University of Virginia Library

46. XLVI.
THE ROMANCE OF DR. VANDYKE.

“I am, correctly speaking, not Dr.
Vandyke, but the Baron Julius von
Dyke, a German by birth, and belonging
to a family whose representatives held
important commands in the armies of
the Emperor Charles V. As I am a
person, however, of democratical opinions,
I do not value the von in my name
a farthing, and will sell you my patent
of baron for sixpence. I will not enlarge
upon the former importance of my
family, which, in time, grew poorer—
then poorer—then landless. Whereupon
the baron, my father, went to London;
was induced to emigrate to Virginia;
brought me, his only son, with him; and
died, leaving me at twenty-five possessed
of a small, a very small, estate, but, what
was better, an education as a physician,
the result of study at Göttingen.

“Well, when my father died, I found
myself quite alone, and did not much
relish the lonely life of a country physician
in Charles City, where my small
estate lay; so I disposed of the land, removed
to Williamsburg, and announced
that I was ready to administer pills and
draughts to the inhabitants of that thriving
capital.

“My success was not encouraging.
The children ran behind their mother's
dresses when I made my appearance;
and once or twice it was intimated to me
that, in certain cases connected with one
branch of the leech's art, my personal
appearance was calculated to produce unfortunate
results. In fact, my young
friend, I was hideously ugly—as ugly as I
am at this moment, or very nearly—and,
in consequence thereof, there was nothing
in the world that I admired so much
as personal beauty. This became, at last,
almost a mania with me, and I would
place myself at the window of my poor
lodgings on Gloucester Street—a small
room on the second floor of a small
house—that which you one day entered
with me—and, from this elevated perch,
I would watch the passers-by on the
street, riveting my eyes, with a passionate,
craving admiration on the beautiful
forms moving to and fro before me.
Not a white, bending neck, seen beneath
a blue scarf, not a slender foot with
arched instep in its high-heeled shoe, or
graceful figure, undulating as it moved
on, but filled me with delight and admiration.
And—not with that material
sentiment which you might imagine—
all was etherealized for me; beauty was
poetry, and I enjoyed this beauty as a
painter enjoys the beauty of a summer
day, when white clouds float against a
blue sky, over emerald fields and forests!”

Dr. Vandyke stopped, to utter a short,
grating laugh.

“Poetical, you see, my young friend.
Try the punch! No? Well, to go on

with my romantic narrative: My greatest
misfortune was to have inherited a
mirror which afforded me a full-length
view of my own exquisite proportions.
This mirror was fixed against the wall
between the windows of my lodging,
and I had only to turn my head to see
my own image. I did turn my head often,
and chiefly after following with my
eyes some handsome young cavalier on
his prancing steed—some radiant young
Apollo, with gracefully-fashioned figure,
slender, erect, and elegant, straight
limbs, rounded where they pressed
against the saddle, attractive features,
chestnut curls—some young Adonis, in
a word, compared with whom I was a
satyr of waste places—a monster. For,
what did I behold in that fatal mirror?
A being scarcely human. A thing, let
us say, about four feet and a half in
height, splay-footed, thin-legged, with
enormous chest, the arms of a windmill,
a head like a pumpkin, sunken eyes, wide
mouth, no neck—a fearful, frightful lusus
naturœ, sent into the world to appall
children, and make the dogs bark—ha!
ha!

“Well, things went on thus for years,
when one day I made the acquaintance
of two young ladies on a visit to the
capital: one was afterward your mother,
the other your aunt. It was your
aunt I fell in love with, and this came
about in an accidental manner—if there
be any accidents in the world. Colonel
Seaton, the uncle of the young ladies,
was addicted to high living, and, one
day, on returning from a grand dinner,
he was taken with an indigestion, which
was near putting an end to him. The
most prominent physician in the capital
was sent for in great haste, but was
absent. The consequence was, that I
was called in to attend Colonel Seaton,
and succeeded in relieving him so expeditiously
that he conceived a high opinion
of my abilities, and invited me to visit
at his house as a friend. This offer I
gladly accepted; and, as Colonel Seaton
had known my father, the baron, I soon
became a familiar friend of the family,
and—fell in love with your aunt, Lady
Brand.”

Dr. Vandyke stopped suddenly, and
plunging his hand into the capacious
pocket of his great-coat, which he persisted
in keeping on, drew forth a huge
pipe and a handful of tobacco.

“It is an extraordinary evidence of
absent-mindedness in me to have forgotten
my pipe,” he said. “Is the world
coming to an end? Come, sweetest solace,
come!”

And, grinning amiably, the doctor
filled the great bowl, picked up a coal
with the tongs, lit his pipe, and began
to puff out clouds of snowy smoke.

“You won't smoke? No? Well, to
continue my interesting narrative: Where
did I stop? Oh, at the commencement
of my charming little romance — what
I call, elegantly, `the romance of Dr.
Vandyke' — my love - affair with the
young beauty from the mountains—from
Rivanna, in a word.”

And the doctor darted a keen glance
at Innis, who remained cold and apathetic.

“'Twas an absolute passion I conceived
for the young lady,” said the doctor,
smoking away in the most nonchalant
manner, “and, after all, my young
friend, there is nothing so strong as what
is called love. Nothing hurts, for a short
time, like disappointment therein! I
will not enlarge upon the charming details
of my affair, but will state what
may appear to you, since it so appears to
me, an astounding circumstance — the
fact that the lady of my affections was
not wholly unkind nor cold to her admirer,
the present narrator. Ellen—you
call her Aunt Ellen now, but she was
then a blooming beauty, too youthful
for auntship—was touched, it seems, by
the devotion of the poor physician who
evidently adored her. She blushed when

Splay-foot entered: actually faltered in
her address when she spoke to Bleareyes:
and, one day, the presumptuous
Wide-mouth said, `I love you!' — at
which she no more shrunk than she
would have shrunk from an Adonis!
Can you believe that? I remember without
believing it! And at that moment I
tasted the first moment of real happiness
I had tasted in the world! Then the
poor, deformed dwarf was a human being
after all!—the monster was not so
hideous and repulsive as he had dreamed!
—after all, he was a man, belonged to
mankind, was not an ape, a wild-man of
the woods, an object of disgust or horror.
When I took her hand in my own
she did not shudder or grow sick!—then
she had seen that behind this mask was
a heart and a brain—felt that the brain
thought, and the heart throbbed; and her
own heart melted—was nearly my own,
I think!”

Dr. Vandyke terminated this sentence
with a grin, and, smoking with great
gusto, said:

“I am growing a little tired of this
part of my subject, but nothing is so seductive
as this analytical exposition of
human nature under peculiar phases.
You see, my dear friend, I am proceeding
exactly as I proceed when a subject
—a dead body, that is—is lying on a table
before me, and I have the scalpel in
my hand. I dissect a heart as I dissect a
body. Well, what is the lesson that is
sought to be demonstrated in the present
lecture, my youthful friends—friend, that
is? Why, that a deformed dwarf has
actually a heart, feelings, passions, and
that a woman can understand as much,
and see the man through the hideous
mask! To proceed. The romance is
nearly ended. An interruption took
place on that eventful morning, and the
ladies left Williamsburg almost immediately.
I did not see them again for some
years. Then your mother had married
your father—they came to this house to
live—and, visiting Williamsburg once,
Mrs. Innis invited me to come and see
them, as an old friend, in their mountain-home.
I did so, for my old romance remained
untouched—and here I found
your aunt. Shall I continue? I offered
her my hand in this apartment. She
did not reply either `Yes' or `No;' I was
forced to return to the capital—and a
year afterward she was Lady Brand.
All that came about in the most natural
way. Colonel Seaton brought the young
lady to Williamsburg. She there met
Colonel Brand. Her uncle, her friends,
everybody, said, `Marry him,' and she
finally did so, caring for him, as I happen
to know, not a fig! I saw that at a
glance; and what did I do, my friend?
I said to her: `If you should ever require
the aid of a true friend, send for
me, and I will come to you, either by
day or by night;' and then I went back
to my duties, and forgot all about my
romance, and don't care a farthing now
for her beyond mere friendship, nor regret
that she married my rival!

“There's your pretty little romance,
my boy!” said the doctor, laughing;
“love, nay, passion! — disappointment,
anguish, indifference, oblivion! That's
the course of things in this curious world.
You break your heart about a woman
to-day, and in half a year you have forgotten
her! Every thing changes, my
son—nothing remains the same! Do you
think that time, that wears away the very
Pyramids, don't wear away human grief?
The grief is the easier of the two, I assure
you! Eternal despair!—nonsense!
A year is not an eternity! Come! let
us cease this philosophic strain! Drink
me this glass of punch—'tis imperial!
Vive la joie! and let dull care begone!”

The doctor imbibed a huge mouthful
of punch; refilled his glass; mounted
with great agility into his chair, from
which he stepped to the table, and, raising
his arm until it nearly touched the
ceiling, cried:

“A health to Oblivion—the last, best
friend of humanity!”

At an hour past midnight, Dr. Vandyke
was shown to bed by his host; and
anybody who had looked at him would
have seen upon his countenance an expression
of unmistakable disappointment.

In reply to his narrative, Innis had
only said, with the same dull, apathetic
look:

“I said when you came, doctor, that
I regarded you as one of my best friends
—well, your history has more than ever
convinced me of the fact. You relate
your own disappointment, to impress
upon me the moral that grief wears
away, and indifference comes. So be it.
I trust 'twill come! But I shall none the
less leave this house and Virginia, in two
days from this time, never to return.
My house is sold, my valise is already
packed—it is my great good fortune, as
I turn my back forever on Virginia, to
have heard your friendly voice, doctor.
Good-night!”

On the next morning, Dr. Vandyke
returned to Williamsburg.