence. + +13 27 LUXOR occupies part of the site of ancient Thebes, capital of +Egypt; its antiquities are famous. + +14 9 BUT ON OUR SIDE... WAS A TOWER OF MORAL STRENGTH, ETC.: Cf. +Shakespeare, _Richard_ III, Act V, sc. in, 11. 12-13: + + Besides, the king's name is a tower of strength, + Which they upon the adverse party want. + +14 20 FELT MY HEART BURN WITHIN ME: Cf. Luke xxiv. 32. + +14 32 A VERY FINE STORY FROM ONE OF OUR ELDER DRAMATISTS: The dramatist +in question has not been identified. I am indebted indirectly to +Professor W. Strunk, Jr., of Cornell University, for reference to Johann +Caius' Of English Dogs, translated by A. Fleming, in Arber's English +Garner, original edition, Vol. III, p. 253 (new edition, Social England +Illustrated, pp. 28-29), where, after telling how Henry the Seventh, +perceiving that four mastiffs could overcome a lion, ordered the dogs +all hanged, the writer continues: "I read an history answerable to +this, of the selfsame HENRY, who having a notable and an excellent +fair falcon, it fortuned that the King's Falconers, in the presence and +hearing of his Grace, highly commended his Majesty's Falcon, saying, +that it feared not to intermeddle with an eagle, it was so venturous and +so mighty a bird; which when the king heard, he charged that the falcon +should be killed without delay: for the selfsame reason, as it may seem, +which was rehearsed in the conclusion of the former history concerning +the same king." + +15 l OMRAHS... FROM AGRA AND LAHORE: There seems to be a reminiscence +here of Wordsworth's Prelude, Book X, 11. 18-20: + + The Great Mogul, when he + Erewhile went forth from Agra or Lahore, + Rajahs and Omrahs in his train. + +Omrah, which is not found in Century Dictionary, is itself really plural +of Arabic amir (ameer), a commander, nobleman. + +15 23 THE 6TH OF EDWARD LONGSHANKS: a De Quinceyan jest, of course. This +wrould refer to a law of the sixth year of Edward I, or 1278, but there +are but fifteen chapters in the laws of that year. + +16 8 NOT MAGNA LOQUIMUR,... BUT VIVIMUS: not "we speak great things," +but "we live" them. + +17 21 MARLBOROUGH FOREST is twenty-seven miles east of Bath, where De +Quincey attended school. + +18 18 ULYSSES, ETC.: The allusion is, of course, to the slaughter of +the suitors of Penelope, his wife, by Ulysses, after his return. Cf. +Odyssey, Books XXI-XXII. + +19 3 ABOUT WATERLOO: i.e. about 1815. This phrase is one of many that +indicate the deep impression made by this event upon the English mind. +Cf. p. 58. + +19 17 "SAY, ALL OUR PRAISES," ETC.: Cf. Pope, Moral Essays: Epistle III, +Of the Use of Riches, II. 249-250: + + But all our praises why should lords engross, + Rise, honest Muse! and sing the Man of Ross. + +20 3 TURRETS: "Tourettes fyled rounde" appears in Chaucer's Knight's +Tale, 1. 1294, where it means the ring on a dog's collar through which +the leash was passed. Skeat explains _torets_ as "probably eyes in which +rings will turn round, because each eye is a little larger than the +thickness of the ring." Cf. Chaucer's _Treatise on the Astrolabe_, Part +I, sec. 2, "This ring renneth in a maner turet," "this ring runs in a +kind of eye." But Chaucer does not refer to harness. + +21 2 MR. WATERTON TELLS ME: Charles Waterton, the naturalist, was +born in 1782 and died in 1865. His _Wanderings in South America_ was +published in 1825. + +23 11 EARTH AND HER CHILDREN: This paragraph is about one fifth of the +length of the corresponding paragraph as it appeared in _Blackwood_. For +the longer version see Masson's ed., Vol. XIII, p. 289, note 2. + +24 14 THE GENERAL POST-OFFICE: The present office was opened Sept. 23, +1829. St. Martin's-le-Grand is a church within the "city" of London, +so named to distinguish it from St. Martin's-in-the-Fields, which faces +what is now Trafalgar Square, and is, as the name indicates, outside the +"city." The street takes its name from the church. + +28 10 BARNET is a Hertfordshire village, eleven miles north of London. + +29 33 A "COURIER" EVENING PAPER, CONTAINING THE GAZETTE: A gazette was +originally one of the three official papers of the kingdom; afterwards +any official announcement, as this of a great victory. + +30 17 FEY: This is not a Celtic word; it is the Anglo-Saxon _faege_ +retained in Lowland Scotch, which is the most northerly English dialect. +The word appears frequently in descriptions of battles, the Anglo-Saxon +fatalistic philosophy teaching that, certain warriors entered the +conflict _faege_, "doomed." Now the meaning is altered slightly: "You +are surely fey," would be said in Scotland, as Professor Masson remarks, +to a person observed to be in extravagantly high spirits, or in any mood +surprisingly beyond the bounds of his ordinary temperament,--the +notion being that the excitement is supernatural, and a presage of his +approaching death, or of some other calamity about to befall him. + +31 27 THE INSPIRATION OF GOD, ETC.: This is an indication--more +interesting than agreeable, perhaps--of the heights to which the martial +ardor of De Quincey's toryism rises. + +33 13 CAESAR THE DICTATOR, AT HIS LAST DINNER-PARTY, ETC.: related by +Suetonius in his life of Julius Caesar, Chap. LXXXVII: "The day before he +died, some discourse occurring at dinner in M. Lepidus' house upon that +subject, which was the most agreeable way of dying, he expressed his +preference for what is sudden and unexpected" (repentinum inopinatumque +praetulerat). The story is told by Plutarch and Appian also. + +35 13 _BIATHANATOS_: "De Quincey has evidently taken this from John +Donne's treatise: _BIATHANATOS, A Declaration of that Paradoxe or +Thesis, That Self-homicide is not so naturally Sin, that it may never be +otherwise_, 1644. See his paper on _Suicide, etc._, Masson's ed., VIII, +398 [Riverside, IX, 209]. But not even Donne's precedent justifies the +word formation. The only acknowledged compounds are _biaio-thanasia_, +'violent death,' and _biaio-thanatos_, 'dying a violent death.' Even +_bia thanatos_, 'death by violence,' is not classical."--HART. But the +form _biathanatos_ is older than Donne and is said to be common in MSS. +It should be further remarked that neither of the two compounds cited +is classical. As to De Quincey's interpretation of Caesar's meaning here, +cf. Merivale's _History of the Romans under the Empire_, Chap. +XXI, where he translates Caesar's famous reply: "That which is least +expected." Cf. also Shakespeare, _Julius Caesar_, Act II, sc. ii, 1. 33. + +37 25 "NATURE, FROM HER SEAT," ETC.: Cf. Milton's _Paradise Lost_, Book +IX, 11. 780-784: + + So saying, her rash hand in evil hour + Forth reaching to the fruit, she pluck'd, she eat: + Earth felt the wound, and Nature from her seat + Sighing through all her works gave signs of woe, + That all was lost. + +38 2 SO SCENICAL, ETC.: De Quincey's love for effects of this sort +appears everywhere. Cf. the opening paragraphs of the _Revolt of the +Tartars_, Masson's ed., Vol. VII; Riverside ed., Vol. XII. + +39 4 JUS DOMINII: "the law of ownership," a legal term. + +39 14 JUS GENTIUM: "the law of nations," a legal term. + +39 30 "MONSTRUM HORRENDUM," ETC..: _AEneid_, III, 658. Polyphemus, one of +the Cyclopes, whose eye was put out by Ulysses, is meant. Cf. _Odyssey_, +IX, 371 et seq.; _AEneid_, III, 630 _et seq_. + +40 1 ONE OF THE CALENDARS, ETC.: The histories of the three Calenders, +sons of kings, will be found in most selections from the _Arabian +Nights_. A Calender is one of an order of Dervishes founded in the +fourteenth century by an Andalusian Arab; they are wanderers who preach +in market places and live by alms. + +40 10 AL SIRAT: According to Mahometan teaching this bridge over Hades +was in width as a sword's edge. Over it souls must pass to Paradise. + +40 12 UNDER THIS EMINENT MAN, ETC.: For these two sentences the +original in _Blackwood_ had this, with its addition of good De Quinceyan +doctrine: "I used to call him _Cyclops Mastigophorus_, Cyclops the +Whip-bearer, until I observed that his skill made whips useless, except +to fetch off an impertinent fly from a leader's head, upon which +I changed his Grecian name to _Cyclops Diphrelates_ (Cyclops the +Charioteer). I, and others known to me, studied under him the +diphrelatic art. Excuse, reader, a word too elegant to be pedantic. And +also take this remark from me as a _gage d'amitie_--that no word ever +was or _can_ be pedantic which, by supporting a distinction, supports +the accuracy of logic, or which fills up a chasm for the understanding." + +41 1 SOME PEOPLE HAVE CALLED ME PROCRASTINATING: Cf. Page's (Japp's) +_Life_, Chap. XIX, and Japp's _De Quincey Memorials_, Vol. II, pp. +45,47,49- 42 11 THE WHOLE PAGAN PANTHEON: i.e. all the gods put +together; from the Greek _Pantheion_, a temple dedicated to all the +gods. + +43 2 SEVEN ATMOSPHERES OF SLEEP, ETC.: Professor Hart suggests that De +Quincey is here "indulging in jocular arithmetic. The three nights +plus the three days, plus the present night, equal seven." Dr. Cooper +compares with this a reference to the Seven Sleepers of Ephesus. But it +seems doubtful whether any explanation is necessary. + +43 17 LILLIPUTIAN LANCASTER: the county town of Lancashire, in which +Liverpool and Manchester, towns of recent and far greater growth, are +situated. + +44 (footnote) "Giraldus Cambrensis," or Gerald de Barry (1146-1220), was +a Welsh historian; one of his chief works is the _Itinerarium Cambrica_, +or Voyage in Wales. + +47 2 QUARTERING: De Quincey's derivation of this word in his footnote +is correct, but its use in this French sense is not common. De Quincey, +however, has it above, p. 11. + +49 8 THE SHOUT OF ACHILLES: Cf. Homer, _Iliad_, XVIII, 217 _et seq_. + +50 10 BUYING IT, ETC.: De Quincey refers, no doubt, to the pay of common +soldiers and to the practice of employing mercenaries. + +52 1 FASTER THAN EVER MILL-RACE, ETC.: the change in the wording of this +sentence in De Quincey's revision is, as Masson remarks, particularly +characteristic of his sense of melody; it read in _Blackwood_, "We ran +past them faster than ever mill-race in our inexorable flight." + +52 15 HERE WAS THE MAP, ETC.: This sentence is an addition in the +reprint. Masson remarks "how artistically it causes the due pause +between the horror as still in rush of transaction and the backward look +at the wreck when the crash was past." + +53 18 "WHENCE THE SOUND," ETC.: _Paradise Lost_, Book XI, 11. 558-563. + +54 3 WOMAN'S IONIC FORM: In thus using the word Ionic, De Quincey +doubtless has in mind the character of Ionic architecture, with its tall +and graceful column, differing from the severity of the Doric on the one +hand and from the floridity of the Corinthian on the other. Probably he +is thinking of a caryatid. Cf. the following version of the old story of +the origin of the styles of Greek architecture in Vitruvius, IV, Chap. I +(Gwilt's translation), quoted by Hart: "They measured a man's foot, and +finding its length the sixth part of his height, they gave the column +a similar proportion, that is, they made its height six times the +thickness of the shaft measured at the base. Thus the Doric order +obtained its proportion, its strength, and its beauty from the human +figure. With a similar feeling they afterward built the Temple of Diana. +But in that, seeking a new proportion, they used the female figure as +a standard; and for the purpose of producing a more lofty effect they +first made it eight times its thickness in height. Under it they placed +a base, after the manner of a shoe to the foot; they also added volutes +to its capital, like graceful curling hair hanging on each side, and the +front they ornamented with _cymatia_ and festoons in the place of hair. +On the shafts they sunk channels, which bear a resemblance to the folds +of a matronal garment. Thus two orders were invented, one of a masculine +character, without ornament, the other bearing a character which +resembled the delicacy, ornament, and proportion of a female. The +successors of these people, improving in taste, and preferring a more +slender proportion, assigned seven diameters to the height of the Doric +column, and eight and a half to the Ionic." + +55 3 CORYMBI: clusters of fruit or flowers. + +55 28 QUARREL: the bolt of a crossbow, an arrow having a square, +or four-edged head (from Middle Latin _quadrellus_, diminutive of +_quadrum_, a square). + +58 20 WATERLOO AND RECOVERED CHRISTENDOM! Cf. note 19 3. + +61 20 THEN A THIRD TIME THE TRUMPET SOUNDED: There are throughout this +passage, as Dr. Cooper remarks, many reminiscences of the language of +the Book of Revelation. Cf. this with Revelation viii. 10; cf. 61 28 +with Revelation xii. 5, and 62 5 with ix. 13. + +63 29 THE ENDLESS RESURRECTIONS OF HIS LOVE: The following, which Masson +prints as a postscript, was a part of De Quincey's introduction to the +volume of the Collective Edition containing this piece: + +"'THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH.'--This little paper, according to my original +intention, formed part of the 'Suspiria de Profundis'; from which, for +a momentary purpose, I did not scruple to detach it, and to publish it +apart, as sufficiently intelligible even when dislocated from its place +in a larger whole. To my surprise, however, one or two critics, not +carelessly in conversation, but deliberately in print, professed their +inability to apprehend the meaning of the whole, or to follow the links +of the connexion between its several parts. I am myself as little +able to understand where the difficulty lies, or to detect any lurking +obscurity, as these critics found themselves to unravel my logic. +Possibly I may not be an indifferent and neutral judge in such a case. I +will therefore sketch a brief abstract of the little paper according +to my original design, and then leave the reader to judge how far this +design is kept in sight through the actual execution. + +"Thirty-seven years ago, or rather more, accident made me, in the dead +of night, and of a night memorably solemn, the solitary witness of an +appalling scene, which threatened instant death in a shape the most +terrific to two young people whom I had no means of assisting, except +in so far as I was able to give them a most hurried warning of their +danger; but even _that_ not until they stood within the very shadow +of the catastrophe, being divided from the most frightful of deaths by +scarcely more, if more at all, than seventy seconds. + +"Such was the scene, such in its outline, from which the whole of this +paper radiates as a natural expansion. This scene is circumstantially +narrated in Section the Second, entitled 'The Vision of Sudden Death.' + +"But a movement of horror, and of spontaneous recoil from this dreadful +scene, naturally carried the whole of that scene, raised and idealised, +into my dreams, and very soon into a rolling succession of dreams. +The actual scene, as looked down upon from the box of the mail, was +transformed into a dream, as tumultuous and changing as a musical fugue. +This troubled dream is circumstantially reported in Section the Third, +entitled 'Dream-Fugue on the theme of Sudden Death.' What I had beheld +from my seat upon the mail,--the scenical strife of action and passion, +of anguish and fear, as I had there witnessed them moving in ghostly +silence,--this duel between life and death narrowing itself to a +point of such exquisite evanescence as the collision neared; all these +elements of the scene blended, under the law of association, with +the previous and permanent features of distinction investing the mail +itself; which features at that time lay--1st, in velocity unprecedented, +2dly, in the power and beauty of the horses, 3dly, in the official +connexion with the government of a great nation, and, 4thly, in the +function, almost a consecrated function, of publishing and diffusing +through the land the great political events, and especially the great +battles, during a conflict of unparalleled grandeur. These honorary +distinctions are all described circumstantially in the First or +introductory Section ('The Glory of Motion'). The three first were +distinctions maintained at all times; but the fourth and grandest +belonged exclusively to the war with Napoleon; and this it was +which most naturally introduced Waterloo into the dream. Waterloo, I +understand, was the particular feature of the 'Dream-Fugue' which my +censors were least able to account for. Yet surely Waterloo, which, in +common with every other great battle, it had been our special privilege +to publish over all the land, most naturally entered the dream under the +licence of our privilege. If not--if there be anything amiss--let the +Dream be responsible. The Dream is a law to itself; and as well quarrel +with a rainbow for showing, or for _not_ showing, a secondary arch. +So far as I know, every element in the shifting movements of the Dream +derived itself either primarily from the incidents of the actual scene, +or from secondary features associated with the mail. For example, the +cathedral aisle derived itself from the mimic combination of features +which grouped themselves together at the point of approaching +collision--viz. an arrow-like section of the road, six hundred yards +long, under the solemn lights described, with lofty trees meeting +overhead in arches. The guard's horn, again--a humble instrument in +itself--was yet glorified as the organ of publication for so many great +national events. And the incident of the Dying Trumpeter, who rises from +a marble bas-relief, and carries a marble trumpet to his marble lips +for the purpose of warning the female infant, was doubtless secretly +suggested by my own imperfect effort to seize the guard's horn, and to +blow the warning blast. But the Dream knows best; and the Dream, I say +again, is the responsible party." + + +JOAN OF ARC + + +This article appeared originally in _Taifs Magazine_ for March and +August, 1847; it was reprinted by De Quincey in 1854 in the third volume +of his _Collected Writings_. It is found in _Works_, Masson's ed., Vol. +V, pp. 384-416; Riverside ed., Vol. VI, pp. 178-215. + +64 10 LORRAINE, now in great part in the possession of Germany, is the +district in which Domremy, Joan's birthplace, is situated. + +65 14 VAUCOULEURS: a town near Domremy; cf. p. 70. + +65 28 EN CONTUMACE: "in contumacy," a legal term applied to one who, +when summoned to court, fails to appear. + +66 13 ROUEN: the city in Normandy where Joan was burned at the stake. + +66 25 THE LILIES OF FRANCE: the royal emblem of France from very early +times until the Revolution of 1789, when "the wrath of God and man +combined to wither them." + +67 5 M. MICHELET: Jules Michelet (1798-1874) is said to have spent forty +years in the preparation of his great work, the _History of France_. +Cf. the same, translated by G. H. Smith, 2 vols., Appleton, Vol. II, +pp. 119-169; or _Joan of Arc_, from Michelet's _History of France_, +translated by O. W. Wight, New York, 1858. + +67 8 RECOVERED LIBERTY: The Revolution of 1830 had expelled the restored +Bourbon kings. + +67 20 THE BOOK AGAINST PRIESTS: Michelet's lectures as professor of +history in the College de France, in which he attacked the Jesuits, were +published as follows: _Des Jesuites_, 1843; _Du Pretre, de la Femme +et de la Famille_, 1844; _Du Peuple_, 1845. To the second De Quincey +apparently refers. + +67 26 BACK TO THE FALCONER'S LURE: The lure was a decoy used to recall +the hawk to its perch,--sometimes a dead pigeon, sometimes an artificial +bird, with some meat attached. + +68 6 ON THE MODEL OF LORD PERCY: These lines, as Professor Hart notes, +in Percy's Folio, ed. Hales and Furnivall, Vol. II, p. 7, run: + + The stout Erle of Northumberland + a vow to God did make, + his pleasure in the Scottish woods + 3 som_m_ers days to take. + +68 27 PUCELLE D'ORLEANS: Maid of Orleans (the city on the Loire which +Joan saved). + +69 1 THE COLLECTION, ETC.: The work meant is Quicherat, _Proces de +Condamnation et Rehabilitation de Jeanne d'Arc_, 5 vols., Paris, +1841-1849. Cf. De Quincey's note. + +69 21 DELENDA EST ANGLIA VICTRIX! "Victorious England must be +destroyed!" Cf. _Delenda est Carthago_! "Carthage must be destroyed!" +_Delenda est Karthago_ is the version of Florus (II, 15) of the words +used by Cato the Censor, just before the Third Punic War, whenever he +was called upon to record his vote in the Senate on any subject under +discussion. + +69 27 HYDER ALI (1702-1782), a Mahometan adventurer, made himself +maharajah of Mysore and gave the English in India serious trouble; +he was defeated in 1782 by Sir Eyre Coote. Tippoo Sahib, his son and +successor, proved less dangerous and was finally killed at Seringapatam +in 1799. + +70 4 NATIONALITY IT WAS NOT: i.e. nationalism--patriotism--it was not. +Cf. _Revolt of the Tartars_, Riverside ed., Vol. XII, p. 4; Masson's +ed., Vol. VII, p. 370, where De Quincey speaks of the Torgod as "tribes +whose native ferocity was exasperated by debasing forms of superstition, +and by a nationality as well as an inflated conceit of their own merit +absolutely unparalleled." Cf. also footnote, p. 94. + +70 4 SUFFREN: the great French admiral who in 1780-1781 inflicted so +much loss upon the British. + +70 10 MAGNANIMOUS JUSTICE OF ENGLISHMEN: As Professor Hart observes, the +treatment of Joan in _Henry VI_ is hardly magnanimous. + +71 29 THAT ODIOUS MAN: Cf. pp. 79-80. + +72 12 THREE GREAT SUCCESSIVE BATTLES: Rudolf of Lorraine fell at +Crecy (1346); Frederick of Lorraine at Agincourt (1415); the battle of +Nicopolis, which sacrificed the third Lorrainer, took place in 1396. + +73 24 CHARLES VI (1368-1422) had killed several men during his first fit +of insanity. He was for the rest of his life wholly unfit to govern. He +declared Henry V of England, the conqueror of Agincourt, his successor, +thus disinheriting the Dauphin, his son. + +74 2 THE FAMINES, ETC.: Horrible famines occurred in France and England +in 1315, 1336, and 1353. Such insurrections as Wat Tyler's, in 1381, are +probably in De Quincey's mind. + +74 6 THE TERMINATION OF THE CRUSADES: The Crusades came to an end +about 1271. "The ulterior results of the crusades," concludes Cox in +_Encyclopedia Britannica_, "were the breaking up of the feudal system, +the abolition of serfdom, the supremacy of a common law over the +independent jurisdiction of chiefs who claimed the right of private +wars." + +74 7 THE DESTRUCTION OF THE TEMPLARS: This most famous of the military +orders, founded in the twelfth century for the defense of the Latin +kingdom of Jerusalem, having grown so powerful as to be greatly feared, +was suppressed at the beginning of the fourteenth century. + +74 7 THE PAPAL INTERDICTS: "De Quincey has probably in mind such an +interdict as that pronounced in 1200, by Innocent III, against France. +All ecclesiastical functions were suspended and the land was in +desolation."--HART. England was put under interdict several times, as in +1170 (for the murder of Becket) and 1208. + +74 8 THE TRAGEDIES CAUSED OR SUFFERED BY THE HOUSE OF ANJOU, AND BY +THE EMPEROR: "The Emperor is Konradin, the last of the Hohenstaufen, +beheaded by Charles of Anjou at Naples, 1268. The subsequent cruelties +of Charles in Sicily caused the popular uprising known as the +Sicilian Vespers, 1282, in which many thousands of Frenchmen were +assassinated."--HART. + +74 10 THE COLOSSAL FIGURE OF FEUDALISM, ETC.: The English yeomen at +Crecy, overpowering the mounted knights of France, took from feudalism +its chief support,--the superiority of the mounted knight to the +unmounted yeoman. Cf. Green, _History of the English People_, Book IV, +Chap. II. + +74 15 THE ABOMINABLE SPECTACLE OF A DOUBLE POPE: For thirty-eight years +this paradoxical state of things endured. + +75 15 THE ROMAN MARTYROLOGY: a list of the martyrs of the Church, +arranged according to the order of their festivals, and with accounts of +their lives and sufferings. + +76 4 "ABBEYS THERE WERE," ETC.: Cf. Wordsworth, _Peter Bell_, Part +Second: + + Temples like those among the Hindoos, + And mosques, and spires, and abbey windows, + And castles all with ivy green. + +76 17 THE VOSGES ... HAVE NEVER ATTRACTED MUCH NOTICE, ETC.: They came +into like prominence after De Quincey's day in the Franco-Prussian War +of 1870. + +76 31 THOSE MYSTERIOUS FAWNS, ETC.: In some of the romances of the +Middle Ages, especially those containing Celtic material, a knight, +while hunting, is led by his pursuit of a white fawn (or a white stag or +boar) to a _fee_ (i.e. an inhabitant of the "Happy Other-world") or into +the confines of the "Happy Other-world" itself. Sometimes, as in the +_Guigemar_ of Marie de France, the knight passes on to a series of +adventures in consequence of his meeting with the white fawn. I owe this +note to the kindness of Mr. S. W. Kinney, A.M., of Baltimore. + +76 33 THAT ANCIENT STAG: See _Englische Studien,_ Vol. V, p. 16, +where additions are made to the following account from Hardwicke's +_Traditions, Superstitions, and Folk-Lore,_ Manchester and London, 1872, +p. 154: + +This chasing of the white doe or the white hart by the spectre huntsman +has assumed various forms. According to Aristotle a white hart was +killed by Agathocles, King of Sicily, which a thousand years beforehand +had been consecrated to Diana by Diomedes. Alexander the Great is said +by Pliny to have caught a white stag, placed a collar of gold about its +neck, and afterwards set it free. Succeeding heroes have in after days +been announced as the capturers of this famous white hart. Julius Caesar +took the place of Alexander, and Charlemagne caught a white hart at both +Magdeburg, and in the Holstein woods. In 1172 William [Henry] the Lion +is reported to have accomplished a similar feat, according to a Latin +inscription on the walls of Lubeck Cathedral. Tradition says the white +hart has been caught on Rothwell Hay Common, in Yorkshire, and in +Windsor Forest. + +This reference I owe indirectly to Professor J. M. Manly, of Chicago. + +77 4 OR, BEING UPON THE MARCHES OF FRANCE, A MARQUIS: _Marquis_ is +derived from _march,_ and was originally the title of the guardian of +the frontier, or march. + +77 13 AGREED WITH SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY THAT A GOOD DEAL MIGHT BE SAID +ON BOTH SIDES: This expression, as has been pointed out to me, is from +the middle of _Spectator_ No. 122, where Sir Roger, having been appealed +to on a question of fishing privileges, replied, "with an air of a man +who would not give his judgment rashly, that much might be said on both +sides." It is likely, however, that De Quincey may have connected it +in his mind with the discussion of witchcraft at the beginning of +_Spectator_ No. 117, where Addison balances the grounds for belief and +unbelief somewhat as De Quincey does here. + +78 7 BERGERETA: a very late Latin form of French _bergerette,_ "a +shepherdess." + +78 15 M. SIMOND, IN HIS "TRAVELS": The reference is to _Journal of a +Tour and Residence in Great Britain during the years 1810 and 1811,_ by +Louis Simond, 2d ed. (Edinburgh, 1817), to which is added an appendix on +France, written in December, 1815, and October, 1816. De Quincey refers +to this story with horror several times, but such scenes are not yet +wholly unknown. + +79 21 A CHEVALIER OF ST. LOUIS: The French order of St. Louis +was founded by Louis XIV in 1693 for military service. After its +discontinuance at the Revolution this order was reinstated in 1814; but +no knights have been created since 1830. "Chevalier" is the lowest rank +in such an order; it is here erroneously used by De Quincey as a title +of address. + +79 22 "CHEVALIER, AS-TU DONNE," etc.: "Chevalier, have you fed the hog?" +"MA FILLE," ETC.: "My daughter, have you," etc. "PUCELLE," ETC.: "Maid +of Orleans, have you saved the lilies (i.e. France)?" + +79 28 IF THE MAN THAT TURNIPS CRIES: Cf. _Johnsoniana_, ed. R. Napier, +London, 1884, where, in _Anecdotes of Johnson_, by Mrs. Piozzi, p. 29, +is found: "'T is a mere play of words (added he)"--Johnson is speaking +of certain "verses by Lopez de Vega"--"and you might as well say, that + + "If the man who turnips cries, + Cry not when his father dies, + 'T is a proof that he had rather + Have a turnip than his father." + +This reference is given in Bartlett's _Familiar Quotations_. + +80 4 THE ORIFLAMME OF FRANCE: the red banner of St. Denis, preserved in +the abbey of that name, near Paris, and borne before the French king as +a consecrated flag. + +80 22 TWENTY YEARS AFTER, TALKING WITH SOUTHEY: In 1816 De Quincey was +a resident of Grasmere; Southey lived for many years at Keswick, a +few miles away; they met first in 1807. For De Quincey's estimate +of Southey's _Joan of Arc_, see _Works_, Riverside ed., Vol. VI, pp. +262-266; Masson's ed., Vol. V, pp. 238-242. + +80 28 CHINON is a little town near Tours. + +81 3 SHE "PRICKS" FOR SHERIFFS: The old custom was to prick with a pin +the names of those chosen by the sovereign for sheriffs. + +82 9 AMPULLA: the flask containing the sacred oil used at coronations. + +82 10 THE ENGLISH BOY: Henry VI was nine months old when he was +proclaimed king of England and France in 1422, Charles VI of France, and +Henry V, his legal heir, having both died in that year. Henry's mother +was the eldest daughter of Charles VI. + +82 13 DRAWN FROM THE OVENS OF RHEIMS: Rheims, where the kings of France +were crowned, was famous for its biscuits and gingerbread. + +82 26 TINDAL'S "CHRISTIANITY AS OLD AS THE CREATION": Matthew Tindal +(1657-1732) published this work in 1732; its greatest interest lies in +the fact that to this book more than to any other Butler's _Analogy_ was +a reply. Tindal's argument was that natural religion, as taught by the +deists, was complete; that no revelation was necessary. A life according +to nature is all that the best religion can teach. Such doctrine as this +Joan preached in the speech ascribed to her. + +82 27 A PARTE ANTE: "from the part gone before"; Joan's speech being +three centuries earlier than the book from which it was taken. + +83 9 THAT DIVINE PASSAGE IN "PARADISE REGAINED": from Book I, II. +196-205. + +84 34 PATAY IS NEAR ORLEANS: Troyes was the capital of the old province +of Champagne. + +86 25 "NOLEBAT," ETC.: "She would not use her sword or kill any one." + +87 24 MADE PRISONER BY THE BURGUNDIANS: The English have accused the +French officers of conniving at Joan's capture through jealousy of her +successes. Compiegne is fifty miles northeast of Paris. + +87 27 BISHOP OF BEAUVAIS: Beauvais is forty-three miles northwest +of Paris, in Normandy. This bishop, Pierre Cauchon, rector of the +University at Paris, was devoted to the English party. + +87 30 "BISHOP THAT ART," ETC.: Cf. Shakespeare's _Macbeth_, Act I, sc. +v, 1. 13. + +87 33 A TRIPLE CROWN: The papacy is meant, of course. The pope's tiara +is a tall cap of golden cloth, encircled by three coronets. + +88 17 JUDGES EXAMINING THE PRISONER: The judge in France questions a +prisoner minutely when he is first taken, before he is remanded for +trial. De Quincey displays here his inveterate prejudice against the +French; but this practice is widely regarded as the vital error of +French criminal procedure., + +89 5 A WRETCHED DOMINICAN: a member of the order of mendicant friars +established in France by Domingo de Guzman in 1216. Their official name +was Fratres Predicatores, "Preaching Friars," and their chief objects +were preaching and instruction. Their influence was very great until +the rise of the Jesuit order in the sixteenth century. The Dominicans +Le Maitre and Graverent (the Grand Inquisitor) both took part in the +prosecution. + +89 31 FOR A LESS CAUSE THAN MARTYRDOM: Cf. Genesis ii. 24. + +91 14 FROM THE FOUR WINDS: There may be a reminiscence here of Ezekiel +xxxvii. 1-10, especially verse 9: "Come from the four winds, O breath, +and breathe upon these slain, that they may live." + +91 30 LUXOR. See note 13 27. + +92 15 DAUGHTER OF CAESARS: She was the daughter of the German emperor, +Francis I, whose sovereignty, as the name "Holy Roman Empire" shows, was +supposed to continue that of the ancient Roman emperors. + +92 17 CHARLOTTE CORDAY (1768-93) murdered the revolutionist Marat in the +belief that the good of France required it; two days later she paid the +penalty, as she had expected, with her life. + +93 18 GRAFTON, A CHRONICLER: Richard Grafton died about 1572. He was +printer to Edward VI. His chronicle was published in 1569. + +93 20 "FOULE FACE": _Foule_ formerly meant "ugly." + +9321 HOLINSHEAD: Raphael Holinshed died about 1580. His great work, +_Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland_, was used by Shakespeare +as the source of several plays. He writes of Joan: "Of favor +[appearance] was she counted likesome; of person stronglie made, and +manlie; of courage, great, hardie, and stout withall." + +94 (footnote) SATANIC: This epithet was applied to the work of some +of his contemporaries by Southey in the preface to his _Vision of +Judgement_, 1821. It has been generally assumed that Byron and Shelley +are meant. See Introduction to Byron's _Vision of Judgment_ in the new +Murray edition of Byron, Vol. IV. + +96 (footnote) BURGOO: a thick oatmeal gruel or porridge used by seamen. +According to the _New English Dictionary_ the derivation is unknown; but +in the _Athenaeum_, Oct. 6, 1888, quoted by Hart, the word is explained +as a corruption of Arabic _burghul_. + +101 30 ENGLISH PRINCE, REGENT OF FRANCE: John, Duke of Bedford, uncle +of Henry VI. "In genius for war as in political capacity," says J. +R. Green, "John was hardly inferior to Henry [the Fifth, his brother] +himself" (_A History of the English People_, Book IV, Chap. VI). + +101 31 MY LORD OF WINCHESTER: Henry Beaufort, Bishop of Winchester, +half-brother of Henry IV. He was the most prominent English prelate of +his time and was the only Englishman in the Court that condemned +Joan. As to the story of his death, to which De Quincey alludes, see +Shakespeare, 2 Henry VI, Act III, sc. in. Beaufort became cardinal in +1426. + +102 17 WHO IS THIS THAT COMETH FROM DOMREMY? This is an evident +imitation of the famous passage from Isaiah Ixiii. I: "Who is this that +cometh from Edom, with dyed garments from Bozrah?" "Bloody coronation +robes" is rather obscure, but probably refers to the fact that Joan had +shed her own blood to bring about the coronation of her sovereign; she +is supposed to have appeared in armor at the actual coronation ceremony, +and this armor might with reason be imagined as "bloody." + +102 22 SHE ... SHALL TAKE MY LORD'S BRIEF: that is, she shall act as the +bishop's counsel. In the case of Beauvais, as in that of Winchester, +it must be remembered that in all monarchical countries the bishops are +"lords spiritual," on an equality with the greater secular nobles, the +"lords temporal." + + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc, by +Thomas de Quincey + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ENGLISH MAIL-COACH *** + +***** This file should be named 6359.txt or 6359.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/6/3/5/6359/ + +Produced by Anne Soulard, Charles Franks and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc + +Author: Thomas de Quincey + +Release Date: August, 2004 [EBook #6359] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on December 1, 2002] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH AND *** + + + + +Produced by Anne Soulard, Charles Franks +and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team. + + + + +THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH AND JOAN OF ARC + +BY +THOMAS DE QUINCEY + +EDITED WITH INTRODUCTION AND NOTES BY +MILTON HAIGHT TURK, PH.D. + + + + +TO CHARLES DEACON CREE +THIS LITTLE VOLUME IS AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED +_Glencairn, Kilmacolm, Scotland June 27, 1905_ + + + + +PREFACE + + +Some portions of this Introduction have been taken from the Athenaeum +Press _Selections from De Quincey_; many of the notes have also +been transferred from that volume. A number of the new notes I owe to a +review of the _Selections_ by Dr. Lane Cooper, of Cornell University. I +wish also to thank for many favors the Committee and officers of the +Glasgow University Library. + +If a word by way of suggestion to teachers be pertinent, I would +venture to remark that the object of the teacher of literature is, of +course, only to fulfill the desire of the author--to make clear his +facts and to bring home his ideas in all their power and beauty. +Introductions and notes are only means to this end. Teachers, I think, +sometimes lose sight of this fact; I know it is fatally easy for +students to forget it. That teacher will have rendered a great service +who has kept his pupils alive to the real aim of their studies,--to +know the author, not to know of him. + +M.H.T + + + + +CONTENTS + + +INTRODUCTION +I. LIFE +II. CRITICAL REMARKS +III. BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE + +SELECTIONS + THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH + JOAN OF ARC + +NOTES + + + + +INTRODUCTION + +I. LIFE + + +Thomas de Quincey was born in Manchester on the 15th of August, 1785. +His father was a man of high character and great taste for literature +as well as a successful man of business; he died, most unfortunately, +when Thomas was quite young. Very soon after our author's birth the +family removed to The Farm, and later to Greenhay, a larger country +place near Manchester. In 1796 De Quincey's mother, now for some years +a widow, removed to Bath and placed him in the grammar school there. + +Thomas, the future opium-eater, was a weak and sickly child. His first +years were spent in solitude, and when his elder brother, William, a +real boy, came home, the young author followed in humility mingled with +terror the diversions of that ingenious and pugnacious "son of eternal +racket." De Quincey's mother was a woman of strong character and +emotions, as well as excellent mind, but she was excessively formal, +and she seems to have inspired more awe than affection in her children, +to whom she was for all that deeply devoted. Her notions of conduct in +general and of child rearing in particular were very strict. She took +Thomas out of Bath School, after three years' excellent work there, +because he was too much praised, and kept him for a year at an inferior +school at Winkfield in Wiltshire. + +In 1800, at the age of fifteen, De Quincey was ready for Oxford; he had +not been praised without reason, for his scholarship was far in advance +of that of ordinary pupils of his years. "That boy," his master at Bath +School had said, "that boy could harangue an Athenian mob better than +you or I could address an English one." He was sent to Manchester +Grammar School, however, in order that after three years' stay he might +secure a scholarship at Brasenose College, Oxford. He remained there-- +strongly protesting against a situation which deprived him "of +_health_, of _society_, of _amusement_, of _liberty_, of _congeniality +of pursuits_"--for nineteen months, and then ran away. + +His first plan had been to reach Wordsworth, whose _Lyrical Ballads_ +(1798) had solaced him in fits of melancholy and had awakened in him a +deep reverence for the neglected poet. His timidity preventing this, he +made his way to Chester, where his mother then lived, in the hope of +seeing a sister; was apprehended by the older members of the family; +and through the intercession of his uncle, Colonel Penson, received the +promise of a guinea a week to carry out his later project of a solitary +tramp through Wales. From July to November, 1802, De Quincey then led a +wayfarer's life. [Footnote: For a most interesting account of this +period see the _Confessions of an English Opium-Eater_, Athenaeum Press +_Selections from De Quincey_, pp. 165-171, and notes.] He soon lost his +guinea, however, by ceasing to keep his family informed of his +whereabouts, and subsisted for a time with great difficulty. Still +apparently fearing pursuit, with a little borrowed money he broke away +entirely from his home by exchanging the solitude of Wales for the +greater wilderness of London. Failing there to raise money on his +expected patrimony, he for some time deliberately clung to a life of +degradation and starvation rather than return to his lawful governors. + +Discovered by chance by his friends, De Quincey was brought home and +finally allowed (1803) to go to Worcester College, Oxford, on a reduced +income. Here, we are told, "he came to be looked upon as a strange +being who associated with no one." During this time he learned to take +opium. He left, apparently about 1807, without a degree. In the same +year he made the acquaintance of Coleridge and Wordsworth; Lamb he had +sought out in London several years before. + +His acquaintance with Wordsworth led to his settlement in 1809 at +Grasmere, in the beautiful English Lake District; his home for ten +years was Dove Cottage, which Wordsworth had occupied for several years +and which is now held in trust as a memorial of the poet. De Quincey +was married in 1816, and soon after, his patrimony having been +exhausted, he took up literary work in earnest. + +In 1821 he went to London to dispose of some translations from German +authors, but was persuaded first to write and publish an account of his +opium experiences, which accordingly appeared in the _London +Magazine_ in that year. This new sensation eclipsed Lamb's _Essays +of Elia_, which were appearing in the same periodical. The +_Confessions of an English Opium-Eater_ was forthwith published in +book form. De Quincey now made literary acquaintances. Tom Hood found +the shrinking author "at home in a German ocean of literature, in a +storm, flooding all the floor, the tables, and the chairs--billows of +books." Richard Woodhouse speaks of the "depth and reality of his +knowledge. ... His conversation appeared like the elaboration of a mine +of results. ... Taylor led him into political economy, into the Greek +and Latin accents, into antiquities, Roman roads, old castles, the +origin and analogy of languages; upon all these he was informed to +considerable minuteness. The same with regard to Shakespeare's sonnets, +Spenser's minor poems, and the great writers and characters of +Elizabeth's age and those of Cromwell's time." + +From this time on De Quincey maintained himself by contributing to +various magazines. He soon exchanged London and the Lakes for Edinburgh +and its suburb, Lasswade, where the remainder of his life was spent. +_Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine_ and its rival _Tatt's Magazine_ +received a large number of contributions. _The English Mail-Coach_ +appeared in 1849 in Blackwood. _Joan of Arc_ had already been published +(1847) in _Tait_. De Quincey continued to drink laudanum throughout his +life,--twice after 1821 in very great excess. During his last years he +nearly completed a collected edition of his works. He died in Edinburgh +on the 8th of December, 1859. + + +II. CRITICAL REMARKS + + +The Opium-Eater had been a weak, lonely, and over-studious child, and +he was a solitary and ill-developed man. His character and his work +present strange contradictions. He is most precise in statement, yet +often very careless of fact; he is most courteous in manner, yet +inexcusably inconsiderate in his behavior. Again, he sets up a high +standard of purity of diction, yet uses slang quite unnecessarily and +inappropriately; and though a great master of style, he is guilty, at +times, of digression within digression until all trace of the original +subject is lost. + +De Quincey divides his writings into three groups: first, that class +which "proposes primarily to amuse the reader, but which, in doing so, +may or may not happen occasionally to reach a higher station, at which +the amusement passes into an impassioned interest." To this class would +belong the _Autobiographic Sketches_ and the _Literary Reminiscences_. +As a second class he groups "those papers which address themselves +purely to the understanding as an insulated faculty, or do so +primarily." These essays would include, according to Professor Masson's +subdivision, (a) Biographies, such as _Shakespeare_ or _Pope_--_Joan of +Arc_ falls here, yet has some claim to a place in the first class; (b) +Historical essays, like The _Caesars_; (c) Speculative and Theological +essays; (d) Essays in Political Economy and Politics; (e) Papers of +Literary Theory and Criticism, such as the brilliant discussions of +_Rhetoric, Style_, and _Conversation_, and the famous _On the Knocking +at the Gate in 'Macbeth_.' As a third and "far higher" class the author +ranks the _Confessions of an English Opium-Eater_, and also (but more +emphatically) the _Suspiria de Profundis_. "On these," he says, "as +modes of impassioned prose ranging under no precedents that I am aware +of in any literature, it is much more difficult to speak justly, +whether in a hostile or a friendly character." + +Of De Quincey's essays in general it may be said that they bear witness +alike to the diversity of his knowledge and the penetrative power of +his intellect. The wide range of his subjects, however, deprives his +papers when taken together of the weight which might attach to a series +of related discussions. And, remarkable as is De Quincey's aptitude for +analysis and speculation, more than once we have to regret the lack of +the "saving common-sense" possessed by many far less gifted men. His +erudition and insight are always a little in advance of his good +judgment. + +As to the works of the first class, the _Reminiscences_ are defaced +by the shrewish spirit shown in the accounts of Wordsworth and other +friends; nor can we depend upon them as records of fact. But our author +had had exceptional opportunities to observe these famous men and +women, and he possessed no little insight into literature and +personality. As to the _Autobiographic Sketches_, the handling of +events is hopelessly arbitrary and fragmentary. In truth, De Quincey is +drawing an idealized picture of childhood,--creating a type rather than +re-creating a person; it is a study of a child of talent that we +receive from him, and as such these sketches form one of the most +satisfactory products of his pen. + +The _Confessions_ as a narrative is related to the Autobiography, +while its poetical passages range it with the _Suspiria_ and the +_Mail-Coach_. De Quincey seems to have believed that he was +creating in such writings a new literary type of prose poetry or prose +phantasy; he had, with his splendid dreams as subject-matter, lifted +prose to heights hitherto scaled only by the poet. In reality his style +owed much to the seventeenth-century writers, such as Milton and Sir +Thomas Browne. He took part with Coleridge, Lamb, and others in the +general revival of interest in earlier modern English prose, which is a +feature of the Romantic Movement. Still none of his contemporaries +wrote as he did; evidently De Quincey has a distinct quality of his +own. Ruskin, in our own day, is like him, but never the same. + +Yet De Quincey's prose poetry is a very small portion of his work, and +it is not in this way only that he excels. Mr. Saintsbury has spoken of +the strong appeal that De Quincey makes to boys. [Footnote: "Probably +more boys have in the last forty years been brought to a love of +literature proper by De Quincy than by any other writer whatever."-- +_History of Nineteenth-Century Literature_, p.198.] It is not +without significance that he mentions as especially attractive to the +young only writings with a large narrative element. [Footnote: "To read +the _Essay on Murder_, the _English Mail-Coach_, _The Spanish +Nun_, _The Caesars_, and half a score other things at the age of +about fifteen or sixteen is, or ought to be, to fall in love with +them."--_Essays in English Literature_, 1780-1860, p.307.] Few boys +read poetry, whether in verse or prose, and fewer still criticism or +philosophy; to every normal boy the gate of good literature is the good +story. It is the narrative skill of De Quincey that has secured for +him, in preference to other writers of his class, the favor of youthful +readers. + +It would be too much to say that the talent that attracts the young to +him must needs be the Opium-Eater's grand talent, though the notion is +defensible, seeing that only salient qualities in good writing appeal +to inexperienced readers. I believe, however, that this skill in +narration is De Quincey's most persistent quality,--the golden thread +that unites all his most distinguished and most enduring work. And it +is with him a part of his genius for style. Creative power of the kind +that goes to the making of plots De Quincey had not; he has proved that +forever by the mediocrity of _Klosterheim_. Give him Bergmann's +account of the Tartar Migration, or the story of the Fighting Nun,-- +give him the matter,--and a brilliant narrative will result. Indeed, De +Quincey loved a story for its own sake; he rejoiced to see it extend +its winding course before him; he delighted to follow it, touch it, +color it, see it grow into body and being under his hand. That this +enthusiasm should now and then tend to endanger the integrity of the +facts need not surprise us; as I have said elsewhere, accuracy in these +matters is hardly to be expected of De Quincey. And we can take our +pleasure in the skillful unfolding of the dramatic narrative of the +Tartar Flight--we can feel the author's joy in the scenic possibilities +of his theme--even if we know that here and there an incident appears +that is quite in its proper place--but is unknown to history. + +In his _Confessions_ the same constructive power bears its part in +the author's triumph. A peculiar end was to be reached in that +narrative,--an end in which the writer had a deep personal interest. +What is an opium-eater? Says a character in a recent work of fiction, +of a social wreck: "If it isn't whisky with him, it's opium; if it +isn't opium, it's whisky." This speech establishes the popular category +in which De Quincey's habit had placed him. Our attention was to be +drawn from these degrading connections. And this is done not merely by +the correction of some widespread fallacies as to the effects of the +drug; far more it is the result of narrative skill. As we follow with +ever-increasing sympathy the lonely and sensitive child, the wandering +youth, the neuralgic patient, into the terrible grasp of opium, who +realizes, amid the gorgeous delights and the awful horrors of the tale, +that the writer is after all the victim of the worst of bad habits? We +can hardly praise too highly the art which even as we look beneath it +throws its glamour over us still. + +Nor is it only in this constructive power, in the selection and +arrangement of details, that De Quincey excels as a narrator; a score +of minor excellences of his style, such as the fine Latin words or the +sweeping periodic sentences, contribute to the effective progress of +his narrative prose. Mr. Lowell has said that "there are no such vistas +and avenues of verse as Milton's." The comparison is somewhat +hazardous, still I should like to venture the parallel claim that there +are no such streams of prose as De Quincey's. The movement of his +discourse is that of the broad river, not in its weight or force +perhaps, but in its easy flowing progress, in its serene, unhurried +certainty of its end. To be sure, only too often the waters overflow +their banks and run far afield in alien channels. Yet, when great power +over the instrument of language is joined to so much constructive +skill, the result is narrative art of high quality,--an achievement +that must be in no small measure the solid basis of De Quincey's fame. + + +III. BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE + +I. WORKS + + +1. _The Collected Writings of Thomas de Quincey_. New and enlarged +edition by David Masson. Edinburgh: A. and C. Black, 1889-1890. [New +York: The Macmillan Co. 14 vols., with footnotes, a preface to each +volume, and index. Reissued in cheaper form. The standard edition.] + +2. _The Works of Thomas de Quincey_. Riverside Edition. Boston: +Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1877. [12 vols., with notes and index.] + +3. _Selections from De Quincey._ Edited with an Introduction and +Notes, by M. H. Turk. Athenaeum Press Series. Boston, U.S.A., and +London: Ginn and Company, 1902. ["The largest body of selections from +De Quincey recently published.... The selections are _The affliction +of Childhood, Introduction to the World of Strife, A Meeting with Lamb, +A Meeting with Coleridge, Recollections of Wordsworth, Confessions, A +Portion of Suspiria, The English Mail-Coach, Murder as one of the Fine +Arts, Second Paper, Joan of Arc,_ and _On the Knocking at the Gate +in 'Macbeth.'_"] + + +II. BIOGRAPHY AND CRITICISM + + +4. D. MASSON. _Thomas De Quincey._ English Men of Letters. London. +[New York: Harper. An excellent brief biography. This book, with a +good volume of selections, should go far toward supplying the ordinary +student's needs.] + +5. H. S. SALT. DE QUINCEY. Bell's Miniature Series of Great Writers. +London: George Bell and Sons. [A good short life.] 6. A. H. JAPP. +_Thomas De Quincey: His Life and Writings._ London, 1890. [New +York: Scribner. First edition by "H. A. Page," 1877. The standard life +of De Quincey; it contains valuable communications from De Quincey's +daughters, J. Hogg, Rev. F. Jacox, Professor Masson, and others.] + +7. A. H. JAPP. _De Quincey Memorials. Being Letters and Other +Records, here first published. With Communications from Coleridge, the +Wordsworths, Hannah More, Professor Wilson, and others._ 2 vols. +London: W. Heinemann, 1891. + +8. J. HOGG. _De Quincey and his Friends, Personal Recollections, +Souvenirs, and Anecdotes_ [including Woodhouse's _Conversations_, +Findlay's _Personal Recollections_, Hodgson's _On the Genius of +De Quincey_, and a mass of personal notes from a host of friends]. +London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co., 1895. + +9. E. T. MASON. _Personal Traits of British Authors_. New York, +1885. [4 vols. The volume subtitled _Scott, Hogg,_ etc., contains +some accounts of De Quincey not included by Japp or Hogg.] + +10. L. STEPHEN. _Hours in a Library_. Vol. I. New York, 1892. + +11. W. MINTO. _Manual of English Prose Literature_. Boston, 1889. +[Contains the best general discussion of De Quincey's style.] + +12. L. COOPER. _The Prose Poetry of Thomas De Quincey_. Leipzig, +1902. + + + + +THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH + +SECTION I--THE GLORY OF MOTION + + +Some twenty or more years before I matriculated at Oxford, Mr. Palmer, +at that time M.P. for Bath, had accomplished two things, very hard to +do on our little planet, the Earth, however cheap they may be held by +eccentric people in comets: he had invented mail-coaches, and he had +married the daughter of a duke. He was, therefore, just twice as great +a man as Galileo, who did certainly invent (or, which is the same +thing, [Footnote: "_The same thing_":--Thus, in the calendar of the +Church Festivals, the discovery of the true cross (by Helen, the mother +of Constantine) is recorded (and, one might think, with the express +consciousness of sarcasm) as the _Invention_ of the Cross.] +discover) the satellites of Jupiter, those very next things extant to +mail-coaches in the two capital pretensions of speed and keeping time, +but, on the other hand, who did _not_ marry the daughter of a duke. + +These mail-coaches, as organised by Mr. Palmer, are entitled to a +circumstantial notice from myself, having had so large a share in +developing the anarchies of my subsequent dreams: an agency which they +accomplished, 1st, through velocity at that time unprecedented--for +they first revealed the glory of motion; 2dly, through grand effects +for the eye between lamplight and the darkness upon solitary roads; +3dly, through animal beauty and power so often displayed in the class +of horses selected for this mail service; 4thly, through the conscious +presence of a central intellect, that, in the midst of vast distances +[Footnote: "Vast distances":--One case was familiar to mail-coach +travellers where two mails in opposite directions, north and south, +starting at the same minute from points six hundred miles apart, met +almost constantly at a particular bridge which bisected the total +distance.]--of storms, of darkness, of danger--overruled all obstacles +into one steady co-operation to a national result. For my own feeling, +this post-office service spoke as by some mighty orchestra, where a +thousand instruments, all disregarding each other, and so far in danger +of discord, yet all obedient as slaves to the supreme _baton_ of +some great leader, terminate in a perfection of harmony like that of +heart, brain, and lungs in a healthy animal organisation. But, finally, +that particular element in this whole combination which most impressed +myself, and through which it is that to this hour Mr. Palmer's mail- +coach system tyrannises over my dreams by terror and terrific beauty, +lay in the awful _political_ mission which at that time it fulfilled. +The mail-coach it was that distributed over the face of the land, like +the opening of apocalyptic vials, the heart-shaking news of Trafalgar, +of Salamanca, of Vittoria, of Waterloo. These were the harvests that, +in the grandeur of their reaping, redeemed the tears and blood in which +they had been sown. Neither was the meanest peasant so much below the +grandeur and the sorrow of the times as to confound battles such as +these, which were gradually moulding the destinies of Christendom, with +the vulgar conflicts of ordinary warfare, so often no more than +gladiatorial trials of national prowess. The victories of England in +this stupendous contest rose of themselves as natural _Te Deums_ to +heaven; and it was felt by the thoughtful that such victories, at such +a crisis of general prostration, were not more beneficial to ourselves +than finally to France, our enemy, and to the nations of all western or +central Europe, through whose pusillanimity it was that the French +domination had prospered. + +The mail-coach, as the national organ for publishing these mighty +events, thus diffusively influential, became itself a spiritualised and +glorified object to an impassioned heart; and naturally, in the Oxford +of that day, _all_ hearts were impassioned, as being all (or nearly +all) in _early_ manhood. In most universities there is one single +college; in Oxford there were five-and-twenty, all of which were +peopled by young men, the _elite_ of their own generation; not +boys, but men: none under eighteen. In some of these many colleges the +custom permitted the student to keep what are called "short terms"; +that is, the four terms of Michaelmas, Lent, Easter, and Act, were kept +by a residence, in the aggregate, of ninety-one days, or thirteen +weeks. Under this interrupted residence, it was possible that a student +might have a reason for going down to his home four times in the year. +This made eight journeys to and fro. But, as these homes lay dispersed +through all the shires of the island, and most of us disdained all +coaches except his Majesty's mail, no city out of London could pretend +to so extensive a connexion with Mr. Palmer's establishment as Oxford. +Three mails, at the least, I remember as passing every day through +Oxford, and benefiting by my personal patronage--viz., the Worcester, +the Gloucester, and the Holyhead mail. Naturally, therefore, it became +a point of some interest with us, whose journeys revolved every six +weeks on an average, to look a little into the executive details of the +system. With some of these Mr. Palmer had no concern; they rested upon +bye-laws enacted by posting-houses for their own benefit, and upon +other bye-laws, equally stern, enacted by the inside passengers for the +illustration of their own haughty exclusiveness. These last were of a +nature to rouse our scorn; from which the transition was not very long +to systematic mutiny. Up to this time, say 1804, or 1805 (the year of +Trafalgar), it had been the fixed assumption of the four inside people +(as an old tradition of all public carriages derived from the reign of +Charles II) that they, the illustrious quaternion, constituted a +porcelain variety of the human race, whose dignity would have been +compromised by exchanging one word of civility with the three miserable +delf-ware outsides. Even to have kicked an outsider might have been +held to attaint the foot concerned in that operation, so that, perhaps, +it would have required an act of Parliament to restore its purity of +blood. What words, then, could express the horror, and the sense of +treason, in that case, which _had_ happened, where all three +outsides (the trinity of Pariahs) made a vain attempt to sit down at +the same breakfast-table or dinner-table with the consecrated four? I +myself witnessed such an attempt; and on that occasion a benevolent old +gentleman endeavoured to soothe his three holy associates, by +suggesting that, if the outsides were indicted for this criminal +attempt at the next assizes, the court would regard it as a case of +lunacy or _delirium tremens_ rather than of treason. England owes +much of her grandeur to the depth of the aristocratic element in her +social composition, when pulling against her strong democracy. I am not +the man to laugh at it. But sometimes, undoubtedly, it expressed itself +in comic shapes. The course taken with the infatuated outsiders, in the +particular attempt which I have noticed, was that the waiter, beckoning +them away from the privileged _salle-a-manger_, sang out, "This +way, my good men," and then enticed these good men away to the kitchen. +But that plan had not always answered. Sometimes, though rarely, cases +occurred where the intruders, being stronger than usual, or more +vicious than usual, resolutely refused to budge, and so far carried +their point as to have a separate table arranged for themselves in a +corner of the general room. Yet, if an Indian screen could be found +ample enough to plant them out from the very eyes of the high table, or +_dais_, it then became possible to assume as a fiction of law that +the three delf fellows, after all, were not present. They could be +ignored by the porcelain men, under the maxim that objects not +appearing and objects not existing are governed by the same logical +construction. [Footnote: _De non apparentibus_, etc.] + +Such being, at that time, the usage of mail-coaches, what was to be +done by us of young Oxford? We, the most aristocratic of people, who +were addicted to the practice of looking down superciliously even upon +the insides themselves as often very questionable characters--were we, +by voluntarily going outside, to court indignities? If our dress and +bearing sheltered us generally from the suspicion of being "raff" (the +name at that period for "snobs" [Footnote: "_Snobs_," and its +antithesis, "_nobs_," arose among the internal factions of shoemakers +perhaps ten years later. Possibly enough, the terms may have existed +much earlier; but they were then first made known, picturesquely and +effectively, by a trial at some assizes which happened to fix the +public attention.]), we really _were_ such constructively by the place +we assumed. If we did not submit to the deep shadow of eclipse, we +entered at least the skirts of its penumbra. And the analogy of +theatres was valid against us,--where no man can complain of the +annoyances incident to the pit or gallery, having his instant remedy in +paying the higher price of the boxes. But the soundness of this analogy +we disputed. In the case of the theatre, it cannot be pretended that +the inferior situations have any separate attractions, unless the pit +may be supposed to have an advantage for the purposes of the critic or +the dramatic reporter. But the critic or reporter is a rarity. For most +people, the sole benefit is in the price. Now, on the contrary, the +outside of the mail had its own incommunicable advantages. These we +could not forego. The higher price we would willingly have paid, but +not the price connected with the condition of riding inside; which +condition we pronounced insufferable. The air, the freedom of prospect, +the proximity to the horses, the elevation of seat: these were what we +required; but, above all, the certain anticipation of purchasing +occasional opportunities of driving. + +Such was the difficulty which pressed us; and under the coercion of +this difficulty we instituted a searching inquiry into the true quality +and valuation of the different apartments about the mail. We conducted +this inquiry on metaphysical principles; and it was ascertained +satisfactorily that the roof of the coach, which by some weak men had +been called the attics, and by some the garrets, was in reality the +drawing-room; in which drawing-room the box was the chief ottoman or +sofa; whilst it appeared that the _inside_ which had been +traditionally regarded as the only room tenantable by gentlemen, was, +in fact, the coal-cellar in disguise. + +Great wits jump. The very same idea had not long before struck the +celestial intellect of China. Amongst the presents carried out by our +first embassy to that country was a state-coach. It had been specially +selected as a personal gift by George III; but the exact mode of using +it was an intense mystery to Pekin. The ambassador, indeed (Lord +Macartney), had made some imperfect explanations upon this point; but, +as His Excellency communicated these in a diplomatic whisper at the +very moment of his departure, the celestial intellect was very feebly +illuminated, and it became necessary to call a cabinet council on the +grand state question, "Where was the Emperor to sit?" The hammer-cloth +happened to be unusually gorgeous; and, partly on that consideration, +but partly also because the box offered the most elevated seat, was +nearest to the moon, and undeniably went foremost, it was resolved by +acclamation that the box was the imperial throne, and, for the +scoundrel who drove,--he might sit where he could find a perch. The +horses, therefore, being harnessed, solemnly his imperial majesty +ascended his new English throne under a flourish of trumpets, having +the first lord of the treasury on his right hand, and the chief jester +on his left. Pekin gloried in the spectacle; and in the whole flowery +people, constructively present by representation, there was but one +discontented person, and _that_ was the coachman. This mutinous +individual audaciously shouted, "Where am _I_ to sit?" But the +privy council, incensed by his disloyalty, unanimously opened the door, +and kicked him into the inside. He had all the inside places to +himself; but such is the rapacity of ambition that he was still +dissatisfied. "I say," he cried out in an extempore petition addressed +to the Emperor through the window--"I say, how am I to catch hold of +the reins?"--"Anyhow," was the imperial answer; "don't trouble +_me_, man, in my glory. How catch the reins? Why, through the +windows, through the keyholes--_anyhow_." Finally this contumacious +coachman lengthened the check-strings into a sort of jury-reins +communicating with the horses; with these he drove as steadily as Pekin +had any right to expect. The Emperor returned after the briefest of +circuits; he descended in great pomp from his throne, with the severest +resolution never to remount it. A public thanksgiving was ordered for +his majesty's happy escape from the disease of a broken neck; and the +state-coach was dedicated thenceforward as a votive offering to the god +Fo Fo--whom the learned more accurately called Fi Fi. + +A revolution of this same Chinese character did young Oxford of that +era effect in the constitution of mail-coach society. It was a perfect +French Revolution; and we had good reason to say, _ca ira_. In +fact, it soon became _too_ popular. The "public"--a well-known +character, particularly disagreeable, though slightly respectable, and +notorious for affecting the chief seats in synagogues--had at first +loudly opposed this revolution; but, when the opposition showed itself +to be ineffectual, our disagreeable friend went into it with headlong +zeal. At first it was a sort of race between us; and, as the public is +usually from thirty to fifty years old, naturally we of young Oxford, +that averaged about twenty, had the advantage. Then the public took to +bribing, giving fees to horse-keepers, &c., who hired out their persons +as warming-pans on the box seat. _That_, you know, was shocking to +all moral sensibilities. Come to bribery, said we, and there is an end +to all morality,--Aristotle's, Zeno's, Cicero's, or anybody's. And, +besides, of what use was it? For _we_ bribed also. And, as our +bribes, to those of the public, were as five shillings to sixpence, +here again young Oxford had the advantage. But the contest was ruinous +to the principles of the stables connected with the mails. This whole +corporation was constantly bribed, rebribed, and often surrebribed; a +mail-coach yard was like the hustings in a contested election; and a +horse-keeper, ostler, or helper, was held by the philosophical at that +time to be the most corrupt character in the nation. + +There was an impression upon the public mind, natural enough from the +continually augmenting velocity of the mail, but quite erroneous, that +an outside seat on this class of carriages was a post of danger. On the +contrary, I maintained that, if a man had become nervous from some +gipsy prediction in his childhood, allocating to a particular moon now +approaching some unknown danger, and he should inquire earnestly, +"Whither can I fly for shelter? Is a prison the safest retreat? or a +lunatic hospital? or the British Museum?" I should have replied, "Oh +no; I'll tell you what to do. Take lodgings for the next forty days on +the box of his Majesty's mail. Nobody can touch you there. If it is by +bills at ninety days after date that you are made unhappy--if noters +and protesters are the sort of wretches whose astrological shadows +darken the house of life--then note you what I vehemently protest: +viz., that, no matter though the sheriff and under-sheriff in every +county should be running after you with his _posse_, touch a hair +of your head he cannot whilst you keep house and have your legal +domicile on the box of the mail. It is felony to stop the mail; even +the sheriff cannot do that. And an _extra_ touch of the whip to the +leaders (no great matter if it grazes the sheriff) at any time +guarantees your safety." In fact, a bedroom in a quiet house seems a +safe enough retreat; yet it is liable to its own notorious nuisances-- +to robbers by night, to rats, to fire. But the mail laughs at these +terrors. To robbers, the answer is packed up and ready for delivery in +the barrel of the guard's blunderbuss. Rats again! there _are_ none +about mail-coaches any more than snakes in Von Troil's Iceland; +[Footnote: "_Von Troil's Iceland_":--The allusion is to a well- +known chapter in Von Troil's work, entitled, "Concerning the Snakes of +Iceland." The entire chapter consists of these six words--"_There art +no snakes in Iceland_."] except, indeed, now and then a parliamentary +rat, who always hides his shame in what I have shown to be the "coal- +cellar." And, as to fire, I never knew but one in a mail-coach; which +was in the Exeter mail, and caused by an obstinate sailor bound to +Devonport. Jack, making light of the law and the lawgiver that had set +their faces against his offence, insisted on taking up a forbidden seat +[Footnote: "_Forbidden seat_":--The very sternest code of rules was +enforced upon the mails by the Post-office. Throughout England, only +three outsides were allowed, of whom one was to sit on the box, and the +other two immediately behind the box; none, under any pretext, to come +near the guard; an indispensable caution; since else, under the guise +of a passenger, a robber might by any one of a thousand advantages-- +which sometimes are created, but always are favoured, by the animation +of frank social intercourse--have disarmed the guard. Beyond the +Scottish border, the regulation was so far relaxed as to allow of +_four_ outsides, but not relaxed at all as to the mode of placing +them. One, as before, was seated on the box, and the other three on the +front of the roof, with a determinate and ample separation from the +little insulated chair of the guard. This relaxation was conceded by +way of compensating to Scotland her disadvantages in point of +population. England, by the superior density of her population, might +always count upon a large fund of profits in the fractional trips of +chance passengers riding for short distances of two or three stages. In +Scotland this chance counted for much less. And therefore, to make good +the deficiency, Scotland was allowed a compensatory profit upon one +_extra_ passenger.] in the rear of the roof, from which he could +exchange his own yarns with those of the guard. No greater offence was +then known to mail-coaches; it was treason, it was _laesa majestas_, +it was by tendency arson; and the ashes of Jack's pipe, falling amongst +the straw of the hinder boot, containing the mail-bags, raised a flame +which (aided by the wind of our motion) threatened a revolution in the +republic of letters. Yet even this left the sanctity of the box +unviolated. In dignified repose, the coachman and myself sat on, +resting with benign composure upon our knowledge that the fire would +have to burn its way through four inside passengers before it could +reach ourselves. I remarked to the coachman, with a quotation from +Virgil's "AEneid" really too hackneyed-- + + "Jam proximus ardet + Ucalegon." + +But, recollecting that the Virgilian part of the coachman's education +might have been neglected, I interpreted so far as to say that perhaps +at that moment the flames were catching hold of our worthy brother and +inside passenger, Ucalegon. The coachman made no answer,--which is my +own way when a stranger addresses me either in Syriac or in Coptic; but +by his faint sceptical smile he seemed to insinuate that he knew +better,--for that Ucalegon, as it happened, was not in the way-bill, +and therefore could not have been booked. + +No dignity is perfect which does not at some point ally itself with the +mysterious. The connexion of the mail with the state and the executive +government--a connexion obvious, but yet not strictly defined--gave to +the whole mail establishment an official grandeur which did us service +on the roads, and invested us with seasonable terrors. Not the less +impressive were those terrors because their legal limits were +imperfectly ascertained. Look at those turnpike gates: with what +deferential hurry, with what an obedient start, they fly open at our +approach! Look at that long line of carts and carters ahead, +audaciously usurping the very crest of the road. Ah! traitors, they do +not hear us as yet; but, as soon as the dreadful blast of our horn +reaches them with proclamation of our approach, see with what frenzy of +trepidation they fly to their horses' heads, and deprecate our wrath by +the precipitation of their crane-neck quarterings. Treason they feel to +be their crime; each individual carter feels himself under the ban of +confiscation and attainder; his blood is attainted through six +generations; and nothing is wanting but the headsman and his axe, the +block and the sawdust, to close up the vista of his horrors. What! +shall it be within benefit of clergy to delay the king's message on the +high road?--to interrupt the great respirations, ebb and flood, +_systole_ and _diastole_, of the national intercourse?--to endanger the +safety of tidings running day and night between all nations and +languages? Or can it be fancied, amongst the weakest of men, that the +bodies of the criminals will be given up to their widows for Christian +burial? Now, the doubts which were raised as to our powers did more to +wrap them in terror, by wrapping them in uncertainty, than could have +been effected by the sharpest definitions of the law from the Quarter +Sessions. We, on our parts (we, the collective mail, I mean), did our +utmost to exalt the idea of our privileges by the insolence with which +we wielded them. Whether this insolence rested upon law that gave it a +sanction, or upon conscious power that haughtily dispensed with that +sanction, equally it spoke from a potential station; and the agent, in +each particular insolence of the moment, was viewed reverentially, as +one having authority. + +Sometimes after breakfast his Majesty's mail would become frisky; and, +in its difficult wheelings amongst the intricacies of early markets, it +would upset an apple-cart, a cart loaded with eggs, &c. Huge was the +affliction and dismay, awful was the smash. I, as far as possible, +endeavoured in such a case to represent the conscience and moral +sensibilities of the mail; and, when wildernesses of eggs were lying +poached under our horses' hoofs, then would I stretch forth my hands in +sorrow, saying (in words too celebrated at that time, from the false +echoes [Footnote: "_False echoes_":--Yes, false! for the words +ascribed to Napoleon, as breathed to the memory of Desaix, never were +uttered at all. They stand in the same category of theatrical fictions +as the cry of the foundering line-of-battle ship _Vengeur_, as the +vaunt of General Cambronne at Waterloo, "La Garde meurt, mais ne se +rend pas," or as the repartees of Talleyrand.] of Marengo), "Ah! +wherefore have we not time to weep over you?"--which was evidently +impossible, since, in fact, we had not time to laugh over them. Tied to +post-office allowance in some cases of fifty minutes for eleven miles, +could the royal mail pretend to undertake the offices of sympathy and +condolence? Could it be expected to provide tears for the accidents of +the road? If even it seemed to trample on humanity, it did so, I felt, +in discharge of its own more peremptory duties. + +Upholding the morality of the mail, _a fortiori_ I upheld its +rights; as a matter of duty, I stretched to the uttermost its privilege +of imperial precedency, and astonished weak minds by the feudal powers +which I hinted to be lurking constructively in the charters of this +proud establishment. Once I remember being on the box of the Holyhead +mail, between Shrewsbury and Oswestry, when a tawdry thing from +Birmingham, some "Tallyho" or "Highflyer," all flaunting with green and +gold, came up alongside of us. What a contrast to our royal simplicity +of form and colour in this plebeian wretch! The single ornament on our +dark ground of chocolate colour was the mighty shield of the imperial +arms, but emblazoned in proportions as modest as a signet-ring bears to +a seal of office. Even this was displayed only on a single panel, +whispering, rather than proclaiming, our relations to the mighty state; +whilst the beast from Birmingham, our green-and-gold friend from false, +fleeting, perjured Brummagem, had as much writing and painting on its +sprawling flanks as would have puzzled a decipherer from the tombs of +Luxor. For some time this Birmingham machine ran along by our side--a +piece of familiarity that already of itself seemed to me sufficiently +Jacobinical. But all at once a movement of the horses announced a +desperate intention of leaving us behind. "Do you see _that?_" I +said to the coachman.--"I see," was his short answer. He was wide +awake,--yet he waited longer than seemed prudent; for the horses of our +audacious opponent had a disagreeable air of freshness and power. But +his motive was loyal; his wish was that the Birmingham conceit should +be full-blown before he froze it. When _that_ seemed right, he +unloosed, or, to speak by a stronger word, he _sprang_, his known +resources: he slipped our royal horses like cheetahs, or hunting- +leopards, after the affrighted game. How they could retain such a +reserve of fiery power after the work they had accomplished seemed hard +to explain. But on our side, besides the physical superiority, was a +tower of moral strength, namely the king's name, "which they upon the +adverse faction wanted." Passing them without an effort, as it seemed, +we threw them into the rear with so lengthening an interval between us +as proved in itself the bitterest mockery of their presumption; whilst +our guard blew back a shattering blast of triumph that was really too +painfully full of derision. + +I mention this little incident for its connexion with what followed. A +Welsh rustic, sitting behind me, asked if I had not felt my heart burn +within me during the progress of the race? I said, with philosophic +calmness, _No_; because we were not racing with a mail, so that no +glory could be gained. In fact, it was sufficiently mortifying that +such a Birmingham thing should dare to challenge us. The Welshman +replied that he didn't see _that_; for that a cat might look at a +king, and a Brummagem coach might lawfully race the Holyhead mail. +"_Race_ us, if you like," I replied, "though even _that_ has an +air of sedition; but not _beat_ us. This would have been treason; +and for its own sake I am glad that the 'Tallyho' was disappointed." So +dissatisfied did the Welshman seem with this opinion that at last I was +obliged to tell him a very fine story from one of our elder dramatists: +viz., that once, in some far Oriental kingdom, when the sultan of all +the land, with his princes, ladies, and chief omrahs, were flying their +falcons, a hawk suddenly flew at a majestic eagle, and, in defiance of +the eagle's natural advantages, in contempt also of the eagle's +traditional royalty, and before the whole assembled field of astonished +spectators from Agra and Lahore, killed the eagle on the spot. +Amazement seized the sultan at the unequal contest, and burning +admiration for its unparalleled result. He commanded that the hawk +should be brought before him; he caressed the bird with enthusiasm; and +he ordered that, for the commemoration of his matchless courage, a +diadem of gold and rubies should be solemnly placed on the hawk's head, +but then that, immediately after this solemn coronation, the bird +should be led off to execution, as the most valiant indeed of traitors, +but not the less a traitor, as having dared to rise rebelliously +against his liege lord and anointed sovereign, the eagle. "Now," said I +to the Welshman, "to you and me, as men of refined sensibilities, how +painful it would have been that this poor Brummagem brute, the +'Tallyho,' in the impossible case of a victory over us, should have +been crowned with Birmingham tinsel, with paste diamonds and Roman +pearls, and then led off to instant execution." The Welshman doubted if +that could be warranted by law. And, when I hinted at the 6th of Edward +Longshanks, chap. 18, for regulating the precedency of coaches, as +being probably the statute relied on for the capital punishment of such +offences, he replied drily that, if the attempt to pass a mail really +were treasonable, it was a pity that the "Tallyho" appeared to have so +imperfect an acquaintance with law. + +The modern modes of travelling cannot compare with the old mail-coach +system in grandeur and power. They boast of more velocity,--not, +however, as a consciousness, but as a fact of our lifeless knowledge, +resting upon _alien_ evidence: as, for instance, because somebody +_says_ that we have gone fifty miles in the hour, though we are far +from feeling it as a personal experience; or upon the evidence of a +result, as that actually we find ourselves in York four hours after +leaving London. Apart from such an assertion, or such a result, I +myself am little aware of the pace. But, seated on the old mail-coach, +we needed no evidence out of ourselves to indicate the velocity. On +this system the word was not _magna loquimur_, as upon railways, +but _vivimus_. Yes, "magna _vivimus_"; we do not make verbal +ostentation of our grandeurs, we realise our grandeurs in act, and in +the very experience of life. The vital experience of the glad animal +sensibilities made doubts impossible on the question of our speed; we +heard our speed, we saw it, we felt it as a thrilling; and this speed +was not the product of blind insensate agencies, that had no sympathy +to give, but was incarnated in the fiery eyeballs of the noblest +amongst brutes, in his dilated nostril, spasmodic muscles, and thunder- +beating hoofs. The sensibility of the horse, uttering itself in the +maniac light of his eye, might be the last vibration of such a +movement; the glory of Salamanca might be the first. But the +intervening links that connected them, that spread the earthquake of +battle into the eyeballs of the horse, were the heart of man and its +electric thrillings--kindling in the rapture of the fiery strife, and +then propagating its own tumults by contagious shouts and gestures to +the heart of his servant the horse. But now, on the new system of +travelling, iron tubes and boilers have disconnected man's heart from +the ministers of his locomotion. Nile nor Trafalgar has power to raise +an extra bubble in a steam-kettle. The galvanic cycle is broken up for +ever; man's imperial nature no longer sends itself forward through the +electric sensibility of the horse; the inter-agencies are gone in the +mode of communication between the horse and his master out of which +grew so many aspects of sublimity under accidents of mists that hid, or +sudden blazes that revealed, of mobs that agitated, or midnight +solitudes that awed. Tidings fitted to convulse all nations must +henceforwards travel by culinary process; and the trumpet that once +announced from afar the laurelled mail, heart-shaking when heard +screaming on the wind and proclaiming itself through the darkness to +every village or solitary house on its route, has now given way for +ever to the pot-wallopings of the boiler. Thus have perished multiform +openings for public expressions of interest, scenical yet natural, in +great national tidings,--for revelations of faces and groups that could +not offer themselves amongst the fluctuating mobs of a railway station. +The gatherings of gazers about a laurelled mail had one centre, and +acknowledged one sole interest. But the crowds attending at a railway +station have as little unity as running water, and own as many centres +as there are separate carriages in the train. + +How else, for example, than as a constant watcher for the dawn, and for +the London mail that in summer months entered about daybreak amongst +the lawny thickets of Maryborough forest, couldst thou, sweet Fanny of +the Bath road, have become the glorified inmate of my dreams? Yet +Fanny, as the loveliest young woman for face and person that perhaps in +my whole life I have beheld, merited the station which even now, from a +distance of forty years, she holds in my dreams; yes, though by links +of natural association she brings along with her a troop of dreadful +creatures, fabulous and not fabulous, that are more abominable to the +heart than Fanny and the dawn are delightful. + +Miss Fanny of the Bath road, strictly speaking, lived at a mile's +distance from that road, but came so continually to meet the mail that +I on my frequent transits rarely missed her, and naturally connected +her image with the great thoroughfare where only I had ever seen her. +Why she came so punctually I do not exactly know; but I believe with +some burden of commissions, to be executed in Bath, which had gathered +to her own residence as a central rendezvous for converging them. The +mail-coachman who drove the Bath mail and wore the royal livery +[Footnote: "Wore the royal livery":--The general impression was that +the royal livery belonged of right to the mail-coachmen as their +professional dress. But that was an error. To the guard it _did_ +belong, I believe, and was obviously essential as an official warrant, +and as a means of instant identification for his person, in the +discharge of his important public duties. But the coachman, and +especially if his place in the series did not connect him immediately +with London and the General Post-Office, obtained the scarlet coat only +as an honorary distinction after long (or, if not long, trying and +special) service.] happened to be Fanny's grandfather. A good man he +was, that loved his beautiful granddaughter, and, loving her wisely, +was vigilant over her deportment in any case where young Oxford might +happen to be concerned. Did my vanity then suggest that I myself, +individually, could fall within the line of his terrors? Certainly not, +as regarded any physical pretensions that I could plead; for Fanny (as +a chance passenger from her own neighbourhood once told me) counted in +her train a hundred and ninety-nine professed admirers, if not open +aspirants to her favour; and probably not one of the whole brigade but +excelled myself in personal advantages. Ulysses even, with the unfair +advantage of his accursed bow, could hardly have undertaken that amount +of suitors. So the danger might have seemed slight--only that woman is +universally aristocratic; it is amongst her nobilities of heart that +she _is_ so. Now, the aristocratic distinctions in my favour might +easily with Miss Fanny have compensated my physical deficiencies. Did I +then make love to Fanny? Why, yes; about as much love as one +_could_ make whilst the mail was changing horses--a process which, +ten years later, did not occupy above eighty seconds; but _then_,-- +viz., about Waterloo--it occupied five times eighty. Now, four hundred +seconds offer a field quite ample enough for whispering into a young +woman's ear a great deal of truth, and (by way of parenthesis) some +trifle of falsehood. Grandpapa did right, therefore, to watch me. And +yet, as happens too often to the grandpapas of earth in a contest with +the admirers of granddaughters, how vainly would he have watched me had +I meditated any evil whispers to Fanny! She, it is my belief, would +have protected herself against any man's evil suggestions. But he, as +the result showed, could not have intercepted the opportunities for +such suggestions. Yet, why not? Was he not active? Was he not blooming? +Blooming he was as Fanny herself. + +"Say, all our praises why should lords----" + +Stop, that's not the line. + +"Say, all our roses why should girls engross?" + +The coachman showed rosy blossoms on his face deeper even than his +granddaughter's--_his_ being drawn from the ale-cask, Fanny's from +the fountains of the dawn. But, in spite of his blooming face, some +infirmities he had; and one particularly in which he too much resembled +a crocodile. This lay in a monstrous inaptitude for turning round. The +crocodile, I presume, owes that inaptitude to the absurd _length_ +of his back; but in our grandpapa it arose rather from the absurd +_breadth_ of his back, combined, possibly, with some growing +stiffness in his legs. Now, upon this crocodile infirmity of his I +planted a human advantage for tendering my homage to Miss Fanny. In +defiance of all his honourable vigilance, no sooner had he presented to +us his mighty Jovian back (what a field for displaying to mankind his +royal scarlet!), whilst inspecting professionally the buckles, the +straps, and the silvery turrets [Footnote: "_Turrets_":--As one who +loves and venerates Chaucer for his unrivalled merits of tenderness, of +picturesque characterisation, and of narrative skill, I noticed with +great pleasure that the word _torrettes_ is used by him to designate +the little devices through which the reins are made to pass. This same +word, in the same exact sense, I heard uniformly used by many scores of +illustrious mail-coachmen to whose confidential friendship I had the +honour of being admitted in my younger days.] of his harness, than I +raised Miss Fanny's hand to my lips, and, by the mixed tenderness and +respectfulness of my manner, caused her easily to understand how happy +it would make me to rank upon her list as No. 10 or 12: in which case a +few casualties amongst her lovers (and, observe, they _hanged_ +liberally in those days) might have promoted me speedily to the top of +the tree; as, on the other hand, with how much loyalty of submission I +acquiesced by anticipation in her award, supposing that she should +plant me in the very rearward of her favour, as No. 199 + 1. Most truly +I loved this beautiful and ingenuous girl; and, had it not been for the +Bath mail, timing all courtships by post- office allowance, heaven only +knows what might have come of it. People talk of being over head and +ears in love; now, the mail was the cause that I sank only over ears in +love,--which, you know, still left a trifle of brain to overlook the +whole conduct of the affair. + +Ah, reader! when I look back upon those days, it seems to me that all +things change--all things perish. "Perish the roses and the palms of +kings": perish even the crowns and trophies of Waterloo: thunder and +lightning are not the thunder and lightning which I remember. Roses are +degenerating. The Fannies of our island--though this I say with +reluctance--are not visibly improving; and the Bath road is notoriously +superannuated. Crocodiles, you will say, are stationary. Mr. Waterton +tells me that the crocodile does _not change_,--that a cayman, in +fact, or an alligator, is just as good for riding upon as he was in the +time of the Pharaohs. _That_ may be; but the reason is that the +crocodile does not live fast--he is a slow coach. I believe it is +generally understood among naturalists that the crocodile is a +blockhead. It is my own impression that the Pharaohs were also +blockheads. Now, as the Pharaohs and the crocodile domineered over +Egyptian society, this accounts for a singular mistake that prevailed +through innumerable generations on the Nile. The crocodile made the +ridiculous blunder of supposing man to be meant chiefly for his own +eating. Man, taking a different view of the subject, naturally met that +mistake by another: he viewed the crocodile as a thing sometimes to +worship, but always to run away from. And this continued till Mr. +Waterton [Footnote: "_Mr. Waterton_":--Had the reader lived through +the last generation, he would not need to be told that, some thirty or +thirty-five years back, Mr. Waterton, a distinguished country gentleman +of ancient family in Northumberland, publicly mounted and rode in top- +boots a savage old crocodile, that was restive and very impertinent, +but all to no purpose. The crocodile jibbed and tried to kick, but +vainly. He was no more able to throw the squire than Sinbad was to +throw the old scoundrel who used his back without paying for it, until +he discovered a mode (slightly immoral, perhaps, though some think not) +of murdering the old fraudulent jockey, and so circuitously of +unhorsing him.] changed the relations between the animals. The mode of +escaping from the reptile he showed to be not by running away, but by +leaping on its back booted and spurred. The two animals had +misunderstood each other. The use of the crocodile has now been cleared +up--viz., to be ridden; and the final cause of man is that he may +improve the health of the crocodile by riding him a-fox-hunting before +breakfast. And it is pretty certain that any crocodile who has been +regularly hunted through the season, and is master of the weight he +carries, will take a six-barred gate now as well as ever he would have +done in the infancy of the pyramids. + +If, therefore, the crocodile does _not_ change, all things else +undeniably _do_: even the shadow of the pyramids grows less. And +often the restoration in vision of Fanny and the Bath road makes me too +pathetically sensible of that truth. Out of the darkness, if I happen +to call back the image of Fanny, up rises suddenly from a gulf of forty +years a rose in June; or, if I think for an instant of the rose in +June, up rises the heavenly face of Fanny. One after the other, like +the antiphonies in the choral service, rise Fanny and the rose in June, +then back again the rose in June and Fanny. Then come both together, as +in a chorus--roses and Fannies, Fannies and roses, without end, thick +as blossoms in paradise. Then comes a venerable crocodile, in a royal +livery of scarlet and gold, with sixteen capes; and the crocodile is +driving four-in-hand from the box of the Bath mail. And suddenly we +upon the mail are pulled up by a mighty dial, sculptured with the +hours, that mingle with the heavens and the heavenly host. Then all at +once we are arrived at Marlborough forest, amongst the lovely +households [Footnote: "_Households_":--Roe-deer do not congregate +in herds like the fallow or the red deer, but by separate families, +parents and children; which feature of approximation to the sanctity of +human hearths, added to their comparatively miniature and graceful +proportions, conciliates to them an interest of peculiar tenderness, +supposing even that this beautiful creature is less characteristically +impressed with the grandeurs of savage and forest life.] of the roe- +deer; the deer and their fawns retire into the dewy thickets; the +thickets are rich with roses; once again the roses call up the sweet +countenance of Fanny; and she, being the granddaughter of a crocodile, +awakens a dreadful host of semi-legendary animals--griffins, dragons, +basilisks, sphinxes--till at length the whole vision of fighting images +crowds into one towering armorial shield, a vast emblazonry of human +charities and human loveliness that have perished, but quartered +heraldically with unutterable and demoniac natures, whilst over all +rises, as a surmounting crest, one fair female hand, with the +forefinger pointing, in sweet, sorrowful admonition, upwards to heaven, +where is sculptured the eternal writing which proclaims the frailty of +earth and her children. + + +GOING DOWN WITH VICTORY + + +But the grandest chapter of our experience within the whole mail-coach +service was on those occasions when we went down from London with the +news of victory. A period of about ten years stretched from Trafalgar +to Waterloo; the second and third years of which period (1806 and 1807) +were comparatively sterile; but the other nine (from 1805 to 1815 +inclusively) furnished a long succession of victories, the least of +which, in such a contest of Titans, had an inappreciable value of +position: partly for its absolute interference with the plans of our +enemy, but still more from its keeping alive through central Europe the +sense of a deep-seated vulnerability in France. Even to tease the +coasts of our enemy, to mortify them by continual blockades, to insult +them by capturing if it were but a baubling schooner under the eyes of +their arrogant armies, repeated from time to time a sullen proclamation +of power lodged in one quarter to which the hopes of Christendom turned +in secret. How much more loudly must this proclamation have spoken in +the audacity [Footnote: "_Audacity_":--Such the French accounted +it; and it has struck me that Soult would not have been so popular in +London, at the period of her present Majesty's coronation, or in +Manchester, on occasion of his visit to that town, if they had been +aware of the insolence with which he spoke of us in notes written at +intervals from the field of Waterloo. As though it had been mere felony +in our army to look a French one in the face, he said in more notes +than one, dated from two to four P.M. on the field of Waterloo, "Here +are the English--we have them; they are caught _en flagrant delit_" +Yet no man should have known us better; no man had drunk deeper from +the cup of humiliation than Soult had in 1809, when ejected by us with +headlong violence from Oporto, and pursued through a long line of +wrecks to the frontier of Spain; and subsequently at Albuera, in the +bloodiest of recorded battles, to say nothing of Toulouse, he should +have learned our pretensions.] of having bearded the _elite_ of +their troops, and having beaten them in pitched battles! Five years of +life it was worth paying down for the privilege of an outside place on +a mail-coach, when carrying down the first tidings of any such event. +And it is to be noted that, from our insular situation, and the +multitude of our frigates disposable for the rapid transmission of +intelligence, rarely did any unauthorised rumour steal away a +prelibation from the first aroma of the regular despatches. The +government news was generally the earliest news. + +From eight P.M. to fifteen or twenty minutes later imagine the mails +assembled on parade in Lombard Street; where, at that time, [Footnote: +"_At that time_":--I speak of the era previous to Waterloo.] and +not in St. Martin's-le-Grand, was seated the General Post-Office. In +what exact strength we mustered I do not remember; but, from the length +of each separate _attelage_, we filled the street, though a long +one, and though we were drawn up in double file. On _any_ night the +spectacle was beautiful. The absolute perfection of all the +appointments about the carriages and the harness, their strength, their +brilliant cleanliness, their beautiful simplicity--but, more than all, +the royal magnificence of the horses--were what might first have fixed +the attention. Every carriage on every morning in the year was taken +down to an official inspector for examination: wheels, axles, +linchpins, pole, glasses, lamps, were all critically probed and tested. +Every part of every carriage had been cleaned, every horse had been +groomed, with as much rigour as if they belonged to a private +gentleman; and that part of the spectacle offered itself always. But +the night before us is a night of victory; and, behold! to the ordinary +display what a heart-shaking addition!--horses, men, carriages, all are +dressed in laurels and flowers, oak-leaves and ribbons. The guards, as +being officially his Majesty's servants, and of the coachmen such as +are within the privilege of the post-office, wear the royal liveries of +course; and, as it is summer (for all the _land_ victories were +naturally won in summer), they wear, on this fine evening, these +liveries exposed to view, without any covering of upper coats. Such a +costume, and the elaborate arrangement of the laurels in their hats, +dilate their hearts, by giving to them openly a personal connexion with +the great news in which already they have the general interest of +patriotism. That great national sentiment surmounts and quells all +sense of ordinary distinctions. Those passengers who happen to be +gentlemen are now hardly to be distinguished as such except by dress; +for the usual reserve of their manner in speaking to the attendants has +on this night melted away. One heart, one pride, one glory, connects +every man by the transcendent bond of his national blood. The +spectators, who are numerous beyond precedent, express their sympathy +with these fervent feelings by continual hurrahs. Every moment are +shouted aloud by the post-office servants, and summoned to draw up, the +great ancestral names of cities known to history through a thousand +years--Lincoln, Winchester, Portsmouth, Gloucester, Oxford, Bristol, +Manchester, York, Newcastle, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Perth, Stirling, +Aberdeen--expressing the grandeur of the empire by the antiquity of its +towns, and the grandeur of the mail establishment by the diffusive +radiation of its separate missions. Every moment you hear the thunder +of lids locked down upon the mail-bags. That sound to each individual +mail is the signal for drawing off; which process is the finest part of +the entire spectacle. Then come the horses into play. Horses! can these +be horses that bound off with the action and gestures of leopards? What +stir!--what sea-like ferment!--what a thundering of wheels!--what a +trampling of hoofs!--what a sounding of trumpets!--what farewell +cheers--what redoubling peals of brotherly congratulation, connecting +the name of the particular mail--"Liverpool for ever!"--with the name +of the particular victory--"Badajoz for ever!" or "Salamanca for ever!" +The half-slumbering consciousness that all night long, and all the next +day--perhaps for even a longer period--many of these mails, like fire +racing along a train of gunpowder, will be kindling at every instant +new successions of burning joy, has an obscure effect of multiplying +the victory itself, by multiplying to the imagination into infinity the +stages of its progressive diffusion. A fiery arrow seems to be let +loose, which from that moment is destined to travel, without +intermission, westwards for three hundred [Footnote: "_Three +hundred_":--Of necessity, this scale of measurement, to an American, +if he happens to be a thoughtless man, must sound ludicrous. +Accordingly, I remember a case in which an American writer indulges +himself in the luxury of a little fibbing, by ascribing to an +Englishman a pompous account of the Thames, constructed entirely upon +American ideas of grandeur, and concluding in something like these +terms:--"And, sir, arriving at London, this mighty father of rivers +attains a breadth of at least two furlongs, having, in its winding +course, traversed the astonishing distance of one hundred and seventy +miles." And this the candid American thinks it fair to contrast with +the scale of the Mississippi. Now, it is hardly worth while to answer a +pure fiction gravely; else one might say that no Englishman out of +Bedlam ever thought of looking in an island for the rivers of a +continent, nor, consequently, could have thought of looking for the +peculiar grandeur of the Thames in the length of its course, or in the +extent of soil which it drains. Yet, if he _had_ been so absurd, +the American might have recollected that a river, not to be compared +with the Thames even as to volume of water--viz., the Tiber--has +contrived to make itself heard of in this world for twenty-five +centuries to an extent not reached as yet by any river, however +corpulent, of his own land. The glory of the Thames is measured by the +destiny of the population to which it ministers, by the commerce which +it supports, by the grandeur of the empire in which, though far from +the largest, it is the most influential stream. Upon some such scale, +and not by a transfer of Columbian standards, is the course of our +English mails to be valued. The American may fancy the effect of his +own valuations to our English ears by supposing the case of a Siberian +glorifying his country in these terms:--"These wretches, sir, in France +and England, cannot march half a mile in any direction without finding +a house where food can be had and lodging; whereas such is the noble +desolation of our magnificent country that in many a direction for a +thousand miles I will engage that a dog shall not find shelter from a +snow-storm, nor a wren find an apology for breakfast."] miles-- +northwards for six hundred; and the sympathy of our Lombard Street +friends at parting is exalted a hundredfold by a sort of visionary +sympathy with the yet slumbering sympathies which in so vast a +succession we are going to awake. + +Liberated from the embarrassments of the city, and issuing into the +broad uncrowded avenues of the northern suburbs, we soon begin to enter +upon our natural pace of ten miles an hour. In the broad light of the +summer evening, the sun, perhaps, only just at the point of setting, we +are seen from every storey of every house. Heads of every age crowd to +the windows; young and old understand the language of our victorious +symbols; and rolling volleys of sympathising cheers run along us, +behind us, and before us. The beggar, rearing himself against the wall, +forgets his lameness--real or assumed--thinks not of his whining trade, +but stands erect, with bold exulting smiles, as we pass him. The +victory has healed him, and says, Be thou whole! Women and children, +from garrets alike and cellars, through infinite London, look down or +look up with loving eyes upon our gay ribbons and our martial laurels; +sometimes kiss their hands; sometimes hang out, as signals of +affection, pocket-handkerchiefs, aprons, dusters, anything that, by +catching the summer breezes, will express an aerial jubilation. On the +London side of Barnet, to which we draw near within a few minutes after +nine, observe that private carriage which is approaching us. The +weather being so warm, the glasses are all down; and one may read, as +on the stage of a theatre, everything that goes on within. It contains +three ladies--one likely to be "mamma," and two of seventeen or +eighteen, who are probably her daughters. What lovely animation, what +beautiful unpremeditated pantomime, explaining to us every syllable +that passes, in these ingenuous girls! By the sudden start and raising +of the hands on first discovering our laurelled equipage, by the sudden +movement and appeal to the elder lady from both of them, and by the +heightened colour on their animated countenances, we can almost hear +them saying, "See, see! Look at their laurels! Oh, mamma! there has +been a great battle in Spain; and it has been a great victory." In a +moment we are on the point of passing them. We passengers--I on the +box, and the two on the roof behind me--raise our hats to the ladies; +the coachman makes his professional salute with the whip; the guard +even, though punctilious on the matter of his dignity as an officer +under the crown, touches his hat. The ladies move to us, in return, +with a winning graciousness of gesture; all smile on each side in a way +that nobody could misunderstand, and that nothing short of a grand +national sympathy could so instantaneously prompt. Will these ladies +say that we are nothing to _them_? Oh no; they will not say +_that_. They cannot deny--they do not deny--that for this night +they are our sisters; gentle or simple, scholar or illiterate servant, +for twelve hours to come, we on the outside have the honour to be their +brothers. Those poor women, again, who stop to gaze upon us with +delight at the entrance of Barnet, and seem, by their air of weariness, +to be returning from labour--do you mean to say that they are +washerwomen and charwomen? Oh, my poor friend, you are quite mistaken. +I assure you they stand in a far higher rank; for this one night they +feel themselves by birthright to be daughters of England, and answer to +no humbler title. + +Every joy, however, even rapturous joy--such is the sad law of earth-- +may carry with it grief, or fear of grief, to some. Three miles beyond +Barnet, we see approaching us another private carriage, nearly +repeating the circumstances of the former case. Here, also, the glasses +are all down; here, also, is an elderly lady seated; but the two +daughters are missing; for the single young person sitting by the +lady's side seems to be an attendant--so I judge from her dress, and +her air of respectful reserve. The lady is in mourning; and her +countenance expresses sorrow. At first she does not look up; so that I +believe she is not aware of our approach, until she hears the measured +beating of our horses' hoofs. Then she raises her eyes to settle them +painfully on our triumphal equipage. Our decorations explain the case +to her at once; but she beholds them with apparent anxiety, or even +with terror. Some time before this, I, finding it difficult to hit a +flying mark when embarrassed by the coachman's person and reins +intervening, had given to the guard a "Courier" evening paper, +containing the gazette, for the next carriage that might pass. +Accordingly he tossed it in, so folded that the huge capitals +expressing some such legend as GLORIOUS VICTORY might catch the eye at +once. To see the paper, however, at all, interpreted as it was by our +ensigns of triumph, explained everything; and, if the guard were right +in thinking the lady to have received it with a gesture of horror, it +could not be doubtful that she had suffered some deep personal +affliction in connexion with this Spanish war. + +Here, now, was the case of one who, having formerly suffered, might, +erroneously perhaps, be distressing herself with anticipations of +another similar suffering. That same night, and hardly three hours +later, occurred the reverse case. A poor woman, who too probably would +find herself, in a day or two, to have suffered the heaviest of +afflictions by the battle, blindly allowed herself to express an +exultation so unmeasured in the news and its details as gave to her the +appearance which amongst Celtic Highlanders is called _fey_. This +was at some little town where we changed horses an hour or two after +midnight. Some fair or wake had kept the people up out of their beds, +and had occasioned a partial illumination of the stalls and booths, +presenting an unusual but very impressive effect. We saw many lights +moving about as we drew near; and perhaps the most striking scene on +the whole route was our reception at this place. The flashing of +torches and the beautiful radiance of blue lights (technically, Bengal +lights) upon the heads of our horses; the fine effect of such a showery +and ghostly illumination falling upon our flowers and glittering +laurels [Footnote: "_Glittering laurels_":--I must observe that the +colour of _green_ suffers almost a spiritual change and exaltation +under the effect of Bengal lights.]; whilst all around ourselves, that +formed a centre of light, the darkness gathered on the rear and flanks +in massy blackness: these optical splendours, together with the +prodigious enthusiasm of the people, composed a picture at once +scenical and affecting, theatrical and holy. As we staid for three or +four minutes, I alighted; and immediately from a dismantled stall in +the street, where no doubt she had been presiding through the earlier +part of the night, advanced eagerly a middle-aged woman. The sight of +my newspaper it was that had drawn her attention upon myself. The +victory which we were carrying down to the provinces on _this_ +occasion was the imperfect one of Talavera--imperfect for its results, +such was the virtual treachery of the Spanish general, Cuesta, but not +imperfect in its ever-memorable heroism. I told her the main outline of +the battle. The agitation of her enthusiasm had been so conspicuous +when listening, and when first applying for information, that I could +not but ask her if she had not some relative in the Peninsular army. Oh +yes; her only son was there. In what regiment? He was a trooper in the +23d Dragoons. My heart sank within me as she made that answer. This +sublime regiment, which an Englishman should never mention without +raising his hat to their memory, had made the most memorable and +effective charge recorded in military annals. They leaped their horses +--_over_ a trench where they could; _into_ it, and with the result of +death or mutilation, when they could _not_. What proportion cleared the +trench is nowhere stated. Those who _did_ closed up and went down upon +the enemy with such divinity of fervour (I use the word _divinity_ by +design: the inspiration of God must have prompted this movement for +those whom even then He was calling to His presence) that two results +followed. As regarded the enemy, this 23d Dragoons, not, I believe, +originally three hundred and fifty strong, paralysed a French column +six thousand strong, then ascended the hill, and fixed the gaze of the +whole French army. As regarded themselves, the 23d were supposed at +first to have been barely not annihilated; but eventually, I believe, +about one in four survived. And this, then, was the regiment--a +regiment already for some hours glorified and hallowed to the ear of +all London, as lying stretched, by a large majority, upon one bloody +aceldama--in which the young trooper served whose mother was now +talking in a spirit of such joyous enthusiasm. Did I tell her the +truth? Had I the heart to break up her dreams? No. To-morrow, said I to +myself--to-morrow, or the next day, will publish the worst. For one +night more wherefore should she not sleep in peace? After to-morrow the +chances are too many that peace will forsake her pillow. This brief +respite, then, let her owe to _my_ gift and _my_ forbearance. But, if I +told her not of the bloody price that had been paid, not therefore was +I silent on the contributions from her son's regiment to that day's +service and glory. I showed her not the funeral banners under which the +noble regiment was sleeping. I lifted not the overshadowing laurels +from the bloody trench in which horse and rider lay mangled together. +But I told her how these dear children of England, officers and +privates, had leaped their horses over all obstacles as gaily as +hunters to the morning's chase. I told her how they rode their horses +into the midst of death,--saying to myself, but not saying to _her_ +"and laid down their young lives for thee, O mother England! as +willingly--poured out their noble blood as cheerfully--as ever, after a +long day's sport, when infants, they had rested their weary heads upon +their mother's knees, or had sunk to sleep in her arms." Strange it is, +yet true, that she seemed to have no fears for her son's safety, even +after this knowledge that the 23d Dragoons had been memorably engaged; +but so much was she enraptured by the knowledge that _his_ regiment, +and therefore that _he_, had rendered conspicuous service in the +dreadful conflict--a service which had actually made them, within the +last twelve hours, the foremost topic of conversation in London--so +absolutely was fear swallowed up in joy--that, in the mere simplicity +of her fervent nature, the poor woman threw her arms round my neck, as +she thought of her son, and gave to _me_ the kiss which secretly was +meant for _him_. + + +SECTION II--THE VISION OF SUDDEN DEATH + + +What is to be taken as the predominant opinion of man, reflective and +philosophic, upon SUDDEN DEATH? It is remarkable that, in different +conditions of society, sudden death has been variously regarded as the +consummation of an earthly career most fervently to be desired, or, +again, as that consummation which is with most horror to be deprecated. +Caesar the Dictator, at his last dinner-party (_coena_), on the very +evening before his assassination, when the minutes of his earthly +career were numbered, being asked what death, in _his_ judgment, +might be pronounced the most eligible, replied "That which should be +most sudden." On the other hand, the divine Litany of our English +Church, when breathing forth supplications, as if in some +representative character, for the whole human race prostrate before +God, places such a death in the very van of horrors: "From lightning +and tempest; from plague, pestilence, and famine; from battle and +murder, and from SUDDEN DEATH--_Good Lord, deliver us_." Sudden +death is here made to crown the climax in a grand ascent of calamities; +it is ranked among the last of curses; and yet by the noblest of Romans +it was ranked as the first of blessings. In that difference most +readers will see little more than the essential difference between +Christianity and Paganism. But this, on consideration, I doubt. The +Christian Church may be right in its estimate of sudden death; and it +is a natural feeling, though after all it may also be an infirm one, to +wish for a quiet dismissal from life, as that which _seems_ most +reconcilable with meditation, with penitential retrospects, and with +the humilities of farewell prayer. There does not, however, occur to me +any direct scriptural warrant for this earnest petition of the English +Litany, unless under a special construction of the word "sudden." It +seems a petition indulged rather and conceded to human infirmity than +exacted from human piety. It is not so much a doctrine built upon the +eternities of the Christian system as a plausible opinion built upon +special varieties of physical temperament. Let that, however, be as it +may, two remarks suggest themselves as prudent restraints upon a +doctrine which else _may_ wander, and _has_ wandered, into an +uncharitable superstition. The first is this: that many people are +likely to exaggerate the horror of a sudden death from the disposition +to lay a false stress upon words or acts simply because by an accident +they have become _final_ words or acts. If a man dies, for +instance, by some sudden death when he happens to be intoxicated, such +a death is falsely regarded with peculiar horror; as though the +intoxication were suddenly exalted into a blasphemy. But _that_ is +unphilosophic. The man was, or he was not, _habitually_ a drunkard. +If not, if his intoxication were a solitary accident, there can be no +reason for allowing special emphasis to this act simply because through +misfortune it became his final act. Nor, on the other hand, if it were +no accident, but one of his _habitual_ transgressions, will it be +the more habitual or the more a transgression because some sudden +calamity, surprising him, has caused this habitual transgression to be +also a final one. Could the man have had any reason even dimly to +foresee his own sudden death, there would have been a new feature in +his act of intemperance--a feature of presumption and irreverence, as +in one that, having known himself drawing near to the presence of God, +should have suited his demeanour to an expectation so awful. But this +is no part of the case supposed. And the only new element in the man's +act is not any element of special immorality, but simply of special +misfortune. + +The other remark has reference to the meaning of the word _sudden_. +Very possibly Caesar and the Christian Church do not differ in the way +supposed,--that is, do not differ by any difference of doctrine as +between Pagan and Christian views of the moral temper appropriate to +death; but perhaps they are contemplating different cases. Both +contemplate a violent death, a _Biathanatos_--death that is +_biaios_, or, in other words, death that is brought about, not by +internal and spontaneous change, but by active force having its origin +from without. In this meaning the two authorities agree. Thus far they +are in harmony. But the difference is that the Roman by the word +"sudden" means _unlingering_, whereas the Christian Litany by +"sudden death" means a death _without warning_, consequently +without any available summons to religious preparation. The poor +mutineer who kneels down to gather into his heart the bullets from +twelve firelocks of his pitying comrades dies by a most sudden death in +Caesar's sense; one shock, one mighty spasm, one (possibly _not_ +one) groan, and all is over. But, in the sense of the Litany, the +mutineer's death is far from sudden: his offence originally, his +imprisonment, his trial, the interval between his sentence and its +execution, having all furnished him with separate warnings of his fate +--having all summoned him to meet it with solemn preparation. + +Here at once, in this sharp verbal distinction, we comprehend the +faithful earnestness with which a holy Christian Church pleads on +behalf of her poor departing children that God would vouchsafe to them +the last great privilege and distinction possible on a death-bed, viz., +the opportunity of untroubled preparation for facing this mighty trial. +Sudden death, as a mere variety in the modes of dying where death in +some shape is inevitable, proposes a question of choice which, equally +in the Roman and the Christian sense, will be variously answered +according to each man's variety of temperament. Meantime, one aspect of +sudden death there is, one modification, upon which no doubt can arise, +that of all martyrdoms it is the most agitating--viz., where it +surprises a man under circumstances which offer (or which seem to +offer) some hurrying, flying, inappreciably minute chance of evading +it. Sudden as the danger which it affronts must be any effort by which +such an evasion can be accomplished. Even _that_, even the sickening +necessity for hurrying in extremity where all hurry seems destined to +be vain,--even that anguish is liable to a hideous exasperation in one +particular case: viz., where the appeal is made not exclusively to the +instinct of self-preservation, but to the conscience, on behalf of some +other life besides your own, accidentally thrown upon _your_ +protection. To fail, to collapse in a service merely your own, might +seem comparatively venial; though, in fact, it is far from venial. But +to fail in a case where Providence has suddenly thrown into your hands +the final interests of another,--a fellow creature shuddering between +the gates of life and death: this, to a man of apprehensive conscience, +would mingle the misery of an atrocious criminality with the misery of +a bloody calamity. You are called upon, by the case supposed, possibly +to die, but to die at the very moment when, by any even partial failure +or effeminate collapse of your energies, you will be self-denounced as +a murderer. You had but the twinkling of an eye for your effort, and +that effort might have been unavailing; but to have risen to the level +of such an effort would have rescued you, though not from dying, yet +from dying as a traitor to your final and farewell duty. + +The situation here contemplated exposes a dreadful ulcer, lurking far +down in the depths of human nature. It is not that men generally are +summoned to face such awful trials. But potentially, and in shadowy +outline, such a trial is moving subterraneously in perhaps all men's +natures. Upon the secret mirror of our dreams such a trial is darkly +projected, perhaps, to every one of us. That dream, so familiar to +childhood, of meeting a lion, and, through languishing prostration in +hope and the energies of hope, that constant sequel of lying down +before the lion publishes the secret frailty of human nature--reveals +its deep-seated falsehood to itself--records its abysmal treachery. +Perhaps not one of us escapes that dream; perhaps, as by some sorrowful +doom of man, that dream repeats for every one of us, through every +generation, the original temptation in Eden. Every one of us, in this +dream, has a bait offered to the infirm places of his own individual +will; once again a snare is presented for tempting him into captivity +to a luxury of ruin; once again, as in aboriginal Paradise, the man +falls by his own choice; again, by infinite iteration, the ancient +earth groans to Heaven, through her secret caves, over the weakness of +her child. "Nature, from her seat, sighing through all her works," +again "gives signs of woe that all is lost"; and again the counter-sigh +is repeated to the sorrowing heavens for the endless rebellion against +God. It is not without probability that in the world of dreams every +one of us ratifies for himself the original transgression. In dreams, +perhaps under some secret conflict of the midnight sleeper, lighted up +to the consciousness at the time, but darkened to the memory as soon as +all is finished, each several child of our mysterious race completes +for himself the treason of the aboriginal fall. + +The incident, so memorable in itself by its features of horror, and so +scenical by its grouping for the eye, which furnished the text for this +reverie upon _Sudden Death_ occurred to myself in the dead of +night, as a solitary spectator, when seated on the box of the +Manchester and Glasgow mail, in the second or third summer after +Waterloo. I find it necessary to relate the circumstances, because they +are such as could not have occurred unless under a singular combination +of accidents. In those days, the oblique and lateral communications +with many rural post-offices were so arranged, either through necessity +or through defect of system, as to make it requisite for the main +north-western mail (_i.e._, the _down_ mail) on reaching Manchester to +halt for a number of hours; how many, I do not remember; six or seven, +I think; but the result was that, in the ordinary course, the mail +recommenced its journey northwards about midnight. Wearied with the +long detention at a gloomy hotel, I walked out about eleven o'clock at +night for the sake of fresh air; meaning to fall in with the mail and +resume my seat at the post-office. The night, however, being yet dark, +as the moon had scarcely risen, and the streets being at that hour +empty, so as to offer no opportunities for asking the road, I lost my +way, and did not reach the post-office until it was considerably past +midnight; but, to my great relief (as it was important for me to be in +Westmoreland by the morning), I saw in the huge saucer eyes of the +mail, blazing through the gloom, an evidence that my chance was not yet +lost. Past the time it was; but, by some rare accident, the mail was +not even yet ready to start. I ascended to my seat on the box, where my +cloak was still lying as it had lain at the Bridgewater Arms. I had +left it there in imitation of a nautical discoverer, who leaves a bit +of bunting on the shore of his discovery, by way of warning off the +ground the whole human race, and notifying to the Christian and the +heathen worlds, with his best compliments, that he has hoisted his +pocket-handkerchief once and for ever upon that virgin soil: +thenceforward claiming the _jus dominii_ to the top of the atmosphere +above it, and also the right of driving shafts to the centre of the +earth below it; so that all people found after this warning either +aloft in upper chambers of the atmosphere, or groping in subterraneous +shafts, or squatting audaciously on the surface of the soil, will be +treated as trespassers--kicked, that is to say, or decapitated, as +circumstances may suggest, by their very faithful servant, the owner of +the said pocket-handkerchief. In the present case, it is probable that +my cloak might not have been respected, and the _jus gentium_ might +have been cruelly violated in my person--for, in the dark, people +commit deeds of darkness, gas being a great ally of morality; but it so +happened that on this night there was no other outside passenger; and +thus the crime, which else was but too probable, missed fire for want +of a criminal. + +Having mounted the box, I took a small quantity of laudanum, having +already travelled two hundred and fifty miles--viz., from a point +seventy miles beyond London. In the taking of laudanum there was +nothing extraordinary. But by accident it drew upon me the special +attention of my assessor on the box, the coachman. And in _that_ +also there was nothing extraordinary. But by accident, and with great +delight, it drew my own attention to the fact that this coachman was a +monster in point of bulk, and that he had but one eye. In fact, he had +been foretold by Virgil as + + "Monstrum horrendum, informe, ingens, cui lumen ademptum." + +He answered to the conditions in every one of the items:--1, a monster +he was; 2, dreadful; 3, shapeless; 4, huge; 5, who had lost an eye. But +why should _that_ delight me? Had he been one of the Calendars in +the "Arabian Nights," and had paid down his eye as the price of his +criminal curiosity, what right had _I_ to exult in his misfortune? +I did _not_ exult; I delighted in no man's punishment, though it +were even merited. But these personal distinctions (Nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5) +identified in an instant an old friend of mine whom I had known in the +south for some years as the most masterly of mail-coachmen. He was the +man in all Europe that could (if _any_ could) have driven six-in- +hand full gallop over _Al Sirat_--that dreadful bridge of Mahomet, +with no side battlements, and of _extra_ room not enough for a +razor's edge--leading right across the bottomless gulf. Under this +eminent man, whom in Greek I cognominated Cyclops _Diphrelates_ +(Cyclops the Charioteer), I, and others known to me, studied the +diphrelatic art. Excuse, reader, a word too elegant to be pedantic. As +a pupil, though I paid extra fees, it is to be lamented that I did not +stand high in his esteem. It showed his dogged honesty (though, +observe, not his discernment) that he could not see my merits. Let us +excuse his absurdity in this particular by remembering his want of an +eye. Doubtless _that_ made him blind to my merits. In the art of +conversation, however, he admitted that I had the whip-hand of him. On +the present occasion great joy was at our meeting. But what was Cyclops +doing here? Had the medical men recommended northern air, or how? I +collected, from such explanations as he volunteered, that he had an +interest at stake in some suit-at-law now pending at Lancaster; so that +probably he had got himself transferred to this station for the purpose +of connecting with his professional pursuits an instant readiness for +the calls of his lawsuit. + +Meantime, what are we stopping for? Surely we have now waited long +enough. Oh, this procrastinating mail, and this procrastinating post- +office! Can't they take a lesson upon that subject from _me_? Some +people have called _me_ procrastinating. Yet you are witness, +reader, that I was here kept waiting for the post-office. Will the +post-office lay its hand on its heart, in its moments of sobriety, and +assert that ever it waited for me? What are they about? The guard tells +me that there is a large extra accumulation of foreign mails this +night, owing to irregularities caused by war, by wind, by weather, in +the packet service, which as yet does not benefit at all by steam. For +an _extra_ hour, it seems, the post-office has been engaged in +threshing out the pure wheaten correspondence of Glasgow, and winnowing +it from the chaff of all baser intermediate towns. But at last all is +finished. Sound your horn, guard! Manchester, good-bye! we've lost an +hour by your criminal conduct at the post-office: which, however, +though I do not mean to part with a serviceable ground of complaint, +and one which really _is_ such for the horses, to me secretly is an +advantage, since it compels us to look sharply for this lost hour +amongst the next eight or nine, and to recover it (if we can) at the +rate of one mile extra per hour. Off we are at last, and at eleven +miles an hour; and for the moment I detect no changes in the energy or +in the skill of Cyclops. + +From Manchester to Kendal, which virtually (though not in law) is the +capital of Westmoreland, there were at this time seven stages of eleven +miles each. The first five of these, counting from Manchester, +terminate in Lancaster; which is therefore fifty-five miles north of +Manchester, and the same distance exactly from Liverpool. The first +three stages terminate in Preston (called, by way of distinction from +other towns of that name, _Proud_ Preston); at which place it is +that the separate roads from Liverpool and from Manchester to the north +become confluent. [Footnote: "_Confluent_":--Suppose a capital Y +(the Pythagorean letter): Lancaster is at the foot of this letter; +Liverpool at the top of the _right_ branch; Manchester at the top +of the _left_; Proud Preston at the centre, where the two branches +unite. It is thirty-three miles along either of the two branches; it is +twenty-two miles along the stem,--viz., from Preston in the middle to +Lancaster at the root. There's a lesson in geography for the reader!] +Within these first three stages lay the foundation, the progress, and +termination of our night's adventure. During the first stage, I found +out that Cyclops was mortal: he was liable to the shocking affection of +sleep--a thing which previously I had never suspected. If a man +indulges in the vicious habit of sleeping, all the skill in aurigation +of Apollo himself, with the horses of Aurora to execute his notions, +avails him nothing. "Oh, Cyclops!" I exclaimed, "thou art mortal. My +friend, thou snorest." Through the first eleven miles, however, this +infirmity--which I grieve to say that he shared with the whole Pagan +Pantheon--betrayed itself only by brief snatches. On waking up, he made +an apology for himself which, instead of mending matters, laid open a +gloomy vista of coming disasters. The summer assizes, he reminded me, +were now going on at Lancaster: in consequence of which for three +nights and three days he had not lain down on a bed. During the day he +was waiting for his own summons as a witness on the trial in which he +was interested, or else, lest he should be missing at the critical +moment, was drinking with the other witnesses under the pastoral +surveillance of the attorneys. During the night, or that part of it +which at sea would form the middle watch, he was driving. This +explanation certainly accounted for his drowsiness, but in a way which +made it much more alarming; since now, after several days' resistance +to this infirmity, at length he was steadily giving way. Throughout the +second stage he grew more and more drowsy. In the second mile of the +third stage he surrendered himself finally and without a struggle to +his perilous temptation. All his past resistance had but deepened the +weight of this final oppression. Seven atmospheres of sleep rested upon +him; and, to consummate the case, our worthy guard, after singing "Love +amongst the Roses" for perhaps thirty times, without invitation and +without applause, had in revenge moodily resigned himself to slumber-- +not so deep, doubtless, as the coachman's, but deep enough for +mischief. And thus at last, about ten miles from Preston, it came about +that I found myself left in charge of his Majesty's London and Glasgow +mail, then running at the least twelve miles an hour. + +What made this negligence less criminal than else it must have been +thought was the condition of the roads at night during the assizes. At +that time, all the law business of populous Liverpool, and also of +populous Manchester, with its vast cincture of populous rural +districts, was called up by ancient usage to the tribunal of +Lilliputian Lancaster. To break up this old traditional usage required, +1, a conflict with powerful established interests, 2, a large system of +new arrangements, and 3, a new parliamentary statute. But as yet this +change was merely in contemplation. As things were at present, twice in +the year [Footnote: "_Twice in the year_":--There were at that time +only two assizes even in the most populous counties--viz., the Lent +Assizes and the Summer Assizes.] so vast a body of business rolled +northwards from the southern quarter of the county that for a fortnight +at least it occupied the severe exertions of two judges in its +despatch. The consequence of this was that every horse available for +such a service, along the whole line of road, was exhausted in carrying +down the multitudes of people who were parties to the different suits. +By sunset, therefore, it usually happened that, through utter +exhaustion amongst men and horses, the road sank into profound silence. +Except the exhaustion in the vast adjacent county of York from a +contested election, no such silence succeeding to no such fiery uproar +was ever witnessed in England. + +On this occasion the usual silence and solitude prevailed along the +road. Not a hoof nor a wheel was to be heard. And, to strengthen this +false luxurious confidence in the noiseless roads, it happened also +that the night was one of peculiar solemnity and peace. For my own +part, though slightly alive to the possibilities of peril, I had so far +yielded to the influence of the mighty calm as to sink into a profound +reverie. The month was August; in the middle of which lay my own +birthday--a festival to every thoughtful man suggesting solemn and +often sigh-born [Footnote: "_Sigh-born_":--I owe the suggestion of +this word to an obscure remembrance of a beautiful phrase in "Giraldus +Cambrensis"--viz., _suspiriosae cogitationes_.] thoughts. The county +was my own native county--upon which, in its southern section, more +than upon any equal area known to man past or present, had descended +the original curse of labour in its heaviest form, not mastering the +bodies only of men, as of slaves, or criminals in mines, but working +through the fiery will. Upon no equal space of earth was, or ever had +been, the same energy of human power put forth daily. At this +particular season also of the assizes, that dreadful hurricane of +flight and pursuit, as it might have seemed to a stranger, which swept +to and from Lancaster all day long, hunting the county up and down, and +regularly subsiding back into silence about sunset, could not fail +(when united with this permanent distinction of Lancashire as the very +metropolis and citadel of labour) to point the thoughts pathetically +upon that counter-vision of rest, of saintly repose from strife and +sorrow, towards which, as to their secret haven, the profounder +aspirations of man's heart are in solitude continually travelling. +Obliquely upon our left we were nearing the sea; which also must, under +the present circumstances, be repeating the general state of halcyon +repose. The sea, the atmosphere, the light, bore each an orchestral +part in this universal lull. Moonlight and the first timid tremblings +of the dawn were by this time blending; and the blendings were brought +into a still more exquisite state of unity by a slight silvery mist, +motionless and dreamy, that covered the woods and fields, but with a +veil of equable transparency. Except the feet of our own horses,-- +which, running on a sandy margin of the road, made but little +disturbance,--there was no sound abroad. In the clouds and on the earth +prevailed the same majestic peace; and, in spite of all that the +villain of a schoolmaster has done for the ruin of our sublimer +thoughts, which are the thoughts of our infancy, we still believe in no +such nonsense as a limited atmosphere. Whatever we may swear with our +false feigning lips, in our faithful hearts we still believe, and must +for ever believe, in fields of air traversing the total gulf between +earth and the central heavens. Still, in the confidence of children +that tread without fear every chamber in their father's house, and to +whom no door is closed, we, in that Sabbatic vision which sometimes is +revealed for an hour upon nights like this, ascend with easy steps from +the sorrow-stricken fields of earth upwards to the sandals of God. + +Suddenly, from thoughts like these I was awakened to a sullen sound, as +of some motion on the distant road. It stole upon the air for a moment; +I listened in awe; but then it died away. Once roused, however, I could +not but observe with alarm the quickened motion of our horses. Ten +years' experience had made my eye learned in the valuing of motion; and +I saw that we were now running thirteen miles an hour. I pretend to no +presence of mind. On the contrary, my fear is that I am miserably and +shamefully deficient in that quality as regards action. The palsy of +doubt and distraction hangs like some guilty weight of dark unfathomed +remembrances upon my energies when the signal is flying for +_action_. But, on the other hand, this accursed gift I have, as +regards _thought_, that in the first step towards the possibility +of a misfortune I see its total evolution; in the radix of the series I +see too certainly and too instantly its entire expansion; in the first +syllable of the dreadful sentence I read already the last. It was not +that I feared for ourselves. _Us_ our bulk and impetus charmed +against peril in any collision. And I had ridden through too many +hundreds of perils that were frightful to approach, that were matter of +laughter to look back upon, the first face of which was horror, the +parting face a jest--for any anxiety to rest upon _our_ interests. +The mail was not built, I felt assured, nor bespoke, that could betray +_me_ who trusted to its protection. But any carriage that we could +meet would be frail and light in comparison of ourselves. And I +remarked this ominous accident of our situation,--we were on the wrong +side of the road. But then, it may be said, the other party, if other +there was, might also be on the wrong side; and two wrongs might make a +right. _That_ was not likely. The same motive which had drawn +_us_ to the right-hand side of the road--viz., the luxury of the +soft beaten sand as contrasted with the paved centre--would prove +attractive to others. The two adverse carriages would therefore, to a +certainty, be travelling on the same side; and from this side, as not +being ours in law, the crossing over to the other would, of course, be +looked for from _us_. [Footnote: It is true that, according to the +law of the case as established by legal precedents, all carriages were +required to give way before royal equipages, and therefore before the +mail as one of them. But this only increased the danger, as being a +regulation very imperfectly made known, very unequally enforced, and +therefore often embarrassing the movements on both sides.] Our lamps, +still lighted, would give the impression of vigilance on our part. And +every creature that met us would rely upon _us_ for quartering. +[Footnote: "_Quartering_":--This is the technical word, and, I +presume, derived from the French _cartayer_, to evade a rut or any +obstacle.] All this, and if the separate links of the anticipation had +been a thousand times more, I saw, not discursively, or by effort, or +by succession, but by one flash of horrid simultaneous intuition. + +Under this steady though rapid anticipation of the evil which +_might_ be gathering ahead, ah! what a sullen mystery of fear, what +a sigh of woe, was that which stole upon the air, as again the far-off +sound of a wheel was heard! A whisper it was--a whisper from, perhaps, +four miles off--secretly announcing a ruin that, being foreseen, was +not the less inevitable; that, being known, was not therefore healed. +What could be done--who was it that could do it--to check the storm- +flight of these maniacal horses? Could I not seize the reins from the +grasp of the slumbering coachman? You, reader, think that it would have +been in _your_ power to do so. And I quarrel not with your estimate +of yourself. But, from the way in which the coachman's hand was viced +between his upper and lower thigh, this was impossible. Easy was it? +See, then, that bronze equestrian statue. The cruel rider has kept the +bit in his horse's mouth for two centuries. Unbridle him for a minute, +if you please, and wash his mouth with water. Easy was it? Unhorse me, +then, that imperial rider; knock me those marble feet from those marble +stirrups of Charlemagne. + +The sounds ahead strengthened, and were now too clearly the sounds of +wheels. Who and what could it be? Was it industry in a taxed cart? Was +it youthful gaiety in a gig? Was it sorrow that loitered, or joy that +raced? For as yet the snatches of sound were too intermitting, from +distance, to decipher the character of the motion. Whoever were the +travellers, something must be done to warn them. Upon the other party +rests the active responsibility, but upon _us_--and, woe is me! +that _us_ was reduced to my frail opium-shattered self--rests the +responsibility of warning. Yet, how should this be accomplished? Might +I not sound the guard's horn? Already, on the first thought, I was +making my way over the roof of the guard's seat. But this, from the +accident which I have mentioned, of the foreign mails being piled upon +the roof, was a difficult and even dangerous attempt to one cramped by +nearly three hundred miles of outside travelling. And, fortunately, +before I had lost much time in the attempt, our frantic horses swept +round an angle of the road which opened upon us that final stage where +the collision must be accomplished and the catastrophe sealed. All was +apparently finished. The court was sitting; the case was heard; the +judge had finished; and only the verdict was yet in arrear. + +Before us lay an avenue straight as an arrow, six hundred yards, +perhaps, in length; and the umbrageous trees, which rose in a regular +line from either side, meeting high overhead, gave to it the character +of a cathedral aisle. These trees lent a deeper solemnity to the early +light; but there was still light enough to perceive, at the further end +of this Gothic aisle, a frail reedy gig, in which were seated a young +man, and by his side a young lady. Ah, young sir! what are you about? +If it is requisite that you should whisper your communications to this +young lady--though really I see nobody, at an hour and on a road so +solitary, likely to overhear you--is it therefore requisite that you +should carry your lips forward to hers? The little carriage is creeping +on at one mile an hour; and the parties within it, being thus tenderly +engaged, are naturally bending down their heads. Between them and +eternity, to all human calculation, there is but a minute and a half. +Oh heavens! what is it that I shall do? Speaking or acting, what help +can I offer? Strange it is, and to a mere auditor of the tale might +seem laughable, that I should need a suggestion from the "Iliad" to +prompt the sole resource that remained. Yet so it was. Suddenly I +remembered the shout of Achilles, and its effect. But could I pretend +to shout like the son of Peleus, aided by Pallas? No: but then I needed +not the shout that should alarm all Asia militant; such a shout would +suffice as might carry terror into the hearts of two thoughtless young +people and one gig-horse. I shouted--and the young man heard me not. A +second time I shouted--and now he heard me, for now he raised his +head. + +Here, then, all had been done that, by me, _could_ be done; more on +_my_ part was not possible. Mine had been the first step; the +second was for the young man; the third was for God. If, said I, this +stranger is a brave man, and if indeed he loves the young girl at his +side--or, loving her not, if he feels the obligation, pressing upon +every man worthy to be called a man, of doing his utmost for a woman +confided to his protection--he will at least make some effort to save +her. If _that_ fails, he will not perish the more, or by a death +more cruel, for having made it; and he will die as a brave man should, +with his face to the danger, and with his arm about the woman that he +sought in vain to save. But, if he makes no effort,--shrinking without +a struggle from his duty,--he himself will not the less certainly +perish for this baseness of poltroonery. He will die no less: and why +not? Wherefore should we grieve that there is one craven less in the +world? No; _let_ him perish, without a pitying thought of ours +wasted upon him; and, in that case, all our grief will be reserved for +the fate of the helpless girl who now, upon the least shadow of failure +in _him_, must by the fiercest of translations--must without time +for a prayer--must within seventy seconds stand before the judgment- +seat of God. + +But craven he was not: sudden had been the call upon him, and sudden +was his answer to the call. He saw, he heard, he comprehended, the ruin +that was coming down: already its gloomy shadow darkened above him; and +already he was measuring his strength to deal with it. Ah! what a +vulgar thing does courage seem when we see nations buying it and +selling it for a shilling a-day: ah! what a sublime thing does courage +seem when some fearful summons on the great deeps of life carries a +man, as if running before a hurricane, up to the giddy crest of some +tumultuous crisis from which lie two courses, and a voice says to him +audibly, "One way lies hope; take the other, and mourn for ever!" How +grand a triumph if, even then, amidst the raving of all around him, and +the frenzy of the danger, the man is able to confront his situation--is +able to retire for a moment into solitude with God, and to seek his +counsel from _Him!_ + +For seven seconds, it might be, of his seventy, the stranger settled +his countenance steadfastly upon us, as if to search and value every +element in the conflict before him. For five seconds more of his +seventy he sat immovably, like one that mused on some great purpose. +For five more, perhaps, he sat with eyes upraised, like one that prayed +in sorrow, under some extremity of doubt, for light that should guide +him to the better choice. Then suddenly he rose; stood upright; and, by +a powerful strain upon the reins, raising his horse's fore-feet from +the ground, he slewed him round on the pivot of his hind-legs, so as to +plant the little equipage in a position nearly at right angles to ours. +Thus far his condition was not improved; except as a first step had +been taken towards the possibility of a second. If no more were done, +nothing was done; for the little carriage still occupied the very +centre of our path, though in an altered direction. Yet even now it may +not be too late: fifteen of the seventy seconds may still be +unexhausted; and one almighty bound may avail to clear the ground. +Hurry, then, hurry! for the flying moments--_they_ hurry. Oh, +hurry, hurry, my brave young man! for the cruel hoofs of our horses-- +_they_ also hurry! Fast are the flying moments, faster are the +hoofs of our horses. But fear not for _him_, if human energy can +suffice; faithful was he that drove to his terrific duty; faithful was +the horse to _his_ command. One blow, one impulse given with voice +and hand, by the stranger, one rush from the horse, one bound as if in +the act of rising to a fence, landed the docile creature's forefeet +upon the crown or arching centre of the road. The larger half of the +little equipage had then cleared our over-towering shadow: _that_ +was evident even to my own agitated sight. But it mattered little that +one wreck should float off in safety if upon the wreck that perished +were embarked the human freightage. The rear part of the carriage--was +_that_ certainly beyond the line of absolute ruin? What power could +answer the question? Glance of eye, thought of man, wing of angel, +which of these had speed enough to sweep between the question and the +answer, and divide the one from the other? Light does not tread upon +the steps of light more indivisibly than did our all-conquering arrival +upon the escaping efforts of the gig. _That_ must the young man +have felt too plainly. His back was now turned to us; not by sight +could he any longer communicate with the peril; but, by the dreadful +rattle of our harness, too truly had his ear been instructed that all +was finished as regarded any effort of _his_. Already in resignation he +had rested from his struggle; and perhaps in his heart he was +whispering, "Father, which art in heaven, do Thou finish above what I +on earth have attempted." Faster than ever mill-race we ran past them +in our inexorable flight. Oh, raving of hurricanes that must have +sounded in their young ears at the moment of our transit! Even in that +moment the thunder of collision spoke aloud. Either with the swingle- +bar, or with the haunch of our near leader, we had struck the off-wheel +of the little gig; which stood rather obliquely, and not quite so far +advanced as to be accurately parallel with the near-wheel. The blow, +from the fury of our passage, resounded terrifically. I rose in horror, +to gaze upon the ruins we might have caused. From my elevated station I +looked down, and looked back upon the scene; which in a moment told its +own tale, and wrote all its records on my heart for ever. + +Here was the map of the passion that now had finished. The horse was +planted immovably, with his fore-feet upon the paved crest of the +central road. He of the whole party might be supposed untouched by the +passion of death. The little cany carriage--partly, perhaps, from the +violent torsion of the wheels in its recent movement, partly from the +thundering blow we had given to it--as if it sympathised with human +horror, was all alive with tremblings and shiverings. The young man +trembled not, nor shivered. He sat like a rock. But _his_ was the +steadiness of agitation frozen into rest by horror. As yet he dared not +to look round; for he knew that, if anything remained to do, by him it +could no longer be done. And as yet he knew not for certain if their +safety were accomplished. But the lady-- + +But the lady--! Oh, heavens! will that spectacle ever depart from my +dreams, as she rose and sank upon her seat, sank and rose, threw up her +arms wildly to heaven, clutched at some visionary object in the air, +fainting, praying, raving, despairing? Figure to yourself, reader, the +elements of the case; suffer me to recall before your mind the +circumstances of that unparalleled situation. From the silence and deep +peace of this saintly summer night--from the pathetic blending of this +sweet moonlight, dawnlight, dreamlight--from the manly tenderness of +this flattering, whispering, murmuring love--suddenly as from the woods +and fields--suddenly as from the chambers of the air opening in +revelation--suddenly as from the ground yawning at her feet, leaped +upon her, with the flashing of cataracts, Death the crowned phantom, +with all the equipage of his terrors, and the tiger roar of his voice. + +The moments were numbered; the strife was finished; the vision was +closed. In the twinkling of an eye, our flying horses had carried us to +the termination of the umbrageous aisle; at the right angles we wheeled +into our former direction; the turn of the road carried the scene out +of my eyes in an instant, and swept it into my dreams for ever. + + +SECTION III--DREAM-FUGUE: + +FOUNDED ON THE PRECEDING THEME OF SUDDEN DEATH + + "Whence the sound + Of instruments, that made melodious chime, + Was heard, of harp and organ; and who moved + Their stops and chords was seen; his volant touch + Instinct through all proportions, low and high, + Fled and pursued transverse the resonant fugue." + _Par. Lost_, Bk. XI. + +_Tumultuosissimamente_ + + +Passion of sudden death! that once in youth I read and interpreted by +the shadows of thy averted signs [Footnote: "_Averted signs_":--I +read the course and changes of the lady's agony in the succession of +her involuntary gestures; but it must be remembered that I read all +this from the rear, never once catching the lady's full face, and even +her profile imperfectly.]!--rapture of panic taking the shape (which +amongst tombs in churches I have seen) of woman bursting her sepulchral +bonds--of woman's Ionic form bending forward from the ruins of her +grave with arching foot, with eyes upraised, with clasped adoring +hands--waiting, watching, trembling, praying for the trumpet's call to +rise from dust for ever! Ah, vision too fearful of shuddering humanity +on the brink of almighty abysses!--vision that didst start back, that +didst reel away, like a shrivelling scroll from before the wrath of +fire racing on the wings of the wind! Epilepsy so brief of horror, +wherefore is it that thou canst not die? Passing so suddenly into +darkness, wherefore is it that still thou sheddest thy sad funeral +blights upon the gorgeous mosaics of dreams? Fragment of music too +passionate, heard once, and heard no more, what aileth thee, that thy +deep rolling chords come up at intervals through all the worlds of +sleep, and after forty years have lost no element of horror? + + +I + + +Lo, it is summer--almighty summer! The everlasting gates of life and +summer are thrown open wide; and on the ocean, tranquil and verdant as +a savannah, the unknown lady from the dreadful vision and I myself are +floating--she upon a fairy pinnace, and I upon an English three- +decker. Both of us are wooing gales of festal happiness within the +domain of our common country, within that ancient watery park, within +the pathless chase of ocean, where England takes her pleasure as a +huntress through winter and summer, from the rising to the setting sun. +Ah, what a wilderness of floral beauty was hidden, or was suddenly +revealed, upon the tropic islands through which the pinnace moved! And +upon her deck what a bevy of human flowers: young women how lovely, +young men how noble, that were dancing together, and slowly drifting +towards _us_ amidst music and incense, amidst blossoms from forests +and gorgeous corymbi from vintages, amidst natural carolling, and the +echoes of sweet girlish laughter. Slowly the pinnace nears us, gaily +she hails us, and silently she disappears beneath the shadow of our +mighty bows. But then, as at some signal from heaven, the music, and +the carols, and the sweet echoing of girlish laughter--all are hushed. +What evil has smitten the pinnace, meeting or overtaking her? Did ruin +to our friends couch within our own dreadful shadow? Was our shadow the +shadow of death? I looked over the bow for an answer, and, behold! the +pinnace was dismantled; the revel and the revellers were found no more; +the glory of the vintage was dust; and the forests with their beauty +were left without a witness upon the seas. "But where," and I turned to +our crew--"where are the lovely women that danced beneath the awning of +flowers and clustering corymbi? Whither have fled the noble young men +that danced with _them_?" Answer there was none. But suddenly the +man at the mast-head, whose countenance darkened with alarm, cried out, +"Sail on the weather beam! Down she comes upon us: in seventy seconds +she also will founder." + + +II + + +I looked to the weather side, and the summer had departed. The sea was +rocking, and shaken with gathering wrath. Upon its surface sat mighty +mists, which grouped themselves into arches and long cathedral aisles. +Down one of these, with the fiery pace of a quarrel from a cross-bow, +ran a frigate right athwart our course. "Are they mad?" some voice +exclaimed from our deck. "Do they woo their ruin?" But in a moment, as +she was close upon us, some impulse of a heady current or local vortex +gave a wheeling bias to her course, and off she forged without a shock. +As she ran past us, high aloft amongst the shrouds stood the lady of +the pinnace. The deeps opened ahead in malice to receive her, towering +surges of foam ran after her, the billows were fierce to catch her. But +far away she was borne into desert spaces of the sea: whilst still by +sight I followed her, as she ran before the howling gale, chased by +angry sea-birds and by maddening billows; still I saw her, as at the +moment when she ran past us, standing amongst the shrouds, with her +white draperies streaming before the wind. There she stood, with hair +dishevelled, one hand clutched amongst the tackling--rising, sinking, +fluttering, trembling, praying; there for leagues I saw her as she +stood, raising at intervals one hand to heaven, amidst the fiery crests +of the pursuing waves and the raving of the storm; until at last, upon +a sound from afar of malicious laughter and mockery, all was hidden for +ever in driving showers; and afterwards, but when I knew not, nor how, + + +III + + +Sweet funeral bells from some incalculable distance, wailing over the +dead that die before the dawn, awakened me as I slept in a boat moored +to some familiar shore. The morning twilight even then was breaking; +and, by the dusky revelations which it spread, I saw a girl, adorned +with a garland of white roses about her head for some great festival, +running along the solitary strand in extremity of haste. Her running +was the running of panic; and often she looked back as to some dreadful +enemy in the rear. But, when I leaped ashore, and followed on her steps +to warn her of a peril in front, alas! from me she fled as from another +peril, and vainly I shouted to her of quicksands that lay ahead. Faster +and faster she ran; round a promontory of rocks she wheeled out of +sight; in an instant I also wheeled round it, but only to see the +treacherous sands gathering above her head. Already her person was +buried; only the fair young head and the diadem of white roses around +it were still visible to the pitying heavens; and, last of all, was +visible one white marble arm. I saw by the early twilight this fair +young head, as it was sinking down to darkness--saw this marble arm, as +it rose above her head and her treacherous grave, tossing, faltering, +rising, clutching, as at some false deceiving hand stretched out from +the clouds--saw this marble arm uttering her dying hope, and then +uttering her dying despair. The head, the diadem, the arm--these all +had sunk; at last over these also the cruel quicksand had closed; and +no memorial of the fair young girl remained on earth, except my own +solitary tears, and the funeral bells from the desert seas, that, +rising again more softly, sang a requiem over the grave of the buried +child, and over her blighted dawn. + +I sat, and wept in secret the tears that men have ever given to the +memory of those that died before the dawn, and by the treachery of +earth, our mother. But suddenly the tears and funeral bells were hushed +by a shout as of many nations, and by a roar as from some great king's +artillery, advancing rapidly along the valleys, and heard afar by +echoes from the mountains. "Hush!" I said, as I bent my ear earthwards +to listen--"hush!--this either is the very anarchy of strife, or else" +--and then I listened more profoundly, and whispered as I raised my +head--"or else, oh heavens! it is _victory_ that is final, victory +that swallows up all strife." + + +IV + + +Immediately, in trance, I was carried over land and sea to some distant +kingdom, and placed upon a triumphal car, amongst companions crowned +with laurel. The darkness of gathering midnight, brooding over all the +land, hid from us the mighty crowds that were weaving restlessly about +ourselves as a centre: we heard them, but saw them not. Tidings had +arrived, within an hour, of a grandeur that measured itself against +centuries; too full of pathos they were, too full of joy, to utter +themselves by other language than by tears, by restless anthems, and +_Te Deums_ reverberated from the choirs and orchestras of earth. +These tidings we that sat upon the laurelled car had it for our +privilege to publish amongst all nations. And already, by signs audible +through the darkness, by snortings and tramplings, our angry horses, +that knew no fear or fleshly weariness, upbraided us with delay. +Wherefore _was_ it that we delayed? We waited for a secret word, +that should bear witness to the hope of nations as now accomplished for +ever. At midnight the secret word arrived; which word was--_Waterloo +and Recovered Christendom!_ The dreadful word shone by its own light; +before us it went; high above our leaders' heads it rode, and spread a +golden light over the paths which we traversed. Every city, at the +presence of the secret word, threw open its gates. The rivers were +conscious as we crossed. All the forests, as we ran along their +margins, shivered in homage to the secret word. And the darkness +comprehended it. + +Two hours after midnight we approached a mighty Minster. Its gates, +which rose to the clouds, were closed. But, when the dreadful word that +rode before us reached them with its golden light, silently they moved +back upon their hinges; and at a flying gallop our equipage entered the +grand aisle of the cathedral. Headlong was our pace; and at every +altar, in the little chapels and oratories to the right hand and left +of our course, the lamps, dying or sickening, kindled anew in sympathy +with the secret word that was flying past. Forty leagues we might have +run in the cathedral, and as yet no strength of morning light had +reached us, when before us we saw the aerial galleries of organ and +choir. Every pinnacle of fretwork, every station of advantage amongst +the traceries, was crested by white-robed choristers that sang +deliverance; that wept no more tears, as once their fathers had wept; +but at intervals that sang together to the generations, saying, + + "Chant the deliverer's praise in every tongue," + +and receiving answers from afar, + + "Such as once in heaven and earth were sung." + +And of their chanting was no end; of our headlong pace was neither +pause nor slackening. + +Thus as we ran like torrents--thus as we swept with bridal rapture over +the Campo Santo [Footnote: "_Campo Santo_":--It is probable that +most of my readers will be acquainted with the history of the Campo +Santo (or cemetery) at Pisa, composed of earth brought from Jerusalem +from a bed of sanctity as the highest prize which the noble piety of +crusaders could ask or imagine. To readers who are unacquainted with +England, or who (being English) are yet unacquainted with the cathedral +cities of England, it may be right to mention that the graves within- +side the cathedrals often form a flat pavement over which carriages and +horses _might_ run; and perhaps a boyish remembrance of one +particular cathedral, across which I had seen passengers walk and +burdens carried, as about two centuries back they were through the +middle of St. Paul's in London, may have assisted my dream.] of the +cathedral graves--suddenly we became aware of a vast necropolis rising +upon the far-off horizon--a city of sepulchres, built within the +saintly cathedral for the warrior dead that rested from their feuds on +earth. Of purple granite was the necropolis; yet, in the first minute, +it lay like a purple stain upon the horizon, so mighty was the +distance. In the second minute it trembled through many changes, +growing into terraces and towers of wondrous altitude, so mighty was +the pace. In the third minute already, with our dreadful gallop, we +were entering its suburbs. Vast sarcophagi rose on every side, having +towers and turrets that, upon the limits of the central aisle, strode +forward with haughty intrusion, that ran back with mighty shadows into +answering recesses. Every sarcophagus showed many bas-reliefs--bas- +reliefs of battles and of battle-fields; battles from forgotten ages, +battles from yesterday; battle-fields that, long since, nature had +healed and reconciled to herself with the sweet oblivion of flowers; +battle-fields that were yet angry and crimson with carnage. Where the +terraces ran, there did _we_ run; where the towers curved, there +did _we_ curve. With the flight of swallows our horses swept round +every angle. Like rivers in flood wheeling round headlands, like +hurricanes that ride into the secrets of forests, faster than ever +light unwove the mazes of darkness, our flying equipage carried earthly +passions, kindled warrior instincts, amongst the dust that lay around +us--dust oftentimes of our noble fathers that had slept in God from +Crecy to Trafalgar. And now had we reached the last sarcophagus, now +were we abreast of the last bas-relief, already had we recovered the +arrow-like flight of the illimitable central aisle, when coming up this +aisle to meet us we beheld afar off a female child, that rode in a +carriage as frail as flowers. The mists which went before her hid the +fawns that drew her, but could not hide the shells and tropic flowers +with which she played--but could not hide the lovely smiles by which +she uttered her trust in the mighty cathedral, and in the cherubim that +looked down upon her from the mighty shafts of its pillars. Face to +face she was meeting us; face to face she rode, as if danger there were +none. "Oh, baby!" I exclaimed, "shalt thou be the ransom for Waterloo? +Must we, that carry tidings of great joy to every people, be messengers +of ruin to thee!" In horror I rose at the thought; but then also, in +horror at the thought, rose one that was sculptured on a bas-relief--a +Dying Trumpeter. Solemnly from the field of battle he rose to his feet; +and, unslinging his stony trumpet, carried it, in his dying anguish, to +his stony lips--sounding once, and yet once again; proclamation that, +in _thy_ ears, oh baby! spoke from the battlements of death. +Immediately deep shadows fell between us, and aboriginal silence. The +choir had ceased to sing. The hoofs of our horses, the dreadful rattle +of our harness, the groaning of our wheels, alarmed the graves no more. +By horror the bas-relief had been unlocked unto life. By horror we, +that were so full of life, we men and our horses, with their fiery +fore-legs rising in mid air to their everlasting gallop, were frozen to +a bas-relief. Then a third time the trumpet sounded; the seals were +taken off all pulses; life, and the frenzy of life, tore into their +channels again; again the choir burst forth in sunny grandeur, as from +the muffling of storms and darkness; again the thunderings of our +horses carried temptation into the graves. One cry burst from our lips, +as the clouds, drawing off from the aisle, showed it empty before us.-- +"Whither has the infant fled?--is the young child caught up to God?" +Lo! afar off, in a vast recess, rose three mighty windows to the +clouds; and on a level with their summits, at height insuperable to +man, rose an altar of purest alabaster. On its eastern face was +trembling a crimson glory. A glory was it from the reddening dawn that +now streamed _through_ the windows? Was it from the crimson robes +of the martyrs painted _on_ the windows? Was it from the bloody +bas-reliefs of earth? There, suddenly, within that crimson radiance, +rose the apparition of a woman's head, and then of a woman's figure. +The child it was--grown up to woman's height. Clinging to the horns of +the altar, voiceless she stood--sinking, rising, raving, despairing; +and behind the volume of incense that, night and day, streamed upwards +from the altar, dimly was seen the fiery font, and the shadow of that +dreadful being who should have baptized her with the baptism of death. +But by her side was kneeling her better angel, that hid his face with +wings; that wept and pleaded for _her_; that prayed when _she_ could +_not_; that fought with Heaven by tears for _her_ deliverance; which +also, as he raised his immortal countenance from his wings, I saw, by +the glory in his eye, that from Heaven he had won at last. + + +V + + +Then was completed the passion of the mighty fugue. The golden tubes of +the organ, which as yet had but muttered at intervals--gleaming amongst +clouds and surges of incense--threw up, as from fountains unfathomable, +columns of heart-shattering music. Choir and anti-choir were filling +fast with unknown voices. Thou also, Dying Trumpeter, with thy love +that was victorious, and thy anguish that was finishing, didst enter +the tumult; trumpet and echo--farewell love, and farewell anguish--rang +through the dreadful _sanctus_. Oh, darkness of the grave! that +from the crimson altar and from the fiery font wert visited and +searched by the effulgence in the angel's eye--were these indeed thy +children? Pomps of life, that, from the burials of centuries, rose +again to the voice of perfect joy, did ye indeed mingle with the +festivals of Death? Lo! as I looked back for seventy leagues through +the mighty cathedral, I saw the quick and the dead that sang together +to God, together that sang to the generations of man. All the hosts of +jubilation, like armies that ride in pursuit, moved with one step. Us, +that, with laurelled heads, were passing from the cathedral, they +overtook, and, as with a garment, they wrapped us round with thunders +greater than our own. As brothers we moved together; to the dawn that +advanced, to the stars that fled; rendering thanks to God in the +highest--that, having hid His face through one generation behind thick +clouds of War, once again was ascending, from the Campo Santo of +Waterloo was ascending, in the visions of Peace; rendering thanks for +thee, young girl! whom having overshadowed with His ineffable passion +of death, suddenly did God relent, suffered thy angel to turn aside His +arm, and even in thee, sister unknown! shown to me for a moment only to +be hidden for ever, found an occasion to glorify His goodness. A +thousand times, amongst the phantoms of sleep, have I seen thee +entering the gates of the golden dawn, with the secret word riding +before thee, with the armies of the grave behind thee,--seen thee +sinking, rising, raving, despairing; a thousand times in the worlds of +sleep have I seen thee followed by God's angel through storms, through +desert seas, through the darkness of quicksands, through dreams and the +dreadful revelations that are in dreams; only that at the last, with +one sling of His victorious arm, He might snatch thee back from ruin, +and might emblazon in thy deliverance the endless resurrections of His +love! + + + + +JOAN OF ARC [Footnote: "_Arc_":--Modern France, that should know a +great deal better than myself, insists that the name is not D'Arc-- +_i.e._, of Arc--but _Darc_. Now it happens sometimes that, if +a person whose position guarantees his access to the best information +will content himself with gloomy dogmatism, striking the table with his +fist, and saying in a terrific voice, "It _is_ so, and there's an +end of it," one bows deferentially, and submits. But, if, unhappily for +himself, won by this docility, he relents too amiably into reasons and +arguments, probably one raises an insurrection against him that may +never be crushed; for in the fields of logic one can skirmish, perhaps, +as well as he. Had he confined himself to dogmatism, he would have +intrenched his position in darkness, and have hidden his own vulnerable +points. But coming down to base reasons he lets in light, and one sees +where to plant the blows. Now, the worshipful reason of modern France +for disturbing the old received spelling is that Jean Hordal, a +descendant of La Pucelle's brother, spelled the name _Darc_ in +1612. But what of that? It is notorious that what small matter of +spelling Providence had thought fit to disburse amongst man in the +seventeenth century was all monopolised by printers; now, M. Hordal was +_not_ a printer.] + + +What is to be thought of _her_? What is to be thought of the poor +shepherd girl from the hills and forests of Lorraine, that--like the +Hebrew shepherd boy from the hills and forests of Judea--rose suddenly +out of the quiet, out of the safety, out of the religious inspiration, +rooted in deep pastoral solitudes, to a station in the van of armies, +and to the more perilous station at the right hand of kings? The Hebrew +boy inaugurated his patriotic mission by an _act_, by a victorious +_act_, such as no man could deny. But so did the girl of Lorraine, +if we read her story as it was read by those who saw her nearest. +Adverse armies bore witness to the boy as no pretender; but so they did +to the gentle girl. Judged by the voices of all who saw them _from a +station of good will_, both were found true and loyal to any promises +involved in their first acts. Enemies it was that made the difference +between their subsequent fortunes. The boy rose to a splendour and a +noonday prosperity, both personal and public, that rang through the +records of his people, and became a byword among his posterity for a +thousand years, until the sceptre was departing from Judah. The poor, +forsaken girl, on the contrary, drank not herself from that cup of rest +which she had secured for France. She never sang together with the +songs that rose in her native Domremy as echoes to the departing steps +of invaders. She mingled not in the festal dances at Vaucouleurs which +celebrated in rapture the redemption of France. No! for her voice was +then silent; no! for her feet were dust. Pure, innocent, noble-hearted +girl! whom, from earliest youth, ever I believed in as full of truth +and self-sacrifice, this was amongst the strongest pledges for +_thy_ truth, that never once--no, not for a moment of weakness-- +didst thou revel in the vision of coronets and honour from man. +Coronets for thee! Oh, no! Honours, if they come when all is over, are +for those that share thy blood. [Footnote: "_Those that share thy +blood_":--A collateral relative of Joanna's was subsequently ennobled +by the title of _Du Lys_.] Daughter of Domremy, when the gratitude +of thy king shall awaken, thou wilt be sleeping the sleep of the dead. +Call her, King of France, but she will not hear thee. Cite her by the +apparitors to come and receive a robe of honour, but she will be found +_en contumace_. When the thunders of universal France, as even yet +may happen, shall proclaim the grandeur of the poor shepherd girl that +gave up all for her country, thy ear, young shepherd girl, will have +been deaf for five centuries. To suffer and to do, that was thy portion +in this life; that was thy destiny; and not for a moment was it hidden +from thyself. Life, thou saidst, is short; and the sleep which is in +the grave is long; let me use that life, so transitory, for the glory +of those heavenly dreams destined to comfort the sleep which is so +long! This pure creature--pure from every suspicion of even a visionary +self-interest, even as she was pure in senses more obvious--never once +did this holy child, as regarded herself, relax from her belief in the +darkness that was travelling to meet her. She might not prefigure the +very manner of her death; she saw not in vision, perhaps, the aerial +altitude of the fiery scaffold, the spectators without end, on every +road, pouring into Rouen as to a coronation, the surging smoke, the +volleying flames, the hostile faces all around, the pitying eye that +lurked but here and there, until nature and imperishable truth broke +loose from artificial restraints--these might not be apparent through +the mists of the hurrying future. But the voice that called her to +death, _that_ she heard for ever. + +Great was the throne of France even in those days, and great was He +that sat upon it; but well Joanna knew that not the throne, nor he that +sat upon it, was for _her_; but, on the contrary, that she was for +_them_; not she by them, but they by her, should rise from the +dust. Gorgeous were the lilies of France, and for centuries had the +privilege to spread their beauty over land and sea, until, in another +century, the wrath of God and man combined to wither them; but well +Joanna knew, early at Domremy she had read that bitter truth, that the +lilies of France would decorate no garland for _her_. Flower nor +bud, bell nor blossom, would ever bloom for _her_! + + * * * * * + +But stay. What reason is there for taking up this subject of Joanna +precisely in the spring of 1847? Might it not have been left till the +spring of 1947, or, perhaps, left till called for? Yes, but it _is_ +called for, and clamorously. You are aware, reader, that amongst the +many original thinkers whom modern France has produced, one of the +reputed leaders is M. Michelet. All these writers are of a +revolutionary cast; not in a political sense merely, but in all senses; +mad, oftentimes, as March hares; crazy with the laughing gas of +recovered liberty; drunk with the wine cup of their mighty Revolution, +snorting, whinnying, throwing up their heels, like wild horses in the +boundless pampas, and running races of defiance with snipes, or with +the winds, or with their own shadows, if they can find nothing else to +challenge. Some time or other, I, that have leisure to read, may +introduce _you_, that have not, to two or three dozen of these +writers; of whom I can assure you beforehand that they are often +profound, and at intervals are even as impassioned as if they were come +of our best English blood. But now, confining our attention to M. +Michelet, we in England--who know him best by his worst book, the book +against priests, etc.--know him disadvantageously. That book is a +rhapsody of incoherence. But his "History of France" is quite another +thing. A man, in whatsoever craft he sails, cannot stretch away out of +sight when he is linked to the windings of the shore by towing-ropes of +History. Facts, and the consequences of facts, draw the writer back to +the falconer's lure from the giddiest heights of speculation. Here, +therefore--in his "France"--if not always free from flightiness, if now +and then off like a rocket for an airy wheel in the clouds, M. +Michelet, with natural politeness, never forgets that he has left a +large audience waiting for him on earth, and gazing upward in anxiety +for his return; return, therefore, he does. But History, though clear +of certain temptations in one direction, has separate dangers of its +own. It is impossible so to write a history of France, or of England-- +works becoming every hour more indispensable to the inevitably +political man of this day--without perilous openings for error. If I, +for instance, on the part of England, should happen to turn my labours +into that channel, and (on the model of Lord Percy going to Chevy +Chase) + + "A vow to God should make + My pleasure in the Michelet woods + Three summer days to take," + +probably, from simple delirium, I might hunt M. Michelet into +_delirium tremens_. Two strong angels stand by the side of History, +whether French history or English, as heraldic supporters: the angel of +research on the left hand, that must read millions of dusty parchments, +and of pages blotted with lies; the angel of meditation on the right +hand, that must cleanse these lying records with fire, even as of old +the draperies of _asbestos_ were cleansed, and must quicken them +into regenerated life. Willingly I acknowledge that no man will ever +avoid innumerable errors of detail; with so vast a compass of ground to +traverse, this is impossible; but such errors (though I have a bushel +on hand, at M. Michelet's service) are not the game I chase; it is the +bitter and unfair spirit in which M. Michelet writes against England. +Even _that_, after all, is but my secondary object; the real one is +Joanna, the Pucelle d'Orleans herself. + +I am not going to write the history of La Pucelle: to do this, or even +circumstantially to report the history of her persecution and bitter +death, of her struggle with false witnesses and with ensnaring judges, +it would be necessary to have before us _all_ the documents, and +therefore the collection only now forthcoming in Paris. [Footnote: +"_Only now forthcoming_":--In 1847 _began_ the publication (from +official records) of Joanna's trial. It was interrupted, I fear, +by the convulsions of 1848; and whether even yet finished I do not +know.] But _my_ purpose is narrower. There have been great thinkers, +disdaining the careless judgments of contemporaries, who have +thrown themselves boldly on the judgment of a far posterity, that +should have had time to review, to ponder, to compare. There have been +great actors on the stage of tragic humanity that might, with the same +depth of confidence, have appealed from the levity of compatriot +friends--too heartless for the sublime interest of their story, and too +impatient for the labour of sifting its perplexities--to the +magnanimity and justice of enemies. To this class belongs the Maid of +Arc. The ancient Romans were too faithful to the ideal of grandeur in +themselves not to relent, after a generation or two, before the +grandeur of Hannibal. Mithridates, a more doubtful person, yet, merely +for the magic perseverance of his indomitable malice, won from the same +Romans the only real honour that ever he received on earth. And we +English have ever shown the same homage to stubborn enmity. To work +unflinchingly for the ruin of England; to say through life, by word and +by deed, _Delenda est Anglia Victrix_!--that one purpose of malice, +faithfully pursued, has quartered some people upon our national funds +of homage as by a perpetual annuity. Better than an inheritance of +service rendered to England herself has sometimes proved the most +insane hatred to England. Hyder Ali, even his son Tippoo, though so far +inferior, and Napoleon, have all benefited by this disposition among +ourselves to exaggerate the merit of diabolic enmity. Not one of these +men was ever capable, in a solitary instance, of praising an enemy +(what do you say to _that_, reader?); and yet in _their_ behalf, we +consent to forget, not their crimes only, but (which is worse) their +hideous bigotry and anti-magnanimous egotism--for nationality it was +not. Suffren, and some half dozen of other French nautical heroes, +because rightly they did us all the mischief they could (which was +really great), are names justly reverenced in England. On the same +principle, La Pucelle d'Orleans, the victorious enemy of England, has +been destined to receive her deepest commemoration from the magnanimous +justice of Englishmen. + +Joanna, as we in England should call her, but according to her own +statement, Jeanne (or, as M. Michelet asserts, Jean [Footnote: +"_Jean_":--M. Michelet asserts that there was a mystical meaning at +that era in calling a child _Jean_; it implied a secret commendation of +a child, if not a dedication, to St. John the evangelist, the beloved +disciple, the apostle of love and mysterious visions. But, really, as +the name was so exceedingly common, few people will detect a mystery in +calling a _boy_ by the name of Jack, though it _does_ seem mysterious +to call a girl Jack. It may be less so in France, where a beautiful +practice has always prevailed of giving a boy his mother's name-- +preceded and strengthened by a male name, as _Charles Anne_, _Victor +Victoire_. In cases where a mother's memory has been unusually dear to +a son, this vocal memento of her, locked into the circle of his own +name, gives to it the tenderness of a testamentary relic, or a funeral +ring. I presume, therefore, that La Pucelle must have borne the +baptismal name of Jeanne Jean; the latter with no reference, perhaps, +to so sublime a person as St. John, but simply to some relative.]) +D'Arc was born at Domremy, a village on the marches of Lorraine and +Champagne, and dependent upon the town of Vaucouleurs. I have called +her a Lorrainer, not simply because the word is prettier, but because +Champagne too odiously reminds us English of what are for _us_ +imaginary wines--which, undoubtedly, La Pucelle tasted as rarely as we +English: we English, because the champagne of London is chiefly grown +in Devonshire; La Pucelle, because the champagne of Champagne never, by +any chance, flowed into the fountain of Domremy, from which only she +drank. M. Michelet will have her to be a _Champenoise_, and for no +better reason than that she "took after her father," who happened to be +a _Champenois_. + +These disputes, however, turn on refinements too nice. Domremy stood +upon the frontiers, and, like other frontiers, produced a _mixed_ +race, representing the _cis_ and the _trans_. A river (it is +true) formed the boundary line at this point--the river Meuse; and +_that_, in old days, might have divided the populations; but in +these days it did not; there were bridges, there were ferries, and +weddings crossed from the right bank to the left. Here lay two great +roads, not so much for travellers that were few, as for armies that +were too many by half. These two roads, one of which was the great +highroad between France and Germany, _decussated_ at this very +point; which is a learned way of saying that they formed a St. Andrew's +Cross, or letter X. I hope the compositor will choose a good large X; +in which case the point of intersection, the _locus_ of conflux and +intersection for these four diverging arms, will finish the reader's +geographical education, by showing him to a hair's-breadth where it was +that Domremy stood. These roads, so grandly situated, as great trunk +arteries between two mighty realms,[Footnote: And reminding one of that +inscription, so justly admired by Paul Richter, which a Russian Czarina +placed on a guide-post near Moscow: _This is the road that leads to +Constantinople._] and haunted for ever by wars or rumours of wars, +decussated (for anything I know to the contrary) absolutely under +Joanna's bedroom window; one rolling away to the right, past M. D'Arc's +old barn, and the other unaccountably preferring to sweep round that +odious man's pig-sty to the left. + +On whichever side of the border chance had thrown Joanna, the same love +to France would have been nurtured. For it is a strange fact, noticed +by M. Michelet and others, that the Dukes of Bar and Lorraine had for +generations pursued the policy of eternal warfare with France on their +own account, yet also of eternal amity and league with France in case +anybody else presumed to attack her. Let peace settle upon France, and +before long you might rely upon seeing the little vixen Lorraine flying +at the throat of France. Let France be assailed by a formidable enemy, +and instantly you saw a Duke of Lorraine insisting on having his own +throat cut in support of France; which favour accordingly was +cheerfully granted to him in three great successive battles: twice by +the English, viz., at Crecy and Agincourt, once by the Sultan at +Nicopolis. + +This sympathy with France during great eclipses, in those that during +ordinary seasons were always teasing her with brawls and guerilla +inroads, strengthened the natural piety to France of those that were +confessedly the children of her own house. The outposts of France, as +one may call the great frontier provinces, were of all localities the +most devoted to the Fleurs de Lys. To witness, at any great crisis, the +generous devotion to these lilies of the little fiery cousin that in +gentler weather was for ever tilting at the breast of France, could not +but fan the zeal of France's legitimate daughters; while to occupy a +post of honour on the frontiers against an old hereditary enemy of +France would naturally stimulate this zeal by a sentiment of martial +pride, by a sense of danger always threatening, and of hatred always +smouldering. That great four-headed road was a perpetual memento to +patriotic ardour. To say "This way lies the road to Paris, and that +other way to Aix-la-Chapelle; this to Prague, that to Vienna," +nourished the warfare of the heart by daily ministrations of sense. The +eye that watched for the gleams of lance or helmet from the hostile +frontier, the ear that listened for the groaning of wheels, made the +highroad itself, with its relations to centres so remote, into a manual +of patriotic duty. + +The situation, therefore, _locally_, of Joanna was full of profound +suggestions to a heart that listened for the stealthy steps of change +and fear that too surely were in motion. But, if the place were grand, +the time, the burden of the time, was far more so. The air overhead in +its upper chambers was _hurtling_ with the obscure sound; was dark +with sullen fermenting of storms that had been gathering for a hundred +and thirty years. The battle of Agincourt in Joanna's childhood had +reopened the wounds of France. Crecy and Poictiers, those withering +overthrows for the chivalry of France, had, before Agincourt occurred, +been tranquilised by more than half a century; but this resurrection of +their trumpet wails made the whole series of battles and endless +skirmishes take their stations as parts in one drama. The graves that +had closed sixty years ago seemed to fly open in sympathy with a sorrow +that echoed their own. The monarchy of France laboured in extremity, +rocked and reeled like a ship fighting with the darkness of monsoons. +The madness of the poor king (Charles VI), falling in at such a crisis, +like the case of women labouring in child-birth during the storming of +a city, trebled the awfulness of the time. Even the wild story of the +incident which had immediately occasioned the explosion of this +madness--the case of a man unknown, gloomy, and perhaps maniacal +himself, coming out of a forest at noonday, laying his hand upon the +bridle of the king's horse, checking him for a moment to say, "Oh, +king, thou art betrayed," and then vanishing, no man knew whither, as +he had appeared for no man knew what--fell in with the universal +prostration of mind that laid France on her knees, as before the slow +unweaving of some ancient prophetic doom. The famines, the +extraordinary diseases, the insurrections of the peasantry up and down +Europe--these were chords struck from the same mysterious harp; but +these were transitory chords. There had been others of deeper and more +ominous sound. The termination of the Crusades, the destruction of the +Templars, the Papal interdicts, the tragedies caused or suffered by the +house of Anjou, and by the Emperor--these were full of a more permanent +significance. But, since then, the colossal figure of feudalism was +seen standing, as it were on tiptoe, at Crecy, for flight from earth: +that was a revolution unparalleled; yet _that_ was a trifle by +comparison with the more fearful revolutions that were mining below the +Church. By her own internal schisms, by the abominable spectacle of a +double Pope--so that no man, except through political bias, could even +guess which was Heaven's vicegerent, and which the creature of Hell-- +the Church was rehearsing, as in still earlier forms she had already +rehearsed, those vast rents in her foundations which no man should ever +heal. + +These were the loftiest peaks of the cloudland in the skies that to the +scientific gazer first caught the colors of the _new_ morning in +advance. But the whole vast range alike of sweeping glooms overhead +dwelt upon all meditative minds, even upon those that could not +distinguish the tendencies nor decipher the forms. It was, therefore, +not her own age alone, as affected by its immediate calamities, that +lay with such weight upon Joanna's mind, but her own age as one section +in a vast mysterious drama, unweaving through a century back, and +drawing nearer continually to some dreadful crisis. Cataracts and +rapids were heard roaring ahead; and signs were seen far back, by help +of old men's memories, which answered secretly to signs now coming +forward on the eye, even as locks answer to keys. It was not wonderful +that in such a haunted solitude, with such a haunted heart, Joanna +should see angelic visions, and hear angelic voices. These voices +whispered to her for ever the duty, self-imposed, of delivering France. +Five years she listened to these monitory voices with internal +struggles. At length she could resist no longer. Doubt gave way; and +she left her home for ever in order to present herself at the dauphin's +court. The education of this poor girl was mean according to the +present standard: was ineffably grand, according to a purer philosophic +standard: and only not good for our age because for us it would be +unattainable. She read nothing, for she could not read; but she had +heard others read parts of the Roman martyrology. She wept in sympathy +with the sad "Misereres" of the Romish Church; she rose to heaven with +the glad triumphant "Te Deums" of Rome; she drew her comfort and her +vital strength from the rites of the same Church. But, next after these +spiritual advantages, she owed most to the advantages of her situation. +The fountain of Domremy was on the brink of a boundless forest; and it +was haunted to that degree by fairies that the parish priest +(_cure_) was obliged to read mass there once a year, in order to +keep them in any decent bounds. Fairies are important, even in a +statistical view: certain weeds mark poverty in the soil; fairies mark +its solitude. As surely as the wolf retires before cities does the +fairy sequester herself from the haunts of the licensed victualer. A +village is too much for her nervous delicacy; at most, she can tolerate +a distant view of a hamlet. We may judge, therefore, by the uneasiness +and extra trouble which they gave to the parson, in what strength the +fairies mustered at Domremy, and, by a satisfactory consequence, how +thinly sown with men and women must have been that region even in its +inhabited spots. But the forests of Domremy--those were the glories of +the land: for in them abode mysterious powers and ancient secrets that +towered into tragic strength. "Abbeys there were, and abbey windows"-- +"like Moorish temples of the Hindoos"--that exercised even princely +power both in Lorraine and in the German Diets. These had their sweet +bells that pierced the forests for many a league at matins or vespers, +and each its own dreamy legend. Few enough, and scattered enough, were +these abbeys, so as in no degree to disturb the deep solitude of the +region; yet many enough to spread a network or awning of Christian +sanctity over what else might have seemed a heathen wilderness. This +sort of religious talisman being secured, a man the most afraid of +ghosts (like myself, suppose, or the reader) becomes armed into courage +to wander for days in their sylvan recesses. The mountains of the +Vosges, on the eastern frontier of France, have never attracted much +notice from Europe, except in 1813-14 for a few brief months, when they +fell within Napoleon's line of defence against the Allies. But they are +interesting for this among other features, that they do not, like some +loftier ranges, repel woods; the forests and the hills are on sociable +terms. "Live and let live" is their motto. For this reason, in part, +these tracts in Lorraine were a favourite hunting-ground with the +Carlovingian princes. About six hundred years before Joanna's +childhood, Charlemagne was known to have hunted there. That, of itself, +was a grand incident in the traditions of a forest or a chase. In these +vast forests, also, were to be found (if anywhere to be found) those +mysterious fawns that tempted solitary hunters into visionary and +perilous pursuits. Here was seen (if anywhere seen) that ancient stag +who was already nine hundred years old, but possibly a hundred or two +more, when met by Charlemagne; and the thing was put beyond doubt by +the inscription upon his golden collar. I believe Charlemagne knighted +the stag; and, if ever he is met again by a king, he ought to be made +an earl, or, being upon the marches of France, a marquis. Observe, I +don't absolutely vouch for all these things: my own opinion varies. On +a fine breezy forenoon I am audaciously sceptical; but as twilight sets +in my credulity grows steadily, till it becomes equal to anything that +could be desired. And I have heard candid sportsmen declare that, +outside of these very forests, they laughed loudly at all the dim tales +connected with their haunted solitudes, but, on reaching a spot +notoriously eighteen miles deep within them, they agreed with Sir Roger +de Coverley that a good deal might be said on both sides. + +Such traditions, or any others that (like the stag) connect distant +generations with each other, are, for that cause, sublime; and the +sense of the shadowy, connected with such appearances that reveal +themselves or not according to circumstances, leaves a colouring of +sanctity over ancient forests, even in those minds that utterly reject +the legend as a fact. + +But, apart from all distinct stories of that order, in any solitary +frontier between two great empires--as here, for instance, or in the +desert between Syria and the Euphrates--there is an inevitable +tendency, in minds of any deep sensibility, to people the solitudes +with phantom images of powers that were of old so vast. Joanna, +therefore, in her quiet occupation of a shepherdess, would be led +continually to brood over the political condition of her country by the +traditions of the past no less than by the mementoes of the local +present. + +M. Michelet, indeed, says that La Pucelle was not a shepherdess. I beg +his pardon; she was. What he rests upon I guess pretty well: it is the +evidence of a woman called Haumette, the most confidential friend of +Joanna. Now, she is a good witness, and a good girl, and I like her; +for she makes a natural and affectionate report of Joanna's ordinary +life. But still, however good she may be as a witness, Joanna is +better; and she, when speaking to the dauphin, calls herself in the +Latin report _Bergereta_. Even Haumette confesses that Joanna +tended sheep in her girlhood. And I believe that, if Miss Haumette were +taking coffee along with me this very evening (February 12, 1847)--in +which there would be no subject for scandal or for maiden blushes, +because I am an intense philosopher, and Miss H. would be hard upon 450 +years old--she would admit the following comment upon her evidence to +be right. A Frenchman, about forty years ago--M. Simond, in his +"Travels"--mentions accidentally the following hideous scene as one +steadily observed and watched by himself in chivalrous France not very +long before the French Revolution: A peasant was plowing; and the team +that drew his plow was a donkey and a woman. Both were regularly +harnessed; both pulled alike. This is bad enough; but the Frenchman +adds that, in distributing his lashes, the peasant was obviously +desirous of being impartial; or, if either of the yokefellows had a +right to complain, certainly it was not the donkey. Now, in any country +where such degradation of females could be tolerated by the state of +manners, a woman of delicacy would shrink from acknowledging, either +for herself or her friend, that she had ever been addicted to any mode +of labour not strictly domestic; because, if once owning herself a +praedial servant, she would be sensible that this confession extended by +probability in the hearer's thoughts to the having incurred indignities +of this horrible kind. Haumette clearly thinks it more dignified for +Joanna to have been darning the stockings of her horny-hoofed father, +M. D'Arc, than keeping sheep, lest she might then be suspected of +having ever done something worse. But, luckily, there was no danger of +_that_: Joanna never was in service; and my opinion is that her +father should have mended his own stockings, since probably he was the +party to make the holes in them, as many a better man than D'Arc does-- +meaning by _that_ not myself, because, though probably a better man +than D'Arc, I protest against doing anything of the kind. If I lived +even with Friday in Juan Fernandez, either Friday must do all the +darning, or else it must go undone. The better men that I meant were +the sailors in the British navy, every man of whom mends his own +stockings. Who else is to do it? Do you suppose, reader, that the +junior lords of the admiralty are under articles to darn for the navy? + +The reason, meantime, for my systematic hatred of D'Arc is this: There +was a story current in France before the Revolution, framed to ridicule +the pauper aristocracy, who happened to have long pedigrees and short +rent rolls: viz., that a head of such a house, dating from the +Crusades, was overheard saying to his son, a Chevalier of St. Louis, +"_Chevalier, as-tu donne au cochon a manger_?" Now, it is clearly +made out by the surviving evidence that D'Arc would much have preferred +continuing to say, "_Ma fille, as-tu donne au cochon a manger_?" to +saying, "_Pucelle d'Orleans, as-tu sauve les fleurs-de-lys_?" There +is an old English copy of verses which argues thus: + + "If the man that turnips cries + Cry not when his father dies, + Then 'tis plain the man had rather + Have a turnip than his father." + +I cannot say that the logic of these verses was ever _entirely_ to +my satisfaction. I do not see my way through it as clearly as could be +wished. But I see my way most clearly through D'Arc; and the result is +--that he would greatly have preferred not merely a turnip to his +father, but the saving a pound or so of bacon to saving the Oriflamme +of France. + +It is probable (as M. Michelet suggests) that the title of Virgin or +Pucelle had in itself, and apart from the miraculous stories about her, +a secret power over the rude soldiery and partisan chiefs of that +period; for in such a person they saw a representative manifestation of +the Virgin Mary, who, in a course of centuries, had grown steadily upon +the popular heart. + +As to Joanna's supernatural detection of the dauphin (Charles VII) +among three hundred lords and knights, I am surprised at the credulity +which could ever lend itself to that theatrical juggle. Who admires +more than myself the sublime enthusiasm, the rapturous faith in +herself, of this pure creature? But I am far from admiring stage +artifices which not La Pucelle, but the court, must have arranged; nor +can surrender myself to the conjurer's legerdemain, such as may be seen +every day for a shilling. Southey's "Joan of Arc" was published in +1796. Twenty years after, talking with Southey, I was surprised to find +him still owning a secret bias in favor of Joan, founded on her +detection of the dauphin. The story, for the benefit of the reader new +to the case, was this: La Pucelle was first made known to the dauphin, +and presented to his court, at Chinon; and here came her first trial. +By way of testing her supernatural pretensions, she was to find out the +royal personage amongst the whole ark of clean and unclean creatures. +Failing in this _coup d'essai_, she would not simply disappoint +many a beating heart in the glittering crowd that on different motives +yearned for her success, but she would ruin herself, and, as the oracle +within had told her, would, by ruining herself, ruin France. Our own +Sovereign Lady Victoria rehearses annually a trial not so severe in +degree, but the same in kind. She "pricks" for sheriffs. Joanna pricked +for a king. But observe the difference: our own Lady pricks for two men +out of three; Joanna for one man out of three hundred. Happy Lady of +the Islands and the Orient!--she _can_ go astray in her choice only +by one-half: to the extent of one-half she _must_ have the +satisfaction of being right. And yet, even with these tight limits to +the misery of a boundless discretion, permit me, Liege Lady, with all +loyalty, to submit that now and then you prick with your pin the wrong +man. But the poor child from Domremy, shrinking under the gaze of a +dazzling court--not _because_ dazzling (for in visions she had seen +those that were more so), but because some of them wore a scoffing +smile on their features--how should _she_ throw her line into so +deep a river to angle for a king, where many a gay creature was +sporting that masqueraded as kings in dress! Nay, even more than any +true king would have done: for, in Southey's version of the story, the +dauphin says, by way of trying the virgin's magnetic sympathy with +royalty, + + "On the throne, + I the while mingling with the menial throng, + Some courtier shall be seated." + +This usurper is even crowned: "the jeweled crown shines on a menial's +head." But, really, that is "_un peu fort_"; and the mob of +spectators might raise a scruple whether our friend the jackdaw upon +the throne, and the dauphin himself, were not grazing the shins of +treason. For the dauphin could not lend more than belonged to him. +According to the popular notion, he had no crown for himself; +consequently none to lend, on any pretence whatever, until the +consecrated Maid should take him to Rheims. This was the _popular_ +notion in France. But certainly it was the dauphin's interest to +support the popular notion, as he meant to use the services of Joanna. +For if he were king already, what was it that she could do for him +beyond Orleans? That is to say, what more than a merely _military_ +service could she render him? And, above all, if he were king without a +coronation, and without the oil from the sacred ampulla, what advantage +was yet open to him by celerity above his competitor, the English boy? +Now was to be a race for a coronation: he that should win _that_ +race carried the superstition of France along with him: he that should +first be drawn from the ovens of Rheims was under that superstition +baked into a king. + +La Pucelle, before she could be allowed to practise as a warrior, was +put through her manual and platoon exercise, as a pupil in divinity, at +the bar of six eminent men in wigs. According to Southey (v. 393, bk. +iii., in the original edition of his "Joan of Arc,") she "appalled the +doctors." It's not easy to do _that_: but they had some reason to +feel bothered, as that surgeon would assuredly feel bothered who, upon +proceeding to dissect a subject, should find the subject retaliating as +a dissector upon himself, especially if Joanna ever made the speech to +them which occupies v. 354-391, bk. iii. It is a double impossibility: +1st, because a piracy from Tindal's "Christianity as old as the +Creation"--a piracy _a parte ante_, and by three centuries; 2d, it +is quite contrary to the evidence on Joanna's trial. Southey's "Joan" +of A.D. 1796 (Cottle, Bristol) tells the doctors, among other secrets, +that she never in her life attended--1st, Mass; nor 2d, the Sacramental +Table; nor 3d, Confession. In the meantime, all this deistical +confession of Joanna's, besides being suicidal for the interest of her +cause, is opposed to the depositions upon _both_ trials. The very +best witness called from first to last deposes that Joanna attended +these rites of her Church even too often; was taxed with doing so; and, +by blushing, owned the charge as a fact, though certainly not as a +fault. Joanna was a girl of natural piety, that saw God in forests and +hills and fountains, but did not the less seek him in chapels and +consecrated oratories. + +This peasant girl was self-educated through her own natural +meditativeness. If the reader turns to that divine passage in "Paradise +Regained" which Milton has put into the mouth of our Saviour when first +entering the wilderness, and musing upon the tendency of those great +impulses growing within himself----- + + "Oh, what a multitude of thoughts at once + Awakened in me swarm, while I consider + What from within I feel myself, and hear + What from without comes often to my ears, + Ill sorting with my present state compared! + When I was yet a child, no childish play + To me was pleasing; all my mind was set + Serious to learn and know, and thence to do, + What might be public good; myself I thought + Born to that end----" + +he will have some notion of the vast reveries which brooded over the +heart of Joanna in early girlhood, when the wings were budding that +should carry her from Orleans to Rheims; when the golden chariot was +dimly revealing itself that should carry her from the kingdom of +_France Delivered_ to the Eternal Kingdom. + +It is not requisite for the honour of Joanna, nor is there in this +place room, to pursue her brief career of _action._ That, though +wonderful, forms the earthly part of her story; the spiritual part is +the saintly passion of her imprisonment, trial, and execution. It is +unfortunate, therefore, for Southey's "Joan of Arc" (which, however, +should always be regarded as a _juvenile_ effort), that precisely +when her real glory begins the poem ends. But this limitation of the +interest grew, no doubt, from the constraint inseparably attached to +the law of epic unity. Joanna's history bisects into two opposite +hemispheres, and both could not have been presented to the eye in one +poem, unless by sacrificing all unity of theme, or else by involving +the earlier half, as a narrative episode, in the latter; which, +however, might have been done, for it might have been communicated to a +fellow-prisoner, or a confessor, by Joanna herself. It is sufficient, +as concerns _this_ section of Joanna's life, to say that she +fulfilled, to the height of her promises, the restoration of the +prostrate throne. France had become a province of England, and for the +ruin of both, if such a yoke could be maintained. Dreadful pecuniary +exhaustion caused the English energy to droop; and that critical +opening La Pucelle used with a corresponding felicity of audacity and +suddenness (that were in themselves portentous) for introducing the +wedge of French native resources, for rekindling the national pride, +and for planting the dauphin once more upon his feet. When Joanna +appeared, he had been on the point of giving up the struggle with the +English, distressed as they were, and of flying to the south of France. +She taught him to blush for such abject counsels. She liberated +Orleans, that great city, so decisive by its fate for the issue of the +war, and then beleaguered by the English with an elaborate application +of engineering skill unprecedented in Europe. Entering the city after +sunset on the 29th of April, she sang mass on Sunday, May 8th, for the +entire disappearance of the besieging force. On the 29th of June she +fought and gained over the English the decisive battle of Patay; on the +9th of July she took Troyes by a _coup-de-main_ from a mixed +garrison of English and Burgundians; on the 15th of that month she +carried the dauphin into Rheims; on Sunday the 17th she crowned him; +and there she rested from her labour of triumph. All that was to be +_done_ she had now accomplished; what remained was--to +_suffer_. + +All this forward movement was her own; excepting one man, the whole +council was against her. Her enemies were all that drew power from +earth. Her supporters were her own strong enthusiasm, and the headlong +contagion by which she carried this sublime frenzy into the hearts of +women, of soldiers, and of all who lived by labour. Henceforward she +was thwarted; and the worst error that she committed was to lend the +sanction of her presence to counsels which she had ceased to approve. +But she had now accomplished the capital objects which her own visions +had dictated. These involved all the rest. Errors were now less +important; and doubtless it had now become more difficult for herself +to pronounce authentically what _were_ errors. The noble girl had +achieved, as by a rapture of motion, the capital end of clearing out a +free space around her sovereign, giving him the power to move his arms +with effect, and, secondly, the inappreciable end of winning for that +sovereign what seemed to all France the heavenly ratification of his +rights, by crowning him with the ancient solemnities. She had made it +impossible for the English now to step before her. They were caught in +an irretrievable blunder, owing partly to discord among the uncles of +Henry VI, partly to a want of funds, but partly to the very +impossibility which they believed to press with tenfold force upon any +French attempt to forestall theirs. They laughed at such a thought; +and, while they laughed, _she_ did it. Henceforth the single +redress for the English of this capital oversight, but which never +_could_ have redressed it effectually, was to vitiate and taint the +coronation of Charles VII as the work of a witch. That policy, and not +malice (as M. Michelet is so happy to believe), was the moving +principle in the subsequent prosecution of Joanna. Unless they unhinged +the force of the first coronation in the popular mind by associating it +with power given from hell, they felt that the sceptre of the invader +was broken. + +But she, the child that, at nineteen, had wrought wonders so great for +France, was she not elated? Did she not lose, as men so often +_have_ lost, all sobriety of mind when standing upon the pinnacle +of success so giddy? Let her enemies declare. During the progress of +her movement, and in the centre of ferocious struggles, she had +manifested the temper of her feelings by the pity which she had +everywhere expressed for the suffering enemy. She forwarded to the +English leaders a touching invitation to unite with the French, as +brothers, in a common crusade against infidels--thus opening the road +for a soldierly retreat. She interposed to protect the captive or the +wounded; she mourned over the excesses of her countrymen; she threw +herself off her horse to kneel by the dying English soldier, and to +comfort him with such ministrations, physical or spiritual, as his +situation allowed. "Nolebat," says the evidence, "uti ense suo, aut +quemquam interficere." She sheltered the English that invoked her aid +in her own quarters. She wept as she beheld, stretched on the field of +battle, so many brave enemies that had died without confession. And, as +regarded herself, her elation expressed itself thus: on the day when +she had finished her work, she wept; for she knew that, when her +_triumphal_ task was done, her end must be approaching. Her +aspirations pointed only to a place which seemed to her more than +usually full of natural piety, as one in which it would give her +pleasure to die. And she uttered, between smiles and tears, as a wish +that inexpressibly fascinated her heart, and yet was half fantastic, a +broken prayer that God would return her to the solitudes from which he +had drawn her, and suffer her to become a shepherdess once more. It was +a natural prayer, because nature has laid a necessity upon every human +heart to seek for rest and to shrink from torment. Yet, again, it was a +half-fantastic prayer, because, from childhood upward, visions that she +had no power to mistrust, and the voices which sounded in her ear for +ever, had long since persuaded her mind that for _her_ no such +prayer could be granted. Too well she felt that her mission must be +worked out to the end, and that the end was now at hand. All went wrong +from this time. She herself had created the _funds_ out of which +the French restoration should grow; but she was not suffered to witness +their development or their prosperous application. More than one +military plan was entered upon which she did not approve. But she still +continued to expose her person as before. Severe wounds had not taught +her caution. And at length, in a sortie from Compiegne (whether through +treacherous collusion on the part of her own friends is doubtful to +this day), she was made prisoner by the Burgundians, and finally +surrendered to the English. + +Now came her trial. This trial, moving of course under English +influence, was conducted in chief by the Bishop of Beauvais. He was a +Frenchman, sold to English interests, and hoping, by favour of the +English leaders, to reach the highest preferment. "Bishop that art, +Archbishop that shalt be, Cardinal that mayest be," were the words that +sounded continually in his ear; and doubtless a whisper of visions +still higher, of a triple crown, and feet upon the necks of kings, +sometimes stole into his heart. M. Michelet is anxious to keep us in +mind that this bishop was but an agent of the English. True. But it +does not better the case for his countryman that, being an accomplice +in the crime, making himself the leader in the persecution against the +helpless girl, he was willing to be all this in the spirit, and with +the conscious vileness of a cat's-paw. Never from the foundations of +the earth was there such a trial as this, if it were laid open in all +its beauty of defence and all its hellishness of attack. Oh, child of +France! shepherdess, peasant girl! trodden under foot by all around +thee, how I honour thy flashing intellect, quick as God's lightning, +and true as God's lightning to its mark, that ran before France and +laggard Europe by many a century, confounding the malice of the +ensnarer, and making dumb the oracles of falsehood! Is it not +scandalous, is it not humiliating to civilization, that, even at this +day, France exhibits the horrid spectacle of judges examining the +prisoner against himself; seducing him, by fraud, into treacherous +conclusions against his own head; using the terrors of their power for +extorting confessions from the frailty of hope; nay (which is worse), +using the blandishments of condescension and snaky kindness for thawing +into compliances of gratitude those whom they had failed to freeze into +terror? Wicked judges! barbarian jurisprudence!--that, sitting in your +own conceit on the summits of social wisdom, have yet failed to learn +the first principles of criminal justice--sit ye humbly and with +docility at the feet of this girl from Domremy, that tore your webs of +cruelty into shreds and dust. "Would you examine me as a witness +against myself?" was the question by which many times she defied their +arts. Continually she showed that their interrogations were irrelevant +to any business before the court, or that entered into the ridiculous +charges against her. General questions were proposed to her on points +of casuistical divinity; two-edged questions, which not one of +themselves could have answered, without, on the one side, landing +himself in heresy (as then interpreted), or, on the other, in some +presumptuous expression of self-esteem. Next came a wretched Dominican, +that pressed her with an objection, which, if applied to the Bible, +would tax every one of its miracles with unsoundness. The monk had the +excuse of never having read the Bible. M. Michelet has no such excuse; +and it makes one blush for him, as a philosopher, to find him +describing such an argument as "weighty," whereas it is but a varied +expression of rude Mahometan metaphysics. Her answer to this, if there +were room to place the whole in a clear light, was as shattering as it +was rapid. Another thought to entrap her by asking what language the +angelic visitors of her solitude had talked--as though heavenly +counsels could want polyglot interpreters for every word, or that God +needed language at all in whispering thoughts to a human heart. Then +came a worse devil, who asked her whether the Archangel Michael had +appeared naked. Not comprehending the vile insinuation, Joanna, whose +poverty suggested to her simplicity that it might be the _costliness_ +of suitable robes which caused the demur, asked them if they fancied +God, who clothed the flowers of the valleys, unable to find raiment for +his servants. The answer of Joanna moves a smile of tenderness, but the +disappointment of her judges makes one laugh exultingly. Others +succeeded by troops, who upbraided her with leaving her father; as if +that greater Father, whom she believed herself to have been serving, +did not retain the power of dispensing with his own rules, or had not +said that for a less cause than martyrdom man and woman should leave +both father and mother. + +On Easter Sunday, when the trial had been long proceeding, the poor +girl fell so ill as to cause a belief that she had been poisoned. It +was not poison. Nobody had any interest in hastening a death so +certain. M. Michelet, whose sympathies with all feelings are so quick +that one would gladly see them always as justly directed, reads the +case most truly. Joanna had a twofold malady. She was visited by a +paroxysm of the complaint called _homesickness_. The cruel nature +of her imprisonment, and its length, could not but point her solitary +thoughts, in darkness and in chains (for chained she was), to Domremy. +And the season, which was the most heavenly period of the spring, added +stings to this yearning. That was one of her maladies--_nostalgia_, +as medicine calls it; the other was weariness and exhaustion from daily +combats with malice. She saw that everybody hated her and thirsted for +her blood; nay, many kind-hearted creatures that would have pitied her +profoundly, as regarded all political charges, had their natural +feelings warped by the belief that she had dealings with fiendish +powers. She knew she was to die; that was _not_ the misery! the +misery was that this consummation could not be reached without so much +intermediate strife, as if she were contending for some chance (where +chance was none) of happiness, or were dreaming for a moment of +escaping the inevitable. Why, then, _did_ she contend? Knowing that +she would reap nothing from answering her persecutors, why did she not +retire by silence from the superfluous contest? It was because her +quick and eager loyalty to truth would not suffer her to see it +darkened by frauds which _she_ could expose, but others, even of +candid listeners, perhaps, could not; it was through that imperishable +grandeur of soul which taught her to submit meekly and without a +struggle to her punishment, but taught her _not_ to submit--no, not +for a moment--to calumny as to facts, or to misconstruction as to +motives. Besides, there were secretaries all around the court taking +down her words. That was meant for no good to _her_. But the end +does not always correspond to the meaning. And Joanna might say to +herself, "These words that will be used against me to-morrow and the +next day, perhaps, in some nobler generation, may rise again for my +justification." Yes, Joanna, they _are_ rising even now in Paris, +and for more than justification! + +Woman, sister, there are some things which you do not execute as well +as your brother, man; no, nor ever will. Pardon me if I doubt whether +you will ever produce a great poet from your choirs, or a Mozart, or a +Phidias, or a Michael Angelo, or a great philosopher, or a great +scholar. By which last is meant--not one who depends simply on an +infinite memory, but also on an infinite and electrical power of +combination; bringing together from the four winds, like the angel of +the resurrection, what else were dust from dead men's bones, into the +unity of breathing life. If you _can_ create yourselves into any of +these great creators, why have you not? + +Yet, sister woman, though I cannot consent to find a Mozart or a +Michael Angelo in your sex, cheerfully, and with the love that burns in +depths of admiration, I acknowledge that you can do one thing as well +as the best of us men--a greater thing than even Milton is known to +have done, or Michael Angelo; you can die grandly, and as goddesses +would die, were goddesses mortal. If any distant worlds (which +_may_ be the case) are so far ahead of us Tellurians in optical +resources as to see distinctly through their telescopes all that we do +on earth, what is the grandest sight to which we ever treat them? St. +Peter's at Rome, do you fancy, on Easter Sunday, or Luxor, or perhaps +the Himalayas? Oh, no! my friend; suggest something better; these are +baubles to _them_; they see in other worlds, in their own, far +better toys of the same kind. These, take my word for it, are nothing. +Do you give it up? The finest thing, then, we have to show them is a +scaffold on the morning of execution. I assure you there is a strong +muster in those far telescopic worlds, on any such morning, of those +who happen to find themselves occupying the right hemisphere for a peep +at _us_. How, then, if it be announced in some such telescopic +world by those who make a livelihood of catching glimpses at our +newspapers, whose language they have long since deciphered, that the +poor victim in the morning's sacrifice is a woman? How, if it be +published in that distant world that the sufferer wears upon her head, +in the eyes of many, the garlands of martyrdom? How, if it should be +some Marie Antoinette, the widowed queen, coming forward on the +scaffold, and presenting to the morning air her head, turned gray by +sorrow--daughter of Caesars kneeling down humbly to kiss the +guillotine, as one that worships death? How, if it were the noble +Charlotte Corday, that in the bloom of youth, that with the loveliest +of persons, that with homage waiting upon her smiles wherever she +turned her face to scatter them--homage that followed those smiles as +surely as the carols of birds, after showers in spring, follow the +reappearing sun and the racing of sunbeams over the hills--yet thought +all these things cheaper than the dust upon her sandals, in comparison +of deliverance from hell for her dear suffering France! Ah! these were +spectacles indeed for those sympathising people in distant worlds; and +some, perhaps, would suffer a sort of martyrdom themselves, because +they could not testify their wrath, could not bear witness to the +strength of love and to the fury of hatred that burned within them at +such scenes, could not gather into golden urns some of that glorious +dust which rested in the catacombs of earth. + +On the Wednesday after Trinity Sunday in 1431, being then about +nineteen years of age, the Maid of Arc underwent her martyrdom. She was +conducted before mid-day, guarded by eight hundred spearmen, to a +platform of prodigious height, constructed of wooden billets supported +by occasional walls of lath and plaster, and traversed by hollow spaces +in every direction for the creation of air currents. The pile "struck +terror," says M. Michelet, "by its height"; and, as usual, the English +purpose in this is viewed as one of pure malignity. But there are two +ways of explaining all that. It is probable that the purpose was +merciful. On the circumstances of the execution I shall not linger. +Yet, to mark the almost fatal felicity of M. Michelet in finding out +whatever may injure the English name, at a moment when every reader +will be interested in Joanna's personal appearance, it is really +edifying to notice the ingenuity by which he draws into light from a +dark corner a very unjust account of it, and neglects, though lying +upon the highroad, a very pleasing one. Both are from English pens. +Grafton, a chronicler, but little read, being a stiff-necked John Bull, +thought fit to say that no wonder Joanna should be a virgin, since her +"foule face" was a satisfactory solution of that particular merit. +Holinshead, on the other hand, a chronicler somewhat later, every way +more important, and at one time universally read, has given a very +pleasing testimony to the interesting character of Joanna's person and +engaging manners. Neither of these men lived till the following +century, so that personally this evidence is none at all. Grafton +sullenly and carelessly believed as he wished to believe; Holinshead +took pains to inquire, and reports undoubtedly the general impression +of France. But I cite the case as illustrating M. Michelet's candour. +[Footnote: Amongst the many ebullitions of M. Michelet's fury against +us poor English are four which will be likely to amuse the reader; and +they are the more conspicuous in collision with the justice which he +sometimes does us, and the very indignant admiration which, under some +aspects, he grants to us. 1. Our English literature he admires with +some gnashing of teeth. He pronounces it "fine and sombre," but, I +lament to add, "skeptical, Judaic, Satanic--in a word, antichristian." +That Lord Byron should figure as a member of this diabolical +corporation will not surprise men. It _will_ surprise them to hear +that Milton is one of its Satanic leaders. Many are the generous and +eloquent Frenchmen, besides Chateaubriand, who have, in the course of +the last thirty years, nobly suspended their own burning nationality, +in order to render a more rapturous homage at the feet of Milton; and +some of them have raised Milton almost to a level with angelic natures. +Not one of them has thought of looking for him _below_ the earth. +As to Shakspere, M. Michelet detects in him a most extraordinary mare's +nest. It is this: he does "not recollect to have seen the name of God" +in any part of his works. On reading such words, it is natural to rub +one's eyes, and suspect that all one has ever seen in this world may +have been a pure ocular delusion. In particular, I begin myself to +suspect that the word "_la gloire_" never occurs in any Parisian +journal. "The great English nation," says M. Michelet, "has one immense +profound vice"--to wit, "pride." Why, really, that may be true; but we +have a neighbour not absolutely clear of an "immense profound vice," as +like ours in colour and shape as cherry to cherry. In short, M. +Michelet thinks us, by fits and starts, admirable--only that we are +detestable; and he would adore some of our authors, were it not that so +intensely he could have wished to kick them. + +2. M. Michelet thinks to lodge an arrow in our sides by a very odd +remark upon Thomas a Kempis: which is, that a man of any conceivable +European blood--a Finlander, suppose, or a Zantiote--might have written +Tom; only not an Englishman. Whether an Englishman could have forged +Tom must remain a matter of doubt, unless the thing had been tried long +ago. That problem was intercepted for ever by Tom's perverseness in +choosing to manufacture himself. Yet, since nobody is better aware than +M. Michelet that this very point of Kempis _having_ manufactured +Kempis is furiously and hopelessly litigated, three or four nations +claiming to have forged his work for him, the shocking old doubt will +raise its snaky head once more--whether this forger, who rests in so +much darkness, might not, after all, be of English blood. Tom, it may +be feared, is known to modern English literature chiefly by an +irreverent mention of his name in a line of Peter Pindar's (Dr Wolcot) +fifty years back, where he is described as + + "Kempis Tom, + Who clearly shows the way to Kingdom Come" + +Few in these days can have read him, unless in the Methodist version of +John Wesley Among those few, however, happens to be myself, which arose +from the accident of having, when a boy of eleven, received a copy of +the "De Imitatione Christi" as a bequest from a relation who died very +young, from which cause, and from the external prettiness of the book-- +being a Glasgow reprint by the celebrated Foulis, and gaily bound--I +was induced to look into it, and finally read it many times over, +partly out of some sympathy which, even in those days, I had with its +simplicity and devotional fervour, but much more from the savage +delight I found in laughing at Tom's Latinity that, I freely grant to M +Michelet, is inimitable. Yet, after all, it is not certain whether the +original _was_ Latin. But, however that may have been, if it is +possible that M Michelet [Footnote: "_If M. Michelet can be +accurate_"--However, on consideration, this statement does not depend +on Michelet. The bibliographer Barbier has absolutely _specified_ +sixty in a separate dissertation, _soixante traductions_ among +those even that have not escaped the search. The Italian translations +are said to be thirty. As to mere editions, not counting the early MSS. +for half a century before printing was introduced, those in Latin +amount to 2000, and those in French to 1000. Meantime it is very clear +to me that this astonishing popularity so entirely unparalleled in +literature, could not have existed except in Roman Catholic times, nor +subsequently have lingered in any Protestant land. It was the denial of +Scripture fountains to thirsty lands which made this slender rill of +Scripture truth so passionately welcome.] can be accurate in saying +that there are no less than sixty French versions (not editions, +observe, but separate versions) existing of the "De Imitatione," how +prodigious must have been the adaptation of the book to the religious +heart of the fifteenth century! Excepting the Bible, but excepting +_that_ only in Protestant lands, no book known to man has had the +same distinction. It is the most marvellous bibliographical fact on +record. + +3. Our English girls, it seems, are as faulty in one way as we English +males in another. None of us men could have written the _Opera +Omnia_ of Mr. a Kempis; neither could any of our girls have assumed +male attire like La Pucelle. But why? Because, says Michelet, English +girls and German think so much of an indecorum. Well, that is a good +fault, generally speaking. But M. Michelet ought to have remembered a +fact in the martyrologies which justifies both parties--the French +heroine for doing, and the general choir of English girls for _not_ +doing. A female saint, specially renowned in France, had, for a reason +as weighty as Joanna's--viz., expressly to shield her modesty among +men--worn a male military harness. That reason and that example +authorised La Pucelle; but our English girls, as a body, have seldom +any such reason, and certainly no such saintly example, to plead. This +excuses _them_. Yet, still, if it is indispensable to the national +character that our young women should now and then trespass over the +frontier of decorum, it then becomes a patriotic duty in me to assure +M. Michelet that we _have_ such ardent females among us, and in a +long series; some detected in naval hospitals when too sick to remember +their disguise; some on fields of battle; multitudes never detected at +all; some only suspected; and others discharged without noise by war +offices and other absurd people. In our navy, both royal and +commercial, and generally from deep remembrances of slighted love, +women have sometimes served in disguise for many years, taking +contentedly their daily allowance of burgoo, biscuit, or cannon-balls-- +anything, in short, digestible or indigestible, that it might please +Providence to send. One thing, at least, is to their credit: never any +of these poor masks, with their deep silent remembrances, have been +detected through murmuring, or what is nautically understood by +"skulking." So, for once, M. Michelet has an _erratum_ to enter +upon the fly-leaf of his book in presentation copies. + +4. But the last of these ebullitions is the most lively. We English, at +Orleans, and after Orleans (which is not quite so extraordinary, if all +were told), fled before the Maid of Arc. Yes, says M. Michelet, you +_did_: deny it, if you can. Deny it, _mon cher_? I don't mean +to deny it. Running away, in many cases, is a thing so excellent that +no philosopher would, at times, condescend to adopt any other step. All +of us nations in Europe, without one exception, have shown our +philosophy in that way at times. Even people "_qui ne se rendent +pas_" have deigned both to run and to shout, "_Sauve qui peut_!" +at odd times of sunset; though, for my part, I have no pleasure in +recalling unpleasant remembrances to brave men; and yet, really, being +so philosophic, they ought _not_ to be unpleasant. But the amusing +feature in M. Michelet's reproach is the way in which he _improves_ +and varies against us the charge of running, as if he were singing a +catch. Listen to him: They "_showed their backs_" did these +English. (Hip, hip, hurrah! three times three!) "_Behind good walls +they let themselves be taken_." (Hip, hip! nine times nine!) They +"_ran as fast as their legs could carry them_" (Hurrah! twenty- +seven times twenty-seven!) They "_ran before a girl_"; they did. +(Hurrah! eighty-one times eighty-one!) This reminds one of criminal +indictments on the old model in English courts, where (for fear the +prisoner should escape) the crown lawyer varied the charge perhaps +through forty counts. The law laid its guns so as to rake the accused +at every possible angle. While the indictment was reading, he seemed a +monster of crime in his own eyes; and yet, after all, the poor fellow +had but committed one offence, and not always _that_. N. B.--Not +having the French original at hand, I make my quotations from a +friend's copy of Mr. Walter Kelly's translation; which seems to me +faithful, spirited, and idiomatically English--liable, in fact, only to +the single reproach of occasional provincialisms.] + +The circumstantial incidents of the execution, unless with more space +than I can now command, I should be unwilling to relate. I should fear +to injure, by imperfect report, a martyrdom which to myself appears so +unspeakably grand. Yet, for a purpose, pointing not at Joanna, but at +M. Michelet--viz, to convince him that an Englishman is capable of +thinking more highly of La Pucelle than even her admiring countrymen--I +shall, in parting, allude to one or two traits in Joanna's demeanour on +the scaffold, and to one or two in that of the bystanders, which +authorise me in questioning an opinion of his upon this martyr's +firmness. The reader ought to be reminded that Joanna D'Arc was +subjected to an unusually unfair trial of opinion. Any of the elder +Christian martyrs had not much to fear of _personal_ rancour. The +martyr was chiefly regarded as the enemy of Caesar; at times, also, +where any knowledge of the Christian faith and morals existed, with the +enmity that arises spontaneously in the worldly against the spiritual. +But the martyr, though disloyal, was not supposed to be therefore anti- +national; and still less was _individually_ hateful. What was hated +(if anything) belonged to his class, not to himself separately. Now, +Joanna, if hated at all, was hated personally, and in Rouen on national +grounds. Hence there would be a certainty of calumny arising against +_her_ such as would not affect martyrs in general. That being the +case, it would follow of necessity that some people would impute to her +a willingness to recant. No innocence could escape _that_. Now, had +she really testified this willingness on the scaffold, it would have +argued nothing at all but the weakness of a genial nature shrinking +from the instant approach of torment. And those will often pity that +weakness most who, in their own persons, would yield to it least. +Meantime, there never was a calumny uttered that drew less support from +the recorded circumstances. It rests upon no _positive_ testimony, +and it has a weight of contradicting testimony to stem. And yet, +strange to say, M, Michelet, who at times seems to admire the Maid of +Arc as much as I do, is the one sole writer among her _friends_ who +lends some countenance to this odious slander. His words are that, if +she did not utter this word _recant_ with her lips, she uttered it +in her heart. "Whether she _said_ the word is uncertain; but I +affirm that she _thought_ it." + +Now, I affirm that she did not; not in any sense of the word +"_thought_" applicable to the case. Here is France calumniating La +Pucelle; here is England defending her. M. Michelet can only mean that, +on _a priori_ principles, every woman must be presumed liable to +such a weakness; that Joanna was a woman; _ergo_, that she was +liable to such a weakness. That is, he only supposes her to have +uttered the word by an argument which presumes it impossible for +anybody to have done otherwise. I, on the contrary, throw the onus of +the argument not on presumable tendencies of nature, but on the known +facts of that morning's execution, as recorded by multitudes. What +else, I demand, than mere weight of metal, absolute nobility of +deportment, broke the vast line of battle then arrayed against her? +What else but her meek, saintly demeanour won, from the enemies that +till now had believed her a witch, tears of rapturous admiration? "Ten +thousand men," says M. Michelet himself--"ten thousand men wept"; and +of these ten thousand the majority were political enemies knitted +together by cords of superstition. What else was it but her constancy, +united with her angelic gentleness, that drove the fanatic English +soldier--who had sworn to throw a fagot on her scaffold as _his_ +tribute of abhorrence, that _did_ so, that fulfilled his vow-- +suddenly to turn away a penitent for life, saying everywhere that he +had seen a dove rising upon wings to heaven from the ashes where she +had stood? What else drove the executioner to kneel at every shrine for +pardon to _his_ share in the tragedy? And, if all this were +insufficient, then I cite the closing act of her life as valid on her +behalf, were all other testimonies against her. The executioner had +been directed to apply his torch from below. He did so. The fiery smoke +rose upward in billowing volumes. A Dominican monk was then standing +almost at her side. Wrapped up in his sublime office, he saw not the +danger, but still persisted in his prayers. Even then, when the last +enemy was racing up the fiery stairs to seize her, even at that moment +did this noblest of girls think only for _him_, the one friend that +would not forsake her, and not for herself; bidding him with her last +breath to care for his own preservation, but to leave _her_ to God. +That girl, whose latest breath ascended in this sublime expression of +self-oblivion, did not utter the word _recant_ either with her lips or +in her heart. No; she did not, though one should rise from the dead to +swear it. + + * * * * * + +Bishop of Beauvais! thy victim died in fire upon a scaffold--thou upon +a down bed. But, for the departing minutes of life, both are oftentimes +alike. At the farewell crisis, when the gates of death are opening, and +flesh is resting from its struggles, oftentimes the tortured and the +torturer have the same truce from carnal torment; both sink together +into sleep; together both sometimes kindle into dreams. When the mortal +mists were gathering fast upon you two, bishop and shepherd girl--when +the pavilions of life were closing up their shadowy curtains about you +--let us try, through the gigantic glooms, to decipher the flying +features of your separate visions. + +The shepherd girl that had delivered France--she, from her dungeon, +she, from her baiting at the stake, she, from her duel with fire, as +she entered her last dream--saw Domremy, saw the fountain of Domremy, +saw the pomp of forests in which her childhood had wandered. That +Easter festival which man had denied to her languishing heart--that +resurrection of springtime, which the darkness of dungeons had +intercepted from _her_, hungering after the glorious liberty of +forests--were by God given back into her hands as jewels that had been +stolen from her by robbers. With those, perhaps (for the minutes of +dreams can stretch into ages), was given back to her by God the bliss +of childhood. By special privilege for _her_ might be created, in +this farewell dream, a second childhood, innocent as the first; but +not, like _that_, sad with the gloom of a fearful mission in the +rear. This mission had now been fulfilled. The storm was weathered; the +skirts even of that mighty storm were drawing off. The blood that she +was to reckon for had been exacted; the tears that she was to shed in +secret had been paid to the last. The hatred to herself in all eyes had +been faced steadily, had been suffered, had been survived. And in her +last fight upon the scaffold she had triumphed gloriously; victoriously +she had tasted the stings of death. For all, except this comfort from +her farewell dream, she had died--died amid the tears of ten thousand +enemies--died amid the drums and trumpets of armies--died amid peals +redoubling upon peals, volleys upon volleys, from the saluting clarions +of martyrs. + +Bishop of Beauvais! because the guilt-burdened man is in dreams haunted +and waylaid by the most frightful of his crimes, and because upon that +fluctuating mirror--rising (like the mocking mirrors of _mirage_ in +Arabian deserts) from the fens of death-most of all are reflected the +sweet countenances which the man has laid in ruins; therefore I know, +bishop, that you also, entering your final dream, saw Domremy. That +fountain, of which the witnesses spoke so much, showed itself to your +eyes in pure morning dews; but neither dews, nor the holy dawn, could +cleanse away the bright spots of innocent blood upon its surface. By +the fountain, bishop, you saw a woman seated, that hid her face. But, +as _you_ draw near, the woman raises her wasted features. Would +Domremy know them again for the features of her child? Ah, but _you_ +know them, bishop, well! Oh, mercy! what a groan was _that_ which the +servants, waiting outside the bishop's dream at his bedside, heard from +his labouring heart, as at this moment he turned away from the fountain +and the woman, seeking rest in the forests afar off. Yet not _so_ to +escape the woman, whom once again he must behold before he dies. In the +forests to which he prays for pity, will he find a respite? What a +tumult, what a gathering of feet is there! In glades where only wild +deer should run armies and nations are assembling; towering in the +fluctuating crowd are phantoms that belong to departed hours. There is +the great English Prince, Regent of France. There is my Lord of +Winchester, the princely cardinal, that died and made no sign. There is +the bishop of Beauvais, clinging to the shelter of thickets. What +building is that which hands so rapid are raising? Is it a martyr's +scaffold? Will they burn the child of Domremy a second time? No; it is +a tribunal that rises to the clouds; and two nations stand around it, +waiting for a trial. Shall my Lord of Beauvais sit again upon the +judgment-seat, and again number the hours for the innocent? Ah, no! he +is the prisoner at the bar. Already all is waiting: the mighty audience +is gathered, the Court is hurrying to their seats, the witnesses are +arrayed, the trumpets are sounding, the judge is taking his place. Oh, +but this is sudden! My lord, have you no counsel? "Counsel I have none; +in heaven above, or on earth beneath, counsellor there is none now that +would take a brief from _me_: all are silent." Is it, indeed, come to +this? Alas! the time is short, the tumult is wondrous, the crowd +stretches away into infinity; but yet I will search in it for somebody +to take your brief; I know of somebody that will be your counsel. Who +is this that cometh from Domremy? Who is she in bloody coronation robes +from Rheims? Who is she that cometh with blackened flesh from walking +the furnaces of Rouen? This is she, the shepherd girl, counsellor that +had none for herself, whom I choose, bishop, for yours. She it is, I +engage, that shall take my lord's brief. She it is, bishop, that would +plead for you; yes, bishop, _she_--when heaven and earth are silent. + + + + +NOTES + +THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH + + +"In October 1849 there appeared in _Blackwood's Magazine_ an +article entitled _The English Mail-Coach, or the Glory of Motion_. +There was no intimation that it was to be continued; but in December +1849 there followed in the same magazine an article in two sections, +headed by a paragraph explaining that it was by the author of the +previous article in the October number, and was to be taken in +connexion with that article. One of the sections of this second article +was entitled _The Vision of Sudden Death_, and the other _Dream- +Fugue on the above theme of Sudden Death_. When De Quincey revised +the papers in 1854 for republication in volume iv of the Collective +Edition of his writings, he brought the whole under the one general +title of _The English Mail-Coach_, dividing the text, as at +present, into three sections or chapters, the first with the sub-title +_The Glory of Motion_, the second with the sub-title _The Vision +of Sudden Death_, and the third with the sub-title _Dream-Fugue, +founded on the preceding theme of Sudden Death_. Great care was +bestowed on the revision. Passages that had appeared in the magazine +articles were omitted; new sentences were inserted; and the language +was retouched throughout."--MASSON. Cf. as to the revision, Professor +Dowden's article, "How De Quincey worked," _Saturday Review_, Feb. +23, 1895. This selection is found in _Works_, Masson's ed., Vol. +XIII, pp. 270-327; Riverside ed., Vol. I, pp. 517-582. + +1 6 HE HAD MARRIED THE DAUGHTER OF A DUKE: "Mr. John Palmer, a native +of Bath, and from about 1768 the energetic proprietor of the Theatre +Royal in that city, had been led, by the wretched state in those days +of the means of intercommunication between Bath and London, wand his +own consequent difficulties in arranging for a punctual succession of +good actors at his theatre, to turn his attention to the improvement of +the whole system of Post-Office conveyance, and of locomotive machinery +generally, in the British Islands. The result was a scheme for +superseding, on the great roads at least, the then existing system of +sluggish and irregular stage-coaches, the property of private persons +and companies, by a new system of government coaches, in connexion with +the Post-Office, carrying the mails and also a regulated number of +passengers, with clockwork precision, at a rate of comparative speed, +which he hoped should ultimately be not less than ten miles an hour. +The opposition to the scheme was, of course, enormous; coach +proprietors, innkeepers, the Post-Office officials themselves, were all +against Mr. Palmer; he was voted a crazy enthusiast and a public bore. +Pitt, however, when the scheme was submitted to him, recognized its +feasibility; on the 8th of August 1784 the first mail-coach on Mr. +Palmer's plan started from London at 8 o'clock in the morning and +reached Bristol at 11 o'clock at night; and from that day the success +of the new system was assured.--Mr. Palmer himself, having been +appointed Surveyor and Comptroller-General of the Post-Office, took +rank as an eminent and wealthy public man, M. P. for Bath and what not, +and lived till 1818. De Quincey makes it one of his distinctions that +he "had married the daughter of a duke," and in a footnote to that +paragraph he gives the lady's name as "Lady Madeline Gordon." From an +old Debrett, however, I learn that Lady Madelina Gordon, second +daughter of Alexander, fourth Duke of Gordon, was first married, on the +3d of April 1789, to Sir Robert Sinclair, Bart., and next, on the 25th +of November 1805, to _Charles Palmer, of Lockley Park, Berks, Esq._ +If Debrett is right, her second husband was not John Palmer of Mail- +Coach celebrity, and De Quincey is wrong."--MASSON. + +1 (footnote) INVENTION OF THE CROSS: Concerning the _Inventio sanctae +crucis_, see Smith, _Dictionary of Christian Antiquities_, Vol. +I, p. 503. + +2 4 NATIONAL RESULT: Cf. De Quincey's paper on _Travelling, Works,_ +Riverside ed., Vol. II, especially pp. 313-314; Masson's ed., Vol. I, +especially pp. 270-271. + +3 13 THE FOUR TERMS OF MICHAELMAS, LENT, EASTER, AND ACT: These might +be called respectively the autumn, winter, spring, and summer terms. +Michaelmas, the feast of St. Michael and All Angels, is on September +29. Hilary and Trinity are other names for Lent term and Act term +respectively. Act term is the last term of the academic year; its name +is that originally given to a disputation for a Master's degree; such +disputations took place at the end of the year generally, and hence +gave a name to the summer term. Although the rules concerning residence +at Oxford are more stringent than in De Quincey's time, only eighteen +weeks' residence is required during the year, six in Michaelmas, six in +Lent, and six in Easter and Act. + +3 17 GOING DOWN: Cf. "Going down with victory," i.e. from London into +the country. + +3 30 POSTING-HOUSES: inns where relays of horses were furnished for +coaches and carriages. Cf. De Quincey on _Travelling, loc. cit._ + +4 3 AN OLD TRADITION... from the reign of Charles II: Then no one sat +outside; later, outside places were taken by servants, and were quite +cheap. + +4 9 ATTAINT THE FOOT: The word is used in its legal sense. The blood of +one convicted of high treason is "attaint," and his deprivations extend +to his descendants, unless Parliament remove the attainder. + +4 14 PARIAHS: The fate of social outcasts seems to have taken early and +strong hold upon De Quincey's mind; one of the _Suspiria_ was to +have enlarged upon this theme. Strictly speaking, the Pariahs is that +one of the lower castes of Hindoo society of which foreigners have seen +most; it is not in all districts the lowest caste, however. + +5 6 OBJECTS NOT APPEARING, ETC.: _De non apparentibus et non +existentibus eadem est lex_, a Roman legal phrase. + +5 16 "SNOBS": Apparently snob originally meant "shoemaker"; then, in +university cant, a "townsman" as opposed to a "gownsman." Cf. _Gradus +ad Cantabrigiam_ (1824), quoted in _Century Dictionary_: "_Snobs_.--A +term applied indiscriminately to all who have not the honour of being +members of the university; but in a more particular manner to the +'profanum vulgus,' the tag-rag and bob-tail, who vegetate on the sedgy +banks of Camus." This use is in De Quincey's mind. Later, in the +strikes of that time, the workmen who accepted lower wages were called +_snobs_; those who held out for higher, _nobs_. + +7 33 FO FO... FI FI: "This paragraph is a caricature of a story told in +Staunton's Account of the Earl of Macartney's Embassy to China in +1792."--MASSON. + +8 4 CA IRA ("This will do," "This is the go"): "a proverb of the French +Revolutionists when they were hanging the aristocrats in the streets, +&c., and the burden of one of the most popular revolutionary songs, 'Ca +ira, ca ira, ca ira.'"--MASSON. + +8 18 ALL MORALITY,--ARISTOTLE'S, ZENO'S, CICERO'S: Each of these three +has a high place in the history of ethical teaching. Aristotle wrote +the so-called _Nicomachean Ethics_. According to his teaching, +"ethical virtue is that permanent direction of the will which guards +the mean [_to meson_] proper for us... Bravery is the mean between +cowardice and temerity; temperance, the mean between inordinate desire +and stupid indifference; etc." (Ueberweg, _History of Philosophy_, +Vol. I, p. 169). Zeno, who died about 264 B.C., founded about 308 the +Stoic sect, which took its name from the "Painted Porch" (_Stoa +poklae_) in the Agora at Athens, where the master taught. The Stoics +held that men should be free from passion, and undisturbed by joy or +grief, submitting themselves uncomplainingly to their fate. Such +austere views are, of course, as far as possible removed from those of +the Eudaemonist, who sought happiness as the end of life. Cicero was +the author of De Officiis, "Of Duties." + +9 9 ASTROLOGICAL SHADOWS: misfortunes due to being born under an +unlucky star; house of life is also an astrological term. + +9 24 VON TROIL'S ICELAND: The Letters on Iceland (Pinkerton's Voyages +and Travels, Vol. I, p. 621), containing Observations ... made during a +Voyage undertaken in the year 1772, by Uno Von Troil, D.D., of +Stockholm, contains no chapter of the kind. Such a chapter had +appeared, however, in N. Horrebow's (Danish, 1758) Natural History of +Iceland: "Chap. LXXII. Concerning snakes. No snakes of any kind are to +be met with throughout the whole island." In Boswell's Johnson, Vol. +IV, p. 314, Temple ed., there is a much more correct allusion, which +may have been in De Quincey's mind: "Langton said very well to me +afterwards, that he could repeat Johnson's conversation before dinner, +as Johnson had said that he could repeat a complete chapter of The +Natural History of Iceland, from the Danish of Horrebow, the whole of +which was exactly thus: 'Chap. LXXII. Concerning Snakes. There are no +snakes to be met with throughout the whole island.'" + +9 25 A PARLIAMENTARY RAT: one who deserts his own party when it is +losing. + +10 16 "JAM PROXIMUS," etc.: AEneid, II, lines 311-312: "Now next (to +Deiphobus' house) Ucalegon (i.e. his house) blazes!" + +11 27 QUARTERINGS: See p. 47, footnote, and note 47 2. + +11 32 WITHIN BENEFIT OF CLERGY: Benefit of clergy was, under old +English law, the right of clerics, afterward extended to all who could +read, to plead exemption from trial before a secular judge. This +privilege was first legally recognized in 1274, and was not wholly +abolished until 1827. + +12 9 QUARTER SESSIONS: This court is held in England in the counties by +justices of the peace for the trial of minor criminal offenses and to +administer the poor laws, etc. + +12 26 FALSE ECHOES OF MARENGO: General Desaix was shot through the +heart at the battle of Marengo (June 14, 1800); he died without a word, +and his body was found by Rovigo (cf. Memoirs of the Duke of Rovigo, +London, 1835, Vol. I, p. 181), "stripped of his clothes, and surrounded +by other naked bodies." Napoleon, however, published three different +versions of an heroic and devoted message from Desaix to himself, the +original version being: "Go, tell the First Consul that I die with this +regret,--that I have not done enough for posterity." (Cf. Lanfrey, +History of Napoleon the First, 2d ed., London, 1886, Vol. II, p. 39.) +Napoleon himself was credited likewise with the words De Quincey +adopts. "Why is it not permitted me to weep" is one version (Bussey, +_History of Napoleon_, London, 1840, Vol. I, p. 302). Cf. Hazlitt, +_Life of Napoleon_, 2d ed., London, 1852, Vol. II, p. 317, +footnote. + +12 (footnote) THE CRY OF THE FOUNDERING LINE-OF-BATTLE SHIP "VENGEUR": +On the 1st of June, 1794, the English fleet under Lord Howe defeated +the French under Villaret-Joyeuse, taking six ships and sinking a +seventh, the _Vengeur_. This ship sank, as a matter of fact, with +part of her crew on board, imploring kid which there was not time to +give them. Some two hundred and fifty men had been taken off by the +English; the rest were lost. On the 9th of July Barrere published a +report setting forth "how the _Vengeur_, ... being entirely +disabled, ... refused to strike, though sinking; how the enemies fired +on her, but she returned their fire, shot aloft all her tricolor +streamers, shouted _Vive la Republique_, ... and so, in this mad +whirlwind of fire and shouting and invincible despair, went down into +the ocean depths; _Vive la Republique_ and a universal volley from +the upper deck being the last sounds she made." Cf. Carlyle, _Sinking +of the Vengeur_, and _French Revolution, Book_ XVIII, Chap. VI. + +12 (footnote) LA GARDE MEURT, ETC.: "This phrase, attributed to +Cambronne, who was made prisoner at Waterloo, was vehemently denied by +him. It was invented by Rougemont, a prolific author of _mots_, two +days after the battle, in the _Independant_."--Fournier's _L'Esprit +dans l'Histoire_, trans. Bartlett, _Familiar Quotations_, p. 661. + +13 25 BRUMMAGEM: Birmingham became early the chief place of manufacture +of cheap wares. Hence the name _Brummagem_, a vulgar pronunciation +of the name of the city, has become in England a common name for cheap, +tawdry jewelry. Cf. also Shakespeare, Richard III, Act I, sc. iv, 1. +55: + + False, fleeting, perjured Clarence. + +13 27 LUXOR occupies part of the site of ancient Thebes, capital of +Egypt; its antiquities are famous. + +14 9 BUT ON OUR SIDE... WAS A TOWER OF MORAL STRENGTH, ETC.: Cf. +Shakespeare, _Richard_ III, Act V, sc. in, 11. 12-13: + + Besides, the king's name is a tower of strength, + Which they upon the adverse party want. + +14 20 FELT MY HEART BURN WITHIN ME: Cf. Luke xxiv. 32. + +14 32 A VERY FINE STORY FROM ONE OF OUR ELDER DRAMATISTS: The dramatist +in question has not been identified. I am indebted indirectly to +Professor W. Strunk, Jr., of Cornell University, for reference to +Johann Caius' Of English Dogs, translated by A. Fleming, in Arber's +English Garner, original edition, Vol. III, p. 253 (new edition, Social +England Illustrated, pp. 28-29), where, after telling how Henry the +Seventh, perceiving that four mastiffs could overcome a lion, ordered +the dogs all hanged, the writer continues: "I read an history +answerable to this, of the selfsame HENRY, who having a notable and an +excellent fair falcon, it fortuned that the King's Falconers, in the +presence and hearing of his Grace, highly commended his Majesty's +Falcon, saying, that it feared not to intermeddle with an eagle, it was +so venturous and so mighty a bird; which when the king heard, he +charged that the falcon should be killed without delay: for the +selfsame reason, as it may seem, which was rehearsed in the conclusion +of the former history concerning the same king." + +15 l OMRAHS... FROM AGRA AND LAHORE: There seems to be a reminiscence +here of Wordsworth's Prelude, Book X, 11. 18-20: + + The Great Mogul, when he + Erewhile went forth from Agra or Lahore, + Rajahs and Omrahs in his train. + +Omrah, which is not found in Century Dictionary, is itself really +plural of Arabic amir (ameer), a commander, nobleman. + +15 23 THE 6TH OF EDWARD LONGSHANKS: a De Quinceyan jest, of course. +This wrould refer to a law of the sixth year of Edward I, or 1278, but +there are but fifteen chapters in the laws of that year. + +16 8 NOT MAGNA LOQUIMUR,... BUT VIVIMUS: not "we speak great things," +but "we live" them. + +17 21 MARLBOROUGH FOREST is twenty-seven miles east of Bath, where De +Quincey attended school. + +18 18 ULYSSES, ETC.: The allusion is, of course, to the slaughter of +the suitors of Penelope, his wife, by Ulysses, after his return. Cf. +Odyssey, Books XXI-XXII. + +19 3 ABOUT WATERLOO: i.e. about 1815. This phrase is one of many that +indicate the deep impression made by this event upon the English mind. +Cf. p. 58. + +19 17 "SAY, ALL OUR PRAISES," ETC.: Cf. Pope, Moral Essays: Epistle +III, Of the Use of Riches, II. 249-250: + + But all our praises why should lords engross, + Rise, honest Muse! and sing the Man of Ross. + +20 3 TURRETS: "Tourettes fyled rounde" appears in Chaucer's Knight's +Tale, 1. 1294, where it means the ring on a dog's collar through which +the leash was passed. Skeat explains _torets_ as "probably eyes in +which rings will turn round, because each eye is a little larger than +the thickness of the ring." Cf. Chaucer's _Treatise on the +Astrolabe_, Part I, sec. 2, "This ring renneth in a maner turet," +"this ring runs in a kind of eye." But Chaucer does not refer to +harness. + +21 2 MR. WATERTON TELLS ME: Charles Waterton, the naturalist, was born +in 1782 and died in 1865. His _Wanderings in South America_ was +published in 1825. + +23 11 EARTH AND HER CHILDREN: This paragraph is about one fifth of the +length of the corresponding paragraph as it appeared in +_Blackwood_. For the longer version see Masson's ed., Vol. XIII, p. +289, note 2. + +24 14 THE GENERAL POST-OFFICE: The present office was opened Sept. 23, +1829. St. Martin's-le-Grand is a church within the "city" of London, so +named to distinguish it from St. Martin's-in-the-Fields, which faces +what is now Trafalgar Square, and is, as the name indicates, outside +the "city." The street takes its name from the church. + +28 10 BARNET is a Hertfordshire village, eleven miles north of London. + +29 33 A "COURIER" EVENING PAPER, CONTAINING THE GAZETTE: A gazette was +originally one of the three official papers of the kingdom; afterwards +any official announcement, as this of a great victory. + +30 17 FEY: This is not a Celtic word; it is the Anglo-Saxon _faege_ +retained in Lowland Scotch, which is the most northerly English +dialect. The word appears frequently in descriptions of battles, the +Anglo-Saxon fatalistic philosophy teaching that, certain warriors +entered the conflict _faege_, "doomed." Now the meaning is altered +slightly: "You are surely fey," would be said in Scotland, as Professor +Masson remarks, to a person observed to be in extravagantly high +spirits, or in any mood surprisingly beyond the bounds of his ordinary +temperament,--the notion being that the excitement is supernatural, and +a presage of his approaching death, or of some other calamity about to +befall him. + +31 27 THE INSPIRATION OF GOD, ETC.: This is an indication--more +interesting than agreeable, perhaps--of the heights to which the +martial ardor of De Quincey's toryism rises. + +33 13 CAESAR THE DICTATOR, AT HIS LAST DINNER-PARTY, ETC.: related by +Suetonius in his life of Julius Caesar, Chap. LXXXVII: "The day before +he died, some discourse occurring at dinner in M. Lepidus' house upon +that subject, which was the most agreeable way of dying, he expressed +his preference for what is sudden and unexpected" (repentinum +inopinatumque praetulerat). The story is told by Plutarch and Appian +also. + +35 13 _BIATHANATOS_: "De Quincey has evidently taken this from John +Donne's treatise: _BIATHANATOS, A Declaration of that Paradoxe or +Thesis, That Self-homicide is not so naturally Sin, that it may never +be otherwise_, 1644. See his paper on _Suicide, etc._, Masson's +ed., VIII, 398 [Riverside, IX, 209]. But not even Donne's precedent +justifies the word formation. The only acknowledged compounds are +_biaio-thanasia_, 'violent death,' and _biaio-thanatos_, 'dying +a violent death.' Even _bia thanatos_, 'death by violence,' is not +classical."--HART. But the form _biathanatos_ is older than Donne +and is said to be common in MSS. It should be further remarked that +neither of the two compounds cited is classical. As to De Quincey's +interpretation of Caesar's meaning here, cf. Merivale's _History of +the Romans under the Empire_, Chap. XXI, where he translates Caesar's +famous reply: "That which is least expected." Cf. also Shakespeare, +_Julius Caesar_, Act II, sc. ii, 1. 33. + +37 25 "NATURE, FROM HER SEAT," ETC.: Cf. Milton's _Paradise Lost_, +Book IX, 11. 780-784: + + So saying, her rash hand in evil hour + Forth reaching to the fruit, she pluck'd, she eat: + Earth felt the wound, and Nature from her seat + Sighing through all her works gave signs of woe, + That all was lost. + +38 2 SO SCENICAL, ETC.: De Quincey's love for effects of this sort +appears everywhere. Cf. the opening paragraphs of the _Revolt of the +Tartars_, Masson's ed., Vol. VII; Riverside ed., Vol. XII. + +39 4 JUS DOMINII: "the law of ownership," a legal term. + +39 14 JUS GENTIUM: "the law of nations," a legal term. + +39 30 "MONSTRUM HORRENDUM," ETC..: _AEneid_, III, 658. Polyphemus, +one of the Cyclopes, whose eye was put out by Ulysses, is meant. Cf. +_Odyssey_, IX, 371 et seq.; _AEneid_, III, 630 _et seq_. + +40 1 ONE OF THE CALENDARS, ETC.: The histories of the three Calenders, +sons of kings, will be found in most selections from the _Arabian +Nights_. A Calender is one of an order of Dervishes founded in the +fourteenth century by an Andalusian Arab; they are wanderers who preach +in market places and live by alms. + +40 10 AL SIRAT: According to Mahometan teaching this bridge over Hades +was in width as a sword's edge. Over it souls must pass to Paradise. + +40 12 UNDER THIS EMINENT MAN, ETC.: For these two sentences the +original in _Blackwood_ had this, with its addition of good De +Quinceyan doctrine: "I used to call him _Cyclops Mastigophorus_, +Cyclops the Whip-bearer, until I observed that his skill made whips +useless, except to fetch off an impertinent fly from a leader's head, +upon which I changed his Grecian name to _Cyclops Diphrelates_ +(Cyclops the Charioteer). I, and others known to me, studied under him +the diphrelatic art. Excuse, reader, a word too elegant to be pedantic. +And also take this remark from me as a _gage d'amitie_--that no word +ever was or _can_ be pedantic which, by supporting a distinction, +supports the accuracy of logic, or which fills up a chasm for the +understanding." + +41 1 SOME PEOPLE HAVE CALLED ME PROCRASTINATING: Cf. Page's (Japp's) +_Life_, Chap. XIX, and Japp's _De Quincey Memorials_, Vol. II, +pp. 45,47,49- + +42 11 THE WHOLE PAGAN PANTHEON: i.e. all the gods put together; from +the Greek _Pantheion_, a temple dedicated to all the gods. + +43 2 SEVEN ATMOSPHERES OF SLEEP, ETC.: Professor Hart suggests that De +Quincey is here "indulging in jocular arithmetic. The three nights plus +the three days, plus the present night, equal seven." Dr. Cooper +compares with this a reference to the Seven Sleepers of Ephesus. But it +seems doubtful whether any explanation is necessary. + +43 17 LILLIPUTIAN LANCASTER: the county town of Lancashire, in which +Liverpool and Manchester, towns of recent and far greater growth, are +situated. + +44 (footnote) "Giraldus Cambrensis," or Gerald de Barry (1146-1220), +was a Welsh historian; one of his chief works is the _Itinerarium +Cambrica_, or Voyage in Wales. + +47 2 QUARTERING: De Quincey's derivation of this word in his footnote +is correct, but its use in this French sense is not common. De Quincey, +however, has it above, p. 11. + +49 8 THE SHOUT OF ACHILLES: Cf. Homer, _Iliad_, XVIII, 217 _et +seq_. + +50 10 BUYING IT, ETC.: De Quincey refers, no doubt, to the pay of +common soldiers and to the practice of employing mercenaries. + +52 1 FASTER THAN EVER MILL-RACE, ETC.: the change in the wording of +this sentence in De Quincey's revision is, as Masson remarks, +particularly characteristic of his sense of melody; it read in +_Blackwood_, "We ran past them faster than ever mill-race in our +inexorable flight." + +52 15 HERE WAS THE MAP, ETC.: This sentence is an addition in the +reprint. Masson remarks "how artistically it causes the due pause +between the horror as still in rush of transaction and the backward +look at the wreck when the crash was past." + +53 18 "WHENCE THE SOUND," ETC.: _Paradise Lost_, Book XI, 11. 558- +563. + +54 3 WOMAN'S IONIC FORM: In thus using the word Ionic, De Quincey +doubtless has in mind the character of Ionic architecture, with its +tall and graceful column, differing from the severity of the Doric on +the one hand and from the floridity of the Corinthian on the other. +Probably he is thinking of a caryatid. Cf. the following version of the +old story of the origin of the styles of Greek architecture in +Vitruvius, IV, Chap. I (Gwilt's translation), quoted by Hart: "They +measured a man's foot, and finding its length the sixth part of his +height, they gave the column a similar proportion, that is, they made +its height six times the thickness of the shaft measured at the base. +Thus the Doric order obtained its proportion, its strength, and its +beauty from the human figure. With a similar feeling they afterward +built the Temple of Diana. But in that, seeking a new proportion, they +used the female figure as a standard; and for the purpose of producing +a more lofty effect they first made it eight times its thickness in +height. Under it they placed a base, after the manner of a shoe to the +foot; they also added volutes to its capital, like graceful curling +hair hanging on each side, and the front they ornamented with +_cymatia_ and festoons in the place of hair. On the shafts they +sunk channels, which bear a resemblance to the folds of a matronal +garment. Thus two orders were invented, one of a masculine character, +without ornament, the other bearing a character which resembled the +delicacy, ornament, and proportion of a female. The successors of these +people, improving in taste, and preferring a more slender proportion, +assigned seven diameters to the height of the Doric column, and eight +and a half to the Ionic." + +55 3 CORYMBI: clusters of fruit or flowers. + +55 28 QUARREL: the bolt of a crossbow, an arrow having a square, or +four-edged head (from Middle Latin _quadrellus_, diminutive of +_quadrum_, a square). + +58 20 WATERLOO AND RECOVERED CHRISTENDOM! Cf. note 19 3. + +61 20 THEN A THIRD TIME THE TRUMPET SOUNDED: There are throughout this +passage, as Dr. Cooper remarks, many reminiscences of the language of +the Book of Revelation. Cf. this with Revelation viii. 10; cf. 61 28 +with Revelation xii. 5, and 62 5 with ix. 13. + +63 29 THE ENDLESS RESURRECTIONS OF HIS LOVE: The following, which +Masson prints as a postscript, was a part of De Quincey's introduction +to the volume of the Collective Edition containing this piece: + +"'THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH.'--This little paper, according to my original +intention, formed part of the 'Suspiria de Profundis'; from which, for +a momentary purpose, I did not scruple to detach it, and to publish it +apart, as sufficiently intelligible even when dislocated from its place +in a larger whole. To my surprise, however, one or two critics, not +carelessly in conversation, but deliberately in print, professed their +inability to apprehend the meaning of the whole, or to follow the links +of the connexion between its several parts. I am myself as little able +to understand where the difficulty lies, or to detect any lurking +obscurity, as these critics found themselves to unravel my logic. +Possibly I may not be an indifferent and neutral judge in such a case. +I will therefore sketch a brief abstract of the little paper according +to my original design, and then leave the reader to judge how far this +design is kept in sight through the actual execution. + +"Thirty-seven years ago, or rather more, accident made me, in the dead +of night, and of a night memorably solemn, the solitary witness of an +appalling scene, which threatened instant death in a shape the most +terrific to two young people whom I had no means of assisting, except +in so far as I was able to give them a most hurried warning of their +danger; but even _that_ not until they stood within the very shadow +of the catastrophe, being divided from the most frightful of deaths by +scarcely more, if more at all, than seventy seconds. + +"Such was the scene, such in its outline, from which the whole of this +paper radiates as a natural expansion. This scene is circumstantially +narrated in Section the Second, entitled 'The Vision of Sudden Death.' + +"But a movement of horror, and of spontaneous recoil from this dreadful +scene, naturally carried the whole of that scene, raised and idealised, +into my dreams, and very soon into a rolling succession of dreams. The +actual scene, as looked down upon from the box of the mail, was +transformed into a dream, as tumultuous and changing as a musical +fugue. This troubled dream is circumstantially reported in Section the +Third, entitled 'Dream-Fugue on the theme of Sudden Death.' What I had +beheld from my seat upon the mail,--the scenical strife of action and +passion, of anguish and fear, as I had there witnessed them moving in +ghostly silence,--this duel between life and death narrowing itself to +a point of such exquisite evanescence as the collision neared; all +these elements of the scene blended, under the law of association, with +the previous and permanent features of distinction investing the mail +itself; which features at that time lay--1st, in velocity +unprecedented, 2dly, in the power and beauty of the horses, 3dly, in +the official connexion with the government of a great nation, and, +4thly, in the function, almost a consecrated function, of publishing +and diffusing through the land the great political events, and +especially the great battles, during a conflict of unparalleled +grandeur. These honorary distinctions are all described +circumstantially in the First or introductory Section ('The Glory of +Motion'). The three first were distinctions maintained at all times; +but the fourth and grandest belonged exclusively to the war with +Napoleon; and this it was which most naturally introduced Waterloo into +the dream. Waterloo, I understand, was the particular feature of the +'Dream-Fugue' which my censors were least able to account for. Yet +surely Waterloo, which, in common with every other great battle, it had +been our special privilege to publish over all the land, most naturally +entered the dream under the licence of our privilege. If not--if there +be anything amiss--let the Dream be responsible. The Dream is a law to +itself; and as well quarrel with a rainbow for showing, or for +_not_ showing, a secondary arch. So far as I know, every element in +the shifting movements of the Dream derived itself either primarily +from the incidents of the actual scene, or from secondary features +associated with the mail. For example, the cathedral aisle derived +itself from the mimic combination of features which grouped themselves +together at the point of approaching collision--viz. an arrow-like +section of the road, six hundred yards long, under the solemn lights +described, with lofty trees meeting overhead in arches. The guard's +horn, again--a humble instrument in itself--was yet glorified as the +organ of publication for so many great national events. And the +incident of the Dying Trumpeter, who rises from a marble bas-relief, +and carries a marble trumpet to his marble lips for the purpose of +warning the female infant, was doubtless secretly suggested by my own +imperfect effort to seize the guard's horn, and to blow the warning +blast. But the Dream knows best; and the Dream, I say again, is the +responsible party." + + +JOAN OF ARC + + +This article appeared originally in _Taifs Magazine_ for March and +August, 1847; it was reprinted by De Quincey in 1854 in the third +volume of his _Collected Writings_. It is found in _Works_, +Masson's ed., Vol. V, pp. 384-416; Riverside ed., Vol. VI, pp. 178-215. + +64 10 LORRAINE, now in great part in the possession of Germany, is the +district in which Domremy, Joan's birthplace, is situated. + +65 14 VAUCOULEURS: a town near Domremy; cf. p. 70. + +65 28 EN CONTUMACE: "in contumacy," a legal term applied to one who, +when summoned to court, fails to appear. + +66 13 ROUEN: the city in Normandy where Joan was burned at the stake. + +66 25 THE LILIES OF FRANCE: the royal emblem of France from very early +times until the Revolution of 1789, when "the wrath of God and man +combined to wither them." + +67 5 M. MICHELET: Jules Michelet (1798-1874) is said to have spent +forty years in the preparation of his great work, the _History of +France_. Cf. the same, translated by G. H. Smith, 2 vols., Appleton, +Vol. II, pp. 119-169; or _Joan of Arc_, from Michelet's _History +of France_, translated by O. W. Wight, New York, 1858. + +67 8 RECOVERED LIBERTY: The Revolution of 1830 had expelled the +restored Bourbon kings. + +67 20 THE BOOK AGAINST PRIESTS: Michelet's lectures as professor of +history in the College de France, in which he attacked the Jesuits, +were published as follows: _Des Jesuites_, 1843; _Du Pretre, de +la Femme et de la Famille_, 1844; _Du Peuple_, 1845. To the +second De Quincey apparently refers. + +67 26 BACK TO THE FALCONER'S LURE: The lure was a decoy used to recall +the hawk to its perch,--sometimes a dead pigeon, sometimes an +artificial bird, with some meat attached. + +68 6 ON THE MODEL OF LORD PERCY: These lines, as Professor Hart notes, +in Percy's Folio, ed. Hales and Furnivall, Vol. II, p. 7, run: + + The stout Erle of Northumberland + a vow to God did make, + his pleasure in the Scottish woods + 3 som_m_ers days to take. + +68 27 PUCELLE D'ORLEANS: Maid of Orleans (the city on the Loire which +Joan saved). + +69 1 THE COLLECTION, ETC.: The work meant is Quicherat, _Proces de +Condamnation et Rehabilitation de Jeanne d'Arc_, 5 vols., Paris, +1841-1849. Cf. De Quincey's note. + +69 21 DELENDA EST ANGLIA VICTRIX! "Victorious England must be +destroyed!" Cf. _Delenda est Carthago_! "Carthage must be +destroyed!" _Delenda est Karthago_ is the version of Florus (II, +15) of the words used by Cato the Censor, just before the Third Punic +War, whenever he was called upon to record his vote in the Senate on +any subject under discussion. + +69 27 HYDER ALI (1702-1782), a Mahometan adventurer, made himself +maharajah of Mysore and gave the English in India serious trouble; he +was defeated in 1782 by Sir Eyre Coote. Tippoo Sahib, his son and +successor, proved less dangerous and was finally killed at Seringapatam +in 1799. + +70 4 NATIONALITY IT WAS NOT: i.e. nationalism--patriotism--it was not. +Cf. _Revolt of the Tartars_, Riverside ed., Vol. XII, p. 4; +Masson's ed., Vol. VII, p. 370, where De Quincey speaks of the Torgod +as "tribes whose native ferocity was exasperated by debasing forms of +superstition, and by a nationality as well as an inflated conceit of +their own merit absolutely unparalleled." Cf. also footnote, p. 94. + +70 4 SUFFREN: the great French admiral who in 1780-1781 inflicted so +much loss upon the British. + +70 10 MAGNANIMOUS JUSTICE OF ENGLISHMEN: As Professor Hart observes, +the treatment of Joan in _Henry VI_ is hardly magnanimous. + +71 29 THAT ODIOUS MAN: Cf. pp. 79-80. + +72 12 THREE GREAT SUCCESSIVE BATTLES: Rudolf of Lorraine fell at Crecy +(1346); Frederick of Lorraine at Agincourt (1415); the battle of +Nicopolis, which sacrificed the third Lorrainer, took place in 1396. + +73 24 CHARLES VI (1368-1422) had killed several men during his first +fit of insanity. He was for the rest of his life wholly unfit to +govern. He declared Henry V of England, the conqueror of Agincourt, his +successor, thus disinheriting the Dauphin, his son. + +74 2 THE FAMINES, ETC.: Horrible famines occurred in France and England +in 1315, 1336, and 1353. Such insurrections as Wat Tyler's, in 1381, +are probably in De Quincey's mind. + +74 6 THE TERMINATION OF THE CRUSADES: The Crusades came to an end about +1271. "The ulterior results of the crusades," concludes Cox in +_Encyclopedia Britannica_, "were the breaking up of the feudal +system, the abolition of serfdom, the supremacy of a common law over +the independent jurisdiction of chiefs who claimed the right of private +wars." + +74 7 THE DESTRUCTION OF THE TEMPLARS: This most famous of the military +orders, founded in the twelfth century for the defense of the Latin +kingdom of Jerusalem, having grown so powerful as to be greatly feared, +was suppressed at the beginning of the fourteenth century. + +74 7 THE PAPAL INTERDICTS: "De Quincey has probably in mind such an +interdict as that pronounced in 1200, by Innocent III, against France. +All ecclesiastical functions were suspended and the land was in +desolation."--HART. England was put under interdict several times, as +in 1170 (for the murder of Becket) and 1208. + +74 8 THE TRAGEDIES CAUSED OR SUFFERED BY THE HOUSE OF ANJOU, AND BY THE +EMPEROR: "The Emperor is Konradin, the last of the Hohenstaufen, +beheaded by Charles of Anjou at Naples, 1268. The subsequent cruelties +of Charles in Sicily caused the popular uprising known as the Sicilian +Vespers, 1282, in which many thousands of Frenchmen were +assassinated."--HART. + +74 10 THE COLOSSAL FIGURE OF FEUDALISM, ETC.: The English yeomen at +Crecy, overpowering the mounted knights of France, took from feudalism +its chief support,--the superiority of the mounted knight to the +unmounted yeoman. Cf. Green, _History of the English People_, Book +IV, Chap. II. + +74 15 THE ABOMINABLE SPECTACLE OF A DOUBLE POPE: For thirty-eight years +this paradoxical state of things endured. + +75 15 THE ROMAN MARTYROLOGY: a list of the martyrs of the Church, +arranged according to the order of their festivals, and with accounts +of their lives and sufferings. + +76 4 "ABBEYS THERE WERE," ETC.: Cf. Wordsworth, _Peter Bell_, Part +Second: + + Temples like those among the Hindoos, + And mosques, and spires, and abbey windows, + And castles all with ivy green. + +76 17 THE VOSGES ... HAVE NEVER ATTRACTED MUCH NOTICE, ETC.: They came +into like prominence after De Quincey's day in the Franco-Prussian War +of 1870. + +76 31 THOSE MYSTERIOUS FAWNS, ETC.: In some of the romances of the +Middle Ages, especially those containing Celtic material, a knight, +while hunting, is led by his pursuit of a white fawn (or a white stag +or boar) to a _fee_ (i.e. an inhabitant of the "Happy Other-world") +or into the confines of the "Happy Other-world" itself. Sometimes, as +in the _Guigemar_ of Marie de France, the knight passes on to a +series of adventures in consequence of his meeting with the white fawn. +I owe this note to the kindness of Mr. S. W. Kinney, A.M., of +Baltimore. + +76 33 THAT ANCIENT STAG: See _Englische Studien,_ Vol. V, p. 16, +where additions are made to the following account from Hardwicke's +_Traditions, Superstitions, and Folk-Lore,_ Manchester and London, +1872, p. 154: + +This chasing of the white doe or the white hart by the spectre huntsman +has assumed various forms. According to Aristotle a white hart was +killed by Agathocles, King of Sicily, which a thousand years beforehand +had been consecrated to Diana by Diomedes. Alexander the Great is said +by Pliny to have caught a white stag, placed a collar of gold about its +neck, and afterwards set it free. Succeeding heroes have in after days +been announced as the capturers of this famous white hart. Julius +Caesar took the place of Alexander, and Charlemagne caught a white hart +at both Magdeburg, and in the Holstein woods. In 1172 William [Henry] +the Lion is reported to have accomplished a similar feat, according to +a Latin inscription on the walls of Lubeck Cathedral. Tradition says +the white hart has been caught on Rothwell Hay Common, in Yorkshire, +and in Windsor Forest. + +This reference I owe indirectly to Professor J. M. Manly, of Chicago. + +77 4 OR, BEING UPON THE MARCHES OF FRANCE, A MARQUIS: _Marquis_ is +derived from _march,_ and was originally the title of the guardian +of the frontier, or march. + +77 13 AGREED WITH SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY THAT A GOOD DEAL MIGHT BE SAID +ON BOTH SIDES: This expression, as has been pointed out to me, is from +the middle of _Spectator_ No. 122, where Sir Roger, having been +appealed to on a question of fishing privileges, replied, "with an air +of a man who would not give his judgment rashly, that much might be +said on both sides." It is likely, however, that De Quincey may have +connected it in his mind with the discussion of witchcraft at the +beginning of _Spectator_ No. 117, where Addison balances the +grounds for belief and unbelief somewhat as De Quincey does here. + +78 7 BERGERETA: a very late Latin form of French _bergerette,_ "a +shepherdess." + +78 15 M. SIMOND, IN HIS "TRAVELS": The reference is to _Journal of a +Tour and Residence in Great Britain during the years 1810 and 1811,_ +by Louis Simond, 2d ed. (Edinburgh, 1817), to which is added an +appendix on France, written in December, 1815, and October, 1816. De +Quincey refers to this story with horror several times, but such scenes +are not yet wholly unknown. + +79 21 A CHEVALIER OF ST. LOUIS: The French order of St. Louis was +founded by Louis XIV in 1693 for military service. After its +discontinuance at the Revolution this order was reinstated in 1814; but +no knights have been created since 1830. "Chevalier" is the lowest rank +in such an order; it is here erroneously used by De Quincey as a title +of address. + +79 22 "CHEVALIER, AS-TU DONNE," etc.: "Chevalier, have you fed the +hog?" "MA FILLE," ETC.: "My daughter, have you," etc. "PUCELLE," ETC.: +"Maid of Orleans, have you saved the lilies (i.e. France)?" + +79 28 IF THE MAN THAT TURNIPS CRIES: Cf. _Johnsoniana_, ed. R. +Napier, London, 1884, where, in _Anecdotes of Johnson_, by Mrs. +Piozzi, p. 29, is found: "'T is a mere play of words (added he)"-- +Johnson is speaking of certain "verses by Lopez de Vega"--"and you +might as well say, that + + "If the man who turnips cries, + Cry not when his father dies, + 'T is a proof that he had rather + Have a turnip than his father." + +This reference is given in Bartlett's _Familiar Quotations_. + +80 4 THE ORIFLAMME OF FRANCE: the red banner of St. Denis, preserved in +the abbey of that name, near Paris, and borne before the French king as +a consecrated flag. + +80 22 TWENTY YEARS AFTER, TALKING WITH SOUTHEY: In 1816 De Quincey was +a resident of Grasmere; Southey lived for many years at Keswick, a few +miles away; they met first in 1807. For De Quincey's estimate of +Southey's _Joan of Arc_, see _Works_, Riverside ed., Vol. VI, +pp. 262-266; Masson's ed., Vol. V, pp. 238-242. + +80 28 CHINON is a little town near Tours. + +81 3 SHE "PRICKS" FOR SHERIFFS: The old custom was to prick with a pin +the names of those chosen by the sovereign for sheriffs. + +82 9 AMPULLA: the flask containing the sacred oil used at coronations. + +82 10 THE ENGLISH BOY: Henry VI was nine months old when he was +proclaimed king of England and France in 1422, Charles VI of France, +and Henry V, his legal heir, having both died in that year. Henry's +mother was the eldest daughter of Charles VI. + +82 13 DRAWN FROM THE OVENS OF RHEIMS: Rheims, where the kings of France +were crowned, was famous for its biscuits and gingerbread. + +82 26 TINDAL'S "CHRISTIANITY AS OLD AS THE CREATION": Matthew Tindal +(1657-1732) published this work in 1732; its greatest interest lies in +the fact that to this book more than to any other Butler's +_Analogy_ was a reply. Tindal's argument was that natural religion, +as taught by the deists, was complete; that no revelation was +necessary. A life according to nature is all that the best religion can +teach. Such doctrine as this Joan preached in the speech ascribed to +her. + +82 27 A PARTE ANTE: "from the part gone before"; Joan's speech being +three centuries earlier than the book from which it was taken. + +83 9 THAT DIVINE PASSAGE IN "PARADISE REGAINED": from Book I, II. 196- +205. + +84 34 PATAY IS NEAR ORLEANS: Troyes was the capital of the old province +of Champagne. + +86 25 "NOLEBAT," ETC.: "She would not use her sword or kill any one." + +87 24 MADE PRISONER BY THE BURGUNDIANS: The English have accused the +French officers of conniving at Joan's capture through jealousy of her +successes. Compiegne is fifty miles northeast of Paris. + +87 27 BISHOP OF BEAUVAIS: Beauvais is forty-three miles northwest of +Paris, in Normandy. This bishop, Pierre Cauchon, rector of the +University at Paris, was devoted to the English party. + +87 30 "BISHOP THAT ART," ETC.: Cf. Shakespeare's _Macbeth_, Act I, +sc. v, 1. 13. + +87 33 A TRIPLE CROWN: The papacy is meant, of course. The pope's tiara +is a tall cap of golden cloth, encircled by three coronets. + +88 17 JUDGES EXAMINING THE PRISONER: The judge in France questions a +prisoner minutely when he is first taken, before he is remanded for +trial. De Quincey displays here his inveterate prejudice against the +French; but this practice is widely regarded as the vital error of +French criminal procedure., + +89 5 A WRETCHED DOMINICAN: a member of the order of mendicant friars +established in France by Domingo de Guzman in 1216. Their official name +was Fratres Predicatores, "Preaching Friars," and their chief objects +were preaching and instruction. Their influence was very great until +the rise of the Jesuit order in the sixteenth century. The Dominicans +Le Maitre and Graverent (the Grand Inquisitor) both took part in the +prosecution. + +89 31 FOR A LESS CAUSE THAN MARTYRDOM: Cf. Genesis ii. 24. + +91 14 FROM THE FOUR WINDS: There may be a reminiscence here of Ezekiel +xxxvii. 1-10, especially verse 9: "Come from the four winds, O breath, +and breathe upon these slain, that they may live." + +91 30 LUXOR. See note 13 27. + +92 15 DAUGHTER OF CAESARS: She was the daughter of the German emperor, +Francis I, whose sovereignty, as the name "Holy Roman Empire" shows, +was supposed to continue that of the ancient Roman emperors. + +92 17 CHARLOTTE CORDAY (1768-93) murdered the revolutionist Marat in +the belief that the good of France required it; two days later she paid +the penalty, as she had expected, with her life. + +93 18 GRAFTON, A CHRONICLER: Richard Grafton died about 1572. He was +printer to Edward VI. His chronicle was published in 1569. + +93 20 "FOULE FACE": _Foule_ formerly meant "ugly." + +9321 HOLINSHEAD: Raphael Holinshed died about 1580. His great work, +_Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland_, was used by +Shakespeare as the source of several plays. He writes of Joan: "Of +favor [appearance] was she counted likesome; of person stronglie made, +and manlie; of courage, great, hardie, and stout withall." + +94 (footnote) SATANIC: This epithet was applied to the work of some of +his contemporaries by Southey in the preface to his _Vision of +Judgement_, 1821. It has been generally assumed that Byron and +Shelley are meant. See Introduction to Byron's _Vision of Judgment_ +in the new Murray edition of Byron, Vol. IV. + +96 (footnote) BURGOO: a thick oatmeal gruel or porridge used by seamen. +According to the _New English Dictionary_ the derivation is +unknown; but in the _Athenaeum_, Oct. 6, 1888, quoted by Hart, the +word is explained as a corruption of Arabic _burghul_. + +101 30 ENGLISH PRINCE, REGENT OF FRANCE: John, Duke of Bedford, uncle +of Henry VI. "In genius for war as in political capacity," says J. R. +Green, "John was hardly inferior to Henry [the Fifth, his brother] +himself" (_A History of the English People_, Book IV, Chap. VI). + +101 31 MY LORD OF WINCHESTER: Henry Beaufort, Bishop of Winchester, +half-brother of Henry IV. He was the most prominent English prelate of +his time and was the only Englishman in the Court that condemned Joan. +As to the story of his death, to which De Quincey alludes, see +Shakespeare, 2 Henry VI, Act III, sc. in. Beaufort became cardinal in +1426. + +102 17 WHO IS THIS THAT COMETH FROM DOMREMY? This is an evident +imitation of the famous passage from Isaiah Ixiii. I: "Who is this that +cometh from Edom, with dyed garments from Bozrah?" "Bloody coronation +robes" is rather obscure, but probably refers to the fact that Joan had +shed her own blood to bring about the coronation of her sovereign; she +is supposed to have appeared in armor at the actual coronation +ceremony, and this armor might with reason be imagined as "bloody." + +102 22 SHE ... SHALL TAKE MY LORD'S BRIEF: that is, she shall act as +the bishop's counsel. In the case of Beauvais, as in that of +Winchester, it must be remembered that in all monarchical countries the +bishops are "lords spiritual," on an equality with the greater secular +nobles, the "lords temporal." + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc +by Thomas de Quincey + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH AND *** + +This file should be named 7mjnc10.txt or 7mjnc10.zip +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks get a new NUMBER, 7mjnc11.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, 7mjnc10a.txt + +Produced by Anne Soulard, Charles Franks +and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team. + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc + +Author: Thomas de Quincey + +Release Date: August, 2004 [EBook #6359] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on December 1, 2002] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH AND *** + + + + +Produced by Anne Soulard, Charles Franks +and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team. + + + + +THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH AND JOAN OF ARC + +BY +THOMAS DE QUINCEY + +EDITED WITH INTRODUCTION AND NOTES BY +MILTON HAIGHT TURK, PH.D. + + + + +TO CHARLES DEACON CREE +THIS LITTLE VOLUME IS AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED +_Glencairn, Kilmacolm, Scotland June 27, 1905_ + + + + +PREFACE + + +Some portions of this Introduction have been taken from the Athenæum +Press _Selections from De Quincey_; many of the notes have also +been transferred from that volume. A number of the new notes I owe to a +review of the _Selections_ by Dr. Lane Cooper, of Cornell University. I +wish also to thank for many favors the Committee and officers of the +Glasgow University Library. + +If a word by way of suggestion to teachers be pertinent, I would +venture to remark that the object of the teacher of literature is, of +course, only to fulfill the desire of the author--to make clear his +facts and to bring home his ideas in all their power and beauty. +Introductions and notes are only means to this end. Teachers, I think, +sometimes lose sight of this fact; I know it is fatally easy for +students to forget it. That teacher will have rendered a great service +who has kept his pupils alive to the real aim of their studies,--to +know the author, not to know of him. + +M.H.T + + + + +CONTENTS + + +INTRODUCTION +I. LIFE +II. CRITICAL REMARKS +III. BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE + +SELECTIONS + THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH + JOAN OF ARC + +NOTES + + + + +INTRODUCTION + +I. LIFE + + +Thomas de Quincey was born in Manchester on the 15th of August, 1785. +His father was a man of high character and great taste for literature +as well as a successful man of business; he died, most unfortunately, +when Thomas was quite young. Very soon after our author's birth the +family removed to The Farm, and later to Greenhay, a larger country +place near Manchester. In 1796 De Quincey's mother, now for some years +a widow, removed to Bath and placed him in the grammar school there. + +Thomas, the future opium-eater, was a weak and sickly child. His first +years were spent in solitude, and when his elder brother, William, a +real boy, came home, the young author followed in humility mingled with +terror the diversions of that ingenious and pugnacious "son of eternal +racket." De Quincey's mother was a woman of strong character and +emotions, as well as excellent mind, but she was excessively formal, +and she seems to have inspired more awe than affection in her children, +to whom she was for all that deeply devoted. Her notions of conduct in +general and of child rearing in particular were very strict. She took +Thomas out of Bath School, after three years' excellent work there, +because he was too much praised, and kept him for a year at an inferior +school at Winkfield in Wiltshire. + +In 1800, at the age of fifteen, De Quincey was ready for Oxford; he had +not been praised without reason, for his scholarship was far in advance +of that of ordinary pupils of his years. "That boy," his master at Bath +School had said, "that boy could harangue an Athenian mob better than +you or I could address an English one." He was sent to Manchester +Grammar School, however, in order that after three years' stay he might +secure a scholarship at Brasenose College, Oxford. He remained there-- +strongly protesting against a situation which deprived him "of +_health_, of _society_, of _amusement_, of _liberty_, of _congeniality +of pursuits_"--for nineteen months, and then ran away. + +His first plan had been to reach Wordsworth, whose _Lyrical Ballads_ +(1798) had solaced him in fits of melancholy and had awakened in him a +deep reverence for the neglected poet. His timidity preventing this, he +made his way to Chester, where his mother then lived, in the hope of +seeing a sister; was apprehended by the older members of the family; +and through the intercession of his uncle, Colonel Penson, received the +promise of a guinea a week to carry out his later project of a solitary +tramp through Wales. From July to November, 1802, De Quincey then led a +wayfarer's life. [Footnote: For a most interesting account of this +period see the _Confessions of an English Opium-Eater_, Athenæum Press +_Selections from De Quincey_, pp. 165-171, and notes.] He soon lost his +guinea, however, by ceasing to keep his family informed of his +whereabouts, and subsisted for a time with great difficulty. Still +apparently fearing pursuit, with a little borrowed money he broke away +entirely from his home by exchanging the solitude of Wales for the +greater wilderness of London. Failing there to raise money on his +expected patrimony, he for some time deliberately clung to a life of +degradation and starvation rather than return to his lawful governors. + +Discovered by chance by his friends, De Quincey was brought home and +finally allowed (1803) to go to Worcester College, Oxford, on a reduced +income. Here, we are told, "he came to be looked upon as a strange +being who associated with no one." During this time he learned to take +opium. He left, apparently about 1807, without a degree. In the same +year he made the acquaintance of Coleridge and Wordsworth; Lamb he had +sought out in London several years before. + +His acquaintance with Wordsworth led to his settlement in 1809 at +Grasmere, in the beautiful English Lake District; his home for ten +years was Dove Cottage, which Wordsworth had occupied for several years +and which is now held in trust as a memorial of the poet. De Quincey +was married in 1816, and soon after, his patrimony having been +exhausted, he took up literary work in earnest. + +In 1821 he went to London to dispose of some translations from German +authors, but was persuaded first to write and publish an account of his +opium experiences, which accordingly appeared in the _London +Magazine_ in that year. This new sensation eclipsed Lamb's _Essays +of Elia_, which were appearing in the same periodical. The +_Confessions of an English Opium-Eater_ was forthwith published in +book form. De Quincey now made literary acquaintances. Tom Hood found +the shrinking author "at home in a German ocean of literature, in a +storm, flooding all the floor, the tables, and the chairs--billows of +books." Richard Woodhouse speaks of the "depth and reality of his +knowledge. ... His conversation appeared like the elaboration of a mine +of results. ... Taylor led him into political economy, into the Greek +and Latin accents, into antiquities, Roman roads, old castles, the +origin and analogy of languages; upon all these he was informed to +considerable minuteness. The same with regard to Shakespeare's sonnets, +Spenser's minor poems, and the great writers and characters of +Elizabeth's age and those of Cromwell's time." + +From this time on De Quincey maintained himself by contributing to +various magazines. He soon exchanged London and the Lakes for Edinburgh +and its suburb, Lasswade, where the remainder of his life was spent. +_Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine_ and its rival _Tatt's Magazine_ +received a large number of contributions. _The English Mail-Coach_ +appeared in 1849 in Blackwood. _Joan of Arc_ had already been published +(1847) in _Tait_. De Quincey continued to drink laudanum throughout his +life,--twice after 1821 in very great excess. During his last years he +nearly completed a collected edition of his works. He died in Edinburgh +on the 8th of December, 1859. + + +II. CRITICAL REMARKS + + +The Opium-Eater had been a weak, lonely, and over-studious child, and +he was a solitary and ill-developed man. His character and his work +present strange contradictions. He is most precise in statement, yet +often very careless of fact; he is most courteous in manner, yet +inexcusably inconsiderate in his behavior. Again, he sets up a high +standard of purity of diction, yet uses slang quite unnecessarily and +inappropriately; and though a great master of style, he is guilty, at +times, of digression within digression until all trace of the original +subject is lost. + +De Quincey divides his writings into three groups: first, that class +which "proposes primarily to amuse the reader, but which, in doing so, +may or may not happen occasionally to reach a higher station, at which +the amusement passes into an impassioned interest." To this class would +belong the _Autobiographic Sketches_ and the _Literary Reminiscences_. +As a second class he groups "those papers which address themselves +purely to the understanding as an insulated faculty, or do so +primarily." These essays would include, according to Professor Masson's +subdivision, (a) Biographies, such as _Shakespeare_ or _Pope_--_Joan of +Arc_ falls here, yet has some claim to a place in the first class; (b) +Historical essays, like The _Cæsars_; (c) Speculative and Theological +essays; (d) Essays in Political Economy and Politics; (e) Papers of +Literary Theory and Criticism, such as the brilliant discussions of +_Rhetoric, Style_, and _Conversation_, and the famous _On the Knocking +at the Gate in 'Macbeth_.' As a third and "far higher" class the author +ranks the _Confessions of an English Opium-Eater_, and also (but more +emphatically) the _Suspiria de Profundis_. "On these," he says, "as +modes of impassioned prose ranging under no precedents that I am aware +of in any literature, it is much more difficult to speak justly, +whether in a hostile or a friendly character." + +Of De Quincey's essays in general it may be said that they bear witness +alike to the diversity of his knowledge and the penetrative power of +his intellect. The wide range of his subjects, however, deprives his +papers when taken together of the weight which might attach to a series +of related discussions. And, remarkable as is De Quincey's aptitude for +analysis and speculation, more than once we have to regret the lack of +the "saving common-sense" possessed by many far less gifted men. His +erudition and insight are always a little in advance of his good +judgment. + +As to the works of the first class, the _Reminiscences_ are defaced +by the shrewish spirit shown in the accounts of Wordsworth and other +friends; nor can we depend upon them as records of fact. But our author +had had exceptional opportunities to observe these famous men and +women, and he possessed no little insight into literature and +personality. As to the _Autobiographic Sketches_, the handling of +events is hopelessly arbitrary and fragmentary. In truth, De Quincey is +drawing an idealized picture of childhood,--creating a type rather than +re-creating a person; it is a study of a child of talent that we +receive from him, and as such these sketches form one of the most +satisfactory products of his pen. + +The _Confessions_ as a narrative is related to the Autobiography, +while its poetical passages range it with the _Suspiria_ and the +_Mail-Coach_. De Quincey seems to have believed that he was +creating in such writings a new literary type of prose poetry or prose +phantasy; he had, with his splendid dreams as subject-matter, lifted +prose to heights hitherto scaled only by the poet. In reality his style +owed much to the seventeenth-century writers, such as Milton and Sir +Thomas Browne. He took part with Coleridge, Lamb, and others in the +general revival of interest in earlier modern English prose, which is a +feature of the Romantic Movement. Still none of his contemporaries +wrote as he did; evidently De Quincey has a distinct quality of his +own. Ruskin, in our own day, is like him, but never the same. + +Yet De Quincey's prose poetry is a very small portion of his work, and +it is not in this way only that he excels. Mr. Saintsbury has spoken of +the strong appeal that De Quincey makes to boys. [Footnote: "Probably +more boys have in the last forty years been brought to a love of +literature proper by De Quincy than by any other writer whatever."-- +_History of Nineteenth-Century Literature_, p.198.] It is not +without significance that he mentions as especially attractive to the +young only writings with a large narrative element. [Footnote: "To read +the _Essay on Murder_, the _English Mail-Coach_, _The Spanish +Nun_, _The Cæsars_, and half a score other things at the age of +about fifteen or sixteen is, or ought to be, to fall in love with +them."--_Essays in English Literature_, 1780-1860, p.307.] Few boys +read poetry, whether in verse or prose, and fewer still criticism or +philosophy; to every normal boy the gate of good literature is the good +story. It is the narrative skill of De Quincey that has secured for +him, in preference to other writers of his class, the favor of youthful +readers. + +It would be too much to say that the talent that attracts the young to +him must needs be the Opium-Eater's grand talent, though the notion is +defensible, seeing that only salient qualities in good writing appeal +to inexperienced readers. I believe, however, that this skill in +narration is De Quincey's most persistent quality,--the golden thread +that unites all his most distinguished and most enduring work. And it +is with him a part of his genius for style. Creative power of the kind +that goes to the making of plots De Quincey had not; he has proved that +forever by the mediocrity of _Klosterheim_. Give him Bergmann's +account of the Tartar Migration, or the story of the Fighting Nun,-- +give him the matter,--and a brilliant narrative will result. Indeed, De +Quincey loved a story for its own sake; he rejoiced to see it extend +its winding course before him; he delighted to follow it, touch it, +color it, see it grow into body and being under his hand. That this +enthusiasm should now and then tend to endanger the integrity of the +facts need not surprise us; as I have said elsewhere, accuracy in these +matters is hardly to be expected of De Quincey. And we can take our +pleasure in the skillful unfolding of the dramatic narrative of the +Tartar Flight--we can feel the author's joy in the scenic possibilities +of his theme--even if we know that here and there an incident appears +that is quite in its proper place--but is unknown to history. + +In his _Confessions_ the same constructive power bears its part in +the author's triumph. A peculiar end was to be reached in that +narrative,--an end in which the writer had a deep personal interest. +What is an opium-eater? Says a character in a recent work of fiction, +of a social wreck: "If it isn't whisky with him, it's opium; if it +isn't opium, it's whisky." This speech establishes the popular category +in which De Quincey's habit had placed him. Our attention was to be +drawn from these degrading connections. And this is done not merely by +the correction of some widespread fallacies as to the effects of the +drug; far more it is the result of narrative skill. As we follow with +ever-increasing sympathy the lonely and sensitive child, the wandering +youth, the neuralgic patient, into the terrible grasp of opium, who +realizes, amid the gorgeous delights and the awful horrors of the tale, +that the writer is after all the victim of the worst of bad habits? We +can hardly praise too highly the art which even as we look beneath it +throws its glamour over us still. + +Nor is it only in this constructive power, in the selection and +arrangement of details, that De Quincey excels as a narrator; a score +of minor excellences of his style, such as the fine Latin words or the +sweeping periodic sentences, contribute to the effective progress of +his narrative prose. Mr. Lowell has said that "there are no such vistas +and avenues of verse as Milton's." The comparison is somewhat +hazardous, still I should like to venture the parallel claim that there +are no such streams of prose as De Quincey's. The movement of his +discourse is that of the broad river, not in its weight or force +perhaps, but in its easy flowing progress, in its serene, unhurried +certainty of its end. To be sure, only too often the waters overflow +their banks and run far afield in alien channels. Yet, when great power +over the instrument of language is joined to so much constructive +skill, the result is narrative art of high quality,--an achievement +that must be in no small measure the solid basis of De Quincey's fame. + + +III. BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE + +I. WORKS + + +1. _The Collected Writings of Thomas de Quincey_. New and enlarged +edition by David Masson. Edinburgh: A. and C. Black, 1889-1890. [New +York: The Macmillan Co. 14 vols., with footnotes, a preface to each +volume, and index. Reissued in cheaper form. The standard edition.] + +2. _The Works of Thomas de Quincey_. Riverside Edition. Boston: +Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1877. [12 vols., with notes and index.] + +3. _Selections from De Quincey._ Edited with an Introduction and +Notes, by M. H. Turk. Athenaeum Press Series. Boston, U.S.A., and +London: Ginn and Company, 1902. ["The largest body of selections from +De Quincey recently published.... The selections are _The affliction +of Childhood, Introduction to the World of Strife, A Meeting with Lamb, +A Meeting with Coleridge, Recollections of Wordsworth, Confessions, A +Portion of Suspiria, The English Mail-Coach, Murder as one of the Fine +Arts, Second Paper, Joan of Arc,_ and _On the Knocking at the Gate +in 'Macbeth.'_"] + + +II. BIOGRAPHY AND CRITICISM + + +4. D. MASSON. _Thomas De Quincey._ English Men of Letters. London. +[New York: Harper. An excellent brief biography. This book, with a +good volume of selections, should go far toward supplying the ordinary +student's needs.] + +5. H. S. SALT. DE QUINCEY. Bell's Miniature Series of Great Writers. +London: George Bell and Sons. [A good short life.] 6. A. H. JAPP. +_Thomas De Quincey: His Life and Writings._ London, 1890. [New +York: Scribner. First edition by "H. A. Page," 1877. The standard life +of De Quincey; it contains valuable communications from De Quincey's +daughters, J. Hogg, Rev. F. Jacox, Professor Masson, and others.] + +7. A. H. JAPP. _De Quincey Memorials. Being Letters and Other +Records, here first published. With Communications from Coleridge, the +Wordsworths, Hannah More, Professor Wilson, and others._ 2 vols. +London: W. Heinemann, 1891. + +8. J. HOGG. _De Quincey and his Friends, Personal Recollections, +Souvenirs, and Anecdotes_ [including Woodhouse's _Conversations_, +Findlay's _Personal Recollections_, Hodgson's _On the Genius of +De Quincey_, and a mass of personal notes from a host of friends]. +London: Sampson Low, Marston & Co., 1895. + +9. E. T. MASON. _Personal Traits of British Authors_. New York, +1885. [4 vols. The volume subtitled _Scott, Hogg,_ etc., contains +some accounts of De Quincey not included by Japp or Hogg.] + +10. L. STEPHEN. _Hours in a Library_. Vol. I. New York, 1892. + +11. W. MINTO. _Manual of English Prose Literature_. Boston, 1889. +[Contains the best general discussion of De Quincey's style.] + +12. L. COOPER. _The Prose Poetry of Thomas De Quincey_. Leipzig, +1902. + + + + +THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH + +SECTION I--THE GLORY OF MOTION + + +Some twenty or more years before I matriculated at Oxford, Mr. Palmer, +at that time M.P. for Bath, had accomplished two things, very hard to +do on our little planet, the Earth, however cheap they may be held by +eccentric people in comets: he had invented mail-coaches, and he had +married the daughter of a duke. He was, therefore, just twice as great +a man as Galileo, who did certainly invent (or, which is the same +thing, [Footnote: "_The same thing_":--Thus, in the calendar of the +Church Festivals, the discovery of the true cross (by Helen, the mother +of Constantine) is recorded (and, one might think, with the express +consciousness of sarcasm) as the _Invention_ of the Cross.] +discover) the satellites of Jupiter, those very next things extant to +mail-coaches in the two capital pretensions of speed and keeping time, +but, on the other hand, who did _not_ marry the daughter of a duke. + +These mail-coaches, as organised by Mr. Palmer, are entitled to a +circumstantial notice from myself, having had so large a share in +developing the anarchies of my subsequent dreams: an agency which they +accomplished, 1st, through velocity at that time unprecedented--for +they first revealed the glory of motion; 2dly, through grand effects +for the eye between lamplight and the darkness upon solitary roads; +3dly, through animal beauty and power so often displayed in the class +of horses selected for this mail service; 4thly, through the conscious +presence of a central intellect, that, in the midst of vast distances +[Footnote: "Vast distances":--One case was familiar to mail-coach +travellers where two mails in opposite directions, north and south, +starting at the same minute from points six hundred miles apart, met +almost constantly at a particular bridge which bisected the total +distance.]--of storms, of darkness, of danger--overruled all obstacles +into one steady co-operation to a national result. For my own feeling, +this post-office service spoke as by some mighty orchestra, where a +thousand instruments, all disregarding each other, and so far in danger +of discord, yet all obedient as slaves to the supreme _baton_ of +some great leader, terminate in a perfection of harmony like that of +heart, brain, and lungs in a healthy animal organisation. But, finally, +that particular element in this whole combination which most impressed +myself, and through which it is that to this hour Mr. Palmer's mail- +coach system tyrannises over my dreams by terror and terrific beauty, +lay in the awful _political_ mission which at that time it fulfilled. +The mail-coach it was that distributed over the face of the land, like +the opening of apocalyptic vials, the heart-shaking news of Trafalgar, +of Salamanca, of Vittoria, of Waterloo. These were the harvests that, +in the grandeur of their reaping, redeemed the tears and blood in which +they had been sown. Neither was the meanest peasant so much below the +grandeur and the sorrow of the times as to confound battles such as +these, which were gradually moulding the destinies of Christendom, with +the vulgar conflicts of ordinary warfare, so often no more than +gladiatorial trials of national prowess. The victories of England in +this stupendous contest rose of themselves as natural _Te Deums_ to +heaven; and it was felt by the thoughtful that such victories, at such +a crisis of general prostration, were not more beneficial to ourselves +than finally to France, our enemy, and to the nations of all western or +central Europe, through whose pusillanimity it was that the French +domination had prospered. + +The mail-coach, as the national organ for publishing these mighty +events, thus diffusively influential, became itself a spiritualised and +glorified object to an impassioned heart; and naturally, in the Oxford +of that day, _all_ hearts were impassioned, as being all (or nearly +all) in _early_ manhood. In most universities there is one single +college; in Oxford there were five-and-twenty, all of which were +peopled by young men, the _élite_ of their own generation; not +boys, but men: none under eighteen. In some of these many colleges the +custom permitted the student to keep what are called "short terms"; +that is, the four terms of Michaelmas, Lent, Easter, and Act, were kept +by a residence, in the aggregate, of ninety-one days, or thirteen +weeks. Under this interrupted residence, it was possible that a student +might have a reason for going down to his home four times in the year. +This made eight journeys to and fro. But, as these homes lay dispersed +through all the shires of the island, and most of us disdained all +coaches except his Majesty's mail, no city out of London could pretend +to so extensive a connexion with Mr. Palmer's establishment as Oxford. +Three mails, at the least, I remember as passing every day through +Oxford, and benefiting by my personal patronage--viz., the Worcester, +the Gloucester, and the Holyhead mail. Naturally, therefore, it became +a point of some interest with us, whose journeys revolved every six +weeks on an average, to look a little into the executive details of the +system. With some of these Mr. Palmer had no concern; they rested upon +bye-laws enacted by posting-houses for their own benefit, and upon +other bye-laws, equally stern, enacted by the inside passengers for the +illustration of their own haughty exclusiveness. These last were of a +nature to rouse our scorn; from which the transition was not very long +to systematic mutiny. Up to this time, say 1804, or 1805 (the year of +Trafalgar), it had been the fixed assumption of the four inside people +(as an old tradition of all public carriages derived from the reign of +Charles II) that they, the illustrious quaternion, constituted a +porcelain variety of the human race, whose dignity would have been +compromised by exchanging one word of civility with the three miserable +delf-ware outsides. Even to have kicked an outsider might have been +held to attaint the foot concerned in that operation, so that, perhaps, +it would have required an act of Parliament to restore its purity of +blood. What words, then, could express the horror, and the sense of +treason, in that case, which _had_ happened, where all three +outsides (the trinity of Pariahs) made a vain attempt to sit down at +the same breakfast-table or dinner-table with the consecrated four? I +myself witnessed such an attempt; and on that occasion a benevolent old +gentleman endeavoured to soothe his three holy associates, by +suggesting that, if the outsides were indicted for this criminal +attempt at the next assizes, the court would regard it as a case of +lunacy or _delirium tremens_ rather than of treason. England owes +much of her grandeur to the depth of the aristocratic element in her +social composition, when pulling against her strong democracy. I am not +the man to laugh at it. But sometimes, undoubtedly, it expressed itself +in comic shapes. The course taken with the infatuated outsiders, in the +particular attempt which I have noticed, was that the waiter, beckoning +them away from the privileged _salle-à-manger_, sang out, "This +way, my good men," and then enticed these good men away to the kitchen. +But that plan had not always answered. Sometimes, though rarely, cases +occurred where the intruders, being stronger than usual, or more +vicious than usual, resolutely refused to budge, and so far carried +their point as to have a separate table arranged for themselves in a +corner of the general room. Yet, if an Indian screen could be found +ample enough to plant them out from the very eyes of the high table, or +_dais_, it then became possible to assume as a fiction of law that +the three delf fellows, after all, were not present. They could be +ignored by the porcelain men, under the maxim that objects not +appearing and objects not existing are governed by the same logical +construction. [Footnote: _De non apparentibus_, etc.] + +Such being, at that time, the usage of mail-coaches, what was to be +done by us of young Oxford? We, the most aristocratic of people, who +were addicted to the practice of looking down superciliously even upon +the insides themselves as often very questionable characters--were we, +by voluntarily going outside, to court indignities? If our dress and +bearing sheltered us generally from the suspicion of being "raff" (the +name at that period for "snobs" [Footnote: "_Snobs_," and its +antithesis, "_nobs_," arose among the internal factions of shoemakers +perhaps ten years later. Possibly enough, the terms may have existed +much earlier; but they were then first made known, picturesquely and +effectively, by a trial at some assizes which happened to fix the +public attention.]), we really _were_ such constructively by the place +we assumed. If we did not submit to the deep shadow of eclipse, we +entered at least the skirts of its penumbra. And the analogy of +theatres was valid against us,--where no man can complain of the +annoyances incident to the pit or gallery, having his instant remedy in +paying the higher price of the boxes. But the soundness of this analogy +we disputed. In the case of the theatre, it cannot be pretended that +the inferior situations have any separate attractions, unless the pit +may be supposed to have an advantage for the purposes of the critic or +the dramatic reporter. But the critic or reporter is a rarity. For most +people, the sole benefit is in the price. Now, on the contrary, the +outside of the mail had its own incommunicable advantages. These we +could not forego. The higher price we would willingly have paid, but +not the price connected with the condition of riding inside; which +condition we pronounced insufferable. The air, the freedom of prospect, +the proximity to the horses, the elevation of seat: these were what we +required; but, above all, the certain anticipation of purchasing +occasional opportunities of driving. + +Such was the difficulty which pressed us; and under the coercion of +this difficulty we instituted a searching inquiry into the true quality +and valuation of the different apartments about the mail. We conducted +this inquiry on metaphysical principles; and it was ascertained +satisfactorily that the roof of the coach, which by some weak men had +been called the attics, and by some the garrets, was in reality the +drawing-room; in which drawing-room the box was the chief ottoman or +sofa; whilst it appeared that the _inside_ which had been +traditionally regarded as the only room tenantable by gentlemen, was, +in fact, the coal-cellar in disguise. + +Great wits jump. The very same idea had not long before struck the +celestial intellect of China. Amongst the presents carried out by our +first embassy to that country was a state-coach. It had been specially +selected as a personal gift by George III; but the exact mode of using +it was an intense mystery to Pekin. The ambassador, indeed (Lord +Macartney), had made some imperfect explanations upon this point; but, +as His Excellency communicated these in a diplomatic whisper at the +very moment of his departure, the celestial intellect was very feebly +illuminated, and it became necessary to call a cabinet council on the +grand state question, "Where was the Emperor to sit?" The hammer-cloth +happened to be unusually gorgeous; and, partly on that consideration, +but partly also because the box offered the most elevated seat, was +nearest to the moon, and undeniably went foremost, it was resolved by +acclamation that the box was the imperial throne, and, for the +scoundrel who drove,--he might sit where he could find a perch. The +horses, therefore, being harnessed, solemnly his imperial majesty +ascended his new English throne under a flourish of trumpets, having +the first lord of the treasury on his right hand, and the chief jester +on his left. Pekin gloried in the spectacle; and in the whole flowery +people, constructively present by representation, there was but one +discontented person, and _that_ was the coachman. This mutinous +individual audaciously shouted, "Where am _I_ to sit?" But the +privy council, incensed by his disloyalty, unanimously opened the door, +and kicked him into the inside. He had all the inside places to +himself; but such is the rapacity of ambition that he was still +dissatisfied. "I say," he cried out in an extempore petition addressed +to the Emperor through the window--"I say, how am I to catch hold of +the reins?"--"Anyhow," was the imperial answer; "don't trouble +_me_, man, in my glory. How catch the reins? Why, through the +windows, through the keyholes--_anyhow_." Finally this contumacious +coachman lengthened the check-strings into a sort of jury-reins +communicating with the horses; with these he drove as steadily as Pekin +had any right to expect. The Emperor returned after the briefest of +circuits; he descended in great pomp from his throne, with the severest +resolution never to remount it. A public thanksgiving was ordered for +his majesty's happy escape from the disease of a broken neck; and the +state-coach was dedicated thenceforward as a votive offering to the god +Fo Fo--whom the learned more accurately called Fi Fi. + +A revolution of this same Chinese character did young Oxford of that +era effect in the constitution of mail-coach society. It was a perfect +French Revolution; and we had good reason to say, _ça ira_. In +fact, it soon became _too_ popular. The "public"--a well-known +character, particularly disagreeable, though slightly respectable, and +notorious for affecting the chief seats in synagogues--had at first +loudly opposed this revolution; but, when the opposition showed itself +to be ineffectual, our disagreeable friend went into it with headlong +zeal. At first it was a sort of race between us; and, as the public is +usually from thirty to fifty years old, naturally we of young Oxford, +that averaged about twenty, had the advantage. Then the public took to +bribing, giving fees to horse-keepers, &c., who hired out their persons +as warming-pans on the box seat. _That_, you know, was shocking to +all moral sensibilities. Come to bribery, said we, and there is an end +to all morality,--Aristotle's, Zeno's, Cicero's, or anybody's. And, +besides, of what use was it? For _we_ bribed also. And, as our +bribes, to those of the public, were as five shillings to sixpence, +here again young Oxford had the advantage. But the contest was ruinous +to the principles of the stables connected with the mails. This whole +corporation was constantly bribed, rebribed, and often surrebribed; a +mail-coach yard was like the hustings in a contested election; and a +horse-keeper, ostler, or helper, was held by the philosophical at that +time to be the most corrupt character in the nation. + +There was an impression upon the public mind, natural enough from the +continually augmenting velocity of the mail, but quite erroneous, that +an outside seat on this class of carriages was a post of danger. On the +contrary, I maintained that, if a man had become nervous from some +gipsy prediction in his childhood, allocating to a particular moon now +approaching some unknown danger, and he should inquire earnestly, +"Whither can I fly for shelter? Is a prison the safest retreat? or a +lunatic hospital? or the British Museum?" I should have replied, "Oh +no; I'll tell you what to do. Take lodgings for the next forty days on +the box of his Majesty's mail. Nobody can touch you there. If it is by +bills at ninety days after date that you are made unhappy--if noters +and protesters are the sort of wretches whose astrological shadows +darken the house of life--then note you what I vehemently protest: +viz., that, no matter though the sheriff and under-sheriff in every +county should be running after you with his _posse_, touch a hair +of your head he cannot whilst you keep house and have your legal +domicile on the box of the mail. It is felony to stop the mail; even +the sheriff cannot do that. And an _extra_ touch of the whip to the +leaders (no great matter if it grazes the sheriff) at any time +guarantees your safety." In fact, a bedroom in a quiet house seems a +safe enough retreat; yet it is liable to its own notorious nuisances-- +to robbers by night, to rats, to fire. But the mail laughs at these +terrors. To robbers, the answer is packed up and ready for delivery in +the barrel of the guard's blunderbuss. Rats again! there _are_ none +about mail-coaches any more than snakes in Von Troil's Iceland; +[Footnote: "_Von Troil's Iceland_":--The allusion is to a well- +known chapter in Von Troil's work, entitled, "Concerning the Snakes of +Iceland." The entire chapter consists of these six words--"_There art +no snakes in Iceland_."] except, indeed, now and then a parliamentary +rat, who always hides his shame in what I have shown to be the "coal- +cellar." And, as to fire, I never knew but one in a mail-coach; which +was in the Exeter mail, and caused by an obstinate sailor bound to +Devonport. Jack, making light of the law and the lawgiver that had set +their faces against his offence, insisted on taking up a forbidden seat +[Footnote: "_Forbidden seat_":--The very sternest code of rules was +enforced upon the mails by the Post-office. Throughout England, only +three outsides were allowed, of whom one was to sit on the box, and the +other two immediately behind the box; none, under any pretext, to come +near the guard; an indispensable caution; since else, under the guise +of a passenger, a robber might by any one of a thousand advantages-- +which sometimes are created, but always are favoured, by the animation +of frank social intercourse--have disarmed the guard. Beyond the +Scottish border, the regulation was so far relaxed as to allow of +_four_ outsides, but not relaxed at all as to the mode of placing +them. One, as before, was seated on the box, and the other three on the +front of the roof, with a determinate and ample separation from the +little insulated chair of the guard. This relaxation was conceded by +way of compensating to Scotland her disadvantages in point of +population. England, by the superior density of her population, might +always count upon a large fund of profits in the fractional trips of +chance passengers riding for short distances of two or three stages. In +Scotland this chance counted for much less. And therefore, to make good +the deficiency, Scotland was allowed a compensatory profit upon one +_extra_ passenger.] in the rear of the roof, from which he could +exchange his own yarns with those of the guard. No greater offence was +then known to mail-coaches; it was treason, it was _læsa majestas_, +it was by tendency arson; and the ashes of Jack's pipe, falling amongst +the straw of the hinder boot, containing the mail-bags, raised a flame +which (aided by the wind of our motion) threatened a revolution in the +republic of letters. Yet even this left the sanctity of the box +unviolated. In dignified repose, the coachman and myself sat on, +resting with benign composure upon our knowledge that the fire would +have to burn its way through four inside passengers before it could +reach ourselves. I remarked to the coachman, with a quotation from +Virgil's "Æneid" really too hackneyed-- + + "Jam proximus ardet + Ucalegon." + +But, recollecting that the Virgilian part of the coachman's education +might have been neglected, I interpreted so far as to say that perhaps +at that moment the flames were catching hold of our worthy brother and +inside passenger, Ucalegon. The coachman made no answer,--which is my +own way when a stranger addresses me either in Syriac or in Coptic; but +by his faint sceptical smile he seemed to insinuate that he knew +better,--for that Ucalegon, as it happened, was not in the way-bill, +and therefore could not have been booked. + +No dignity is perfect which does not at some point ally itself with the +mysterious. The connexion of the mail with the state and the executive +government--a connexion obvious, but yet not strictly defined--gave to +the whole mail establishment an official grandeur which did us service +on the roads, and invested us with seasonable terrors. Not the less +impressive were those terrors because their legal limits were +imperfectly ascertained. Look at those turnpike gates: with what +deferential hurry, with what an obedient start, they fly open at our +approach! Look at that long line of carts and carters ahead, +audaciously usurping the very crest of the road. Ah! traitors, they do +not hear us as yet; but, as soon as the dreadful blast of our horn +reaches them with proclamation of our approach, see with what frenzy of +trepidation they fly to their horses' heads, and deprecate our wrath by +the precipitation of their crane-neck quarterings. Treason they feel to +be their crime; each individual carter feels himself under the ban of +confiscation and attainder; his blood is attainted through six +generations; and nothing is wanting but the headsman and his axe, the +block and the sawdust, to close up the vista of his horrors. What! +shall it be within benefit of clergy to delay the king's message on the +high road?--to interrupt the great respirations, ebb and flood, +_systole_ and _diastole_, of the national intercourse?--to endanger the +safety of tidings running day and night between all nations and +languages? Or can it be fancied, amongst the weakest of men, that the +bodies of the criminals will be given up to their widows for Christian +burial? Now, the doubts which were raised as to our powers did more to +wrap them in terror, by wrapping them in uncertainty, than could have +been effected by the sharpest definitions of the law from the Quarter +Sessions. We, on our parts (we, the collective mail, I mean), did our +utmost to exalt the idea of our privileges by the insolence with which +we wielded them. Whether this insolence rested upon law that gave it a +sanction, or upon conscious power that haughtily dispensed with that +sanction, equally it spoke from a potential station; and the agent, in +each particular insolence of the moment, was viewed reverentially, as +one having authority. + +Sometimes after breakfast his Majesty's mail would become frisky; and, +in its difficult wheelings amongst the intricacies of early markets, it +would upset an apple-cart, a cart loaded with eggs, &c. Huge was the +affliction and dismay, awful was the smash. I, as far as possible, +endeavoured in such a case to represent the conscience and moral +sensibilities of the mail; and, when wildernesses of eggs were lying +poached under our horses' hoofs, then would I stretch forth my hands in +sorrow, saying (in words too celebrated at that time, from the false +echoes [Footnote: "_False echoes_":--Yes, false! for the words +ascribed to Napoleon, as breathed to the memory of Desaix, never were +uttered at all. They stand in the same category of theatrical fictions +as the cry of the foundering line-of-battle ship _Vengeur_, as the +vaunt of General Cambronne at Waterloo, "La Garde meurt, mais ne se +rend pas," or as the repartees of Talleyrand.] of Marengo), "Ah! +wherefore have we not time to weep over you?"--which was evidently +impossible, since, in fact, we had not time to laugh over them. Tied to +post-office allowance in some cases of fifty minutes for eleven miles, +could the royal mail pretend to undertake the offices of sympathy and +condolence? Could it be expected to provide tears for the accidents of +the road? If even it seemed to trample on humanity, it did so, I felt, +in discharge of its own more peremptory duties. + +Upholding the morality of the mail, _a fortiori_ I upheld its +rights; as a matter of duty, I stretched to the uttermost its privilege +of imperial precedency, and astonished weak minds by the feudal powers +which I hinted to be lurking constructively in the charters of this +proud establishment. Once I remember being on the box of the Holyhead +mail, between Shrewsbury and Oswestry, when a tawdry thing from +Birmingham, some "Tallyho" or "Highflyer," all flaunting with green and +gold, came up alongside of us. What a contrast to our royal simplicity +of form and colour in this plebeian wretch! The single ornament on our +dark ground of chocolate colour was the mighty shield of the imperial +arms, but emblazoned in proportions as modest as a signet-ring bears to +a seal of office. Even this was displayed only on a single panel, +whispering, rather than proclaiming, our relations to the mighty state; +whilst the beast from Birmingham, our green-and-gold friend from false, +fleeting, perjured Brummagem, had as much writing and painting on its +sprawling flanks as would have puzzled a decipherer from the tombs of +Luxor. For some time this Birmingham machine ran along by our side--a +piece of familiarity that already of itself seemed to me sufficiently +Jacobinical. But all at once a movement of the horses announced a +desperate intention of leaving us behind. "Do you see _that?_" I +said to the coachman.--"I see," was his short answer. He was wide +awake,--yet he waited longer than seemed prudent; for the horses of our +audacious opponent had a disagreeable air of freshness and power. But +his motive was loyal; his wish was that the Birmingham conceit should +be full-blown before he froze it. When _that_ seemed right, he +unloosed, or, to speak by a stronger word, he _sprang_, his known +resources: he slipped our royal horses like cheetahs, or hunting- +leopards, after the affrighted game. How they could retain such a +reserve of fiery power after the work they had accomplished seemed hard +to explain. But on our side, besides the physical superiority, was a +tower of moral strength, namely the king's name, "which they upon the +adverse faction wanted." Passing them without an effort, as it seemed, +we threw them into the rear with so lengthening an interval between us +as proved in itself the bitterest mockery of their presumption; whilst +our guard blew back a shattering blast of triumph that was really too +painfully full of derision. + +I mention this little incident for its connexion with what followed. A +Welsh rustic, sitting behind me, asked if I had not felt my heart burn +within me during the progress of the race? I said, with philosophic +calmness, _No_; because we were not racing with a mail, so that no +glory could be gained. In fact, it was sufficiently mortifying that +such a Birmingham thing should dare to challenge us. The Welshman +replied that he didn't see _that_; for that a cat might look at a +king, and a Brummagem coach might lawfully race the Holyhead mail. +"_Race_ us, if you like," I replied, "though even _that_ has an +air of sedition; but not _beat_ us. This would have been treason; +and for its own sake I am glad that the 'Tallyho' was disappointed." So +dissatisfied did the Welshman seem with this opinion that at last I was +obliged to tell him a very fine story from one of our elder dramatists: +viz., that once, in some far Oriental kingdom, when the sultan of all +the land, with his princes, ladies, and chief omrahs, were flying their +falcons, a hawk suddenly flew at a majestic eagle, and, in defiance of +the eagle's natural advantages, in contempt also of the eagle's +traditional royalty, and before the whole assembled field of astonished +spectators from Agra and Lahore, killed the eagle on the spot. +Amazement seized the sultan at the unequal contest, and burning +admiration for its unparalleled result. He commanded that the hawk +should be brought before him; he caressed the bird with enthusiasm; and +he ordered that, for the commemoration of his matchless courage, a +diadem of gold and rubies should be solemnly placed on the hawk's head, +but then that, immediately after this solemn coronation, the bird +should be led off to execution, as the most valiant indeed of traitors, +but not the less a traitor, as having dared to rise rebelliously +against his liege lord and anointed sovereign, the eagle. "Now," said I +to the Welshman, "to you and me, as men of refined sensibilities, how +painful it would have been that this poor Brummagem brute, the +'Tallyho,' in the impossible case of a victory over us, should have +been crowned with Birmingham tinsel, with paste diamonds and Roman +pearls, and then led off to instant execution." The Welshman doubted if +that could be warranted by law. And, when I hinted at the 6th of Edward +Longshanks, chap. 18, for regulating the precedency of coaches, as +being probably the statute relied on for the capital punishment of such +offences, he replied drily that, if the attempt to pass a mail really +were treasonable, it was a pity that the "Tallyho" appeared to have so +imperfect an acquaintance with law. + +The modern modes of travelling cannot compare with the old mail-coach +system in grandeur and power. They boast of more velocity,--not, +however, as a consciousness, but as a fact of our lifeless knowledge, +resting upon _alien_ evidence: as, for instance, because somebody +_says_ that we have gone fifty miles in the hour, though we are far +from feeling it as a personal experience; or upon the evidence of a +result, as that actually we find ourselves in York four hours after +leaving London. Apart from such an assertion, or such a result, I +myself am little aware of the pace. But, seated on the old mail-coach, +we needed no evidence out of ourselves to indicate the velocity. On +this system the word was not _magna loquimur_, as upon railways, +but _vivimus_. Yes, "magna _vivimus_"; we do not make verbal +ostentation of our grandeurs, we realise our grandeurs in act, and in +the very experience of life. The vital experience of the glad animal +sensibilities made doubts impossible on the question of our speed; we +heard our speed, we saw it, we felt it as a thrilling; and this speed +was not the product of blind insensate agencies, that had no sympathy +to give, but was incarnated in the fiery eyeballs of the noblest +amongst brutes, in his dilated nostril, spasmodic muscles, and thunder- +beating hoofs. The sensibility of the horse, uttering itself in the +maniac light of his eye, might be the last vibration of such a +movement; the glory of Salamanca might be the first. But the +intervening links that connected them, that spread the earthquake of +battle into the eyeballs of the horse, were the heart of man and its +electric thrillings--kindling in the rapture of the fiery strife, and +then propagating its own tumults by contagious shouts and gestures to +the heart of his servant the horse. But now, on the new system of +travelling, iron tubes and boilers have disconnected man's heart from +the ministers of his locomotion. Nile nor Trafalgar has power to raise +an extra bubble in a steam-kettle. The galvanic cycle is broken up for +ever; man's imperial nature no longer sends itself forward through the +electric sensibility of the horse; the inter-agencies are gone in the +mode of communication between the horse and his master out of which +grew so many aspects of sublimity under accidents of mists that hid, or +sudden blazes that revealed, of mobs that agitated, or midnight +solitudes that awed. Tidings fitted to convulse all nations must +henceforwards travel by culinary process; and the trumpet that once +announced from afar the laurelled mail, heart-shaking when heard +screaming on the wind and proclaiming itself through the darkness to +every village or solitary house on its route, has now given way for +ever to the pot-wallopings of the boiler. Thus have perished multiform +openings for public expressions of interest, scenical yet natural, in +great national tidings,--for revelations of faces and groups that could +not offer themselves amongst the fluctuating mobs of a railway station. +The gatherings of gazers about a laurelled mail had one centre, and +acknowledged one sole interest. But the crowds attending at a railway +station have as little unity as running water, and own as many centres +as there are separate carriages in the train. + +How else, for example, than as a constant watcher for the dawn, and for +the London mail that in summer months entered about daybreak amongst +the lawny thickets of Maryborough forest, couldst thou, sweet Fanny of +the Bath road, have become the glorified inmate of my dreams? Yet +Fanny, as the loveliest young woman for face and person that perhaps in +my whole life I have beheld, merited the station which even now, from a +distance of forty years, she holds in my dreams; yes, though by links +of natural association she brings along with her a troop of dreadful +creatures, fabulous and not fabulous, that are more abominable to the +heart than Fanny and the dawn are delightful. + +Miss Fanny of the Bath road, strictly speaking, lived at a mile's +distance from that road, but came so continually to meet the mail that +I on my frequent transits rarely missed her, and naturally connected +her image with the great thoroughfare where only I had ever seen her. +Why she came so punctually I do not exactly know; but I believe with +some burden of commissions, to be executed in Bath, which had gathered +to her own residence as a central rendezvous for converging them. The +mail-coachman who drove the Bath mail and wore the royal livery +[Footnote: "Wore the royal livery":--The general impression was that +the royal livery belonged of right to the mail-coachmen as their +professional dress. But that was an error. To the guard it _did_ +belong, I believe, and was obviously essential as an official warrant, +and as a means of instant identification for his person, in the +discharge of his important public duties. But the coachman, and +especially if his place in the series did not connect him immediately +with London and the General Post-Office, obtained the scarlet coat only +as an honorary distinction after long (or, if not long, trying and +special) service.] happened to be Fanny's grandfather. A good man he +was, that loved his beautiful granddaughter, and, loving her wisely, +was vigilant over her deportment in any case where young Oxford might +happen to be concerned. Did my vanity then suggest that I myself, +individually, could fall within the line of his terrors? Certainly not, +as regarded any physical pretensions that I could plead; for Fanny (as +a chance passenger from her own neighbourhood once told me) counted in +her train a hundred and ninety-nine professed admirers, if not open +aspirants to her favour; and probably not one of the whole brigade but +excelled myself in personal advantages. Ulysses even, with the unfair +advantage of his accursed bow, could hardly have undertaken that amount +of suitors. So the danger might have seemed slight--only that woman is +universally aristocratic; it is amongst her nobilities of heart that +she _is_ so. Now, the aristocratic distinctions in my favour might +easily with Miss Fanny have compensated my physical deficiencies. Did I +then make love to Fanny? Why, yes; about as much love as one +_could_ make whilst the mail was changing horses--a process which, +ten years later, did not occupy above eighty seconds; but _then_,-- +viz., about Waterloo--it occupied five times eighty. Now, four hundred +seconds offer a field quite ample enough for whispering into a young +woman's ear a great deal of truth, and (by way of parenthesis) some +trifle of falsehood. Grandpapa did right, therefore, to watch me. And +yet, as happens too often to the grandpapas of earth in a contest with +the admirers of granddaughters, how vainly would he have watched me had +I meditated any evil whispers to Fanny! She, it is my belief, would +have protected herself against any man's evil suggestions. But he, as +the result showed, could not have intercepted the opportunities for +such suggestions. Yet, why not? Was he not active? Was he not blooming? +Blooming he was as Fanny herself. + +"Say, all our praises why should lords----" + +Stop, that's not the line. + +"Say, all our roses why should girls engross?" + +The coachman showed rosy blossoms on his face deeper even than his +granddaughter's--_his_ being drawn from the ale-cask, Fanny's from +the fountains of the dawn. But, in spite of his blooming face, some +infirmities he had; and one particularly in which he too much resembled +a crocodile. This lay in a monstrous inaptitude for turning round. The +crocodile, I presume, owes that inaptitude to the absurd _length_ +of his back; but in our grandpapa it arose rather from the absurd +_breadth_ of his back, combined, possibly, with some growing +stiffness in his legs. Now, upon this crocodile infirmity of his I +planted a human advantage for tendering my homage to Miss Fanny. In +defiance of all his honourable vigilance, no sooner had he presented to +us his mighty Jovian back (what a field for displaying to mankind his +royal scarlet!), whilst inspecting professionally the buckles, the +straps, and the silvery turrets [Footnote: "_Turrets_":--As one who +loves and venerates Chaucer for his unrivalled merits of tenderness, of +picturesque characterisation, and of narrative skill, I noticed with +great pleasure that the word _torrettes_ is used by him to designate +the little devices through which the reins are made to pass. This same +word, in the same exact sense, I heard uniformly used by many scores of +illustrious mail-coachmen to whose confidential friendship I had the +honour of being admitted in my younger days.] of his harness, than I +raised Miss Fanny's hand to my lips, and, by the mixed tenderness and +respectfulness of my manner, caused her easily to understand how happy +it would make me to rank upon her list as No. 10 or 12: in which case a +few casualties amongst her lovers (and, observe, they _hanged_ +liberally in those days) might have promoted me speedily to the top of +the tree; as, on the other hand, with how much loyalty of submission I +acquiesced by anticipation in her award, supposing that she should +plant me in the very rearward of her favour, as No. 199 + 1. Most truly +I loved this beautiful and ingenuous girl; and, had it not been for the +Bath mail, timing all courtships by post- office allowance, heaven only +knows what might have come of it. People talk of being over head and +ears in love; now, the mail was the cause that I sank only over ears in +love,--which, you know, still left a trifle of brain to overlook the +whole conduct of the affair. + +Ah, reader! when I look back upon those days, it seems to me that all +things change--all things perish. "Perish the roses and the palms of +kings": perish even the crowns and trophies of Waterloo: thunder and +lightning are not the thunder and lightning which I remember. Roses are +degenerating. The Fannies of our island--though this I say with +reluctance--are not visibly improving; and the Bath road is notoriously +superannuated. Crocodiles, you will say, are stationary. Mr. Waterton +tells me that the crocodile does _not change_,--that a cayman, in +fact, or an alligator, is just as good for riding upon as he was in the +time of the Pharaohs. _That_ may be; but the reason is that the +crocodile does not live fast--he is a slow coach. I believe it is +generally understood among naturalists that the crocodile is a +blockhead. It is my own impression that the Pharaohs were also +blockheads. Now, as the Pharaohs and the crocodile domineered over +Egyptian society, this accounts for a singular mistake that prevailed +through innumerable generations on the Nile. The crocodile made the +ridiculous blunder of supposing man to be meant chiefly for his own +eating. Man, taking a different view of the subject, naturally met that +mistake by another: he viewed the crocodile as a thing sometimes to +worship, but always to run away from. And this continued till Mr. +Waterton [Footnote: "_Mr. Waterton_":--Had the reader lived through +the last generation, he would not need to be told that, some thirty or +thirty-five years back, Mr. Waterton, a distinguished country gentleman +of ancient family in Northumberland, publicly mounted and rode in top- +boots a savage old crocodile, that was restive and very impertinent, +but all to no purpose. The crocodile jibbed and tried to kick, but +vainly. He was no more able to throw the squire than Sinbad was to +throw the old scoundrel who used his back without paying for it, until +he discovered a mode (slightly immoral, perhaps, though some think not) +of murdering the old fraudulent jockey, and so circuitously of +unhorsing him.] changed the relations between the animals. The mode of +escaping from the reptile he showed to be not by running away, but by +leaping on its back booted and spurred. The two animals had +misunderstood each other. The use of the crocodile has now been cleared +up--viz., to be ridden; and the final cause of man is that he may +improve the health of the crocodile by riding him a-fox-hunting before +breakfast. And it is pretty certain that any crocodile who has been +regularly hunted through the season, and is master of the weight he +carries, will take a six-barred gate now as well as ever he would have +done in the infancy of the pyramids. + +If, therefore, the crocodile does _not_ change, all things else +undeniably _do_: even the shadow of the pyramids grows less. And +often the restoration in vision of Fanny and the Bath road makes me too +pathetically sensible of that truth. Out of the darkness, if I happen +to call back the image of Fanny, up rises suddenly from a gulf of forty +years a rose in June; or, if I think for an instant of the rose in +June, up rises the heavenly face of Fanny. One after the other, like +the antiphonies in the choral service, rise Fanny and the rose in June, +then back again the rose in June and Fanny. Then come both together, as +in a chorus--roses and Fannies, Fannies and roses, without end, thick +as blossoms in paradise. Then comes a venerable crocodile, in a royal +livery of scarlet and gold, with sixteen capes; and the crocodile is +driving four-in-hand from the box of the Bath mail. And suddenly we +upon the mail are pulled up by a mighty dial, sculptured with the +hours, that mingle with the heavens and the heavenly host. Then all at +once we are arrived at Marlborough forest, amongst the lovely +households [Footnote: "_Households_":--Roe-deer do not congregate +in herds like the fallow or the red deer, but by separate families, +parents and children; which feature of approximation to the sanctity of +human hearths, added to their comparatively miniature and graceful +proportions, conciliates to them an interest of peculiar tenderness, +supposing even that this beautiful creature is less characteristically +impressed with the grandeurs of savage and forest life.] of the roe- +deer; the deer and their fawns retire into the dewy thickets; the +thickets are rich with roses; once again the roses call up the sweet +countenance of Fanny; and she, being the granddaughter of a crocodile, +awakens a dreadful host of semi-legendary animals--griffins, dragons, +basilisks, sphinxes--till at length the whole vision of fighting images +crowds into one towering armorial shield, a vast emblazonry of human +charities and human loveliness that have perished, but quartered +heraldically with unutterable and demoniac natures, whilst over all +rises, as a surmounting crest, one fair female hand, with the +forefinger pointing, in sweet, sorrowful admonition, upwards to heaven, +where is sculptured the eternal writing which proclaims the frailty of +earth and her children. + + +GOING DOWN WITH VICTORY + + +But the grandest chapter of our experience within the whole mail-coach +service was on those occasions when we went down from London with the +news of victory. A period of about ten years stretched from Trafalgar +to Waterloo; the second and third years of which period (1806 and 1807) +were comparatively sterile; but the other nine (from 1805 to 1815 +inclusively) furnished a long succession of victories, the least of +which, in such a contest of Titans, had an inappreciable value of +position: partly for its absolute interference with the plans of our +enemy, but still more from its keeping alive through central Europe the +sense of a deep-seated vulnerability in France. Even to tease the +coasts of our enemy, to mortify them by continual blockades, to insult +them by capturing if it were but a baubling schooner under the eyes of +their arrogant armies, repeated from time to time a sullen proclamation +of power lodged in one quarter to which the hopes of Christendom turned +in secret. How much more loudly must this proclamation have spoken in +the audacity [Footnote: "_Audacity_":--Such the French accounted +it; and it has struck me that Soult would not have been so popular in +London, at the period of her present Majesty's coronation, or in +Manchester, on occasion of his visit to that town, if they had been +aware of the insolence with which he spoke of us in notes written at +intervals from the field of Waterloo. As though it had been mere felony +in our army to look a French one in the face, he said in more notes +than one, dated from two to four P.M. on the field of Waterloo, "Here +are the English--we have them; they are caught _en flagrant délit_" +Yet no man should have known us better; no man had drunk deeper from +the cup of humiliation than Soult had in 1809, when ejected by us with +headlong violence from Oporto, and pursued through a long line of +wrecks to the frontier of Spain; and subsequently at Albuera, in the +bloodiest of recorded battles, to say nothing of Toulouse, he should +have learned our pretensions.] of having bearded the _élite_ of +their troops, and having beaten them in pitched battles! Five years of +life it was worth paying down for the privilege of an outside place on +a mail-coach, when carrying down the first tidings of any such event. +And it is to be noted that, from our insular situation, and the +multitude of our frigates disposable for the rapid transmission of +intelligence, rarely did any unauthorised rumour steal away a +prelibation from the first aroma of the regular despatches. The +government news was generally the earliest news. + +From eight P.M. to fifteen or twenty minutes later imagine the mails +assembled on parade in Lombard Street; where, at that time, [Footnote: +"_At that time_":--I speak of the era previous to Waterloo.] and +not in St. Martin's-le-Grand, was seated the General Post-Office. In +what exact strength we mustered I do not remember; but, from the length +of each separate _attelage_, we filled the street, though a long +one, and though we were drawn up in double file. On _any_ night the +spectacle was beautiful. The absolute perfection of all the +appointments about the carriages and the harness, their strength, their +brilliant cleanliness, their beautiful simplicity--but, more than all, +the royal magnificence of the horses--were what might first have fixed +the attention. Every carriage on every morning in the year was taken +down to an official inspector for examination: wheels, axles, +linchpins, pole, glasses, lamps, were all critically probed and tested. +Every part of every carriage had been cleaned, every horse had been +groomed, with as much rigour as if they belonged to a private +gentleman; and that part of the spectacle offered itself always. But +the night before us is a night of victory; and, behold! to the ordinary +display what a heart-shaking addition!--horses, men, carriages, all are +dressed in laurels and flowers, oak-leaves and ribbons. The guards, as +being officially his Majesty's servants, and of the coachmen such as +are within the privilege of the post-office, wear the royal liveries of +course; and, as it is summer (for all the _land_ victories were +naturally won in summer), they wear, on this fine evening, these +liveries exposed to view, without any covering of upper coats. Such a +costume, and the elaborate arrangement of the laurels in their hats, +dilate their hearts, by giving to them openly a personal connexion with +the great news in which already they have the general interest of +patriotism. That great national sentiment surmounts and quells all +sense of ordinary distinctions. Those passengers who happen to be +gentlemen are now hardly to be distinguished as such except by dress; +for the usual reserve of their manner in speaking to the attendants has +on this night melted away. One heart, one pride, one glory, connects +every man by the transcendent bond of his national blood. The +spectators, who are numerous beyond precedent, express their sympathy +with these fervent feelings by continual hurrahs. Every moment are +shouted aloud by the post-office servants, and summoned to draw up, the +great ancestral names of cities known to history through a thousand +years--Lincoln, Winchester, Portsmouth, Gloucester, Oxford, Bristol, +Manchester, York, Newcastle, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Perth, Stirling, +Aberdeen--expressing the grandeur of the empire by the antiquity of its +towns, and the grandeur of the mail establishment by the diffusive +radiation of its separate missions. Every moment you hear the thunder +of lids locked down upon the mail-bags. That sound to each individual +mail is the signal for drawing off; which process is the finest part of +the entire spectacle. Then come the horses into play. Horses! can these +be horses that bound off with the action and gestures of leopards? What +stir!--what sea-like ferment!--what a thundering of wheels!--what a +trampling of hoofs!--what a sounding of trumpets!--what farewell +cheers--what redoubling peals of brotherly congratulation, connecting +the name of the particular mail--"Liverpool for ever!"--with the name +of the particular victory--"Badajoz for ever!" or "Salamanca for ever!" +The half-slumbering consciousness that all night long, and all the next +day--perhaps for even a longer period--many of these mails, like fire +racing along a train of gunpowder, will be kindling at every instant +new successions of burning joy, has an obscure effect of multiplying +the victory itself, by multiplying to the imagination into infinity the +stages of its progressive diffusion. A fiery arrow seems to be let +loose, which from that moment is destined to travel, without +intermission, westwards for three hundred [Footnote: "_Three +hundred_":--Of necessity, this scale of measurement, to an American, +if he happens to be a thoughtless man, must sound ludicrous. +Accordingly, I remember a case in which an American writer indulges +himself in the luxury of a little fibbing, by ascribing to an +Englishman a pompous account of the Thames, constructed entirely upon +American ideas of grandeur, and concluding in something like these +terms:--"And, sir, arriving at London, this mighty father of rivers +attains a breadth of at least two furlongs, having, in its winding +course, traversed the astonishing distance of one hundred and seventy +miles." And this the candid American thinks it fair to contrast with +the scale of the Mississippi. Now, it is hardly worth while to answer a +pure fiction gravely; else one might say that no Englishman out of +Bedlam ever thought of looking in an island for the rivers of a +continent, nor, consequently, could have thought of looking for the +peculiar grandeur of the Thames in the length of its course, or in the +extent of soil which it drains. Yet, if he _had_ been so absurd, +the American might have recollected that a river, not to be compared +with the Thames even as to volume of water--viz., the Tiber--has +contrived to make itself heard of in this world for twenty-five +centuries to an extent not reached as yet by any river, however +corpulent, of his own land. The glory of the Thames is measured by the +destiny of the population to which it ministers, by the commerce which +it supports, by the grandeur of the empire in which, though far from +the largest, it is the most influential stream. Upon some such scale, +and not by a transfer of Columbian standards, is the course of our +English mails to be valued. The American may fancy the effect of his +own valuations to our English ears by supposing the case of a Siberian +glorifying his country in these terms:--"These wretches, sir, in France +and England, cannot march half a mile in any direction without finding +a house where food can be had and lodging; whereas such is the noble +desolation of our magnificent country that in many a direction for a +thousand miles I will engage that a dog shall not find shelter from a +snow-storm, nor a wren find an apology for breakfast."] miles-- +northwards for six hundred; and the sympathy of our Lombard Street +friends at parting is exalted a hundredfold by a sort of visionary +sympathy with the yet slumbering sympathies which in so vast a +succession we are going to awake. + +Liberated from the embarrassments of the city, and issuing into the +broad uncrowded avenues of the northern suburbs, we soon begin to enter +upon our natural pace of ten miles an hour. In the broad light of the +summer evening, the sun, perhaps, only just at the point of setting, we +are seen from every storey of every house. Heads of every age crowd to +the windows; young and old understand the language of our victorious +symbols; and rolling volleys of sympathising cheers run along us, +behind us, and before us. The beggar, rearing himself against the wall, +forgets his lameness--real or assumed--thinks not of his whining trade, +but stands erect, with bold exulting smiles, as we pass him. The +victory has healed him, and says, Be thou whole! Women and children, +from garrets alike and cellars, through infinite London, look down or +look up with loving eyes upon our gay ribbons and our martial laurels; +sometimes kiss their hands; sometimes hang out, as signals of +affection, pocket-handkerchiefs, aprons, dusters, anything that, by +catching the summer breezes, will express an aerial jubilation. On the +London side of Barnet, to which we draw near within a few minutes after +nine, observe that private carriage which is approaching us. The +weather being so warm, the glasses are all down; and one may read, as +on the stage of a theatre, everything that goes on within. It contains +three ladies--one likely to be "mamma," and two of seventeen or +eighteen, who are probably her daughters. What lovely animation, what +beautiful unpremeditated pantomime, explaining to us every syllable +that passes, in these ingenuous girls! By the sudden start and raising +of the hands on first discovering our laurelled equipage, by the sudden +movement and appeal to the elder lady from both of them, and by the +heightened colour on their animated countenances, we can almost hear +them saying, "See, see! Look at their laurels! Oh, mamma! there has +been a great battle in Spain; and it has been a great victory." In a +moment we are on the point of passing them. We passengers--I on the +box, and the two on the roof behind me--raise our hats to the ladies; +the coachman makes his professional salute with the whip; the guard +even, though punctilious on the matter of his dignity as an officer +under the crown, touches his hat. The ladies move to us, in return, +with a winning graciousness of gesture; all smile on each side in a way +that nobody could misunderstand, and that nothing short of a grand +national sympathy could so instantaneously prompt. Will these ladies +say that we are nothing to _them_? Oh no; they will not say +_that_. They cannot deny--they do not deny--that for this night +they are our sisters; gentle or simple, scholar or illiterate servant, +for twelve hours to come, we on the outside have the honour to be their +brothers. Those poor women, again, who stop to gaze upon us with +delight at the entrance of Barnet, and seem, by their air of weariness, +to be returning from labour--do you mean to say that they are +washerwomen and charwomen? Oh, my poor friend, you are quite mistaken. +I assure you they stand in a far higher rank; for this one night they +feel themselves by birthright to be daughters of England, and answer to +no humbler title. + +Every joy, however, even rapturous joy--such is the sad law of earth-- +may carry with it grief, or fear of grief, to some. Three miles beyond +Barnet, we see approaching us another private carriage, nearly +repeating the circumstances of the former case. Here, also, the glasses +are all down; here, also, is an elderly lady seated; but the two +daughters are missing; for the single young person sitting by the +lady's side seems to be an attendant--so I judge from her dress, and +her air of respectful reserve. The lady is in mourning; and her +countenance expresses sorrow. At first she does not look up; so that I +believe she is not aware of our approach, until she hears the measured +beating of our horses' hoofs. Then she raises her eyes to settle them +painfully on our triumphal equipage. Our decorations explain the case +to her at once; but she beholds them with apparent anxiety, or even +with terror. Some time before this, I, finding it difficult to hit a +flying mark when embarrassed by the coachman's person and reins +intervening, had given to the guard a "Courier" evening paper, +containing the gazette, for the next carriage that might pass. +Accordingly he tossed it in, so folded that the huge capitals +expressing some such legend as GLORIOUS VICTORY might catch the eye at +once. To see the paper, however, at all, interpreted as it was by our +ensigns of triumph, explained everything; and, if the guard were right +in thinking the lady to have received it with a gesture of horror, it +could not be doubtful that she had suffered some deep personal +affliction in connexion with this Spanish war. + +Here, now, was the case of one who, having formerly suffered, might, +erroneously perhaps, be distressing herself with anticipations of +another similar suffering. That same night, and hardly three hours +later, occurred the reverse case. A poor woman, who too probably would +find herself, in a day or two, to have suffered the heaviest of +afflictions by the battle, blindly allowed herself to express an +exultation so unmeasured in the news and its details as gave to her the +appearance which amongst Celtic Highlanders is called _fey_. This +was at some little town where we changed horses an hour or two after +midnight. Some fair or wake had kept the people up out of their beds, +and had occasioned a partial illumination of the stalls and booths, +presenting an unusual but very impressive effect. We saw many lights +moving about as we drew near; and perhaps the most striking scene on +the whole route was our reception at this place. The flashing of +torches and the beautiful radiance of blue lights (technically, Bengal +lights) upon the heads of our horses; the fine effect of such a showery +and ghostly illumination falling upon our flowers and glittering +laurels [Footnote: "_Glittering laurels_":--I must observe that the +colour of _green_ suffers almost a spiritual change and exaltation +under the effect of Bengal lights.]; whilst all around ourselves, that +formed a centre of light, the darkness gathered on the rear and flanks +in massy blackness: these optical splendours, together with the +prodigious enthusiasm of the people, composed a picture at once +scenical and affecting, theatrical and holy. As we staid for three or +four minutes, I alighted; and immediately from a dismantled stall in +the street, where no doubt she had been presiding through the earlier +part of the night, advanced eagerly a middle-aged woman. The sight of +my newspaper it was that had drawn her attention upon myself. The +victory which we were carrying down to the provinces on _this_ +occasion was the imperfect one of Talavera--imperfect for its results, +such was the virtual treachery of the Spanish general, Cuesta, but not +imperfect in its ever-memorable heroism. I told her the main outline of +the battle. The agitation of her enthusiasm had been so conspicuous +when listening, and when first applying for information, that I could +not but ask her if she had not some relative in the Peninsular army. Oh +yes; her only son was there. In what regiment? He was a trooper in the +23d Dragoons. My heart sank within me as she made that answer. This +sublime regiment, which an Englishman should never mention without +raising his hat to their memory, had made the most memorable and +effective charge recorded in military annals. They leaped their horses +--_over_ a trench where they could; _into_ it, and with the result of +death or mutilation, when they could _not_. What proportion cleared the +trench is nowhere stated. Those who _did_ closed up and went down upon +the enemy with such divinity of fervour (I use the word _divinity_ by +design: the inspiration of God must have prompted this movement for +those whom even then He was calling to His presence) that two results +followed. As regarded the enemy, this 23d Dragoons, not, I believe, +originally three hundred and fifty strong, paralysed a French column +six thousand strong, then ascended the hill, and fixed the gaze of the +whole French army. As regarded themselves, the 23d were supposed at +first to have been barely not annihilated; but eventually, I believe, +about one in four survived. And this, then, was the regiment--a +regiment already for some hours glorified and hallowed to the ear of +all London, as lying stretched, by a large majority, upon one bloody +aceldama--in which the young trooper served whose mother was now +talking in a spirit of such joyous enthusiasm. Did I tell her the +truth? Had I the heart to break up her dreams? No. To-morrow, said I to +myself--to-morrow, or the next day, will publish the worst. For one +night more wherefore should she not sleep in peace? After to-morrow the +chances are too many that peace will forsake her pillow. This brief +respite, then, let her owe to _my_ gift and _my_ forbearance. But, if I +told her not of the bloody price that had been paid, not therefore was +I silent on the contributions from her son's regiment to that day's +service and glory. I showed her not the funeral banners under which the +noble regiment was sleeping. I lifted not the overshadowing laurels +from the bloody trench in which horse and rider lay mangled together. +But I told her how these dear children of England, officers and +privates, had leaped their horses over all obstacles as gaily as +hunters to the morning's chase. I told her how they rode their horses +into the midst of death,--saying to myself, but not saying to _her_ +"and laid down their young lives for thee, O mother England! as +willingly--poured out their noble blood as cheerfully--as ever, after a +long day's sport, when infants, they had rested their weary heads upon +their mother's knees, or had sunk to sleep in her arms." Strange it is, +yet true, that she seemed to have no fears for her son's safety, even +after this knowledge that the 23d Dragoons had been memorably engaged; +but so much was she enraptured by the knowledge that _his_ regiment, +and therefore that _he_, had rendered conspicuous service in the +dreadful conflict--a service which had actually made them, within the +last twelve hours, the foremost topic of conversation in London--so +absolutely was fear swallowed up in joy--that, in the mere simplicity +of her fervent nature, the poor woman threw her arms round my neck, as +she thought of her son, and gave to _me_ the kiss which secretly was +meant for _him_. + + +SECTION II--THE VISION OF SUDDEN DEATH + + +What is to be taken as the predominant opinion of man, reflective and +philosophic, upon SUDDEN DEATH? It is remarkable that, in different +conditions of society, sudden death has been variously regarded as the +consummation of an earthly career most fervently to be desired, or, +again, as that consummation which is with most horror to be deprecated. +Cæsar the Dictator, at his last dinner-party (_coena_), on the very +evening before his assassination, when the minutes of his earthly +career were numbered, being asked what death, in _his_ judgment, +might be pronounced the most eligible, replied "That which should be +most sudden." On the other hand, the divine Litany of our English +Church, when breathing forth supplications, as if in some +representative character, for the whole human race prostrate before +God, places such a death in the very van of horrors: "From lightning +and tempest; from plague, pestilence, and famine; from battle and +murder, and from SUDDEN DEATH--_Good Lord, deliver us_." Sudden +death is here made to crown the climax in a grand ascent of calamities; +it is ranked among the last of curses; and yet by the noblest of Romans +it was ranked as the first of blessings. In that difference most +readers will see little more than the essential difference between +Christianity and Paganism. But this, on consideration, I doubt. The +Christian Church may be right in its estimate of sudden death; and it +is a natural feeling, though after all it may also be an infirm one, to +wish for a quiet dismissal from life, as that which _seems_ most +reconcilable with meditation, with penitential retrospects, and with +the humilities of farewell prayer. There does not, however, occur to me +any direct scriptural warrant for this earnest petition of the English +Litany, unless under a special construction of the word "sudden." It +seems a petition indulged rather and conceded to human infirmity than +exacted from human piety. It is not so much a doctrine built upon the +eternities of the Christian system as a plausible opinion built upon +special varieties of physical temperament. Let that, however, be as it +may, two remarks suggest themselves as prudent restraints upon a +doctrine which else _may_ wander, and _has_ wandered, into an +uncharitable superstition. The first is this: that many people are +likely to exaggerate the horror of a sudden death from the disposition +to lay a false stress upon words or acts simply because by an accident +they have become _final_ words or acts. If a man dies, for +instance, by some sudden death when he happens to be intoxicated, such +a death is falsely regarded with peculiar horror; as though the +intoxication were suddenly exalted into a blasphemy. But _that_ is +unphilosophic. The man was, or he was not, _habitually_ a drunkard. +If not, if his intoxication were a solitary accident, there can be no +reason for allowing special emphasis to this act simply because through +misfortune it became his final act. Nor, on the other hand, if it were +no accident, but one of his _habitual_ transgressions, will it be +the more habitual or the more a transgression because some sudden +calamity, surprising him, has caused this habitual transgression to be +also a final one. Could the man have had any reason even dimly to +foresee his own sudden death, there would have been a new feature in +his act of intemperance--a feature of presumption and irreverence, as +in one that, having known himself drawing near to the presence of God, +should have suited his demeanour to an expectation so awful. But this +is no part of the case supposed. And the only new element in the man's +act is not any element of special immorality, but simply of special +misfortune. + +The other remark has reference to the meaning of the word _sudden_. +Very possibly Cæsar and the Christian Church do not differ in the way +supposed,--that is, do not differ by any difference of doctrine as +between Pagan and Christian views of the moral temper appropriate to +death; but perhaps they are contemplating different cases. Both +contemplate a violent death, a _Biathanatos_--death that is +_biaios_, or, in other words, death that is brought about, not by +internal and spontaneous change, but by active force having its origin +from without. In this meaning the two authorities agree. Thus far they +are in harmony. But the difference is that the Roman by the word +"sudden" means _unlingering_, whereas the Christian Litany by +"sudden death" means a death _without warning_, consequently +without any available summons to religious preparation. The poor +mutineer who kneels down to gather into his heart the bullets from +twelve firelocks of his pitying comrades dies by a most sudden death in +Cæsar's sense; one shock, one mighty spasm, one (possibly _not_ +one) groan, and all is over. But, in the sense of the Litany, the +mutineer's death is far from sudden: his offence originally, his +imprisonment, his trial, the interval between his sentence and its +execution, having all furnished him with separate warnings of his fate +--having all summoned him to meet it with solemn preparation. + +Here at once, in this sharp verbal distinction, we comprehend the +faithful earnestness with which a holy Christian Church pleads on +behalf of her poor departing children that God would vouchsafe to them +the last great privilege and distinction possible on a death-bed, viz., +the opportunity of untroubled preparation for facing this mighty trial. +Sudden death, as a mere variety in the modes of dying where death in +some shape is inevitable, proposes a question of choice which, equally +in the Roman and the Christian sense, will be variously answered +according to each man's variety of temperament. Meantime, one aspect of +sudden death there is, one modification, upon which no doubt can arise, +that of all martyrdoms it is the most agitating--viz., where it +surprises a man under circumstances which offer (or which seem to +offer) some hurrying, flying, inappreciably minute chance of evading +it. Sudden as the danger which it affronts must be any effort by which +such an evasion can be accomplished. Even _that_, even the sickening +necessity for hurrying in extremity where all hurry seems destined to +be vain,--even that anguish is liable to a hideous exasperation in one +particular case: viz., where the appeal is made not exclusively to the +instinct of self-preservation, but to the conscience, on behalf of some +other life besides your own, accidentally thrown upon _your_ +protection. To fail, to collapse in a service merely your own, might +seem comparatively venial; though, in fact, it is far from venial. But +to fail in a case where Providence has suddenly thrown into your hands +the final interests of another,--a fellow creature shuddering between +the gates of life and death: this, to a man of apprehensive conscience, +would mingle the misery of an atrocious criminality with the misery of +a bloody calamity. You are called upon, by the case supposed, possibly +to die, but to die at the very moment when, by any even partial failure +or effeminate collapse of your energies, you will be self-denounced as +a murderer. You had but the twinkling of an eye for your effort, and +that effort might have been unavailing; but to have risen to the level +of such an effort would have rescued you, though not from dying, yet +from dying as a traitor to your final and farewell duty. + +The situation here contemplated exposes a dreadful ulcer, lurking far +down in the depths of human nature. It is not that men generally are +summoned to face such awful trials. But potentially, and in shadowy +outline, such a trial is moving subterraneously in perhaps all men's +natures. Upon the secret mirror of our dreams such a trial is darkly +projected, perhaps, to every one of us. That dream, so familiar to +childhood, of meeting a lion, and, through languishing prostration in +hope and the energies of hope, that constant sequel of lying down +before the lion publishes the secret frailty of human nature--reveals +its deep-seated falsehood to itself--records its abysmal treachery. +Perhaps not one of us escapes that dream; perhaps, as by some sorrowful +doom of man, that dream repeats for every one of us, through every +generation, the original temptation in Eden. Every one of us, in this +dream, has a bait offered to the infirm places of his own individual +will; once again a snare is presented for tempting him into captivity +to a luxury of ruin; once again, as in aboriginal Paradise, the man +falls by his own choice; again, by infinite iteration, the ancient +earth groans to Heaven, through her secret caves, over the weakness of +her child. "Nature, from her seat, sighing through all her works," +again "gives signs of woe that all is lost"; and again the counter-sigh +is repeated to the sorrowing heavens for the endless rebellion against +God. It is not without probability that in the world of dreams every +one of us ratifies for himself the original transgression. In dreams, +perhaps under some secret conflict of the midnight sleeper, lighted up +to the consciousness at the time, but darkened to the memory as soon as +all is finished, each several child of our mysterious race completes +for himself the treason of the aboriginal fall. + +The incident, so memorable in itself by its features of horror, and so +scenical by its grouping for the eye, which furnished the text for this +reverie upon _Sudden Death_ occurred to myself in the dead of +night, as a solitary spectator, when seated on the box of the +Manchester and Glasgow mail, in the second or third summer after +Waterloo. I find it necessary to relate the circumstances, because they +are such as could not have occurred unless under a singular combination +of accidents. In those days, the oblique and lateral communications +with many rural post-offices were so arranged, either through necessity +or through defect of system, as to make it requisite for the main +north-western mail (_i.e._, the _down_ mail) on reaching Manchester to +halt for a number of hours; how many, I do not remember; six or seven, +I think; but the result was that, in the ordinary course, the mail +recommenced its journey northwards about midnight. Wearied with the +long detention at a gloomy hotel, I walked out about eleven o'clock at +night for the sake of fresh air; meaning to fall in with the mail and +resume my seat at the post-office. The night, however, being yet dark, +as the moon had scarcely risen, and the streets being at that hour +empty, so as to offer no opportunities for asking the road, I lost my +way, and did not reach the post-office until it was considerably past +midnight; but, to my great relief (as it was important for me to be in +Westmoreland by the morning), I saw in the huge saucer eyes of the +mail, blazing through the gloom, an evidence that my chance was not yet +lost. Past the time it was; but, by some rare accident, the mail was +not even yet ready to start. I ascended to my seat on the box, where my +cloak was still lying as it had lain at the Bridgewater Arms. I had +left it there in imitation of a nautical discoverer, who leaves a bit +of bunting on the shore of his discovery, by way of warning off the +ground the whole human race, and notifying to the Christian and the +heathen worlds, with his best compliments, that he has hoisted his +pocket-handkerchief once and for ever upon that virgin soil: +thenceforward claiming the _jus dominii_ to the top of the atmosphere +above it, and also the right of driving shafts to the centre of the +earth below it; so that all people found after this warning either +aloft in upper chambers of the atmosphere, or groping in subterraneous +shafts, or squatting audaciously on the surface of the soil, will be +treated as trespassers--kicked, that is to say, or decapitated, as +circumstances may suggest, by their very faithful servant, the owner of +the said pocket-handkerchief. In the present case, it is probable that +my cloak might not have been respected, and the _jus gentium_ might +have been cruelly violated in my person--for, in the dark, people +commit deeds of darkness, gas being a great ally of morality; but it so +happened that on this night there was no other outside passenger; and +thus the crime, which else was but too probable, missed fire for want +of a criminal. + +Having mounted the box, I took a small quantity of laudanum, having +already travelled two hundred and fifty miles--viz., from a point +seventy miles beyond London. In the taking of laudanum there was +nothing extraordinary. But by accident it drew upon me the special +attention of my assessor on the box, the coachman. And in _that_ +also there was nothing extraordinary. But by accident, and with great +delight, it drew my own attention to the fact that this coachman was a +monster in point of bulk, and that he had but one eye. In fact, he had +been foretold by Virgil as + + "Monstrum horrendum, informe, ingens, cui lumen ademptum." + +He answered to the conditions in every one of the items:--1, a monster +he was; 2, dreadful; 3, shapeless; 4, huge; 5, who had lost an eye. But +why should _that_ delight me? Had he been one of the Calendars in +the "Arabian Nights," and had paid down his eye as the price of his +criminal curiosity, what right had _I_ to exult in his misfortune? +I did _not_ exult; I delighted in no man's punishment, though it +were even merited. But these personal distinctions (Nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5) +identified in an instant an old friend of mine whom I had known in the +south for some years as the most masterly of mail-coachmen. He was the +man in all Europe that could (if _any_ could) have driven six-in- +hand full gallop over _Al Sirat_--that dreadful bridge of Mahomet, +with no side battlements, and of _extra_ room not enough for a +razor's edge--leading right across the bottomless gulf. Under this +eminent man, whom in Greek I cognominated Cyclops _Diphrélates_ +(Cyclops the Charioteer), I, and others known to me, studied the +diphrelatic art. Excuse, reader, a word too elegant to be pedantic. As +a pupil, though I paid extra fees, it is to be lamented that I did not +stand high in his esteem. It showed his dogged honesty (though, +observe, not his discernment) that he could not see my merits. Let us +excuse his absurdity in this particular by remembering his want of an +eye. Doubtless _that_ made him blind to my merits. In the art of +conversation, however, he admitted that I had the whip-hand of him. On +the present occasion great joy was at our meeting. But what was Cyclops +doing here? Had the medical men recommended northern air, or how? I +collected, from such explanations as he volunteered, that he had an +interest at stake in some suit-at-law now pending at Lancaster; so that +probably he had got himself transferred to this station for the purpose +of connecting with his professional pursuits an instant readiness for +the calls of his lawsuit. + +Meantime, what are we stopping for? Surely we have now waited long +enough. Oh, this procrastinating mail, and this procrastinating post- +office! Can't they take a lesson upon that subject from _me_? Some +people have called _me_ procrastinating. Yet you are witness, +reader, that I was here kept waiting for the post-office. Will the +post-office lay its hand on its heart, in its moments of sobriety, and +assert that ever it waited for me? What are they about? The guard tells +me that there is a large extra accumulation of foreign mails this +night, owing to irregularities caused by war, by wind, by weather, in +the packet service, which as yet does not benefit at all by steam. For +an _extra_ hour, it seems, the post-office has been engaged in +threshing out the pure wheaten correspondence of Glasgow, and winnowing +it from the chaff of all baser intermediate towns. But at last all is +finished. Sound your horn, guard! Manchester, good-bye! we've lost an +hour by your criminal conduct at the post-office: which, however, +though I do not mean to part with a serviceable ground of complaint, +and one which really _is_ such for the horses, to me secretly is an +advantage, since it compels us to look sharply for this lost hour +amongst the next eight or nine, and to recover it (if we can) at the +rate of one mile extra per hour. Off we are at last, and at eleven +miles an hour; and for the moment I detect no changes in the energy or +in the skill of Cyclops. + +From Manchester to Kendal, which virtually (though not in law) is the +capital of Westmoreland, there were at this time seven stages of eleven +miles each. The first five of these, counting from Manchester, +terminate in Lancaster; which is therefore fifty-five miles north of +Manchester, and the same distance exactly from Liverpool. The first +three stages terminate in Preston (called, by way of distinction from +other towns of that name, _Proud_ Preston); at which place it is +that the separate roads from Liverpool and from Manchester to the north +become confluent. [Footnote: "_Confluent_":--Suppose a capital Y +(the Pythagorean letter): Lancaster is at the foot of this letter; +Liverpool at the top of the _right_ branch; Manchester at the top +of the _left_; Proud Preston at the centre, where the two branches +unite. It is thirty-three miles along either of the two branches; it is +twenty-two miles along the stem,--viz., from Preston in the middle to +Lancaster at the root. There's a lesson in geography for the reader!] +Within these first three stages lay the foundation, the progress, and +termination of our night's adventure. During the first stage, I found +out that Cyclops was mortal: he was liable to the shocking affection of +sleep--a thing which previously I had never suspected. If a man +indulges in the vicious habit of sleeping, all the skill in aurigation +of Apollo himself, with the horses of Aurora to execute his notions, +avails him nothing. "Oh, Cyclops!" I exclaimed, "thou art mortal. My +friend, thou snorest." Through the first eleven miles, however, this +infirmity--which I grieve to say that he shared with the whole Pagan +Pantheon--betrayed itself only by brief snatches. On waking up, he made +an apology for himself which, instead of mending matters, laid open a +gloomy vista of coming disasters. The summer assizes, he reminded me, +were now going on at Lancaster: in consequence of which for three +nights and three days he had not lain down on a bed. During the day he +was waiting for his own summons as a witness on the trial in which he +was interested, or else, lest he should be missing at the critical +moment, was drinking with the other witnesses under the pastoral +surveillance of the attorneys. During the night, or that part of it +which at sea would form the middle watch, he was driving. This +explanation certainly accounted for his drowsiness, but in a way which +made it much more alarming; since now, after several days' resistance +to this infirmity, at length he was steadily giving way. Throughout the +second stage he grew more and more drowsy. In the second mile of the +third stage he surrendered himself finally and without a struggle to +his perilous temptation. All his past resistance had but deepened the +weight of this final oppression. Seven atmospheres of sleep rested upon +him; and, to consummate the case, our worthy guard, after singing "Love +amongst the Roses" for perhaps thirty times, without invitation and +without applause, had in revenge moodily resigned himself to slumber-- +not so deep, doubtless, as the coachman's, but deep enough for +mischief. And thus at last, about ten miles from Preston, it came about +that I found myself left in charge of his Majesty's London and Glasgow +mail, then running at the least twelve miles an hour. + +What made this negligence less criminal than else it must have been +thought was the condition of the roads at night during the assizes. At +that time, all the law business of populous Liverpool, and also of +populous Manchester, with its vast cincture of populous rural +districts, was called up by ancient usage to the tribunal of +Lilliputian Lancaster. To break up this old traditional usage required, +1, a conflict with powerful established interests, 2, a large system of +new arrangements, and 3, a new parliamentary statute. But as yet this +change was merely in contemplation. As things were at present, twice in +the year [Footnote: "_Twice in the year_":--There were at that time +only two assizes even in the most populous counties--viz., the Lent +Assizes and the Summer Assizes.] so vast a body of business rolled +northwards from the southern quarter of the county that for a fortnight +at least it occupied the severe exertions of two judges in its +despatch. The consequence of this was that every horse available for +such a service, along the whole line of road, was exhausted in carrying +down the multitudes of people who were parties to the different suits. +By sunset, therefore, it usually happened that, through utter +exhaustion amongst men and horses, the road sank into profound silence. +Except the exhaustion in the vast adjacent county of York from a +contested election, no such silence succeeding to no such fiery uproar +was ever witnessed in England. + +On this occasion the usual silence and solitude prevailed along the +road. Not a hoof nor a wheel was to be heard. And, to strengthen this +false luxurious confidence in the noiseless roads, it happened also +that the night was one of peculiar solemnity and peace. For my own +part, though slightly alive to the possibilities of peril, I had so far +yielded to the influence of the mighty calm as to sink into a profound +reverie. The month was August; in the middle of which lay my own +birthday--a festival to every thoughtful man suggesting solemn and +often sigh-born [Footnote: "_Sigh-born_":--I owe the suggestion of +this word to an obscure remembrance of a beautiful phrase in "Giraldus +Cambrensis"--viz., _suspiriosæ cogitationes_.] thoughts. The county +was my own native county--upon which, in its southern section, more +than upon any equal area known to man past or present, had descended +the original curse of labour in its heaviest form, not mastering the +bodies only of men, as of slaves, or criminals in mines, but working +through the fiery will. Upon no equal space of earth was, or ever had +been, the same energy of human power put forth daily. At this +particular season also of the assizes, that dreadful hurricane of +flight and pursuit, as it might have seemed to a stranger, which swept +to and from Lancaster all day long, hunting the county up and down, and +regularly subsiding back into silence about sunset, could not fail +(when united with this permanent distinction of Lancashire as the very +metropolis and citadel of labour) to point the thoughts pathetically +upon that counter-vision of rest, of saintly repose from strife and +sorrow, towards which, as to their secret haven, the profounder +aspirations of man's heart are in solitude continually travelling. +Obliquely upon our left we were nearing the sea; which also must, under +the present circumstances, be repeating the general state of halcyon +repose. The sea, the atmosphere, the light, bore each an orchestral +part in this universal lull. Moonlight and the first timid tremblings +of the dawn were by this time blending; and the blendings were brought +into a still more exquisite state of unity by a slight silvery mist, +motionless and dreamy, that covered the woods and fields, but with a +veil of equable transparency. Except the feet of our own horses,-- +which, running on a sandy margin of the road, made but little +disturbance,--there was no sound abroad. In the clouds and on the earth +prevailed the same majestic peace; and, in spite of all that the +villain of a schoolmaster has done for the ruin of our sublimer +thoughts, which are the thoughts of our infancy, we still believe in no +such nonsense as a limited atmosphere. Whatever we may swear with our +false feigning lips, in our faithful hearts we still believe, and must +for ever believe, in fields of air traversing the total gulf between +earth and the central heavens. Still, in the confidence of children +that tread without fear every chamber in their father's house, and to +whom no door is closed, we, in that Sabbatic vision which sometimes is +revealed for an hour upon nights like this, ascend with easy steps from +the sorrow-stricken fields of earth upwards to the sandals of God. + +Suddenly, from thoughts like these I was awakened to a sullen sound, as +of some motion on the distant road. It stole upon the air for a moment; +I listened in awe; but then it died away. Once roused, however, I could +not but observe with alarm the quickened motion of our horses. Ten +years' experience had made my eye learned in the valuing of motion; and +I saw that we were now running thirteen miles an hour. I pretend to no +presence of mind. On the contrary, my fear is that I am miserably and +shamefully deficient in that quality as regards action. The palsy of +doubt and distraction hangs like some guilty weight of dark unfathomed +remembrances upon my energies when the signal is flying for +_action_. But, on the other hand, this accursed gift I have, as +regards _thought_, that in the first step towards the possibility +of a misfortune I see its total evolution; in the radix of the series I +see too certainly and too instantly its entire expansion; in the first +syllable of the dreadful sentence I read already the last. It was not +that I feared for ourselves. _Us_ our bulk and impetus charmed +against peril in any collision. And I had ridden through too many +hundreds of perils that were frightful to approach, that were matter of +laughter to look back upon, the first face of which was horror, the +parting face a jest--for any anxiety to rest upon _our_ interests. +The mail was not built, I felt assured, nor bespoke, that could betray +_me_ who trusted to its protection. But any carriage that we could +meet would be frail and light in comparison of ourselves. And I +remarked this ominous accident of our situation,--we were on the wrong +side of the road. But then, it may be said, the other party, if other +there was, might also be on the wrong side; and two wrongs might make a +right. _That_ was not likely. The same motive which had drawn +_us_ to the right-hand side of the road--viz., the luxury of the +soft beaten sand as contrasted with the paved centre--would prove +attractive to others. The two adverse carriages would therefore, to a +certainty, be travelling on the same side; and from this side, as not +being ours in law, the crossing over to the other would, of course, be +looked for from _us_. [Footnote: It is true that, according to the +law of the case as established by legal precedents, all carriages were +required to give way before royal equipages, and therefore before the +mail as one of them. But this only increased the danger, as being a +regulation very imperfectly made known, very unequally enforced, and +therefore often embarrassing the movements on both sides.] Our lamps, +still lighted, would give the impression of vigilance on our part. And +every creature that met us would rely upon _us_ for quartering. +[Footnote: "_Quartering_":--This is the technical word, and, I +presume, derived from the French _cartayer_, to evade a rut or any +obstacle.] All this, and if the separate links of the anticipation had +been a thousand times more, I saw, not discursively, or by effort, or +by succession, but by one flash of horrid simultaneous intuition. + +Under this steady though rapid anticipation of the evil which +_might_ be gathering ahead, ah! what a sullen mystery of fear, what +a sigh of woe, was that which stole upon the air, as again the far-off +sound of a wheel was heard! A whisper it was--a whisper from, perhaps, +four miles off--secretly announcing a ruin that, being foreseen, was +not the less inevitable; that, being known, was not therefore healed. +What could be done--who was it that could do it--to check the storm- +flight of these maniacal horses? Could I not seize the reins from the +grasp of the slumbering coachman? You, reader, think that it would have +been in _your_ power to do so. And I quarrel not with your estimate +of yourself. But, from the way in which the coachman's hand was viced +between his upper and lower thigh, this was impossible. Easy was it? +See, then, that bronze equestrian statue. The cruel rider has kept the +bit in his horse's mouth for two centuries. Unbridle him for a minute, +if you please, and wash his mouth with water. Easy was it? Unhorse me, +then, that imperial rider; knock me those marble feet from those marble +stirrups of Charlemagne. + +The sounds ahead strengthened, and were now too clearly the sounds of +wheels. Who and what could it be? Was it industry in a taxed cart? Was +it youthful gaiety in a gig? Was it sorrow that loitered, or joy that +raced? For as yet the snatches of sound were too intermitting, from +distance, to decipher the character of the motion. Whoever were the +travellers, something must be done to warn them. Upon the other party +rests the active responsibility, but upon _us_--and, woe is me! +that _us_ was reduced to my frail opium-shattered self--rests the +responsibility of warning. Yet, how should this be accomplished? Might +I not sound the guard's horn? Already, on the first thought, I was +making my way over the roof of the guard's seat. But this, from the +accident which I have mentioned, of the foreign mails being piled upon +the roof, was a difficult and even dangerous attempt to one cramped by +nearly three hundred miles of outside travelling. And, fortunately, +before I had lost much time in the attempt, our frantic horses swept +round an angle of the road which opened upon us that final stage where +the collision must be accomplished and the catastrophe sealed. All was +apparently finished. The court was sitting; the case was heard; the +judge had finished; and only the verdict was yet in arrear. + +Before us lay an avenue straight as an arrow, six hundred yards, +perhaps, in length; and the umbrageous trees, which rose in a regular +line from either side, meeting high overhead, gave to it the character +of a cathedral aisle. These trees lent a deeper solemnity to the early +light; but there was still light enough to perceive, at the further end +of this Gothic aisle, a frail reedy gig, in which were seated a young +man, and by his side a young lady. Ah, young sir! what are you about? +If it is requisite that you should whisper your communications to this +young lady--though really I see nobody, at an hour and on a road so +solitary, likely to overhear you--is it therefore requisite that you +should carry your lips forward to hers? The little carriage is creeping +on at one mile an hour; and the parties within it, being thus tenderly +engaged, are naturally bending down their heads. Between them and +eternity, to all human calculation, there is but a minute and a half. +Oh heavens! what is it that I shall do? Speaking or acting, what help +can I offer? Strange it is, and to a mere auditor of the tale might +seem laughable, that I should need a suggestion from the "Iliad" to +prompt the sole resource that remained. Yet so it was. Suddenly I +remembered the shout of Achilles, and its effect. But could I pretend +to shout like the son of Peleus, aided by Pallas? No: but then I needed +not the shout that should alarm all Asia militant; such a shout would +suffice as might carry terror into the hearts of two thoughtless young +people and one gig-horse. I shouted--and the young man heard me not. A +second time I shouted--and now he heard me, for now he raised his +head. + +Here, then, all had been done that, by me, _could_ be done; more on +_my_ part was not possible. Mine had been the first step; the +second was for the young man; the third was for God. If, said I, this +stranger is a brave man, and if indeed he loves the young girl at his +side--or, loving her not, if he feels the obligation, pressing upon +every man worthy to be called a man, of doing his utmost for a woman +confided to his protection--he will at least make some effort to save +her. If _that_ fails, he will not perish the more, or by a death +more cruel, for having made it; and he will die as a brave man should, +with his face to the danger, and with his arm about the woman that he +sought in vain to save. But, if he makes no effort,--shrinking without +a struggle from his duty,--he himself will not the less certainly +perish for this baseness of poltroonery. He will die no less: and why +not? Wherefore should we grieve that there is one craven less in the +world? No; _let_ him perish, without a pitying thought of ours +wasted upon him; and, in that case, all our grief will be reserved for +the fate of the helpless girl who now, upon the least shadow of failure +in _him_, must by the fiercest of translations--must without time +for a prayer--must within seventy seconds stand before the judgment- +seat of God. + +But craven he was not: sudden had been the call upon him, and sudden +was his answer to the call. He saw, he heard, he comprehended, the ruin +that was coming down: already its gloomy shadow darkened above him; and +already he was measuring his strength to deal with it. Ah! what a +vulgar thing does courage seem when we see nations buying it and +selling it for a shilling a-day: ah! what a sublime thing does courage +seem when some fearful summons on the great deeps of life carries a +man, as if running before a hurricane, up to the giddy crest of some +tumultuous crisis from which lie two courses, and a voice says to him +audibly, "One way lies hope; take the other, and mourn for ever!" How +grand a triumph if, even then, amidst the raving of all around him, and +the frenzy of the danger, the man is able to confront his situation--is +able to retire for a moment into solitude with God, and to seek his +counsel from _Him!_ + +For seven seconds, it might be, of his seventy, the stranger settled +his countenance steadfastly upon us, as if to search and value every +element in the conflict before him. For five seconds more of his +seventy he sat immovably, like one that mused on some great purpose. +For five more, perhaps, he sat with eyes upraised, like one that prayed +in sorrow, under some extremity of doubt, for light that should guide +him to the better choice. Then suddenly he rose; stood upright; and, by +a powerful strain upon the reins, raising his horse's fore-feet from +the ground, he slewed him round on the pivot of his hind-legs, so as to +plant the little equipage in a position nearly at right angles to ours. +Thus far his condition was not improved; except as a first step had +been taken towards the possibility of a second. If no more were done, +nothing was done; for the little carriage still occupied the very +centre of our path, though in an altered direction. Yet even now it may +not be too late: fifteen of the seventy seconds may still be +unexhausted; and one almighty bound may avail to clear the ground. +Hurry, then, hurry! for the flying moments--_they_ hurry. Oh, +hurry, hurry, my brave young man! for the cruel hoofs of our horses-- +_they_ also hurry! Fast are the flying moments, faster are the +hoofs of our horses. But fear not for _him_, if human energy can +suffice; faithful was he that drove to his terrific duty; faithful was +the horse to _his_ command. One blow, one impulse given with voice +and hand, by the stranger, one rush from the horse, one bound as if in +the act of rising to a fence, landed the docile creature's forefeet +upon the crown or arching centre of the road. The larger half of the +little equipage had then cleared our over-towering shadow: _that_ +was evident even to my own agitated sight. But it mattered little that +one wreck should float off in safety if upon the wreck that perished +were embarked the human freightage. The rear part of the carriage--was +_that_ certainly beyond the line of absolute ruin? What power could +answer the question? Glance of eye, thought of man, wing of angel, +which of these had speed enough to sweep between the question and the +answer, and divide the one from the other? Light does not tread upon +the steps of light more indivisibly than did our all-conquering arrival +upon the escaping efforts of the gig. _That_ must the young man +have felt too plainly. His back was now turned to us; not by sight +could he any longer communicate with the peril; but, by the dreadful +rattle of our harness, too truly had his ear been instructed that all +was finished as regarded any effort of _his_. Already in resignation he +had rested from his struggle; and perhaps in his heart he was +whispering, "Father, which art in heaven, do Thou finish above what I +on earth have attempted." Faster than ever mill-race we ran past them +in our inexorable flight. Oh, raving of hurricanes that must have +sounded in their young ears at the moment of our transit! Even in that +moment the thunder of collision spoke aloud. Either with the swingle- +bar, or with the haunch of our near leader, we had struck the off-wheel +of the little gig; which stood rather obliquely, and not quite so far +advanced as to be accurately parallel with the near-wheel. The blow, +from the fury of our passage, resounded terrifically. I rose in horror, +to gaze upon the ruins we might have caused. From my elevated station I +looked down, and looked back upon the scene; which in a moment told its +own tale, and wrote all its records on my heart for ever. + +Here was the map of the passion that now had finished. The horse was +planted immovably, with his fore-feet upon the paved crest of the +central road. He of the whole party might be supposed untouched by the +passion of death. The little cany carriage--partly, perhaps, from the +violent torsion of the wheels in its recent movement, partly from the +thundering blow we had given to it--as if it sympathised with human +horror, was all alive with tremblings and shiverings. The young man +trembled not, nor shivered. He sat like a rock. But _his_ was the +steadiness of agitation frozen into rest by horror. As yet he dared not +to look round; for he knew that, if anything remained to do, by him it +could no longer be done. And as yet he knew not for certain if their +safety were accomplished. But the lady-- + +But the lady--! Oh, heavens! will that spectacle ever depart from my +dreams, as she rose and sank upon her seat, sank and rose, threw up her +arms wildly to heaven, clutched at some visionary object in the air, +fainting, praying, raving, despairing? Figure to yourself, reader, the +elements of the case; suffer me to recall before your mind the +circumstances of that unparalleled situation. From the silence and deep +peace of this saintly summer night--from the pathetic blending of this +sweet moonlight, dawnlight, dreamlight--from the manly tenderness of +this flattering, whispering, murmuring love--suddenly as from the woods +and fields--suddenly as from the chambers of the air opening in +revelation--suddenly as from the ground yawning at her feet, leaped +upon her, with the flashing of cataracts, Death the crowned phantom, +with all the equipage of his terrors, and the tiger roar of his voice. + +The moments were numbered; the strife was finished; the vision was +closed. In the twinkling of an eye, our flying horses had carried us to +the termination of the umbrageous aisle; at the right angles we wheeled +into our former direction; the turn of the road carried the scene out +of my eyes in an instant, and swept it into my dreams for ever. + + +SECTION III--DREAM-FUGUE: + +FOUNDED ON THE PRECEDING THEME OF SUDDEN DEATH + + "Whence the sound + Of instruments, that made melodious chime, + Was heard, of harp and organ; and who moved + Their stops and chords was seen; his volant touch + Instinct through all proportions, low and high, + Fled and pursued transverse the resonant fugue." + _Par. Lost_, Bk. XI. + +_Tumultuosissimamente_ + + +Passion of sudden death! that once in youth I read and interpreted by +the shadows of thy averted signs [Footnote: "_Averted signs_":--I +read the course and changes of the lady's agony in the succession of +her involuntary gestures; but it must be remembered that I read all +this from the rear, never once catching the lady's full face, and even +her profile imperfectly.]!--rapture of panic taking the shape (which +amongst tombs in churches I have seen) of woman bursting her sepulchral +bonds--of woman's Ionic form bending forward from the ruins of her +grave with arching foot, with eyes upraised, with clasped adoring +hands--waiting, watching, trembling, praying for the trumpet's call to +rise from dust for ever! Ah, vision too fearful of shuddering humanity +on the brink of almighty abysses!--vision that didst start back, that +didst reel away, like a shrivelling scroll from before the wrath of +fire racing on the wings of the wind! Epilepsy so brief of horror, +wherefore is it that thou canst not die? Passing so suddenly into +darkness, wherefore is it that still thou sheddest thy sad funeral +blights upon the gorgeous mosaics of dreams? Fragment of music too +passionate, heard once, and heard no more, what aileth thee, that thy +deep rolling chords come up at intervals through all the worlds of +sleep, and after forty years have lost no element of horror? + + +I + + +Lo, it is summer--almighty summer! The everlasting gates of life and +summer are thrown open wide; and on the ocean, tranquil and verdant as +a savannah, the unknown lady from the dreadful vision and I myself are +floating--she upon a fairy pinnace, and I upon an English three- +decker. Both of us are wooing gales of festal happiness within the +domain of our common country, within that ancient watery park, within +the pathless chase of ocean, where England takes her pleasure as a +huntress through winter and summer, from the rising to the setting sun. +Ah, what a wilderness of floral beauty was hidden, or was suddenly +revealed, upon the tropic islands through which the pinnace moved! And +upon her deck what a bevy of human flowers: young women how lovely, +young men how noble, that were dancing together, and slowly drifting +towards _us_ amidst music and incense, amidst blossoms from forests +and gorgeous corymbi from vintages, amidst natural carolling, and the +echoes of sweet girlish laughter. Slowly the pinnace nears us, gaily +she hails us, and silently she disappears beneath the shadow of our +mighty bows. But then, as at some signal from heaven, the music, and +the carols, and the sweet echoing of girlish laughter--all are hushed. +What evil has smitten the pinnace, meeting or overtaking her? Did ruin +to our friends couch within our own dreadful shadow? Was our shadow the +shadow of death? I looked over the bow for an answer, and, behold! the +pinnace was dismantled; the revel and the revellers were found no more; +the glory of the vintage was dust; and the forests with their beauty +were left without a witness upon the seas. "But where," and I turned to +our crew--"where are the lovely women that danced beneath the awning of +flowers and clustering corymbi? Whither have fled the noble young men +that danced with _them_?" Answer there was none. But suddenly the +man at the mast-head, whose countenance darkened with alarm, cried out, +"Sail on the weather beam! Down she comes upon us: in seventy seconds +she also will founder." + + +II + + +I looked to the weather side, and the summer had departed. The sea was +rocking, and shaken with gathering wrath. Upon its surface sat mighty +mists, which grouped themselves into arches and long cathedral aisles. +Down one of these, with the fiery pace of a quarrel from a cross-bow, +ran a frigate right athwart our course. "Are they mad?" some voice +exclaimed from our deck. "Do they woo their ruin?" But in a moment, as +she was close upon us, some impulse of a heady current or local vortex +gave a wheeling bias to her course, and off she forged without a shock. +As she ran past us, high aloft amongst the shrouds stood the lady of +the pinnace. The deeps opened ahead in malice to receive her, towering +surges of foam ran after her, the billows were fierce to catch her. But +far away she was borne into desert spaces of the sea: whilst still by +sight I followed her, as she ran before the howling gale, chased by +angry sea-birds and by maddening billows; still I saw her, as at the +moment when she ran past us, standing amongst the shrouds, with her +white draperies streaming before the wind. There she stood, with hair +dishevelled, one hand clutched amongst the tackling--rising, sinking, +fluttering, trembling, praying; there for leagues I saw her as she +stood, raising at intervals one hand to heaven, amidst the fiery crests +of the pursuing waves and the raving of the storm; until at last, upon +a sound from afar of malicious laughter and mockery, all was hidden for +ever in driving showers; and afterwards, but when I knew not, nor how, + + +III + + +Sweet funeral bells from some incalculable distance, wailing over the +dead that die before the dawn, awakened me as I slept in a boat moored +to some familiar shore. The morning twilight even then was breaking; +and, by the dusky revelations which it spread, I saw a girl, adorned +with a garland of white roses about her head for some great festival, +running along the solitary strand in extremity of haste. Her running +was the running of panic; and often she looked back as to some dreadful +enemy in the rear. But, when I leaped ashore, and followed on her steps +to warn her of a peril in front, alas! from me she fled as from another +peril, and vainly I shouted to her of quicksands that lay ahead. Faster +and faster she ran; round a promontory of rocks she wheeled out of +sight; in an instant I also wheeled round it, but only to see the +treacherous sands gathering above her head. Already her person was +buried; only the fair young head and the diadem of white roses around +it were still visible to the pitying heavens; and, last of all, was +visible one white marble arm. I saw by the early twilight this fair +young head, as it was sinking down to darkness--saw this marble arm, as +it rose above her head and her treacherous grave, tossing, faltering, +rising, clutching, as at some false deceiving hand stretched out from +the clouds--saw this marble arm uttering her dying hope, and then +uttering her dying despair. The head, the diadem, the arm--these all +had sunk; at last over these also the cruel quicksand had closed; and +no memorial of the fair young girl remained on earth, except my own +solitary tears, and the funeral bells from the desert seas, that, +rising again more softly, sang a requiem over the grave of the buried +child, and over her blighted dawn. + +I sat, and wept in secret the tears that men have ever given to the +memory of those that died before the dawn, and by the treachery of +earth, our mother. But suddenly the tears and funeral bells were hushed +by a shout as of many nations, and by a roar as from some great king's +artillery, advancing rapidly along the valleys, and heard afar by +echoes from the mountains. "Hush!" I said, as I bent my ear earthwards +to listen--"hush!--this either is the very anarchy of strife, or else" +--and then I listened more profoundly, and whispered as I raised my +head--"or else, oh heavens! it is _victory_ that is final, victory +that swallows up all strife." + + +IV + + +Immediately, in trance, I was carried over land and sea to some distant +kingdom, and placed upon a triumphal car, amongst companions crowned +with laurel. The darkness of gathering midnight, brooding over all the +land, hid from us the mighty crowds that were weaving restlessly about +ourselves as a centre: we heard them, but saw them not. Tidings had +arrived, within an hour, of a grandeur that measured itself against +centuries; too full of pathos they were, too full of joy, to utter +themselves by other language than by tears, by restless anthems, and +_Te Deums_ reverberated from the choirs and orchestras of earth. +These tidings we that sat upon the laurelled car had it for our +privilege to publish amongst all nations. And already, by signs audible +through the darkness, by snortings and tramplings, our angry horses, +that knew no fear or fleshly weariness, upbraided us with delay. +Wherefore _was_ it that we delayed? We waited for a secret word, +that should bear witness to the hope of nations as now accomplished for +ever. At midnight the secret word arrived; which word was--_Waterloo +and Recovered Christendom!_ The dreadful word shone by its own light; +before us it went; high above our leaders' heads it rode, and spread a +golden light over the paths which we traversed. Every city, at the +presence of the secret word, threw open its gates. The rivers were +conscious as we crossed. All the forests, as we ran along their +margins, shivered in homage to the secret word. And the darkness +comprehended it. + +Two hours after midnight we approached a mighty Minster. Its gates, +which rose to the clouds, were closed. But, when the dreadful word that +rode before us reached them with its golden light, silently they moved +back upon their hinges; and at a flying gallop our equipage entered the +grand aisle of the cathedral. Headlong was our pace; and at every +altar, in the little chapels and oratories to the right hand and left +of our course, the lamps, dying or sickening, kindled anew in sympathy +with the secret word that was flying past. Forty leagues we might have +run in the cathedral, and as yet no strength of morning light had +reached us, when before us we saw the aerial galleries of organ and +choir. Every pinnacle of fretwork, every station of advantage amongst +the traceries, was crested by white-robed choristers that sang +deliverance; that wept no more tears, as once their fathers had wept; +but at intervals that sang together to the generations, saying, + + "Chant the deliverer's praise in every tongue," + +and receiving answers from afar, + + "Such as once in heaven and earth were sung." + +And of their chanting was no end; of our headlong pace was neither +pause nor slackening. + +Thus as we ran like torrents--thus as we swept with bridal rapture over +the Campo Santo [Footnote: "_Campo Santo_":--It is probable that +most of my readers will be acquainted with the history of the Campo +Santo (or cemetery) at Pisa, composed of earth brought from Jerusalem +from a bed of sanctity as the highest prize which the noble piety of +crusaders could ask or imagine. To readers who are unacquainted with +England, or who (being English) are yet unacquainted with the cathedral +cities of England, it may be right to mention that the graves within- +side the cathedrals often form a flat pavement over which carriages and +horses _might_ run; and perhaps a boyish remembrance of one +particular cathedral, across which I had seen passengers walk and +burdens carried, as about two centuries back they were through the +middle of St. Paul's in London, may have assisted my dream.] of the +cathedral graves--suddenly we became aware of a vast necropolis rising +upon the far-off horizon--a city of sepulchres, built within the +saintly cathedral for the warrior dead that rested from their feuds on +earth. Of purple granite was the necropolis; yet, in the first minute, +it lay like a purple stain upon the horizon, so mighty was the +distance. In the second minute it trembled through many changes, +growing into terraces and towers of wondrous altitude, so mighty was +the pace. In the third minute already, with our dreadful gallop, we +were entering its suburbs. Vast sarcophagi rose on every side, having +towers and turrets that, upon the limits of the central aisle, strode +forward with haughty intrusion, that ran back with mighty shadows into +answering recesses. Every sarcophagus showed many bas-reliefs--bas- +reliefs of battles and of battle-fields; battles from forgotten ages, +battles from yesterday; battle-fields that, long since, nature had +healed and reconciled to herself with the sweet oblivion of flowers; +battle-fields that were yet angry and crimson with carnage. Where the +terraces ran, there did _we_ run; where the towers curved, there +did _we_ curve. With the flight of swallows our horses swept round +every angle. Like rivers in flood wheeling round headlands, like +hurricanes that ride into the secrets of forests, faster than ever +light unwove the mazes of darkness, our flying equipage carried earthly +passions, kindled warrior instincts, amongst the dust that lay around +us--dust oftentimes of our noble fathers that had slept in God from +Crécy to Trafalgar. And now had we reached the last sarcophagus, now +were we abreast of the last bas-relief, already had we recovered the +arrow-like flight of the illimitable central aisle, when coming up this +aisle to meet us we beheld afar off a female child, that rode in a +carriage as frail as flowers. The mists which went before her hid the +fawns that drew her, but could not hide the shells and tropic flowers +with which she played--but could not hide the lovely smiles by which +she uttered her trust in the mighty cathedral, and in the cherubim that +looked down upon her from the mighty shafts of its pillars. Face to +face she was meeting us; face to face she rode, as if danger there were +none. "Oh, baby!" I exclaimed, "shalt thou be the ransom for Waterloo? +Must we, that carry tidings of great joy to every people, be messengers +of ruin to thee!" In horror I rose at the thought; but then also, in +horror at the thought, rose one that was sculptured on a bas-relief--a +Dying Trumpeter. Solemnly from the field of battle he rose to his feet; +and, unslinging his stony trumpet, carried it, in his dying anguish, to +his stony lips--sounding once, and yet once again; proclamation that, +in _thy_ ears, oh baby! spoke from the battlements of death. +Immediately deep shadows fell between us, and aboriginal silence. The +choir had ceased to sing. The hoofs of our horses, the dreadful rattle +of our harness, the groaning of our wheels, alarmed the graves no more. +By horror the bas-relief had been unlocked unto life. By horror we, +that were so full of life, we men and our horses, with their fiery +fore-legs rising in mid air to their everlasting gallop, were frozen to +a bas-relief. Then a third time the trumpet sounded; the seals were +taken off all pulses; life, and the frenzy of life, tore into their +channels again; again the choir burst forth in sunny grandeur, as from +the muffling of storms and darkness; again the thunderings of our +horses carried temptation into the graves. One cry burst from our lips, +as the clouds, drawing off from the aisle, showed it empty before us.-- +"Whither has the infant fled?--is the young child caught up to God?" +Lo! afar off, in a vast recess, rose three mighty windows to the +clouds; and on a level with their summits, at height insuperable to +man, rose an altar of purest alabaster. On its eastern face was +trembling a crimson glory. A glory was it from the reddening dawn that +now streamed _through_ the windows? Was it from the crimson robes +of the martyrs painted _on_ the windows? Was it from the bloody +bas-reliefs of earth? There, suddenly, within that crimson radiance, +rose the apparition of a woman's head, and then of a woman's figure. +The child it was--grown up to woman's height. Clinging to the horns of +the altar, voiceless she stood--sinking, rising, raving, despairing; +and behind the volume of incense that, night and day, streamed upwards +from the altar, dimly was seen the fiery font, and the shadow of that +dreadful being who should have baptized her with the baptism of death. +But by her side was kneeling her better angel, that hid his face with +wings; that wept and pleaded for _her_; that prayed when _she_ could +_not_; that fought with Heaven by tears for _her_ deliverance; which +also, as he raised his immortal countenance from his wings, I saw, by +the glory in his eye, that from Heaven he had won at last. + + +V + + +Then was completed the passion of the mighty fugue. The golden tubes of +the organ, which as yet had but muttered at intervals--gleaming amongst +clouds and surges of incense--threw up, as from fountains unfathomable, +columns of heart-shattering music. Choir and anti-choir were filling +fast with unknown voices. Thou also, Dying Trumpeter, with thy love +that was victorious, and thy anguish that was finishing, didst enter +the tumult; trumpet and echo--farewell love, and farewell anguish--rang +through the dreadful _sanctus_. Oh, darkness of the grave! that +from the crimson altar and from the fiery font wert visited and +searched by the effulgence in the angel's eye--were these indeed thy +children? Pomps of life, that, from the burials of centuries, rose +again to the voice of perfect joy, did ye indeed mingle with the +festivals of Death? Lo! as I looked back for seventy leagues through +the mighty cathedral, I saw the quick and the dead that sang together +to God, together that sang to the generations of man. All the hosts of +jubilation, like armies that ride in pursuit, moved with one step. Us, +that, with laurelled heads, were passing from the cathedral, they +overtook, and, as with a garment, they wrapped us round with thunders +greater than our own. As brothers we moved together; to the dawn that +advanced, to the stars that fled; rendering thanks to God in the +highest--that, having hid His face through one generation behind thick +clouds of War, once again was ascending, from the Campo Santo of +Waterloo was ascending, in the visions of Peace; rendering thanks for +thee, young girl! whom having overshadowed with His ineffable passion +of death, suddenly did God relent, suffered thy angel to turn aside His +arm, and even in thee, sister unknown! shown to me for a moment only to +be hidden for ever, found an occasion to glorify His goodness. A +thousand times, amongst the phantoms of sleep, have I seen thee +entering the gates of the golden dawn, with the secret word riding +before thee, with the armies of the grave behind thee,--seen thee +sinking, rising, raving, despairing; a thousand times in the worlds of +sleep have I seen thee followed by God's angel through storms, through +desert seas, through the darkness of quicksands, through dreams and the +dreadful revelations that are in dreams; only that at the last, with +one sling of His victorious arm, He might snatch thee back from ruin, +and might emblazon in thy deliverance the endless resurrections of His +love! + + + + +JOAN OF ARC [Footnote: "_Arc_":--Modern France, that should know a +great deal better than myself, insists that the name is not D'Arc-- +_i.e._, of Arc--but _Darc_. Now it happens sometimes that, if +a person whose position guarantees his access to the best information +will content himself with gloomy dogmatism, striking the table with his +fist, and saying in a terrific voice, "It _is_ so, and there's an +end of it," one bows deferentially, and submits. But, if, unhappily for +himself, won by this docility, he relents too amiably into reasons and +arguments, probably one raises an insurrection against him that may +never be crushed; for in the fields of logic one can skirmish, perhaps, +as well as he. Had he confined himself to dogmatism, he would have +intrenched his position in darkness, and have hidden his own vulnerable +points. But coming down to base reasons he lets in light, and one sees +where to plant the blows. Now, the worshipful reason of modern France +for disturbing the old received spelling is that Jean Hordal, a +descendant of La Pucelle's brother, spelled the name _Darc_ in +1612. But what of that? It is notorious that what small matter of +spelling Providence had thought fit to disburse amongst man in the +seventeenth century was all monopolised by printers; now, M. Hordal was +_not_ a printer.] + + +What is to be thought of _her_? What is to be thought of the poor +shepherd girl from the hills and forests of Lorraine, that--like the +Hebrew shepherd boy from the hills and forests of Judea--rose suddenly +out of the quiet, out of the safety, out of the religious inspiration, +rooted in deep pastoral solitudes, to a station in the van of armies, +and to the more perilous station at the right hand of kings? The Hebrew +boy inaugurated his patriotic mission by an _act_, by a victorious +_act_, such as no man could deny. But so did the girl of Lorraine, +if we read her story as it was read by those who saw her nearest. +Adverse armies bore witness to the boy as no pretender; but so they did +to the gentle girl. Judged by the voices of all who saw them _from a +station of good will_, both were found true and loyal to any promises +involved in their first acts. Enemies it was that made the difference +between their subsequent fortunes. The boy rose to a splendour and a +noonday prosperity, both personal and public, that rang through the +records of his people, and became a byword among his posterity for a +thousand years, until the sceptre was departing from Judah. The poor, +forsaken girl, on the contrary, drank not herself from that cup of rest +which she had secured for France. She never sang together with the +songs that rose in her native Domrémy as echoes to the departing steps +of invaders. She mingled not in the festal dances at Vaucouleurs which +celebrated in rapture the redemption of France. No! for her voice was +then silent; no! for her feet were dust. Pure, innocent, noble-hearted +girl! whom, from earliest youth, ever I believed in as full of truth +and self-sacrifice, this was amongst the strongest pledges for +_thy_ truth, that never once--no, not for a moment of weakness-- +didst thou revel in the vision of coronets and honour from man. +Coronets for thee! Oh, no! Honours, if they come when all is over, are +for those that share thy blood. [Footnote: "_Those that share thy +blood_":--A collateral relative of Joanna's was subsequently ennobled +by the title of _Du Lys_.] Daughter of Domrémy, when the gratitude +of thy king shall awaken, thou wilt be sleeping the sleep of the dead. +Call her, King of France, but she will not hear thee. Cite her by the +apparitors to come and receive a robe of honour, but she will be found +_en contumace_. When the thunders of universal France, as even yet +may happen, shall proclaim the grandeur of the poor shepherd girl that +gave up all for her country, thy ear, young shepherd girl, will have +been deaf for five centuries. To suffer and to do, that was thy portion +in this life; that was thy destiny; and not for a moment was it hidden +from thyself. Life, thou saidst, is short; and the sleep which is in +the grave is long; let me use that life, so transitory, for the glory +of those heavenly dreams destined to comfort the sleep which is so +long! This pure creature--pure from every suspicion of even a visionary +self-interest, even as she was pure in senses more obvious--never once +did this holy child, as regarded herself, relax from her belief in the +darkness that was travelling to meet her. She might not prefigure the +very manner of her death; she saw not in vision, perhaps, the aerial +altitude of the fiery scaffold, the spectators without end, on every +road, pouring into Rouen as to a coronation, the surging smoke, the +volleying flames, the hostile faces all around, the pitying eye that +lurked but here and there, until nature and imperishable truth broke +loose from artificial restraints--these might not be apparent through +the mists of the hurrying future. But the voice that called her to +death, _that_ she heard for ever. + +Great was the throne of France even in those days, and great was He +that sat upon it; but well Joanna knew that not the throne, nor he that +sat upon it, was for _her_; but, on the contrary, that she was for +_them_; not she by them, but they by her, should rise from the +dust. Gorgeous were the lilies of France, and for centuries had the +privilege to spread their beauty over land and sea, until, in another +century, the wrath of God and man combined to wither them; but well +Joanna knew, early at Domrémy she had read that bitter truth, that the +lilies of France would decorate no garland for _her_. Flower nor +bud, bell nor blossom, would ever bloom for _her_! + + * * * * * + +But stay. What reason is there for taking up this subject of Joanna +precisely in the spring of 1847? Might it not have been left till the +spring of 1947, or, perhaps, left till called for? Yes, but it _is_ +called for, and clamorously. You are aware, reader, that amongst the +many original thinkers whom modern France has produced, one of the +reputed leaders is M. Michelet. All these writers are of a +revolutionary cast; not in a political sense merely, but in all senses; +mad, oftentimes, as March hares; crazy with the laughing gas of +recovered liberty; drunk with the wine cup of their mighty Revolution, +snorting, whinnying, throwing up their heels, like wild horses in the +boundless pampas, and running races of defiance with snipes, or with +the winds, or with their own shadows, if they can find nothing else to +challenge. Some time or other, I, that have leisure to read, may +introduce _you_, that have not, to two or three dozen of these +writers; of whom I can assure you beforehand that they are often +profound, and at intervals are even as impassioned as if they were come +of our best English blood. But now, confining our attention to M. +Michelet, we in England--who know him best by his worst book, the book +against priests, etc.--know him disadvantageously. That book is a +rhapsody of incoherence. But his "History of France" is quite another +thing. A man, in whatsoever craft he sails, cannot stretch away out of +sight when he is linked to the windings of the shore by towing-ropes of +History. Facts, and the consequences of facts, draw the writer back to +the falconer's lure from the giddiest heights of speculation. Here, +therefore--in his "France"--if not always free from flightiness, if now +and then off like a rocket for an airy wheel in the clouds, M. +Michelet, with natural politeness, never forgets that he has left a +large audience waiting for him on earth, and gazing upward in anxiety +for his return; return, therefore, he does. But History, though clear +of certain temptations in one direction, has separate dangers of its +own. It is impossible so to write a history of France, or of England-- +works becoming every hour more indispensable to the inevitably +political man of this day--without perilous openings for error. If I, +for instance, on the part of England, should happen to turn my labours +into that channel, and (on the model of Lord Percy going to Chevy +Chase) + + "A vow to God should make + My pleasure in the Michelet woods + Three summer days to take," + +probably, from simple delirium, I might hunt M. Michelet into +_delirium tremens_. Two strong angels stand by the side of History, +whether French history or English, as heraldic supporters: the angel of +research on the left hand, that must read millions of dusty parchments, +and of pages blotted with lies; the angel of meditation on the right +hand, that must cleanse these lying records with fire, even as of old +the draperies of _asbestos_ were cleansed, and must quicken them +into regenerated life. Willingly I acknowledge that no man will ever +avoid innumerable errors of detail; with so vast a compass of ground to +traverse, this is impossible; but such errors (though I have a bushel +on hand, at M. Michelet's service) are not the game I chase; it is the +bitter and unfair spirit in which M. Michelet writes against England. +Even _that_, after all, is but my secondary object; the real one is +Joanna, the Pucelle d'Orléans herself. + +I am not going to write the history of La Pucelle: to do this, or even +circumstantially to report the history of her persecution and bitter +death, of her struggle with false witnesses and with ensnaring judges, +it would be necessary to have before us _all_ the documents, and +therefore the collection only now forthcoming in Paris. [Footnote: +"_Only now forthcoming_":--In 1847 _began_ the publication (from +official records) of Joanna's trial. It was interrupted, I fear, +by the convulsions of 1848; and whether even yet finished I do not +know.] But _my_ purpose is narrower. There have been great thinkers, +disdaining the careless judgments of contemporaries, who have +thrown themselves boldly on the judgment of a far posterity, that +should have had time to review, to ponder, to compare. There have been +great actors on the stage of tragic humanity that might, with the same +depth of confidence, have appealed from the levity of compatriot +friends--too heartless for the sublime interest of their story, and too +impatient for the labour of sifting its perplexities--to the +magnanimity and justice of enemies. To this class belongs the Maid of +Arc. The ancient Romans were too faithful to the ideal of grandeur in +themselves not to relent, after a generation or two, before the +grandeur of Hannibal. Mithridates, a more doubtful person, yet, merely +for the magic perseverance of his indomitable malice, won from the same +Romans the only real honour that ever he received on earth. And we +English have ever shown the same homage to stubborn enmity. To work +unflinchingly for the ruin of England; to say through life, by word and +by deed, _Delenda est Anglia Victrix_!--that one purpose of malice, +faithfully pursued, has quartered some people upon our national funds +of homage as by a perpetual annuity. Better than an inheritance of +service rendered to England herself has sometimes proved the most +insane hatred to England. Hyder Ali, even his son Tippoo, though so far +inferior, and Napoleon, have all benefited by this disposition among +ourselves to exaggerate the merit of diabolic enmity. Not one of these +men was ever capable, in a solitary instance, of praising an enemy +(what do you say to _that_, reader?); and yet in _their_ behalf, we +consent to forget, not their crimes only, but (which is worse) their +hideous bigotry and anti-magnanimous egotism--for nationality it was +not. Suffren, and some half dozen of other French nautical heroes, +because rightly they did us all the mischief they could (which was +really great), are names justly reverenced in England. On the same +principle, La Pucelle d'Orléans, the victorious enemy of England, has +been destined to receive her deepest commemoration from the magnanimous +justice of Englishmen. + +Joanna, as we in England should call her, but according to her own +statement, Jeanne (or, as M. Michelet asserts, Jean [Footnote: +"_Jean_":--M. Michelet asserts that there was a mystical meaning at +that era in calling a child _Jean_; it implied a secret commendation of +a child, if not a dedication, to St. John the evangelist, the beloved +disciple, the apostle of love and mysterious visions. But, really, as +the name was so exceedingly common, few people will detect a mystery in +calling a _boy_ by the name of Jack, though it _does_ seem mysterious +to call a girl Jack. It may be less so in France, where a beautiful +practice has always prevailed of giving a boy his mother's name-- +preceded and strengthened by a male name, as _Charles Anne_, _Victor +Victoire_. In cases where a mother's memory has been unusually dear to +a son, this vocal memento of her, locked into the circle of his own +name, gives to it the tenderness of a testamentary relic, or a funeral +ring. I presume, therefore, that La Pucelle must have borne the +baptismal name of Jeanne Jean; the latter with no reference, perhaps, +to so sublime a person as St. John, but simply to some relative.]) +D'Arc was born at Domrémy, a village on the marches of Lorraine and +Champagne, and dependent upon the town of Vaucouleurs. I have called +her a Lorrainer, not simply because the word is prettier, but because +Champagne too odiously reminds us English of what are for _us_ +imaginary wines--which, undoubtedly, La Pucelle tasted as rarely as we +English: we English, because the champagne of London is chiefly grown +in Devonshire; La Pucelle, because the champagne of Champagne never, by +any chance, flowed into the fountain of Domrémy, from which only she +drank. M. Michelet will have her to be a _Champenoise_, and for no +better reason than that she "took after her father," who happened to be +a _Champenois_. + +These disputes, however, turn on refinements too nice. Domrémy stood +upon the frontiers, and, like other frontiers, produced a _mixed_ +race, representing the _cis_ and the _trans_. A river (it is +true) formed the boundary line at this point--the river Meuse; and +_that_, in old days, might have divided the populations; but in +these days it did not; there were bridges, there were ferries, and +weddings crossed from the right bank to the left. Here lay two great +roads, not so much for travellers that were few, as for armies that +were too many by half. These two roads, one of which was the great +highroad between France and Germany, _decussated_ at this very +point; which is a learned way of saying that they formed a St. Andrew's +Cross, or letter X. I hope the compositor will choose a good large X; +in which case the point of intersection, the _locus_ of conflux and +intersection for these four diverging arms, will finish the reader's +geographical education, by showing him to a hair's-breadth where it was +that Domrémy stood. These roads, so grandly situated, as great trunk +arteries between two mighty realms,[Footnote: And reminding one of that +inscription, so justly admired by Paul Richter, which a Russian Czarina +placed on a guide-post near Moscow: _This is the road that leads to +Constantinople._] and haunted for ever by wars or rumours of wars, +decussated (for anything I know to the contrary) absolutely under +Joanna's bedroom window; one rolling away to the right, past M. D'Arc's +old barn, and the other unaccountably preferring to sweep round that +odious man's pig-sty to the left. + +On whichever side of the border chance had thrown Joanna, the same love +to France would have been nurtured. For it is a strange fact, noticed +by M. Michelet and others, that the Dukes of Bar and Lorraine had for +generations pursued the policy of eternal warfare with France on their +own account, yet also of eternal amity and league with France in case +anybody else presumed to attack her. Let peace settle upon France, and +before long you might rely upon seeing the little vixen Lorraine flying +at the throat of France. Let France be assailed by a formidable enemy, +and instantly you saw a Duke of Lorraine insisting on having his own +throat cut in support of France; which favour accordingly was +cheerfully granted to him in three great successive battles: twice by +the English, viz., at Crécy and Agincourt, once by the Sultan at +Nicopolis. + +This sympathy with France during great eclipses, in those that during +ordinary seasons were always teasing her with brawls and guerilla +inroads, strengthened the natural piety to France of those that were +confessedly the children of her own house. The outposts of France, as +one may call the great frontier provinces, were of all localities the +most devoted to the Fleurs de Lys. To witness, at any great crisis, the +generous devotion to these lilies of the little fiery cousin that in +gentler weather was for ever tilting at the breast of France, could not +but fan the zeal of France's legitimate daughters; while to occupy a +post of honour on the frontiers against an old hereditary enemy of +France would naturally stimulate this zeal by a sentiment of martial +pride, by a sense of danger always threatening, and of hatred always +smouldering. That great four-headed road was a perpetual memento to +patriotic ardour. To say "This way lies the road to Paris, and that +other way to Aix-la-Chapelle; this to Prague, that to Vienna," +nourished the warfare of the heart by daily ministrations of sense. The +eye that watched for the gleams of lance or helmet from the hostile +frontier, the ear that listened for the groaning of wheels, made the +highroad itself, with its relations to centres so remote, into a manual +of patriotic duty. + +The situation, therefore, _locally_, of Joanna was full of profound +suggestions to a heart that listened for the stealthy steps of change +and fear that too surely were in motion. But, if the place were grand, +the time, the burden of the time, was far more so. The air overhead in +its upper chambers was _hurtling_ with the obscure sound; was dark +with sullen fermenting of storms that had been gathering for a hundred +and thirty years. The battle of Agincourt in Joanna's childhood had +reopened the wounds of France. Crécy and Poictiers, those withering +overthrows for the chivalry of France, had, before Agincourt occurred, +been tranquilised by more than half a century; but this resurrection of +their trumpet wails made the whole series of battles and endless +skirmishes take their stations as parts in one drama. The graves that +had closed sixty years ago seemed to fly open in sympathy with a sorrow +that echoed their own. The monarchy of France laboured in extremity, +rocked and reeled like a ship fighting with the darkness of monsoons. +The madness of the poor king (Charles VI), falling in at such a crisis, +like the case of women labouring in child-birth during the storming of +a city, trebled the awfulness of the time. Even the wild story of the +incident which had immediately occasioned the explosion of this +madness--the case of a man unknown, gloomy, and perhaps maniacal +himself, coming out of a forest at noonday, laying his hand upon the +bridle of the king's horse, checking him for a moment to say, "Oh, +king, thou art betrayed," and then vanishing, no man knew whither, as +he had appeared for no man knew what--fell in with the universal +prostration of mind that laid France on her knees, as before the slow +unweaving of some ancient prophetic doom. The famines, the +extraordinary diseases, the insurrections of the peasantry up and down +Europe--these were chords struck from the same mysterious harp; but +these were transitory chords. There had been others of deeper and more +ominous sound. The termination of the Crusades, the destruction of the +Templars, the Papal interdicts, the tragedies caused or suffered by the +house of Anjou, and by the Emperor--these were full of a more permanent +significance. But, since then, the colossal figure of feudalism was +seen standing, as it were on tiptoe, at Crécy, for flight from earth: +that was a revolution unparalleled; yet _that_ was a trifle by +comparison with the more fearful revolutions that were mining below the +Church. By her own internal schisms, by the abominable spectacle of a +double Pope--so that no man, except through political bias, could even +guess which was Heaven's vicegerent, and which the creature of Hell-- +the Church was rehearsing, as in still earlier forms she had already +rehearsed, those vast rents in her foundations which no man should ever +heal. + +These were the loftiest peaks of the cloudland in the skies that to the +scientific gazer first caught the colors of the _new_ morning in +advance. But the whole vast range alike of sweeping glooms overhead +dwelt upon all meditative minds, even upon those that could not +distinguish the tendencies nor decipher the forms. It was, therefore, +not her own age alone, as affected by its immediate calamities, that +lay with such weight upon Joanna's mind, but her own age as one section +in a vast mysterious drama, unweaving through a century back, and +drawing nearer continually to some dreadful crisis. Cataracts and +rapids were heard roaring ahead; and signs were seen far back, by help +of old men's memories, which answered secretly to signs now coming +forward on the eye, even as locks answer to keys. It was not wonderful +that in such a haunted solitude, with such a haunted heart, Joanna +should see angelic visions, and hear angelic voices. These voices +whispered to her for ever the duty, self-imposed, of delivering France. +Five years she listened to these monitory voices with internal +struggles. At length she could resist no longer. Doubt gave way; and +she left her home for ever in order to present herself at the dauphin's +court. The education of this poor girl was mean according to the +present standard: was ineffably grand, according to a purer philosophic +standard: and only not good for our age because for us it would be +unattainable. She read nothing, for she could not read; but she had +heard others read parts of the Roman martyrology. She wept in sympathy +with the sad "Misereres" of the Romish Church; she rose to heaven with +the glad triumphant "Te Deums" of Rome; she drew her comfort and her +vital strength from the rites of the same Church. But, next after these +spiritual advantages, she owed most to the advantages of her situation. +The fountain of Domrémy was on the brink of a boundless forest; and it +was haunted to that degree by fairies that the parish priest +(_curé_) was obliged to read mass there once a year, in order to +keep them in any decent bounds. Fairies are important, even in a +statistical view: certain weeds mark poverty in the soil; fairies mark +its solitude. As surely as the wolf retires before cities does the +fairy sequester herself from the haunts of the licensed victualer. A +village is too much for her nervous delicacy; at most, she can tolerate +a distant view of a hamlet. We may judge, therefore, by the uneasiness +and extra trouble which they gave to the parson, in what strength the +fairies mustered at Domrémy, and, by a satisfactory consequence, how +thinly sown with men and women must have been that region even in its +inhabited spots. But the forests of Domrémy--those were the glories of +the land: for in them abode mysterious powers and ancient secrets that +towered into tragic strength. "Abbeys there were, and abbey windows"-- +"like Moorish temples of the Hindoos"--that exercised even princely +power both in Lorraine and in the German Diets. These had their sweet +bells that pierced the forests for many a league at matins or vespers, +and each its own dreamy legend. Few enough, and scattered enough, were +these abbeys, so as in no degree to disturb the deep solitude of the +region; yet many enough to spread a network or awning of Christian +sanctity over what else might have seemed a heathen wilderness. This +sort of religious talisman being secured, a man the most afraid of +ghosts (like myself, suppose, or the reader) becomes armed into courage +to wander for days in their sylvan recesses. The mountains of the +Vosges, on the eastern frontier of France, have never attracted much +notice from Europe, except in 1813-14 for a few brief months, when they +fell within Napoleon's line of defence against the Allies. But they are +interesting for this among other features, that they do not, like some +loftier ranges, repel woods; the forests and the hills are on sociable +terms. "Live and let live" is their motto. For this reason, in part, +these tracts in Lorraine were a favourite hunting-ground with the +Carlovingian princes. About six hundred years before Joanna's +childhood, Charlemagne was known to have hunted there. That, of itself, +was a grand incident in the traditions of a forest or a chase. In these +vast forests, also, were to be found (if anywhere to be found) those +mysterious fawns that tempted solitary hunters into visionary and +perilous pursuits. Here was seen (if anywhere seen) that ancient stag +who was already nine hundred years old, but possibly a hundred or two +more, when met by Charlemagne; and the thing was put beyond doubt by +the inscription upon his golden collar. I believe Charlemagne knighted +the stag; and, if ever he is met again by a king, he ought to be made +an earl, or, being upon the marches of France, a marquis. Observe, I +don't absolutely vouch for all these things: my own opinion varies. On +a fine breezy forenoon I am audaciously sceptical; but as twilight sets +in my credulity grows steadily, till it becomes equal to anything that +could be desired. And I have heard candid sportsmen declare that, +outside of these very forests, they laughed loudly at all the dim tales +connected with their haunted solitudes, but, on reaching a spot +notoriously eighteen miles deep within them, they agreed with Sir Roger +de Coverley that a good deal might be said on both sides. + +Such traditions, or any others that (like the stag) connect distant +generations with each other, are, for that cause, sublime; and the +sense of the shadowy, connected with such appearances that reveal +themselves or not according to circumstances, leaves a colouring of +sanctity over ancient forests, even in those minds that utterly reject +the legend as a fact. + +But, apart from all distinct stories of that order, in any solitary +frontier between two great empires--as here, for instance, or in the +desert between Syria and the Euphrates--there is an inevitable +tendency, in minds of any deep sensibility, to people the solitudes +with phantom images of powers that were of old so vast. Joanna, +therefore, in her quiet occupation of a shepherdess, would be led +continually to brood over the political condition of her country by the +traditions of the past no less than by the mementoes of the local +present. + +M. Michelet, indeed, says that La Pucelle was not a shepherdess. I beg +his pardon; she was. What he rests upon I guess pretty well: it is the +evidence of a woman called Haumette, the most confidential friend of +Joanna. Now, she is a good witness, and a good girl, and I like her; +for she makes a natural and affectionate report of Joanna's ordinary +life. But still, however good she may be as a witness, Joanna is +better; and she, when speaking to the dauphin, calls herself in the +Latin report _Bergereta_. Even Haumette confesses that Joanna +tended sheep in her girlhood. And I believe that, if Miss Haumette were +taking coffee along with me this very evening (February 12, 1847)--in +which there would be no subject for scandal or for maiden blushes, +because I am an intense philosopher, and Miss H. would be hard upon 450 +years old--she would admit the following comment upon her evidence to +be right. A Frenchman, about forty years ago--M. Simond, in his +"Travels"--mentions accidentally the following hideous scene as one +steadily observed and watched by himself in chivalrous France not very +long before the French Revolution: A peasant was plowing; and the team +that drew his plow was a donkey and a woman. Both were regularly +harnessed; both pulled alike. This is bad enough; but the Frenchman +adds that, in distributing his lashes, the peasant was obviously +desirous of being impartial; or, if either of the yokefellows had a +right to complain, certainly it was not the donkey. Now, in any country +where such degradation of females could be tolerated by the state of +manners, a woman of delicacy would shrink from acknowledging, either +for herself or her friend, that she had ever been addicted to any mode +of labour not strictly domestic; because, if once owning herself a +prædial servant, she would be sensible that this confession extended by +probability in the hearer's thoughts to the having incurred indignities +of this horrible kind. Haumette clearly thinks it more dignified for +Joanna to have been darning the stockings of her horny-hoofed father, +M. D'Arc, than keeping sheep, lest she might then be suspected of +having ever done something worse. But, luckily, there was no danger of +_that_: Joanna never was in service; and my opinion is that her +father should have mended his own stockings, since probably he was the +party to make the holes in them, as many a better man than D'Arc does-- +meaning by _that_ not myself, because, though probably a better man +than D'Arc, I protest against doing anything of the kind. If I lived +even with Friday in Juan Fernandez, either Friday must do all the +darning, or else it must go undone. The better men that I meant were +the sailors in the British navy, every man of whom mends his own +stockings. Who else is to do it? Do you suppose, reader, that the +junior lords of the admiralty are under articles to darn for the navy? + +The reason, meantime, for my systematic hatred of D'Arc is this: There +was a story current in France before the Revolution, framed to ridicule +the pauper aristocracy, who happened to have long pedigrees and short +rent rolls: viz., that a head of such a house, dating from the +Crusades, was overheard saying to his son, a Chevalier of St. Louis, +"_Chevalier, as-tu donné au cochon à manger_?" Now, it is clearly +made out by the surviving evidence that D'Arc would much have preferred +continuing to say, "_Ma fille, as-tu donné au cochon à manger_?" to +saying, "_Pucelle d'Orléans, as-tu sauvé les fleurs-de-lys_?" There +is an old English copy of verses which argues thus: + + "If the man that turnips cries + Cry not when his father dies, + Then 'tis plain the man had rather + Have a turnip than his father." + +I cannot say that the logic of these verses was ever _entirely_ to +my satisfaction. I do not see my way through it as clearly as could be +wished. But I see my way most clearly through D'Arc; and the result is +--that he would greatly have preferred not merely a turnip to his +father, but the saving a pound or so of bacon to saving the Oriflamme +of France. + +It is probable (as M. Michelet suggests) that the title of Virgin or +Pucelle had in itself, and apart from the miraculous stories about her, +a secret power over the rude soldiery and partisan chiefs of that +period; for in such a person they saw a representative manifestation of +the Virgin Mary, who, in a course of centuries, had grown steadily upon +the popular heart. + +As to Joanna's supernatural detection of the dauphin (Charles VII) +among three hundred lords and knights, I am surprised at the credulity +which could ever lend itself to that theatrical juggle. Who admires +more than myself the sublime enthusiasm, the rapturous faith in +herself, of this pure creature? But I am far from admiring stage +artifices which not La Pucelle, but the court, must have arranged; nor +can surrender myself to the conjurer's legerdemain, such as may be seen +every day for a shilling. Southey's "Joan of Arc" was published in +1796. Twenty years after, talking with Southey, I was surprised to find +him still owning a secret bias in favor of Joan, founded on her +detection of the dauphin. The story, for the benefit of the reader new +to the case, was this: La Pucelle was first made known to the dauphin, +and presented to his court, at Chinon; and here came her first trial. +By way of testing her supernatural pretensions, she was to find out the +royal personage amongst the whole ark of clean and unclean creatures. +Failing in this _coup d'essai_, she would not simply disappoint +many a beating heart in the glittering crowd that on different motives +yearned for her success, but she would ruin herself, and, as the oracle +within had told her, would, by ruining herself, ruin France. Our own +Sovereign Lady Victoria rehearses annually a trial not so severe in +degree, but the same in kind. She "pricks" for sheriffs. Joanna pricked +for a king. But observe the difference: our own Lady pricks for two men +out of three; Joanna for one man out of three hundred. Happy Lady of +the Islands and the Orient!--she _can_ go astray in her choice only +by one-half: to the extent of one-half she _must_ have the +satisfaction of being right. And yet, even with these tight limits to +the misery of a boundless discretion, permit me, Liege Lady, with all +loyalty, to submit that now and then you prick with your pin the wrong +man. But the poor child from Domremy, shrinking under the gaze of a +dazzling court--not _because_ dazzling (for in visions she had seen +those that were more so), but because some of them wore a scoffing +smile on their features--how should _she_ throw her line into so +deep a river to angle for a king, where many a gay creature was +sporting that masqueraded as kings in dress! Nay, even more than any +true king would have done: for, in Southey's version of the story, the +dauphin says, by way of trying the virgin's magnetic sympathy with +royalty, + + "On the throne, + I the while mingling with the menial throng, + Some courtier shall be seated." + +This usurper is even crowned: "the jeweled crown shines on a menial's +head." But, really, that is "_un peu fort_"; and the mob of +spectators might raise a scruple whether our friend the jackdaw upon +the throne, and the dauphin himself, were not grazing the shins of +treason. For the dauphin could not lend more than belonged to him. +According to the popular notion, he had no crown for himself; +consequently none to lend, on any pretence whatever, until the +consecrated Maid should take him to Rheims. This was the _popular_ +notion in France. But certainly it was the dauphin's interest to +support the popular notion, as he meant to use the services of Joanna. +For if he were king already, what was it that she could do for him +beyond Orleans? That is to say, what more than a merely _military_ +service could she render him? And, above all, if he were king without a +coronation, and without the oil from the sacred ampulla, what advantage +was yet open to him by celerity above his competitor, the English boy? +Now was to be a race for a coronation: he that should win _that_ +race carried the superstition of France along with him: he that should +first be drawn from the ovens of Rheims was under that superstition +baked into a king. + +La Pucelle, before she could be allowed to practise as a warrior, was +put through her manual and platoon exercise, as a pupil in divinity, at +the bar of six eminent men in wigs. According to Southey (v. 393, bk. +iii., in the original edition of his "Joan of Arc,") she "appalled the +doctors." It's not easy to do _that_: but they had some reason to +feel bothered, as that surgeon would assuredly feel bothered who, upon +proceeding to dissect a subject, should find the subject retaliating as +a dissector upon himself, especially if Joanna ever made the speech to +them which occupies v. 354-391, bk. iii. It is a double impossibility: +1st, because a piracy from Tindal's "Christianity as old as the +Creation"--a piracy _a parte ante_, and by three centuries; 2d, it +is quite contrary to the evidence on Joanna's trial. Southey's "Joan" +of A.D. 1796 (Cottle, Bristol) tells the doctors, among other secrets, +that she never in her life attended--1st, Mass; nor 2d, the Sacramental +Table; nor 3d, Confession. In the meantime, all this deistical +confession of Joanna's, besides being suicidal for the interest of her +cause, is opposed to the depositions upon _both_ trials. The very +best witness called from first to last deposes that Joanna attended +these rites of her Church even too often; was taxed with doing so; and, +by blushing, owned the charge as a fact, though certainly not as a +fault. Joanna was a girl of natural piety, that saw God in forests and +hills and fountains, but did not the less seek him in chapels and +consecrated oratories. + +This peasant girl was self-educated through her own natural +meditativeness. If the reader turns to that divine passage in "Paradise +Regained" which Milton has put into the mouth of our Saviour when first +entering the wilderness, and musing upon the tendency of those great +impulses growing within himself----- + + "Oh, what a multitude of thoughts at once + Awakened in me swarm, while I consider + What from within I feel myself, and hear + What from without comes often to my ears, + Ill sorting with my present state compared! + When I was yet a child, no childish play + To me was pleasing; all my mind was set + Serious to learn and know, and thence to do, + What might be public good; myself I thought + Born to that end----" + +he will have some notion of the vast reveries which brooded over the +heart of Joanna in early girlhood, when the wings were budding that +should carry her from Orleans to Rheims; when the golden chariot was +dimly revealing itself that should carry her from the kingdom of +_France Delivered_ to the Eternal Kingdom. + +It is not requisite for the honour of Joanna, nor is there in this +place room, to pursue her brief career of _action._ That, though +wonderful, forms the earthly part of her story; the spiritual part is +the saintly passion of her imprisonment, trial, and execution. It is +unfortunate, therefore, for Southey's "Joan of Arc" (which, however, +should always be regarded as a _juvenile_ effort), that precisely +when her real glory begins the poem ends. But this limitation of the +interest grew, no doubt, from the constraint inseparably attached to +the law of epic unity. Joanna's history bisects into two opposite +hemispheres, and both could not have been presented to the eye in one +poem, unless by sacrificing all unity of theme, or else by involving +the earlier half, as a narrative episode, in the latter; which, +however, might have been done, for it might have been communicated to a +fellow-prisoner, or a confessor, by Joanna herself. It is sufficient, +as concerns _this_ section of Joanna's life, to say that she +fulfilled, to the height of her promises, the restoration of the +prostrate throne. France had become a province of England, and for the +ruin of both, if such a yoke could be maintained. Dreadful pecuniary +exhaustion caused the English energy to droop; and that critical +opening La Pucelle used with a corresponding felicity of audacity and +suddenness (that were in themselves portentous) for introducing the +wedge of French native resources, for rekindling the national pride, +and for planting the dauphin once more upon his feet. When Joanna +appeared, he had been on the point of giving up the struggle with the +English, distressed as they were, and of flying to the south of France. +She taught him to blush for such abject counsels. She liberated +Orleans, that great city, so decisive by its fate for the issue of the +war, and then beleaguered by the English with an elaborate application +of engineering skill unprecedented in Europe. Entering the city after +sunset on the 29th of April, she sang mass on Sunday, May 8th, for the +entire disappearance of the besieging force. On the 29th of June she +fought and gained over the English the decisive battle of Patay; on the +9th of July she took Troyes by a _coup-de-main_ from a mixed +garrison of English and Burgundians; on the 15th of that month she +carried the dauphin into Rheims; on Sunday the 17th she crowned him; +and there she rested from her labour of triumph. All that was to be +_done_ she had now accomplished; what remained was--to +_suffer_. + +All this forward movement was her own; excepting one man, the whole +council was against her. Her enemies were all that drew power from +earth. Her supporters were her own strong enthusiasm, and the headlong +contagion by which she carried this sublime frenzy into the hearts of +women, of soldiers, and of all who lived by labour. Henceforward she +was thwarted; and the worst error that she committed was to lend the +sanction of her presence to counsels which she had ceased to approve. +But she had now accomplished the capital objects which her own visions +had dictated. These involved all the rest. Errors were now less +important; and doubtless it had now become more difficult for herself +to pronounce authentically what _were_ errors. The noble girl had +achieved, as by a rapture of motion, the capital end of clearing out a +free space around her sovereign, giving him the power to move his arms +with effect, and, secondly, the inappreciable end of winning for that +sovereign what seemed to all France the heavenly ratification of his +rights, by crowning him with the ancient solemnities. She had made it +impossible for the English now to step before her. They were caught in +an irretrievable blunder, owing partly to discord among the uncles of +Henry VI, partly to a want of funds, but partly to the very +impossibility which they believed to press with tenfold force upon any +French attempt to forestall theirs. They laughed at such a thought; +and, while they laughed, _she_ did it. Henceforth the single +redress for the English of this capital oversight, but which never +_could_ have redressed it effectually, was to vitiate and taint the +coronation of Charles VII as the work of a witch. That policy, and not +malice (as M. Michelet is so happy to believe), was the moving +principle in the subsequent prosecution of Joanna. Unless they unhinged +the force of the first coronation in the popular mind by associating it +with power given from hell, they felt that the sceptre of the invader +was broken. + +But she, the child that, at nineteen, had wrought wonders so great for +France, was she not elated? Did she not lose, as men so often +_have_ lost, all sobriety of mind when standing upon the pinnacle +of success so giddy? Let her enemies declare. During the progress of +her movement, and in the centre of ferocious struggles, she had +manifested the temper of her feelings by the pity which she had +everywhere expressed for the suffering enemy. She forwarded to the +English leaders a touching invitation to unite with the French, as +brothers, in a common crusade against infidels--thus opening the road +for a soldierly retreat. She interposed to protect the captive or the +wounded; she mourned over the excesses of her countrymen; she threw +herself off her horse to kneel by the dying English soldier, and to +comfort him with such ministrations, physical or spiritual, as his +situation allowed. "Nolebat," says the evidence, "uti ense suo, aut +quemquam interficere." She sheltered the English that invoked her aid +in her own quarters. She wept as she beheld, stretched on the field of +battle, so many brave enemies that had died without confession. And, as +regarded herself, her elation expressed itself thus: on the day when +she had finished her work, she wept; for she knew that, when her +_triumphal_ task was done, her end must be approaching. Her +aspirations pointed only to a place which seemed to her more than +usually full of natural piety, as one in which it would give her +pleasure to die. And she uttered, between smiles and tears, as a wish +that inexpressibly fascinated her heart, and yet was half fantastic, a +broken prayer that God would return her to the solitudes from which he +had drawn her, and suffer her to become a shepherdess once more. It was +a natural prayer, because nature has laid a necessity upon every human +heart to seek for rest and to shrink from torment. Yet, again, it was a +half-fantastic prayer, because, from childhood upward, visions that she +had no power to mistrust, and the voices which sounded in her ear for +ever, had long since persuaded her mind that for _her_ no such +prayer could be granted. Too well she felt that her mission must be +worked out to the end, and that the end was now at hand. All went wrong +from this time. She herself had created the _funds_ out of which +the French restoration should grow; but she was not suffered to witness +their development or their prosperous application. More than one +military plan was entered upon which she did not approve. But she still +continued to expose her person as before. Severe wounds had not taught +her caution. And at length, in a sortie from Compiègne (whether through +treacherous collusion on the part of her own friends is doubtful to +this day), she was made prisoner by the Burgundians, and finally +surrendered to the English. + +Now came her trial. This trial, moving of course under English +influence, was conducted in chief by the Bishop of Beauvais. He was a +Frenchman, sold to English interests, and hoping, by favour of the +English leaders, to reach the highest preferment. "Bishop that art, +Archbishop that shalt be, Cardinal that mayest be," were the words that +sounded continually in his ear; and doubtless a whisper of visions +still higher, of a triple crown, and feet upon the necks of kings, +sometimes stole into his heart. M. Michelet is anxious to keep us in +mind that this bishop was but an agent of the English. True. But it +does not better the case for his countryman that, being an accomplice +in the crime, making himself the leader in the persecution against the +helpless girl, he was willing to be all this in the spirit, and with +the conscious vileness of a cat's-paw. Never from the foundations of +the earth was there such a trial as this, if it were laid open in all +its beauty of defence and all its hellishness of attack. Oh, child of +France! shepherdess, peasant girl! trodden under foot by all around +thee, how I honour thy flashing intellect, quick as God's lightning, +and true as God's lightning to its mark, that ran before France and +laggard Europe by many a century, confounding the malice of the +ensnarer, and making dumb the oracles of falsehood! Is it not +scandalous, is it not humiliating to civilization, that, even at this +day, France exhibits the horrid spectacle of judges examining the +prisoner against himself; seducing him, by fraud, into treacherous +conclusions against his own head; using the terrors of their power for +extorting confessions from the frailty of hope; nay (which is worse), +using the blandishments of condescension and snaky kindness for thawing +into compliances of gratitude those whom they had failed to freeze into +terror? Wicked judges! barbarian jurisprudence!--that, sitting in your +own conceit on the summits of social wisdom, have yet failed to learn +the first principles of criminal justice--sit ye humbly and with +docility at the feet of this girl from Domrémy, that tore your webs of +cruelty into shreds and dust. "Would you examine me as a witness +against myself?" was the question by which many times she defied their +arts. Continually she showed that their interrogations were irrelevant +to any business before the court, or that entered into the ridiculous +charges against her. General questions were proposed to her on points +of casuistical divinity; two-edged questions, which not one of +themselves could have answered, without, on the one side, landing +himself in heresy (as then interpreted), or, on the other, in some +presumptuous expression of self-esteem. Next came a wretched Dominican, +that pressed her with an objection, which, if applied to the Bible, +would tax every one of its miracles with unsoundness. The monk had the +excuse of never having read the Bible. M. Michelet has no such excuse; +and it makes one blush for him, as a philosopher, to find him +describing such an argument as "weighty," whereas it is but a varied +expression of rude Mahometan metaphysics. Her answer to this, if there +were room to place the whole in a clear light, was as shattering as it +was rapid. Another thought to entrap her by asking what language the +angelic visitors of her solitude had talked--as though heavenly +counsels could want polyglot interpreters for every word, or that God +needed language at all in whispering thoughts to a human heart. Then +came a worse devil, who asked her whether the Archangel Michael had +appeared naked. Not comprehending the vile insinuation, Joanna, whose +poverty suggested to her simplicity that it might be the _costliness_ +of suitable robes which caused the demur, asked them if they fancied +God, who clothed the flowers of the valleys, unable to find raiment for +his servants. The answer of Joanna moves a smile of tenderness, but the +disappointment of her judges makes one laugh exultingly. Others +succeeded by troops, who upbraided her with leaving her father; as if +that greater Father, whom she believed herself to have been serving, +did not retain the power of dispensing with his own rules, or had not +said that for a less cause than martyrdom man and woman should leave +both father and mother. + +On Easter Sunday, when the trial had been long proceeding, the poor +girl fell so ill as to cause a belief that she had been poisoned. It +was not poison. Nobody had any interest in hastening a death so +certain. M. Michelet, whose sympathies with all feelings are so quick +that one would gladly see them always as justly directed, reads the +case most truly. Joanna had a twofold malady. She was visited by a +paroxysm of the complaint called _homesickness_. The cruel nature +of her imprisonment, and its length, could not but point her solitary +thoughts, in darkness and in chains (for chained she was), to Domrémy. +And the season, which was the most heavenly period of the spring, added +stings to this yearning. That was one of her maladies--_nostalgia_, +as medicine calls it; the other was weariness and exhaustion from daily +combats with malice. She saw that everybody hated her and thirsted for +her blood; nay, many kind-hearted creatures that would have pitied her +profoundly, as regarded all political charges, had their natural +feelings warped by the belief that she had dealings with fiendish +powers. She knew she was to die; that was _not_ the misery! the +misery was that this consummation could not be reached without so much +intermediate strife, as if she were contending for some chance (where +chance was none) of happiness, or were dreaming for a moment of +escaping the inevitable. Why, then, _did_ she contend? Knowing that +she would reap nothing from answering her persecutors, why did she not +retire by silence from the superfluous contest? It was because her +quick and eager loyalty to truth would not suffer her to see it +darkened by frauds which _she_ could expose, but others, even of +candid listeners, perhaps, could not; it was through that imperishable +grandeur of soul which taught her to submit meekly and without a +struggle to her punishment, but taught her _not_ to submit--no, not +for a moment--to calumny as to facts, or to misconstruction as to +motives. Besides, there were secretaries all around the court taking +down her words. That was meant for no good to _her_. But the end +does not always correspond to the meaning. And Joanna might say to +herself, "These words that will be used against me to-morrow and the +next day, perhaps, in some nobler generation, may rise again for my +justification." Yes, Joanna, they _are_ rising even now in Paris, +and for more than justification! + +Woman, sister, there are some things which you do not execute as well +as your brother, man; no, nor ever will. Pardon me if I doubt whether +you will ever produce a great poet from your choirs, or a Mozart, or a +Phidias, or a Michael Angelo, or a great philosopher, or a great +scholar. By which last is meant--not one who depends simply on an +infinite memory, but also on an infinite and electrical power of +combination; bringing together from the four winds, like the angel of +the resurrection, what else were dust from dead men's bones, into the +unity of breathing life. If you _can_ create yourselves into any of +these great creators, why have you not? + +Yet, sister woman, though I cannot consent to find a Mozart or a +Michael Angelo in your sex, cheerfully, and with the love that burns in +depths of admiration, I acknowledge that you can do one thing as well +as the best of us men--a greater thing than even Milton is known to +have done, or Michael Angelo; you can die grandly, and as goddesses +would die, were goddesses mortal. If any distant worlds (which +_may_ be the case) are so far ahead of us Tellurians in optical +resources as to see distinctly through their telescopes all that we do +on earth, what is the grandest sight to which we ever treat them? St. +Peter's at Rome, do you fancy, on Easter Sunday, or Luxor, or perhaps +the Himalayas? Oh, no! my friend; suggest something better; these are +baubles to _them_; they see in other worlds, in their own, far +better toys of the same kind. These, take my word for it, are nothing. +Do you give it up? The finest thing, then, we have to show them is a +scaffold on the morning of execution. I assure you there is a strong +muster in those far telescopic worlds, on any such morning, of those +who happen to find themselves occupying the right hemisphere for a peep +at _us_. How, then, if it be announced in some such telescopic +world by those who make a livelihood of catching glimpses at our +newspapers, whose language they have long since deciphered, that the +poor victim in the morning's sacrifice is a woman? How, if it be +published in that distant world that the sufferer wears upon her head, +in the eyes of many, the garlands of martyrdom? How, if it should be +some Marie Antoinette, the widowed queen, coming forward on the +scaffold, and presenting to the morning air her head, turned gray by +sorrow--daughter of Caesars kneeling down humbly to kiss the +guillotine, as one that worships death? How, if it were the noble +Charlotte Corday, that in the bloom of youth, that with the loveliest +of persons, that with homage waiting upon her smiles wherever she +turned her face to scatter them--homage that followed those smiles as +surely as the carols of birds, after showers in spring, follow the +reappearing sun and the racing of sunbeams over the hills--yet thought +all these things cheaper than the dust upon her sandals, in comparison +of deliverance from hell for her dear suffering France! Ah! these were +spectacles indeed for those sympathising people in distant worlds; and +some, perhaps, would suffer a sort of martyrdom themselves, because +they could not testify their wrath, could not bear witness to the +strength of love and to the fury of hatred that burned within them at +such scenes, could not gather into golden urns some of that glorious +dust which rested in the catacombs of earth. + +On the Wednesday after Trinity Sunday in 1431, being then about +nineteen years of age, the Maid of Arc underwent her martyrdom. She was +conducted before mid-day, guarded by eight hundred spearmen, to a +platform of prodigious height, constructed of wooden billets supported +by occasional walls of lath and plaster, and traversed by hollow spaces +in every direction for the creation of air currents. The pile "struck +terror," says M. Michelet, "by its height"; and, as usual, the English +purpose in this is viewed as one of pure malignity. But there are two +ways of explaining all that. It is probable that the purpose was +merciful. On the circumstances of the execution I shall not linger. +Yet, to mark the almost fatal felicity of M. Michelet in finding out +whatever may injure the English name, at a moment when every reader +will be interested in Joanna's personal appearance, it is really +edifying to notice the ingenuity by which he draws into light from a +dark corner a very unjust account of it, and neglects, though lying +upon the highroad, a very pleasing one. Both are from English pens. +Grafton, a chronicler, but little read, being a stiff-necked John Bull, +thought fit to say that no wonder Joanna should be a virgin, since her +"foule face" was a satisfactory solution of that particular merit. +Holinshead, on the other hand, a chronicler somewhat later, every way +more important, and at one time universally read, has given a very +pleasing testimony to the interesting character of Joanna's person and +engaging manners. Neither of these men lived till the following +century, so that personally this evidence is none at all. Grafton +sullenly and carelessly believed as he wished to believe; Holinshead +took pains to inquire, and reports undoubtedly the general impression +of France. But I cite the case as illustrating M. Michelet's candour. +[Footnote: Amongst the many ebullitions of M. Michelet's fury against +us poor English are four which will be likely to amuse the reader; and +they are the more conspicuous in collision with the justice which he +sometimes does us, and the very indignant admiration which, under some +aspects, he grants to us. 1. Our English literature he admires with +some gnashing of teeth. He pronounces it "fine and sombre," but, I +lament to add, "skeptical, Judaic, Satanic--in a word, antichristian." +That Lord Byron should figure as a member of this diabolical +corporation will not surprise men. It _will_ surprise them to hear +that Milton is one of its Satanic leaders. Many are the generous and +eloquent Frenchmen, besides Chateaubriand, who have, in the course of +the last thirty years, nobly suspended their own burning nationality, +in order to render a more rapturous homage at the feet of Milton; and +some of them have raised Milton almost to a level with angelic natures. +Not one of them has thought of looking for him _below_ the earth. +As to Shakspere, M. Michelet detects in him a most extraordinary mare's +nest. It is this: he does "not recollect to have seen the name of God" +in any part of his works. On reading such words, it is natural to rub +one's eyes, and suspect that all one has ever seen in this world may +have been a pure ocular delusion. In particular, I begin myself to +suspect that the word "_la gloire_" never occurs in any Parisian +journal. "The great English nation," says M. Michelet, "has one immense +profound vice"--to wit, "pride." Why, really, that may be true; but we +have a neighbour not absolutely clear of an "immense profound vice," as +like ours in colour and shape as cherry to cherry. In short, M. +Michelet thinks us, by fits and starts, admirable--only that we are +detestable; and he would adore some of our authors, were it not that so +intensely he could have wished to kick them. + +2. M. Michelet thinks to lodge an arrow in our sides by a very odd +remark upon Thomas à Kempis: which is, that a man of any conceivable +European blood--a Finlander, suppose, or a Zantiote--might have written +Tom; only not an Englishman. Whether an Englishman could have forged +Tom must remain a matter of doubt, unless the thing had been tried long +ago. That problem was intercepted for ever by Tom's perverseness in +choosing to manufacture himself. Yet, since nobody is better aware than +M. Michelet that this very point of Kempis _having_ manufactured +Kempis is furiously and hopelessly litigated, three or four nations +claiming to have forged his work for him, the shocking old doubt will +raise its snaky head once more--whether this forger, who rests in so +much darkness, might not, after all, be of English blood. Tom, it may +be feared, is known to modern English literature chiefly by an +irreverent mention of his name in a line of Peter Pindar's (Dr Wolcot) +fifty years back, where he is described as + + "Kempis Tom, + Who clearly shows the way to Kingdom Come" + +Few in these days can have read him, unless in the Methodist version of +John Wesley Among those few, however, happens to be myself, which arose +from the accident of having, when a boy of eleven, received a copy of +the "De Imitatione Christi" as a bequest from a relation who died very +young, from which cause, and from the external prettiness of the book-- +being a Glasgow reprint by the celebrated Foulis, and gaily bound--I +was induced to look into it, and finally read it many times over, +partly out of some sympathy which, even in those days, I had with its +simplicity and devotional fervour, but much more from the savage +delight I found in laughing at Tom's Latinity that, I freely grant to M +Michelet, is inimitable. Yet, after all, it is not certain whether the +original _was_ Latin. But, however that may have been, if it is +possible that M Michelet [Footnote: "_If M. Michelet can be +accurate_"--However, on consideration, this statement does not depend +on Michelet. The bibliographer Barbier has absolutely _specified_ +sixty in a separate dissertation, _soixante traductions_ among +those even that have not escaped the search. The Italian translations +are said to be thirty. As to mere editions, not counting the early MSS. +for half a century before printing was introduced, those in Latin +amount to 2000, and those in French to 1000. Meantime it is very clear +to me that this astonishing popularity so entirely unparalleled in +literature, could not have existed except in Roman Catholic times, nor +subsequently have lingered in any Protestant land. It was the denial of +Scripture fountains to thirsty lands which made this slender rill of +Scripture truth so passionately welcome.] can be accurate in saying +that there are no less than sixty French versions (not editions, +observe, but separate versions) existing of the "De Imitatione," how +prodigious must have been the adaptation of the book to the religious +heart of the fifteenth century! Excepting the Bible, but excepting +_that_ only in Protestant lands, no book known to man has had the +same distinction. It is the most marvellous bibliographical fact on +record. + +3. Our English girls, it seems, are as faulty in one way as we English +males in another. None of us men could have written the _Opera +Omnia_ of Mr. à Kempis; neither could any of our girls have assumed +male attire like La Pucelle. But why? Because, says Michelet, English +girls and German think so much of an indecorum. Well, that is a good +fault, generally speaking. But M. Michelet ought to have remembered a +fact in the martyrologies which justifies both parties--the French +heroine for doing, and the general choir of English girls for _not_ +doing. A female saint, specially renowned in France, had, for a reason +as weighty as Joanna's--viz., expressly to shield her modesty among +men--worn a male military harness. That reason and that example +authorised La Pucelle; but our English girls, as a body, have seldom +any such reason, and certainly no such saintly example, to plead. This +excuses _them_. Yet, still, if it is indispensable to the national +character that our young women should now and then trespass over the +frontier of decorum, it then becomes a patriotic duty in me to assure +M. Michelet that we _have_ such ardent females among us, and in a +long series; some detected in naval hospitals when too sick to remember +their disguise; some on fields of battle; multitudes never detected at +all; some only suspected; and others discharged without noise by war +offices and other absurd people. In our navy, both royal and +commercial, and generally from deep remembrances of slighted love, +women have sometimes served in disguise for many years, taking +contentedly their daily allowance of burgoo, biscuit, or cannon-balls-- +anything, in short, digestible or indigestible, that it might please +Providence to send. One thing, at least, is to their credit: never any +of these poor masks, with their deep silent remembrances, have been +detected through murmuring, or what is nautically understood by +"skulking." So, for once, M. Michelet has an _erratum_ to enter +upon the fly-leaf of his book in presentation copies. + +4. But the last of these ebullitions is the most lively. We English, at +Orleans, and after Orleans (which is not quite so extraordinary, if all +were told), fled before the Maid of Arc. Yes, says M. Michelet, you +_did_: deny it, if you can. Deny it, _mon cher_? I don't mean +to deny it. Running away, in many cases, is a thing so excellent that +no philosopher would, at times, condescend to adopt any other step. All +of us nations in Europe, without one exception, have shown our +philosophy in that way at times. Even people "_qui ne se rendent +pas_" have deigned both to run and to shout, "_Sauve qui peut_!" +at odd times of sunset; though, for my part, I have no pleasure in +recalling unpleasant remembrances to brave men; and yet, really, being +so philosophic, they ought _not_ to be unpleasant. But the amusing +feature in M. Michelet's reproach is the way in which he _improves_ +and varies against us the charge of running, as if he were singing a +catch. Listen to him: They "_showed their backs_" did these +English. (Hip, hip, hurrah! three times three!) "_Behind good walls +they let themselves be taken_." (Hip, hip! nine times nine!) They +"_ran as fast as their legs could carry them_" (Hurrah! twenty- +seven times twenty-seven!) They "_ran before a girl_"; they did. +(Hurrah! eighty-one times eighty-one!) This reminds one of criminal +indictments on the old model in English courts, where (for fear the +prisoner should escape) the crown lawyer varied the charge perhaps +through forty counts. The law laid its guns so as to rake the accused +at every possible angle. While the indictment was reading, he seemed a +monster of crime in his own eyes; and yet, after all, the poor fellow +had but committed one offence, and not always _that_. N. B.--Not +having the French original at hand, I make my quotations from a +friend's copy of Mr. Walter Kelly's translation; which seems to me +faithful, spirited, and idiomatically English--liable, in fact, only to +the single reproach of occasional provincialisms.] + +The circumstantial incidents of the execution, unless with more space +than I can now command, I should be unwilling to relate. I should fear +to injure, by imperfect report, a martyrdom which to myself appears so +unspeakably grand. Yet, for a purpose, pointing not at Joanna, but at +M. Michelet--viz, to convince him that an Englishman is capable of +thinking more highly of La Pucelle than even her admiring countrymen--I +shall, in parting, allude to one or two traits in Joanna's demeanour on +the scaffold, and to one or two in that of the bystanders, which +authorise me in questioning an opinion of his upon this martyr's +firmness. The reader ought to be reminded that Joanna D'Arc was +subjected to an unusually unfair trial of opinion. Any of the elder +Christian martyrs had not much to fear of _personal_ rancour. The +martyr was chiefly regarded as the enemy of Cæsar; at times, also, +where any knowledge of the Christian faith and morals existed, with the +enmity that arises spontaneously in the worldly against the spiritual. +But the martyr, though disloyal, was not supposed to be therefore anti- +national; and still less was _individually_ hateful. What was hated +(if anything) belonged to his class, not to himself separately. Now, +Joanna, if hated at all, was hated personally, and in Rouen on national +grounds. Hence there would be a certainty of calumny arising against +_her_ such as would not affect martyrs in general. That being the +case, it would follow of necessity that some people would impute to her +a willingness to recant. No innocence could escape _that_. Now, had +she really testified this willingness on the scaffold, it would have +argued nothing at all but the weakness of a genial nature shrinking +from the instant approach of torment. And those will often pity that +weakness most who, in their own persons, would yield to it least. +Meantime, there never was a calumny uttered that drew less support from +the recorded circumstances. It rests upon no _positive_ testimony, +and it has a weight of contradicting testimony to stem. And yet, +strange to say, M, Michelet, who at times seems to admire the Maid of +Arc as much as I do, is the one sole writer among her _friends_ who +lends some countenance to this odious slander. His words are that, if +she did not utter this word _recant_ with her lips, she uttered it +in her heart. "Whether she _said_ the word is uncertain; but I +affirm that she _thought_ it." + +Now, I affirm that she did not; not in any sense of the word +"_thought_" applicable to the case. Here is France calumniating La +Pucelle; here is England defending her. M. Michelet can only mean that, +on _a priori_ principles, every woman must be presumed liable to +such a weakness; that Joanna was a woman; _ergo_, that she was +liable to such a weakness. That is, he only supposes her to have +uttered the word by an argument which presumes it impossible for +anybody to have done otherwise. I, on the contrary, throw the onus of +the argument not on presumable tendencies of nature, but on the known +facts of that morning's execution, as recorded by multitudes. What +else, I demand, than mere weight of metal, absolute nobility of +deportment, broke the vast line of battle then arrayed against her? +What else but her meek, saintly demeanour won, from the enemies that +till now had believed her a witch, tears of rapturous admiration? "Ten +thousand men," says M. Michelet himself--"ten thousand men wept"; and +of these ten thousand the majority were political enemies knitted +together by cords of superstition. What else was it but her constancy, +united with her angelic gentleness, that drove the fanatic English +soldier--who had sworn to throw a fagot on her scaffold as _his_ +tribute of abhorrence, that _did_ so, that fulfilled his vow-- +suddenly to turn away a penitent for life, saying everywhere that he +had seen a dove rising upon wings to heaven from the ashes where she +had stood? What else drove the executioner to kneel at every shrine for +pardon to _his_ share in the tragedy? And, if all this were +insufficient, then I cite the closing act of her life as valid on her +behalf, were all other testimonies against her. The executioner had +been directed to apply his torch from below. He did so. The fiery smoke +rose upward in billowing volumes. A Dominican monk was then standing +almost at her side. Wrapped up in his sublime office, he saw not the +danger, but still persisted in his prayers. Even then, when the last +enemy was racing up the fiery stairs to seize her, even at that moment +did this noblest of girls think only for _him_, the one friend that +would not forsake her, and not for herself; bidding him with her last +breath to care for his own preservation, but to leave _her_ to God. +That girl, whose latest breath ascended in this sublime expression of +self-oblivion, did not utter the word _recant_ either with her lips or +in her heart. No; she did not, though one should rise from the dead to +swear it. + + * * * * * + +Bishop of Beauvais! thy victim died in fire upon a scaffold--thou upon +a down bed. But, for the departing minutes of life, both are oftentimes +alike. At the farewell crisis, when the gates of death are opening, and +flesh is resting from its struggles, oftentimes the tortured and the +torturer have the same truce from carnal torment; both sink together +into sleep; together both sometimes kindle into dreams. When the mortal +mists were gathering fast upon you two, bishop and shepherd girl--when +the pavilions of life were closing up their shadowy curtains about you +--let us try, through the gigantic glooms, to decipher the flying +features of your separate visions. + +The shepherd girl that had delivered France--she, from her dungeon, +she, from her baiting at the stake, she, from her duel with fire, as +she entered her last dream--saw Domrémy, saw the fountain of Domrémy, +saw the pomp of forests in which her childhood had wandered. That +Easter festival which man had denied to her languishing heart--that +resurrection of springtime, which the darkness of dungeons had +intercepted from _her_, hungering after the glorious liberty of +forests--were by God given back into her hands as jewels that had been +stolen from her by robbers. With those, perhaps (for the minutes of +dreams can stretch into ages), was given back to her by God the bliss +of childhood. By special privilege for _her_ might be created, in +this farewell dream, a second childhood, innocent as the first; but +not, like _that_, sad with the gloom of a fearful mission in the +rear. This mission had now been fulfilled. The storm was weathered; the +skirts even of that mighty storm were drawing off. The blood that she +was to reckon for had been exacted; the tears that she was to shed in +secret had been paid to the last. The hatred to herself in all eyes had +been faced steadily, had been suffered, had been survived. And in her +last fight upon the scaffold she had triumphed gloriously; victoriously +she had tasted the stings of death. For all, except this comfort from +her farewell dream, she had died--died amid the tears of ten thousand +enemies--died amid the drums and trumpets of armies--died amid peals +redoubling upon peals, volleys upon volleys, from the saluting clarions +of martyrs. + +Bishop of Beauvais! because the guilt-burdened man is in dreams haunted +and waylaid by the most frightful of his crimes, and because upon that +fluctuating mirror--rising (like the mocking mirrors of _mirage_ in +Arabian deserts) from the fens of death-most of all are reflected the +sweet countenances which the man has laid in ruins; therefore I know, +bishop, that you also, entering your final dream, saw Domrémy. That +fountain, of which the witnesses spoke so much, showed itself to your +eyes in pure morning dews; but neither dews, nor the holy dawn, could +cleanse away the bright spots of innocent blood upon its surface. By +the fountain, bishop, you saw a woman seated, that hid her face. But, +as _you_ draw near, the woman raises her wasted features. Would +Domrémy know them again for the features of her child? Ah, but _you_ +know them, bishop, well! Oh, mercy! what a groan was _that_ which the +servants, waiting outside the bishop's dream at his bedside, heard from +his labouring heart, as at this moment he turned away from the fountain +and the woman, seeking rest in the forests afar off. Yet not _so_ to +escape the woman, whom once again he must behold before he dies. In the +forests to which he prays for pity, will he find a respite? What a +tumult, what a gathering of feet is there! In glades where only wild +deer should run armies and nations are assembling; towering in the +fluctuating crowd are phantoms that belong to departed hours. There is +the great English Prince, Regent of France. There is my Lord of +Winchester, the princely cardinal, that died and made no sign. There is +the bishop of Beauvais, clinging to the shelter of thickets. What +building is that which hands so rapid are raising? Is it a martyr's +scaffold? Will they burn the child of Domrémy a second time? No; it is +a tribunal that rises to the clouds; and two nations stand around it, +waiting for a trial. Shall my Lord of Beauvais sit again upon the +judgment-seat, and again number the hours for the innocent? Ah, no! he +is the prisoner at the bar. Already all is waiting: the mighty audience +is gathered, the Court is hurrying to their seats, the witnesses are +arrayed, the trumpets are sounding, the judge is taking his place. Oh, +but this is sudden! My lord, have you no counsel? "Counsel I have none; +in heaven above, or on earth beneath, counsellor there is none now that +would take a brief from _me_: all are silent." Is it, indeed, come to +this? Alas! the time is short, the tumult is wondrous, the crowd +stretches away into infinity; but yet I will search in it for somebody +to take your brief; I know of somebody that will be your counsel. Who +is this that cometh from Domrémy? Who is she in bloody coronation robes +from Rheims? Who is she that cometh with blackened flesh from walking +the furnaces of Rouen? This is she, the shepherd girl, counsellor that +had none for herself, whom I choose, bishop, for yours. She it is, I +engage, that shall take my lord's brief. She it is, bishop, that would +plead for you; yes, bishop, _she_--when heaven and earth are silent. + + + + +NOTES + +THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH + + +"In October 1849 there appeared in _Blackwood's Magazine_ an +article entitled _The English Mail-Coach, or the Glory of Motion_. +There was no intimation that it was to be continued; but in December +1849 there followed in the same magazine an article in two sections, +headed by a paragraph explaining that it was by the author of the +previous article in the October number, and was to be taken in +connexion with that article. One of the sections of this second article +was entitled _The Vision of Sudden Death_, and the other _Dream- +Fugue on the above theme of Sudden Death_. When De Quincey revised +the papers in 1854 for republication in volume iv of the Collective +Edition of his writings, he brought the whole under the one general +title of _The English Mail-Coach_, dividing the text, as at +present, into three sections or chapters, the first with the sub-title +_The Glory of Motion_, the second with the sub-title _The Vision +of Sudden Death_, and the third with the sub-title _Dream-Fugue, +founded on the preceding theme of Sudden Death_. Great care was +bestowed on the revision. Passages that had appeared in the magazine +articles were omitted; new sentences were inserted; and the language +was retouched throughout."--MASSON. Cf. as to the revision, Professor +Dowden's article, "How De Quincey worked," _Saturday Review_, Feb. +23, 1895. This selection is found in _Works_, Masson's ed., Vol. +XIII, pp. 270-327; Riverside ed., Vol. I, pp. 517-582. + +1 6 HE HAD MARRIED THE DAUGHTER OF A DUKE: "Mr. John Palmer, a native +of Bath, and from about 1768 the energetic proprietor of the Theatre +Royal in that city, had been led, by the wretched state in those days +of the means of intercommunication between Bath and London, wand his +own consequent difficulties in arranging for a punctual succession of +good actors at his theatre, to turn his attention to the improvement of +the whole system of Post-Office conveyance, and of locomotive machinery +generally, in the British Islands. The result was a scheme for +superseding, on the great roads at least, the then existing system of +sluggish and irregular stage-coaches, the property of private persons +and companies, by a new system of government coaches, in connexion with +the Post-Office, carrying the mails and also a regulated number of +passengers, with clockwork precision, at a rate of comparative speed, +which he hoped should ultimately be not less than ten miles an hour. +The opposition to the scheme was, of course, enormous; coach +proprietors, innkeepers, the Post-Office officials themselves, were all +against Mr. Palmer; he was voted a crazy enthusiast and a public bore. +Pitt, however, when the scheme was submitted to him, recognized its +feasibility; on the 8th of August 1784 the first mail-coach on Mr. +Palmer's plan started from London at 8 o'clock in the morning and +reached Bristol at 11 o'clock at night; and from that day the success +of the new system was assured.--Mr. Palmer himself, having been +appointed Surveyor and Comptroller-General of the Post-Office, took +rank as an eminent and wealthy public man, M. P. for Bath and what not, +and lived till 1818. De Quincey makes it one of his distinctions that +he "had married the daughter of a duke," and in a footnote to that +paragraph he gives the lady's name as "Lady Madeline Gordon." From an +old Debrett, however, I learn that Lady Madelina Gordon, second +daughter of Alexander, fourth Duke of Gordon, was first married, on the +3d of April 1789, to Sir Robert Sinclair, Bart., and next, on the 25th +of November 1805, to _Charles Palmer, of Lockley Park, Berks, Esq._ +If Debrett is right, her second husband was not John Palmer of Mail- +Coach celebrity, and De Quincey is wrong."--MASSON. + +1 (footnote) INVENTION OF THE CROSS: Concerning the _Inventio sanctae +crucis_, see Smith, _Dictionary of Christian Antiquities_, Vol. +I, p. 503. + +2 4 NATIONAL RESULT: Cf. De Quincey's paper on _Travelling, Works,_ +Riverside ed., Vol. II, especially pp. 313-314; Masson's ed., Vol. I, +especially pp. 270-271. + +3 13 THE FOUR TERMS OF MICHAELMAS, LENT, EASTER, AND ACT: These might +be called respectively the autumn, winter, spring, and summer terms. +Michaelmas, the feast of St. Michael and All Angels, is on September +29. Hilary and Trinity are other names for Lent term and Act term +respectively. Act term is the last term of the academic year; its name +is that originally given to a disputation for a Master's degree; such +disputations took place at the end of the year generally, and hence +gave a name to the summer term. Although the rules concerning residence +at Oxford are more stringent than in De Quincey's time, only eighteen +weeks' residence is required during the year, six in Michaelmas, six in +Lent, and six in Easter and Act. + +3 17 GOING DOWN: Cf. "Going down with victory," i.e. from London into +the country. + +3 30 POSTING-HOUSES: inns where relays of horses were furnished for +coaches and carriages. Cf. De Quincey on _Travelling, loc. cit._ + +4 3 AN OLD TRADITION... from the reign of Charles II: Then no one sat +outside; later, outside places were taken by servants, and were quite +cheap. + +4 9 ATTAINT THE FOOT: The word is used in its legal sense. The blood of +one convicted of high treason is "attaint," and his deprivations extend +to his descendants, unless Parliament remove the attainder. + +4 14 PARIAHS: The fate of social outcasts seems to have taken early and +strong hold upon De Quincey's mind; one of the _Suspiria_ was to +have enlarged upon this theme. Strictly speaking, the Pariahs is that +one of the lower castes of Hindoo society of which foreigners have seen +most; it is not in all districts the lowest caste, however. + +5 6 OBJECTS NOT APPEARING, ETC.: _De non apparentibus et non +existentibus eadem est lex_, a Roman legal phrase. + +5 16 "SNOBS": Apparently snob originally meant "shoemaker"; then, in +university cant, a "townsman" as opposed to a "gownsman." Cf. _Gradus +ad Cantabrigiam_ (1824), quoted in _Century Dictionary_: "_Snobs_.--A +term applied indiscriminately to all who have not the honour of being +members of the university; but in a more particular manner to the +'profanum vulgus,' the tag-rag and bob-tail, who vegetate on the sedgy +banks of Camus." This use is in De Quincey's mind. Later, in the +strikes of that time, the workmen who accepted lower wages were called +_snobs_; those who held out for higher, _nobs_. + +7 33 FO FO... FI FI: "This paragraph is a caricature of a story told in +Staunton's Account of the Earl of Macartney's Embassy to China in +1792."--MASSON. + +8 4 ÇA IRA ("This will do," "This is the go"): "a proverb of the French +Revolutionists when they were hanging the aristocrats in the streets, +&c., and the burden of one of the most popular revolutionary songs, 'Ça +ira, ça ira, ça ira.'"--MASSON. + +8 18 ALL MORALITY,--ARISTOTLE'S, ZENO'S, CICERO'S: Each of these three +has a high place in the history of ethical teaching. Aristotle wrote +the so-called _Nicomachean Ethics_. According to his teaching, +"ethical virtue is that permanent direction of the will which guards +the mean [_to méson_] proper for us... Bravery is the mean between +cowardice and temerity; temperance, the mean between inordinate desire +and stupid indifference; etc." (Ueberweg, _History of Philosophy_, +Vol. I, p. 169). Zeno, who died about 264 B.C., founded about 308 the +Stoic sect, which took its name from the "Painted Porch" (_Stoa +poklae_) in the Agora at Athens, where the master taught. The Stoics +held that men should be free from passion, and undisturbed by joy or +grief, submitting themselves uncomplainingly to their fate. Such +austere views are, of course, as far as possible removed from those of +the Eudæmonist, who sought happiness as the end of life. Cicero was +the author of De Officiis, "Of Duties." + +9 9 ASTROLOGICAL SHADOWS: misfortunes due to being born under an +unlucky star; house of life is also an astrological term. + +9 24 VON TROIL'S ICELAND: The Letters on Iceland (Pinkerton's Voyages +and Travels, Vol. I, p. 621), containing Observations ... made during a +Voyage undertaken in the year 1772, by Uno Von Troil, D.D., of +Stockholm, contains no chapter of the kind. Such a chapter had +appeared, however, in N. Horrebow's (Danish, 1758) Natural History of +Iceland: "Chap. LXXII. Concerning snakes. No snakes of any kind are to +be met with throughout the whole island." In Boswell's Johnson, Vol. +IV, p. 314, Temple ed., there is a much more correct allusion, which +may have been in De Quincey's mind: "Langton said very well to me +afterwards, that he could repeat Johnson's conversation before dinner, +as Johnson had said that he could repeat a complete chapter of The +Natural History of Iceland, from the Danish of Horrebow, the whole of +which was exactly thus: 'Chap. LXXII. Concerning Snakes. There are no +snakes to be met with throughout the whole island.'" + +9 25 A PARLIAMENTARY RAT: one who deserts his own party when it is +losing. + +10 16 "JAM PROXIMUS," etc.: Æneid, II, lines 311-312: "Now next (to +Deiphobus' house) Ucalegon (i.e. his house) blazes!" + +11 27 QUARTERINGS: See p. 47, footnote, and note 47 2. + +11 32 WITHIN BENEFIT OF CLERGY: Benefit of clergy was, under old +English law, the right of clerics, afterward extended to all who could +read, to plead exemption from trial before a secular judge. This +privilege was first legally recognized in 1274, and was not wholly +abolished until 1827. + +12 9 QUARTER SESSIONS: This court is held in England in the counties by +justices of the peace for the trial of minor criminal offenses and to +administer the poor laws, etc. + +12 26 FALSE ECHOES OF MARENGO: General Desaix was shot through the +heart at the battle of Marengo (June 14, 1800); he died without a word, +and his body was found by Rovigo (cf. Memoirs of the Duke of Rovigo, +London, 1835, Vol. I, p. 181), "stripped of his clothes, and surrounded +by other naked bodies." Napoleon, however, published three different +versions of an heroic and devoted message from Desaix to himself, the +original version being: "Go, tell the First Consul that I die with this +regret,--that I have not done enough for posterity." (Cf. Lanfrey, +History of Napoleon the First, 2d ed., London, 1886, Vol. II, p. 39.) +Napoleon himself was credited likewise with the words De Quincey +adopts. "Why is it not permitted me to weep" is one version (Bussey, +_History of Napoleon_, London, 1840, Vol. I, p. 302). Cf. Hazlitt, +_Life of Napoleon_, 2d ed., London, 1852, Vol. II, p. 317, +footnote. + +12 (footnote) THE CRY OF THE FOUNDERING LINE-OF-BATTLE SHIP "VENGEUR": +On the 1st of June, 1794, the English fleet under Lord Howe defeated +the French under Villaret-Joyeuse, taking six ships and sinking a +seventh, the _Vengeur_. This ship sank, as a matter of fact, with +part of her crew on board, imploring kid which there was not time to +give them. Some two hundred and fifty men had been taken off by the +English; the rest were lost. On the 9th of July Barrere published a +report setting forth "how the _Vengeur_, ... being entirely +disabled, ... refused to strike, though sinking; how the enemies fired +on her, but she returned their fire, shot aloft all her tricolor +streamers, shouted _Vive la République_, ... and so, in this mad +whirlwind of fire and shouting and invincible despair, went down into +the ocean depths; _Vive la République_ and a universal volley from +the upper deck being the last sounds she made." Cf. Carlyle, _Sinking +of the Vengeur_, and _French Revolution, Book_ XVIII, Chap. VI. + +12 (footnote) LA GARDE MEURT, ETC.: "This phrase, attributed to +Cambronne, who was made prisoner at Waterloo, was vehemently denied by +him. It was invented by Rougemont, a prolific author of _mots_, two +days after the battle, in the _Indépendant_."--Fournier's _L'Esprit +dans l'Histoire_, trans. Bartlett, _Familiar Quotations_, p. 661. + +13 25 BRUMMAGEM: Birmingham became early the chief place of manufacture +of cheap wares. Hence the name _Brummagem_, a vulgar pronunciation +of the name of the city, has become in England a common name for cheap, +tawdry jewelry. Cf. also Shakespeare, Richard III, Act I, sc. iv, 1. +55: + + False, fleeting, perjured Clarence. + +13 27 LUXOR occupies part of the site of ancient Thebes, capital of +Egypt; its antiquities are famous. + +14 9 BUT ON OUR SIDE... WAS A TOWER OF MORAL STRENGTH, ETC.: Cf. +Shakespeare, _Richard_ III, Act V, sc. in, 11. 12-13: + + Besides, the king's name is a tower of strength, + Which they upon the adverse party want. + +14 20 FELT MY HEART BURN WITHIN ME: Cf. Luke xxiv. 32. + +14 32 A VERY FINE STORY FROM ONE OF OUR ELDER DRAMATISTS: The dramatist +in question has not been identified. I am indebted indirectly to +Professor W. Strunk, Jr., of Cornell University, for reference to +Johann Caius' Of English Dogs, translated by A. Fleming, in Arber's +English Garner, original edition, Vol. III, p. 253 (new edition, Social +England Illustrated, pp. 28-29), where, after telling how Henry the +Seventh, perceiving that four mastiffs could overcome a lion, ordered +the dogs all hanged, the writer continues: "I read an history +answerable to this, of the selfsame HENRY, who having a notable and an +excellent fair falcon, it fortuned that the King's Falconers, in the +presence and hearing of his Grace, highly commended his Majesty's +Falcon, saying, that it feared not to intermeddle with an eagle, it was +so venturous and so mighty a bird; which when the king heard, he +charged that the falcon should be killed without delay: for the +selfsame reason, as it may seem, which was rehearsed in the conclusion +of the former history concerning the same king." + +15 l OMRAHS... FROM AGRA AND LAHORE: There seems to be a reminiscence +here of Wordsworth's Prelude, Book X, 11. 18-20: + + The Great Mogul, when he + Erewhile went forth from Agra or Lahore, + Rajahs and Omrahs in his train. + +Omrah, which is not found in Century Dictionary, is itself really +plural of Arabic amir (ameer), a commander, nobleman. + +15 23 THE 6TH OF EDWARD LONGSHANKS: a De Quinceyan jest, of course. +This wrould refer to a law of the sixth year of Edward I, or 1278, but +there are but fifteen chapters in the laws of that year. + +16 8 NOT MAGNA LOQUIMUR,... BUT VIVIMUS: not "we speak great things," +but "we live" them. + +17 21 MARLBOROUGH FOREST is twenty-seven miles east of Bath, where De +Quincey attended school. + +18 18 ULYSSES, ETC.: The allusion is, of course, to the slaughter of +the suitors of Penelope, his wife, by Ulysses, after his return. Cf. +Odyssey, Books XXI-XXII. + +19 3 ABOUT WATERLOO: i.e. about 1815. This phrase is one of many that +indicate the deep impression made by this event upon the English mind. +Cf. p. 58. + +19 17 "SAY, ALL OUR PRAISES," ETC.: Cf. Pope, Moral Essays: Epistle +III, Of the Use of Riches, II. 249-250: + + But all our praises why should lords engross, + Rise, honest Muse! and sing the Man of Ross. + +20 3 TURRETS: "Tourettes fyled rounde" appears in Chaucer's Knight's +Tale, 1. 1294, where it means the ring on a dog's collar through which +the leash was passed. Skeat explains _torets_ as "probably eyes in +which rings will turn round, because each eye is a little larger than +the thickness of the ring." Cf. Chaucer's _Treatise on the +Astrolabe_, Part I, sec. 2, "This ring renneth in a maner turet," +"this ring runs in a kind of eye." But Chaucer does not refer to +harness. + +21 2 MR. WATERTON TELLS ME: Charles Waterton, the naturalist, was born +in 1782 and died in 1865. His _Wanderings in South America_ was +published in 1825. + +23 11 EARTH AND HER CHILDREN: This paragraph is about one fifth of the +length of the corresponding paragraph as it appeared in +_Blackwood_. For the longer version see Masson's ed., Vol. XIII, p. +289, note 2. + +24 14 THE GENERAL POST-OFFICE: The present office was opened Sept. 23, +1829. St. Martin's-le-Grand is a church within the "city" of London, so +named to distinguish it from St. Martin's-in-the-Fields, which faces +what is now Trafalgar Square, and is, as the name indicates, outside +the "city." The street takes its name from the church. + +28 10 BARNET is a Hertfordshire village, eleven miles north of London. + +29 33 A "COURIER" EVENING PAPER, CONTAINING THE GAZETTE: A gazette was +originally one of the three official papers of the kingdom; afterwards +any official announcement, as this of a great victory. + +30 17 FEY: This is not a Celtic word; it is the Anglo-Saxon _faege_ +retained in Lowland Scotch, which is the most northerly English +dialect. The word appears frequently in descriptions of battles, the +Anglo-Saxon fatalistic philosophy teaching that, certain warriors +entered the conflict _faege_, "doomed." Now the meaning is altered +slightly: "You are surely fey," would be said in Scotland, as Professor +Masson remarks, to a person observed to be in extravagantly high +spirits, or in any mood surprisingly beyond the bounds of his ordinary +temperament,--the notion being that the excitement is supernatural, and +a presage of his approaching death, or of some other calamity about to +befall him. + +31 27 THE INSPIRATION OF GOD, ETC.: This is an indication--more +interesting than agreeable, perhaps--of the heights to which the +martial ardor of De Quincey's toryism rises. + +33 13 CÆSAR THE DICTATOR, AT HIS LAST DINNER-PARTY, ETC.: related by +Suetonius in his life of Julius Cæsar, Chap. LXXXVII: "The day before +he died, some discourse occurring at dinner in M. Lepidus' house upon +that subject, which was the most agreeable way of dying, he expressed +his preference for what is sudden and unexpected" (repentinum +inopinatumque praetulerat). The story is told by Plutarch and Appian +also. + +35 13 _BIATHANATOS_: "De Quincey has evidently taken this from John +Donne's treatise: _BIATHANATOS, A Declaration of that Paradoxe or +Thesis, That Self-homicide is not so naturally Sin, that it may never +be otherwise_, 1644. See his paper on _Suicide, etc._, Masson's +ed., VIII, 398 [Riverside, IX, 209]. But not even Donne's precedent +justifies the word formation. The only acknowledged compounds are +_biaio-thanasia_, 'violent death,' and _biaio-thanatos_, 'dying +a violent death.' Even _bia thanatos_, 'death by violence,' is not +classical."--HART. But the form _biathanatos_ is older than Donne +and is said to be common in MSS. It should be further remarked that +neither of the two compounds cited is classical. As to De Quincey's +interpretation of Cæsar's meaning here, cf. Merivale's _History of +the Romans under the Empire_, Chap. XXI, where he translates Cæsar's +famous reply: "That which is least expected." Cf. also Shakespeare, +_Julius Cæsar_, Act II, sc. ii, 1. 33. + +37 25 "NATURE, FROM HER SEAT," ETC.: Cf. Milton's _Paradise Lost_, +Book IX, 11. 780-784: + + So saying, her rash hand in evil hour + Forth reaching to the fruit, she pluck'd, she eat: + Earth felt the wound, and Nature from her seat + Sighing through all her works gave signs of woe, + That all was lost. + +38 2 SO SCENICAL, ETC.: De Quincey's love for effects of this sort +appears everywhere. Cf. the opening paragraphs of the _Revolt of the +Tartars_, Masson's ed., Vol. VII; Riverside ed., Vol. XII. + +39 4 JUS DOMINII: "the law of ownership," a legal term. + +39 14 JUS GENTIUM: "the law of nations," a legal term. + +39 30 "MONSTRUM HORRENDUM," ETC..: _Æneid_, III, 658. Polyphemus, +one of the Cyclopes, whose eye was put out by Ulysses, is meant. Cf. +_Odyssey_, IX, 371 et seq.; _Æneid_, III, 630 _et seq_. + +40 1 ONE OF THE CALENDARS, ETC.: The histories of the three Calenders, +sons of kings, will be found in most selections from the _Arabian +Nights_. A Calender is one of an order of Dervishes founded in the +fourteenth century by an Andalusian Arab; they are wanderers who preach +in market places and live by alms. + +40 10 AL SIRAT: According to Mahometan teaching this bridge over Hades +was in width as a sword's edge. Over it souls must pass to Paradise. + +40 12 UNDER THIS EMINENT MAN, ETC.: For these two sentences the +original in _Blackwood_ had this, with its addition of good De +Quinceyan doctrine: "I used to call him _Cyclops Mastigophorus_, +Cyclops the Whip-bearer, until I observed that his skill made whips +useless, except to fetch off an impertinent fly from a leader's head, +upon which I changed his Grecian name to _Cyclops Diphrelates_ +(Cyclops the Charioteer). I, and others known to me, studied under him +the diphrelatic art. Excuse, reader, a word too elegant to be pedantic. +And also take this remark from me as a _gage d'amitié_--that no word +ever was or _can_ be pedantic which, by supporting a distinction, +supports the accuracy of logic, or which fills up a chasm for the +understanding." + +41 1 SOME PEOPLE HAVE CALLED ME PROCRASTINATING: Cf. Page's (Japp's) +_Life_, Chap. XIX, and Japp's _De Quincey Memorials_, Vol. II, +pp. 45,47,49- + +42 11 THE WHOLE PAGAN PANTHEON: i.e. all the gods put together; from +the Greek _Pantheion_, a temple dedicated to all the gods. + +43 2 SEVEN ATMOSPHERES OF SLEEP, ETC.: Professor Hart suggests that De +Quincey is here "indulging in jocular arithmetic. The three nights plus +the three days, plus the present night, equal seven." Dr. Cooper +compares with this a reference to the Seven Sleepers of Ephesus. But it +seems doubtful whether any explanation is necessary. + +43 17 LILLIPUTIAN LANCASTER: the county town of Lancashire, in which +Liverpool and Manchester, towns of recent and far greater growth, are +situated. + +44 (footnote) "Giraldus Cambrensis," or Gerald de Barry (1146-1220), +was a Welsh historian; one of his chief works is the _Itinerarium +Cambrica_, or Voyage in Wales. + +47 2 QUARTERING: De Quincey's derivation of this word in his footnote +is correct, but its use in this French sense is not common. De Quincey, +however, has it above, p. 11. + +49 8 THE SHOUT OF ACHILLES: Cf. Homer, _Iliad_, XVIII, 217 _et +seq_. + +50 10 BUYING IT, ETC.: De Quincey refers, no doubt, to the pay of +common soldiers and to the practice of employing mercenaries. + +52 1 FASTER THAN EVER MILL-RACE, ETC.: the change in the wording of +this sentence in De Quincey's revision is, as Masson remarks, +particularly characteristic of his sense of melody; it read in +_Blackwood_, "We ran past them faster than ever mill-race in our +inexorable flight." + +52 15 HERE WAS THE MAP, ETC.: This sentence is an addition in the +reprint. Masson remarks "how artistically it causes the due pause +between the horror as still in rush of transaction and the backward +look at the wreck when the crash was past." + +53 18 "WHENCE THE SOUND," ETC.: _Paradise Lost_, Book XI, 11. 558- +563. + +54 3 WOMAN'S IONIC FORM: In thus using the word Ionic, De Quincey +doubtless has in mind the character of Ionic architecture, with its +tall and graceful column, differing from the severity of the Doric on +the one hand and from the floridity of the Corinthian on the other. +Probably he is thinking of a caryatid. Cf. the following version of the +old story of the origin of the styles of Greek architecture in +Vitruvius, IV, Chap. I (Gwilt's translation), quoted by Hart: "They +measured a man's foot, and finding its length the sixth part of his +height, they gave the column a similar proportion, that is, they made +its height six times the thickness of the shaft measured at the base. +Thus the Doric order obtained its proportion, its strength, and its +beauty from the human figure. With a similar feeling they afterward +built the Temple of Diana. But in that, seeking a new proportion, they +used the female figure as a standard; and for the purpose of producing +a more lofty effect they first made it eight times its thickness in +height. Under it they placed a base, after the manner of a shoe to the +foot; they also added volutes to its capital, like graceful curling +hair hanging on each side, and the front they ornamented with +_cymatia_ and festoons in the place of hair. On the shafts they +sunk channels, which bear a resemblance to the folds of a matronal +garment. Thus two orders were invented, one of a masculine character, +without ornament, the other bearing a character which resembled the +delicacy, ornament, and proportion of a female. The successors of these +people, improving in taste, and preferring a more slender proportion, +assigned seven diameters to the height of the Doric column, and eight +and a half to the Ionic." + +55 3 CORYMBI: clusters of fruit or flowers. + +55 28 QUARREL: the bolt of a crossbow, an arrow having a square, or +four-edged head (from Middle Latin _quadrellus_, diminutive of +_quadrum_, a square). + +58 20 WATERLOO AND RECOVERED CHRISTENDOM! Cf. note 19 3. + +61 20 THEN A THIRD TIME THE TRUMPET SOUNDED: There are throughout this +passage, as Dr. Cooper remarks, many reminiscences of the language of +the Book of Revelation. Cf. this with Revelation viii. 10; cf. 61 28 +with Revelation xii. 5, and 62 5 with ix. 13. + +63 29 THE ENDLESS RESURRECTIONS OF HIS LOVE: The following, which +Masson prints as a postscript, was a part of De Quincey's introduction +to the volume of the Collective Edition containing this piece: + +"'THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH.'--This little paper, according to my original +intention, formed part of the 'Suspiria de Profundis'; from which, for +a momentary purpose, I did not scruple to detach it, and to publish it +apart, as sufficiently intelligible even when dislocated from its place +in a larger whole. To my surprise, however, one or two critics, not +carelessly in conversation, but deliberately in print, professed their +inability to apprehend the meaning of the whole, or to follow the links +of the connexion between its several parts. I am myself as little able +to understand where the difficulty lies, or to detect any lurking +obscurity, as these critics found themselves to unravel my logic. +Possibly I may not be an indifferent and neutral judge in such a case. +I will therefore sketch a brief abstract of the little paper according +to my original design, and then leave the reader to judge how far this +design is kept in sight through the actual execution. + +"Thirty-seven years ago, or rather more, accident made me, in the dead +of night, and of a night memorably solemn, the solitary witness of an +appalling scene, which threatened instant death in a shape the most +terrific to two young people whom I had no means of assisting, except +in so far as I was able to give them a most hurried warning of their +danger; but even _that_ not until they stood within the very shadow +of the catastrophe, being divided from the most frightful of deaths by +scarcely more, if more at all, than seventy seconds. + +"Such was the scene, such in its outline, from which the whole of this +paper radiates as a natural expansion. This scene is circumstantially +narrated in Section the Second, entitled 'The Vision of Sudden Death.' + +"But a movement of horror, and of spontaneous recoil from this dreadful +scene, naturally carried the whole of that scene, raised and idealised, +into my dreams, and very soon into a rolling succession of dreams. The +actual scene, as looked down upon from the box of the mail, was +transformed into a dream, as tumultuous and changing as a musical +fugue. This troubled dream is circumstantially reported in Section the +Third, entitled 'Dream-Fugue on the theme of Sudden Death.' What I had +beheld from my seat upon the mail,--the scenical strife of action and +passion, of anguish and fear, as I had there witnessed them moving in +ghostly silence,--this duel between life and death narrowing itself to +a point of such exquisite evanescence as the collision neared; all +these elements of the scene blended, under the law of association, with +the previous and permanent features of distinction investing the mail +itself; which features at that time lay--1st, in velocity +unprecedented, 2dly, in the power and beauty of the horses, 3dly, in +the official connexion with the government of a great nation, and, +4thly, in the function, almost a consecrated function, of publishing +and diffusing through the land the great political events, and +especially the great battles, during a conflict of unparalleled +grandeur. These honorary distinctions are all described +circumstantially in the First or introductory Section ('The Glory of +Motion'). The three first were distinctions maintained at all times; +but the fourth and grandest belonged exclusively to the war with +Napoleon; and this it was which most naturally introduced Waterloo into +the dream. Waterloo, I understand, was the particular feature of the +'Dream-Fugue' which my censors were least able to account for. Yet +surely Waterloo, which, in common with every other great battle, it had +been our special privilege to publish over all the land, most naturally +entered the dream under the licence of our privilege. If not--if there +be anything amiss--let the Dream be responsible. The Dream is a law to +itself; and as well quarrel with a rainbow for showing, or for +_not_ showing, a secondary arch. So far as I know, every element in +the shifting movements of the Dream derived itself either primarily +from the incidents of the actual scene, or from secondary features +associated with the mail. For example, the cathedral aisle derived +itself from the mimic combination of features which grouped themselves +together at the point of approaching collision--viz. an arrow-like +section of the road, six hundred yards long, under the solemn lights +described, with lofty trees meeting overhead in arches. The guard's +horn, again--a humble instrument in itself--was yet glorified as the +organ of publication for so many great national events. And the +incident of the Dying Trumpeter, who rises from a marble bas-relief, +and carries a marble trumpet to his marble lips for the purpose of +warning the female infant, was doubtless secretly suggested by my own +imperfect effort to seize the guard's horn, and to blow the warning +blast. But the Dream knows best; and the Dream, I say again, is the +responsible party." + + +JOAN OF ARC + + +This article appeared originally in _Taifs Magazine_ for March and +August, 1847; it was reprinted by De Quincey in 1854 in the third +volume of his _Collected Writings_. It is found in _Works_, +Masson's ed., Vol. V, pp. 384-416; Riverside ed., Vol. VI, pp. 178-215. + +64 10 LORRAINE, now in great part in the possession of Germany, is the +district in which Domrémy, Joan's birthplace, is situated. + +65 14 VAUCOULEURS: a town near Domrémy; cf. p. 70. + +65 28 EN CONTUMACE: "in contumacy," a legal term applied to one who, +when summoned to court, fails to appear. + +66 13 ROUEN: the city in Normandy where Joan was burned at the stake. + +66 25 THE LILIES OF FRANCE: the royal emblem of France from very early +times until the Revolution of 1789, when "the wrath of God and man +combined to wither them." + +67 5 M. MICHELET: Jules Michelet (1798-1874) is said to have spent +forty years in the preparation of his great work, the _History of +France_. Cf. the same, translated by G. H. Smith, 2 vols., Appleton, +Vol. II, pp. 119-169; or _Joan of Arc_, from Michelet's _History +of France_, translated by O. W. Wight, New York, 1858. + +67 8 RECOVERED LIBERTY: The Revolution of 1830 had expelled the +restored Bourbon kings. + +67 20 THE BOOK AGAINST PRIESTS: Michelet's lectures as professor of +history in the Collège de France, in which he attacked the Jesuits, +were published as follows: _Des Jésuites_, 1843; _Du Prêtre, de +la Femme et de la Famille_, 1844; _Du Peuple_, 1845. To the +second De Quincey apparently refers. + +67 26 BACK TO THE FALCONER'S LURE: The lure was a decoy used to recall +the hawk to its perch,--sometimes a dead pigeon, sometimes an +artificial bird, with some meat attached. + +68 6 ON THE MODEL OF LORD PERCY: These lines, as Professor Hart notes, +in Percy's Folio, ed. Hales and Furnivall, Vol. II, p. 7, run: + + The stout Erle of Northumberland + a vow to God did make, + his pleasure in the Scottish woods + 3 som_m_ers days to take. + +68 27 PUCELLE D'ORLÉANS: Maid of Orleans (the city on the Loire which +Joan saved). + +69 1 THE COLLECTION, ETC.: The work meant is Quicherat, _Procès de +Condamnation et Réhabilitation de Jeanne d'Arc_, 5 vols., Paris, +1841-1849. Cf. De Quincey's note. + +69 21 DELENDA EST ANGLIA VICTRIX! "Victorious England must be +destroyed!" Cf. _Delenda est Carthago_! "Carthage must be +destroyed!" _Delenda est Karthago_ is the version of Florus (II, +15) of the words used by Cato the Censor, just before the Third Punic +War, whenever he was called upon to record his vote in the Senate on +any subject under discussion. + +69 27 HYDER ALI (1702-1782), a Mahometan adventurer, made himself +maharajah of Mysore and gave the English in India serious trouble; he +was defeated in 1782 by Sir Eyre Coote. Tippoo Sahib, his son and +successor, proved less dangerous and was finally killed at Seringapatam +in 1799. + +70 4 NATIONALITY IT WAS NOT: i.e. nationalism--patriotism--it was not. +Cf. _Revolt of the Tartars_, Riverside ed., Vol. XII, p. 4; +Masson's ed., Vol. VII, p. 370, where De Quincey speaks of the Torgod +as "tribes whose native ferocity was exasperated by debasing forms of +superstition, and by a nationality as well as an inflated conceit of +their own merit absolutely unparalleled." Cf. also footnote, p. 94. + +70 4 SUFFREN: the great French admiral who in 1780-1781 inflicted so +much loss upon the British. + +70 10 MAGNANIMOUS JUSTICE OF ENGLISHMEN: As Professor Hart observes, +the treatment of Joan in _Henry VI_ is hardly magnanimous. + +71 29 THAT ODIOUS MAN: Cf. pp. 79-80. + +72 12 THREE GREAT SUCCESSIVE BATTLES: Rudolf of Lorraine fell at Crécy +(1346); Frederick of Lorraine at Agincourt (1415); the battle of +Nicopolis, which sacrificed the third Lorrainer, took place in 1396. + +73 24 CHARLES VI (1368-1422) had killed several men during his first +fit of insanity. He was for the rest of his life wholly unfit to +govern. He declared Henry V of England, the conqueror of Agincourt, his +successor, thus disinheriting the Dauphin, his son. + +74 2 THE FAMINES, ETC.: Horrible famines occurred in France and England +in 1315, 1336, and 1353. Such insurrections as Wat Tyler's, in 1381, +are probably in De Quincey's mind. + +74 6 THE TERMINATION OF THE CRUSADES: The Crusades came to an end about +1271. "The ulterior results of the crusades," concludes Cox in +_Encyclopedia Britannica_, "were the breaking up of the feudal +system, the abolition of serfdom, the supremacy of a common law over +the independent jurisdiction of chiefs who claimed the right of private +wars." + +74 7 THE DESTRUCTION OF THE TEMPLARS: This most famous of the military +orders, founded in the twelfth century for the defense of the Latin +kingdom of Jerusalem, having grown so powerful as to be greatly feared, +was suppressed at the beginning of the fourteenth century. + +74 7 THE PAPAL INTERDICTS: "De Quincey has probably in mind such an +interdict as that pronounced in 1200, by Innocent III, against France. +All ecclesiastical functions were suspended and the land was in +desolation."--HART. England was put under interdict several times, as +in 1170 (for the murder of Becket) and 1208. + +74 8 THE TRAGEDIES CAUSED OR SUFFERED BY THE HOUSE OF ANJOU, AND BY THE +EMPEROR: "The Emperor is Konradin, the last of the Hohenstaufen, +beheaded by Charles of Anjou at Naples, 1268. The subsequent cruelties +of Charles in Sicily caused the popular uprising known as the Sicilian +Vespers, 1282, in which many thousands of Frenchmen were +assassinated."--HART. + +74 10 THE COLOSSAL FIGURE OF FEUDALISM, ETC.: The English yeomen at +Crecy, overpowering the mounted knights of France, took from feudalism +its chief support,--the superiority of the mounted knight to the +unmounted yeoman. Cf. Green, _History of the English People_, Book +IV, Chap. II. + +74 15 THE ABOMINABLE SPECTACLE OF A DOUBLE POPE: For thirty-eight years +this paradoxical state of things endured. + +75 15 THE ROMAN MARTYROLOGY: a list of the martyrs of the Church, +arranged according to the order of their festivals, and with accounts +of their lives and sufferings. + +76 4 "ABBEYS THERE WERE," ETC.: Cf. Wordsworth, _Peter Bell_, Part +Second: + + Temples like those among the Hindoos, + And mosques, and spires, and abbey windows, + And castles all with ivy green. + +76 17 THE VOSGES ... HAVE NEVER ATTRACTED MUCH NOTICE, ETC.: They came +into like prominence after De Quincey's day in the Franco-Prussian War +of 1870. + +76 31 THOSE MYSTERIOUS FAWNS, ETC.: In some of the romances of the +Middle Ages, especially those containing Celtic material, a knight, +while hunting, is led by his pursuit of a white fawn (or a white stag +or boar) to a _fee_ (i.e. an inhabitant of the "Happy Other-world") +or into the confines of the "Happy Other-world" itself. Sometimes, as +in the _Guigemar_ of Marie de France, the knight passes on to a +series of adventures in consequence of his meeting with the white fawn. +I owe this note to the kindness of Mr. S. W. Kinney, A.M., of +Baltimore. + +76 33 THAT ANCIENT STAG: See _Englische Studien,_ Vol. V, p. 16, +where additions are made to the following account from Hardwicke's +_Traditions, Superstitions, and Folk-Lore,_ Manchester and London, +1872, p. 154: + +This chasing of the white doe or the white hart by the spectre huntsman +has assumed various forms. According to Aristotle a white hart was +killed by Agathocles, King of Sicily, which a thousand years beforehand +had been consecrated to Diana by Diomedes. Alexander the Great is said +by Pliny to have caught a white stag, placed a collar of gold about its +neck, and afterwards set it free. Succeeding heroes have in after days +been announced as the capturers of this famous white hart. Julius +Caesar took the place of Alexander, and Charlemagne caught a white hart +at both Magdeburg, and in the Holstein woods. In 1172 William [Henry] +the Lion is reported to have accomplished a similar feat, according to +a Latin inscription on the walls of Lubeck Cathedral. Tradition says +the white hart has been caught on Rothwell Hay Common, in Yorkshire, +and in Windsor Forest. + +This reference I owe indirectly to Professor J. M. Manly, of Chicago. + +77 4 OR, BEING UPON THE MARCHES OF FRANCE, A MARQUIS: _Marquis_ is +derived from _march,_ and was originally the title of the guardian +of the frontier, or march. + +77 13 AGREED WITH SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY THAT A GOOD DEAL MIGHT BE SAID +ON BOTH SIDES: This expression, as has been pointed out to me, is from +the middle of _Spectator_ No. 122, where Sir Roger, having been +appealed to on a question of fishing privileges, replied, "with an air +of a man who would not give his judgment rashly, that much might be +said on both sides." It is likely, however, that De Quincey may have +connected it in his mind with the discussion of witchcraft at the +beginning of _Spectator_ No. 117, where Addison balances the +grounds for belief and unbelief somewhat as De Quincey does here. + +78 7 BERGERETA: a very late Latin form of French _bergerette,_ "a +shepherdess." + +78 15 M. SIMOND, IN HIS "TRAVELS": The reference is to _Journal of a +Tour and Residence in Great Britain during the years 1810 and 1811,_ +by Louis Simond, 2d ed. (Edinburgh, 1817), to which is added an +appendix on France, written in December, 1815, and October, 1816. De +Quincey refers to this story with horror several times, but such scenes +are not yet wholly unknown. + +79 21 A CHEVALIER OF ST. LOUIS: The French order of St. Louis was +founded by Louis XIV in 1693 for military service. After its +discontinuance at the Revolution this order was reinstated in 1814; but +no knights have been created since 1830. "Chevalier" is the lowest rank +in such an order; it is here erroneously used by De Quincey as a title +of address. + +79 22 "CHEVALIER, AS-TU DONNÉ," etc.: "Chevalier, have you fed the +hog?" "MA FILLE," ETC.: "My daughter, have you," etc. "PUCELLE," ETC.: +"Maid of Orleans, have you saved the lilies (i.e. France)?" + +79 28 IF THE MAN THAT TURNIPS CRIES: Cf. _Johnsoniana_, ed. R. +Napier, London, 1884, where, in _Anecdotes of Johnson_, by Mrs. +Piozzi, p. 29, is found: "'T is a mere play of words (added he)"-- +Johnson is speaking of certain "verses by Lopez de Vega"--"and you +might as well say, that + + "If the man who turnips cries, + Cry not when his father dies, + 'T is a proof that he had rather + Have a turnip than his father." + +This reference is given in Bartlett's _Familiar Quotations_. + +80 4 THE ORIFLAMME OF FRANCE: the red banner of St. Denis, preserved in +the abbey of that name, near Paris, and borne before the French king as +a consecrated flag. + +80 22 TWENTY YEARS AFTER, TALKING WITH SOUTHEY: In 1816 De Quincey was +a resident of Grasmere; Southey lived for many years at Keswick, a few +miles away; they met first in 1807. For De Quincey's estimate of +Southey's _Joan of Arc_, see _Works_, Riverside ed., Vol. VI, +pp. 262-266; Masson's ed., Vol. V, pp. 238-242. + +80 28 CHINON is a little town near Tours. + +81 3 SHE "PRICKS" FOR SHERIFFS: The old custom was to prick with a pin +the names of those chosen by the sovereign for sheriffs. + +82 9 AMPULLA: the flask containing the sacred oil used at coronations. + +82 10 THE ENGLISH BOY: Henry VI was nine months old when he was +proclaimed king of England and France in 1422, Charles VI of France, +and Henry V, his legal heir, having both died in that year. Henry's +mother was the eldest daughter of Charles VI. + +82 13 DRAWN FROM THE OVENS OF RHEIMS: Rheims, where the kings of France +were crowned, was famous for its biscuits and gingerbread. + +82 26 TINDAL'S "CHRISTIANITY AS OLD AS THE CREATION": Matthew Tindal +(1657-1732) published this work in 1732; its greatest interest lies in +the fact that to this book more than to any other Butler's +_Analogy_ was a reply. Tindal's argument was that natural religion, +as taught by the deists, was complete; that no revelation was +necessary. A life according to nature is all that the best religion can +teach. Such doctrine as this Joan preached in the speech ascribed to +her. + +82 27 A PARTE ANTE: "from the part gone before"; Joan's speech being +three centuries earlier than the book from which it was taken. + +83 9 THAT DIVINE PASSAGE IN "PARADISE REGAINED": from Book I, II. 196- +205. + +84 34 PATAY IS NEAR ORLEANS: Troyes was the capital of the old province +of Champagne. + +86 25 "NOLEBAT," ETC.: "She would not use her sword or kill any one." + +87 24 MADE PRISONER BY THE BURGUNDIANS: The English have accused the +French officers of conniving at Joan's capture through jealousy of her +successes. Compiègne is fifty miles northeast of Paris. + +87 27 BISHOP OF BEAUVAIS: Beauvais is forty-three miles northwest of +Paris, in Normandy. This bishop, Pierre Cauchon, rector of the +University at Paris, was devoted to the English party. + +87 30 "BISHOP THAT ART," ETC.: Cf. Shakespeare's _Macbeth_, Act I, +sc. v, 1. 13. + +87 33 A TRIPLE CROWN: The papacy is meant, of course. The pope's tiara +is a tall cap of golden cloth, encircled by three coronets. + +88 17 JUDGES EXAMINING THE PRISONER: The judge in France questions a +prisoner minutely when he is first taken, before he is remanded for +trial. De Quincey displays here his inveterate prejudice against the +French; but this practice is widely regarded as the vital error of +French criminal procedure., + +89 5 A WRETCHED DOMINICAN: a member of the order of mendicant friars +established in France by Domingo de Guzman in 1216. Their official name +was Fratres Predicatores, "Preaching Friars," and their chief objects +were preaching and instruction. Their influence was very great until +the rise of the Jesuit order in the sixteenth century. The Dominicans +Le Maitre and Graverent (the Grand Inquisitor) both took part in the +prosecution. + +89 31 FOR A LESS CAUSE THAN MARTYRDOM: Cf. Genesis ii. 24. + +91 14 FROM THE FOUR WINDS: There may be a reminiscence here of Ezekiel +xxxvii. 1-10, especially verse 9: "Come from the four winds, O breath, +and breathe upon these slain, that they may live." + +91 30 LUXOR. See note 13 27. + +92 15 DAUGHTER OF CÆSARS: She was the daughter of the German emperor, +Francis I, whose sovereignty, as the name "Holy Roman Empire" shows, +was supposed to continue that of the ancient Roman emperors. + +92 17 CHARLOTTE CORDAY (1768-93) murdered the revolutionist Marat in +the belief that the good of France required it; two days later she paid +the penalty, as she had expected, with her life. + +93 18 GRAFTON, A CHRONICLER: Richard Grafton died about 1572. He was +printer to Edward VI. His chronicle was published in 1569. + +93 20 "FOULE FACE": _Foule_ formerly meant "ugly." + +9321 HOLINSHEAD: Raphael Holinshed died about 1580. His great work, +_Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland_, was used by +Shakespeare as the source of several plays. He writes of Joan: "Of +favor [appearance] was she counted likesome; of person stronglie made, +and manlie; of courage, great, hardie, and stout withall." + +94 (footnote) SATANIC: This epithet was applied to the work of some of +his contemporaries by Southey in the preface to his _Vision of +Judgement_, 1821. It has been generally assumed that Byron and +Shelley are meant. See Introduction to Byron's _Vision of Judgment_ +in the new Murray edition of Byron, Vol. IV. + +96 (footnote) BURGOO: a thick oatmeal gruel or porridge used by seamen. +According to the _New English Dictionary_ the derivation is +unknown; but in the _Athenaeum_, Oct. 6, 1888, quoted by Hart, the +word is explained as a corruption of Arabic _burghul_. + +101 30 ENGLISH PRINCE, REGENT OF FRANCE: John, Duke of Bedford, uncle +of Henry VI. "In genius for war as in political capacity," says J. R. +Green, "John was hardly inferior to Henry [the Fifth, his brother] +himself" (_A History of the English People_, Book IV, Chap. VI). + +101 31 MY LORD OF WINCHESTER: Henry Beaufort, Bishop of Winchester, +half-brother of Henry IV. He was the most prominent English prelate of +his time and was the only Englishman in the Court that condemned Joan. +As to the story of his death, to which De Quincey alludes, see +Shakespeare, 2 Henry VI, Act III, sc. in. Beaufort became cardinal in +1426. + +102 17 WHO IS THIS THAT COMETH FROM DOMRÉMY? This is an evident +imitation of the famous passage from Isaiah Ixiii. I: "Who is this that +cometh from Edom, with dyed garments from Bozrah?" "Bloody coronation +robes" is rather obscure, but probably refers to the fact that Joan had +shed her own blood to bring about the coronation of her sovereign; she +is supposed to have appeared in armor at the actual coronation +ceremony, and this armor might with reason be imagined as "bloody." + +102 22 SHE ... SHALL TAKE MY LORD'S BRIEF: that is, she shall act as +the bishop's counsel. In the case of Beauvais, as in that of +Winchester, it must be remembered that in all monarchical countries the +bishops are "lords spiritual," on an equality with the greater secular +nobles, the "lords temporal." + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc +by Thomas de Quincey + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ENGLISH MAIL-COACH AND *** + +This file should be named 8mjnc10.txt or 8mjnc10.zip +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks get a new NUMBER, 8mjnc11.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, 8mjnc10a.txt + +Produced by Anne Soulard, Charles Franks +and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team. + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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