42. CHAPTER XLII.
QUIET RESUMPTION OF LIFE.
Miss Freeling, who became a sort of messenger between
Richard and the Governor's Family, told him how Miss
Rowena was pleased with the paper; — beyond this, she could
say nothing, and Richard expected nothing. In this, still,
he was repaid for his journey; and added to this, his spirits
seemed to revive in the remembrance of Junia. He wrote
to her, and she to him; and her letters were as music in
the night of his sorrows.
Clover clenched the nail of Richard's calamity, which
Miss Eyre had already driven to the head; and despair becoming
a habit and law of his mind, and getting himself
used to it, it offered less and less obstruction to the routine
of his days, and uniformity of his feelings.
He bowed to the will of Heaven, and addressed himself
with firmness and sobriety to the days of the years of his
pilgrimage. He read his Bible more diligently, — not to
repine with Job, but to invigorate himself on Paul, and
especially to imitate his Master, who went about doing
good.
There were moments when he would abandon the city,
and retire to the country, returning to the house of his
father, or wedding the shadows of his heart to the evening
of the days of Junia. But his business was extensive, and
its concerns complicated, and it involved the interest of parties
very dear to him.
While he would utterly banish Melicent from his thoughts,
we may suppose he did it somewhat like the poet in Gil
Blas, who, having resolved to abandon his art, bade an eternal
adieu to the Muses, in verse!
Did he never complain? Did no discontent overhang his
brow? Did no imprecation attempt the purity of his lip?
There is no trial so severe as that of the heart. There
is no furnace of affliction so hot as that enkindled in the
sensibilities. There is no temptation from which a man
had better pray for quick deliverance than that addressed to
the affections and sentiments.
The fowls were a fortunate affair. They supplied his
purse with cash, and his leisure with amusement. The
crowing of the cocks set Memmy and Bebby to cackling, and
Uncle must of course pipe up a little, too.
The ancient Church used to clothe its penitents in white
sheets. Richard seemed to belong to this class, for Roxy
declared his face was white as a sheet; but Aunt Grint,
more lenient than those priests who ordered hair-shirts in
addition, recommended the extract of valerian, under which
he visibly amended.
And if still in any sense outside of the Church, he was
willing to serve it in the humble capacity of verger; and he
sought to get his Ragged children into some of the meetings.
At least, he raised them to the Griped Hand, which
was a stepping-stone to the Church. Chuk improved in
manners and speech, and suffered Mysie to comb his hair
and wash his clothes.
The golden apples which Hercules took from the garden
of the Hesperides could not be kept anywhere else, and had
to be conveyed back where they grew. Men may say what
they will about the cultivation of virtue outside the Church,
there will always be a sighing and pining of these virtues
for the Church — the true Church. Richard especially, as
he seemed to have derived the seeds of the good he was able
to effect from the Church, was most happy in being permitted
to return thither some of the fruit. In truth, are not all
ragamuffins, gamins, sneaks, trulls, topers, Golden Apples,
that at some period or other have been stolen from the
Church?
Richard's old pupils of the Sabbath-school visited him,
and he took them to see his “Olive-garden,” and they
assisted him in cultivating it. They brought their little
library-books, full of pictures and pretty ideas, and gave
them to these outcasts. They invited them to their picnics
and rural celebrations, and their mothers and aunts
made decent clothes for them. These Sabbath-school boys
led Chuk to the Griped Hand! This was considered a
great exploit, — a crowning triumph.
Dr. Broadwell and Parson Smith honored Richard with a
visit. These gentlemen, while they supposed Richard essentially
culpable, relied on his judgment and discretion, and
could not question his good intentions. Parson Smith,
indeed, had frequently seen Richard, and believing in the
soundness of his piety and purity of his aims, notwithstanding
the darkness that shrouded portions of his history, and seeing,
as he thought, every token of contrition, was unwilling
that his relations to the Church and Christian people should
materially change. If he were a sinner before God, the
Parson argued, he had better keep within reach of the
appointed means of grace.
They called to converse with Richard on the Theatre,
circuses, and similar things, that were the pests of recreation,
and corrupted the proper pastime of the people. The
discussion was harmonious and interesting. To concentrate
on the Griped Hand, and make that attractive to Leisure
and Weariness, to Ignorance and Grossness, and the
varied desultory thirsts and instincts of men, was a foregone
conclusion. But could it have a kind of municipal prerogative,
— would the city confer upon the Rectors of that institution
a licensing power, and compel the wandering disciples
of Thespis, and rude children of the Centaurs, to submit to
their arbitration, — a point would be gained. So these
Churchmen thought, and Richard with them.
Both these divines, in conversation with Richard, wholly
forgot that Richard was a bad man. The exercise of the
mind on any good object is wont to give a turn of goodness
to the mind. Moreover, Parson Smith theorized that bad
men might have some good qualities, and Dr. Broadwell
practised on the Parson's theory; — thus the working methods
of these two men were identical. It was a favorite
notion with the Parson, that you had better shake hands with
a man's virtues, than kick at his vices. He was known
once to have said he would sooner take virtue from the
devil's back, than see it sprawling under his belly.
Some called this smooth preaching. “There are different
kinds of smoothness,” he replied. “There is the smoothing
quality of the laundress' iron, the carpenter's plane,
and the farmer's roller; there is a smooth road, and a
smooth skin; there is the smoothness of silk and of liquor.
If we can iron down some of the wrinkles in human society,
— it is already well starched, — or joint religion and
life, or roll the fields we sow, that they may stand a drought,
and the Church be saved from dulling her scythe on stones,
when she mows, — it were smooth preaching something
worth.”
Richard was an atom distressed by a letter from Junia, in
which, after announcing the death of her grandfather, she
says, “I am going to Woodylin. I long to be where Violet
is buried and Richard suffers. My father's earnest, beautiful
soul urges me. My mother's image, as an enmarbled
pale reminiscence, in the shadows of the past, smiles upon
me. Grandfather heard in the trees the same bird that
foreshadowed the death of Violet, and looking at me, he said
its note was Wood-y-lin! I tremble for thy misery, good,
kind one! Have I not caused it all? Let me, if I cannot
remove it, be where it is. Be not troubled for my coming.
My excellent uncle consents to the journey. My cousin will
convey me to the stage road. Winkle will take care of
me then.”
Richard replied, begging her not to come. Her presence,
while it would rejoice him, would do his cause no good; —
that was past attempt, or hope. Her health, he said, would
be endangered. She would be among strangers, without a
home, or comforts, or friends, like her uncle's.
She rejoined, “Leave me to my resolution and my love.
Give me the ministry of your smile and gladness, for one
day. Conduct me to the spot where Violet lies, and, with
thy arm to lean upon, and the beauty of Rosemary Dell
about me, I shall go cheerfully to my final rest.”
Richard gave instructions to Winkle, — who was on the
alert for whatever was pathetic, as well as prompt in what
was purely commercial, on his route, — to be mindful of
Junia, and bring her safely.
But Winkle could manage better than Richard. “Let
her wait another week, and that will be, he said, a full week;
and Mr. St. John will have to fit out an extra, and it shall
be the pleasant little invalid hack, and Simon, the pleasant
little invalid hack-driver, shall drive it; for Mr. St. John
owes it to the route, ever since he lost his bet on Tunny's
head; and Munk will not object. I always told them, if we
only had a sick people's carriage, and a carriage with blinds
for lovers, and Simon, with his pleasant way of singing, to
drive it, we should do a swimming business. Did you ever
drive lovers? It's rich, driving them for nothing!”
