University of Virginia Library

5. CHAPTER V.

The landlady (for it was she) soon re-appeared, and I was
careful to meet her again at the top of the stairs, and save
her as much trouble as I could, in her peculiar situation, which
was of a nature to render a woman very sacred in the eyes
of a good man. She had brought a book to amuse me—the
second I had met with in the whole course of the day. The
first I had got by heart—it was a guide-book for the Isle-of-Wight
in duodecimo; and this turned out to be a guide-book
to the Isle-of-Wight in quarto. I could not enjoy such variety—it
reminded me of the fare I had been used to in the
heart of New-England—fish-and-potatoes one day, and potatoes-and-fish
another; and after waiting a while in hope that
some of the voices that I heard wrangling below might come
within reach of mine, I took a chair and sat down by the bell-rope,
knowing by experience what sort of a job I had before
me, and forthwith began to pull a sort of triple-bob-major,
with rests long enough to afford me a nap at the end of
each bar: with much difficulty, and after I had played out
all the tunes I knew, and was just going to begin again with
variations of Yankee Doodle by Matthews, intending to accompany
the air with the original words—

I succeeded in getting a guide to my chamber, a corroty-haired
girl with a pretty good face, who after leading me out
into the cool night air, as if that were a part of her duty before
she put me to bed, conducted me through the kitchen,
which was crowded with servants all talking together; and
having apologized for leading me that way (the only way there
was to my bed-room), she passed me over to the ugliest creature
I ever saw in the shape of a chamber-maid, who starting
off the moment she saw me, with a heavy trot like a cart-horse,
begged me to follow. I did so, pursuing her at half speed
this way and that, up stairs and down, till she arrived at a
door in the garret where, letting fall a courtesy as if she had
trod upon something that hurt her foot, and pushing open the
door, she informed my worship that I was in my bed-room.
I started at the girl in amazement. A bedroom!—how
on earth could she manage to keep her countenance—
what in the name of all Cape-Elizabeth was I to do—
laugh or cry? There were two little beds in the room, six
feet by three—stuck just under the eves, like a pair of swallows'-nests.
Pray said I to the girl,—who appeared rather
anxious to get away, as if she knew by bitter experience what
was to be expected from the wrath of a lodger who had been
decoyed into that particular room—she stood as if she had
entrapped a wild beast, ready to jump over the railings if I
spoke or moved—Pray said I, am I to sleep here?

If you please, Sir.

If I please! why, my good girl, I cannot get my breath
here; the roof is too low, and as for that little window there,
why—hang the window! little as it is, it was never made to
open, I see; I can't move it a peg—neither up nor down, nor
sideways. What am I to do? occupy that little bed there,
not more than two or three feet wide, and stuck under the hot
smoking thatched roof, upon which the summer-sun has been
blazing all day. Am I to sleep there, I say?

Yes, Sir—if you please—

Why—if I should happen to lift my head in the night, I
shall certainly knock my brains out—

If you please, continued she in the same tone, half frightened
to death, and letting fall another courtesy as ugly as herself.

You may go—my dear—said I, in that most persuasive way
so peculiar to our family; being satisfied that if she staid another
minute I should be strongly tempted to open the obnoxious
window, by pitching her through it head-foremost.

Hardly was she gone when it occurred to me to look at the
bed more narrowly. I went up to it—threw down the
coverlid—and gasped for breath—heavy cotton sheets,
that clung to whatever they touched! and a feather-bed,
precisely such as I would employ to suffocate a man, if there
were no hope for him in a case of hydrophobia! And this in
the middle of September, between a floor which was warm to
the tread, and a roof that was warm to the touch, with no
way to introduce a breath of air into the room though you
were dying for it. Such were my prospects.

I walked up to the bell-rope once more, threw off my coat,
and after ringing two or three times gently, to prepare the
folks in the kitchen, whose uproar continued long and long after
I was in bed, I drew up my chair and set to for an
their half-day's work. By and by, the steps of somebody
were heard, and a smothered laugh, and a couple of
persons, followed by a third, who I dare say was the chamber-maid,
passed by my door and took shelter in the room opposite,
which I hoped was like that in which I was doing
(or being done). I'll teach them to titter, said I to myself as
they tripped by the door.

When these people were disposed of—I would have given a
trifle to see who they were, but there was no chance for a
peep, the glass of my door being covered with a green stuff—

when they were disposed of I say, the chamber-maid was
obliging enough to see what I wanted. She must have been
used to like behaviour in those who occupied my room, or she
must have thought by the noise, for I kept pulling away, that
her lodger was in a fit, with his hands tied to the bell-rope.

I cannot possibly go to bed in this way said I, the moment
I saw her face at the door. I cannot sleep in cotton-sheets
my good girl, at this season of the year.

She dropped another courtesy, without looking up or saying
a word in reply.

Have you no linen sheets? Why don't you speak? Nothing
but heavy cotton sheets with the fur on, for such weather as
—where the devil are you going? what is the matter with
you? why don't you answer me? Stop, I say!

Another awkward courtesy, and away she drove to inquire
if I might be indulged with a pair of linen sheets, leaving me
half undressed and sore with perplexity, to prepare for the
issue. After awhile she came back to say, that she's very
sawry, and Missis very sawry, she's no linen sheets haired.

Very well, if that be the case; but I should like to know
if I can have a pair of cotton sheets with the wool off—

Sir!

If they are not haired, so much the better.

Very well, Sir.

Stop—send for my boots, or take them with you now, and
let me be called—fire and fury, you don't hear a word I say.

Yes I do, Sir.

Well, what have I said?

Why Sir, you said you, you—you—you asked me where
the devil I was goin'?

Pshaw! send for my boots, or take them with you now,
and let me be called at seven to-morrow morning—at seven
precisely, d'ye hear.

Another courtesy and a sort of whimper, which sounded to
me like a smothered giggle.

Have my boots ready for me outside the door when I get
up, so that I may not have to disturb the whole house for
them—do you hear?—and tell the boy to be ready with the
gig at seven, will you?—zounds, are you deaf?

Yes Sir—no Sir.

Yes Sir—no Sir; what am I to understand by that?

Yes Sir—

Yes Sir!

No Sir!

Pho pho, leave me.

I now prepared to go to bed, not knowing whether to laugh
or be angry, though I knew that if I did not sleep, I should
wish the Sand-Rock Hotel at the bottom of the Red-Sea;
and that if I did sleep, I should stand a pretty fair chance of
being smothered, or of knocking my brains out whenever I
lifted my head. But sleep was out of the question—I had
little to be afraid of on that score; the noise below would
have kept me awake, if I had been ever so sleepy, or
in ever so delightful a bed—to say nothing of the fever
I was in for having suffered myself to be so packed
away; nor of the bitter self-examination that I subjected
myself to, touching the inconceivable folly of my behaviour
toward—not a woman, but the shape of a woman, who
though I had never seen her face, nor heard her speech, had
haunted me night and day for three whole years; nor any
thing of the peculiar structure of the window and the bed,
one of which, though it would not suffer a breath of air to
get to me, kept rattling to the breeze all night long, while the
other shrieked so as to be heard all over the house, whenever
I stirred hand or foot, and was so narrow, that move
which way I would, I was sure to roll the clothes off.

I lived through the night—how I escaped the catastrophe I
spoke of, He only knows who watches over the ship-boy on
the giddy mast, and the lodgers of the Sand-Rock Hotel.
But I know that I had a narrow escape and that I never can be
sufficiently thankful. I was very sleepy toward morning (after
the house had got still) and yet I could not sleep—I durst
not sleep—I was afraid,—for whenever I shut my eyes, a
tomb like a city was before me, and a beautiful apparition
that I knew, swept by me with a slow majestic tread that I
knew, and disappeared in the far shadow of the grave; or
she stood still before me—in the attire of a bride, and when
I strove to look at her, my heart was heavy with unspeakable
sorrow, for I knew that she was not of our earth, and yet
I loved her. No—no, I could not sleep—and yet, after I was
up and out in the fresh morning air, so happy was I, that I could
hardly speak for joy. I recollected having seen her shadow
pass by my chamber door, arm in arm with a shadow that I
knew to be her husband—pass by to the bridal-couch, even
as they did in the story told by Rousseau, and that I started up
with a feeling that no language can describe; it was like that
which I suppose the lover of Julia had, when as he lay
awake after he had parted from her, he heard her step and the
rustling of her dress—poor wretch—as she and her husband
passed by to their marriage-bed. But such thoughts are
evil. They may do mischief where I would only do good;
they may be a trouble to her, who if I could have my way,
should never know what trouble is. And therefore, casting
off the recollection of what I suffered in my sleep, for I must
have been asleep, though I had no other proof than the memory
of this cruel dream, I shall proceed with my story.

I should have got up early, as early as I could see, if I
had not been afraid of disturbing the house; but having had
some experience of what is called the breakfast-hour in

hotels, I chose to lie and wait to be waked. But I could
not wait for ever, and so after looking at my watch, and finding
that as usual the hour had gone by at which I was to
have been called, I jumped out of bed, and consumed as
much time as I possibly could in the hope of hearing a knock,
before I laid hold of the bell-rope, or opened the door to look
for my boots. It was all in vain however—ring I must, and
ring I did, five or six times before a soul came near me.

At last the girl appeared. How soon can you give me
breakfast?

As soon as you like Sir; what would you please to have,
Sir?

Nothing but a little tea and toast, with a fresh egg, if you
have one—

Yes Sir.

I shall be back in about an hour, and I must be away as
soon as possible after I get back.

Yes Sir—

Stay, stay—don't forget the egg; do you hear me?

Yes Sir—No Sir, I mean—we 'll not forget the egg.

After a full hour's walk over what is said to be the highest
part of the island, I came back, and without stopping to
inquire the way, went up to the little room I had occupied
the evening before. I found it now occupied with luggage,
and as if that were not enough to provoke me, with the luggage
of women, who judging by their shawls and bonnets
and umbrellas, and grey-cloaks lined with silk, and the huge
bag that I saw stuffed out like a feather-bed, must have been
ladies of a certain age—unmarried. Being rather surprised
at what I saw, I had begun to prepare for another tug at the
bell-rope—the more, as the cloth was not laid and there was
no sign of breakfast—when the red-haired girl came up, and
gave me to understand that I had no business in that room—

the room that I had engaged and occupied and was paying
for, and that I was to have my breakfast below.

Below—where—

In the coffee-room—

In the coffee-room; I was told you had no coffee-room.

No more we have Sir; but there's a room below that you
can have now, as the gentleman has just gone out.

Indeed—I am very lucky—

Yes Sir.

And so I am to be turned out of my own room whether I
will or no, that I may have a chance of being turned out of
another man's room when the proprietor gets back?

If you please Sir; the ladies are expected every minute,
and if they should find you here—

If they should find me here. Why, what the deuse!—upon
my word young woman, I have a great mind to stay here till
they do come; and if they were not females I would throw
the baggage out of the window this minute, and leave your
master to settle the affair with them as he could. Where is
he—why did he not ask my leave?—

Law Sir! how could we ask your leave; wa'nt you gone
out to take a walk?

What could I say to that? Nothing. And so I did as I
was bid—walked down to the room below, where I repeated
the order for tea, toast, and a fresh egg. Still there was no
other sign of breakfast than a tea-pot and a canister, a table,
a chair, and a bell-rope, three things which I made immediate
use of, but with little or no effect you may suppose; for the
waiter did not appear till I had rung repeatedly, and when he
did there was neither egg nor toast. After a while however
the toast came, and I inquired for the egg; but no egg appeared
till I had actually finished my breakfast and begun to
ring for my bill. By this time I was in the mood for horsewhipping

any body that might happen to fall in my way. I
do not know that I was ever so angry before—even with a
trifle, though trifles by the way are the very things to try the
temper of a man. I could always bear sorrow without flinching—if
it were heavy; trial, if it were enough to crush me,
without a word or a look to show that I suffered; any thing I
might say, if it were both unavoidable and severe. But I
never could behave like a man where to behave like a man
would appear to be the easiest thing in the world. The
wreck of a great hope I could bear—I could bear it, for I
have borne it;—the loss of much that I most loved on earth, I
could suffer, without a murmur and perhaps without a tear;
without losing either my self-command or my equanimity for
above a day. And yet, if my shoe-maker should bring me
a pair of shoes that pinched my feet—after I had given him
fair notice and full warning—or a pair of boots that were only
to be pulled on by half pulling my fingers off, I should
behave like a mad man, as every body knows. And so it is
with many, whose behaviour would be insupportable to a bystander,
if they were assailed by a petty every-day vexation.
But wreck them as it were, body and spirit, fortune health
and character; heap sorrow upon them; pile up grief upon
grief, and you see nothing but a little more gravity in their
look, and a little more serious manhood in their speech. They
may be paler for a time, they may look more thoughtful for
a season, but their foreheads will be high, their voices clear,
and their tread firm, till the shadow of death has gone by, or
till they have gone by for ever, on their way to the only city
of refuge for a proud man, who has outlived a majestic hope
—the grave.