"Please don't give me anything, Doctor Eaton; believe me, I shall do better without."
"And then we shall have you sick on our hands, Abraham and I. What should we do with you?"
"I'll try not to trouble you," she said,"but I would rather you left me to myself to-night"; but even as she spoke, a quick convulsion of muscles about her face told of pain.
Doctor Eaton had not seen me, for I stood in the shadow of the bed behind him.
"Who will stay with your sister tonight?" he asked Mr. Axtell.
Mr. Axtell looked around at me, as if expecting that I would answer; and I presented myself for the office.
"You look scarcely fit," was the village-physician's somewhat ungracious comment; and his eyes said, what his lips dared not,"Who are you?"
"I think you'll find me so, if you try me."
Miss Axtell had gone away again, and neither saw nor heeded me.
"Will you come below?"and the doctor looked at me as he went out.
I followed him. In the library he shut the door, sat down near the table, took from his pocket a small phial containing a light brown powder, and, dividing a piece of paper into the minute scraps needful, made a deposit in each from the phial, and then, folding over the bits of paper, handed them to me.
"Are you accustomed to take care of sick persons?" he asked.
"Not much; but I am a physician's daughter. I have a little experience."
"Are you a visitor here?"
"No,at the parsonage."
A pair of quick gray eyes danced out at me from under browy cliffs clothed with a ledge of lashes, in an actually startling manner. I didn't think the man had so much of life in him.
"You're Mrs. Wilton's sister, perhaps."
"I am."
"Give her one of these every half-hour, till she falls asleep."
"Yes, Sir."
"Don't let her talk; but she won't, though. If she gets incoherent,says wild things,talks of what you can't understand,send for me; I live next door."
"Is this all for her?"
"Enough. Do you know her?"
"I never saw her until to-night."
"The brother? Monstrous fellow."
"Until to-day."
"Look up there."
"Where?"
"On the wall."
"At what?"
There were several paintings hanging there.
"The face, of course."
"I can't see it very well."
Shadows were upon it, and the lampshade was on.
"Then I'll take this off"; and Doctor Eaton removed the shade, letting the light up to the wall.
"A young girl's face," I said.
The doctor was looking at me, and not at the painting there. A little bit of confusion came,I don't know why.
"Do you like it?" I ventured.
"I like it? I'm not the one to like it."
"Somebody does, then?"
"Of course. What did he paint it for, if he didn't like it?"
"I do not know of whom you are talking, at all," I said, a little vexed at this information-no-information style.
"You don't?" in a voice of the utmost astonishment.
"No. Is this all, for the sick lady? I think I ought to go to her."
"Of course you ought. It's a sad thing, this death in the house"; and Doctor Eaton picked up his hat, and opened the door.
Kate was waiting in the hall.
"Mr. Abraham thinks you'd better look in and see if it's well to have any watchers in there, before you go," she said.
"Well, light me in, then, Katie. You wait in there, if you please, Miss," to me; and I saw the two go to the front-room on the right.
A waft of something, it may have been the air that came out of that room, sent me back from the hall, and I shut the door behind me. It was several minutes before they came back. In the interim I had taken a long look at the face on the wall. It seemed too young to be very beautiful, and I couldn't help wishing that the artist had waited a year or two, until a little more of the outline of life had come to it; yet it was a sweet, loving face, with a brow as low and cool as Sophie's own, only it hadn't any shadow of an Aaron on it. I didn't hear the door open, I hadn't heard the sound of living thing, when some one said, close to me, as I was standing looking up at the face I've spoken of,
"What are you doing?"
It was Mr. Axtell, and the voice was a prickly one.
"Is there any harm?" I said. "I'm only looking here,"pointing to where my eyes had been before. "Who painted it?"
"An unknown, poor painter."
"Was he poor in spirit?"
"He is now, I trust."
A man that has variant voices is a cruel thing in this world, because one cannot help their coming in at some one of the gates of the heart, which cannot all be guarded at the same moment. "Poor in spirit?" "He is now, I trust." I felt decidedly vexed at this man before me for having such tones in his voice.
"Can I go up to Miss Axtell now?" I asked.
"In a moment, when Kate has shown Doctor Eaton out."
I picked up my powders and my illustrious book, and waited.
Kate came.
"The doctor says there's no need," she said, in her laconic way.
Kate, I afterwards learned, was the daughter of the farmer that Sophie heard Miss Axtell consoling for the loss of his wife, one day.
MY DAPHNEMy budding Daphne wanted scope
To bourgeon all her flowers of hope.
She felt a cramp around her root
That crippled every outmost shoot.
I set me to the kindly task;
I found a trim and tidy cask,
Shapely and painted; straightway seized
The timely waif; and, quick released
From earthen bound and sordid thrall,
My Daphne sat there, proud and tall.
Stately and tall, like any queen,
She spread her farthingale of green;
Nor stinted aught with larger fate,
For that she was innately great.
I learned, in accidental way,
A secret, on an after-day,
A chance that marked the simple change
As something ominous and strange.
And so, therefrom, with anxious care,
Almost with underthought of prayer,
As, day by day, my listening soul
Waited to catch the coming roll
Of pealing victory, that should bear
My country's triumph on the air,
I tended gently all the more
The plant whose life a portent bore.
The weary winter wore away,
And still we waited, day by day;
And still, in full and leafy pride,
My Daphne strengthened at my side,
Till her fair buds outburst their bars,
And whitened gloriously to stars!
Above each stalwart, loyal stem
Rested their heavenly diadem,
And flooded forth their incense rare,
A breathing Joy, upon the air!
Well might my backward thought recall
The cramp, the hindrance, and the thrall,
The strange release to larger space,
The issue into growth and grace,
And joyous hail the homely sign
That so had spelled a hope divine!
For all this life, and light, and bloom,
This breath of Peace that blessed the room,
Was born from out the banded rim,
Once crowded close, and black, and grim,
With grains that feed the Cannon's breath,
And boom his sentences of death!
CONCERNING DISAGREEABLE PEOPLE
"On the whole, it was very disagreeable," wrote a certain great traveller and hunter, summing up an account of his position, as he composed himself to rest upon a certain evening after a hard day's work. And no doubt it must have been very disagreeable. The night was cold and dark; and the intrepid traveller had to lie down to sleep in the open air, without even a tree to shelter him. A heavy shower of hail was falling,each hailstone about the size of an egg. The dark air was occasionally illuminated by forked lightning, of the most appalling aspect; and the thunder was deafening. By various sounds, heard in the intervals of the peals, it seemed evident that the vicinity was pervaded by wolves, tigers, elephants, wild-boars, and serpents. A peculiar motion, perceptible under horse-cloth which was wrapped up to serve as a pillow, appeared to indicate that a snake was wriggling about underneath it. The hunter had some ground for thinking that it was a very venomous one, as indeed in the morning it proved to be; but he was too tired to look. And speaking of the general condition of matters upon that evening, the hunter stated, with great mildness of language, that "it was very disagreeable."
Most readers would be disposed to say that disagreeable was hardly the right word. No doubt, all things that are perilous, horrible, awful, ghastly, deadly, and the like, are disagreeable too. But when we use the word disagreeable by itself, our meaning is understood to be, that in calling the thing disagreeable we have said the worst of it. A long and tiresome sermon is disagreeable; but a venomous snake under your pillow passes beyond being disagreeable. To have a tooth stopped is disagreeable; to be broken on the wheel (though nobody could like it) transcends that. If a thing be horrible and awful, you would not say it was disagreeable. The greater includes the less: as when a human being becomes entitled to write D.D. after his name, he drops all mention of the M.A. borne in preceding years.
Let this truth be remembered, by such as shall read the following pages. We are to think about disagreeable people. Let it be understood that (speaking generally) we are to think of people who are no worse than disagreeable. It cannot be denied, even by the most prejudiced, that murderers, pirates, slave-drivers, and burglars, are disagreeable. The cut-throat, the poisoner, the sneaking black-guard who shoots his landlord from behind a hedge, are no doubt disagreeable people,so very disagreeable that in this country the common consent of mankind removes them from human society by the instrumentality of a halter. But disagreeable is too mild a word. Such people are all that, and a great deal more. And accordingly they stand beyond the range of this dissertation. We are to treat of folk who are disagreeable, and not worse than disagreeable. We may sometimes, indeed, overstep the boundary-line. But it is to be remembered that there are people who in the main are good people, who yet are extremely disagreeable. And a further complication is introduced into the subject by the fact, that some people who are far from good are yet unquestionably agreeable. You disapprove them; but you cannot help liking them. Others, again, are substantially good; yet you are angry with yourself to find that you cannot like them.
I take for granted that all observant human beings will admit that in this world there are disagreeable people. Probably the distinction which presses itself most strongly upon our attention, as we mingle in the society of our fellow-men, is the distinction between agreeable people and disagreeable. There are various tests, more or less important, which put all mankind to right and left. A familiar division is into rich and poor. Thomas Paine, with great vehemence, denied the propriety of that classification, and declared that the only true and essential classification of mankind is into male and female. I have read a story whose author maintained, that, to his mind, by far the most interesting and thorough division of our race is into such as have been hanged and such as have not been hanged: he himself belonging to the former class. But we all, more or less, recognize and act upon the great classification of all human beings into the agreeable and the disagreeable. And we begin very early to recognize and act upon it. Very early in life, the little child understands and feels the vast difference between people who are nice and people who are not nice. In school-boy days, the first thing settled as to any new acquaintance, man or boy, is on which side he stands of the great boundary-line. It is not genius, not scholarship, not wisdom, not strength nor speed, that fixes the man's place. None of these things is chiefly looked to: the question is, Is he agreeable or disagreeable? And according as that question is decided, the man is described, in the forcible language of youth, as "a brick," or as "a beast."
Yet it is to be remembered that the division between the agreeable and disagreeable of mankind is one which may be transcended. It is a scratch on the earth,not a ten-foot wall. And you will find men who pass from one side of it to the other, and back again,probably several times in a week, or even in a day. There are people whom you never know where to have. They are constantly skipping from side to side of that line of demarcation; or they even walk along with a foot on each side of it. There are people who are always disagreeable, and disagreeable to all men. There are people who are agreeable at some times, and disagreeable at others. There are people who are agreeable to some men, and disagreeable to other men. I do not intend by the last-named class people who intentionally make themselves agreeable to a certain portion of the race, to which they think it worth while to make themselves agreeable, and who do not take that trouble in the case of the remainder of humankind. What I mean is this: that there are people who have such an affinity and sympathy with certain other people, who so suit certain other people, that they are agreeable to these other people, though perhaps not particularly so to the race at large. And exceptional tastes and likings are often the strongest. The thing you like enthusiastically another man absolutely loathes. The thing which all men like is for the most part liked with a mild and subdued liking. Everybody likes good and well-made bread; but nobody goes into raptures over it. Few persons like caviare; but those who do like it are very fond of it. I never knew but one being who liked mustard with apple-pie; but that solitary man ate it with avidity, and praised the flavor with enthusiasm.
But it is impossible to legislate for every individual case. Every rule must have exceptions from it; but it would be foolish to resolve to lay down no more rules. There may be, somewhere, the man who likes Mr. Snarling; and to that man Mr. Snarling would doubtless be agreeable. But for practical purposes Mr. Snarling may justly be described as a disagreeable man, if he be disagreeable to nine hundred and ninety-nine mortals out of every thousand. And with precision sufficient for the ordinary business of life we may say that there are people who are essentially disagreeable.
There are people who go through life, leaving an unpleasant influence on all whom they come near. You are not at your ease in their society. You feel awkward and constrained while with them. That is probably the mildest degree in the scale of unpleasantness. There are people who disseminate a much worse influence. As the upas-tree was said to blight all the country round it, so do these disagreeable folk prejudicially affect the whole surrounding moral atmosphere. They chill all warmth of heart in those near them; they put down anything generous or magnanimous; they suggest unpleasant thoughts and associations; they excite a diverse and numerous array of bad tempers. The great evil of disagreeable people lies in this: that they tend powerfully to make other people disagreeable too. And these people are not necessarily bad people, though they produce a bad effect. It is not certain that they design to be disagreeable. There are those who do entertain that design; and they always succeed in carrying it out. Nobody ever tried diligently to be disagreeable, and failed. Such persons may, indeed, inflict much less annoyance than they wished; they may even fail of inflicting any pain whatever on others; but they make themselves as disgusting as they could desire. And in many cases they succeed in inflicting a good deal of pain. A very low, vulgar, petty, and uncultivated nature may cause much suffering to a lofty, noble, and refined one,particularly if the latter be in a position of dependence or subjection. A wretched hornet may madden a noble horse; a contemptible mosquito may destroy the night's rest which would have recruited a noble brain. But without any evil intention, sometimes with the very kindest intention, there are those who worry and torment you. It is through want of perception,want of tact,coarseness of nature,utter lack of power to understand you. Were you ever sitting in a considerable company, a good deal saddened by something you did not choose to tell to any one, and probably looking dull and dispirited enough,and did a fussy host or hostess draw the attention of the entire party upon you, by earnestly and repeatedly asking if you were ill, if you had a headache, because you seemed so dull and so unlike yourself? And did that person time after time return to the charge, till you would have liked to poison him? There is nothing more disagreeable, and few things more mischievous, than a well-meaning, meddling fool. And where there was no special intention, good or bad, towards yourself, you have known people make you uncomfortable through the simple exhibition to you, and pressure upon you, of their own inherent disagreeableness. You have known people after talking to whom for a while you felt disgusted with everything, and above all, with those people themselves. Talking to them, you felt your moral nature being rubbed against the grain, being stung all over with nettles. You showed your new house and furniture to such a man, and with eagle eye he traced out and pointed out every scratch on your fine fresh paint, and every flaw in your oak and walnut; he showed you that there were corners of your big mirrors that distorted your face,that there were bits of your grand marble mantel-pieces that might be expected soon to scale away. Or you have known a man who, with no evil intention, made it his practice to talk of you before your face as your other friends are accustomed to talk of you behind your back. It need not be said that the result is anything but pleasant. "What a fool you were, Smith, in saying that at Snooks's last night!" your friend exclaims, when you meet him next morning. You were quite aware, by this time, that what you said was foolish; but there is something grating in hearing your name connected with the unpleasant epithet. I would strongly advise any man, who does not wish to be set down as disagreeable, entirely to break off the habit (if he has such a habit) of addressing to even his best friends any sentence beginning with "What a fool you were." Let me offer the like advice as to sentences which set out as follows:"I say, Smith, I think your brother is the greatest fool on the face of the earth." Stop that kind of thing, my friend; or you may come to be classed with Mr. Snarling. You are probably a manly fellow, and a sincere friend; and for the sake of your substantial good qualities, one would stand a great deal. But over-frankness is disagreeable; and if you make over-frankness your leading characteristic, of course your entire character will come to be disagreeable, and you will be a disagreeable person.