"Did you ever perform in public?" he asked.

"No. I was taught when I was very young; but I have never danced except to please father and his friends."

This was a relief, and some kind of an excuse. He felt not quite such a reprobate; but again he reflected that when he was looking at her he did not know that she was not in a theatre every night in the week. He expected that Jean would offer some further explanation of the unusual accomplishment which his daughter had acquired; but he was silent, and Zachariah rose to depart, for it was eleven o'clock. Jean apparently was a little restless at the absence of approval on Zachariah's part, and at last he said abruptly:

"What do you think of her?"

Zachariah hesitated, and Pauline came to the rescue. "Father, what a shame! Don't put him in such an awkward position."

"It was very wonderful," stammered Zachariah, "but we are not used to that kind of thing."

"Who are the 'we'?" said Pauline. "Ah, of course you are Puritans. I am a—what do you call it?—a daughter, no, that isn't it—a child of the devil. I won't have that though. My father isn't the devil. Even YOU wouldn't say that, Mr. Coleman. Ah, I have no business to joke, you look so solemn; you think my tricks are satanic; but what was it in your book, 'C'est moi, l'Eternel, qui fais toutes les choses la'?" and as Zachariah advanced to the doors he made him a bow with a grace which no lady of quality could have surpassed.

He walked home with many unusual thoughts. It was the first time he had ever been in the company of a woman of any liveliness of temperament, and with an intellect which was on equal terms with that of a man. In his own Calvinistic Dissenting society the pious women who were members of the church took little or no interest in the mental life of their husband. They read no books, knew nothing of politics, were astonishingly ignorant, and lived in their household duties. To be with a woman who could stand up against him was a new experience. Here was a girl to whom every thought her father possessed was familiar!

But there was another experience. From his youth upwards he had been trained with every weapon in the chapel armoury, and yet he now found himself as powerless as the merest novice to prevent the very sinful occupation of dwelling upon every attitude of Pauline, and outlining every one of her limbs. Do what he might, her image was for ever before his eyes, and reconstructed itself after every attempt to abolish it, just as a reflected image in a pool slowly but inevitably gathers itself together again after each disturbance of the water. When he got home, he found, to his surprise, that his wife was still sitting up. She had been to the weekly prayer-meeting, and was not in a very pleasant temper. She was not spiteful, but unusually frigid. She felt herself to be better than her husband, and she asked him if he could not arrange in future that his political meetings might not interfere with his religious duties.

"Your absence, too, was noticed, and Mrs. Carver asked me how it was that Mr. Coleman could let me go home alone. She offered to tell Mr. Carver to come home with me; but I refused."

Delightfully generous of Mrs. Carver! That was the sort of kindness for which she and many of her Pike Street friends were so distinguished; and Mrs. Coleman not only felt it deeply, but was glad of the opportunity of letting Mr. Coleman know how good the Carvers were.

It was late, but Mrs. Coleman produced the Bible. Zachariah opened it rather mechanically. They were going regularly through it at family worship, and had got into Numbers. The portion for that evening was part of the 26th chapter: "And these are they that were numbered of the Levites after their families: of Gershon, the family of the Gershonites: of Kohath, the family of the Kohathites: of Merari, the family of the Merarites," &c., &c. Zachariah, having read about a dozen verses, knelt down and prayed; but, alas, even in his prayer he saw Pauline's red stockings.

The next morning his wife was more pleasant, and even talkative— talkative, that is to say, for her. Something had struck her.

"My dear," quoth she, as they sat at breakfast, "what a pity it is that the Major is not a converted character!"

Zachariah could not but think so too.

"I have been wondering if we could get him to attend our chapel. Who knows?—some word might go to his heart which might be as the seed sown on good ground."

"Have you tried to convert him yourself?"

"Oh no, Zachariah! I don't think that would be quite proper."

She screwed up her lips a little, and then, looking down at her knees very demurely, smoothed her apron.

"Why not, my dear? Surely it is our duty to testify to the belief that is in us. Poor Christiana, left alone, says, as you will remember, 'O neighbour, knew you but as much as I do, I doubt not but that you would go with me.'"

"Ah, yes, that was all very well then." She again smoothed her apron. "Besides, you know," she added suddenly, "there were no public means of grace in the City of Destruction. Have YOU said anything to the Major?"

"No."

She did not push her advantage, and the unpleasant fact again stood before Zachariah's eyes, as it had stood a hundred times before them lately, that when he had been with sinners he had been just what they were, barring the use of profane language. What had he done for his master with the Major, with Jean, and with Pauline?—and the awful figure of the Crucified seemed to rise before him and rebuke him. He was wretched: he had resolved over and over again to break out against those who belonged to the world, to abjure them and all their works. Somehow or other, though, he had not done it.

"Suppose," said Mrs. Zachariah, "we were to ask the Major here on Sunday afternoon to tea, and to chapel afterwards."

"Certainly." He was rather pleased with the proposition. He would be able to bear witness in this way at any rate to the truth.

"Perhaps we might at the same time ask Jean Caillaud, his friend. Would to God"—his wife started—"would to God," he exclaimed fervently, "that these men could be brought into the Church of Christ!"

"To be sure. Ask Mr. Caillaud, then, too."

"If we do, we must ask his daughter also; he would not go out without her."

"I was not aware he had a daughter. You never told me anything about her."

"I never saw her till the other evening."

"I don't know anything of her. She is a foreigner too. I hope she is a respectable young person."

"I know very little; but she is more English than foreign. Jean has been here a good many years, and she came over when she was quite young. I think she must come."

"Very well." And so it was settled.

Zachariah that night vowed to his Redeemer that, come what might, he would never again give Him occasion to look at him with averted face and ask if he was ashamed of Him. The text ran in his ears: "Whosoever therefore shall be ashamed of me and of My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him also shall the Son of man be ashamed, when He cometh in the glory of His Father with the holy angels."



CHAPTER VI—TEA A LA MODE



Sunday afternoon came. It was the strangest party. Pauline, on being introduced to Mrs. Coleman, made a profound curtsey, which Mrs. Coleman returned by an inclination of her head, as if she consented to recognise Pauline, but to go no further. Tea was served early, as chapel began at half-past six. Mrs. Coleman, although it was Sunday, was very busy. She had made hot buttered toast, and she had bought some muffins, but had appeased her conscience by telling the boy that she would not pay for them till Monday. The milk was always obtained on the same terms. She also purchased some water-cresses; but the water-cress man demanded prompt cash settlement, and she was in a strait. At last the desire for the water-cresses prevailed, and she said:

"How much?"

"Three-halfpence."

"Now, mind I give you twopence for yourself—mind I give it you. I do not approve of buying and selling on Sunday. We will settle about the other ha'porth another time."

"All right, ma'am; if you like it that way, it's no odds to me;" and Mrs. Coleman went her way upstairs really believing that she had prevented the commission of a crime.

Let those of us cast the stone who can take oath that in their own morality there is no casuistry. Probably ours is worse than hers, because hers was traditional and ours is self-manufactured.

Everything being at last in order, Mrs. Coleman, looking rather warm, but still very neat and very charming, sat at the head of the table, with her back to the fireplace; the Major was on her right, Jean on her left, Pauline next to him, and opposite to her Zachariah. Zachariah and his wife believed in asking a blessing on their food; but, curiously enough, in 1814, even amongst the strictest sort, it had come to be the custom not to ask it at breakfast or tea, but only at dinner; although breakfast and tea in those days certainly needed a blessing as much as dinner, for they were substantial meals. An exception was made in favour of public tea-meetings. At a public tea-meeting a blessing was always asked and a hymn was always sung.

For some time nothing remarkable was said. The weather was very hot, and Mrs. Coleman complained. It had been necessary to keep up a fire for the sake of the kettle. The Major promptly responded to her confession of faintness by opening the window wider, by getting a shawl to put over the back of her chair; and these little attentions she rewarded by smiles and particular watchfulness over his plate and cup. At last he and Jean fell to talking about the jubilee which was to take place on the first of the next month to celebrate the centenary of the "accession of the illustrious family of Brunswick to the throne"—so ran the public notice. There was to be a grand display in the parks, a sham naval action on the Serpentine, and a balloon ascent.

"Are you going, Caillaud?" said the Major. "It will be a holiday."

"We," cried Pauline—"we! I should think not. WE go to rejoice over your House of Brunswick; and it is to be the anniversary of your battle of the Nile too! WE go! No, no."

"What's your objection to the House of Brunswick? And as for the battle of the Nile, you are no friend to Napoleon." So replied the Major, who always took a pleasure in exciting Pauline.

"The House of Brunswick! Why should we thank God for them; thank God for the stupidest race that ever sat upon a throne; thank God for stupidity—and in a king, Major? God, the Maker of the sun and stars—to call upon the nation to bless Him for your Prince Regent. As for the Nile, I am, as you say, no friend to Napoleon, but I am French. It is horrible to me to think—I saw him the other day—that your Brunswick Prince is in London and Napoleon is in Elba."

"God, after all," said the Major, laughing, "is not so hostile to stupidity, then; as you suppose."

"Ah! don't plague me, Major; that's what you are always trying to do. I'm not going to thank the Supreme for the Brunswicks. I don't believe He wanted them here."

Pauline's religion was full of the most lamentable inconsistencies, which the Major was very fond of exposing, but without much effect, and her faith was restored after every assault with wonderful celerity. By way of excuse for her we may be permitted to say that a perfectly consistent, unassailable creed, in which conclusion follows from premiss in unimpeachable order, is impossible. We cannot construct such a creed about any man or woman we know, and least of all about the universe. We acknowledge opposites which we have no power to bring together; and Pauline, although she knew nothing of philosophy, may not have been completely wrong with her Supreme who hated the Brunswicks and nevertheless sanctioned Carlton House.

Pauline surprised Mrs. Zachariah considerably. A woman, and more particularly a young woman, even supposing her to be quite orthodox, who behaved in that style amongst the members of Pike Street, would have been like a wild seagull in a farmyard of peaceful, clucking, brown-speckled fowls. All the chapel maidens and matrons, of course, were serious; but their seriousness was decent and in order. Mrs. Coleman was therefore scandalised, nervous, and dumb. Jean, as his manner was when his daughter expressed herself strongly, was also silent. His love for her was a consuming, hungry fire. It utterly extinguished all trace, not merely of selfishness, but of self, in him, and he was perfectly content, when Pauline spoke well, to remain quiet, and not allow a word of his to disturb the effect which he thought she ought to produce.

The Major, as a man of the world, thought the conversation was becoming a little too metaphysical, and asked Mrs. Coleman gaily if she would like to see the fete.

"Really, I hardly know what to say. I suppose"—and this was said with a peculiar acidity—"there is nothing wrong in it? Zachariah, my dear, would you like to go?"

Zachariah did not reply. His thoughts were elsewhere. But at last the spirit moved in him:

"Miss Pauline, your Supreme Being won't help you very far. There is no light save in God's Holy Word. God hath concluded them all in unbelief that He might have mercy upon all. As by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of One shall many be made righteous. That is the explanation; that is the gospel. God allows all this wickedness that His own glory may be manifested thereby, and His own love in sending Jesus Christ to save us: that, as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord. Do you ask me why does God wink at the crimes of kings and murderers? What if God, willing to show His wrath, and to make His power known, endured with much long-suffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction, and that He might make known the riches of His glory on the vessels of mercy which He had afore prepared unto glory, even us whom He had called? Miss Pauline, the mere light of human reason will never save you or give you peace. Unless you believe God's Word you are lost; lost here and hereafter; lost HERE even, for until you believe it you wander in a fog of ever deepening confusion. All is dark and inexplicable."

Being very much excited, he used largely the words of St. Paul, and not his own. How clear it all seemed to him, how indisputable! Childish association and years of unquestioning repetition gave an absolute certainty to what was almost unmeaning to other people.

Mrs. Zachariah, although she had expressed a strong desire for the Major's conversion, and was the only other representative of the chapel present, was very fidgety and uncomfortable during this speech. She had an exquisite art, which she sometimes practised, of dropping her husband, or rather bringing him down. So, when there was a pause, everybody being moved at least by his earnestness, she said:

"My dear, will you take any more tea?"

He was looking on the table-cloth, with his head on his hands, and did not answer.

"Major Maitland, may I give you some more tea?"

"No, thank you." The Major too was impressed—more impressed than the lady who sat next to him, and she felt rebuffed and annoyed. To Pauline, Zachariah had spoken Hebrew; but his passion was human, and her heart leapt out to meet him, although she knew not what answer to make. Her father was in the same position; but the Major's case was a little different. He had certainly at some time or other read the Epistle to the Romans, and some expressions were not entirely unfamiliar to him.

"'Vessels of wrath fitted to destruction!'—a strong and noble phrase. Who are your vessels of wrath, Coleman?"

Caillaud and Pauline saw a little light, but it was speedily eclipsed again.

"The unregenerate."

"Who are they?"

"Those whom God has not called."

"Castlereagh, Liverpool, Sidmouth, and the rest of the gang, for example?"

Zachariah felt that the moment had come.

"Yes, yes; but not only they. More than they. God help me if I deny the Cross of Christ—all of us into whose hearts God's grace has not been poured—we, you, all of us, if we have not been born of the Spirit and redeemed by the sacrifice of His Son."

Zachariah put in the "us" and the "we," it will be observed. It was a concession to blunt the sharpness of that dreadful dividing-line.

"We? Not yourself, Caillaud, and Pauline?"

He could not face the question. Something within him said that he ought to have gone further; that he ought to have singled out the Major, Caillaud, and Pauline; held them fast, looked straight into their eyes, and told them each one there and then that they were in the bonds of iniquity, sold unto Satan, and in danger of hell-fire. But, alas! he was at least a century and a half too late. He struggled, wrestled, self against self, and failed, not through want of courage, but because he wanted a deeper conviction. The system was still the same, even to its smallest details, but the application had become difficult. The application, indeed, was a good deal left to the sinner himself. That was the difference. Phrases had been invented or discovered which served to express modern hesitation to bring the accepted doctrine into actual, direct, week-day practice. It was in that way that it was gradually bled into impotence. One of these phrases came into his mind. It was from his favourite author:

"'Who art thou that judgest?' It is not for me, Major Maitland."

Ah, but, Zachariah, do you not remember that Paul is not speaking of those who deny the Lord, but of the weak in faith; of differences in eating and drinking, and the observation of days? Whether he remembered it or not, he could say no more. Caillaud, the Major, Pauline, condemned to the everlasting consequences of the wrath of the Almighty! He could not pronounce such a sentence, and yet his conscience whispered that just for want of the last nail in a sure place what he had built would come tumbling to the ground. During the conversation the time had stolen away, and, to their horror, Zachariah and his wife discovered that it was a quarter-past six. He hastily informed his guests that he had hoped they would attend him to his chapel. Would they go? The Major consented. He had nothing particular on hand, but Caillaud and Pauline refused. Zachariah was particularly urgent that these two should accompany him, but they were steadfast, for all set religious performances were hateful to them.

"No, Coleman, no more; I know what it all means."

"And I," added Pauline, "cannot sit still with so many respectable people; I never could. I have been to church, and always felt impelled to do something peculiar in it which would have made them turn me out. I cannot, too, endure preaching. I cannot tolerate that man up in the pulpit looking down over all the people—so wise and so self-satisfied. I want to pull him out and say. 'Here, you, sir, come here and let me see if you can tell me two or three things I want to know.' Then, Mr. Coleman, I am never well in a great building, especially in a church; I have such a weight upon my head as if the roof were resting on it."

He looked mournfully at her, but there was no time to remonstrate. Mrs. Zachariah was ready, in her Sunday best of sober bluish cloud- colour. Although it was her Sunday best, there was not a single thread of finery on it, and there was not a single crease nor spot. She bade Caillaud and Pauline good-bye with much cheerfulness, and tripped downstairs. The Major had preceded her, but Zachariah lingered for a moment with the other two.

"Come, my dear, make haste, we shall be so late."

"Go on with the Major; I shall catch you in a moment; I walk faster than you. I must close the window a trifle, and take two or three of the coals off the fire."

Caillaud and Pauline lingered too. The three were infinitely nearer to one another than they knew. Zachariah thought he was so far, and yet he was so close. The man rose up behind the Calvinist, and reached out arms to touch and embrace his friends.

"Good-bye, Caillaud; good-bye, Pauline! May God in His mercy bless and save you. God bless you!"

Caillaud looked steadfastly at him for a moment. and then, in his half-forgotten French fashion, threw his arms round his neck, and the two remained for a moment locked together, Pauline standing by herself apart. She came forward, took Zachariah's hand, when it was free, in both her own, held her head back a little, as if for clearness of survey, and said slowly, "God bless you, Mr. Coleman." She then went downstairs. Her father followed her, and Zachariah went after his wife and the Major, whom, however, he did not overtake till he reached the chapel door, where they were both waiting for him.



CHAPTER VII—JEPHTHAH



The Reverend Thomas Bradshaw, of Pike Street Meeting-House, was not a descendant from Bradshaw the regicide, but claimed that he belonged to the same family. He was in 1814 about fifty years old, and minister of one of the most important churches in the eastern part of London. He was tall and spare, and showed his height in the pulpit, for he always spoke without a note, and used a small Bible, which he held close to his eyes. He was a good classical scholar, and he understood Hebrew, too, as well as few men in that day understood it. He had a commanding figure, ruled his church like a despot; had a crowded congregation, of which the larger portion was masculine; and believed in predestination and the final perseverance of the saints. He was rather unequal in his discourses, for he had a tendency to moodiness, and, at times, even to hypochondria. When this temper was upon him he was combative or melancholy; and sometimes, to the disgust of many who came from all parts of London to listen to him, he did not preach in the proper sense of the word, but read a chapter, made a comment or two upon it, caused a hymn to be sung, and then dismissed his congregation with the briefest of prayers. Although he took no active part in politics, he was republican through and through, and never hesitated for a moment in those degenerate days to say what he thought about any scandal. In this respect he differed from his fellow-ministers, who, under the pretence of increasing zeal for religion, had daily fewer and fewer points of contact with the world outside. Mr. Bradshaw had been married when he was about thirty; but his wife died in giving birth to a daughter, who also died,—and for twenty years he had been a widower, with no thought of changing his condition. He was understood to have peculiar opinions about second marriages, although he kept them very much to himself. One thing, however, was known, that for a twelvemonth after the death of his wife he was away from England, and that he came back an altered man to his people in Bedfordshire, where at that time he was settled. His discourses were remarkably strong, and of a kind seldom, or indeed never, heard now. They taxed the whole mental powers of his audience, and were utterly unlike the simple stuff which became fashionable with the Evangelistic movement. Many of them, taken down by some of his hearers, survive in manuscript to the present day. They will not, as a rule, bear printing, because the assumption on which they rest is not now assumed; but if it be granted, they are unanswerable; and it is curious that even now and then, although they are never for a moment anything else than a strict deduction from what we in the latter half of the century consider unproven or even false, they express themselves in the same terms as the newest philosophy. Occasionally too, more particularly when he sets himself the task of getting into the interior of a Bible character, he is intensely dramatic, and what are shadows to the careless reader become living human beings, with the reddest of blood visible under their skin.

On this particular evening Mr. Bradshaw took the story of Jephthah's daughter: —"The Spirit of the Lord came upon Jephthah." Here is an abstract of his discourse. "It WAS the Spirit of the Lord, notwithstanding what happened. I beg you also to note that there is a mistranslation in our version. The Hebrew has it, 'Then it shall be, that WHOSOEVER'—not WHATSOEVER—'cometh forth of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return in peace from the children of Ammon, shall surely be the Lord's, and I will offer HIM'—not IT—'up for a burnt-offering.' Nevertheless I believe my text—it WAS the Spirit of the Lord. This Hebrew soldier was the son of a harlot. He was driven by his brethren out of his father's house. Ammon made war upon Israel, and in their distress the elders of Israel went to fetch Jephthah. Mark, my friends, God's election. The children of the lawful wife are passed by, and the child of the harlot is chosen. Jephthah forgets his grievances and becomes captain of the host. Ammon is over against them. Jephthah's rash vow—this is sometimes called. I say it is not a rash vow. It may be rash to those who have never been brought to extremity by the children of Ammon—to those who have not cared whether Ammon or Christ wins. Men and women sitting here in comfortable pews"—this was said with a kind of snarl—"may talk of Jephthah's rash vow. God be with them, what do they know of the struggles of such a soul? It does not say so directly in the Bible, but we are led to infer it, that Jephthah was successful because of his vow. 'The Lord delivered them into his hands.' He would not have done it if He had been displeased with the 'rash vow'" (another snarl). "He smote them from Aroer even till thou come to Minnith. Ah, but what follows? The Omnipotent and Omniscient might have ordered it, surely, that a slave might have met Jephthah. Why, in His mercy, did He not do it? Who are we that we should question what He did? But if we may not inquire too closely into His designs, it is permitted us, my friends, when His reason accords with ours, to try and show it. Jephthah had played for a great stake. Ought the Almighty—let us speak it with reverence—to have let him off with an ox, or even with a serf? I say that if we are to conquer Ammon we must pay for it, and we ought to pay for it. Yes, and perhaps God wanted the girl—who can tell? Jephthah comes back in triumph. Let me read the passage to you: —'Behold his daughter came out to meet him with timbrels and with dances: AND SHE WAS HIS ONLY CHILD: BESIDE HER HE HAD NEITHER SON NOR DAUGHTER. And it came to pass, when he saw her, that he rent his clothes, and said, Alas, my daughter! thou hast brought me very low, and thou art one of them that trouble me: for I have opened my mouth unto the Lord, and I cannot go back.' Now, you read poetry, I dare say—what you call poetry. I say in all of it—all, at least, I have seen—nothing comes up to that. 'SHE WAS HIS ONLY CHILD: BESIDE HER HE HAD NEITHER SON NOR DAUGHTER.'"—(Mr. Bradshaw's voice broke a little as he went over the words again with great deliberation and infinite pathos.)—"The inspired writer leaves the fact just as it stands, and is content. Inspiration itself can do nothing to make it more touching than it is in its own bare nakedness. There is no thought in Jephthah of recantation, nor in the maiden of revolt, but nevertheless he has his own sorrow. HE IS BROUGHT VERY LOW. God does not rebuke him for his grief. He knows well enough, my dear friends, the nature which He took upon Himself—nay, are we not the breath of His nostrils, created in His image? He does not anywhere, therefore, I say, forbid that we should even break our hearts over those we love and lose. She asks for two months by herself upon the mountains before her death. What a time for him! At the end of the two months God held him still to his vow; he did not shrink; she submitted, and was slain. But you will want me to tell you in conclusion where the gospel is in all this. Gospel! I say that the blessed gospel is in the Old Testament as well as in the New. I say that the Word of God is one, and that His message is here this night for you and me, as distinctly as it is at the end of the sacred volume. Observe, as I have told you before, that Jephthah is the son of the harlot. He hath mercy on whom He will have mercy. He calls them His people who are not His people; and He calls her beloved which was not beloved. God at any rate is no stickler for hereditary rights. Moreover, it does not follow because you, my hearers, have God-fearing parents, that God has elected you. He may have chosen, instead of you, instead of me, the wretchedest creature outside, whose rags we will not touch. But to what did God elect Jephthah? To a respectable, easy, decent existence, with money at interest, regular meals, sleep after them, and unbroken rest at night? He elected him to that tremendous oath and that tremendous penalty. He elected him to the agony he endured while she was away upon the hills! That is God's election; an election to the cross and to the cry, 'Eli, Eli, lama Sabachthani.' 'Yes,' you will say, 'but He elected him to the victory over Ammon.' Doubtless He did; but what cared Jephthah for his victory over Ammon when she came to meet him, or, indeed, for the rest of his life? What is a victory, what are triumphal arches and the praise of all creation to a lonely man? Be sure, if God elects you, He elects you to suffering. Whom He loveth He chasteneth, and His stripes are not play-work. Ammon will not be conquered unless your heart be well nigh broken. I tell you, too, as Christ's minister, that you are not to direct your course according to your own desires. You are not to say, -'I will give up this and that so that I may be saved.' Did not St. Paul wish himself accursed from Christ for his brethren? If God should command you to go down to the bottomless pit in fulfilment of His blessed designs, it is your place to go. Out with self—I was about to say this damned self; and if Israel calls, if Christ calls, take not a sheep or ox— that is easy enough—but take your choicest possession, take your own heart, your own blood, your very self, to the altar."

During the sermon the Major was much excited. Apart altogether from the effect of the actual words spoken, Mr: Bradshaw had a singular and contagious power over men. The three, Mrs. Coleman, the Major, and Zachariah, came out together. Mrs. Zachariah stayed behind in the lobby for some female friend to whom she wished to speak about a Sunday-school tea-meeting which was to take place that week. The other two stood aside, ill at ease, amongst the crowd pressing out into the street. Presently Mrs. Coleman found her friend, whom she at once informed that Major Maitland and her husband were waiting for her, and that therefore she had not a moment to spare. That little triumph accomplished, she had nothing of importance to say about the tea-meeting, and rejoined her party with great good-humour. She walked between the Major and Zachariah, and at once asked the Major how he "enjoyed the service." The phrase was very unpleasant to Zachariah, but he was silent.

"Well, ma'am," said the Major, "Mr. Bradshaw is a very remarkable man. It is a long time since any speaker stirred me as he did. He is a born orator, if ever there was one."

"I could have wished," said Zachariah, "as you are not often in chapel, that his sermon had been founded on some passage in the New Testament which would have given him the opportunity of more simply expounding the gospel of Christ."

"He could not have been better, I should think. He went to my heart, though it is rather a difficult passage in the case of a man about town like me; and I tell you what, Coleman, he made me determine I would read the Bible again. What a story that is!"

"Major, I thank God if you will read it; and not for the stories in it, save as all are part of one story—the story of God's redeeming mercy."

The Major made no reply, for the word was unwinged.

Mrs. Zachariah was silent, but when they came to their door both she and her husband pressed him to come in. He refused, however; he would stroll homeward, he said, and have a smoke as he went.

"He touched me, Coleman, he did. I thought, between you and me"—and he spoke softly—"I had not now got such a tender place; I thought it was all healed over long ago. I cannot come in. You'll excuse me. Yes, I'll just wander back to Piccadilly. I could not talk."

They parted, and Zachariah and his wife went upstairs. Their supper was soon ready.

"Jane," he said slowly, "I did not receive much assistance from you in my endeavours to bring our friends to a knowledge of the truth. I thought that, as you desired the attempt, you would have helped me a little."

"There is a reason for everything; and, what is more, I do not consider it right to take upon myself what belongs to a minister. It may do more harm than good."

"Take upon yourself what belongs to a minister! My dear Jane, is nobody but a minister to bear witness for the Master?"

"Of course I did not mean to say that; you know I did not. Why do you catch at my words? Perhaps, if you had not been quite so forward, Mr. Caillaud and his daughter might have gone to chapel."

After supper, and when he was alone, Zachariah sat for some time without moving. He presently rose and opened the Bible again, which lay on the table—the Bible which belonged to his father—and turned to the fly-leaf on which was written the family history. There was the record of his father's marriage, dated on the day of the event. There was the record of his own birth. There was the record of his mother's death, still in his father's writing, but in an altered hand, the letters not so distinct, and the strokes crooked and formed with difficulty. There was the record of Zachariah's own marriage. A cloud of shapeless, inarticulate sentiment obscured the man's eyes and brain. He could not define what he felt, but he did feel. He could not bear it, and he shut the book, opening it again at the twenty-second Psalm—the one which the disciples of Jesus called to mind on the night of the crucifixion. It was one which Mr. Bradshaw often read, and Zachariah had noted in it a few corrections made in the translation:

"My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me? Our fathers trusted in Thee; they trusted, and Thou didst deliver them. . . . Be not far from me; for trouble is near; for there is none to help. . . . Be Thou not far from me, O Lord: O my strength, haste Thee to help me. . . . Save me from the lion's mouth: and from the horns of the wild oxen Thou hast answered me."

"From the horns of the wild oxen"—that correction had often been precious to Zachariah. When at the point of being pinned to the ground—so he understood it—help had arisen; risen up from the earth, and might again arise. It was upon the first part of the text he dwelt now. It came upon him with fearful distinctness that he was alone—that he could never hope for sympathy from his wife as long as he lived. Mr. Bradshaw's words that evening recurred to him. God's purpose in choosing to smite Jephthah in that way was partly intelligible, and, after all, Jephthah was elected to redeem his country too. But what could be God's purpose in electing one of his servants to indifference and absence of affection where he had a right to expect it? Could anybody be better for not being loved? Even Zachariah could not think it possible. But Mr. Bradshaw's words again recurred. Who was he that he should question God's designs? It might be part of the Divine design that he, Zachariah Coleman, should not be made better by anything. It might be part of that design, part of a fulfilment of a plan devised by the Infinite One, that he should be broken, nay, perhaps not saved. Mr. Bradshaw's doctrine that night was nothing new. Zachariah had believed from his childhood, or had thought he believed, that the potter had power over the clay—of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour and another unto dishonour; and that the thing formed unto dishonour could not reply and say to him that formed it: 'Why hast thou made me thus?' Nevertheless, to believe it generally was one thing; to believe it as a truth for him was another. Darkness, the darkness as of the crucifixion night, seemed over and around him. Poor wretch! he thought he was struggling with his weakness; but he was in reality struggling against his own strength. WHY had God so decreed? Do what he could, that fatal WHY, the protest of his reason, asserted itself; and yet he cursed himself for permitting it, believing it to be a sin. He walked about his room for some relief. He looked out of the window. It was getting late; the sky was clearing, as it does in London at that hour, and he saw the stars. There was nothing to help him there. They mocked him rather with their imperturbable, obstinate stillness. At last he turned round, fell upon his knees, and poured out himself before his Maker, entreating Him for light. He rose from the ground, looked again out of the window, and the first flush of the morning was just visible. Light was coming to the world in obedience to the Divine command, but not to him. He was exhausted, and crept into his bedroom, undressing without candle, and without a sound. For a few minutes he thought he should never sleep again, save in his grave; but an unseen Hand presently touched him, and he knew nothing till he was awakened by the broad day streaming over him.



CHAPTER VIII—UNCONVENTIONAL JUSTICE



In December, 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 from Lara:

"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 within Had 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 I DO know. 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 they DIRECT it. DIRECT it, 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, had NOT been 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.



CHAPTER IX—A STRAIN ON THE CABLE



Bow Street was 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 pounds 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. What WILL become 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 chose THAT way."

"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 embrace Till 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 anarchist TILL 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.



CHAPTER X—DISINTEGRATION BY DEGREES



We must 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."

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 Legouve. In 1793 came the Terror, and the Dupins were denounced and thrown into the Luxembourg. Legouve 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 Legouve, 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. Legouve 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.