Chapter LIXXV
Then went the jury out whose names were Mr. Blindman,
Mr. No-good, Mr. Malice, Mr. Love-lust, Mr. Live-loose, Mr.
Heady, Mr. High-mind, Mr. Enmity, Mr. Liar, Mr. Cruelty, Mr.
Hate-light, Mr. Implacable, who every one gave in his
private verdict against him among themselves, and afterwards
unanimously concluded to bring him in guilty before the
judge. And first among themselves, Mr. Blindman, the
foreman, said, I see clearly that this man is a heretic.
Then said Mr. No-good, Away with such a fellow from the
earth! Ay, said Mr. Malice, for I hate the very look of
him. Then said Mr. Love-lust, I could never endure him.
Nor I, said Mr. Live-loose; for he would be always
condemning my way. Hang him, hang him, said Mr. Heady. A
sorry scrub, said Mr. High-mind. My heart riseth against
him, said Mr. Enmity. He is a rogue, said Mr. Liar.
Hanging is too good for him, said Mr. Cruelty. Let us
despatch him out of the way said Mr. Hate-light. Then said
Mr. Implacable, Might I have all the world given me, I could
not be reconciled to him; therefore let us forthwith bring
him in guilty of death. — Pilgrim's Progress.
When immortal Bunyan makes his picture of the
persecuting passions bringing in their verdict of guilty,
who pities Faithful? That is a rare and blessed lot which
some greatest men have not attained, to know ourselves
guiltless before a condemning crowd — to be sure that what we
are denounced for is solely the good in us. The pitiable
lot is that of the man who could not call himself a martyr
even though he were to persuade himself that the men who
stoned him were but ugly passions incarnate — who knows that
he is stoned, not
for professing the Right, but for not
being the man he professed to be.
This was the consciousness that Bulstrode was withering
under while he made his preparations for departing from
Middlemarch, and going to end his stricken life in that sad
refuge, the indifference of new faces. The duteous merciful
constancy of his wife had delivered him from one dread, but
it could not hinder her presence from being still a tribunal
before which he shrank from confession and desired advocacy.
His equivocations with himself about the death of Raffles
had sustained the conception of an Omniscience whom he
prayed to, yet he had a terror upon him which would not let
him expose them to judgment by a full confession to his
wife: the acts which he had washed and diluted with inward
argument and motive, and for which it seemed comparatively
easy to win invisible pardon — what name would she call them
by? That she should ever silently call his acts Murder was
what he could not bear. He felt shrouded by her doubt: he
got strength to face her from the sense that she could not
yet feel warranted in pronouncing that worst condemnation on
him. Some time, perhaps — when he was dying — he would tell
her all: in the deep shadow of that time, when she held his
hand in the gathering darkness, she might listen without
recoiling from his touch. Perhaps: but concealment had been
the habit of his life, and the impulse to confession had no
power against the dread of a deeper humiliation.
He was full of timid care for his wife, not only because
he deprecated any harshness of judgment from her, but
because he felt a deep distress at the sight of her
suffering. She had sent her daughters away to board at a
school on the coast, that this crisis might be hidden from
them as far as possible. Set free by their absence from the
intolerable necessity of accounting for her grief or of
beholding their frightened wonder, she could live
unconstrainedly with the sorrow that was every day streaking
her hair with whiteness and making her eyelids languid.
"Tell me anything that you would like to have me do,
Harriet," Bulstrode had said to her; "I mean with regard to
arrangements of property. It is my intention not to
sell the land I possess in this neighborhood, but to leave
it to you as a safe provision. If you have any wish on such
subjects, do not conceal it from me."
A few days afterwards, when she had returned from a
visit to her brother's, she began to speak to her husband on
a subject which had for some time been in her mind.
"I should like to do something for my brother's
family, Nicholas; and I think we are bound to make some
amends to Rosamond and her husband. Walter says Mr. Lydgate
must leave the town, and his practice is almost good for
nothing, and they have very little left to settle anywhere
with. I would rather do without something for ourselves, to
make some amends to my poor brother's family."
Mrs. Bulstrode did not wish to go nearer to the facts
than in the phrase " make some amends; " knowing that her
husband must understand her. He had a particular reason,
which she was not aware of, for wincing under her
suggestion. He hesitated before he said —
"It is not possible to carry out your wish in the way
you propose, my dear. Mr. Lydgate has virtually rejected
any further service from me. He has returned the thousand
pounds which I lent him. Mrs. Casaubon advanced him the sum
for that purpose. Here is his letter."
The letter seemed to cut Mrs. Bulstrode severely. The
mention of Mrs. Casaubon's loan seemed a reflection of that
public feeling which held it a matter of course that every
one would avoid a connection with her husband. She was
silent for some time; and the tears fell one after the
other, her chin trembling as she wiped them away.
Bulstrode, sitting opposite to her, ached at the sight of
that grief-worn face, which two months before had been
bright and blooming. It had aged to keep sad company with
his own withered features. Urged into some effort at
comforting her, he said —
"There is another means, Harriet, by which I might do a
service to your brother's family, if you like to act in it.
And it would, I think, be beneficial to you: it would be an
advantageous way of managing the land which I mean to be
yours."
She looked attentive.
"Garth once thought of undertaking the management of
Stone Court in order to place your nephew Fred there. The
stock was to remain as it is, and they were to pay a certain
share of the profits instead of an ordinary rent. That
would be a desirable beginning for the young man, in
conjunction with his employment under Garth. Would it be a
satisfaction to you?"
"Yes, it would," said Mrs. Bulstrode, with some return
of energy. "Poor Walter is so east down; I would try
anything in my power to do him some good before I go away.
We have always been brother and sister."
"You must make the proposal to Garth yourself, Harriet,"
said Mr. Bulstrode, not liking what he had to say, but
desiring the end he had in view, for other reasons besides
the consolation of his wife. "You must state to him that
the land is virtually yours, and that he need have no
transactions with me. Communications can be made through
Standish. I mention this, because Garth gave up being my
agent. I can put into your hands a paper which he himself
drew up, stating conditions; and you can propose his renewed
acceptance of them. I think it is not unlikely that he will
accept when you propose the thing for the sake of your
nephew."