InDecember, 1814, a steamboat was set in motion on the Limehouse Canal, the Lord Mayor and other distinguished persons being on board. In the same month Joanna Southcott died. She had announced that on the 19th October she was to be delivered of the Prince of Peace, although she was then sixty years old. Thousands of persons believed her, and a cradle was made. The Prince of Peace did not arrive, and in a little more than two months poor Joanna had departed, the cause of her departure having being certified as dropsy. Death did not diminish the number of her disciples, for they took refuge in the hope of her resurrection. “The arm of the Lord is not shortened,” they truly affirmed; and even to this day there are people who are waiting for the fulfilment of Joanna’s prophecies and the appearance of the “second Shiloh.” Zachariah had been frequently twitted in joke by his profane companions in the printing-office upon his supposed belief in the delusion. It was their delight to assume that all the “pious ones,” as they called them, were alike; and on the morning of the 30th of December, the day after Joanna expired, they were more than usually tormenting. Zachariah did not remonstrate. In his conscientious eagerness to bear witness for his Master, he had often tried his hand upon his mates; but he had never had the smallest success, and had now desisted. Moreover, his thoughts were that morning with his comrades, the Friends of the People. He hummed to himself the lines fromLara:
“Within that land was many a malcontent,Who cursed the tyranny to which he bent;That soil full many a wringing despot saw,Who worked his wantonness in form of law:Long war without and frequent broil withinHad made a path for blood and giant sin.”
“Within that land was many a malcontent,Who cursed the tyranny to which he bent;That soil full many a wringing despot saw,Who worked his wantonness in form of law:Long war without and frequent broil withinHad made a path for blood and giant sin.”
The last meeting had been unusually exciting. Differences of opinion had arisen as to future procedure, many of the members, the Secretary included, advocating action; but what they understood by it is very difficult to say. A special call had been made for that night, and Zachariah was in a difficulty. His native sternness and detestation of kings and their ministers would have led him almost to any length; but he had a sober head on his shoulders. So had the Major, and so had Caillaud. Consequently they held back, and insisted, before stirring a step towards actual revolution, that there should be some fair chance of support and success. The Major in particular warned them of the necessity of drill; and plainly told them also that, not only were the middle classes all against them, but their own class was hostile. This was perfectly true, although it was a truth so unpleasant that he had to endure some very strong language, and even hints of treason. No wonder: for it is undoubtedly very bitter to be obliged to believe that the men whom we want to help do not themselves wish to be helped. To work hard for those who will thank us, to head a majority against oppressors, is a brave thing; but far more honour is due to the Maitlands, Caillauds, Colemans, and others of that stamp who strove for thirty years from the outbreak of the French revolution onwards, not merely to rend the chains of the prisoners, but had to achieve the more difficult task of convincing them that they would be happier if they were free. These heroes are forgotten, or nearly so. Who remembers the poor creatures who met in the early mornings on the Lancashire moors or were shot by the yeomanry? They sleep in graves over which stands no tombstone, or probably their bodies have been carted away to make room for a railway which has been driven through their resting-place. They saw the truth before those whom the world delights to honour as its political redeemers; but they have perished utterly from our recollection, and will never be mentioned in history. Will there ever be a great Day of Assize when a just judgment shall be pronounced; when all the impostors who have been crowned for what they did not deserve will be stripped, and the Divine word will be heard calling upon the faithful to inherit the kingdom,—who, when “I was an hungered gave me meat, when I was thirsty gave me drink; when I was a stranger took me in; when I was naked visited me; when I was in prison came unto me?” Never! It was a dream of an enthusiastic Galilean youth, and let us not desire that it may ever come true. Let us rather gladly consent to be crushed into indistinguishable dust, with no hope of record: rejoicing only if some infinitesimal portion of the good work may be achieved by our obliteration, and content to be remembered only in that anthem which in the future it will be ordained shall be sung in our religious services in honour of all holy apostles and martyrs who have left no name.
The night before the special meeting a gentleman in a blue cloak, and with a cigar in his mouth, sauntered past the entrance to Carter’s Rents, where Mr. Secretary lived. It was getting late, but he was evidently not in a hurry, and seemed to enjoy the coolness of the air, for presently he turned and walked past the entrance again. He took out his watch—it was a quarter to eleven o’clock—and he cursed Mr. Secretary and the beer-shops which had probably detained him. A constable came by, but never showed himself in the least degree inquisitive; although it was odd that anybody should select Carter’s Rents for a stroll. Presently Mr. Secretary came in sight, a trifle, but not much, the worse for liquor. It was odd, also, that he took no notice of the blue cloak and cigar, but went straight to his own lodging. The other, after a few moments followed; and it was a third time odd that he should find the door unbolted and go upstairs. All this, we say, would have been strange to a spectator, but it was not so to these three persons. Presently the one first named found himself in Mr. Secretary’s somewhat squalid room. He then stood disclosed as the assistant whom the Secretary had first seen at Whitehall sitting in the Commissioner’s Office. This was not the second nor third interview which had taken place since then.
“Well, Mr. Hardy, what do you want here to-night?”
“Well, my friend, you know, I suppose. How goes the game?”
“D—m me if Idoknow. If you think I am going to split, you are very much mistaken.”
“Split! Who wants you to split? Why, there’s nothing to split about. I can tell you just as much as you can tell me.”
“Why do you come here then?”
“For the pleasure of seeing you, and to—” Mr. Hardy put his hand carelessly in his pocket, a movement which was followed by a metallic jingle—“and just to—to—explain one or two little matters.”
The Secretary observed that he was very tired.
“Are you? I believe I am tired too.”
Mr. Hardy took out a little case-bottle with brandy in it, and the Secretary, without saying a word, produced two mugs and a jug of water. The brandy was mixed by Mr. Hardy; but his share of the spirit differed from that assigned to his friend.
“Split!” he continued; “no, I should think not. But we want you to help us. The Major and one or two more had better be kept out of harm’s way for a little while; and we propose not to hurt them, but to take care of them a bit, you understand? And if, the next time, he and the others will be there—we have been looking for the Major for three or four days, but he is not to be found in his old quarters—we will just give them a call. When will you have your next meeting? They will be all handy then.”
“You can find that out without my help. It’s to-morrow.”
“Ah! I suppose you’ve had a stormy discussion. I hope your moderate counsels prevailed.”
Mr. Secretary winked and gave his head a twist on one side, as if he meant thereby to say: “You don’t catch me.”
“It’s a pity,” continued Mr. Hardy, taking no notice, “that some men are always for rushing into extremities. Why don’t they try and redress their grievances, if they have any, in the legitimate way which you yourself propose—by petition?”
It so happened that a couple of hours before, Mr. Secretary having been somewhat noisy and insubordinate, the Major had been obliged to rule him out of order and request his silence. The insult—for so he considered it—was rankling in him.
“Because,” he replied, “we have amongst us two or three d—d conceited, stuck-up fools, who think they are going to ride over us. By God, they are mistaken though! They are the chaps who do all the mischief. Not that I’d say anything against them—no, notwithstanding I stand up against them.”
“Do all the mischief—yes, you’ve just hit it. I do believe that if it were not for these fellows the others would be quiet enough.”
The Secretary took a little more brandy and water. The sense of wrong within him was like an open wound, and the brandy inflamed it. He also began to think that it would not be a bad thing for him if he could seclude the Major, Caillaud, and Zachariah for a season. Zachariah in particular he mortally hated.
“What some of these fine folks would like to do, you see, Mr. Hardy, is to persuade us poor devils to get up the row, while theydirectit.Directit, that’s their word; but we’re not going to be humbugged.”
“Too wide awake, I should say.”
“I should say so too. We are to be told off for the Bank of England, and they are to show it to us at the other end of Cheapside.”
“Bank of England,” said Mr. Hardy, laughing; “that’s a joke. You might run your heads a long while against that before you get in. You don’t drink your brandy and water.”
The Secretary took another gulp. “And he’s a military man—a military man—a military man.” He was getting rather stupid now, and repeated the phrase each of the three times with increasing unsteadiness, but also with increasing contempt.
Mr. Hardy took our his watch. It was getting on towards midnight. “Good-bye; glad to see you all right,” and he turned to leave. There was a jingling of coin again, and when he had left Mr. Secretary took up the five sovereigns which had found their way to the table and put them in his pocket. His visitor picked his way downstairs. The constable was still pacing up and down Carter’s Rents, but again did not seem to observe him, and he walked meditatively to Jermyn Street. He was at his office by half-past nine, and his chief was only half-an-hour later.
The Major had thought it prudent to change his address; and, furthermore, it was the object of the Government to make his arrest, with that of his colleagues, at the place of meeting, not only to save trouble, but because it would look better. Mr. Hardy had found out, therefore, all he wanted to know, and was enabled to confirm his opinion that the Major was the head of the conspiracy.
But underneath Mr. Secretary’s mine was a deeper mine; for as the Major sat at breakfast the next morning a note came for him, the messenger leaving directly he delivered it to the servant. It was very brief:—“No meeting to-night. Warn all except the Secretary, who has already been acquainted.” There was no signature, and he did not know the handwriting. He reflected for a little while, and then determined to consult Caillaud and Coleman, who were his informal Cabinet. He had no difficulty in finding Coleman, but the Caillauds were not at home, and it was agreed that postponement could do no harm. A message was therefore left at Caillaud’s house, and one was sent to every one of the members, but two or three could not be discovered.
Meanwhile Mr. Secretary, who, strange to say, hadnotbeen acquainted, had been a little overcome by Mr. Hardy’s brandy on the top of the beer he had taken beforehand, and woke in the morning very miserable. Finding the five guineas in his pocket, he was tempted to a public-house hard by, in order that he might cool his stomach and raise his spirits with a draught or two of ale. He remained there a little too long, and on reaching home was obliged to go to bed again. He awoke about six, and then it came into his still somewhat confused brain that he had to attend the meeting. At half-past seven he accordingly took his departure. Meanwhile the Major and Zachariah had determined to post themselves in Red Lion Street, to intercept those of their comrades with whom they had not been able to communicate, and also to see what was going to happen. At a quarter to eight the Secretary turned out of Holborn, and when he came a little nearer, Zachariah saw that at a distance of fifty yards there was a constable following him. He came on slowly until he was abreast of a narrow court, when suddenly there was a pistol-shot, and he was dead on the pavement. Zachariah’s first impulse was to rush forward, but he saw the constable running, followed by others, and he discerned in an instant that to attempt to assist would lead to his own arrest and do no good. He managed, however, to reach the Major, and for two or three moments they stood stock-still on the edge of the pavement struck with amazement. Presently a woman passed them with a thick veil over her face.
“Home,” she said; “don’t stay here like fools. Pack up your things and be off. You’ll be in prison to-morrow morning.”
“Be off!” gasped Zachariah; “be off!—where?”
“Anywhere!” and she had gone.
The constables, after putting the corpse in a hackney coach, proceeded to the room; but it was dark and empty. They had no directions to do anything more that night, and returned to Bow Street. The next morning, however, as soon as it was light, a Secretary of State’s warrant, backed by sufficient force, was presented at the lodgings of Caillaud and Zachariah. The birds had flown, and not a soul could tell what had become of them. In Zachariah’s street, which was rather a Radical quarter, the official inquiries were not answered politely, and one of the constables received on the top of his head an old pail with slops in it. The minutest investigation failed to discover to whom the pail belonged.
Bow Streetwas completely at fault, and never discovered the secret of that assassination. It was clear that neither the Major nor Coleman were the murderers, as they had been noticed at some distance from the spot where the Secretary fell by several persons who described them accurately. Nor was Caillaud suspected, as the constable testified that he passed him on the opposite side of the street, as he followed the Secretary. The only conclusion, according to Bow Street, which was free from all doubt was, that whoever did the deed was a committee consisting of a single member. A reward of £500 did not bring forward anybody who knew anything about the business. As for Caillaud, his daughter and the Major, the next morning saw them far on the way to Dover, and eventually they arrived at Paris in safety. Zachariah, when he reached home, found his wife gone. A note lay for him there, probably from the same hand which warned the Major, telling him not to lose an instant, but to join in Islington one of the mails to Manchester. His wife would start that night from St. Martin’s le Grand by a coach which went by another road. He was always prompt, and in five minutes he was out of the house. The fare was carefully folded by his unknown friend in the letter. He just managed as directed, to secure a place, not by the regular Manchester mail, but by one which went through Barnet and stopped to take up passengers at the “Angel.” He climbed upon the roof, and presently was travelling rapidly through Holloway and Highgate. He found, to his relief, that nobody had heard of the murder, and he was left pretty much to his own reflections. His first thoughts were an attempt to unravel the mystery. Why was it so sudden? Why had no word not hint of what was intended reached him? He could not guess. In those days the clubs were so beset with spies that frequently the most important resolutions were taken by one man, who confided in nobody. It was winter, but fortunately Zachariah was well wrapped up. He journeyed on, hour after hour, in a state of mazed bewilderment, one thought tumbling over another, and when morning broke over the flats he had not advanced a single step in the determination of his future path. Nothing is more painful to a man of any energy than the inability to put things in order in himself—to place before himself what he has to do, and arrange the means for doing it. To be the passive victim of a rushing stream of disconnected impressions is torture, especially if the emergency be urgent. So when the sun came up Zachariah began to be ashamed of himself that the night had passed in these idiotic moonings, which had left him just where he was, and he tried to settle what he was to do when he reached Manchester. He did not know a soul; but he could conjecture why he was advised to go thither. It was a disaffected town, and Friends of the People were very strong there. His first duty was to get a lodging, his second to get work, and his third to find out a minister of God under whom he could worship. He put this last, not because it was the least important, but because he had the most time to decide upon it. At about ten o’clock at night he came to his journey’s end, and to his joy saw his wife waiting for him. They went at once to a small inn hard by, and Mrs. Coleman began to overwhelm him with interrogation; but he quietly suggested that not a syllable should be spoken till they had had some rest, and that they should swallow their supper and go to bed. In the morning Zachariah rose and looked out of the window. He saw nothing but a small backyard in which some miserable, scraggy fowls were crouching under a cart to protect themselves from the rain, which was falling heavily through the dim, smoky air. His spirits sank. He had no fear of apprehension or prosecution, but the prospect before him was depressing. Although he was a poor man, he had not been accustomed to oscillations of fortune, and he was in an utterly strange place, with five pounds in his pocket, and nothing to do.
He was, however, resolved not to yield, and thought it best to begin with his wife before she could begin with him.
“Now, my dear, tell me what has happened, who sent you here, and what kind of a journey you have had?”
“Mr. Bradshaw came about seven o’clock, and told me the Government was about to suppress the Friends of the People; that you did not know it; that I must go to Manchester; that you would come after me; and that a message would be left for you. He took me to the coach, and paid for me.”
“Mr. Bradshaw! Did he tell you anything more?”
“No; except that he did not think we should be pursued, and that he would send our things after us when he knew where we were.”
“You have not heard anything more, then?”
“No.”
“You haven’t heard that the Secretary was shot?”
“Shot! Oh dear! Zachariah, what will become of us?”
Her husband then told her what he knew, she listening with great eagerness and in silence.
“Oh, Zachariah, what will become of us?” she broke out again.
“There is no reason to worry yourself, Jane; it is perfectly easy for me to prove my innocence. It is better for us, however, to stay here for a time. The Government won’t go any further with us; they will search for the murderer—that’s all.”
“Why, then, are we sent here and the others are let alone? I suppose the Major is not here?”
“I cannot say.”
“To think I should ever come to this! I haven’t got a rag with me beyond what I have on. I haven’t got any clean things; a nice sort of creature I am to go out of doors. And it all had nothing to do with us.”
“Nothing to do with us! My dear Jane, do you mean that we are not to help other people, but sit at home and enjoy ourselves? Besides, if you thought it wrong, why did you not say so before?”
“How was I to know what you were doing? You never told me anything; you never do. One thing I do know is that we shall starve and I suppose I shall have to go about and beg. I haven’t even another pair of shoes or stockings to my feet.”
Zachariah pondered for a moment. His first impulse was something very different; but at last he rose, went up to his wife, kissed her softly on the forehead, and said:
“Never mind, my dear; courage, you will have your clothes next week. Come with me and look out for a lodging.”
Mrs. Zachariah, however, shook herself free—not violently, but still decidedly—from his caresses.
“Most likely seized by the Government. Look for a lodging! That’s just like you! How can I go out in this pouring rain?”
Zachariah lately, at any rate, had ceased to expect much affection in his wife for him; but he thought she was sensible, and equal to any complexity of circumstances, or even to disaster. He thought this, not on any positive evidence; but he concluded, somewhat absurdly, that her coldness meant common sense and capacity for facing trouble courageously and with deliberation. He had now to find out his mistake, and to learn that the absence of emotion neither proves, nor is even a ground for suspecting, any good whatever of a person; that, on the contrary, it is a ground for suspecting weakness, and possibly imbecility.
Mrs. Coleman refused to go out, and after breakfast Zachariah went by himself, having first inquired what was a likely quarter. As he wandered along much that had been before him again and again once more recurred to him. He had been overtaken by calamity, and he had not heard from his wife one single expression of sympathy, nor had he received one single idea which could help him. She had thought of nothing but herself, and even of herself not reasonably. She was not the helpmeet which he felt he had a right to expect. He could have endured any defect, so it seemed, if only he could have had love; he could have endured the want of love if only he could have had a counsellor. But he had neither, and he rebelled, questioning the justice of his lot. Then he fell into the old familiar controversy with himself, and it was curiously characteristic of him, that, as he paced those dismal Manchester pavements, all their gloom disappeared as he re-argued the universal problem of which his case was an example. He admitted the unquestionable right of the Almighty to damn three parts of creation to eternal hell if so He willed; why not, then, one sinner like Zachariah Coleman to a weary pilgrimage for thirty or forty years? He rebuked himself when he found that he had all his life assented so easily to the doctrine of God’s absolute authority in the election and disposal of the creatures He had made, and yet that he revolted when God touched him, and awarded him a punishment which, in comparison with the eternal loss of His presence, was as nothing. At last—and here, through his religion, he came down to the only consolation possible for him—he said to himself, “Thus hath He decreed; it is foolish to struggle against His ordinances; we can but submit.” “A poor gospel,” says his critic. Poor!—yes, it may be; but it is the gospel according to Job, and any other is a mere mirage. “Doth the hawk fly by thy wisdom and stretch her wings towards the south?” Confess ignorance and the folly of insurrection, and there is a chance that even the irremediable will be somewhat mitigated. Poor!—yes; but it is genuine; and this at least must be said for Puritanism, that of all the theologies and philosophies it is the most honest in its recognition of the facts; the most real, if we penetrate to the heart of it, in the remedy which it offers.
He found two small furnished rooms which would answer his purpose till his own furniture should arrive, and he and his wife took possession that same morning. He then wrote to his landlord in London—a man whom he knew he could trust—and directed him to send his goods. For the present, although he had no fear whatever of any prosecution, he thought fit to adopt a feigned name, with which we need not trouble ourselves. In the afternoon he sallied out to seek employment. The weather had cleared, but Mrs. Coleman still refused to accompany him, and she occupied herself moodily with setting the place to rights, as she called it, although, as it happened, it was particularly neat and clean. There was not so much printing done in Manchester then as now, and Zachariah had no success. He came home about seven o’clock, weary and disheartened. His wife was one of those women who under misfortune show all that is worst in them, as many women in misfortune show all that is best.
“You might have been sure you would get nothing to do here. If, as you say, there is no danger, why did you not stay in London?”
“You know all about it, my dear; we were warned to come.”
“Yes, but why in such a hurry? Why didn’t you stop to think?”
“It is all very well to say so now, but there were only a few minutes in which to decide. Besides, when I got home I found you gone.”
Mrs. Zachariah conveniently took no notice of the last part of this remark, which, of course, settled the whole question, but continued:
“Ah, well, I suppose it’s all right; but I’m sure we shall starve—I am convinced we shall. Oh! I wish my poor dear mother were alive! I have no home to go to. Whatwillbecome of us?”
He lost his patience a little.
“Jane,” he said, “what is our religion worth if it does not support us in times like these? Does it not teach us to bow to God’s will? Surely we, who have had such advantages, ought to behave under our trials better than those who have been brought up like heathens. God will not leave us. Don’t you remember Mr. Bradshaw’s sermon upon the passage through the Red Sea. When the Israelites were brought down to the very shore with nothing but destruction before them, a way was opened. What did Mr. Bradshaw bid us observe? The Egyptians were close behind—so close that the Israelites saw them; the sea was in front. The road was not made till the enemy was upon them, and then the waters were divided and became a wall unto them on their right hand and on their left; the very waters, Mr. Bradshaw remarked, which before were their terror. God, too, might have sent them a different way; no doubt He might, but He chosethatway.”
“Zachariah, I heard Mr. Bradshaw as well as yourself; I am a member of the church just as much as you are, and I don’t think it becoming of you to preach to me as if you were a minister.” Her voice rose and became shriller as she went on. “I will not stand it. Who are you that you should talk to me so?—bad enough to bring me down here to die, without treating me as if I were an unconverted character. Oh! if I had but a home to go to!” and she covered her face with her apron and became hysterical.
What a revelation! By this time he had looked often into the soul of the woman whom he had chosen—the woman with whom he was to be for ever in this world—and had discovered that there was nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing which answered anything in himself with a smile of recognition; but he now looked again, and found something worse than emptiness. He found lurking in the obscure darkness a reptile with cruel fangs which at any moment might turn upon him when he was at his weakest and least able to defend himself. He had that in him by nature which would have prompted him to desperate deeds. He could have flung himself from her with a curse, or even have killed himself in order to escape from his difficulty. But whatever there was in him originally had been changed. Upon the wild stem had been grafted a nobler slip, which drew all its sap from the old root, but had civilised and sweetened its acrid juices. He leaned over his wife, caressed her, gave her water, and restored her.
“God knows,” he said, “I did not mean to preach to you. God in heaven knows I need that somebody should preach to me.” He knelt down before her as she remained leaning back in the chair, and he repeated the Lord’s Prayer: “Give us this day our daily bread.Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive them that trespass against us.” But will it be believed that as he rose from his knees, before he had actually straightened his limbs, two lines from the “Corsair” flashed into his mind, not particularly apposite, but there they were:
“She rose—she sprung—she clung to his embraceTill his heart heaved beneath her hidden face?”
“She rose—she sprung—she clung to his embraceTill his heart heaved beneath her hidden face?”
Whence had they descended? He was troubled at their sudden intrusion, and he went silently to the window, moodily gazing into the street. His wife, left to herself, recovered, and prepared supper. There was no reconciliation, at least on her side. She was not capable of reconciliation. Her temper exhausted itself gradually. With her the storm never broke up nobly and with magnificent forgetfulness into clear spaces of azure, with the singing of birds and with hot sunshine turning into diamonds every remaining drop of the deluge which had threatened ruin; the change was always rather to a uniformly obscured sky and a cold drizzle which lasted all day.
The next morning he renewed his quest. He was away all day long, but he had no success. He was now getting very anxious. He was expecting his furniture, which he had directed to be sent to the inn where they had first stayed, and he would have to pay for the carriage. His landlord had insisted on a week’s rent beforehand, so that, putting aside the sum for the carrier, he had now two pounds left. He thought of appealing to his friends; but he had a great horror of asking for charity, and could not bring himself to do it.
The third, fourth, and fifth day passed, with no result. On the seventh day he found that his goods had come; but he decided not to move, as it meant expense. He took away a chest of clothes, and remained where he was. By way of recoil from the older doctrine that suffering does men good, it has been said that it does no good. Both statements are true, and both untrue. Many it merely brutalises. Half the crime of the world is caused by suffering, and half its virtues are due to happiness. Nevertheless suffering, actual personal suffering, is the mother of innumerable beneficial experiences, and unless we are so weak that we yield and break, it extracts from us genuine answers to many questions which, without it, we either do not put to ourselves, or, if they are asked, are turned aside with traditional replies. A man who is strong and survives can hardly pace the pavements of a city for days searching for employment, his pocket every day becoming lighter, without feeling in after life that he is richer by something which all the universities in the world could not have given him. The most dramatic of poets cannot imagine, even afar off, what such a man feels and thinks, especially if his temperament be nervous and foreboding. How foreign, hard, repellent, are the streets in which he is a stranger, alone amidst a crowd of people all intent upon their own occupation, whilst he has none! At noon, when business is at its height, he, with nothing to do, sits down on a seat in an open place, or, may be, on the doorstep of an empty house, unties the little parcel he has brought with him, and eats his dry bread. He casts up in his mind the shops he has visited; he reflects that he has taken all the more promising first, and that not more than two or three are left. He thinks of the vast waste of the city all round him; its miles of houses; and he has a more vivid sense of abandonment than if he were on a plank in the middle of the Atlantic. Towards the end of the afternoon the pressure in the offices and banks increases; the clerks hurry hither and thither; he has no share whatever in the excitement; he is an intrusion. He lingers about aimlessly, and presently the great tide turns outwards and flows towards the suburbs. Every vehicle which passes him is crowded with happy folk who have earned their living and are going home. He has earned nothing. Let anybody who wants to test the strength of the stalk of carle hemp in him try it by the wringing strain of a day thus spent! How humiliating are the repulses he encounters! Most employers to whom a request is made for something to do prefer to treat it as a petition for aims, and answer accordingly. They understand what is wanted before a word is spoken, and bawl out “No! Shut the door after you.” One man to whom Zachariah applied was opening his letters. For a moment he did not pay the slightest attention, but as Zachariah continued waiting, he shouted with an oath, “What do you stand staring there for? Be off!” There was once a time when Zachariah would have stood up against the wretch; but he could not do it now, and he retreated in silence. Nevertheless, when he got out into the Street he felt as if he could have rushed back and gripped the brute’s throat till he had squeezed the soul out of his carcass. Those of us who have craved unsuccessfully for permission to do what the Maker of us all has fitted us to do alone understand how revolutions are generated. Talk about the atrocities of the Revolution! All the atrocities of the democracy heaped together ever since the world began would not equal, if we had any gauge by which to measure them, the atrocities perpetrated in a week upon the poor, simply because they are poor; and the marvel rather is, not that there is every now and then a September massacre at which all the world shrieks, but that such horrors are so infrequent. Again, I say, let no man judge communist or anarchisttill he has asked for leave to work, and a “Damn your eyes!” has rung in his ears.
Zachariah had some self-respect; he was cared for by God, and in God’s Book was a registered decree concerning him. These men treated him as if he were not a person, an individual soul, but as an atom of a mass to be swept out anywhere, into the gutter—into the river. He was staggered for a time. Hundreds and thousands of human beings swarmed past him, and he could not help saying to himself as he looked up to the grey sky, “Is it true, then? Does God really know anything about me? Are we not born by the million every week, like spawn, and crushed out of existence like spawn? Is not humanity the commonest and cheapest thing in the world?” But as yet his faith was unshaken, and he repelled the doubt as a temptation of Satan. Blessed is the man who can assign promptly everything which is not in harmony with himself to a devil, and so get rid of it. The pitiful case is that of the distracted mortal who knows not what is the degree of authority which his thoughts and impulses possess; who is constantly bewildered by contrary messages, and has no evidence as to their authenticity. Zachariah had his rule still; the suggestion in the street was tried by it; found to be false; was labelled accordingly, and he was relieved.
The dread of the real, obvious danger was not so horrible as a vague, shapeless fear which haunted him. It was a coward enemy, for it seized him when he was most tired and most depressed. What is that nameless terror? Is it a momentary revelation of the infinite abyss which surrounds us; from the sight of which we are mercifully protected by a painted vapour, by an illusion that unspeakable darkness which we all of us know to exist, but which we hypocritically deny, and determine never to confess to one another? Here again, however, Zachariah had his advantage over others. He had his precedent. He remembered that quagmire in the immortal Progress into which, if even a good man falls, he can find no bottom; he remembered that gloom so profound “that ofttimes, when he lifted up his foot to set forward, he knew not where or upon what he should set it next;” he remembered the flame and smoke, the sparks and hideous noises, the things that cared not for Christian’s sword, so that he was forced to betake himself to another weapon called All-prayer; he remembered how that Christian “was so confounded that he did not know his own voice;” he remembered the voice of a man as going before, saying, “Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear none ill,for Thou art with me.” Lastly, he remembered that by-and-by the day broke, and Christian cried, “He hath turned the shadow of death into the morning.” He remembered all this; he could connect his trouble with the trouble of others; he could give it a place in the dispensation of things, and could therefore lift himself above it.
He had now been in Manchester a fortnight, and his little store had dwindled down to five shillings. It was Saturday night. On the Sunday, as his last chance, he meant to write to Mr. Bradshaw. He went out on the Sunday morning, and had persuaded his wife to accompany him. They entered the first place of worship they saw. It was a Methodist chapel, and the preacher was Arminian in the extreme. It was the first time Zachariah had ever been present at a Methodist service. The congregation sang with much fervour, and during the prayer, which was very long, they broke in upon it with ejaculations of their own, such as “Hear him, O Lord!”—“Lord have mercy on us!”
The preacher spoke a broad Lancashire dialect, and was very dramatic. He pictured God’s efforts to save a soul. Under the pulpit ledge was the imaginary bottomless pit of this world—not of the next. He leaned over and pretended to be drawing the soul up with a cord. “He comes, he comes!” he cried; “God be praised he is safe!” and he landed him on the Bible. The congregation gave a great groan of relief. “There he is on the Rock of Ages! No, no, he slips; the Devil has him!” The preacher tried to rescue him: “He is gone—gone!” and he bent over the pulpit in agony. The people almost shrieked. “Gone—gone!” he said again with most moving pathos, and was still for a moment. Then gathering himself up, he solemnly repeated the terrible verses: “For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened,and have tasted of the heavenly gift,and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost,and have tasted the good word of God,and the powers of the world to come,if they shall fall away,to renew them again unto repentance;seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh,and put Him to an open shame.” Zachariah knew that text well. Round it had raged the polemics of ages. Mr. Bradshaw had never referred to it but once, and all the elder members of his congregation were eager in the extreme to hear what he had to say about it. He boldly declared that it had nothing to do with the elect. He was compelled to do so. Following his master Calvin, he made it apply to outsiders. The elect, says Calvin, are beyond the risk of fatal fall. But “I deny,” he goes on to say, that “there is any reason why God may not bestow even on the reprobate a taste of His favour; may irradiate their minds with some scintillations of His light; may touch them with some sense of His goodness; may somehow engrave His word on their minds.” Horrible, most horrible, we scream, that the Almighty should thus play with those whom He means to destroy; but let us once more remember that these men did not idly believe in such cruelty. They were forced into their belief by the demands of their understanding, and their assent was more meritorious than the weak protests of so-called enlightenment. Zachariah, pondering absently on what he had heard, was passing out of the chapel when a hand was gently laid on his shoulder.
“Ah, friend, what are you doing here?”
He turned round and recognised William Ogden, who had been sent by the Hampden Club in Manchester some six months before as a delegate to the Friends of the People in London. The two walked some distance together, and Zachariah gave him the history of the last three weeks. With the murder he was, of course, acquainted. Ogden was a letterpress printer, and when he heard that Zachariah was in such straits, he said that he thought he might perhaps find him a job for the present, and told him to come to his office on the following morning. Zachariah’s heart rejoiced that his bread would not fail, but he characteristically rejoiced even more at this signal proof that his trust in his God was justified. When he reached home he proposed to his wife that they should at once kneel down and thank God for His mercy.
“Of course, Zachariah; but you are not yet sure you will get anything. I will take off my things directly.”
“Need you wait to take off your things, my dear?”
“Really, Zachariah, you do make such strange remarks sometimes. I need not wait; but I am sure it will be more becoming, and it will give you an opportunity to think over what you are going to say.”
Accordingly Mrs. Coleman retired for about five minutes. On her return she observed that it was the time for regular family prayer, and she produced the Bible. Zachariah had indeed had the opportunity to think, and he had thought very rapidly. The mere opening of the sacred Book, however, always acted as a spell, and when its heavy lids fell down on either side the room cleared itself of all haunting, intrusive evil spirits. He read the seventeenth chapter of Exodus, the story of the water brought out of the rock; and he thanked the Almighty with great earnestness for the favour shown him, never once expressing a doubt that he would not be successful. He was not mistaken, for Ogden had a place for him, just as good and just as permanent as the one he had left in London.
Wemust now advance a little more rapidly. It was in the beginning of 1815 that Zachariah found himself settled in Manchester. That eventful year passed without any external change, so far as he was concerned. He became a member of the Hampden Club, to which Ogden and Bamford belonged; but he heard nothing of Maitland nor of Caillaud. He had a letter now and then from Mr. Bradshaw and it was a sore trial to him that nobody could be found in Manchester to take the place of that worthy man of God. He could not attach himself definitely to any church in the town, and the habit grew upon him of wandering into this or the other chapel as his fancy led him. His comrades often met on Sunday evenings. At first he would not go; but he was afterwards persuaded to do so. The reasons which induced him to alter his mind were, in the first place, the piety, methodistic most of it, which was then mixed up with politics; and secondly, a growing fierceness of temper, which made the cause of the people a religion. From 1816 downwards it may be questioned whether he would not have felt himself more akin with any of his democratic friends, who were really in earnest over the great struggle, than with a sleek half Tory professor of the gospel, however orthodox he might have been. In 1816 the situation of the working classes had become almost intolerable. Towards the end of the year wheat rose to a quarter, and incendiarism was common all over England. A sense of insecurity and terror took possession of everybody. Secret outrages, especially fires by night, chill the courage of the bravest, as those know well enough who have lived in an agricultural county, when, just before going to bed, great lights are seen on the horizon; when men and women collect on bridges or on hill tops, asking “Where is it?” and when fire-engines tearing through the streets arrive useless at their journey’s end because the hose has been cut. One evening in November 1816, Zachariah was walking home to his lodgings. A special meeting of the club had been called for the following Sunday to consider a proposal made for a march of the unemployed upon London. Three persons passed him—two men and a woman—who turned round and looked at him and then went on. He did not recognise them, but he noticed that they stopped opposite a window, and as he came up they looked at him again. He could not be mistaken; they were the Major, Caillaud, and his daughter. The most joyous recognition followed, and Zachariah insisted on their going home with him. It often happens that we become increasingly intimate with one another even when we are shut out from all intercourse. Zachariah had not seen the Major nor Caillaud nor Pauline for two years, and not a single thought had been interchanged. Nevertheless he was much nearer and dearer to them than he was before. He had unconsciously moved on a line rapidly sweeping round into parallelism with theirs. The relationship between himself and his wife during those two years had become, not openly hostile, it is true, but it was neutral. Long ago he had given up the habit of talking to her about politics, the thing which lay nearest to his heart just then. The pumping effort of bringing out a single sentence in her presence on any abstract topic was incredible, and so he learned at last to come home, though his heart and mind were full to bursting, and say nothing more to her than that he had seen her friend Mrs. Sykes, or bought his tea at a different shop. On the other hand, the revolutionary literature of the time, and more particularly Byron, increasingly interested him. The very wildness and remoteness of Byron’s romance was just what suited him. It is all very well for the happy and well-to-do to talk scornfully of poetic sentimentality. Those to whom a natural outlet for their affection is denied know better. They instinctively turn to books which are the farthest removed from commonplace and are in a sense unreal. Not to the prosperous man, a dweller in beautiful scenery, well married to an intelligent wife, is Byron precious, but to the poor wretch, say some City clerk, with an aspiration beyond his desk, who has two rooms in Camberwell and who before he knew what he was doing made a marriage—well—which was a mistake, but who is able to turn to that island in the summer sea, where dwells Kaled, his mistress—Kaled, the Dark Page disguised as a man, who watches her beloved dying:
“Who nothing fears, nor feels, nor heeds, nor sees,Save that damp brow which rests upon his knees;Save that pale aspect, where the eye, though dim,Held all the light that shone on earth for him.”
“Who nothing fears, nor feels, nor heeds, nor sees,Save that damp brow which rests upon his knees;Save that pale aspect, where the eye, though dim,Held all the light that shone on earth for him.”
When they came indoors, and Mrs. Zachariah heard on the stairs the tramp of other feet besides those of her husband, she prepared herself to be put out of temper. Not that she could ever be really surprised. She was not one of those persons who keep a house orderly for the sake of appearances. She would have been just the same if she had been living alone, shipwrecked on a solitary island in the Pacific. She was the born natural enemy of dirt, dust, untidiness, and of every kind of irregularity, as the cat is the born natural enemy of the mouse. The sight of dirt, in fact, gave her a quiet kind of delight, because she foresaw the pleasure of annihilating it. Irregularity was just as hateful to her. She could not sit still if one ornament on the mantelpiece looked one way and the other another way, and she would have risen from her deathbed, if she could have done so, to put a chair straight. She was not, therefore, aggrieved in expectancy because she was not fit to be seen. It was rather because she resented any interruption of domestic order of which she had not been previously forewarned. As it happened, however the Major came first, and striding into the room, he shook her hand with considerable fervour and kissed it gallantly. Her gathering ill-temper disappeared with the promptitude of a flash. It was a muddy night; the Major had not carefully wiped his boots, and the footmarks were all over the floor. She saw them, but they were nothing.
“My dear Mrs. Coleman, how are you? What a blessing to be here again in your comfortable quarters.”
“Really, Major Maitland, it is very good of you to say so. I am very glad to see you again. Where have you been? I thought we had lost you for ever.”
Caillaud and his daughter had followed. They bowed to her formally, and she begged them to be seated.
“Then, my dear madam,” continued the Major, laughing, “you must have thought me dead. You might have known that if I had not been dead I must have come back.”
She coloured just a trifle, but made no reply further than to invite all the company to have supper.
Zachariah was somewhat surprised. He did not know what sort of a supper it could be; but he was silent. She asked Pauline to take off her bonnet, and then proceeded to lay the cloth. For five minutes, or perhaps ten minutes, she disappeared, and then there came, not only bread and cheese, but cold ham, a plentiful supply of beer, and, more wonderful still, a small cold beefsteak pie. Everything was produced as easily as if it had been the ordinary fare, and Zachariah was astonished at his wife’s equality to the emergency. Whence she obtained the ham and beefsteak pie he could not conjecture. She apologised for having nothing hot; would have had something better if she had known, etc., etc., and then sat down at the head of the table. The Major sat on her right, Pauline next to him, and opposite to Pauline, Caillaud and Zachariah. Their hostess immediately began to ask questions about the events of that fatal night when they all left London.
The Major, however, interposed, and said that it would perhaps be better if nothing was said upon that subject.
“A dismal topic,” he observed; “talking about it can do no good, and I for one don’t want to be upset by thinking about it just before I go to bed.”
“At least,” said Zachariah, “you can tell us why you are in Manchester?”
“Certainly,” replied the Major. “In the first place, Paris is not quite so pleasant as it used to be; London, too, is not attractive; and we thought that, on the whole, Manchester was to be preferred. Moreover, a good deal will have to be done during the next twelvemonth, and Manchester will do it. You will hear all about it when your club meets next time.”
“You’ve been in Paris?” said Mrs. Zachariah. “Isn’t it very wicked?”
“Well, that depends on what you call wicked.”
“Surely there cannot be two opinions on that point.”
“It does seem so; and yet when you live abroad you find that things which are made a great deal of here are not thought so much of there; and, what is very curious, they think other things very wrong there of which we take no account here.”
“Is that because they are not Christians?”
“Oh dear no; I am speaking of good Christian people; at least so I take them to be. And really, when you come to consider it, we all of us make a great fuss about our own little bit of virtue, and undervalue the rest—I cannot tell upon whose authority.”
“But are they not, Major, dreadfully immoral in France?”
Pauline leaned over her plate and looked Mrs. Coleman straight in the face.
“Mrs. Coleman, you are English; you—”
Her father put up his hand; he foresaw what was coming, and that upon this subject Pauline would have defied all the rules of hospitality. So he replied calmly, but with the calm of suppressed force:
“Mrs. Coleman, as my daughter says, you are English; you are excusable. I will not dispute with you, but I will tell you a little story.”
“Will you not take some more beer, Mr. Caillaud, before you begin?”
“No, thank you, madam, I have finished.”
Caillaud pushed away his plate, on which three parts of what was given him, including all the ham, remained untouched, and began—his Gallicisms and broken English have been corrected in the version now before the reader:
“In 1790 a young man named Dupin was living in Paris, in the house of his father, who was a banker there. The Dupins were rich, and the son kept a mistress, a girl named Victorine. Dupin the younger had developed into one of the worst of men. He was strictly correct in all his dealings, sober, guilty of none of the riotous excesses which often distinguish youth at that age, and most attentive to business; but he was utterly self-regarding, hard, and emotionless. What could have induced Victorine to love him I do not know; but love him she did, and her love instead of being a folly, was her glory. If love were always to be in proportion to desert, measured out in strictest and justest huckstering conformity therewith, what a poor thing it would be! The love at least of a woman is as the love of the Supreme Himself, and just as magnificent. Victorine was faithful to Dupin; and poor and handsome as she was, never wronged him by a loose look. Well, Dupin’s father said his son must marry, and the son saw how reasonable and how necessary the proposal was. He did marry, and he cut himself adrift from Victorine without the least compunction, allowing her a small sum weekly, insufficient to keep her. There was no scene when they parted, for his determination was communicated to her by letter. Three months afterwards she had a child of whom he was the father. Did she quietly take the money and say nothing? Did she tear up the letter in a frenzy and return him the fragments? She did neither. She wrote to him and told him that she would not touch his gold. She would never forget him, but she could not be beholden to him now for a crust of bread. She had done no wrong hitherto—so she said, Mrs. Coleman; I only repeat her words—they are not mine. But to live on him after he had left her would be a mortal crime. So they separated, a victim she—both victims, I may say—to this cursed thing we call Society. One of the conditions on which the money was to have been given was, that she should never again recognise him in any way whatever. This half of the bargain she faithfully observed. For some months she was alone, trying to keep herself and her child, but at last she was taken up by a working stone-mason named Legouvé. In 1793 came the Terror, and the Dupins were denounced and thrown into the Luxembourg. Legouvé was one of the Committee of Public Safety. It came to the recollection of the younger Dupin as he lay expecting death that he had heard that the girl Victorine had gone to live with Legouvé, and a ray of light dawned on him in his dungeon. He commissioned his wife to call on Victorine and implore her to help them. She did so. Ah, that was a wonderful sight—so like the Revolution! Madame Dupin, in her silks and satins, had often passed the ragged Victorine in the streets, and, of course, had never taken the slightest notice of her. Now Madame was kneeling to her! Respectability was in the dust before that which was not by any means respectable; the legitimate before the illegitimate! Oh, it was, I say, a wonderful sight in Victorine’s wretched garret! She was touched with pity, and, furthermore, the memory of her old days with Dupin and her love for him revived. Legouvé was frightfully jealous, and she knew that if she pleaded Dupin’s cause before him she would make matters worse. A sudden thought struck her. She went to Couthon and demanded an audience.
“‘Couthon,’ she said, ‘are the Dupins to die?’
“‘Yes, to-morrow.’
“‘Dupin the younger is the father of my child.’
“‘And he has deserted you, and you hate him. He shall die.’
“‘Pardon me, I do not hate him.’
“‘Ah, you love him still; but that is no reason why he should be spared, my pretty one. We must do our duty. They are plotters against the Republic, and must go.’
“‘Couthon, they must live. Consider; shall that man ascend the scaffold with the thought in his heart that I could have rescued him, and that I did not; that I have had my revenge? Besides, what will be said?—that the Republic uses justice to satisfy private vengeance. All the women in my quarter know who I am.’
“‘That is a fancy.’
“‘Fancy! Is it a fancy to murder Dupin’s wife—murder all that is good in her—murder the belief in her for ever that there is such a thing as generosity? You do not wish to kill the soul? That is the way with tyrants, but not with the Republic.’
“Thus Victorine strove with Couthon, and he at last yielded. Dupin and his father were released that night, and before daybreak they were all out of Paris and safe. In the morning Legouvé found that they were liberated, and on asking Couthon the reason, was answered with a smile that they had an eloquent advocate. Victorine had warned Couthon not to mention her name, and he kept his promise; but Legouvé conjectured but too truly. He went home, and in a furious rage taxed Victorine with infidelity to him, in favour of the man who had abandoned her. He would not listen to her, and thrust her from him with curses. I say nothing more about her history. I will only say this, that Pauline is that child who was born to her after Dupin left her. I say it because I am so proud that Pauline has had such a mother!”
“Pauline her daughter!” said Zachariah. “I thought she was your daughter.”
“She is my daughter: I became her father.”
Everybody was silent.
“Ah, you say nothing,” said Caillaud; “I am not surprised. You are astonished. Well may you be so that such a creature should ever have lived. What would Jesus Christ have said to her?”
The company soon afterwards rose to go.
“Good-bye, Mrs. Coleman,” said the Major in his careless way; “I am glad to find Manchester does not disagree with you. At least, I should think it does not.”
“Oh no, Major Maitland, I like it quite as well as London. Mind, you promise to come againsoon—very soon.”
The Major had gone downstairs first. She had followed him to the first landing, and then returned to bid Pauline and Caillaud good-bye. She stood like a statue while Pauline put on her hat.
“Good-night, madam,” said Caillaud, slightly bowing.
“Good-night, madam,” said Pauline, not bowing in the least.
“Good-night,” she replied, without relaxing her rigidity.
As soon as they were in the street Pauline said, “Father, I abhor that woman. If she lives she will kill her husband.”
Mrs. Coleman, on the other hand, at the same moment said, “Zachariah, Pauline and Caillaud cannot come to this house again.”
“Why not?”
“Why not, Zachariah? I am astonished at you! The child of a woman who lived in open sin!”
He made no reply. Years ago not a doubt would have crossed his mind. That a member of Mr. Bradshaw’s church could receive such people as Caillaud and Pauline would have seemed impossible. Nevertheless, neither Caillaud nor Pauline were now repugnant to him; nor did he feel that any soundless gulf separated them from him, although, so far as he knew his opinions had undergone no change.
Mrs. Coleman forbore to pursue the subject, for her thoughts went off upon another theme, and she was inwardly wondering whether the Major would ever invite her to the theatre again. Just as she was going to sleep, the figure of the Major hovering before her eyes, she suddenly bethought herself that Pauline, if not handsome, was attractive. She started, and lay awake for an hour. When she rose in the morning the same thought again presented itself, to dwell with her hence forwards, and to gnaw her continually like vitriol.
Soonafter this visit debates arose in Zachariah’s club which afterwards ended in the famous march of the Blanketeers, as they were called. Matters were becoming very serious, and the Government was thoroughly alarmed, as well it might be, at the discontent which was manifest all over the country. The Prince Regent was insulted as he went to open Parliament, and the windows of his carriage were broken. It was thought, and with some reason, that the army could not be trusted. One thing is certain, that the reformers found their way into the barracks at Knightsbridge and had lunch there at the expense of the soldiers, who discussed Hone’s pamphlets and roared with laughter over thePolitical Litany. The Prince Regent communicated to both Houses certain papers, and recommended that they should at once be taken into consideration. They contained evidence, so the royal message asserted, of treasonable combinations “to alienate the affections of His Majesty’s subjects from His Majesty’s person and Government,” &c. Secret committees were appointed to consider them both by Lords and Commons, and in about a fortnight they made their reports. The text was the Spitalfields meeting of the preceding 2nd of December. A mob had made it an excuse to march through the city and plunder some shops. Some of the charges brought against the clubs by the Lords’ Committee do not now seem so very appalling. One was, that they were agitating for universal suffrage and annual Parliaments—“projects,” say the Committee, “which evidently involve, not any qualified or partial change but a total subversion of the British constitution.” Another charge was the advocacy of “parochial partnership in land, on the principle that the landholders are not proprietors in chief; that they are but stewards of the public; that the land is the people’s farm; that landed monopoly is contrary to the spirit of Christianity and destructive of the independence and morality of mankind.” The Reform party in Parliament endeavoured to prove that the country was in no real danger, and that the singularly harsh measures proposed were altogether unnecessary. That was true. There was nothing to be feared, because there was no organisation; but nevertheless, especially in the manufacturing towns, the suffering was fearful and the hatred of the Government most bitter. What is so lamentable in the history of those times is the undisciplined wildness and feebleness of the attempts made by the people to better themselves. Nothing is more saddening than the spectacle of a huge mass of humanity goaded, writhing, starving, and yet so ignorant that it cannot choose capable leaders, cannot obey them if perchance it gets them, and does not even know how to name its wrongs. The governing classes are apt to mistake the absurdity of the manner in which a popular demand expresses itself for absurdity of the demand itself; but in truth the absurdity of the expression makes the demand more noteworthy and terrible. Bamford, when he came to London in the beginning of 1817, records the impression which the clubs made upon him. He went to several and found them all alike; “each man with his porter-pot before him and a pipe in his mouth; many speaking at once, more talkers than thinkers; more speakers than listeners. Presently ‘Order’ would be called, and comparative silence would ensue; a speaker, stranger or citizen, would be announced with much courtesy and compliment. ‘Hear, hear, hear’ would follow, with clapping of hands and knocking of knuckles on the tables, till the half-pints danced; then a speech, with compliments to some brother orator or popular statesman; next a resolution in favour of Parliamentary Reform, and a speech to second it; an amendment on some minor point would follow; a seconding of that; a breach of order by some individual of warm temperament; half a dozen would rise to set him right; a dozen to put them down; and the vociferation and gesticulation would become loud and confounding.”
The Manchester clubs had set their hearts upon an expedition to London—thousands strong; each man with a blanket to protect him and a petition in his hand. The discussion on this project was long and eager. The Major, Caillaud and Zachariah steadfastly opposed it; not because of its hardihood, but because of its folly. They were outvoted; but they conceived themselves loyally bound to make it a success. Zachariah and Caillaud were not of much use in organisation, and the whole burden fell upon the Major. Externally gay, and to most persons justifying the charge of frivolity, he was really nothing of the kind when he had once settled down to the work he was born to do. His levity was the mere idle sport of a mind unattached and seeking its own proper object. He was like a cat, which will play with a ball or its own tail in the sunshine, but if a mouse or a bird crosses its path will fasten on it with sudden ferocity. He wrought like a slave during the two months before the eventful 10th March 1817, and well nigh broke his heart over the business. Everything had to be done subterraneously; for though the Habeas Corpus Act was not yet suspended, preparations for what looked like war were perilous. But this was not the greatest difficulty. He pleaded for dictatorial powers, and at once found he had made himself suspected thereby. He was told bluntly that working men did not mean to exchange one despot for another, and that they were just as good as he was. Any other man would have thrown up his commission in disgust, but not so Major Maitland. He persevered unflaggingly, although a sub-committee had been appointed to act with him and check his proceedings. The secretary of this very sub-committee, who was also treasurer, was one of the causes of the failure of the enterprise, for when the march began neither he nor the funds with which he had been entrusted could be found. After the club meetings in the evening there was often an adjournment to Caillaud’s lodgings, where the Major, Zachariah, Caillaud, and Pauline sat up till close upon midnight. One evening there was an informal conference of this kind prior to the club meeting on the following night. The Major was not present, for he was engaged in making some arrangements for the commissariat on the march. He had always insisted on it that they were indispensable, and he had been bitterly opposed the week before by some of his brethren, who were in favour of extempore foraging which looked very much like plunder. He carried his point, notwithstanding some sarcastic abuse and insinuations of half-heartedness, which had touched also Caillaud and Zachariah, who supported him. Zachariah was much depressed.
“Mr. Coleman, you are dull,” said Pauline. “What is the matter?”
“Dull!—that’s not exactly the word. I was thinking of to-morrow.”
“Ah! I thought so. Well?”
Zachariah hesitated a little. “Is it worth all the trouble?” at last he said, an old familiar doubt recurring to him—“Is it worth all the trouble to save them? What are they?—and, after all, what can we do for them? Suppose we succeed, and a hundred thousand creatures like those who blackguarded us last week get votes, and get their taxes reduced, and get all they want, what then?”
Pauline broke in with all the eagerness of a woman who is struck with an idea—“Stop, stop, Mr. Coleman. Here is the mistake you make. Grant it all—grant your achievement is ridiculously small—is it not worth the sacrifice of two or three like you and me to accomplish it? That is our error. We think ourselves of such mighty importance. The question is, whether we are of such importance, and whether the progress of the world one inch will not be cheaply purchased by the annihilation of a score of us. You believe in what you call salvation. You would struggle and die to save a soul; but in reality you can never save a man; you must be content to struggle and die to save a little bit of him—to prevent one habit from descending to his children. You won’t save him wholly, but you may arrest the propagation of an evil trick, and so improve a trifle—just a trifle—whole generations to come. Besides, I don’t believe what you will do is nothing. ‘Give a hundred thousand blackguard creatures votes’—well, that is something. You are disappointed they do not at once become converted and all go to chapel. That is not the way of the Supreme. Your hundred thousand get votes, and perhaps are none the better, and die as they were before they had votes. But the Supreme has a million, or millions, of years before Him.”
Zachariah was silent. Fond of dialectic, he generally strove to present the other side; but he felt no disposition to do so now, and he tried rather to connect what she had said with something which he already believed.
“True,” he said at last; “true, or true in part. What are we?—what are we?” and so Pauline’s philosophy seemed to reconcile itself with one of his favourite dogmas, but it had not quite the same meaning which it had for him ten years ago.
“Besides,” said Caillaud, “we hate Liverpool and all his crew. When I think of that speech at the opening of Parliament I become violent. There it is; I have stuck it up over the mantelpiece:
“Deeply as I lament the pressure of these evils upon the country,I am sensible that they are of a nature not to admit of an immediate remedy.But whilst I observe with peculiar satisfaction the fortitude with which so many privations have been borne,and the active benevolence which has been employed to mitigate them,I am persuaded that the great sources of our national prosperity are essentially unimpaired;and I entertain a confident expectation that the native energy of the country will at no distant period surmount all the difficulties in which we are involved.”
“Deeply as I lament the pressure of these evils upon the country,I am sensible that they are of a nature not to admit of an immediate remedy.But whilst I observe with peculiar satisfaction the fortitude with which so many privations have been borne,and the active benevolence which has been employed to mitigate them,I am persuaded that the great sources of our national prosperity are essentially unimpaired;and I entertain a confident expectation that the native energy of the country will at no distant period surmount all the difficulties in which we are involved.”
“My God,” continued Caillaud, “I could drive a knife into the heart of the man who thus talks!”
“No murder, Caillaud,” said Zachariah.
“Well, no. What is it but a word? Let us say sacrifice. Do you call the death of your Charles a murder? No; and the reason why you do not is what? Not that it was decreed by a Court. There have been many murders decreed by Courts according to law. Was not the death of your Jesus Christ a murder? Murder means death for base, selfish ends. What said Jesus—that He came to send a sword? Of course He did. Every idea is a sword. What a God He was! He was the first who ever cared for the people—for the real people, the poor, the ignorant, the fools, the weak-minded, the slaves. The Greeks and Romans thought nothing of these. I salute thee, O Thou Son of the People!” and Caillaud took down a little crucifix which, strange to say, always hung in his room, and reverently inclined himself to it. “A child of the people,” he continued, “in everything, simple, foolish, wise, ragged, Divine, martyred Hero.”
Zachariah was not astonished at this melodramatic display, for he knew Caillaud well; and although this was a little more theatrical than anything he had ever seen before, it was not out of keeping with his friend’s character. Nor was it insincere, for Caillaud was not an Englishman. Moreover, there is often more insincerity in purposely lowering the expression beneath the thought, and denying the thought thereby, than in a little exaggeration. Zachariah, although he was a Briton, had no liking for that hypocrisy which takes a pride in reducing the extraordinary to the commonplace, and in forcing an ignoble form upon that which is highest. The conversation went no further. At last Caillaud said:
“Come, Pauline, a tune; we have not had one for a long time.”
Pauline smiled, and went into her little room. Meanwhile her father removed chairs and table, piling them one on another so as to leave a clear space. He and Zachariah crouched into the recess by the fireplace. Pauline entered in the self same short black dress trimmed with red, with the red artificial flower, wearing the same red stockings and dancing-slippers, but without the shawl. The performance this time was not quite what it was when Zachariah had seen it in London. Between herself and the corner where Zachariah and her father were seated she now had an imaginary partner, before whom she advanced, receded, bowed, displayed herself in the most exquisitely graceful attitudes, never once overstepping the mark, and yet showing every limb and line to the utmost advantage. Zachariah, as before, followed every movement with eager—shall we say with hungry eyes? He was so unused to exhibitions of this kind that their grace was not, as it should have been, their only charm; for, as we before observed, in his chapel circle even ordinary dancing was a thing prohibited. The severity of manners to which he had been accustomed tended to produce an effect the very opposite to that which was designed; for it can hardly be doubted that if it were the custom in England for women to conceal the face, a glimpse of an eye or a nose would excite unpleasant thoughts.