"Persons upon her plane are very much to be pitied," observed Pendlam, quietly.
Susan began to cry, and the scene became so painful to me, that I made haste to shake hands with the ill-mated couple, say a few soothing words, and take leave of them. From that time, I saw Pendlam occasionally, but avoided the house. It was a peculiarity of his impressible nature, to imbibe, unconsciously to himself, the sentiments of powerful persons with whom he came in contact, retain and revolve them in his intellect, until they reappeared as his own original convictions. He now went with reformers, and carried with him their atmosphere. To hear him talk, you would have thought universal reorganization at hand. I said I avoided the house; but one day Horatio came to me with a doleful face, backing a petition that I would go and talk with Susan.
"There has been an explosion! The old woman is gone; she has declared open, internecine war against Pendlam."
"I thought she had declared that some time ago, good Horatio!"
"Ah, but now she is trying to get his wife away from him! She has sent plenipotentiaries, with threats and entreaties, and they have frightened Susan out of her poor little wits. Go and reassure her."
"Horatio, I am not certain what would be best. They never belonged together. But at your request, I will go and see what I can do."
I went. Susan received me with an effort at a smile, which was a failure, and at my inquiry for Pendlam, burst into tears.
"He is not dead, I hope."
"No," sobbed Susan.
"Nor in jail?"
"No." Another sob.
"Nor in any serious trouble?"
"Trouble enough, Heaven knows! Mother has gone. I don't know what to do.All the nice people we used to visit with have turned against us."
"But our happiness does not depend upon nice people, you know, dear Susan."
"But he is getting into the strangest ways! Shabby folks, with long beards, come to see him. He has left off family devotions."
Susan was weeping; when, at a quick step in the hall, she took alarm, and hurried from the room, just in time to hide her tears from her husband.
"Alone?" said Pendlam.
"No; Susan has just left me."
"I am glad you have come. I have thought for several days that I required your magnetism. Every thing with me now is magnetism. My nature demands a certain magnetism, as the appetite demands a certain quality of food. There are coarse magnetisms, and fine magnetisms; yours is peculiarly agreeable to me. Some repel me, and some attract irresistibly. I have only to follow my impressions, to get what is necessary for me. That's where I am," said Pendlam.
He urged me to stay and dine; and as I desired an opportunity to converse further with Susan, I consented. I was surprised to see a dish of roast meat come upon the table,—Pendlam having, for the past year, preached vegetarianism. But he assured me that he had not changed his theory of dietetics.
"There are times, however, when we require the magnetisms of certain animal foods. To-day I perceived that my system demanded the magnetism of lamb. If your constitution is wanting in the lamb element, you will find this tender."
Pendlam, I should observe, had neglected to say grace.
"Your theory of magnetisms," said I, "would seem a very convenient one. To-morrow, for example, you can require the magnetism of roast beef. The next day, the magnetisms of turtle-soup and venison will be found agreeable. The magnetisms of some birds are said to be excellent. And I have no doubt but in time you will arrive at the discovery, that the magnetism of a certain distilled beverage, called brandy, stimulates digestion."
Pendlam laughed and blushed.
"I have not forgotten that for three good years of my life I waged war against King Alchohol. (Will you try a bit of the lamb?) But I do not push my principles over the verge of prejudice, as those do who condemn the grape."
"Condemn the grape?" I repeated.
"The juice of the grape, which is the same thing. Where this can be obtained pure, it will be found highly beneficial to persons on a certain plane. The grape magnetism is eminently spiritualizing."
So saying, to my utter astonishment, Pendlam uncorked a small bottle, whichI had supposed to contain pepper-sauce, and commenced pouring out WINE.
"This will answer in lieu of grace," I suggested.
"The act of prayer," said Pendlam, "has indisputable uses. It opens the avenues to an influx of spiritual magnetisms. But where the mind is kept in the receptive condition without the aid of the external form of prayer, this becomes like a scaffolding after the house is built. Step by step, I have been led to this high spiritual plane."
Susan, as of old, sat and sighed.
Pendlam found my magnetism so attractive, that it was impossible for me to obtain a minute's conversation with Susan alone. I departed, wearied and disheartened with her sad, despairing face haunting me.
I had little further personal knowledge of Pendlam's career, until Horatio came for me, one evening, to attend a meeting of the Disciples of Freedom.
We found the Melodeon crowded by one of those stifling audiences for which no ventilation seems availing. A portion had come to be interested, a portion to be amused. To the former, the object of the meeting was wise and great; to the latter, it was ridiculous enough to be worth an evening's senseless laughter. For my own part, only the strong desire I felt to observe the characteristics of a new sect daily increasing in numbers and influence could induce me to undergo the exhaustion of sitting an hour in such an assembly.
We took seats in an obscure corner, and looked around. Here were curious, lank stalks of humanity, which seemed to have been raked from unheard-of, outlandish stubbles. Occasionally, in beautiful relief out of these, a clear, full-berried stem of ripened grain lifted its gracious head. It was a strange mixture; a strange power, indeed, that had swept together such promising wheat and such refuse chaff and straw in one incongruous mass.
We turned our eyes to the platform. There sat Pendlam, with other prominent Disciples. A young man was speaking wise and beautiful words. From the well of a deep and sincere soul he drew needed counsel for the perishing multitude; said what he seemed impelled to say, and sat down. He was followed by a sallow-visaged, black-bearded speaker, who poured forth abundant venomous froth of denunciation. He had caught enough of the phraseology of the more philosophical Disciples, to impress the earnest ignorant with some show of profundity. I was glad when his stream dried up. Pendlam next arose and read a paper upon "Magnetisms and Organizations." After him, came forward a gentleman with a model, illustrating the design of a dwelling-house for the Associated Disciples. He showed, entirely to the satisfaction of himself at least, that society should be reduced to a mechanism, and mankind to pivots and wheels. This was the dawn of the millennial era. The world was to be saved by organization. First, an association; then an association of associations, which should spread over the United States, abolish taxes, banks, slavery, and private property, elect its president, annex South America, the British and Russian possessions, and eventually Europe, Africa, and Asia. The model dwelling-house was likened to a manger, in which Christ was to be born, at his second coming. The speaker ended by introducing the "Practical Organizer of the Initial Association of Free Disciples."
Horatio and myself had already remarked upon the platform an individual whose features seemed somehow familiar to us. He was rather stoutly built, full-faced, of a sanguine complexion and temperament. His mouth indicated both sensuality and decision of character. His forehead was prominent and low, his eye keen, his neck thick and muscular. We were not surprised to see him arise and step forward as the Practical Organizer of the Initial Association of Free Disciples.
"Ladies and gentlemen," said he, "I am no orator. I am a business man. I am not here to make a speech, but to tell you about the practical part of this Association."
At the first words he spoke, a flood of recollections rushed over me. For a moment my breath was quite taken away.
"I know him!" "I remember him!" Horatio and I whispered almost simultaneously.
His voice was unmistakable. He was the fellow who had flogged Pendlam four years before.
Extremes had met. The temperance missionary and the infuriate liquor-dealer stood upon the same platform.
Soon after, we took our leave. We walked up and down in the fresh air. How sweet, how cool it seemed, after an hour spent amid the heated breaths of the packed audience!
I had parted from my friend, and was returning home, when I met two persons walking arm in arm. I heard one of them say,—
"I find that no great work can be accomplished, without due regard paid to magnetisms; and in organization, we must take care that they are harmoniously distributed. I find that I now assume relations with every individual according to these subtile laws. You see where I am," said Pendlam.
For Pendlam was the speaker. His companion was the Practical Organizer of the Initial Association of Free Disciples.
I went home, filled with a multitude of reflections. Strong interest led me soon after to pay a visit to Pendlam's house. As I went in, I met a man coming out. He had a stout frame, keen eye, sensual mouth, sanguine complexion, muscular neck.
"Susan," said I, "who is that man?"
"One of my husband's friends," answered Susan, in some confusion.
"And yours?"—eyeing her closely.
"Oh, he comes frequently to the house; I see him occasionally."
"'Tis he who gave Pendlam that bottle of wine?"
"I believe so."
"And that flogging, Susan!"
"Oh, they have made that up," said Susan, innocently.
"If they are satisfied, I have nothing to say. Are you happy, Susan?" for a change had come over her, which I did not readily understand.
"Oh, dear!" said Susan, "we have had so much trouble!" She began to give way to her emotions. "We have lost all our old friends. Mother never comes near us now. Sometimes I don't know what we shall do. Tell me what you think of it;—is Henry so much out of the way as people think? He certainly knows more than anybody else, and I don't see how he can be wrong." She ended with a sob.
"You are aware," I answered, "that Pendlam and I partly agree in every thing, and wholly agree in nothing. He is right, and he is wrong. He takes hold of what is a truth, but detaches it from universal truth, and so it becomes an error." I saw she did not comprehend. "But never despair," I added, "The future depends upon you."
"What can I do?" she pleaded.
"Remain firm in principle, dear Susan. Whatever happens, stand true to him and to yourself. Do that, and all will be well."
The crying of her child, which was sick, called her away. I sought Pendlam's study. I found him busily writing. He was pale and thin, and there was a wild brightness in his eye which did not please me.
"You, of all men!" he exclaimed. "Sit down." He closed the door, with an air of mystery. "I was just writing to you."
"To me? Then I have saved you the trouble of employing a messenger."
"Susan would be mortified and incensed, if she knew what I am about to say. But truth is truth. She is perishing; I see new evidence of it every day. It is for want of magnetisms. I have little to give her, and what I have is not such as she requires. Do not be astonished when I tell you I have discovered that there do not exist between us the requisite affinities."
I smiled; for Pendlam was continually announcing discoveries of facts I had discovered long before.
"You see where I am," said Pendlam. "I am compelled to go to other women for the magnetisms I need; she must receive what she requires from other men."
"That is interesting," I replied. "What is the peculiar process of imparting these magnetisms?"
"Sometimes by conversation,—sometimes by the contact of hands,—perhaps by a kiss; no rule is laid down; the process must depend upon the kind of magnetism to be imparted."
"Very naturally. But what have I to do with all this?"
"I will tell you. I was not Susan's first choice; but you were. That fact is very significant; it shows an affinity. And what I desire is, that—"
"My dear John Henry," I interrupted, "allow me to say that you are quite mistaken. If I know any thing of affinities, there is none between Susan and myself; no more, I judge, than there is between you and the gentleman I met going out, as I was coming in.
"Oh,—Clodman! You saw him?" cried Pendlam.
"Yes, and remember distinctly seeing him at least twice before; once as the Practical Organizer of the Initial Association of Free Disciples, and once as the self-appointed castigator of unfortunate temperance missionaries."
"You are pleased to be sarcastic," said Pendlam, mildly. "He is a very useful man to us. I welcome his visits to my house; for I consider his magnetism highly beneficial to Susan."
"Then, by all the gods at once, you wrong me!" I said. "If that man's magnetism is what she needs, to suppose that mine is, also, is an insult. I lose patience with you, O most free Disciple!"
"I see," replied Pendlam, with a smile, "you have not yet reached the plane of perfect freedom. I cannot argue with you; but when you have had certain necessary experiences, and arrived at my stand-point, you will see as I do."
He conducted me to the door, rather coolly. I stopped a moment to speak toSusan.
"For the love of Heaven," I said, "remember what I told you. You don't know how much depends upon you!"
Susan stared. I left her staring.
About this time Miss Kellerton returned, and played a brilliant engagement. I accompanied Horatio one evening to witness her fourth appearance in a new play, which had taken the theatrical portion of the city by storm. The play-house was packed from top to bottom. We had our seats in the orchestra, where we enjoyed a view of both actors and audience, and a cool breeze from behind the scenes. For criticisms of the performance, I must refer the reader to the newspapers of the period. Horatio cheered like a madman. He was quite beside himself with enthusiasm, especially at the close of the third act. He was clapping furiously, and looking about upon the audience to see who else was cheering, when he suddenly stopped, his hands asunder, his countenance transfixed with an alarming expression. I thought he had clapped himself into a fit.
"Horatio!" I cried,—"Horatio! what's the matter?"
"Look! look!"
"Where?"
"Yonder! by the pillar!" I now thought (his head being turned) that perchance he beheld a ghost. "Don't you see?—Pendlam!"
It was true;—there sat the reformer, out-cheering Horatio himself! By his side was Susan, looking brighter and happier than I had seen her for months. Byherside sat—
"That rascal Clodman!" hissed Horatio, through his teeth.
Miss Kellerton came before the curtain. A vast tumult of applause burst forth and died away. Pendlam cheered after all the rest had ceased. Then he and Clodman conferred,—the face of the latter so near Susan's, as he leaned before her, that Horatio swore he kissed her. Both Pendlam and Susan were beaming with smiles.
"This recreation will do them good," I whispered.
"That Clodman is a villain!" muttered Horatio. "Ask Miss Kellerton; she knows him. But, villainy aside, what a stupendous joke it is to see Pendlam here!"
Horatio arose, flushed and excited.
"Where are you going?" I demanded.
"I'll tell you soon. Let me pass."
He left the theatre. I did not see him again until the play was over. He made his way to the orchestra box where I sat, in time to applaud Miss Kellerton's final appearance before the curtain. Then he grasped my arm.
"Come with me; they are going!"
He indicated Pendlam's party. We passed up the aisle, reached the hall, and waited for them at the foot of the stairs. Presently they appeared. Clodman was praising the performance; Susan expressed her delight; Pendlam said something about miscellaneous magnetisms. They had reached the foot of the stairs, when Horatio sprang upon them like a brigand, and seized John Henry's collar.
"Ha! Horatio!" gasped Pendlam, a good deal startled.
"Too late to escape!" And Horatio drew a tract upon him, like a revolver."Here is something, sir, which I think will suit your case," levelling it atPendlam's throat.
"Ha!" stammered Pendlam, reading the title, "'The Theatre a Stronghold ofVice; a Sermon, by—'"
"By the Reverend John Henry Pendlam," roared out Horatio. "Pendlam, the distinguished temperance-preacher!"
A lurid smile played over the grim features of the Practical Organizer.
"Pendlam has outgrown his former opinions," he said, with a look of hate atHoratio.
"Not precisely," said Pendlam. "I have simply enlarged them, or rather added to them. I preach temperance the same; but every man must be his own master. The vices of the theatre appear just as hideous to me as ever; but the theatre itself may be redeemed, and made an instrument of salvation. As the patronage of bad people rendered it what it has been, so the patronage of the good is required to make it what it should be. The divine magnetism of a few spiritual persons in the audience must necessarily affect, not only the remainder of the audience, but also the actors. In our new Association—"
"Come!" growled the Practical Organizer, turning away, with Susan leaning confidingly on his arm; "shall we go?"
"Excuse me. I will give you my ideas of a spiritual drama another time. I'll take this sermon. I shall read with interest what I had to say on the subject before my mind had attained its present plane. Good night! You see where I am," added Pendlam.
Thenceforward the Pendlams were frequent visitors at the theatres. When John Henry was too much occupied to attend, Clodman had the gallantry to escort Susan. This was considered exceedingly kind in Clodman; he not only treated Susan to delightful dramatic performances, but at the same time imparted to her his valuable magnetism.
One Sabbath evening Horatio came suddenly upon me in the street, and pulled me breathlessly around a corner.
"Wait till I can speak; the miracle of miracles! I have been to—to call onHER; and who do you suppose had been dining with her?"
I named successively several noted actress-hunters and snobs, whose names disgusted Horatio. "Who then?" I asked.
"Pendlam! Pendlam! Pendlam!" ejaculated Horatio. "He wanted to consult HER upon the subject of creating a Divine Drama, or some such nonsense."
"Possibly a new Divine Comedy," I suggested.
"She made him stay and dine on Sunday! And will you believe it?—he finds her magnetic impartations, as he calls them, highly agreeable and advantageous to his constitution! Bless him! he isn't the first man who has found them agreeable, if not so advantageous. But she gave him a dose!"
"Of what?"
"Of bitter truth about Clodman. She knows him for a villain, and told him so. I was there, and glad to hear it. But I was enraged. I could have wrung John Henry Pendlam's neck for him, when he said, with his quiet, charitable, mild, incredulous smile, that he was already aware there existed in the communitya good deal of prejudiceagainst Clodman!"
Matters were now progressing rapidly to a crisis. One day during the ensuing summer, I asked Horatio the usual question, "Where is Pendlam now?"—referring, as John Henry himself would have said, not to locality, but condition.
"That is impossible to say," replied Horatio, "for I have not seen him since yesterday. Then he was situated opposite a bottle of pale sherry, which that rascal Clodman had just brought to the house. They were drinking, and talking over the Organization of Free Disciples. Several wealthy men have become interested in the enterprise, and large amounts have been subscribed. Pendlam is writing a work on the subject."
"And Susan?"
"Her child is sick, and claims all her attention. They are trying to cure it with magnetisms. Clodman is day and night at the house; his magnetism being considered indispensable for the restoration of the child."
A month later, Horatio brought me word that the child was dead.
Another month, and I learned that Susan had been sent to some celebratedWestern Magnetic Springs for her health.
"How did she go?"
Horatio hesitated. "I am sorry to say she has gone with that rascal Clodman, who is travelling on business for the Association. Pendlam remains at home, hard at work on his book. I will now add what I did not wish you to know," said Horatio. "For some months Pendlam's family subsisted almost entirely upon funds advanced him by that rascal Clodman. They talk of his wonderful generosity! But the villain has a wife of his own, and a couple of young children, who are left to suffer for want of the actual necessaries of life. Pendlam has given up preaching, you know, in order to devote himself entirely to the Association."
"Horatio, I am afraid that all is lost. I did hope better things of Susan.Wretched, wretched girl!"
Tears came into Horatio's eyes. "How could the damnable thing ever happen?" he exclaimed, passionately. "She was a true, honest girl; and Pendlam is not a bad man."
"He is a man," I said, "who verily thinketh no evil. He has imagination, intellect, spirituality; but he wants balance. From the first, I saw that his powers needed centralizing. He had no hold upon integral truth, but snatched here a fragment and there a fragment. Always distrust that man, Horatio, that talks forever of planes, and stand-points, and step-by-step processes, and deems it necessary to inform you each day where he stands."
"I do not know what could have saved him!" sighed Horatio.
"I know what could; an entire and absorbing love. His wife should have been one towards whom all his thoughts and sympathies would have been drawn. Such a love would have given him concentration, poise, unity. But, on the other hand, his heart had no anchor, and his intellect was left adrift. He has pursued truth, forgetting that truth is a tree, one and mighty, but with innumerable branches; and that it is unsafe to risk the weight of one's salvation upon a single bough. Susan had no part in his life; she was left with that hungry, yearning heart, until the sympathy even of a Clodman seemed food to her perishing nature. Pity her, Horatio, but do not condemn."
The Initial Association failed. Clodman did not return; and it was foundthat he had appropriated to his private use the funds of the Association.Behind him he had left a distressed family, and many creditors. Where wasSusan?
I now thought it time to hunt up Pendlam. After no little search, I was sent to an obscure lodging. I opened the door pointed out to me, and entered an extraordinary chamber. The sides were covered with strange diagrams, grotesque drawings, lettered inscriptions. Some were sketched rudely upon the plastering with colored chalk; others were designed upon paper, and pasted on the wall. In the centre of the room sat an indescribable human figure, with its face buried in its hands. It wore an anomalous garment, slashed with various colors, like a harlequin's coat. Upon one shoulder was sewed the semblance of a door cut out of blue cloth; on the other, a crescent cut out of green. Upon the head was set a tinsel crown, amid tangles of disordered hair. Above was a huge brass key, suspended by a tow string from the ceiling. Table and floor were littered with manuscripts and papers; under the former I observed an empty bottle.
I spoke. The figure started, and looked up. In the sallow cheeks, untrimmed beard, sunken and encircled eyes, I recognized Pendlam. A quick flush spread over his haggard features, and he made a snatch at his tinsel crown.
"Do not be disturbed," I entreated.
He smiled, but with an air of embarrassment; and leaving the tinsel upon his uncombed head, pointed to the wall.
"You see where I am," said Pendlam.
"I see, yet donotsee."
"I have reached the plane of symbols. You are aware that there is something in symbols?"
"A great deal! a great deal!" I said, from a sorrowful heart, as I glanced around me.
Pendlam, who had spoken doubtingly, seemed encouraged.
"Symbols are the highest expression of spiritual thought. Both words and pictures are used. They are the language of the spirit, which only the same spirit can understand. Look here, and you will see some symbols of a very astonishing character."
"Astonishing," said I, "is a mild word!"
"And what is equally astonishing," added the eager reformer, "is the manner in which they are produced. The hand is moved to write or draw them spontaneously. The symbol comes first, the interpretation afterwards. Here is a vulture soaring away with a lamb. It has a meaning."
"A deep meaning!" I added. "We have known such a vulture!"
"Here," he cried,—too excited to heed any words but his own,—"are swine feeding upon golden fruit."
"Oh, the swine! Oh, the precious, wasted, golden fruit!"
"Here is one in words; it reads,Beware of falling from a balloon. It requires a peculiar experience," added Pendlam, with a smile, "to enable one to understand that beautiful symbol."
"Perhaps I have not had the requisite experience; but"—I laid my hand onPendlam's shoulder—"I know a man who has fallen from several balloons!"
"Here is one," said Pendlam, turning to the table, "which I have just drawn. I was trying to get at its meaning when you came in." He showed me a sketch consisting of a number of zigzag lines, joined one to another, and tending towards a circle.
"My dear John Henry," said I, "any person who has watched your course for the last four or five years will readily see the meaning of that symbol. It is a map of your voyage of discoveries."
"Such tacking and shifting?" queried Pendlam, with a smile commiserating my ignorance.
"Just such tacking and shifting. If you had possessed a good compass, it would have shown you."
Pendlam caught at the word compass. "It is singular;—you must have some spiritual perception;—it was written through my hand nine days ago,Purchase a compass. Here is the writing; I placed it upon the wall as a symbol; and I have intended buying a compass as soon as I could get the means."
"Ah, John Henry," said I, "there is more in your symbols than you suppose.You want no purchasable compass."
Pendlam rewarded my simplicity with another pitying smile.
"Here," said he, "you who know so much of symbols, explain this.Avoid the shores of Old Spain. I have not yet penetrated its meaning."
"Leave it," I replied, "with the unexplained Pythagorean symbol touching abstinence from beans. Perhaps future events will reveal it."
Pendlam smiled as before. But was I not right? Did not lamentable events in the not far-off future give to the symbol a melancholy significance?
"Come," I said, "leave these abstruse studies; take off that symbolic coat, that tinsel crown; wash, comb your hair, and walk with me."
"I should enjoy a walk," replied Pendlam; "but I am directed to retain these symbols upon my person, and you would hardly wish me to appear in the street with them."
"Directed!—by what authority?"
"By the Spirit. Some beautiful use is to be fulfilled. I see where you are," added Pendlam;—"from your stand-point it must look absurd enough."
I sat down, and endeavoured to reason with him. But I found it impossible for a person upon my plane to reach with any argument a person upon his. In vain I recapitulated his successive trials and failures.
"It is true," he confessed, "I have been called to pass through some strange experiences. But all were necessary steps; and I have now reached a stand-point from which I can look back and see in its indisputable place every grade of the progressive ascent. There has been only apparent failure. Our attempted Association was a necessary foreshadowing of what remains to be unfolded; a prophetic symbol. We have all been taught great lessons."
"And the vulture and the lamb!" I said, sternly; "where are they?"
"I perceive," answered Pendlam, charitably, "you do not understand."
"It is you," I cried, "who have failed to understand your own symbols. To use plain language, then, where is Susan? She is the lamb that was entrusted to your keeping, and that you suffered the obscene bird to carry away!"
"You are pleased to employ harsh terms," said Pendlam, meekly. "Susan has done well; she has followed her attractions, and that is obedience to the Spirit. Perfect freedom is essential to progression. Consequently, above a certain plane, monogamy, which has undeniable primitive uses, ceases to exist. The laws of chemical affinity teach this by analogy. When the mutual impartations which result from the conjunction of positive and negative have blended in a state of equilibrium, there is consequent repulsion, and the law of harmonies ordains new combinations. You see where I am," said Pendlam.
Disheartened and sorrowful, I set out to go. At the door I turned back.
"Can I do anything for you, John Henry?"
"Not unless"—Pendlam hesitated a moment—"if you have a dollar to spare?"
I gave him a bank-bill. As he leaned forward to receive it, he struck his head against the suspended key.
"Another symbol," I said."Break not your brains upon the key of brass."
He scratched his head, rearranged his tinsel, and smiling, advanced to show me the stairs. I looked back once: there crowned he stood, in his symbolic coat, with the green crescent and blue door on the shoulders; and as a gust from the stairway blew open the garment, I beheld a great yellow heart on his breast. That picture remained impressed upon my vision. In the street, I recalled the room, the drawings, the inscriptions,—all so tragical and saddening! I had not proceeded far, when, moved by greater compassion, I turned and retraced my steps. At the door of the house, I saw the servant girl who had admitted me coming out with a bottle, and thought it the same I had seen lying empty under Pendlam's table. I followed her into a grocery on the corner. She called for gin, and paid for it out of my bank-bill.
I now changed my mind, and went to consult Horatio. It was concluded that Pendlam's old habits of thought and associations ought to be entirely broken up. Deserted, destitute, dependent, he condescended, after long holding out against us, to listen to what we proposed. Hearing of a vacancy in a newspaper office in a western city, we had procured for him the situation. Not without a struggle, he consented to accept it, abandoned his darling reformatory projects, and set out for his new sphere.
His position was that of subordinate writer; and for a time he maintained it with considerable ability. But he grew restless under restraint; and at length, taking advantage of the managing editor's absence, he published articles on prohibited subjects, which lost the paper half its subscribers, and him his situation. When next heard of, he was gaining a meagre subsistence by writing theatrical puffs,—employment for which he was indebted to the kindness of a certain influential actress named Kellerton.
In the mean time Susan returned from her unhappy wanderings; and her mother's family, seizing upon her like wolves, hid her from the world in their den. And I was pleased not long after to read that an individual named Clodman, a noted swindler, had recently been shot in a street-fight in St. Louis, by a husband whose domestic peace he had disturbed.
The last word of all, that ends this strange, eventful, and, alas! too true history, remains to be said.
For some months, we had heard nothing of Pendlam. But last week I received a bundle of Roman Catholic publications, one of which contained an article proclaiming a miraculous conversion of the distinguished reformer, and thereby greatly glorifying Catholicism.
The same mail brought me a letter from the convert.
"At last," he wrote, "I have found peace in the bosom of the Holy Catholic Church. All my previous experiences were necessary to lead me where I am. This is the divine association I was so long seeking elsewhere in vain; I find in its forms the true symbols of a universal religion; and I now perceive that the seeming errors, in which I was for a time permitted to stray, were wisely designed to convince me of the sublime truth, that celibacy is the single condition befitting a holy apostolic teacher."
Amid the flood of reflections that rushed upon me, arose prominent the image of poor Pendlam's unexplained symbol: "Avoid the shores of old Spain." Had it not now received its interpretation? The tossed voyager, failing to make the continent of truth, but beating hither and thither amid the reefs and breakers of dangerous coasts, mistaking many islands for the main, and drifting on unknown seas, had at last steered straight to the old Catholic shores, from which the great discoverers had sailed so many years before.
The year 1757 was one of the gloomiest ever known to England. At home, the government was in a state of utter confusion, though the country was at war with France, and France was in alliance with Austria; these two nations having departed from their policy of two centuries and a half, in order that they might crush Frederic of Prussia, England's ally. Frederic was defeated at Kolin, by the Austrians, on the 18th of June, and a Russian army was in possession of East Prussia. A German army in British pay, and commanded by the "Butcher" hero of Culloden, was beaten in July, and capitulated in September. In America, the pusillanimity of the English commanders led to terrible disasters, among which the loss of Fort William Henry, and the massacre of its garrison, were conspicuous events. In India, the English were engaged in a doubtful contest with the viceroy of Bengal, who was supported by the French. Even the navy of England appeared at that time to have lost its sense of superiority; for not only had Admiral Byng just been shot for not behaving with proper spirit, but a combined expedition against the coast of France ended in signal failure, and Admiral Holburne declined to attack a French fleet off Louisburg. No wonder that the British people readily believed an author who then published a work to establish the agreeable proposition, "that they were a race of cowards and scoundrels; that nothing could save them; that they were on the point of being enslaved by their enemies, and that they richly deserved their fate." Such a succession of disasters might well discourage a people, some of whom could recollect the long list of victories which commenced with Blenheim and closed with Malplaquet, and by which the arrogance of the Grand Monarque had been punished.
Yet it is from this very year of misfortune that the power of modern England must take its date. "Adversity," said El Hakim to the Knight of the Leopard, "is like the period of the former and of the latter rain,—cold, comfortless, unfriendly to man and to animal; yet from that season have their birth the flower and the fruit, the date, the rose, and the pomegranate." In the summer of 1757 was formed that ministry which succeeded in carrying England's power and glory to heights which they did not reach even under the Protectorship of Cromwell or the rule of Godolphin. Then were commenced those measures which ended in the expulsion of the French from North America, and gave to England a territory here which may perpetuate her institutions for ages after they shall have ceased to be known in the mother-land. Then was America conquered in Germany, and not only was Frederic so assisted as to be able to contend successfully against the three great houses of Bourbon, Habsburg, and Romanoff, and a horde of lesser dynasties, but British armies, at Minden and Creveldt, renewed on the fields of the continent recollections of the island skill and the island courage. Then was a new spirit breathed into the British marine, by which it has ever since been animated, and which has seldom stopped to count odds. Then began that dashing course of enterprise which gave almost everything to England that was assailable, from Goree to Cuba, and from Cuba to the Philippines. Then was laid the foundation of that Oriental dominion of England which has been the object of so much wonder, and of not a little envy; for on the 23d of June, 1757, was fought the battle of Plassey, the first of those many Indian victories that illustrate the names of Clive, Coote, Wellesley, Gough, Napier, and numerous other heroes. It seems odd, that the interest in Indian affairs should have been suddenly and strangely revived in the hundredth year after the victory that laid Bengal at the feet of an English adventurer. Had the insurgent Sepoys delayed action but a few weeks, they might have inaugurated their movement on the very centennial anniversary of the birth of British India.
There is nothing like the rule of the English in India to be found in history. It has been compared to the dominion which Rome held over so large a portion of the world; but the comparison has not the merit of aptness. The population of the Roman Empire, in the age of the Antonines, has been estimated at 120,000,000, including that of Italy. The population of India is not less than 150,000,000, without counting any portion of the conquering race. Rome was favorably situated for the maintenance of her supremacy, as she had been for the work of conquest. Her dominion lay around the Mediterranean, which Italy pierced, looking to the East and the West, and forming, as it were, a great place of arms, whence to subdue or to overawe the nations. Cicero called the Hellenic states and colonies a fringe on the skirts of Barbarism, and the description applies also to the Roman dominion; for though Gaul and Spain were conquered from sea to sea, and the legions were encamped on the Euphrates, and the valley of the Nile was as submissive to the Cæsars as it had been to the Lagidse, yet the Mediterranean was the basis of Roman power, and a short journey in almost any direction from it would have taken the traveller completely from under the protection of the eagles. Not so is it with British India. From no European country is India so remote as from England. The two regions are separated by the ocean, by seas, by deserts, and by some of the most powerful nations. Their sole means of union are found in the leading cause of their separation. England owes her Indian empire to her empire of the sea. India will be hers just so long, and no longer, as she shall be able to maintain her naval supremacy. Those who predict her downfall in the East, either as a consequence of the natives throwing off her rule, or through a Russian invasion, forget that she entered India from the sea, and that until she shall have been subdued on that element it would be idle to think of dispossessing her of her Oriental supremacy. Were the long-cherished dream of Russia to be realized,—a dream that is said to have troubled the sleep of Peter, and which certainly haunted the mind of Catharine,—and Russian proconsuls ruling on the Ganges, India could no more be to Russia what she has been to England, than the Crimea, had he kept it, could have been to Louis Napoleon what it is to the Czar. The condition of Indian dominion is ocean dominion.
In one respect the Indian empire of England resembles the Roman empire. The latter comprised many and widely different countries and races, and so is it with the former. We are so accustomed to speak of India as if it constituted one country, and were inhabited by a homogeneous people, that it is difficult to understand that not even in Europe are nations to be found more unlike to one another than in British India. In Hindostan and the Deccan there are ten different civilized nations, resembling each other no more than Danes resemble Italians, or Spaniards Poles. They differ in moral, physical, and intellectual conditions,—in modes of thought and in modes of life. This is one of the chief causes of England's supremacy, just as a similar state of things not only promoted the conquests of Rome, but facilitated her rule after they had been made. The Emperors ruled over Syrians, Greeks, Egyptians, and other Eastern peoples, with ease, because they had little in common, and could not combine against their conquerors. They did the same in the West, because the inhabitants of that quarter, if left to themselves, would have passed their time in endless quarrels. The old world abounded in great cities, all of which owned the supremacy of Rome, from Gades to Thapsacus; and in modern India the most venerable places are compelled to bow before the upstart Calcutta.
The peculiar condition of India a hundred years since enabled the English to lay the foundations of their power in that country so broadly and so deep that nothing short of a moral convulsion can uproot them, though the edifice erected upon them may be rudely shaken by internal revolts, or by the consequences of external wars. Fifty years sooner or forty years later, the English could have made no impression on India as conquerors. Seventy years before the conquest of Bengal the English traders had been plundered by a viceroy who anticipated the tyranny of Surajah Doulah. They determined not to submit to such exactions. They resolved upon war. But the great Aurungzebe was then on the throne of Delhi; and though the Moghul empire had declined somewhat from the standard set up by Akbar and maintained by Shah Jehan, the fighting merchants were soon taught that they were but as children in the hands of its chief. They were driven out of Bengal, and Aurungzebe thought of expelling them from his whole empire. The punishment of death was visited upon some of the East India Company's officers and servants by the Moghul. This severe lesson made a deep impression on the English. They resumed their humble position as traders on sufferance. They never thought of conquest again. It was not until every man who had been concerned in that business had long been in his grave, that the English dared so much as to think of making another war. Though the Moghuls rapidly became powerless after the death of Aurungzebe, the blows struck by anticipation in their behalf protected them for forty years against the ambition of the intrusive Occidentals, and even for some time after Nadir Shah's Persian invasion had demonstrated that their dynasty was as weak as that of Lodi had been found when Baber came into the land. Whether the English have been right or wrong in making themselves masters of India, it is certain that they were forced upon the work against their own wishes and inclinations, and in self-defence. The very expedition which Clive made use of to effect the subjugation of Bengal had been undertaken on defensive grounds; and so fearful was even that great man of the consequences of a union of the forces of the Moghul with those at the command of the French in the East, that he was at first desirous of making peace with Surajah Doulah himself. When the arrival of reinforcements had induced him to take a bolder course, and the destruction of that fierce viceroy had been resolved upon, it was not until after much doubt and hesitation, and against his original judgment, that that course of action was entered upon which ended in the victory of Plassey. He knew the risk that was run in fighting a pitched battle against a force nearly twenty times larger than his own; and had the viceroy been either a respectable ruler or a good soldier, the English, humanly speaking, must have then failed as signally as their predecessors of 1687; but as he was as destitute of humanity as of courage and skill, and could neither animate his followers by affection nor command them by force of character, he was utterly routed. Not six hundred men fell in the battle of Plassey, on both sides, and most of these were on the side of the vanquished. Seldom has it happened that so mighty a change has been effected with so little slaughter. One is reminded of the battles fought by the few Romans under Lucullus against the entire array of the Armenian monarchy.
Had circumstances not led to the display of British power at the time when great prizes were sure to follow even from minor exertions, England never could have become mistress of India. Had the English remained traders forty years longer,—or even for half that time, perhaps,—they would have encountered very different foes from those which they overthrew so easily when forced to fight for property and life. India was breaking up in 1757, and the process of reformation was about to begin. Had not the English been brought into the vast arena, either a number of powerful monarchies would have been formed, or the whole country would have passed under some new dynasty, which would have revived the power of the state with that rapidity which is so often exhibited in the East, when new and able men assume the reins of government. Hyder Ali might have made himself the master of all India, had it been his lot to contend only with native rulers and native races. Had this been the course of events, and had circumstances brought him into collision with the East India Company when he had made himself the Moghul's successor, can it be believed that he would have experienced any more difficulty in dealing with them than was found by Aurungzebe? We know that the English found in Hyder a very able foe, with but limited means at his disposal, and when they were masters of half the country, and had been almost uniformly victorious. Can it be supposed that they could have effected anything against all India, ruled by so consummate a statesman as Hyder Ali? There seems to have been something providential in the events that caused them to pass from traders to conquerors, at the only time when such a transition could be made either with safety or success. That their career of conquest has been occasionally marked by injustice and crime proves nothing against the position that they may have been appointed by a higher Power to work out a revolution in the East. "The dark mystery of the moral world," in this as in a thousand other instances, remains impenetrable. Heaven selects its own agents, and all that it becomes us to say concerning such relations is, that they do not appear in all cases to be made from among men specially entitled to the honors of canonisation.
The English have frequently been denounced, not only for their errors in governing India, but for their conquest of that country. The French have been especially fervent in these denunciations. It is a fact, however, that the French saw nothing wrong in subduing India until all their own plans to that end had utterly failed. The device originated with them, but the English applied it. Dupleix planned for France what Clive executed for England. The French adhered to their plans for years, and it was not until a very recent period that the last remnants of their influence disappeared from India. They saw not the evil involved in the overthrowing of virtuous nabobs and venerable viceroys, until time and a whole train of events had proved that England alone was competent to the full performance of the work. The English in India have not, on all occasions, been saints; but we are unable to see what moral right the French have to reproach them with the enumeration of their errors. In the East, France was "overcrowed" by England; and that is the sole and the very simple cause of the vast amount of "sympathy" which the French have bestowed upon suffering Indian princes, whose condition in no sense would have been improved, had fortune favored the Gallic race, instead of the Saxon, in their struggle for supremacy in Hindostan.
The prejudice that exists in many minds against England, concerning her Indian empire, is in no small degree owing to something of which she is justly proud; to the talent that characterized the prosecution—his friends called it the persecution—of Warren Hastings. No man, not even Strafford, when borne down by the whole weight of the country party in the first session of the Long Parliament, ever encountered so able a host as that which set itself to effect the ruin of the great British proconsul. He was acquitted by his judges, but he stands blackened forever on the most magnificent pages of his country's eloquence. Burke's speeches are yet read everywhere; and to Burke, Hastings was the principle of Evil incarnate. The two great divisions of civilized mankind hold Burke in lasting remembrance,—the liberals for his labors in the early part of his life, and the conservatives for his writings against the French Revolution; and it is impossible to admire him without condemning Hastings. It is equally impossible to condemn Hastings without condemning the nation for which he performed deeds so vicious and cruel, and which formally acquitted him of each and every charge preferred by Burke and his immortal associates, in the name of the Commons of England. Even those charges were the result, not of conscientious conviction on the part of the Commons, but of Mr. Pitt's determination to crush one who promised to become a formidable political rival. The arguments and eloquence of such men as Burke, Fox, Sheridan, and Grey, constitute a splendid armory, from which the enemies of England can forever draw admirable weapons with which to assail her Indian policy; and they have not been backward in making use of this mighty advantage. No one, who has ever sought to defend England's course in the East, but has had experience of the difficulties which those great men have placed in the way of a successful vindication of their country's cause. Either they were honest, or they were not. If honest, what shall be said of the nation which would not listen to them? If dishonest, what are we to think of men, the first statesmen of their age, who, for mere party ends, had persecuted to his ruin one who was in no respect their inferior, and who had saved India for England? Our own opinion is that Burke and his associates were honest, and that the only dishonest men in the prosecuting party were William Pitt and Henry Dundas,—the first being chief minister, and the other second only to the premier himself in the government. Pitt talked much of his conscience, after having absolved Hastings on the very worst of the charges that had been preferred against him, and then condemned him on lighter charges. When Roger Wildrake heard the landlord at Windsor talk much of his conscience, he was led to observe that his measures were less and his charges larger than they had been in those earlier times when sin was allowed to take its natural course. It was so with Pitt, who was guilty of gross injustice, according to his own arguments, and then threw his conscience into the scale against the accused party, when he saw that that party's acquittal would probably lead to his being converted into a successful political rival. Hastings deserved severe censure, and no light punishment, for some of his deeds; but not even Burke would have condemned him to the slow torture to which he was sentenced by one who believed him to be innocent, and the object of party persecution. But the nice distinctions which Englishmen and Americans can make in the cause and course of this famous state trial, because they live in the very atmosphere of party politics, are utterly unknown to the men of continental Europe; and until the end of time, England will be condemned out of the mouths of her most brilliant sons, whenever her foes—and she is too great not to have many and bitter foes—shall discuss the history of her Indian empire.
Every nation condemns conquest, and every nation with power to enter upon a career of conquest rushes eagerly upon it. The harshest condemnation that has visited England because of her Indian successes has proceeded from nations who have never been backward in seizing the lands of other nations. She has been stigmatized as a usurper, and as having destroyed the independence of Indian states. The facts do not warrant these charges. She has rarely had a contest with any power which was not as much an intruder in India as herself. The Moghul dynasty was as foreign to India as the East India Company, or the house of Hanover; and the viceroys sent to rule over its vast and populous provinces had the same bases of power as were possessed by Clive, and Hastings, and Wellesley, and Bentinck, and Ellenborough, and Dalhousie. The Moghuls obtained Indian dominion by conquests that were rendered easy by Indian troubles; and this is precisely the history of England's Oriental dominion. What difference there is, is favorable to England. The Moghuls were deliberate invaders of India; the founder of that dynasty being an adventurer who sought an empire sword in hand, and won it by violence which no man had provoked. Baber was to India what the Norman William was to England. He long contemplated the conquest of the country, showing a wolf-like perseverance in hunting down his prey. For two-and-twenty years he had his object in view, and invaded India five times before he obtained the throne of Delhi. The English were forced to assume the part of conquerors, and would gladly have remained traders. They did not commence their military career until the Moghul had become a mere shadow, and when that potentate was altogether unable to protect them against the tyrannical practices of his lieutenants. They had to choose between war and extermination, and they belonged to a race which never hesitates when forced to make such a choice. Their wars were waged with the Moghul's viceroys, who were aiming at the foundation of dynastic rule, each in his own government, or with other princes, who were equally usurpers with those viceroys, the Mahratta chiefs, for example, and Hyder Ali. One war led to another, in all of which the English were victorious, until their power extended itself over all India. In one hundred and six years—dating from the capture of Madras by the French in 1746, which event must be taken as the commencement of their military career in India, and closing with the annexation of Pegu, December 28, 1852,—they had completed their work. That, in the course of operations so mighty, and relating to the condition of so many millions of people, they were sometimes guilty of acts of singular injustice, is true, and might be inferred, if there were no facts upon which to base the charge. It is impossible that it should have been otherwise, considering the nature of man, and the character of many of the instruments by which great enterprises are accomplished. But we think it may safely be said, that never was there a career of conquest of such extent accompanied with so little of wrong and suffering to the body of the people. As against the wrong that was perpetrated, and the suffering that was inseparable from wars so numerous and long-continued, are to be set the reign of order and law, under which the mass of the inhabitants have been able to cultivate their fields in quiet, and with the assurance that they should reap where they had sowed, undisturbed by the incursions of robber-bands. The cessation of the Mahratta invasions alone is an ample compensation for whatever of evil may have marked the course of British conquest. The stop that has been put to the cruelties of the native rulers ought not to be forgotten in estimating the amount of evil and of good which that conquest has brought upon India. The world has been shocked by the cruelties of which the rebellious Sepoys have been guilty; but they can astonish no one who is familiar with the history of the races to which these mutineers belong. An indifference to life, and a love of cruelty for cruelty's sake, are common characteristics of most of the Orientals, and are chiefly conspicuous in the ruling classes. The reader of Indian history sickens over details compared with which all that is told of the horrors of the Black Hole of Calcutta is tame and common-place. The English have prevented repetitions of those outrages on humanity, wherever it has been in their power to coerce the princes. They have pared the claws and drawn the teeth of these human tigers. They have acted humanely; yet it may be doubted if they would not have consulted their own immediate interests more closely, if they had acted the part of tyrants rather than of protectors. By ruling through the princes, and allowing them to act as "middle-men," they would have been less troubled with mutinies, and could have amassed greater sums of money. It is to their credit that they have pursued the nobler course; nor ought they to repent of it even in the midst of disasters brought upon them, we are firmly convinced, as much by the mildness of their rule as by any other cause that can be mentioned.
It is yet too early to attempt to account for the rebellion of the Bengal army. That rebellion took the world by surprise, and nowhere more so, it would seem, than in England. A remarkable proof of this is to be found in the tone and language of the debate that took place in the British House of Commons on the 27th of July, in which Mr. Disraeli, Lord Palmerston, Lord John Russell, Mr. Whiteside, Mr. T. Baring, Sir T.E. Perry, Mr. Mangles, Mr. Vernon Smith, and others, participated. That debate was most lively and interesting; and the reading of the ample report in the "Times" revives the recollection of the great field-days of the English senate. Mr. Disraeli's speech is a masterpiece, and would have done honor to times when eloquence was far more common than it is now. Yet the conclusion to which the careful reader of the report must come is, that neither Mr. Disraeli, nor the Premier, nor the President of the Board of Control, nor the Chairman of the Directors of the East India Company, nor any other of the speakers, had a definite idea of the cause of the sudden mutiny of the Sepoys. It is impossible not to admire Mr. Disraeli's talents, as displayed in this speech; and equally impossible is it to find in that speech anything that an intelligent observer of Indian affairs can regard as settling the question, Why did the Sepoys of the Bengal army mutiny in 1857? Everything that he brought forward as a cause of the mutiny was distinctly proved not to be worthy of the name of a cause. Yet the men who could show that he had failed to clear up the mystery could themselves throw no light upon it. The government was especially ignorant of all that it should have known; and there is something almost ludicrous in the tone of the speech made by the President of the Board of Control.
It is not for us to speak authoritatively as to the cause of the Sepoy mutiny, but we venture to express our concurrence with those who have regarded it as, in considerable measure, of Mahometan origin. The Mahometan rule was displaced by the British rule. The Mahometans were for centuries the aristocracy of India, standing to the genuine Indians in pretty much the same relation that the Normans held to the Saxons in England; only it is but justice to them to say, that they rarely bore themselves so offensively towards the Indians as the Normans were accustomed to bear themselves towards the English. They have never lost the recollection of their formerstatus, or ceased to sigh for its restoration. Nor is the time so very remote when they were yet great in the land. Old men among them can recollect when Tippoo Saib was treated as an equal by the English, and have not forgotten how powerful was his father, Hyder. Some few aged Mussulmans there may be yet living who heard from their sires or grandsires, who saw it with their mortal eyes, of the glories of the magnificent Aurungzebe, ere the Persian, or the Affghan, or the Mahratta had carried fire and sword into Shahjehanabad. Two not over-long lives would measure the whole interval of time between the punishment of the English by Aurungzebe and the mutiny at Meerut. Time enough has not yet elapsed to cause the Mahometans to forget what they have been, or to cease to hope that they may yet surpass their fathers. They are not actuated by anything of a sentimental character, but desire to win back, and to enjoy at the expense of the Indian races, the solid advantages of which they have been deprived through the ascendency of a Christian people in the East. "Mahometans in India sigh for the restoration of the old Mahometanrégime," says Colonel Sleeman, "not from any particular attachment to the descendants of Tymour, but with precisely the same feelings that Whigs and Tories sigh for the return to power of their respective parties in England; it would give them all the offices in a country where office is everything. Among them, as among ourselves, every man is disposed to rate his own abilities highly, and to have a good deal of confidence in his own good luck; and all think, that if the field were once opened to them by such a change, they should very soon be able to find good positions for themselves and their children in it. Perhaps there are few communities in the world, among whom education is more generally diffused than among the Mahometans in India. He who holds an office worth twenty rupees a month commonly gives his sons an education equal to that of a prime-minister." [Footnote:Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official, Vol. II. pp. 282, 283.—Colonel Sleeman's work is one of the best ever published on India,—learned, liberal, and philosophical. It has been highly praised by so competent a judge as Mr. Grote.] This very capability for rule must render them not only all the more desirous of obtaining it, but exceedingly dangerous as seekers after it. They are not an ignorant rabble, but men who have an intelligent idea of what they want, and rational modes of effecting its realization. Colonel Sleeman adds, "It is not only the desire for office that makes the educated Mahometans cherish the recollection of the oldrégimein Hindostan; they say, 'We pray every night for the Emperor and his family, because our forefathers ate of the salt of His forefathers,'—that is, our ancestors were in the service of his ancestors, and consequently were of thearistocracyof the country. Whether they really were so matters not; they persuade themselves or their children that they were." In this way the idea of superiority has been kept up among the Mahometans of India; and they have continued to hope for the restoration of their old political supremacy, as pious Jews dream of the rebuilding of Zion. That they were at the bottom of the Meerut mutiny may be taken for granted. That they took for their leader the heir of the Moghul shows the Mahometan nature of the outbreak. At the same time, we believe that if it had not been for the imbecility of Hewitt, who commanded at Meerut, the mutiny never would have occurred, or the mutineers would have been promptly put down. Even after they had escaped from Meerut, Delhi never could have fallen into their hands, if that city—so important, morally and geographically, as well as in a military point of view—had not been without a garrison. That a station of such consequence, stored so abundantly with all the munitions of war, should have been left in an utterly defenceless condition, is a fact that creates inexpressible astonishment, notwithstanding all that happened during the Russian war. Mr. Whiteside, in the debate of the 27th of July, stated that the late General Sir C.J. Napier "said of Delhi, that to guard against surprise, considering its position, its treasures, and its magazines, it should always be defended by twelve thousand picked men." From all that appears, there were not twelve hundred men, or anything like that number, of any kind, in Delhi, last May, to protect either the inhabitants or the stores there deposited. Such another instance of neglect it would be impossible to find in history, after due warning given. Long ago, Albany Fonblanque said, "The sign of the fool with his finger in his mouth, and the sentiment, 'Who'd have thought it?' is the precise emblem of English jurisprudence." The same sign would seem to be applicable to some other branches of the English public service, as well as to that of the law. Perhaps it was because of the warning that nothing was done,—that being the usual course with governments; while it was thought a duty to treat with a sort of spiteful neglect every warning that came from Sir C.J. Napier, because he had a rough, fiery way of expressing his opinion of the folly of those who are perpetually giving occasion for warnings which they never heed,—as if in all ages roughness and fire had not been especial characteristics of the prophetic office.