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 ANTIPODES; 
 
 on, 
 
 THE NEW EXISTENCE. 
 
 A TALE OF REAL LIFE. 
 
 BY A CLERGYMAN. 
 
 IN THREE VOLUMES. 
 VOL. I. 
 
 LONDON: 
 HURST AND BLACKETT, PUBLISHERS, 
 
 SUCCESSORS TO HENRY COLBURN, 
 
 13, GEEAT MARLBOROUGH STREET. 
 1855.
 
 LONDON : 
 
 Printed by Schulze and Co., 1 3, Poland Street.
 
 9^3 
 
 ANTIPODES; 
 
 OE, 
 
 THE NEW EXISTENCE. 
 
 
 ^^^ CHAPTER I. 
 
 s5 "^^ It was on the first of June in some year 
 
 since 1800, that I finally quitted Oxford in 
 
 company with an associate, who had been the 
 
 1^ bane of my life ever since I had the misfortune 
 
 to make his acquaintance, about the time of 
 
 /■^ my matriculation. Never shall I, or can I, 
 
 v> 
 
 pt- forget the brilliancy of that morning. We 
 started, to the best of my recollection, a little 
 before three in the morning ; at any rate the 
 sun had not yet risen in full splendour above 
 
 VOL. I. B 
 
 s 
 
 v>
 
 2 ANTIPODES. 
 
 the horizon, but his crepusculine splendour 
 suffused the eastern heavens with such a flood 
 of celestial brilliancy, beauty and magnificence, 
 as I either never saw, or never noticed before, 
 nor have I since. I said to my intimate friend 
 and mortal foe, 
 
 Ecce ! aurora venit profundens omnia luce. 
 
 Yes, it was a glorious morning : the stars sang 
 in harmony, and all the sons of God shouted 
 for joy. 
 
 But all the glory was in the heavens. Not 
 a single ray of literary glory fell on my head, 
 as I left, for the last time, that seat of sempi- 
 ternal infamy or honour, never to be revisited. 
 I had four years before \'isited it for the first 
 time, as one of its candidates for glory, with 
 a heart as full of that hope which comes to all, 
 as Milton describes a certain place to be devoid 
 of it. Such had been my obstinate perseve- 
 rance and reputed talents prior to my removal 
 to the University, that the first honours were 
 thought to be as certainly mine, as if I had 
 already possessed some undoubted title to them
 
 ANTIPODES. 3 
 
 by purchase or inheritance. But " how art 
 thou fallen from heaven, Lucifer, son of 
 the morning !" 
 
 As the coach hurried us away, very merci- 
 fully to me, from that place of disappointed 
 hope, I could not refrain from observing to 
 mvself, that the sublime mao;nificence of Au- 
 rora pourtrayed the splendour of that honour 
 which I had promised myself some four years 
 before, and which, as we travelled northward, 
 I was leaving for ever behind me. Or did the 
 goddess of day blush at the lack of honour, 
 though not positive infamy, with which I was 
 quitting the spot of my towering hopes and 
 thwarted ambition? I am not a Roman, or 
 I might look upon it as a retrospective omen. 
 
 We set off from the Angel — the harper had 
 gone to repose — measured the length of High 
 Street, for centuries the promenade of loungers ; 
 rattled over the Corn Market and St. Giles's, 
 and passed the Infirmary and Observatory with 
 the rapidity of the Jehuism of that day. We 
 were on the road to Woodstock. The Obser- 
 vatory was now behind me, the first object 
 
 B 2
 
 4 ANTIPODES. 
 
 of my particular notice and admiration when 
 I came, the last when I made my final exodus. 
 I looked back upon that monument of Keene's 
 and Wyat's architectural ingenuity, its beautiful 
 facade, its mimicry of Minerva's temple at 
 Athens, its appropriate apex, the heavens up- 
 held by the shoulders of Atlas — one half of 
 his burden beautifully gilded by the earliest 
 beams of the rising sun. Farewell, thou seat 
 of Aristotelian lore, architectural beauties, ho- 
 nour and dishonour. If ever there was a fool 
 upon earth, that fool is a youth of two or three 
 terms standing at Oxford ; if ever there was 
 humiliation prostrate enough to lick the dust, 
 it is the heart of that fool, when he sees his 
 name among the many, or when he has been 
 plucked. I tuned my face to the north. Never 
 since, have I beheld the globe of Atlas, the 
 towering, ponderous dome of the Radcliffe, 
 the towers of Merton and Magdalen, or any 
 other prominent and obtrusive beauty of the 
 said to be most ancient university in the 
 world. 
 
 My companion was at my side, on whose
 
 ANTIPODES. 5 
 
 shoulders justice placed all my failure, disap- 
 pointment, despair. Yes, he was there ! we 
 might have been the Siamese twins, insepar- 
 able save by the sacrifice of life, and his life 
 he was determined to forfeit, or see me fairly 
 and for ever out of Oxford without its honours 
 and emoluments. Just then a fellowship was 
 vacant, to which, if scholarship was a recom- 
 mendation, I was entitled incomparably beyond 
 any other candidate, especially the one who 
 got it. But a shower of gold can enter, where 
 learning would be repulsed at the door wuth 
 contempt. The tutor was bribed by the bro- 
 ther of one of the opposing candidates, and 
 when I would have requested him to accom- 
 pany me to the College and announce me as 
 a candidate, he refused to hear me, looked 
 as black as midnight, said he was in haste, 
 engaged, that I had no occasion to speak to 
 him on any subject. 
 
 I wonder what bawling Hireton did with the 
 fee. Did he make it a component part of his 
 general hoard, add it acervo, mindful of the 
 coming winter? I am surprised that it did
 
 b ANTIPODES. 
 
 not operate as a mine of gunpowder. Re- 
 tributive justice, however, soon overtook him — 
 he accepted a living and grew crazed. Some 
 attributed his madness to love, which might be 
 true, if they meant the love of money. The 
 all but certainty is, that he did not find the 
 loaves and fishes so plentiful or so good as he 
 had been led to anticipate. Did he ever after 
 reflect on the injury he had done me, and did 
 the recollection make, as I should expect it 
 would, a sore place, small, may be, at the 
 beginning, but gradually spreading; a foul, 
 unclean disease, the leprosy of the conscience ; 
 and was he sure that it would not ultimately be 
 identified with that gnawing worm, which a 
 certain high and mighty personage says will 
 never die ? 
 
 Bawlins: Hireton was a classic — at least he 
 wished to be thought so ; did he never read of 
 a certain artful knave, who, according to the 
 tradition of iEschylus, was condemned by Jupiter 
 to be tied to a rock on Mount Caucasus for 
 thirty thousand years, an eternity to be sure, 
 and to have his liver gnawed upon by a vulture
 
 ANTIPODES. 7 
 
 during all that little eternity, and that his said 
 liver should grow all the while not one particle 
 less ? Either of these accounts is sufficient to 
 deter any man from bribery and corruption. 
 I dare say Hireton soon forgot that he ever 
 took the fee and looked another way while he 
 put it into his pocket — the reverend poacher ! 
 But if he did, so- do not I — will not, shall not, 
 cannot, while memory holds a seat in this 
 distracted globe. But I will make him remember 
 it too. I will send fame, trumpet-tongued, all 
 over England, and, may be, America to boot.
 
 ANTIPODES. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 My back was now turned on Oxford, hope, 
 ambition, fame — the hope, I mean, with which 
 I went thither : that hope had been wrecked 
 without a single anchor to save it on the 
 rock of my association with the companion at 
 my side. Now, however, when I was fairly 
 out of sight of Oxford and beyond Wood- 
 stock, places which by association could awaken 
 my former realms of fairy, I found in Pan- 
 dora's box that there was, forsooth, as the 
 veritable, never-lying heathen mythologists af- 
 firmed, a little, tiny spark, which cheered my
 
 ANTIPODES. 9 
 
 lonely, gloomy hftart, and shone bright and 
 brilliant-like (really I am at the end of my cable,, 
 as commodore Byron would say) — a meteor in 
 Egyptian darkness, or the venerable Bede 
 in the darkness of a barbarous age. I began 
 to think that all was not lost, that my aerial 
 temple of fame had been shivered, but that I 
 might rear one more substantial. 
 
 As the coach hurried us along, and the 
 mountain air inflated my lungs, and different 
 objects crossed my path with the rapidity exactly 
 of a stage coach, I found my spirits begin 
 to ferment, my heart to beat more briskly;^ 
 and I commenced a fresh excogitation of a 
 more successful career of glory. " Hope springs' 
 eternal." I thought of various plans which 
 floated and danced in my brain like motes in 
 the sunbeams, or atoms in Lucretius's system 
 of materialism. I had always been intended 
 for the church, and, after various plans had in 
 my mind been discussed and successively dis- 
 carded, I determined at last that my glory 
 should spring from my contemplated profession. 
 I even affected to laugh at my past disappoint- 
 
 B 3
 
 10 ANTIPODES. 
 
 merit as infra dig., beneath my notice, unworthy 
 my recollection, not fit to be mentioned on the 
 same day or in the same breath with the honour 
 which I was chalking out for myself. Every 
 theological heir of immortality stalked before 
 me like Banquo's ghosts. What was St. Austin's 
 wish ? To hear St. Paul preach. " Yes," said 
 I, " and my eloquence, if not my presence, shall 
 be the basis of a wish to future ages. How 
 many by pulpit eloquence have risen to, I will 
 not say what — the reader may judge — risum 
 teneatis ? I determined yet to figure in the 
 literary world. I would publish on some 
 abstruse , theological subject ; . I would be a 
 controversialist. Fame should still expand her 
 wings over me, only in a more holy cause. And 
 thus did I muse, ruminate, cogitate, plan, as we 
 were travelling on our way to the north. 
 
 So complete had been my failure and so 
 great, considering the expectations which went 
 with me to Oxford, that for some time prior to 
 my leaving, I had conceived to myself very 
 great unpleasantness in meeting my father. I 
 had no rod to fear as formerly — blessed arc Lney
 
 ANTIPODES. 1 1 
 
 who dread no other punishment ; but I returned 
 
 to him without anything to boast of. The 
 
 glory had departed from his house. On my 
 
 return home in the long vacations I used to be 
 
 as proud as if I had been some literary Goliah, 
 
 some prodigy of learning ; but now I seemed to 
 
 be lower by a yard or two in personal stature. 
 
 Now, however, as I was approaching my father's 
 
 residence, and when plans of future fame and 
 
 self-aggrandizement had been brooded over by 
 
 my addle-brains and seemed ready for hatching, 
 
 I began to feel a very great desire to behold 
 
 ao-ain the best of fathers. Had I been the 
 
 prodigal son, he would have come to meet me, 
 
 and have been glad to receive me. There 
 
 never was a son more attached to a father, nor 
 
 father who had a greater affection for a son ; 
 
 in that respect we were like Absalom and David. 
 
 Conceive, then, how I rejoiced at the proximity 
 
 of our interview. I hoped to see him well ; 
 
 such was his affection that, well or ill, I was 
 
 sure to find him happy. I was determined to 
 
 wear no disappointed face, that whatever my 
 
 heart might be, my countenance should not
 
 12 ANTIPODES. 
 
 blab its secrets. I would speak slightingly of 
 the past, with hope and cheerfulness of the 
 future, especially dwell on the honour of the 
 profession for which he had designed me, the 
 happiness wdth which I would embrace it, and 
 the satisfaction to which it might lead. 
 
 Need 1 say that something else endeared 
 home to me still more, made every mile appear 
 twain and every coach to stand still ? Was there 
 something still dearer than a father — a brother, 
 sister, mother ? There were, indeed, all these en- 
 dearments, father mother, sister, brother, all ; but 
 there was some one else whom I ought to have 
 loved less, and could not but love more. What a 
 passion is love ! the elixir of man's duty, the 
 essence of divine worship, the happiness of angels : 
 such is love, love to God, love to man for God's 
 sake. But there is another love, and who will deny 
 its sovereign power ? Since the creation of Eve, 
 when did it not reign over the heart of man ? 
 Coeval with chaos, says the theogonist Hesiod. 
 Well might he date its birth so early. What an 
 omnipotence of passion that must be which is 
 stronger than every other love, and with a cord no
 
 ANTIPODES. 13 
 
 thicker than the gossamer's web, binds and 
 tyrannises over the human heart, not by election 
 but by force ! What shall I call thee — how shall 
 I address thee ? Oh, thou all-devouring flame 
 to which all opposition is but fuel ; extinguishable 
 only by the extinction of reason, how have I 
 lamented for twenty long years the withering of 
 the heart, the deadness to all other concerns, 
 which thy destructive power has wrought ! 
 
 In plain prose, love had riveted a chain 
 round my heart, which dragged me towards 
 the place I was now approaching, with a force 
 inversely as the distance, so that, unlike the 
 chain of a watch, which loses its power the 
 nearer the evolution of the whole, it drew me 
 the more forcibly the nearer I approached. 
 How many ideas crowded upon my mind 
 during the last two or three miles ! Was she 
 well, was she faithful ? I had no doubt, and 
 now, after all my disappointments and total 
 discomfiture, I had with her garnered up my 
 whole heart. I looked to her only for hap- 
 piness : she was the beach on which I cast 
 myself for salvation from the troubled ocean in
 
 1 4 ANTIPODES. 
 
 which I had been wrecked. Henceforth she 
 was to me a happy island, one of the islands of 
 the blessed. Now then did I forget for a 
 moment what had made me so unhappy, and 
 arrived safely at the principal inn in Swallow- 
 beck. 
 
 There my companion and I parted. We 
 had been acquainted four years, only four short 
 years, short they now seemed, and during that 
 brief period he had as effectually accomplished 
 my ruin as to aU University expectations, as if 
 he had been the planet Saturn armed by astro- 
 logers and Omnipotence, as well with my 
 literary destiny. We parted at the principal 
 inn. The final shake of his hand — for we shook 
 hands — the oblique cast of his eye, the con- 
 traction of his eye-brows the disdainful curl of 
 his upper lip, and the satanic set of his teeth, 
 all indicated the deepest regret, not at what he 
 had done, but because he thought he could do 
 no more. His voice was low, loud, harsh and 
 surley, and in the curt, abrupt sentence, he said, 
 " good-bye." Did his last look curse me with 
 ill fortune. 
 
 i
 
 ANTIPODES. , 15 
 
 I confess candidly, gentle reader, entertain what 
 opinion you will of my share of common sense, 
 for some years I thought so. At any rate he 
 cursed me with superstition. He asked me 
 the way to a certain person's house, whom he 
 had known in his native town. I knew the 
 reason, reader, dost thou ? He had blasted my 
 character as a scholar at Oxford : he was de- 
 termined to complete his defamation by doing 
 the same at Swallowbeck. In my schoolboy 
 days I had been cried up by every old wife as a 
 " prent buke :" he was determined to give that 
 book the reputation of being as ill-spelt, ill- 
 printed, incorrect, and every way contemptible 
 as ever issued from nature's shop. What was 
 his motive '? malevolence, not malice. God 
 grant that I may never see him again. He has, 
 however, heard of my misfortunes since : what 
 an unction to his malignant heart ! I am now 
 at my father's house.
 
 16 ANTIPODES. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 I HAD hoped to find my father in good health. 
 I am not physician enough to describe the state 
 in^ which he was, and had been for several 
 months, of which they had wholly omitted to 
 inform me. His face had shrunk as if he was 
 at least twenty years older than what 1 knew 
 him to be, and he was suffering from an almost 
 incessant cough. His eye-sight, too, had so far 
 failed, that he could scarcely recognize my 
 person : my voice, however, told him who I 
 was. 
 
 I also found my mother and brother in very
 
 ANTIPODES. 1 7 
 
 great distress on account of his indisposition. 
 They lamented not only as an affectionate wife 
 and son, which they were sincerely, and un- 
 surpassed by any ; but on account of the dis- 
 qualification which his illness produced for the 
 performance of the duties of his situation. He 
 was a clerk in a commercial house, and did not 
 make money for his employers without long 
 and close seclusion in a small, confined office. 
 The sedentary confinement, indeed, had sown 
 and ripened the seeds of his complaint. Blessed 
 are they who, if they must earn their bread, 
 earn it by the sweat of their brow. The ori- 
 ginal curse for the fall of man was not half so 
 severe, as the bane of being " cribb'd, cabin'd, 
 confined." Yet a clerk is proud of his pale 
 face, a ploughman never of his ruddy, and really 
 handsome complexion ; supposed scholarship 
 makes the difference. 
 
 My mother and brother, when out of my 
 father's sight, wept and lamented, as if they 
 were about to consign his remains to the grave 
 immediately, and as if the shroud and the coffin, 
 and the undertaker, and the scarfs, and hatr
 
 18 ANTIPODES. 
 
 bands, and gloves, and all the other paraphernalia 
 of a funeral were already in the house. Indeed, 
 it was not without reason ; he was exceedingly 
 unwell, but his affliction promised to kill, not 
 by the maiden or guillotine, by one blow and 
 in an instant, but by inches, like the slow poison 
 of some ancient Egyptian sorcerer. It killed, 
 and it did not kill; it imitated the kitten, 
 which plays with the mouse, and will let it 
 neither live nor die. In the midst of life he 
 was in death ; that part of the funeral service 
 his complaint was continually repeating. 
 
 But though it did not kill, it disqualified for 
 the labours of the pen. His fingers were as 
 good as ever, but his eyes could not discri- 
 minate ; a glimmering light played so before 
 them, that sometimes he could distinguish 
 neither letter nor line. This annoyance, how- 
 ever, was not incessant, but exceedingly un- 
 pleasant when any master was present, inas- 
 much as it completely incapacitated for all work 
 the hour or so of its continuance. Fortunately 
 for him they did not honour him often with 
 their presence ; the proceeds were acceptable,
 
 ANTIPODES. 19 
 
 the trouble never ; they were gentlemen trades- 
 men. But though he was not already unable 
 to work, he promised fair very soon to become 
 so ; so said my mother's fears, and they spoke 
 the truth. 
 
 " Jonadab," said she, " your father has now 
 spent a large sum on your education. We 
 kept you at school until you grew a young man, 
 and then sent you to the university, and the 
 most expensive one, too, they say, in the world ; 
 but we sent you to Oxford in preference, be- 
 cause you said you could obtain great distinction 
 there, and rise to great preferment, get a fellow- 
 ship first of all, and then a living. You were a 
 most excellent classical scholar, you know. 
 You said so, you remember, and so did the 
 master." 
 
 So far she ran on like an alarum, and then 
 came to a dead stop. I felt myself nettled, for 
 I knew Vk^hat she was aiming at, and her cir- 
 cuitous way always mortified me more than it 
 would have done coming directly to the point 
 at once. 
 
 " Yes, mother, you certainly have spent a
 
 20 ANTIPODES. 
 
 deal — I admit it. But you knew the expense 
 beforehand, or at any rate should have calculated ; 
 and at all events, it is too late to talk about it 
 now. It is spent and cannot be recalled." 
 
 " Yes, but it has cost so much more than we 
 expected or could reckon on." 
 
 " You knew that it was impossible to calculate 
 to a pound, for the master told you so, and that 
 it would very probably cost considerably more 
 than you would expect." 
 
 "Yes, yes, it is gone — we shall see it no 
 more. It is much easier to spend money than 
 to earn it. But it has cost a deal." 
 "^ "You mean to say that I have been ex- 
 travagant ?" 
 
 " I say nothing about it — no such thing ; I 
 only think — " 
 
 " That I have been a profligate, squandered 
 the greatest part of it upon nothing — upon 
 intemperance, maybe, or gambling. I never 
 was a gambler or a drunkard in my life." 
 
 " I do not say you ever were. Dear me ! you 
 are above being spoken to. You might come 
 back like a Christian at any rate. What you
 
 ANTIPODES. 21 
 
 have spent was all right, and you are welcome 
 to it." 
 
 " What did you begin to talk about the 
 expense for ?" 
 
 '* Why surely we may talk about it." 
 
 After a considerable pause, during which she 
 took a view of her shoes, and then cast a vacant 
 look out of the window, with a countenance as 
 full of mischief as, to use a very common com- 
 parison of her own, an egg is full of meat, she 
 recommenced. 
 
 " You will be very well off now, Jonadab ; 
 you can live like a gentleman." 
 
 " How am I to be better off now than 
 formerly ?" said I, tartly. 
 
 " Well, you know, your fellowship will main- 
 tain you very handsomely, until you obtain 
 something in the church ; and in the meantime, 
 if you get a curacy, your stipend will be so 
 much more than what you will have occasion 
 to spend." 
 
 " I told you long since by letter, that I could 
 not obtain a fellowship : and here I am without
 
 22 ANTIPODES. 
 
 a penny in my pocket except what my father 
 sent me." 
 
 " But there were more fellowships than one ; 
 if you missed one, you could have got another, 
 or can still." 
 
 " I tell you no, it is impossible — utterly 
 impossible, I took no honour, and cannot 
 therefore get a fellowship. Never mention 
 a fellowship to me again as long as you live ; 
 if you possess one spark of affection for me as 
 a mother ought to do, and as you value my life 
 and immortal so\il, never mention the word 
 again." 
 
 " Why, I am sure ; your father has just been 
 saying that if he had all the money which he 
 has spent upon you at Oxford, he could now 
 live independent, in a poor way to be sure, but 
 he could live." 
 
 This remark was a death-blow to me. 1 
 knew the truth of it, and that he now very 
 much stood in need of the money. Every drop 
 he wiped from his eye told me that what I had 
 spent at Oxford, some of it foolishly, but not
 
 ANTIPODES. 23 
 
 much, most of it unavoidably, would be a very 
 acceptable present to him now, when he clearly 
 could not earn a livelihood much longer. I 
 knew not what to say, and, as is usual under 
 such perplexities, asked impertinently, or without 
 any definite object in view, " when did he say 
 so ?" As this question was put in a subdued 
 tone, she answered very quickly : 
 
 " When did he say so ? He has said so 
 manv a time since his affliction commenced, 
 and I am sure he spoke the truth. We have 
 forty pounds a year to live upon, and if we had 
 never sent you to yon spendthrift place, we 
 should have nearly forty pounds a year more, 
 and upon that we could live. But now. Lord, what 
 is to become of us ? But you will be able to 
 keep us, Jonadab ?" 
 
 This was said in an interrogative tone, and 
 was, I know, from the first, the target at which 
 all her circumlocution was aimed. 
 
 " You may depend upon it, mother, that I 
 will support you if it ever be in my power ; but, 
 you know, I must have a beginning." 
 
 " Have it in your power ! Why, there can
 
 24 ANTIPODES. 
 
 be no doubt that, after all your education, you 
 can support us. You have been fed and bred 
 so long by your poor father, who has supported 
 us, though God knows, he never had a tithe 
 of your learning and never but a small 
 salary." 
 
 " Well, well, I can merely say, I will if I can. 
 Pray, say no more about it." 
 
 All this conversation took place in at least 
 half an hour after my entrance into the house. 
 I had not been in a moment after the customary 
 salutations, before she started at full speed. A 
 call from my father in an adjoining room at this 
 period broke off the dialogue, at the instant I 
 thought very fortunately for me ; but the pause , 
 left me to my own cogitations, and verily I thought 
 even my mother's jangle, delicate as was the 
 topic, better than my own thoughts. I looked 
 inward and found all dark, gloomy, dismal, for 
 even hope for the moment shed not a ray to 
 break the melancholy blackness of my heart. 
 It was indeed darkness which may be felt. I 
 had long known the unpleasantness of my 
 father's situation, how sedentary and solitary,
 
 ANTIPODES. . 25 
 
 gradually subversive of his excellent stamina, 
 for few started life with a more iron constitution ; 
 but constant dropping will wear through a stone, 
 — through any thing. 
 
 For years had I seen his health giving way, 
 and long expected the period when he would be 
 obliged to yield to sickness and infirmities. For 
 years during my boyhood and upwards, my ut- 
 most ambition, heart's desire and prayer 
 had been, that I, even I, his son, his eldest son, 
 and none other, might extricate him for ever 
 from the dungeon they call an office, and feed and 
 support him as he had nurtured and pampered 
 roe. If such had not been my desire and am- 
 bition, I would never have gone to Oxford. 
 Surely it was a holy wish, hallowed by a com- 
 mandment in Jehovah's own hand-writing, 
 consecrated by the commendation of every age, 
 no matter what might be colour, creed, civiliza- 
 tion or barbarism. The passion ever has been 
 and ever will be lauded, " by saint, by savage 
 and by sage." It is the God within us, God is 
 love. I never saw a picture I admired so 
 much, as that of a daughter feeding a starving 
 
 VOL. I. C
 
 26 ANTIPODES. 
 
 father in prison from her own breast. If after 
 this Hfe that daughter was not an angel of light, 
 who may or can go to heaven ? talk not of ex- 
 ceptions. There was a Judas among the twelve, 
 a Lucifer in heaven. Some may deride the 
 passion I speak of, yet if derided by all the 
 world, would it be the spirit of God within us. 
 But not only had such been my first and ruling 
 wish, my all-absorbing passion, but I had pledged 
 my honour, promised in the most solemn manner, 
 that, if my father would send me to Oxford, I 
 would support him to the utmost of my 
 power. 
 
 Had it not been for this promise and the ex- 
 pectation he entertained of assistance from me 
 afterwards, he never would have put himself to 
 so much expense. He would have been a 
 madman if he had. It was therefore a specu- 
 lation. Oh ! thought I, if I had not been 
 defrauded of that fellowship, what would I not 
 have done for my father ! He should have come 
 forth into the open air, and lived the rest of his 
 life free as the mountain breeze. But it was 
 .not God's will, was it ? I should have done my
 
 ANTIPODES. 27 
 
 best. I should have exposed the knavish cupidity 
 of the tutor. God helps those who help them- 
 selves. The whole constitution of nature and the 
 government of the universe proclaim the truth 
 daily and every moment. Let every man who 
 wishes to have the aid of heaven take for his 
 motto, " a shoulder set to the wheel." God and 
 nature abhor, not only idleness, — for that every 
 fool will admit, — but want of spirit : " audaces 
 fortuna juvat." The poet who wrote these 
 words had read nature. 
 
 During my mother's absence, which I knew 
 would not be very long, for she had not yet dis- 
 burdened her mind, I attempted to determine 
 what course to pursue. A curacy w^as one and 
 the first object to be attained, the second, a 
 school together with it, endowed or established 
 by myself. Even in that piping time of peace, 
 I would have enlisted and campaigned without 
 danger, had not my promise to repay my father 
 in kind, been manacles to my hands and shackles 
 to my feet. But my reverie was now interrupted 
 by the return of my mother. I saw that she 
 was very anxious to speak, and though afraid to 
 
 c 2
 
 28 ANTIPODES. 
 
 offend, determined to be free ; and, as I knew 
 there would be no peace for her or others, until 
 she had fairly turned her mind inside out on the 
 subject of our present position and prospects, I 
 thought the best plan would be to let the re- 
 servoir off at once and end it. I therefore 
 encouraged her to speak her mind without 
 hesitation or reserve. I began the subject which 
 I knew floated uppermost. 
 
 " Well, mother, what must be done ?" 
 
 " Done ! w^iat has been done ? what situation 
 have you provided for yourself?" 
 
 I told her that at present I was wholly un- 
 provided and must look out for a situation as 
 well as I could. 
 
 " But why did you not look out for one in 
 Oxford, where you could so easily have obtained 
 one ? The great men there would have given 
 you a situation, if you had asked them. What 
 could you be thinking about to come down hither 
 without a situation?" 
 
 " You have conceived, mother, a very mis- 
 taken notion of what you call the great men in 
 Oxford. The tutors of a college, at least of the
 
 ANTIPODES. 29 
 
 college to which I had the misfortune to belong, 
 will be glad to receive from you payment for 
 tuition and other items, generally included in the 
 term Battels, and will encourage you to spend 
 your all, and more than what is really yours, 
 for the good of the house, but with their in- 
 terest, ceases their regard for you. Leave 
 Oxford, and they know you no more. Ask 
 them for a favour, assistance to earn a morsel of 
 bread, and they are surprised at your folly ; ask 
 a second time, and they marvel at your impu- 
 dence. No, I must not look to the college for 
 aid, I know them too well. We made a sad 
 mistake when we thought that, if I only went 
 to college, I should never want a place. The 
 college, I went to was, I confess, in this respect 
 the worst. The long and short of what I have 
 to do now, is, to obtain a curacy, and with it, 
 if possible, a school, and thus I may perhaps be 
 able to do something for you, and thus let us 
 settle the matter, and say no more about it at 
 present." 
 
 But instead of reverting to some other subject, 
 my proposal seemed only to sharpen appetite for
 
 30 AMTIPODES. 
 
 further parley. Her impatience and voice 
 mounted together, when my father, who 
 knew her temper, and suspected that she was 
 uphraiding me with what could not now be 
 amended, entered the room. 
 
 " I wish you would endeavour, my dear, 
 to bear what is past with patience, and to 
 forget it. Jonadab has been unfortunate, but 
 how many have been the same ! All cannot 
 prosper alike." 
 
 Then addressing himself to me he said. 
 
 " Have you any views of a curacy ? for I 
 presume that wiU be the first thing you will look 
 out for." 
 
 " None. Curacies near Oxford are small and 
 insufScient generally for a man's support. 
 Besides, I tell you candidly, I have no friends 
 there." 
 
 " I fear you have none here. You have lost 
 old Mr. Langley's friendship, and from his well 
 known temper, I doubt not, irrecoverably. 
 Curacies also, you know, are not only of small 
 value, but very difficult to be obtained. Did 
 you do your best to obtain a situation before you
 
 ANTIPODES. 31 
 
 left Oxford ? An ushership would do, if it would 
 lead to a curacy." 
 
 " An ushership I should be most happy to 
 accept, and I will certainly write to the tutors 
 for their assistance, which they can as easily give 
 me here as if I were there, provided they be 
 only willing, but that is the question. I have 
 little faith in their disposition to help an absent 
 member." 
 
 " Well, we must hope for the best, and do 
 the best we can for ourselves, and trust in him 
 who never forsakes those who look to him. 
 Let us not repine at misfortunes until we cannot 
 see a blessing when it comes." 
 
 He was now called away upon business, and 
 my mother chose to take herself away without 
 saying another word, for what purpose, the why 
 and the wherefore, must now for ever remain a 
 secret, the important information at the time not 
 having been obtained by me.
 
 32 ANTIPODES. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 I WAS left alone with my brother, who was 
 several years younger than myself. A melan- 
 choly dejection at the present posture and future 
 prospects of our affairs, brought tears into his 
 eyes, more especially the last words of my father. 
 I could see that there was something else in his 
 mind labouring to be brought forth, but with 
 very considerable and manifest pains of par- 
 turition. He wanted to say something, that was 
 clear, and yet what could be the reason of his 
 hesitation, I was unable to conjecture. In 
 common parlance an idea crossed my mind,
 
 ANTIPODES c6 
 
 but to speak the truth, it entered and never 
 went out. After the excitement of other 
 matters it now floated uppermost ; there was a 
 delicacy, however, in making inquiry. Ill as 
 my father was, at death's door to all appearance, 
 and crest-fallen as I had returned, without 
 honour, without prospect, I was ashamed to ask 
 lest the inquiry might seem to argue an in- 
 difference in my mind to these real and important 
 causes for grief and lamentation. My Dulcinea 
 he never saw except when he went into the 
 town, and therefore by way of introduction I 
 asked. 
 
 " Have you been in the town lately ? I think 
 I must call upon Mr. Scrapling, the vicar, and 
 ask him for a title, or if he can procure me one." 
 
 To make the inquiry less pointed and bare- 
 faced I spoke of Mr. Scrapling and a title, but 
 he understood in an instant, the drift of my 
 question ; that was clear by his countenance. 
 
 " Yes, it will be necessary for you to call upon 
 him and also to ask him, but I had much rather 
 you had made your debut elsewhere ; not but 
 every man must have a beginning, and no one 
 
 c 3
 
 34 ANTIPODES. 
 
 can be expected to acquit himself as well at first 
 as afterwards, but I know how much you will 
 dislike it. As for stipend, you will receive from 
 him, not a small one, but literally none. 
 If he gives you a title, you must serve three 
 years for it. His last curate, a Welchman, 
 though he had a family dependent upon him 
 and nothing but a few pounds saved, never re- 
 ceived a penny from him in money. He obtained 
 nothing but a title for deacon and priest's orders, 
 with once or twice, but only once or twice, a 
 dinner." 
 
 It is true, I had, not simply a dislike, but an 
 insurmountable repugnance to commence in my 
 native town, though I did not like to confess it- 
 
 " There never was," said I, " a more complete 
 church-jobber : he would sell the communion- 
 wine, if any body would buy it ; he is more 
 wicked than Simon Magus himself I think it 
 exceedingly sinful to obtain ordination by 
 working for it ; whatever people may call it, it 
 is nothing but a purchase, every man's labour 
 is so much money ; money is given and received 
 for it all the world over- I should not care so
 
 ANTIPODES. 35 
 
 much for commencing where I have been 
 brought up and am well known and have been 
 ever since my childhood ; but, if I may have my 
 choice, I had infinitely rather not be a clergyman 
 than buy myself into the profession in such a 
 way, for it is nothing but bu\ing. I think pur- 
 chasing a living for a clergyman, either by and 
 for himself or more indirectly, no more like the 
 sin of Simon Magus, than purchasing a house 
 or an estate ; the legislature only has made it 
 sinful by precluding the possibility of such 
 a purchase without perjury. If any thing 
 we can do resembles that sin, it is purchasing 
 ordination, giving any compensation for it, no 
 matter what, money or labour in the church, 
 or teachino; the incumbent's children. This is 
 really a very wicked thing, and, if I were in 
 orders this moment through such means, I 
 should not consider myself a clergyman, nor 
 would I do duty as such- I would certainly 
 betake myself to some other mode of obtaining 
 a livelihood-" 
 
 " Well, I am not able to judge whether it be 
 that sin or not. No doubt, many do obtain
 
 36 ANTIPODES. 
 
 orders in that way, indeed, I have no doubt that 
 Mr. Scrapling never gave anything but a title 
 to any curate he has had since he becanne the 
 vicar. Nevertheless, it will be necessary for you 
 to call upon him ; he will have to sign your 
 testimonial to the bishop ; but, if you do not 
 ask him for his own title, I see not how you can 
 ask him to procure for you any other person's." 
 
 " He will never offer me his own title, and 
 about that, therefore, I shall have no difficulty 
 in managing ; and as to his assistance, I am 
 quite sure it matters not whether I ask him or 
 not. As long as he has a title of his own to 
 give, he never will get me any other. Promises 
 he will give me as fast as he can speak ; and 
 never think two minutes after of what he has 
 said." 
 
 " But how very strange all the inhabitants 
 will think it if you never ask him to assist you ; 
 especially if you should remain at home any 
 considerable time, which I think vou are verv 
 likely to do, without a situation, and in want of 
 
 one." 
 
 " That is very true, and I must ask him ;
 
 ANTIPODES. 37 
 
 but, as my father said, let us hope for the best, 
 and say no more about it now." 
 
 After a pause, during which I was anxious 
 to introduce the subject nearest my heart, I said ; 
 
 " Our parish church is a very handsome one 
 and easy, I have been told, to be heard in. Is 
 Mr. Scrapling well-liked ? Has he a good 
 congregation ?" 
 
 Again his countenance told me that he un- 
 derstood the scope of my inquiry. 
 
 " Yes, it is very well frequented, especially 
 by the rich ; but indeed generally by all the 
 parishioners. Though no very good scholar, he 
 is not disliked and yet he is not the most popular. 
 I was there on Sunday. I saw Jane in the 
 street twice" 
 
 Now I knew very well that something was 
 the matter. My brother knew my heart so 
 well that, had all been right, he would have 
 entered upon the subject with alacrity, and 
 poured out all he knew unasked and almost 
 without waiting for an opportunity. Twice did 
 he see her in the street ? Then sickness could 
 not be the cause.
 
 38 ANTIPODES. 
 
 " Is she well ? How did she look ?" 
 " Not so well as I have seen her, though not 
 positively ill. It is reported that she is going 
 to be married." 
 
 " Indeed," said I, and my heart was at my 
 mouth, and my eyes grew so dim, that I could 
 not have recognised my brother, had I not known 
 that he was before me. " Indeed," said I ; but 
 the word trembled on my lips, and the last letter 
 never passed them. My breath could not reach 
 my lips, at least not enough to complete the 
 articulation, and push, so to say, the letter out 
 of my mouth into the open air. I did my 
 utmost to suppress or at least repress the emotion 
 and to show some incredulity, or at least apathy ; 
 but in spite of all I could do, my face and indeed 
 whole person turned half-way from my brother. 
 The shock on my mind gave a sort of rotatory 
 motion to my body. I might have received a 
 tremendous blow on one side of my face, which 
 made me revolve ninety degrees at least. There 
 was, also, for a moment or somewhat more, an 
 abstraction of thought, so that in mind I was 
 no more in the presence of my brother than if
 
 ANTIPODES. 39 
 
 I had been a hundred miles off ; and though I 
 wanted to speak as if nothing were the matter, 
 and had a sort of consciousness that I ought to 
 do so immediately, yet for the life of me could 
 I not drag back my mind to the starting post. 
 He perceived my confusion and speechlessness, 
 and having, himself, poor fellow, known pangs 
 of disappointed love, he was really more 
 sorry than I was myself. Indeed my sensation 
 was not grief, but an emotion, which, for want 
 of a better name, I must call nondescript, I 
 think it partook more of anger, indignation, or 
 resentment than of sorrow. I will leave a 
 more accurate description and appropriate name 
 to those who at present feel the emotion, and 
 are possessed of a more copious and select 
 vocabulary. 
 
 " It is reported, to be sure ; but that has been 
 said, you know, many a time, of you and me, 
 and I have not heard any respectable person say 
 so who was likely to know the truth. Martha, 
 the servant is my informant, and what can she 
 know but vague, unfounded inimours ? Besides, 
 I cannot think she would have him."
 
 40 ANTIPODES. 
 
 It is surprising how easy it is to persuade a 
 man what he wishes to believe, especially a 
 lover; and yet I am unable to say whether I 
 believed or disbelieved. So strange and in- 
 describable was my then state of mind, wounded 
 as it had been by recent disappointment, and 
 gashed afresh now as it was by this severest 
 stab of all, that I knew not what I believed or 
 did not believe, desired, or was indifferent to. 
 His last words, however, informed me who was 
 reputed her successful suitor, and the whole of 
 his palaver gave me a little time for the recol- 
 lection of my thoughts and spirits. I recovered 
 in some degree my equilibrium, off which the 
 shock had fairly thrown me. 
 
 " And whom is she goiug to be married 
 to — at least, as the on dit says ?" 
 
 This I said, not because I had any doubt, 
 for I had heard such a report many a time 
 before, but because it was necessary to say 
 something, and I was glad to find that I had 
 recovered the use of my tongue. 
 
 " Mr. de Witt, your old master. You know 
 it was said some years since, that he had paid
 
 ANTIPODES. 41 
 
 his addresses to her and was accepted ; by the 
 family, at any rate, and some said, by her too ; 
 but I think it is merely because he visits there 
 very often. I cannot think she would marry 
 him, he is so ugly, twenty years, at least, her 
 senior, and subject to hereditary insanity. 
 He has been, you know, repeatedly out of his 
 mind. Pshaw ! it is utterly impossible. I 
 know no young lady in the town that would 
 marry him, if she were never to be married, 
 though not possessed of Jane's fortune, and in 
 personal attractions much her inferior." 
 
 Now all this was strictly true. He was at 
 least twenty years her senior, but, judging from 
 his personal appearance, and standing at the 
 university, I should say twenty-five. He was 
 an old fellow of a college, what they call the 
 senior of a batch, each past the meridian before 
 he succeeded, not by learning or merit, but by 
 standing, to a fellowship. He had been beg- 
 ging and praying God for five-and-twenty years, 
 at least, to take a certain poor, afflicted, rich 
 coUege incumbent out of the miseries of this 
 sinful world, a dear brother unto himself,
 
 42 ANTIPODES. 
 
 and had been searching all that time, without 
 the failure of a single week, the obituary of the 
 newspaper published in his neighbourhood to 
 find his name in the register of the dead. The 
 proprietors of an Insurance office were not 
 better acquainted wnth the bills of mortality or 
 the mode of calculating annuities. He had 
 corresponded continually with the other fellows 
 of his college, and the neighbours of the in- 
 cumbent, to receive information as to the pro- 
 bable duration of his remaining life from 
 physical appearances. Judging, therefore, from 
 the leno-th of time he had been thus stretched 
 on the tenter-hooks of expectation, he must be 
 now at least twenty-five years her senior. But 
 this was not all nor the chief objection. 
 Seniority by twenty-five years was, one would 
 think, anything but a recommendation of a 
 suitor to the acceptance of a young and beau- 
 tiful lady ; but his face ! bon Dieu ! his face ! 
 who shall attempt to describe the lineaments 
 divine ? 
 
 The small-pox, that most formidable arch- 
 fiend to the beauty of the human countenance,
 
 ANTIPODES. 43 
 
 had dug many a hole, though not so many, by 
 a great deal, as upon some ; hut the cavities or 
 indentures in De Witt's visage were so large, 
 and at a distance made such a visible shadow 
 for the perspective sketcher, that verily one 
 was forcibly reminded by it of the mountains 
 and valleys in the moon's orb, visible even to 
 the naked eye, and much more through arti- 
 ficial aids. Only think of a limner taking a 
 portrait of this lunar visage of De Witt. 
 
 " Like the moon, whose orb 
 Through optic glass the Tuscan artist views 
 At evening from the top of Fiesole, 
 Or in Val d'Arno, to descry new lands. 
 Rivers or mountains in her spotty globe." 
 
 But it was not merely the excavations which 
 that disease had made, that were by any means 
 the principal traces of its havoc. This confluent 
 small-pox, as it is called, seemed to have fused 
 the whole mass of his face, like the metal in a 
 cioicible, yet not completely, only so much as to 
 make some parts appear to have run in lique- 
 faction into one another. If two pieces of
 
 44 ANTIPODES. 
 
 lead placed near each other be partially fused, 
 they will form a junction so as to show clearly 
 that it has been by fusion. Thus was it with 
 De Witt's face. The nose was a prominent 
 mass above the general surface, for what nose 
 is not ? but on the sides it appeared for all the 
 world to have been soldered on. It was a 
 noble proboscis, which would not have disgraced 
 the royal family of great Britain : a similar one 
 in bold relief belonged to a late, by the grace of 
 God, king of one island or more, and defender 
 of the faith. 
 
 His face, if symmetry be regarded, was con- 
 siderably too large for his outward man, and 
 surmounted then with a pate still more un- 
 symmetrically proportioned, naked, smooth, 
 shining like a mirror. I remember once seeing 
 and taking particular notice of him, immediately 
 after he was said to have been ill of the typhus 
 fever, and never shall I forget the face exhibited 
 by that pedagogue. From his recent illness, 
 from which he had just recovered, one would 
 have supposed that he would have been in com- 
 plexion pallid, cadaverous, and in the expansion
 
 ANTIPODES. 45 
 
 of his orb shrunk and diminished. Quite the 
 reverse. Never did I see or hear of such a 
 convalescent from v^hat is called malignant 
 typhus. His face was the full moon personified, 
 or rising sun of horizonal rotundity, red as if 
 he had drunk without constitutional injury all 
 the wine ever shipped from Oporto ; far more 
 than usually large, was compared by some at 
 the time to a boiled turnip, and I do assure you, 
 gentle reader, and beg you will not question my 
 veracity, it shone, as I have already observed, 
 like a mirror. What a face to attract the ad- 
 miration of a young lady ! But Desdemona 
 admired and loved the blackamoor : true, but 
 there has been many a handsome black face, 
 yes, in Africa. His cheeks projected until they 
 were on a level with his nose, as noble a pro- 
 montory as was that member. What a cherub ! 
 But notwithstanding these, to me, personal 
 repulsions, she might not think him so ill- 
 favoured or in the least repulsive ; a woman's 
 eyes are not those of a man. Still, even at this 
 moment, my rival though he was, I cannot 
 think that my eyes were magnifying lenses,
 
 46 ANTIPODES. 
 
 which caricatured his features. Admitting, 
 however, the possibility of her feeling no fas- 
 tidious distaste to either his age or person, what 
 could she and her family think of his hereditary 
 failing? "Mens sana in corpore sano," a 
 sound mind in a sound body, has always been 
 esteemed a blessing beyond all price ; the con- 
 trary must, of course, be as great an evil. 
 
 His sisters, though permitted to walk at large 
 without the restraint of a straight jacket, were 
 scarcely ever sane, and one of his brothers died 
 in an asylum. He himself had been frequently 
 raving, but at other times, not only sensible, 
 but clever. As I have already observed, he had 
 recently had, so it was said, the typhus fever, 
 but every one could observe that it must have 
 been a typhus of a very peculiar and novel 
 description, which any pathologist would be 
 puzzled how to classify. He was tied down to 
 his bed, and he raved and bawled, but the 
 typhus, it is well known, will produce this 
 turbulent effect upon the brain, and this voci- 
 ferous propensity upon the vocal organs. 
 
 Still, it was remarked, that the tj^phus
 
 ANTIPODES. 47 
 
 effected a marvellous diminution of the outward 
 man, so that the complexional and personal 
 effects of disease would be visible for some time 
 after. The reverse was the case with De Witt's 
 reputed fever, for immediately on his appear- 
 ance after a most violent attack of typhus, he 
 looked more bloated, sleek, and rubicund than 
 prior to his indisposition. That he was, how- 
 ever, often deranged, or to use the favourite 
 'expression of Judge Vaughan, that " reason was 
 often unseated," was well known from " un- 
 contaminated evidence." It was no secret ; the 
 term typhus was only a trifling and very ex- 
 cusable misnomer. I once met him one sum- 
 mer, about six o'clock in the morning, walking 
 evidently at the utmost stretch of his locomotive 
 powers, his legs succeeding each other with the 
 rapidity of the spokes of a coach-wheel, and he 
 had a gaiter on one leg and none on the other. 
 He went at that rate some distance into the 
 fields, and then returned without having accom- 
 plished any definite object, 
 
 But this might be imputed by some to mere 
 mental abstraction, what they call absence of
 
 48 ANTIPODES. 
 
 mind. I have no doubt that it was an aberration 
 of reason. Considering all these circumstances, 
 therefore, his personal appearance, age and in- 
 sanity, it was at last fairly concluded by me and 
 my brother, that the rumour was only the idle 
 gossip of the partially informed, founded upon 
 conjecture, or what was not less probable, a 
 wilful untruth.
 
 ANTIPODES. 49 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 It was on a beautiful summer's day in June, 
 not long after my return to Swallowbeck, 
 that I took a walk into the fields as had been my 
 daily wont in days when hope told a flattering 
 tale and I was full of glee. I sauntered slowly 
 and dejectedly down the noble valley, in which 
 my father's house stood and down which it looked, 
 never less alone than when alone. I rambled at 
 least three miles before I turned to retrace the 
 distance. The purling pebbly brook wound 
 through the meadows, sometimes returning in 
 its serpentine course so far as to ascend the valley 
 
 VOL. I. D
 
 50 ANTIPODES. 
 
 instead of flowing down it. How often, when a 
 schoolboy, had I fished in this stream for min- 
 nows and gudgeons, w-ith hne and fingers, or 
 dammed up some part and baled out the element, 
 in which alone they could escape from me, or 
 grasped the twisted eel which eluded my grasp 
 and sought for its usual concealment in the 
 mire ! How often in the still, clear deep had I 
 tickled the spotted beauty of the brook ! But 
 those were days when I had rushed to the amuse- 
 ment with the animation peculiar to a release 
 from confinement in the buzzing school. Yet 
 they were not far distant in the solemn, stately 
 march of time ; but they were schoolboy days, 
 though not far off, never to return. 
 
 What a peculiar pleasure combined with me- 
 lancholy regret accompanies the recollection of 
 our schoolboy days, especially when the different 
 localities in the vicinity of the school are as- 
 sociated in our minds with the various pastimes 
 and amusements of the period. 
 
 ** Dear the schoolboy spot 
 We ne'er forget, though there we are forgot."
 
 ANTIPODES. 5 1 
 
 Thus sings Byron, and, well or ill, he sings the 
 truth. It is dear, it is sweet, but its dear sweet- 
 ness is that of the remembrance of some departed 
 friend. 
 
 I turned out of the beaten path and followed 
 the brook in its devious course, sometimes ad- 
 vanced and anon receded, and I could not but 
 moralise on the parable it presented of my past 
 life. How had I brawled and clamoured and 
 hurried on, as I fancied, in my advancement to 
 the glory I so much coveted, and how had I re- 
 treated as far from it ? yet, said I, one may 
 finally struggle forwards. Assuredly I had found 
 my own level. I knew better than before, my 
 capabilities, of which, God knows, I had been 
 grossly ignorant. But in spite of my moralising 
 or endeavours to moralise, the idea of Jane and 
 the matrimonial rumour obtruded themselves 
 upon my mind, demanded attention and would 
 not be denied. I pshawed and stamped and 
 had recourse to all the expedients that I could 
 think of to repulse the impertinent intruder, but 
 not a moment could I fairly get quit of it. No 
 matter then, let me give the subject a fair au- 
 
 D 2 
 
 imiVERSITY Of ILLlNOa 
 
 I iRf/lRV
 
 52 ANTIPODES. 
 
 dience once more, that is, for the thousand and 
 first time in the course of a few days, and try if 
 that will not be the means of banishing it com- 
 pletely, and for some time at least setting my 
 mind at rest. 
 
 I did every thing I could to persuade myself 
 of the utter impossibility she should ever yield 
 to the wishes or menaces of her friends, suppos- 
 ing they did wish her, which was more than I 
 knew, or that she should ever conceive a wish her- 
 self, to marry Mr. de Witt. I dwelt on her unques- 
 tionable attachment to me, a passion which I 
 knew, if any one did, the impossibility of sub- 
 duing; on my own personal attractions, contrasted 
 with the forbidding, and, it is hardly too bad to 
 to say, disgusting aspect of my supposed rival ; 
 on the respectability and probable affluence 
 I might attain to, not inferior at least to his, 
 though he had recently succeeded to a valuable 
 college living ; but what prospect cannot love 
 hold out to that imagination over which it 
 rules. 
 
 I ascended a short distance the acclivity from 
 the valley, whence I had a full view of their
 
 ANTIPODES. 53 
 
 house and of much of their property. Is it pos- 
 sible, said I, for the proprietors of such a residence 
 and such an estate to suffer, much more urge, 
 their beautiful and blooming daughter to ally 
 herself to so much — but I will say no more 
 about him, lest envy may seem to dictate my 
 
 words and guide my pen. I persuaded myself, 
 — I did more — I made myself as sure as of the 
 existence of the house before me, that he was not 
 the destined of heaven for such hymeneal bliss. 
 Again hope began to reanimate my heart, fire 
 my brain and awake the phantoms of imagina- 
 tion, which disappointment for some time had 
 laid. 
 
 I fancied her mine, my own already, not to be, 
 but in actual enjoyment. I revelled in the in- 
 toxication which hope alone can give, the only 
 heaven on earth, for anticipation is always greater 
 felicity than enjoyment. No happiness in this 
 world can equal the intensity of bliss, which hope 
 not only pictures but actually confers. I was thus 
 rioting in the sunshine of hope, and conjuring 
 up fairy realms of bliss, and was not aware that 
 I had again descended into the valley and was
 
 54 ANTIPODES. 
 
 standing by the margin of the brook near a 
 broad basin formed by the eddy, where the 
 schoolboys had been in the habit of bathing. 
 My mind returned from her excursion into the 
 regions of imagination as suddenly as a bird falls 
 when shot dead in the air, I know not why or 
 wherefore, and I as instantly said aloud, 
 
 " How often have I plunged into the water 
 here ! Here it was I first learned to swim, and, 
 for the purpose of acquiring an art foreign to my 
 own element, I have bathed in this place twenty 
 times a day." Such was the fact. " Where 
 now are the many who have bathed with me and 
 dabbled and dipped and swam and floated, back- 
 wards and forwards ? Many are no more, many 
 have repeated their last lesson, their paternoster, 
 their Lord have mercy, and have turned their 
 faces to the wall, and then mingled with the 
 dust of the mothers who brought them into the 
 world with so much joy and sorrow. And some 
 are men of business, plodding the mercantile path 
 to wealth." 
 
 Again my mind was sinking with these 
 reveries into a cold, comfortless gloom, and then
 
 ANTIPODES. 55 
 
 again Jane and marriage and prosperity and 
 happiness rose up before me and drove away 
 these dismal spectres into airy nothing, and I 
 began to be cheerful, and the sun shone flashing 
 upon the water, and I laughed and put myself 
 into motion, when a soft tread behind me on the 
 velvet sward changed my mood and posture 
 together. 
 
 " Well, Mr. Rechab, is it usual with students 
 to laugh at running brooks ?" 
 
 I declare, when first the sound of his feet 
 startled me into attention, I thought, I knew not 
 why, that Jane had been at my side and had 
 surprised me with her name in my heart, if not 
 in my mouth. But he was the sire of one of my 
 old school-fellows. I and his son had often 
 pored over the same passage, talked very know- 
 ingly over the extremely delicate remarks of 
 Juvenal, for we used no expurgated editions, and 
 he was now a member of the most honour- 
 able profession of the law, that is an attorney, 
 alias a solicitor, for some prefer the latter ap- 
 pellation as more genteel, alias in general and 
 broad Yorkshire, a limb.
 
 56 ANTIPODES. 
 
 I was exceedingly glad to meet with old Mr. 
 Scratch, not only for " auld lang syne," but be- 
 cause I instantly thought he would be a channel 
 of communication, true and authentic, respecting 
 the rumour which had caused me as much alarm, 
 as the Reform Bill, when first proposed and 
 stated, did the Tory side of the House. Much 
 small talk passed between us, but shift not your 
 position, gentle reader, with uneasiness or im- 
 patience, lest I should cram down your gizzard, 
 were you willing to gulp, all the twiddle twaddle 
 of the would-be parson and student of Coke and 
 Littleton. But it is absolutely necessary for the 
 purpose I have in writing this veritable piece of 
 psychological autobiography, that you should 
 know something further about the rumour. 
 
 " Your old master, Mr. Rechab, has got, I am 
 most happy to state (stating a case was very 
 legal), a very valuable living in this county." 
 
 Mr. Scratch had a most impressive manner of 
 giving emphasis to any important w^ord in a 
 sentence, and that was, together with a heavier 
 intonation and significant shake of the voice, a 
 shake of the head which he now employed at
 
 ANTIPODES. 57 
 
 bhe aforesaid words " very valuable." I was ex- 
 ceedingly glad, however, at hearing this. With- 
 out ceremony and very naturally it introduced 
 an inquiry, which I should have found consider- 
 able delicacy in making directly, lest Mr. Scratch 
 might have heard of my attachment to Jane, 
 which, though not blazed abroad, had been 
 broached. 
 
 " Yes, it is doubtless a good living, but do you 
 think the mastership he is going to relinquish 
 for it is not better ?" 
 
 " Better ! it is not a tithe of the income." 
 
 "But the farmers are every where refusing to 
 pay tithes, and it seems as if they could not be 
 forced. What then will become of his fine 
 living ?" 
 
 " I know nothing of what is about to come 
 or what will be : I only know that at present it 
 is a very valuable living.^' 
 
 " Why, what is the value of it ? Will it keep 
 
 him r 
 
 " Keep him ! Why, you know nothing about 
 it, it seems. Keep him ! I reckon it will : if it 
 would not, he would have little chance to marry 
 
 D 3
 
 58 ANTIPODES. 
 
 a beautiful young lady of great accomplishments 
 and accustomed to the most respectable mode of 
 living." 
 
 Gracious heavens ! I cannot think at this mo- 
 ment what prevented me from knocking him 
 down. Every word he spoke was a dagger, an 
 insult which deserved a duel, a provocation which 
 drove me mad. He was walking before me, and 
 I could not refrain from grinning and clenching 
 my fist. True, she was so, young, beautiful, a 
 lady, accomplished, accustomed to respectable 
 life ; but what business had he to talk of him 
 marrying that lady ? His words had floored 
 me. Before I had rattled on like Cicero against 
 Cataline or Demosthenes pro corona, or orator 
 Hunt, or a spouter at a Pitt-club, or an old 
 wife over a glass of the crater and a pipe of 
 tobacco. 
 
 But now I was dumb, not because unable to 
 speak, but because I was afraid of speaking in a 
 passion to a man, who, I well knew, whatsoever 
 reports might circulate and whether true or 
 false, was not in the least to be blamed for them. 
 Beside I was afraid of felling him. If he could
 
 ANTIPODES. 59 
 
 have seen me, be would have wondered what 
 upon earth could be the matter with me. I 
 danced about and bit my lips, fingers, fist and 
 arm, as if I had felt a cat-o'-nine tails about my 
 back, and had bitten at a bullet to keep me from 
 feeling. 1 kept silence so long however, that he 
 began to turn round, which he did rather slowly 
 and pompously not having the best supporters, 
 to see if I had not abruptly left him to talk to 
 himself, which I very easily might have done, as 
 we were walking on the grass, and my footsteps 
 were to him no doubt inaudible. When I saw 
 him veering about, of course 1 laid a snaffle on 
 the mouth of my passion, and drew up as quietly 
 and steadily as possible, and certainly much to 
 my own admiration. I also found a tongue 
 which I had lost so long. . 
 
 " And who," said I, rather fiercely as if he had 
 been telling a lie, which made his eyes larger 
 than I had ever seen them before, " and who is 
 this beautiful accomplished lady, accustomed to 
 the most respectable sphere of life, who is going 
 to marry, forsooth, heaven save the mark, the 
 Rev. Mr. de Witt? The epithets you have
 
 60 ANTIPODES. 
 
 applied to her ladyship, half a hundred of them 
 at least, must be ironical or meant to soften the 
 caricature. You have been studying Dean Swift's 
 Art of Sinking." 
 
 " Who ? what ! did you never hear of Miss 
 Jane Seymour, a beautiful, accomplished young 
 lady ? Has she not been most respectably 
 brought up ? Are you a Swallowbeck man and 
 have never seen her ?" 
 
 " Would I never had seen her," said I to my- 
 self, but no matter, it cannot be true : he is one 
 of the many whom the report has reached : it is 
 odd though that he should believe it. 
 
 " Is she really going to be the bride of Mr. de 
 Witt?" 
 
 "Oh, there is no doubt about that: it is certain 
 on unquestionable evidence," 
 
 It is natural for a lawyer to talk about un- 
 questionable evidence, but nevertheless I began 
 to be afraid to ask what that evidence was. 
 
 " What unquestionable evidence is there, if I 
 may be allowed to ask ?" 
 
 " Evidence ! bless your life, there is no reason 
 to doubt it. It is in every body's mouth. (So,
 
 ANTIPODES. 6 1 
 
 thought I, has many a He been.) The portion 
 and wedding-day have been fixed and all arrange- 
 ments made and settled." 
 
 " You talk, Mr. Scratch, of portions being 
 fixed and everything arranged and settled, as if 
 you had had something to do with it. Will you 
 think it impertinent in me to ask, have you been 
 the solicitor employed on the occasion ? Mind 
 you, I am not so impudent as to inquire into 
 the amount of fortune, for with that I have 
 no concern." 
 
 Having run through this sentence of a mile in 
 length, as it appeared to me, with great trepida- 
 tion and a palpitating heart, which made me 
 speak as if I had been out of breath, I positively 
 held my breath for a reply. 
 
 " No, I have not been employed, but I know 
 that some one has been, and that the report is 
 correct. Miss Screech, a near neighbour of 
 mine, who is intimately acquainted with the 
 family, was told so by Mrs. Seymour herself 
 and that an early day was fixed." 
 
 Though it was still all hearsay and I had my
 
 62 ANTIPODES. 
 
 doubts, if not certainty, as to its falsehood, I think 
 my state, mental and physical as well, was what 
 it would have been had it been true. I trembled 
 all over, could not keep the path, could not draw 
 my handkerchief out of my pocket, which I at- 
 tempted to do, though I knew not what for : my 
 hands were as paralyzed as in the relaxation of 
 sleep or benumbed with cold. It was well he 
 was before me and possessed not eyes behind 
 as well as before. He was too old to have the 
 Argus-eyes of a lover, so that my confusion con- 
 founded wholly escaped his notice. I had only 
 power to say with the faintness of an expiring 
 whisper, 
 
 " Did you hear Miss Screech say so ?" 
 
 " 1 did," was his answer. 
 
 He now began to talk about learning and the 
 universities, and what he considered their ad- 
 vantages and defects. He had read much of 
 Newton's works and knew, I have little doubt, 
 as much about the Principia as about the law. 
 Quotations from Shakespeare too interlarded 
 and garnished his common conversation. A deal
 
 ANTIPODES 63 
 
 of things no doubt he said, but, as I am alive 
 this moment, it was only a word here and there 
 which penetrated so far into my ear as to reach 
 the cerebrum and print on it an idea. Isolated 
 words struck on my mind, but not a single half 
 member of a sentence. I could not hear or 
 listen. I was a thousand miles off, carried into 
 the third heaven, where I saw verily things v/hich 
 I cannot utter. He roused me, however, by a 
 question : though my soul was in the clouds, I 
 could recall it. 
 
 " Do you not think a mathematical edu- 
 cation much preferable to a merely classical 
 one ?" 
 
 " Yes," said I, or at least I think I said so. 
 
 *' Many think mathematics the best logic, and 
 I am decidedly of their opinion. They strengthen 
 the mind and give it imperceptibly a habit of 
 arguing. They bring it up, indeed to ratiocination, 
 to which it requires to be nurtured and drilled as 
 to anything else. Every demonstration in Euclid 
 is a lesson in the art of reasoning. Don't you 
 think so, Mr. Rechab? Eh! Don't you think so?" 
 
 " Yes."
 
 64 ANTIPODES. 
 
 " That is the reason I prefer Cambridge to 
 Oxford : they study the mathematics there to 
 such perfection. What competition there is too 
 amongst them ! What an honour it is to be a 
 wrangler ! A first wrang'.er deserves to have 
 his name written in gold : he is greater than the 
 king on his throne. You have no honours at 
 Oxford, Mr. Rechab ?" 
 
 " No." 
 
 This answer I made as mechanically, as a tyro 
 in logic argues at Oxford after the Aristotelian 
 system by A. B. C. I had not at the moment 
 sense to see what he was driving at. He knew 
 that I had gone to Oxford with great expecta- 
 tions, and had returned as bare of honour as his 
 old coat was of nap, and he was determined to 
 gall me a little about it. I had triumphed over 
 his son at school, and now he was resolved to 
 triumph over me, that is, to trample upon one 
 already fallen. 
 
 " It is a pity they have no distinctions at Ox- 
 ford, so famous an university as it is, because 
 honour is so irresistible a stimulus to exertion. 
 The young men would labour a thousand times
 
 ANTIPODES. 65 
 
 more assiduously, did they work for glory. Are 
 not you of my opinion, Mr. Rechab ? Eh ? Don't 
 you think so, Mr. Rechab ?" 
 
 " Yes, exactly so." 
 
 " I wonder they never thought of instituting 
 some honourable classification, for the purpose 
 of exciting competition and exertion. Did you 
 never hear of such a thing ? Did no one ever 
 propose it ?" 
 
 " No." 
 
 " You are quite sure then there are no honours 
 to be obtained in Oxford for the best scholar- 
 ship ? The best scholar and the poorest are 
 alike ? Eh ?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 I was at this time and for some time had been 
 wrapt up in my own thoughts, as the reader 
 will easily perceive, and my simple yes and no 
 were replies to questions which I really did not 
 understand, merely because I did not attend to 
 them. My ear heard, but my mind did not 
 receive : they had through the ear knocked at 
 the door, but the understanding was not at 
 home. But this monosyllabic mode of answer-
 
 66 ANTIPODES. 
 
 ing, the old malignant limb understood as pro- 
 ceeding from my shame and confusion of face, 
 because I had not obtained any honours myself, 
 and thought that I was endeavouring to elude 
 the disgrace by falsely asserting the non-existence 
 of such honour and consequently the impos- 
 sibility of obtaining a non-entity. My mind was 
 therefore now recalled from its vagaries by the 
 great awkward hobbling figure before me coming 
 to a dead stop at my last yes, and commencing 
 a slow revolution on his two ugly pivots. I knew 
 no more than the man in the moon what he was 
 turning for, for I had known neither his queries 
 nor my own answers. 
 
 " And so there are no honours at Oxford ? no- 
 thing like what they call classes, first and second 
 and under the line ?" 
 
 " To be sure there are." 
 
 " I thought you said there were none." 
 
 " No such thing, I could not : it was im- 
 possible. I never did." 
 
 " The devil you did not : you or I must be 
 dreaming. My ears told me that you denied it 
 more than once."
 
 ANTIPODES. 67 
 
 " Then I can merely say that your ears have 
 told you an untruth, and I do not envy you the 
 possession of them." 
 
 " 1 will take my oath of it and swear the 
 truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. 
 I said — you are quite sure there are no honours 
 to be obtained in Oxford ? and your answer was, 
 yes." 
 
 " There is no doubt by yes, I meant there 
 were honours instituted there. I never could 
 think of denying what is so well and universally 
 known." 
 
 He eyed me with a very intelligent elevation 
 of his eyelids and a sardonic, insulting con- 
 formation of mouth, 
 
 " And pray, Mr. Rechab, if I may make bold 
 to ask the question — " 
 
 " There is no boldness about it, Mr. Scratch, 
 nor needs there all this palaver and humbug about 
 what you know just as well as I do. I took no 
 honours." 
 
 " Upon my word, Mr. Rechab, it was not my 
 intention to offend you. I am sorry to find that 
 I have unfortunately, and, I do assure you, quite
 
 68 ANTIPODES. 
 
 unintentionally, happened to probe an apparently 
 very painful sore. Believe me, I am very sorry 
 for it. And so you did not think it worth your 
 while to take an honour : it is no proof of 
 scholarship perhaps : the best scholars perhaps 
 refuse it as infra dig." 
 
 If he had taken my heart into the ball of his 
 hand, and grasped it with his fingers and thumb 
 and wrung it until another drop of blood could 
 not have been expressed, the pain could not 
 have equalled the mortification which every 
 word of his infused like a deadly poison into my 
 soul. The honour he spoke of had been my 
 very existence, the air on which I breathed, the 
 life-blood which kept my heart in motion, and 
 now I heard myself for the first time taunted for 
 having aspired to what the event proved to have 
 been beyond my reach. What could I do or 
 sav ? I could not conceal the chag-rin which he 
 inflicted. Though I had no glass to behold my 
 face in, I knew my eye was dim, my face colour- 
 less. But offending is defending : to save your 
 own life, shoot your antagonist. I cast in his 
 teeth several slippery, dishonourable tricks in h
 
 ANTIPODES. 69 
 
 legal career which had formerly come to my 
 knowledge, and concluded with the following 
 morceau of Billingsgate rhetoric : 
 
 " Has your son Gehazi left Swallowbeck, or 
 does he still continue here a disgrace to the town, 
 his father and the profession ? But he is now in 
 London, is he not? where, if he escape the 
 gallows, he may rob and blackguard, and never be 
 heard of. It was high time for him to leave 
 here, for, though not transported by law, he is so 
 by public execration. I congratulate you upon 
 your hopeful son. If you expect him to obtain 
 distinction, except such as he has among profli- 
 gates and rogues, you have faith to remove 
 mountains. Good day, Mr. Scratch, good day, 
 Sir. I shall be glad to hear of Gehazi being on 
 the woolsack : coslum mat." 
 
 Here fortunately we reached the place where 
 the foot-paths diverged to our separate homes, 
 and he, I believe, as well as I, was much obhged 
 to the road for having the kindness and polite- 
 ness to put an end to an harangue, which in 
 Greece and Rome they called a philippic, in 
 Yorkshire they call blackguardism. But who
 
 70 ANTIPODES. 
 
 can describe, what tongue tell, what heart con- 
 ceive, the mood in which I now wended my way 
 home ? Misfortunes tread on one another's 
 heels, are very sociable, bu'ds of a feather which 
 flock together, but birds of prey. His bad news 
 was misfortune enough, he needed not have 
 coupled with it jibes and jeers. The old sinner, 
 however, stated the case for the prosecution and 
 I replied. It is remarkable that, though my 
 mind was thus harrassed by disappointment in 
 love and ambition and by the insults above, so 
 far it never for moment a occurred to me to seek 
 relief in a glass and a pipe.
 
 ANTIPODES. 7 1 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 The taunts and insults were an ill wind which 
 had blown me this good, that for a considerable 
 time they took off the edge of that uneasiness 
 which the bad tidings respecting Jane had in- 
 flicted. I returned home in an indescribable 
 quandary, irritated, dejected, in high spirits from 
 provocation, in low through fear and something 
 like disappointed love. I unbosomed myself to 
 one who was no Job's comforter, my brother. 
 He instantly burst forth into a torrent of abuse 
 against the veracity of Miss Screech, rated her as 
 such a notorious from house to house gossip, tale-
 
 72 ANTIPODES. 
 
 bearer, backbiter, gadding Dinah, exaggerator, 
 inventress, and so forth, that verily I would not 
 have given a sou for her evidence, if she had 
 kissed the Bible until it had been as covered 
 with saliva as if prepared for the digestion of a 
 boa-constrictor. I therefore felt again relieved 
 of a most intolerable incubus, and directed my 
 thoughts into a more useful channel. Intending 
 myself for the church, I commenced in good 
 earnest a proper course of theological studies, and 
 furbished up again a deal of knowledge which I 
 had for some time suffered to lie undisturbed 
 and gradually to dissolve into the mist of 
 oblivion. 
 
 It was determined also by myself and whole 
 family, that I should immediately pay my respects 
 to the vicar and ask him for assistance. Having, 
 contrary to the expectations of aU, agreeably to 
 some, and to the no small regret of others, so com- 
 pletely failed at Oxford, I was almost ashamed 
 to show my face out of doors. But it was neces- 
 sary for my face to be bronzed, so without any 
 further demur I repaired to the vicarage. My
 
 ANTIPODES. 73 
 
 admission was instantaneous, I believe that I 
 was expected, for Mr. Scrapling was exceed- 
 ingly cordial and kind ; and knowing, it appears, 
 how long I had been at home, expressed his 
 surprise and regret that I had not called sooner. 
 The truth was, as I learned afterwards, his 
 curate was expected to leave soon and he was 
 on the look out for a successor, a labourer, 
 worthy or unworthy, who should never receive 
 his hire. I told him immediately that I was 
 inquiring for a title, and should be much 
 obHged to him for his assistance. 
 
 " Do you know, Mr. Rechab, that curacies 
 are exceedingly difficult to be obtained. It is 
 such an honourable profession, you know, that 
 every one of respectable family is rushing into 
 it, without any regard ; I feai', Mr. Rechab, I 
 say, without any regard, I very much fear, to 
 the divine call. It is an awful thing, Mr. 
 Rechab, really it is a most awful thing. I am 
 shocked to think that so many should take this 
 honour to themselves without being called." 
 
 Here the reverend spiritual friend, the pastor 
 of the parish, appeared to suffer insupportable 
 
 VOL. I. E
 
 74 ANTIPODES. 
 
 distress. I almost thought he was about to 
 shed tears, and he shook his knee by the 
 spring of his foot with astonishing rapidity, 
 w^hich doubtless proceeded from his internal 
 emotion at the impiety in question. But he 
 ceased speaking, evidently I could perceive, 
 for some remark from me which might show 
 in what direction the , wind of my mind 
 blew. 
 
 " No doubt, it is very wrong if they do offer 
 themselves for orders without being called as 
 the Scriptures express it, but how is a man 
 to know that he is called ?" 
 
 "You speak like a very good and wise 
 young man, really like a very good Christian, 
 Mr. Rechab, and I am very glad, Mr. Rechab, 
 exceedingly glad to hear you express so much 
 wisdom, and I think your question, Mr. Rechab, 
 a very important, a vitally important inquiry. 
 It is dreadful to think, Mr. Rechab, most awful 
 indeed, that so many should wish to take orders 
 merely for the sake of a little temporal interest, 
 worldly pelf, Mr. Rechab, mere filthy lucre, 
 Mr. Rechab, which they cannot take with them,
 
 ANTIPODES. 75 
 
 you know, and must so soon, so very soon, 
 leave behind them." 
 
 " It is certainly very wrong to rush into the 
 profession merely for the sake of the emolu- 
 ments, to which it may lead ; but what do 
 you think the best proof that a man is properly 
 called ? Don't you think his having a suitable 
 education and his having been long inclined 
 and intended, the best proof of a spiritual call 
 to the ministry ? If not, what in your opinion 
 is the best and surest ?" 
 
 " The best, Mr. Rechab, the best criterion ; 
 but I will not say the best, the only, the sole 
 proof to be relied upon, is a desire for the 
 honour of being a minister of the blessed 
 Gospel. Let this honour be everything, the 
 only thing you covet. Have no regard for pelf, 
 Mr. Rechab, no regard whatever." 
 
 " Then you mean to say, that no man should 
 wish even so much as to live by the profession. 
 He should labour in the vineyard without hire." 
 
 " Most assuredly, Mr. Rechab, most as- 
 suredly, that is my opinion. Saint Paul main- 
 tained his right to live by the profession, but 
 
 E 2
 
 76 ANTIPODES. 
 
 he did not become an apostle for the sake of 
 living by it. No, he lived by his own hands, 
 and refused wages which he might have re- 
 ceived. He preached, laboured, did everything, 
 for the honour of being an ambassador for 
 Christ. And this is what every man who 
 wishes to be a minister, ought to do. Don't 
 you think so, Mr. Rechab ?" 
 
 I knew very well the drift of his discourse 
 and that he was wishing me to confess, that 
 a curate should refuse a stipend even when 
 offered it. I came, however, to beg his assist- 
 ance in obtaining a title, and therefore thinking 
 it imprudent to quarrel with him, I declined a 
 direct reply. 
 
 " I think it wrong, exceedingly wicked, to 
 seek ordination solely for what are called the 
 loaves and fishes, and in that opinion I perfectly 
 agree with you. You know, no doubt, Mr. 
 Scrapling, that I am looking out for a title. I 
 shall be obliged if you will have the goodness to 
 assist me." 
 
 " Most gladly, Mr. Rechab, most gladly. I 
 shall feel very great pleasure in furthering the
 
 ANTIPODES. 77 
 
 views of such a disinterested young man. 
 You covet the honour of the profession, and, 
 I am quite sure will be an honour to it, I 
 have just been reading the * Christian Remem- 
 brancer,' — the ' Christian Remembrancer ?' yes, 
 that I believe it was — and I saw the following 
 advertisement of a curacy which I think would 
 just suit you : ' Wanted immediately, a Curate 
 for the Parish Church of Littlecome, He 
 must be of evangelical principles. A title will 
 be given if required. N.B. The Living may 
 be sold and a title given to the purchaser. 
 Letters postpaid.' I have a friend, Mr. 
 Rechab, a very pious, godly young friend, who 
 is most anxious to make a purchase of this 
 kind for himself, and I shall be glad if, when 
 you apply for the curacy, you would have the 
 goodness to inquire the value and price of the 
 living." 
 
 I expressed my acknowledgements to Mr. 
 Scrapling as well as I knew how, and, though 
 fully sensible of his selfishness, I was exceed- 
 ingly grateful for his apparent kindness, ap- 
 parent it was, God knew, though I knew not
 
 78 - ANTIPODES. 
 
 then, and promised to do as he requested, and to 
 let him know the result the moment I received a 
 reply to my application, so anxious was I at that 
 time from the distress of my family and my 
 own previous disappointments to obtain some 
 situation, especially in the church, which might 
 remove me from Swallowbeck, where every 
 eye knew and marked me. I particularly 
 wished also to get away without an interview 
 with Mr, De Witt, not because I just now gave 
 credence to the report of his marriage, but 
 because, on account even of the report itself — 
 allowing it to be unfounded, I could not endure 
 the sight of him, and, as for conversing with 
 him, I did not think my tongue would be able to 
 articulate a syllable. The sight of him would be 
 as effectual a patch to my mouth as ever was laid 
 on any mouth by Burkite or ghost. 
 
 For this reason, when I paid my present 
 visit to Mr. Scrapling, I looked before me as 
 far as the turning of streets or other intervening 
 objects would permit, for the purpose of turn- 
 ing back or aside in order to avoid Mr. De 
 Witt or any other objectionable person. In-
 
 ANTIPODES. 79 
 
 deed ever since my return from Oxford, I had 
 on this account Hved so retired, unseen, to all 
 who called invisible, that my friends really 
 thought I was quickly growing into a misan- 
 thrope, a Zimmerman, or a Timon. God 
 knows, though naturally shy, I was always 
 sociable with those I knew, but shame, a mau- 
 vaise honte, at present, made me shroud my- 
 self as much as possible from public gaze. 
 
 After having expressed my thanks to Mr. 
 Scrapling with more warmth than politeness, 
 I was now just retiring and congratulating my- 
 self on having hitherto escaped a rencontre 
 with any obnoxious person, when a knock was 
 heard at the front door. I know not how it 
 happened that I took not the least notice 
 of it, and consequently without the least ex- 
 pectation of such a thing, in going out of the 
 drawing-room into the hall, whom should I 
 thrust my head against but the redoubted 
 Mr. De Witt himself. If you have ever read 
 Virgil or Homer, you will remember the speech- 
 less horror with which a man draws back his 
 steps, when he perceives that he is just treading
 
 80 ANTIPODES. 
 
 upon a large, fiery-eyed snake, in the grass. 
 As I am alive this moment, I know not whether 
 I stood on my head or my heels, was dead or 
 alive, nor do I now recollect, nor have I ever 
 been able to recollect, how I got out of the 
 house into the open air, whether I spoke to 
 the monster or did not, whether or not he 
 vouchsafed a salutation. 
 
 How strange is all this, considering that 
 he had been my preceptor in Greek and Latin, 
 and those liberal arts, to have learned which is 
 said to soften men's manners and suffer them 
 not to be brutal or barbarous. I was told long 
 afterwards, that after long ruminating, ponder- 
 ing, conjecturing, consulting, he could not, with 
 all his perspicacity, and that of those he con- 
 sulted, fathom the penetralia of the mystery. 
 Some, thinking it otherwise unacountable, ex- 
 pressed their opinion, but furtively, for the 
 truth should not always be spoken — that I had, 
 unfortunately, poor man, in consequence of 
 disappointment and grief, poured in spirits 
 which had effervesced and made me tumble or 
 stumble, I forget which.
 
 ANTIPODES. 8 1 
 
 I reached home, however, as light as a 
 feather, but whether I ran or walked, or flew or 
 went on my legs, or in some other way, is one 
 of those millions of events wrapped up in the 
 impenetrable mist of by-gone time. But it is 
 true I reached home, and when my head began 
 to grow clear, after the chaos produced in it by 
 my recent collision with the Rev. Mr. De Witt, 
 I began to think of my prospects. The adver- 
 tisement was in my mind a mathematical 
 demonstration, proof as strong as holy writ, 
 that the vicar was my friend. Had he favoured 
 me only with his promises, I should, as soon as 
 out of his sight, have blown them to the winds. 
 I knew that he could make promises faster a 
 deal than his cook could make pie-crusts, and 
 for the same purpose ; but facts, says a quack of 
 his astonishing cures, are stubborn things. 
 
 So ignorant was I of the ways of the world, 
 that I had no more doubt of getting this ad- 
 vertised curacy, than if my own father had 
 been the rector and had already written and 
 signed my nomination. I began to make all 
 necessary preparations, as if about to be or- 
 
 E 3
 
 82 ANTIPODES. 
 
 dained in the course of a month or six weeks. 
 I read over with all speed the routine books for 
 deacon's orders, got bands made, and wondered 
 whether I should not get a surplice, but after 
 strict inquiry was informed that it was furnished 
 by the parish. I copied out of the " Clerical 
 Almanack," which I bought as part of my pre- 
 paration, a si quis and testimonial to be ready 
 for signature, and read the church service aloud 
 to my brother, who extolled me to where some 
 one was in the body or out of it, he could not 
 tell which. I also copied sermons of every 
 description from the cold, frozen, pagan-ethical 
 of Blair, to the familiar, old-wife, warm twaddle 
 of Cooper. I was sure of the title as soon as 
 the letter should come from Dorsetshire, two 
 or three hundred miles off, for there I pre- 
 sumed, from the address of A. B. C, Post- 
 office, Stalbridge, that the beautiful curacy was 
 situated. 
 
 After the lapse of a week, I began to think 
 the reply of A. B. C. very dilatory ; but com- 
 forted myself with the idea suggested by my 
 brother, that the bishop's day for ordination
 
 ANTIPODES. 83 
 
 not being perhaps very near, he was not in an 
 very great haste to answer, precipitation in 
 that case being unnecessary. But at the end 
 of a fortnight, and then of three weeks, and 
 then of a month, I began to think, and really 
 it was a wonder, an eighth great one of the 
 world, I had never thought so before, that he 
 was already provided. At the expiration of six 
 weeks all hope from that quarter breathed its 
 last, and I in good earnest commenced in con- 
 sultation with my friends the excogitation of 
 some other plan. But first it was decided that 
 I should repeat my visit to the \'icar and tell 
 him plainly that I had now abandoned all ex- 
 pectations from that advertisement, and that I 
 should ask him if he knew of any vacancy 
 amongst his acquaiixtances. 
 
 " Oh, my dear Sir, never talk of it, never 
 mind it. Very probably they had met with a 
 curate prior to your application ; but it matters 
 not, it is of no consequence, no consequence 
 whatever, Mr. Rechab. I have another ad- 
 vertisement for you, from which I am sure you 
 will obtain a curacy."
 
 84 ANTIPODES. 
 
 Here he put into my hand one exactly 
 similar to the former. The address was Z. Y., 
 at some place near the Land's-End, at any rate 
 it was in Cornwall, and it stated that a title 
 would be given, but that, the living being small, 
 the stipend would not be very considerable : at 
 least it spoke to this effect, but I cannot call to 
 mind, nor is it material, the exact phraseology. 
 I accepted it with joy and thankfulness, and as 
 eagerly as a drowning man catches at a reed, 
 and returned home in nearly the same elevation 
 of spirits as on the former occasion. Hope was 
 relighted, and she shone again as long as the 
 fuel lasted, which w^as about a month, for she 
 expired sooner than before. I cannot, however, 
 withhold from the reader's notice a little of the 
 colloquy between us at this interview, not be- 
 cause it is intrinsically important, but because 
 it will more perfectly characterize the person, 
 
 " What do you think, Mr. Rechab ? I dare 
 say your virtuous mind could not guess, if I 
 were not to tell you. I received a letter from a 
 young gentleman this very morning, offering 
 me, Mr. Rechab, yes, offering me myself, a
 
 ANTIPODES. 85 
 
 hundred pounds, no less than a hundred pounds, 
 for a title to my stipendiary curacy, and, in 
 addition to the one hundred pounds, to serve 
 me five years gratuitously." 
 
 " And do you approve of offering money for 
 a title?" 
 
 " I told you, Mr. Rechab, before, I told you 
 most positively that I reprobated the impiety, 
 that I abhorred as damnable the simoniacal sin 
 of purchasing ordination." 
 
 ' ' But you have that letter to show of course, 
 Mr. Scrapling ?" 
 
 " Of course I have the letter, I have it in my 
 writing-desk somewhere ; but you know, Mr. 
 Rechab, I can never think, never entertain for a 
 moment the idea of exhibiting it. I would not, 
 oh ! no, no, no, I would not, Mr. Rechab, for 
 the credit of the profession, and also, though 
 that is not so much, and also for the sake of 
 his relations. He is a respectable, a most 
 highly respectable young gentleman, and of a 
 very respectable family, and no doubt will have 
 influence to obtain orders. I know very well, 
 Mr. Rechab, exceedingly well, I am quite sure.
 
 86 ANTIPODES. 
 
 that, if I were to do my duty, 1 should im- 
 mediately apprize the Bishop. Yes, I should 
 immediately forward his letter to the Bishop ; 
 but there is his family, Mr. Rechab, there is 
 his family, you know." 
 
 " But if you are unwilling to expose him, why 
 do you tell me ?" 
 
 " I tell you as a secret, but I do not tell you 
 his name. No, Mr. Rechab, I mention no 
 names." 
 
 This was very true, and I knew it before I 
 asked the question, but it was my indirect way 
 of asking the name ; however, it is true, his 
 scandal was anonymous, and doubtless there 
 was a reason. 
 
 " But what do you think, Mr. Scrapling, of 
 his offer to serve gratis? Do you think that 
 is right?" 
 
 " Curacies are very difficult to be obtained, 
 Mr. Rechab, exceedingly difficult, I never knew 
 them so difficult. I cannot think what must 
 become of the shoals of young men poured 
 forth every year by the universities, and in- 
 tended by their friends for the church."
 
 ANTIPODES. 87 
 
 " But what, I say, is your opinion of the 
 proposal to serve for nothing ? Is that correct, 
 think you ?" 
 
 " What a shocking thing, Mr. Rechab, what 
 a most shocking thing indeed to offer a 
 hundred pounds for a title ! But they are so 
 difficult to be obtained, are titles, that I do not 
 wonder, I am not at all surprised, Mr. Rechab, 
 that for the sake of one, people should do what 
 is so very wrong." 
 
 I thought it useless to repeat the question 
 again, for that it could not elicit a direct answer, 
 I therefore now rose to take my leave, which as 
 soon as he observed, he invited me to walk out 
 with him through the glebe behind the house. 
 It seems om* conversation had not been suffici- 
 ently extended to his liking, or been productive 
 of the desired result. To his proposal I could 
 not object, as the walk was in the direction of 
 my father's house. We therefore made our 
 exit from the drawing-room through a half-glass 
 door into a very handsome lawn and rich 
 pasture tastefully laid out and wooded, not 
 extensive, but exhibiting in its arrangements
 
 88 ANTIPODES. 
 
 the very elegant taste of his predecessor, who 
 was really a refined and most accomplished 
 scholar and still more devout Christian minis- 
 ter. 
 
 We were scarcely on the terrace when we 
 were joined by one of his children, an exceed- 
 ingly pretty daughter, apparently about six 
 years of age. Never did I see a face from 
 which, in imagination, you would be more in- 
 clined to borrow your idea of an angel of light. 
 Mr. Scrapling himself was an exceedingly fine- 
 looking man, but it was the mother who had 
 bequeathed to her child its celestial beauty. 
 Her hair unrestrained fell over her shoulders 
 in the greatest profusion, in richer exuberance 
 than I thought I had ever seen or noticed 
 before. It was of a light brown, so light as to 
 be perfectly white with a slight discolouration, 
 and the brightness, brilliancy of it bespoke 
 that it was the hair of a creature in the early 
 dawn of life. 
 
 " Well might Lucretia," said I, " call her 
 children her jewels," but of Lucretia, Mr. Scrap- 
 ling had never heard. " Well," said I, " might
 
 ANTIPODES. 89 
 
 our Saviour say, ' of such is the kingdom of 
 heaven.' " 
 
 It was for their innocence, however, that he 
 said so, whereas I was thinking of their personal 
 beauty. I praised his child, and he seemed not 
 quite insensible to the compliment, but if you 
 wish to set his attention broad-awake and to 
 bring every sense he has into the most violent, 
 thrilling, maddening play, speak of money and 
 of curatizing for nothing. The child ran to her 
 curmudgeon of a father with the vivacity, the 
 animation, the glee, which infantile blood alone 
 can give. As we walked through the grounds and 
 discoursed on weightier matters, she played 
 around him, and prattled and laughed at 
 nothing, and asked questions. At length, we 
 came to a summer-house, having in front a 
 verandah overgrown with woodbine and some 
 evergreens, where in my childhood I had often 
 been with the last good man, the preceding 
 vicar, now in heaven if ever man went thither. 
 It was here where he used sometimes during 
 summer to catechise the children of the parish. 
 Said I, 
 
 "Mr. Scrapling, this is a spot dear to me,
 
 90 ANTIPODES. 
 
 and, I believe, to almost every one of my age 
 who has spent his or her life in the parish. I 
 have answered many a question here to your 
 predecessor now in heaven. When I was about 
 the age of that fascinating child of your's, I 
 remember his asking me once in this very 
 place, ' why do you love God ?' I answered with 
 a loud voice and great rapidity, ' because he 
 loves me,' and he was so pleased that he 
 caught me round the neck and kissed me as if 
 I had been his own child. If Mr. St. John 
 were alive, how he would rejoice, Mr. Scrapling, 
 at my desire and intention to be a clergyman ! 
 I should not long want a title." 
 
 This I said, not by way of urging him to 
 assist me : it came naturally and spontaneously 
 from the heart in consequence of the association 
 which the locality produced. 
 
 " I warrant you, Mr. Rechab, 1 have no 
 doubt whatever, my dear Sir, that you will soon 
 succeed. You have a proper notion of the 
 dignity and honour of the profession. You 
 covet. Sir, you covet the honour, and have no 
 regard in the matter for filthy lucre-" 
 
 The sky was now very dark in some portion
 
 ANTIPODES. 91 
 
 of the heavens, and there was a most luminous 
 brightness in another. 
 
 We were under the dome of the alcove, the 
 foliage of which effectually protected us from 
 the large, solitary, rattling drops, which now 
 began to faU. They were few but large as 
 marbles. The black part of the heavens above 
 and behind, and indeed before us, with the 
 exception of two or three fissures in the dense 
 darkness through which the light behind burst 
 out, was so exceedingly pitchy, that it reminded 
 me of utter blindness. The thunder began to 
 mutter, as if there had been some heavy ar- 
 tillery playing at a great but stiU audible dis- 
 tance. The appearance of the heavens interrupted 
 for a minute or two the current of our discourse, 
 which was running just then very rapidly and 
 torrent-like, and also like a flood somewhat 
 muddy. The large drops, however, ceased, 
 and the luminous breaks in the ether seemed 
 to enlarge a little and to pour forth a broader 
 sheet of vivid Hght, though the blackness else- 
 where remained as deep, if not deeper by the 
 foil set by the bright portion. The child was
 
 92 ANTIPODES. 
 
 prattling and playing with the honeysuckle 
 flowers, when we resumed the thread of our 
 confabulation. 
 
 " Yes, Mr. Rechab, you are worthy the 
 ministerial office : you deserve, most richly 
 deserve to be a preacher of the ever blessed 
 Gospel. You are not for, Mr. Rechab, you 
 regard not, you despise the paltry hire, for 
 which the hireling and not the shepherd labours. 
 Always continue to do so. Always despise it. 
 Never work for the Lord for money." 
 
 The words were scarcely outside his lips, 
 when a clap of thunder burst over our heads 
 with a crash as if the whole vault of the heavens 
 above us had been by an omnipotent grasp 
 crushed together, and a flash of lightning 
 simultaneously as it seemed with the report, 
 wrapped the place where we stood as if in a 
 momentary blaze. The beautiful, innocent, 
 playful child was struck to the earth. I saw 
 her beautiful tresses woven by the graces singed 
 to her bare head which lay upon her father's 
 foot, with one eye rolled out of the socket and 
 lying upon her cheek, and the whole face
 
 ANTIPODES. 93 
 
 scorched and black and shrivelled. The de- 
 struction was the work of an instant — as quick 
 as lightning, the common-place comparison — 
 quick as creation. " Let there be light, and 
 there was light." 
 
 " Oh God, my child," exclaimed the un- 
 happy father, while I mechanically took to my 
 legs, but did not know for what. It was not 
 fear, it was not horror, though horror there was 
 and to spare. But when I had sped over some 
 fifty yards, I conceived in an instant an errand 
 for my flight, and for aught I know I may have 
 started on that errand, I ran for a surgeon. As 
 I ran with more haste than speed, as all do who 
 make too great haste, I could not refrain from 
 saying to myself, " Surely the thunder was 
 aimed at the guQty and hit the innocent. 
 Great God, whose way is in the deep, and path 
 in the great waters, what had that innocent, 
 lovely cherub done ? But it was too lovely to 
 be here, too sweet a flower not to be soon trans- 
 planted to Paradise." 
 
 A surgeon of undoubted abilities sped on the 
 wings of love and hope, but the soul had
 
 94 ANTIPODES. 
 
 quitted its frail tenement of clay, lately so 
 beautiful ; but now, such as it is no one could 
 recognize, and was already with its myriads of 
 sisters in the bosom of Abraham. I will not 
 attempt to describe the distress at the ^dcarage, 
 nor did I wait long to be a witness of it. My 
 presence was useless, and I never was clever at 
 administering balm to the incurable wounds of 
 an afflicted mind. After seeing then the in- 
 sufficiency of all earthly aid, I repaired to my 
 own home. 
 
 There I took up my pen to write an applica- 
 tion for the curacy, about which I had the 
 advertisement in my pocket. As some com- 
 pensation for the disadvantage of being per- 
 sonally unknow^n to the parties, I gave a great 
 number of references for character, conduct, and 
 religious opinions : the vicar, the Rev. Mr. 
 Lineage, the Rev. Mr. De Witt, John Recorder, 
 Esq., Christopher Jackson, Esq., and a long list 
 of others, who being unknown to the reader 
 need not be named. I also as before built 
 castles in the air, and entertained no doubt that 
 my application, this at any rate, with so long a
 
 ANTIPODES. 95 
 
 beadroll of most respectable referees, would be 
 successful : so inexhaustible is the fountain of 
 hope. 
 
 But the well of hope was dry again at the 
 expiration of a month, and I now despaired of 
 ever receiving anything but expectations, food 
 for hope but none for the body, from the 
 worthy vicar of Swallowbeck, that most dis- 
 interested prelate, who would work in the vine- 
 yard for the honour and despise the denarius a 
 day. But what was to be done now ? should 
 I sit down in despair ? God forbid, so long as 
 there was a head to scheme and foot to trot. 
 Necessity is the mother of invention, so says the 
 true proverb. When Alexander could not un- 
 tie the gordian knot, he cut it with his sword. 
 But what next ? What says necessity ? " Apply 
 to the tutors of your college," said my father ; 
 " they must know what you are fit for, and must 
 often hear of curacies and scholastic appoint- 
 ments." 
 
 His words would have been gospel, an in- 
 fallible oracle, had I gone to any other college ; 
 but as it was, thev were a romance or novel,
 
 96 ANTIPODES. 
 
 every fact of which has been spawned and 
 hatched in the poet's imagination while his eye 
 has been rolling in fine frenzy. The Rev. Mr. 
 Hireton, however, I began to reflect, had done 
 me an injury for which it would be difficult for 
 him, had he the desire, to make me full repa- 
 ration, and I also began to think and cogitate, 
 and infer and syllogize, and conclude, that he 
 might have some very salutary compunctious 
 visitings and be willing to strike a bargain with 
 his conscience, that if it would only be quiet 
 and let him alone without obliging him to dis- 
 gorge the fee and make restitution, he would 
 help me to a curacy or some other situation. I 
 therefore wrote to him, and also at the same 
 time to his brother tutor, a little black-faced 
 twaddling old wife, who rejoiced in the clack of 
 his own clapper, and would speak you fair while 
 he did you an injury. I never received an 
 answer from Mr. Hireton ; some years after, 
 I was informed that he was at that time non 
 compos. The other wrote to say, that he knew 
 of no situation scholastic or in the church, and 
 that he should always be most happy to hear of
 
 ANTIPODES. 97 
 
 my welfare, prosperity, and happiness through 
 life, which he begged me to believe that he most 
 devoutly wished. Said I to myself on the re- 
 ceipt of this most uncharitable epistle, " if ever 
 it should please God to lay a dispensation on 
 me to preach the Gospel, my first text shall be : 
 ' If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of 
 daily food, and one of you say unto them, 
 depart in peace, be you warmed and filled ; 
 notwithstanding ye give them not those things 
 which are necessary to the body ; what doth it 
 profit ?' " 
 
 VOL T. F
 
 98 ANTIPODES. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 About this time an old neighbour and 
 acquaintance of my father's called at our house, 
 who was an everlasting snufF-taker. His finger 
 and thumb were scarcely ever out of the box, 
 his pocket-handkerchief was for ever vibrating 
 between his pocket and nose like the pendulum 
 of a clock, that is, as regularly and invariably, 
 with this advantage over the time-piece, that 
 the pocket-handkerchief was a never ceasing 
 pendulum, a sort of perpetual motion, for he 
 took snuff and wiped his olfactory member even 
 in bed, and some said while asleep as well as 
 throughout the day, whereas a clock requires 
 to be wound up.
 
 ANTIPODES. 99 
 
 The snuff he so largely partook of was called 
 Prince's mixture. I thought it incredible that any 
 man could or would contract such a servile and m- 
 vincible liking for this apparent gratification ; but 
 man learns and liv^es, or lives and learns. He 
 offered me a pinch : it v^'as politeness, the civility, 
 the etiquette of a fine gentleman. He presents 
 his box to you with a grace ; there is a gentle- 
 manly way of holding the box while your friend 
 introduces the requisite members, and of giving 
 him the box with a genteel nonchalance while 
 you look another way. How much of the 
 gentleman is displayed in the extraction of the 
 handkerchief ! in folding it afresh after expurga- 
 tion ! in shaking the recipient member while 
 you introduce, that is, make to ascend the titil- 
 ating mixture ! 
 
 He offered me a pinch, and, for the first time 
 in my life I took one. I had always held the 
 practice in abhorrence, and therefore should 
 have remembered, and indeed I did, the pithy 
 advice, obsta principiis ; but I had heard some 
 one say that it was a most powerful exhilarator, 
 cheering as a glass without the causticity of 
 
 F 2
 
 100 ANTIPODES. 
 
 spirits. God knows my spirits were at this 
 time down at zero, and anything which could 
 raise them, though artificial and unnatural, was 
 not to be rejected with scorn. I took a pinch of 
 Prince's mixture, and heartily commended its 
 soothing, sedative, comforting efficacy. I went 
 immediately and made a purchase, for I had 
 already passed the Rubicon, a purchase of an 
 ounce of Prince's mixture and a box to be its 
 receptacle. Perhaps never man in the whole 
 world became a determined, regular, persevering 
 snuff-taker so instantly. Juvenal says nemo 
 repente fuit turpissimus, but there are excep- 
 tions to all general rules. Nemo is not true : 
 it is an universal proposition in contingent 
 matter, which is never true ; so a logician 
 would say. But though I turned snuff-taker, 
 you may say, all at once, yet I was not a con- 
 firmed one all at once : in process of time I 
 could and did take it oftener and in greater 
 quantities. No doubt I improved, but I doubt 
 whether I ever had my digitals oftener in the 
 receptacle than on the day I commenced. Be- 
 hold me then much out of the house with a
 
 ANTIPODES. 101 
 
 snufF-box in my pocket and a yellow hundker- 
 chief as a suitable appendage. 
 
 The snuif was, I grant, a stimulant, and 
 fought most bravely against my mental depres- 
 sion, for depressed I was at the gloomy pros- 
 pect before me of inextricable difficulties in 
 which I found myself enveloped. 1 was so 
 completely hemmed in, so perfect and endless 
 were the mazes of the labyrinth in which I was 
 placed, that despair began to take full posses- 
 sion and occupation of my soul. Like Daedalus, 
 I had made the labyrinth for myself, for I might 
 have done better at Oxford if I had exercised 
 sufficient ingenuity and spirit. Why did 1 
 suffer that malignant Hartley to acquire such 
 an ascendency over me ? Why did I not take a 
 brush and dust Mr. Hireton's face ? But 
 though, like Daedalus, I had made the labyrinth 
 myself and for myself, I began to think it 
 utterly impossible to thread my way, or in any 
 manner get out of it, unless 1 could, like that 
 ingenious artist, make myself a pair of wings 
 and take my flight into the air. 
 
 One day during one of these melancholy
 
 1 02 ANTIPODES. 
 
 moods of ennui and despair, I determined to 
 stroll out into the fields, where solitude, I 
 thought, might assist my thoughts in their 
 efforts to discover what ought to he done. 
 Again I wandered near the residence of Jane, 
 or rather within sight of it, though not in the 
 direction described in a preceding chapter. I 
 came to the brook which wound its way along 
 the valley, and sat down on a knoll w^hence I 
 had a full view of a picturesque farm-house. 
 The house of Jane's father was not now visible. 
 This beautiful house stood about half a mile from 
 the brook, on the side of the hill which towered 
 veiy high above it. A field of wheat lay beyond 
 it and now wore a very rich and golden ap- 
 pearance. Higher up and to the eminence 
 as far as the eye could follow, was a dense wood 
 of beeches, firs, and royal oaks of old England, 
 all stately, sublime, majestic in stature, and 
 venerable in age. The oaks spread their broad, 
 expansive, ample arms, as if indicative of their 
 protective power over the land when created 
 into the wooden walls of old England. 
 
 The back ground of the finest oaks, the
 
 ANTIPODES, 103 
 
 strength and glory of the British empire, and 
 the gifts of Ceres undulating in the breeze 
 would have made any house a pretty picture; 
 but, independently of these ornaments, the 
 house itself would have made a beautiful sketch 
 of a rural abode, from that irregularity in its 
 construction and relative arrangements which 
 is the soul of the picturesque. It consisted of 
 two wings very unequal in dimensions and dis- 
 similar in style, and from the centre projected a 
 respectable structure of Gothic architecture with, 
 though the edifice was old and in some places 
 dilapidated, dripstones resting upon grotesque 
 heads. To one side of this central part was 
 attached a porch so large as to be very dispro- 
 portioned to the general size of the dwelhng, 
 having a doorway with a pointed arch, a loop- 
 hole above, and on the pediment what appeared 
 to be and really was — a small sun dial. 
 
 Woodland House, as it was called, was sur- 
 rounded with trees of very large dimensions, 
 though not so thick but that the general structure 
 of the whole could be discerned. The blue 
 smoke curling so beautifully above the trees
 
 1 04 ANTIPODES. 
 
 might have suggested the well known song. Be- 
 hind there wereafarm and other agricultural huild- 
 ings, forming altogether a farmery on a very large 
 scale. The house, woods, and land for miles 
 round were the property of Jane's fither. Half 
 a mile below the house wandered the brook, on 
 whose margin I was now strolling and rumina- 
 ting, as I had done thousands of times before 
 when " a schoolboy wandering in the wood to 
 pluck the primrose gay." I knew every path, 
 nook and turn about the premises. 
 
 A mile beyond the house, a wooden bridge 
 led to a road meant for carts and carriages of 
 any description, though seldom disturbed in its 
 silence and solitude by any such hea^7, noisy 
 vehicles. The road went through the wood 
 behind the house and the fields beyond it, and 
 round by the front again to the brook. It was 
 neither more nor less than what thev call an 
 occupation road. On this I purposed to go in 
 my solitary ramble, the seclusion according at 
 the period with my melancholy mood. But 
 about a quarter of a mile on this side of the 
 bridge I met with a young female of dark but
 
 ANTIPODES. 1 05 
 
 uncommonly handsome complexion and features, 
 leading by the hand an old blind fiddler. He 
 carried his violin under his arm, but, as they 
 approached me, he began to tune it and prepare 
 to play, judging from my appearance as I 
 suppose the female did, that I might be fiddled 
 out of a few pence. While he supported with 
 the instrument, she burst forth into the following 
 ballad, with a voice and expression which I 
 could not but think belied the poverty of her 
 outward appearance. 
 
 " Oh, who can bear the sting that cleaves, 
 Close ever to the heart .'' 
 The sting that love, so fickle, leaves 
 Within the vital part. 
 
 " And oh, thou young and handsome, love 
 Has fed thee long with hope : 
 That hope lies shivered, now then rove 
 A melancholy mope. ^ 
 
 " Deep as thy grief is, deeper still. 
 Far deeper thou shalt see. 
 Venus has stung, but Bacchus vpill 
 A fiercer viper be. 
 
 F 3
 
 1 06 ANTIPODES. 
 
 '* Thy name, now white as hly fair, 
 A nameless name will be ; 
 An enemy will strip thee bare, 
 Then, then I'll come to thee. 
 
 " Then, then the gipsy girl, though poor, 
 A houseless, helpless child. 
 Will be a faithful friend and sure. 
 When thou shalt be reviled. 
 
 " But thou wilt turn to paths of peace. 
 Abhor the god of wine, 
 And Heaven will give a richer fleece. 
 And thou wilt not repine. 
 
 " Thy lady-love, now lost, deplored, 
 Dead as may seem her love. 
 In person as in heart restored. 
 Shall be thy pairing dove. 
 
 " Oh ! when thou art thyself once more. 
 And brighter days shalt see. 
 And when thy cup of bliss runs o'er. 
 Think of the blind and me." 
 
 These gipsies pretend to be fortune-tellers. 
 Was this an impromptu ? There was some- 
 thing so melancholy and prophetically mysterious 
 in this little air, that I ardently wished I had
 
 ANTIPODES. 107 
 
 bestowed my chanty without being thus me- 
 lodiously invited. Low as were my spirits, they 
 were sunk by it lower and lower still, until my 
 snuff-box I found in absolute request to save 
 me from the deepest horrors of despair. I could 
 not but think her song a part of her own history, 
 that it had been composed to the tune of her 
 own sorrows, and that it soon might be the 
 song of mine. I put a shilling into the old 
 man's hand, for which they both seemed exceed- 
 ingly grateful, and soon after I entered the 
 wood. 
 
 " Black melancholy sits, and round her throws, 
 A death-like silence, and a dread repose : 
 Her gloomy presence saddens every scene, 
 Shades every flow'r, and darkens every green, 
 Deepens the murmurs of the falling floods. 
 And hreathes a browner horror o'er the woods." 
 
 These lines occurred to my recollection as 
 peculiarly applicable to my then condition and 
 state of mind, as 1 stole slowly and, save from 
 the brawling brooks, silently and alone up the 
 solitary road, which was overshadowed and
 
 108 ANTIPODES. 
 
 sometimes very dark, and so circuitous that it 
 was impossible to see any one approaching until 
 he was within distance for salutation. As I 
 struggled upw^ards towards the summit and had 
 nearly gained it, I reflected without any assignable 
 cause on the folly of making oneself miserable, 
 whether external circumstances justified such 
 WTetchedness or not. What an inexhaustible 
 mine of unhappiness is a man's own imagina- 
 tion ! Let fortune confer her choicest gifts ever 
 so lavishly, yet can the alchemy of imagination 
 transmute them into the very elixir of woe and 
 sadness. 
 
 " O happiness, our being's end and aim. 
 Good, pleasure, ease, content, whate'er thy name. 
 That something still, which prompts th' eternal sigh, 
 For which we bear to live, or dare to die ; 
 Which still so near us, yet beyond us lies, 
 O'erlook'd, seen double, by the fool and wise." 
 
 " Who shall tell," said I to myself, " wherein 
 it consists ? What is its essence ? It dwells 
 in the bosom of the poor, the poorest, the blind, 
 the halt, the maimed, the Lazarus full of sores,
 
 ANTIPODES. 109 
 
 and often flees with abhorrence the table of 
 Dives. I will be happy, happy in despite of 
 the world, its frowns, its glozing lies. I will 
 this moment and henceforth for ever cast 
 wretchedness from me as a filthy rag, a worn- 
 out garment. I will clothe myself in the glorious 
 garment of hope, resignation, content- 
 ment." 
 
 And now as I emerged from under the 
 sombre canopy of the trees into the open sun- 
 shine, I felt as if I had got rid of the night- 
 mare, as if an insupportable burden had been 
 lifted off my soul and had left me more light 
 and cheerful. I inhaled the breeze of the hills 
 which came perfumed with the fragrance of 
 summer's bouquet, and could not refrain from 
 clasping my hands, casting m.y eyes to heaven, 
 and exclaiming audibly, " Blessed be God, I am 
 happy !" 
 
 And who should stand before me or rather 
 be just passing, but my own, my all, my Jane, 
 my first and last, and the Rev. Mr. De Witt, 
 her reputed suitor ! " If facts can speak," thought 
 I, " and can be rehed upon, this walking together 
 solus cum sold should proclaim, with a voice as
 
 1 1 ANTIPODES. 
 
 j|Dud and true as Jehovah's from Mount Sinai, 
 that he is her accepted lover, (God forgive 
 me for the horrible blasphemy) ; her suitor 
 and in a fair way of conducting her to the 
 altar at no distant period. Probably, reader, 
 you will think, that they were a basilisk to my 
 eyes, that they blasted my eyesight, my precious 
 sight worth worlds of worlds, my heart, my 
 soul, that I was dead. Bless your life, no such 
 thing. I was never more cool in my life. I 
 might have been in a cold bath. Might have been 
 at the North pole, embalmed in an iceberg to 
 to be kept free fi'om taint or corruption thirty 
 thousand years. 
 
 What a wonderful thing is the heart of man! 
 A reed may break it, when the sight of hell 
 could not disturb it. Oh God ! I am indeed 
 fearfully and wonderftilly made, the Bible is 
 true, the word of God. We both made a 
 pause full in each other's face. I never was 
 more myself. There was no palpitation, no tre- 
 pidation, no sigh, no inarticulate, imperfect 
 expression. I stood as firm as a rock, as the 
 everlasting hills which can never be moved, at 
 least without the fulcrum of Archimedes. I
 
 ANTIPODES. 1 1 1 
 
 was not fierce, I was not calm. My mind did 
 not play the truant and run. No, my soul, the 
 whole and every part of it was collected into one 
 solid, immoveable Macedonian phalanx. 
 
 This thorough immobility of muscle did not, 
 however, continue long, though, during the 
 interview, it suffered no serious throw from its 
 centre of gravity- I observed that she was pale, 
 and that her pallor was the effect of mental 
 more than of corporeal sickness. She was 
 not happy, that was certain. Considering 
 how I loved her, can it be wondered at if I was 
 sorry ? if the sight of her wan face, shrunk, but 
 in sickness beautiful and fascinating, ruffled the 
 smooth mirror-hke surface of my soul? No; 
 there was a ripple. We exchanged compliments 
 about health, weather, the season, nothing, any- 
 thing ; but there was a melancholy, heart- 
 broken expression in that mirror of the heart, 
 pale as it was, which told me more plainly than 
 language ever told, or ever will even in heaven, 
 that she was unhappy, that 1 was the cause ; 
 that I could relieve her, and that she expected 
 it from me. All this, I say, was legible in her
 
 112 ANTIPODES. 
 
 countenance, especially when she looked back as 
 we parted. 
 
 I have ever since regretted, I almost think 
 without the interruption of an hour, at least 
 during my waking moments, that I did not 
 return with them, prolong our conversation, and 
 thus make a sort of voyage of discovery. I 
 might probably have learned her mind, a piece 
 of learning which would have saved me a world 
 of grief, a life of much sin, and, need I add, 
 sorrow. We parted, however, on my part very 
 cavalierly. Oh ! that stubbornness of heart, 
 that unbending, unyielding temper, which holds 
 reason cheap and plays the fool. I proceeded 
 home at a quicker pace and made no detour 
 for the purpose of lengthening a walk which 
 had already been long enough. 
 
 My brother still stoutly maintained the utter 
 impossibihty of believing, that she w^ould con- 
 sent, or her friends wish her to become the 
 wife of Mr. De Witt. There was such a pro- 
 digious disparity in everything as must forbid 
 the banns. Again, I could not but acquiesce 
 in the justice of what he said. Reason was on
 
 ANTIPODES. 113 
 
 his side at all events. So soon, therefore, after 
 parting with them, I thought their union as 
 unHkely as that of a mantiger with a beautiful 
 lady. Again then I was consoled and composed, 
 and I now directed my thoughts to the means 
 of obtaining a situation. 
 
 It was determined that I should advertise 
 in some one or more of the newspapers. I did 
 so thrice in a Liverpool paper, and the same 
 number of times in one published at York. 
 Each was a failure : no application was made. 
 The expense was two guineas, not to mention 
 that of postage. The money went, never of 
 course found its way back, and brought no 
 employment. How was it ever Hkely ? If a 
 curacy was anywhere at liberty or promising to 
 be so within half-a-dozen years, the incumbent's 
 house was besieged by personal applicants, 
 numbers known and ready to pray with the 
 lips, and hammer over a copied sermon a 
 twelvemonth gratis. How then could an ad- 
 vertisement succeed ? And yet a curacy has 
 b een obtained in that way. Well, the whole was 
 to me a mystery, and I thought the best mail
 
 1 1 4 ANTIPODES. 
 
 a man in my situation could put on was 
 patience. 
 
 " Something," said I, " will turn up by and 
 bye. When things are at the worst they begin 
 to mend. It is surprising what a run of bad 
 luck you may have at cards one evening, and 
 what an excellent one the next. The world is 
 a lottery : almost everything a man undertakes 
 is a speculation. His business in the course of 
 a twelvemonth may place him in independence 
 and affluence, or in the gazette. Everything 
 apparently is a venture at sea. Though I hold 
 gambling in abhorrence, and should hate the 
 sight of money I had so won as if I had stolen 
 it, I vet think it might be defended to a mathe- 
 matical demonstration, on the score of its being 
 no more a spec than most men's trades and 
 professions," 
 
 Thus I said and spoke at the time, placing 
 the providence of God out of the question. 
 Disappointment and distress often cause a man 
 to express sentiments, which, in his dispas- 
 sionate moments he is far from entertaining.
 
 ANTIPODES. 115 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 My most excellent and amiable brother fell 
 sick on the evening of the day I met Jane. 
 His complaint v»^as the cholera, not Asiatic, that 
 desolating and all-devouring pestilence, for it 
 had not yet paid this island a visit and frightened 
 it from its propriety, but what is commonly called 
 the English. We called in a surgeon without 
 delay, and yet, he said, a half hour's delay would 
 certainly have been fatal, so near was the 
 monster gorging his prey. An inflammation was 
 every moment apprehended, and the Esculapius 
 we consulted made frequent inquiries with a view 
 to ascertain if such had taken place.
 
 116 ANTIPODES. 
 
 I had always loved my brother with as ardent 
 an aifection as one brother ever felt for another, 
 and I had every reason to do so. If I had not 
 loved him, I must have been a monster, a 
 lusus naturae, a tithe of a rational creature, not 
 the man of sound and perfect understanding 
 capable of appreciating the virtue, the amiable- 
 ness, the excellence of such a brother. He was 
 too good for this world, a conviction of which 
 very much increased my anxiety and fear for 
 him while he was ill. I never went to bed ; 
 what would have been the use of it ? But 
 towards morning he became much better, and 
 strong hopes of his recovery were inspired and 
 entertained. 
 
 I recovered my spirits, and though nature had 
 not received her requisite and wonted refreshment 
 during the night, seemed to myself in the morn- 
 ing to possess a more than every day share. The 
 reason was, perhaps, that the excitement of the 
 night being something unusual had compelled 
 my mind to abandon for a time the objects 
 about which it had employed itself, and to busy 
 itself about something of more urgent import-
 
 ANTIPODES. 117 
 
 ance. Be this as it may, I felt unusually 
 hilarious, and, now that my brother was out of 
 danger, though far from well, I laughed and 
 talked in my pleasantest mood, just as when I 
 had not felt the stroke of disappointment and 
 the vista of life was pictured by hope as nothing 
 but delightful. 
 
 With this vivacity and glee I was conversing 
 with my brother about some bagatelle which 
 has since slipped my memory, when about 
 half-past eight o'clock the bells of the parish 
 church commenced a merry peal. " Who," 
 said I, " has been noozed this morning ?" For 
 a marriage I presumed it was, that so early set 
 the bells a ringing. It is singular that, even 
 through association of ideas, had fear not 
 brought it to my recollection, the nuptials of 
 my old pedagogue would not at this moment 
 have crossed my mind ; but neither by associa- 
 tion nor fear nor any other circumstance did I 
 for an instant think of that dreadful event. I 
 went to the window, and, as I stood there, 
 continued speaking to my brother, who made 
 no reply.
 
 118 ANTIPODES. 
 
 After speaking a considerable time and having 
 the conversation wholly to myself, and listening 
 to the exhilarating peal of the bells, for I had 
 always admired the tone of our parish bells, I 
 went to my brother with some apprehension 
 that his silence proceeded from a return of his 
 complaint. No sooner did I fix my eyes upon 
 his face, than the idea like lightning flashed 
 into my mind, for whom this matrimonial peal 
 so early saluted the valley of Swaiiowbeck, and 
 was so cheerily responded to by echo in her 
 retreats. He had suspected the truth the 
 moment the bells saluted his ears, but was 
 afraid to give me alarm which might afterwards 
 turn out unfounded. His look, however, 
 betrayed his opinion, and the instant it caught 
 my eye, the truth flashed on my mind as in- 
 stantaneously as it had on his at the sound of 
 the bells. The peal had been the telegraph to 
 him, and his countenance forwarded the in- 
 telligence to me. 
 
 " Is that Mr. De Witt's marriage ?" said I, 
 the moment I saw him, as if my tongue had 
 been the spokesman to his mind.
 
 ANTIPODES. j 1 9 
 
 He was evidently afraid to v^enture an answer 
 and speak what he thought, and he merely 
 observed, " Oh, no, it does not follow : the 
 bells ring often enough in a large populous 
 parish Hke this." 
 
 He affected to disregard it and made one or 
 two irrelevant observations, but as I looked 
 wistfully out of the window, appearing to take 
 no notice, I observed him steal out of the room 
 as if casually and on no particular errand. I 
 knew the object of his movement : he was 
 gone to make inquiry. I listened at the room- 
 door and heard him send the servant to ask 
 what the bells were ringing for. She soon 
 returned in breathless haste, 
 
 " For Mr. De Witt's marrige, the crnzy 
 schoolmaster." 
 
 " To whom is he married ?" 
 
 " To the beautiful Miss Jane Seymour, Sir. 
 Who would have thought it, Sir ? He is so 
 ugly and old, and cracked besides, I am sure 
 she w^anted a husband badly. 1 would not have 
 had him myself." 
 
 Thus the girl was running on, when my ears
 
 120 ANTIPODES. 
 
 were beyond the reach of her voice. I had 
 taken up my hat in the lobby, and gone out at 
 the front door. I walked with that rapidity, 
 which I had before considered a conclusive de- 
 monstration of Mr. De Witt's insanity, and 
 certainly found it a relief to the maddening 
 turbulence of my mind. I do not wonder at 
 madmen walking so fast, so long and so in- 
 cessantly, as would kill Others from sheer exer- 
 tion. I walked at that rate for months, 
 occasionally for years, and, if I was not mad, 
 I shall always think that this violent exertion 
 and exercise of the body prevented the deposition 
 or destruction of my reason. I bent my way as 
 usual down the valley : it was retired and had 
 been my haunt and the scene of my celestial 
 reveries, ever since the accursed god, for the 
 heathens deified the passion, first kindled the 
 flame which has ever since devoured me. 
 
 I had not paced over a quarter of a mile from 
 home, before I overtook on the banks of the 
 brook, a labourer whom I had long known and 
 been accustomed to exchange a word with. It 
 is strange that though there was no room for
 
 ANTIPODES. 121 
 
 doubt, I could not but observe a doubt spring 
 up in my mind, that after all the report might 
 be only one of the many thousand lies of fame : 
 said I, 
 
 " James, what are they ringing for so merrily 
 and so soon?" 
 
 " For the schoolmaster's wedding. Sir." 
 " Are you sure of that, James ?" 
 " Oh yes, your honour, I seed them myself. 
 The schoolmaster held his head up as if he had 
 been going to fall on his back, and she held 
 her's as much t'other way. There was a 
 scramble, your honour, and I got a sixpence, 
 and had like to have gotten half-a-crown." 
 
 And he was going on, what more he would 
 have said I know not ; he was not a messenger 
 of glad tidings. I passed him, left him behind 
 me with the strides of a maniac, of Mr. De Witt 
 himself. " Too well, too well, thou tellest a tale 
 so iU." 
 
 I plunged into the m.ost secluded haunts of 
 
 the vale and the w^oods, to escape from myself, 
 
 my mind, my soul, my thoughts, for that 
 
 seemed my object or what I strove at, though I 
 
 VOL. I. G
 
 122 ANTIPODES. 
 
 never formed any such purpose ; but ever and 
 anon in some dell or through some avenue 
 of the woods, echo telegraphed to my ears the 
 merry peal of the espoused, shall I say the 
 blessed ? and it rang through my brains, and 
 even, when out of echo's reach or way, still was 
 there the swinging in my brain. Alas ! those 
 church-going bells, how often had I listened to 
 and admired them on a Sunday, when they 
 invited me to God's house ! but now they rang, 
 not an invitation, or call, or summons to church, 
 but a knell to my peace, and made even the 
 worship of God no longer a pleasure. I could 
 not bear to see the altar before which she 
 had knelt. 
 
 Oh, God, did she kneel to plight her troth 
 there in the name of the triune God ? Myste- 
 rious vow : but she made it, or did she only 
 feign or equivocate in some way I knew not, 
 like some I have heard of who to avoid perjury 
 and get off with a bare lie have kissed their 
 thumb instead of the Book ? No, I could not 
 bear to see the communion-rails again : I should 
 lose my sight ; my eyes could never perform
 
 ANTIPODES. 123 
 
 their office again : reminiscence itself almost 
 blasts them. 
 
 " But Heaven hath a hand in these events. 
 To whose high will we bound our calm contents." 
 
 Should do so no doubt, but do we ? Did I 
 then ? Anything but that. The spirit within 
 me lashed me to exertion, and there was no 
 David's harp to soothe and compose me. As 
 I descended the hill again for the hundredth 
 time that day, I exclaimed, " Oh ! I could weep 
 my spirit from mine eyes." But spirit it must 
 have been : no gross, material liquid, such as 
 some fools have gathered and saved in lacryma- 
 tories, descended from my eyes and traced its 
 course along my cheek. No, I could shed no 
 tears. In all my grief, broken-hearted, super- 
 mortal, for the loss of Jane, I never could shed 
 a tear. It was a grief too sacred, too refined, 
 too ethereal, to vent itself in ordinary lacry^ma- 
 tion, and if tears I did shed, they must have 
 been of a spiritual essence, such as angels, if 
 ever they weep, shed in heaven. 
 
 1 traversed the fields, the places I had so 
 
 G 2
 
 124 ANTIPODES. 
 
 often paced in my reveries on her, over and 
 over again on this day, and was surprised, con- 
 sidering the length of time and rapidity I thus 
 exercised my body, that I should feel no lassitude, 
 much less be obliged to take some rest. I re- 
 paired again and again to the road through the 
 wood where I had seen them the day before, 
 and lingered by the spot as if waiting for their 
 reappearance, and as if I could have seen their 
 spirits and conversed with them and told them 
 freely my mind. And to their spirits supposed 
 present, though invisible, I did address myself 
 in all the vehemence of passion, enthusiasm, 
 raving madness, in curses loud and deep, until 
 for a moment recollecting myself, I was shocked 
 at my desperate impiety and folly. I execrated 
 my folly for not having embraced the oppor- 
 tunity which that interview presented. I 
 might have learned the truth and prevented the 
 catastrophe, and my folly in that instance I 
 have always condemned and always shall. 
 
 Then again a momentary consolation flitted 
 athwart my mind, " he is old, he may soon die," 
 but it was only momentary ; reason, the little
 
 ANTIPODES. 125 
 
 left, common sense if I had a bit, replied in the 
 words of Young, " all men tbink aU men mortal 
 but themselves." I can think of his death, but 
 not of my own, I may die before him. Though 
 old for her, he is not an old man. But never- 
 theless, I endeavoured with all my might, with 
 reason or against her, to console and reanimate 
 my almost extinct heart with this reflection and 
 glimmering of a wicked hope. 
 
 I endeavoured also still to cherish the belief 
 and really did entertain it, that they were not 
 married. It is a most extraordinary thing, but 
 never did this belief all this time wholly leave 
 me. Notwithstanding the strongest possible 
 evidence, leaving not the smallest twig to hang 
 a doubt upon, this belief stiU hovered about my 
 heart, and kept the warmth of it from being 
 completely extinguished. 
 
 Thus then deriving comfort, I began to return 
 home, and it was indeed high time. I had 
 been rambling or rather galloping up and down 
 the fields and the woods ever since morning, 
 the fatal half-past eight o'clock, and the shades 
 of evening began now to curtain the face of
 
 126 ANTIPODES. 
 
 nature. The woods grew darker and more 
 dismal, the flowers closed their petals for their 
 nocturnal slumber, and homeward the weary 
 labourer plodded his way, and was leaving the 
 world to darkness and to me. I therefore made 
 the best of my way home, and met by the way 
 more than one emissary from my friends, who 
 had been despatched to look for me and bring 
 me back. I found my father, mother, and 
 brother in great distress, the two latter especially, 
 because they knew more of my unfortunate at- 
 tachment, though not more, for they had not 
 been as close and lynx-eyed observers of my 
 temper.
 
 ANTIPODES. 127 
 
 CHAPTER TX. 
 
 They were, as they expressed themselves, 
 very much concerned at my appearance. I had 
 taken no food all day, and when invited to eat 
 was then first reminded that such had been the 
 case. I was as haggard in countenance as if I 
 had been ill for days, my eye wandered between 
 cognizance of its object and mental abstraction, 
 as if it could not fix directly upon its object, and 
 I was so unsettled that I could not sit still but 
 found relief in perpetual variation of posture. 
 
 But I now began to be surprisingly more 
 composed : the hurricane for the present had 
 blown over and been followed by a considerable
 
 1 28 ANTIPODES. 
 
 though not perfect calm. There was still a 
 slight ripple on the waters, lately so troubled 
 and rolling mountains high. I hoped, I believed 
 they were not married, I had been mistaken, 
 misinformed, the thing was impossible ; yet was 
 1 afraid to make inquiry, which might again call 
 forth the hurricane that was passed. I did 
 my utmost to be calm, composed, quiet, com- 
 fortable in myself, to myself, and to others ; but 
 was like a child which has been most severely 
 beaten, and, long after the punishment is over, 
 and notwithstanding caresses and endearments 
 and endeavours to soothe and make it forget, 
 sobs and heaves convulsively. Thus it was with 
 me. 
 
 The best of relatives did all that affection 
 could suggest to tranquillise and comfort me, and 
 for their sake I did my utmost in co-operation 
 with their efforts. I succeeded more than a few 
 hours before could have been thought possible. 
 But I could not eat, at least just then, it was 
 impossible, my throat was so contracted that 
 my gorge rose at the thought of food. I was 
 obliged to tell them a falsehood, and say that I
 
 ANTIPODES. 129 
 
 had obtained refreshment, and I begged them 
 for a short time at least to allow me a respite 
 fi'om their importunities. My father retired to 
 repose, and, so far as sickness would permit, 
 found in sleep that steeping of the senses in 
 forgetfulness, that sweet, refreshing oblivion of 
 grief and care and anxiety, which innocence, 
 virtue, piety like his alone can give. 
 
 " I have heard old Hannah Glead say," my 
 mother remarked, " that nothing so much 
 soothed and comforted her as a pipe of tobacco, 
 and that, whatever were her griefs, she could 
 blow them all away in the smoke of her pipe. 
 If T were you, my dear, I would learn to smoke. 
 You can give it over, as soon as you are com- 
 fortable, and your uneasiness is gone." 
 
 At their persuasion I would have consented 
 to anything, no matter what or how much mv 
 abhorre.nce. T was like a schoolboy who has 
 been beaten into a thorough submission, who 
 descends from his altitudes and is humble 
 enough to lick the dust. 
 
 " Yes," said I, " I will smoke, do any- 
 thing."
 
 130 ANTIPODES. 
 
 I did not like the idea of its well known 
 eiFects on the teeth, of which I had a most 
 beautiful set ; as to its effects on the complexion, 
 constitution and general health and strength, I 
 was then a novice. They immediately set them- 
 selves to work to procure a pipe and some 
 tobacco. Would that they had liked them as 
 Httle or hated them as much as King James 
 did, when he wrote his " Counterblast." They 
 disappeared for a short time, and again left me 
 to my greatest enemy, myself and my own re- 
 flections. 
 
 My mother returned with the poisonous 
 plant. Little did she know the mischief she 
 was preparing ; that she was unconsciously 
 acting the part of an ancient sorceress, gather- 
 ing herbs by the light of the moon for the 
 destruction of a step-child, or an old useless 
 husband. We could not foresee the conse- 
 quences. That evening on which they tendered 
 to me, poor ignorant creatures, the noxious 
 murderous weed, I shall always regard as one of 
 those unfortunate nights, which I could wish 
 obliterated from the calendar of time. " Let the
 
 ANTIPODES 131 
 
 day perish," said Job, " wherein I was born." Let 
 the evening perish, say I, on which I smoked 
 the first pipe. 
 
 It was undoubtedly one principal cause of my 
 subsequent life of intemperance. I do not say 
 that I and the jolly god should certainly have 
 never shaken hands and become boon com- 
 panions. My misfortune, some small portion 
 of which I have already detailed, might, inde- 
 pendently of every other thing or person, have 
 introduced me to the society of Bacchus. Nor, 
 in saying so, is it my wish or intention to 
 palliate or defend my future career by the mis- 
 fortunes which were my trials or temptations, 
 against which man came into the world on 
 purpose to wage war and fight to the death. 
 But numbers have maintained and will, that 
 man is in a great measure the creature of cir- 
 cumstances. It is easy, they say, for some 
 Pharisaical, methodistical saint to cry out, " I 
 thank thee, O God, that I am not as other men 
 are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers," when the 
 truth is, extortion, injustice, or dishonesty in 
 any shape never was the vice to which by con-
 
 1 32 ANTIPODES. 
 
 stitution, education, or opportunity he was ever 
 tempted. 
 
 If one gudgeon has been caught with a bait, 
 let not another, which never had a bait offered 
 it, glory over it and call it a fool. Man is, they 
 maintain, so universally and all but without fail 
 what circumstances make him, exactly and 
 nothing else, that in ninety-nine instances out 
 of every hundred, some say without a sol'tary 
 exception, he but enacts the part which consti- 
 tution or fortune, or both, the managers of this 
 great theatre, puts into his hands to peiform, 
 verifying to the letter the truism of our peerless 
 dramatist, " All the world's a stage, and all the 
 men and women only players ; they have their 
 entrances, and one man in his time plays many 
 parts, his acts being seven ages." 
 
 I repeat, it was an event in my life much to 
 be lamented, when I had the pipe and tobacco 
 laid before me. It led to drunkenness, or, if 
 it did not lead to it, yet by its fraternal affection 
 for it and constant association with it, it made 
 that vice, when its yoke w^as fairly put on, ten 
 thousand times more difficult to be shaken off.
 
 ANTIPODES. 133 
 
 When a man is a drunkard and a smoker too, 
 and too often they are twin brothers, born toge- 
 ther and bred together, it is in my opinion, and 
 I think myself a judge, having been an experi- 
 mentalist for some years, next to an impos- 
 sibility to cease to be the former unless you first 
 cease to be the latter. Take my word for it, a 
 smoking drunkard must pioneer the way to 
 sobriety by a most determined, persevering ab- 
 juration of the pipe and its negative gratification. 
 I speak from experience. I could never have 
 abandoned intemperance, if I had not first re- 
 nounced smoking. 
 
 But, unless great care and precaution be 
 used, it also leads to drunkenness. You cannot 
 smoke much, which a sedentary man especially 
 in process of time is sure to do, without 
 wishing to drink something. The dryness in the 
 mouth and throat demand some gargle, and the 
 liquid causes you to smoke more and with greater 
 pleasure. You may drink water, but few will 
 do that v.'ho can afford to drink something better 
 
 The event of this evening was a great mis- 
 fortune, but the call for it was so urgent, that I
 
 134 ANTIPODES. 
 
 know not if some would not call it the less of 
 two evils. So tremendous was the effect of 
 recent events and of the last above all, that I am 
 not sure the loss of reason, called in a verdict 
 temporary insanity, would not have been the 
 consequence, or whether, when on the brink of 
 mental aberration, I should not have sought a 
 termination to my sea of troubles in a voluntary 
 deposition of life. And no doubt there is, 
 that I did think suicide the less of two evils, had 
 there not been an hereafter. But said I to 
 myself, 
 
 "To be or not to be ? That's the question. 
 Whether 'tis nobler in the mind, to suffer 
 The stings and arrows of outrageous fortune. 
 Or to take arms against a sea of troubles 
 And by opposing, end them ?" 
 
 And as a proof that my reason was not so 
 warped, that her eyes were not so twisted awry, 
 did not so squint, as to be unable to look 
 straight forward, and that she could form a 
 correct judgment, I mention it as a creditable 
 circumstance to myself, that she came to the
 
 ANTIPODES. 135 
 
 conclusion it was better for the mind to suffer, 
 until a natural and unavoidable paralysis of her 
 powers should plunge her in a Lethe of all care 
 and sorrows. 
 
 But whether it was a misfortune or some- 
 thing to be commended, I smoked a pipe that 
 evening. Mind it was a pipe, not a cigar, the 
 usual appendage to every monkey's mouth in 
 the streets, the quintessence of a macaroni. 
 No, it was a pipe of very respectable longitude, 
 becoming the dignity of a sage and venerable 
 graybeard, and the tobacco was none of your 
 feeble material. I filled my pipe as full as it 
 could hold, and puffed away as if I had been at 
 it ever since I was two feet high, and numbers 
 of boys no higher may be seen in these 
 degenerate days enjoying the reveries which 
 nothing but a pipe can awaken. 
 
 I had not rolled the beautifully curling and 
 odoriferous vapour out of my mouth above two 
 minutes, before I thought it the most effectual 
 and delightful murderer of care, that it ever 
 entered into the heart of man to invent or 
 devise, I was in heaven, in a trance, in an
 
 136 ANTIPODES. 
 
 ecstacy, in a vision of glory, Said I to myself, 
 " I will smoke to all eternity. What care I for 
 teeth ? What is beauty to me, or what has it 
 done for me? Man wants happiness, every 
 man seeks for it, and I have found it. I will 
 never be miserable again." I smiled and said, " I 
 was comfortable." My poor mother and brother 
 were happy too, my smiles found a reflection in 
 their countenances. My happiness was their's. 
 And I smoked forwards and cared for nothing 
 and for nobody. " Yes," said I, " I will always 
 be a smoker. The pipe shall be my companion 
 in my solitary hours, and I will never again be 
 visible to Jane or her odious family. With 
 this delightful associate, this solace under all, 
 sorrow, this panacea for all affliction, I will 
 immure myself in my room, I will never be seen 
 until 1 can obtain some post far, far from hence. 
 Yes, I will smoke for ever." 
 
 And the pipe fell from my hand and my mouth, 
 and lay upon the carpet, its head severed from the 
 trunk, and they hastened to take up the burning 
 head, the little paltry stinking furnace, lest it 
 should turn incendiary and fire the house. My
 
 ANTIPODES. 137 
 
 face was blanched as linen hung out to the sun for 
 a summer, my eye became a dull, lacklustre, 
 albuginous ball, and my head, like a poppy 
 struck by a switch on the neck but not de- 
 capitated, drooped on my shoulders as if too 
 heavy for my power to support it. I began too, 
 to fall from the chair, and there was no small 
 alarm and trepidation and running to and fro 
 and sprinkling of water on my sallow face, 
 accompanied by female shrieks. 
 
 I was sick, and verily so sick, so painfully 
 sick, as I had never experienced before. I 
 have heard of sea-sickness producing a wish 
 that the ship would sink. I never was sea- 
 sick, but I have been tobacco-sick, and had I 
 my choice this moment, I should prefer sea- 
 sickness as much the less of two evils. 
 
 I was blind, tobacco drunk ; everything went 
 round with the rapidity of a tornado. A draught 
 of water or rather half-a-dozen made a little 
 improvement, and restored my faculty of arti- 
 culation. 
 
 " My dear, you smoked too much for a
 
 138 ANTIPODES. 
 
 beginner. You should have been more 
 moderate. You know, it takes some time to 
 make a smoker. You should have taken a 
 whiff only now and then, and have given over 
 when you felt the sickness coming on." 
 
 I was conscious how ridiculous I looked, and, 
 as I became a little better, I observed my 
 brother turn his face and go behind me to con- 
 ceal a laugh. Before the sickness the sensation was 
 celestial to be sure ; it lifted my soul to heaven 
 and was a most effectual antidote to the grief for 
 which I took it, nor do I think that its efficacy as 
 an antidote was less during and for some time 
 after the sickness. For the sickness as completely 
 withdrew my mind, not by coaxing or enticing 
 but by main force, from the subjects of my 
 grief and disappointments, as the reveries divine 
 inspired by the smoke. 
 
 The best physician probably you can call in 
 for the cure of sorrow, is sorrow of some other 
 description. Grief cures grief, pain cures pain, 
 as humours are drawn from one part of the body 
 to another by revulsion. Sore eyes have been
 
 ANTIPODES. 139 
 
 healed by an issue in the arm. I recovered, how- 
 ever, if I remember right, in the course of an hour. 
 They were desirous of repose, and not without 
 reason: it was late and they had had as anxious 
 a day almost as myself. I would have smoked 
 again, but shame forbade the very mention of 
 it, and I therefore retired to bed with as much 
 appearance of resignation and composure as 
 possible — to bed ! but was it to repose, to rest, 
 to sleep, to nature's soft nurse ? Oh, no.
 
 140 ANTIPODES. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 I UNDRESSED and got into bed. The room 
 door was shut, and I inclosed, and determined 
 to do so, myself and my sorrows within that 
 apartment, so that they should be my own, my 
 exclusive sorrows, unknown to others, unseen, 
 unheard, unshared. I did not scorn sympathy, 
 but I was extremely averse to impart my 
 sorrows, like communicating an infectious 
 disease to those whom I loved and could not 
 bear to see pained. I therefore kept myself 
 close, but soon could not refrain from rising and 
 walking across the floor, and did really at one
 
 ANTIPODES. 141 
 
 time make a resolution never again to the las 
 moment of my life to lay my body in a bed and 
 between sheets and blankets, but to repose for 
 the residue of my days on the floor or in a chair. 
 And that resolution I should doubtless have 
 carried into execution, how long God knows, 
 had I been independent of my parents and had 
 I possessed a house of my own. 
 
 And is that beautiful lady, w^hom I have 
 loved until love had made me insensible to the 
 fact that she was not mine but w^as to be ; 
 whom I had garnered up in my heart with the 
 selfishness of a miser whose hoard is his life, 
 his soul, his heaven, his God, and who could for 
 me have turned the pains of dissolution into the 
 beatitudes of heaven, is that image of an angel, 
 if not an angel embodied and let down from 
 Paradise by a chain of seraphim's weaving, a 
 chain of gold, such gold as grows in heaven, 
 such gold as heaven is paved with, love, love, 
 love, is that I cannot describe as anything but 
 my, my only love, my first, my last, in the 
 arms, the embrace of the devil's own creation in 
 mockery of Adam ! Is it so ? Have I lived
 
 142 ANTIPODES. 
 
 to see the day, the night, the damning 
 night ? 
 
 But I live, I must live ; the everlasting will 
 not let me die, nor yet will he let me live. For 
 is this life ? Then what are the pains of death ? 
 " Let the day perish wherein I was born, and the 
 night wherein it was said there is a man-child 
 conceived ; because it shut not up my mother's 
 womb nor hid sorrow from mine eyes." Would 
 there were in this world and in reality such a 
 river Lethe as the ancients feigned or fancied in 
 their infernal regions. Surely, when the imagina- 
 tion entered their heads, thev must have suffered 
 as I do. But what am I to think of Jane ? Is 
 it come to this ? Could she really abjure her 
 first love, her love felt, sworn, plighted to me, 
 not at an altar of men's erection it is true, but 
 at the altar within the vail, the holy of holies, 
 the shrine of a heart burning as pure and holy, 
 undefiled and undefilable, as the fire which 
 descended from heaven and for ever bui'ned for 
 the consumption of the Jewish sacrifices. Her 
 heart swore to mine, they kissed, they embraced, 
 they vowed to be for ever not two hearts but
 
 ANTIPODES. 143 
 
 one : that neither length nor breadth, nor 
 height nor depth, nor things present nor things 
 to come, nor death nor life, nor angels nor 
 principalities, nor heaven nor hell, should dis- 
 unite them. And yet within a twelvemonth — 
 twelvemonth, a year — let me see — for less, not 
 half that, and she is another's, the bride of one 
 too, to whom J was Hyperion to a satyr. Oh ! 
 let me not think of it. " Frailty, thy name is 
 woman." 
 
 Amid all this grief, which devoured, not a 
 part, the core, but the whole undivided total of 
 my soul, amid this ocean of sorrow, there was a 
 drop, it was but a drop, but a drop there 
 certainly was of solace : it was a hope that she 
 would repent, that her heart plucked so violently 
 from its proper place would rebound, and find- 
 ing no access to its former temple, would be as 
 miserable an outcast as my own. Yes, I did 
 hope that she would repent, be sorry, be wretched, 
 and this drop, this single drop of consolation in 
 the ocean of my sorrows, was like what w^ould 
 have been the drop of water from the tip of
 
 144 ANTIPODES. 
 
 Lazarus's finger on the tongue of Dives as he 
 was tormented in the awful flames. 
 
 Satiety, methought, would soon succeed to 
 the zest of first fruition, and, when the rage of 
 passion had subsided, she would be a cool 
 listener to reason and reflection. Pandora's 
 box had been emptied, but hope, though a little 
 one, was it not a little one ? remained behind 
 and illumined with a solitary ray the dark chaos 
 of my soul torn asunder by conflicting passions. 
 She could not love Mr. De Witt, she could not 
 but abhor him. I was, I had been, and having 
 been once could not be deposed, the sole 
 emperor of her heart. How then could she 
 give it to another ? She never had. Her hand, 
 her plight, her troth, or whatever else upon 
 earth they choose to call it, she had given, but 
 her heart — her heart — it was not hers to 
 give. 
 
 I lay with my head reclining on my hand 
 and my elbow on the pillow, how long I know 
 not, a century it might have been, without 
 thinking of or wooing sleep. So perfectly devoid
 
 ANTIPODES. 145 
 
 of all inclination for the oblivious repose did I 
 find my mind, my head, my eyelids, that I 
 thought I should never need that refreshment 
 again. I did not exclaim, " How have I 
 frightened thee, gentle sleep, that thou no more 
 wilt weigh my eyelids down." Those might do 
 that who desired and longed for sleep. I had 
 no wish for it. I completely forgot that it was 
 necessary, until Aurora began to cast, not her 
 shadow like coming events, but her light before 
 her, and reminded me that presently I must 
 rise and show myself below, whether I should 
 have slept or not, and without that cosmetic 
 what would be my complexion at the breakfast- 
 table. 
 
 I endeavoured therefore to banish thought. 
 I covered myself over as if to shut out the 
 biting frost and blasts of winter. I compressed 
 my lips to interdict all soliloquy, and endeavoured 
 to snore as if already submerged over head and 
 ears in Lethe. It was an agonizing effort to be 
 calm, the incarceration of the winds in the cave of 
 iEolus. I carried a thousand daggers in my 
 thoughts, indignation at Jane, and the malice of 
 
 VOL. I. H
 
 146 ANTIPODES. 
 
 a demon to her friends. How then could sleep 
 visit my eyelids, that gentle, peaceable nurse, 
 that delights in down and composure. Yet I 
 strove to be calm, I thought warmth would 
 produce a torpor, and that nature would sink 
 from sheer exhaustion, and then began to hope 
 for the greatest blessing merely sublunary God 
 or nature, I thought, could at that time bestow, 
 forgetfrilness of myself and of all, if it were only 
 for a very short period, a few moments. 
 
 But my brother, as I have related, had been 
 ill, exceedingly ill, and so far from being convales- 
 cent, he was now growing much worse. The 
 excitement of the day had no doubt been very 
 adverse to his recovery ; his complaint requiring 
 stillness of mind as well as of body. About 
 this time then, a few minutes before dawn, when 
 it was doubtful whether it was day or night, I 
 heard several very pitiable moans, as of one in 
 great anguish. I immediately rose, and, had it 
 not been for his pain, should have been glad of 
 the excuse. I found him writhing in great 
 agony : no position was endurable : he lay as on 
 some burning marl. I asked him if I could be
 
 ANTIPODES. 147 
 
 of service, but in such a subdued voice, that he 
 saw, though I loved him as brother should love 
 brother, my thoughts were far away. My mind 
 had left my lips to perform the office of speaking 
 by themselves, and when he requested me to 
 give him the medicine which lay beyond his 
 reach, my mind could just return as if merely to 
 do that and then it reverted to its more im- 
 portant and all-absorbing task. I gave him 
 the medicine, the labelled draught, and he be- 
 came easier, and wished, notwithstanding his 
 pain, to give me that consolation which he re- 
 quired himself I reminded him of the doctor's 
 advice, far more precious than his medicine, that 
 he should be as still as possible and not stir a 
 limb, not even his tongue ; and that even his 
 mind should be a stagnant pool. He was so 
 much better, that it was not necessary to alarm 
 the house. 
 
 I went to the window and looked out between 
 the curtains. The twilight seemed to be 
 diminished, but still it was a most lovely morn. 
 Soon after the sun rose in all his glory^, and 
 
 H 2
 
 148 ANTIPODES. 
 
 reminded me of the morning, the splendid, 
 brilliant morn, when I left Oxford for ever. 
 
 " Yes," said I, " where is honour, where is 
 is love, where is bliss and heaven below ?" Hope 
 had told me a very flattering tale. Imagination 
 floated me " for many summers in a sea of glory," 
 but farewell, a long farewell to all my greatness. 
 I must now hide my diminished head before the 
 superior splendour of a maniac. And she is 
 this moment in the bosom of that maniac, and 
 her lips meet his, and her breath mingles with 
 his, and she is happy, is she ? happy as none 
 are, save on the bridal night and with their 
 youthful love. Is it possible ? I thought she 
 had been mine, my own, my indefeasible right, 
 " but nothing can we call our own but death." 
 Of that only are we sure : we shall die, it is 
 appointed once, but else know we nothing in 
 this world. " How weary, stale, flat and unprofit- 
 able, seem to me all the uses of this world. 
 Fie on't, oh, fie !" 
 
 It now grew cloudy and exceedingly dark. 
 There was a red glaring light thrown against
 
 ANTIPODES. 149 
 
 the heavens in one direction, which I had often 
 gazed upon when retiring to bed, and as it lay 
 nearly In the direction of her father's house, I 
 could not behold it without the association of 
 her, her home and mv love for her. It was the 
 reflection in the atmosphere from the blaze of a 
 large foundry about two or three miles off. No 
 sooner did the darkness come on, than it and 
 all its associations confronted me, and I could 
 not refrain from saying to myself, 
 
 " I have often looked upon thee in a happier 
 mood, never did I think I should behold thee in 
 my present. For years hast thou flickered in 
 the heavens, ever since indeed my memory can 
 identify my being, and thou wilt thus illumine 
 the welkin years after I am unknown, a food to 
 worms." 
 
 And then again revenge lifted up my spirits 
 from the abyss of torture in which they had 
 sunk, and I thought of her friends, her avaricious 
 sire, her mother, her sisters, her brothers. They 
 thought, no doubt, much of this marriage : it 
 was what they would call a match. Their 
 daughter and sister had not at least con
 
 150 ANTIPODES. 
 
 taminated their blood, ignoble as it was, by 
 some impure mixture with a stream of unknown 
 source. No, he was a gentleman, and she would 
 never be less than a lady. Yet they had known 
 of our love and approved of it too. But I was 
 then a rising star, or at least supposed to be, a 
 brilliant meteor just appearing above the horizon, 
 and promising to shine more and more bright 
 and glorious until I reached my meridian. The 
 university was to invest me in the robe of 
 Rabelais. I was to return laden with honours 
 and beautiful with assurances of future prefer- 
 ments. 
 
 But " how are the mighty fallen," Darius 
 fallen, fallen, fallen from his high estate. I 
 was now indeed not the bright and morning 
 star, not a meteor arresting the attention and 
 stretching the expectations of many, but a 
 vapour which had appeared for a very short 
 time and then vanished away — an ignis fatuus, 
 a Will o' the wisp, a Peg with the lantern, which 
 had blazed for a moment and been extinguished 
 in a marsh. I was handsome before, they 
 thought me beautiful and extolled my person as
 
 ANTIPODES. i 5 1 
 
 too prepossessing for my sex, but now, when 
 fortune had turned her back upon me, I had 
 in their eyes neither comeliness nor form, and 
 as a match was anything but desirable. 
 
 Thus it is at present, but will it be so always, 
 will it be so long, will their felicity continue un- 
 impaired, without the loss of a single sweet, for 
 a twelvemonth ? No, it would not be earthly 
 bliss, if it would : such belongs only to heaven. 
 But there was one flaw to which their happiness 
 was liable, more than the general run of sub- 
 lunary bliss : before another year should be 
 gone, he might be raving mad. They might 
 see him raving, and hear him blasphem- 
 
 for a demon and vowing her destruction, or 
 vociferating avaunt to her as to some horrible 
 apparition. What would they not think of him 
 then ? And how would they not repent that 
 they had ever cut off the true course of love. . 
 
 How glad they would be, that they could do 
 what defies omnipotence, undo the gordian knot 
 of wedlock and tie her to me with all my faults
 
 152 ANTIPODES. 
 
 and failings on my head, obscure, unknown, or 
 where known, despised ! Yes, he might be mad 
 ten times in the year, mad and never have a 
 glimmering of reason more. And God knows 
 my heart, and I wish my reader to know it too, 
 I confess my sin and express my repentance, I 
 could not but desire it, pray for it, glory in the 
 anticipation of it, and derive comfort in the 
 midst of all my troubles from the belief that it 
 would be so. 
 
 Then thought I again, what will be the depth 
 of their repentance, if I should prosper, and 
 though now fallen, should rise to the glory with 
 which imagination had invested me ! How will 
 
 abode will be a place of weeping and wailing 
 and gnashing of teeth. I know their avarice, 
 and should fortune or rather I should say Pro- 
 vidence, once more lift up his countenance upon 
 me, their hearts will quiver with anguish as 
 mine does now. And what is there to prevent 
 me ? I am young : I will be industrious and 
 persevering. Nulla dies sine lined shall be
 
 ANTIPODES. 153 
 
 iny motto. I will mount the ladder, and, when 
 at the summit, feast my soul on their remorse 
 and too late repentance. 
 
 And I was really so elevated with this aerial 
 edification, that I could not contain myself, and 
 as if it had all been a reality, " my lungs began 
 to crow like chanticleer." My brother was 
 alarmed and inquired what was the matter. He 
 thought that this crowing had been the sound 
 of weeping, whereas it was in truth an imper- 
 fectly suppressed cachination. His voice, how- 
 ever, recalled to my recollection, that I was not 
 alone, a fact of which I appeared wholly un- 
 cognizant. Notwithstanding his danger and 
 mv affection for him, such at that time was mv 
 state of mind, that, had he died, I could not, I 
 do really believe, have shed a single tear for his 
 irreparable loss to me. I was in his bedroom 
 and did not know it. If every drop of ocean 
 had been a pang, and I had been placed in the 
 centre of the whole, if the ocean has a centre, I 
 could not have been more surrounded, oppressed, 
 overwhelmed with grief, and yet did imagination 
 
 H 3
 
 154 ANTIPODES. 
 
 SO place me through joy in the very heart of 
 heaven, that I could not refrain from laughing. 
 
 What an indescribable, incomprehensible 
 creature is man ! I could laugh in the very 
 heart of sorrow. He began to talk to me in 
 his usual consolatory style, seasoning his sensible 
 and really good advice with the precepts of 
 devotion. I affected to assent, to consent, to 
 acquiesce, to approve, when in reality my at- 
 tention was vacillating as quick as lightning 
 between his words and very different things. 
 He felt so much better, that he advised me to 
 leave him and retire to rest, of which he thought 
 I stood much in need. 
 
 Once more I was in bed, and could see from 
 where I lay the trees, the rookery, and the sun 
 ascending his perpendicular path. Said I, " O 
 thou that roUest above, round as the shield of 
 my fathers, whence are thy beams, O Sun, 
 whence thine everlasting light?" The trees 
 were but a fruitful source of melancholy recol- 
 lection, and the quotation from Ossian was the 
 same. I had often looked at those stately trees.
 
 ANTIPODES. 155 
 
 when I used to rise cheerful in the morning, 
 mercurial, volatile, elastic, and had as often re- 
 peated with pleasure that very quotation. I 
 thought I had done all these things for the last 
 time, for no more could happiness revisit my 
 heart, than blindness could the eyes of Milton, 
 as he himself so pathetically laments. 
 
 But I was now entirely exhausted. Nature 
 was worn out. I did feel a heaviness on the 
 eyelids, and was conscious that it would be well 
 if I could, were it only for a few minutes, un- 
 bend the bow which had been for so many hours 
 so intensely strung. It is a well-known fact, 
 that, very often when a man could not, if he 
 would give the world, sleep during the night, he 
 finds it creep upon him irresistibly when day- 
 light is cast upon his face and he ought to rise 
 and gird himself for the occupations of the day. 
 Thus it was with me now, Morpheus hovered 
 over my eyelids with his wings laden with 
 poppies, and, as I was sensible that he was 
 gradually sealing up my senses in forgetfulness, 
 I thought to myself, for speak I could not, that 
 I should have some sweet, undisturbed,
 
 156 ANTIPODES. 
 
 strengthening sleep, which would recruit my 
 mental and physical powers for another day's 
 campaign of unavailing lamentation and woe. 
 And I did sleep : the sinews were unstrung, my 
 whole corporeal frame was relaxed, but I doubt 
 whether my poor soul, my inward man, were 
 not more lashed, goaded, scourged and harrassed 
 than when all my senses were wide awake. 
 
 I was in the fields, I was at church, I was a 
 clergyman and married my Jane to a monster 
 with a cloven foot, I was happy, I was miserable. 
 I wandered over the country, and over moor- 
 lands, and mountains, and valleys, and rivers, and 
 oceans, and I found no rest for the sole of my 
 foot, like Noah's dove, nor yet for my soul, like 
 the unpardoned, miserable, condemned sinner, 
 whose sentence has been pronounced and who 
 is on the eve of execution, of incarceration in 
 the burning brim stony lake with devils and 
 reprobate spirits. And I sought, methought, 
 for years the object alone I loved, but found no 
 traces of her nor heard any tidings of her abode. 
 Anon I was in a great wood overshadowed with 
 large, spreading trees, dark, gloomy, dismal.
 
 ANTIPODES. 157 
 
 and in the midst there was a road through 
 which I could scarcely see my way. I was lost 
 in the branches ; thorns and brambles held me 
 fast, and I struggled with all my might for 
 extrication and suddenly escaped, and imme- 
 diately found myself in a sick man's dormi- 
 tory. 
 
 I was by his bed-side and saw him fastened 
 to his bed with straps of leather. He could not 
 rise, though he struggled with more than human 
 power. The straps w^iich held his hands and 
 arms were scarcely strong enough, and several 
 around him, whom I did not know, seemed 
 afraid lest he should disentangle himself, and 
 pulled the straps tighter and tighter. Then I 
 heard him shout with the voice of an angel, as 
 if he would have awaked the dead, and he swore 
 and blasphemed, and laughed and hallooed. 
 And anon I beheld a beautiful young lady 
 clothed in the purest w4iite, she might have 
 been an angel of light, and she shrouded her 
 face with a handkerchief fair as the drifted 
 snow, and shook her head and wept and wrung
 
 158 ANTIPODES. 
 
 her hands as if she would have dissolved into 
 tears. 
 
 Then I looked, and lo, a number besides, 
 father and mother, sisters and brothers, 
 mourned and bewailed, as if this had been the 
 house of death and the spirit had just quitted 
 the tenement of clay of a beloved son or 
 daughter. I saw them not only weep but bear 
 on their faces terror, grief, shame and repentance, 
 and heard them curse the day they ever saw 
 him. I could not but wonder and gaze wist- 
 fully on his and their lineaments to trace out, if 
 possible, the marks of recognition, and I looked 
 until my eyes had almost dropped from their 
 sockets, and their strings had cracked, and his 
 contour evolved from the mist which seemed to 
 enshroud it, and grew gradually more and more 
 palpable to view, and enlarged more and more 
 into a hideous bloated face, and it was, yes, it 
 was, as sure as there is a heaven above and an 
 earth beneath, the very visage of my rival. 
 
 Then I turned, as if touched by some in- 
 visible hand, and beheld the mourners clear and
 
 ANTIPODES 159 
 
 unquestionable as at noonday, and they were 
 her sire and brothers and sisters and mother. 
 I heard their lamentation and loud wailing, and 
 his maniac ear-rending vociferation, and I burst 
 into a loud and long continued cachinnation, 
 which swallowed up all their piping and roaring 
 and his bellowing, as the tempestuous ocean the 
 shouts and cries of the distressed mariners, and 
 I made the apartment where I was and the 
 whole house indeed ring and re-echo as if a 
 horse had been neighing within its walls. In 
 an instant I felt myself shaken by the hand and 
 the shoulders, and found myself broad staring 
 awake and my lungs agitating my whole 
 person. 
 
 " My dear Jonadab, what is the meaning of 
 all this laughter ? Do you know where you 
 are ? Oh! my dear, have you lost your reason 
 through grief? Don't you know who I am, 
 and your poor, afflicted, unhappy father ? You 
 don't know, love, how unhappy you make us 
 all. Oh ! that it should have come to this." 
 
 I beheld them weeping and the tears chasing- 
 one another down the pale, attenuated, care-
 
 160 ANTIPODES. 
 
 worn cheeks of my father, and 1 thought surely 
 these are the mourners and I knew it not, and 
 they are all whom I have left me to love and 
 esteem. I inquired what had happened, and 
 endeavoured to comfort them and to dry up 
 their scalding tears. They asked if I could 
 not recollect that I had been lauffhino; so im- 
 moderately, and I told them that I was not 
 quite sure of it but retained something like a 
 recollection of it, but that I had been dreaming. 
 This eifectually cooled the vehemence of their 
 grief. But they thought such boisterons ex- 
 pressions of joy very preposterous and a paradox 
 in one overwhelmed with sorrow. Sleep, said 
 they, is the best physician to a woe-worn 
 mind. 
 
 I rose with some alacrity. My griefs the 
 preceding day and night had been the com- 
 motion of a mighty tempest, but sleep had 
 rocked " my brains in cradle of the rude im- 
 perious surge," and I felt new vigour to my 
 soul, fresh and increased elasticity to my limbs, 
 my strength renewed like the eagle's. I per- 
 formed the necessary ablutions to perfection,
 
 ANTIPODES. 161 
 
 and then made my appearance in the breakfast- 
 parlour, sleek and clean, and neat and elegant, 
 "like the whining school-boy with his satchel and 
 shining morning face," and strove to be myself 
 again. I had turned the house upside down 
 with my individual grief, had converted a well- 
 regulated happy home into chaos come again, 
 confession confounded, and it was now my duty 
 to bring things again into something like order. 
 I had been like a drunkard, who has thrown 
 chairs and tables about and broken glasses, and 
 the next morning found a bill laid before him 
 in which the damages were not forgotten. 
 
 ^^ell the dream, pvpvy cyllaWo of ■wiixoii -vrao 
 as fresh on the page of memory as if the whole 
 account had just come from the press and the 
 sheets had been laid before me for perusal, the 
 dream, I say, was so congenial to the spirit 
 which then ruled within me, that it diffused a 
 hilarity, something more than a bare calm 
 serenity, over the surface of my soul, and I 
 thought and said to myself, " if I mean to make 
 some small amends to my poor afflicted friends, 
 for the invasion I have made upon their peace
 
 162 ANTIPODES. 
 
 and comfort, now is the moment," for more 
 than a moment or two I did not expect my 
 present heaven of soul to last. I therefore did 
 my best to speak comfortably and cheeiingly to 
 them, and made my face play the hypocrite to 
 my heart. The dream, the dream, helped 
 wonderfully to the personation of a character 
 which I was not. 
 
 " Yes," thought I, " that dream was an 
 augury of better days, better to me. The Deity 
 speaks sometimes in dreams and visions of the 
 night. "* And, oh, the very idea of that madness 
 and their woe and waiHng paved the way to my 
 liapplncoo, if kappitipss more I was ever to know 
 in time. And was not this wicked ? If not revenge 
 indeed, for I would not be the cause of his mad- 
 ness and their grief, yet was it in thought, and 
 oh, God sees the thoughts and wiU reckon with 
 us about them. But had I been the cause, the 
 sole, undivided, individual cause of his madness 
 and their consequent lamentation, had my 
 hand alone deranged the intellectual system 
 had their death followed as the eifect, I could 
 not at that time have deemed mvself a murderer,
 
 ANTIPODES. 163 
 
 at least conscience would not have cast it in ray 
 teeth. Oliver Cromwell sat as judge over 
 Charles the First, signed the warrant for his 
 execution, thus macadamized the way to his 
 own greatness, and yet, I dare venture to say, 
 never once thought himself a murderer. Passion 
 of one sort or other can thus blind the eyes to 
 the nature of facts. But I was not the cause 
 nor could I be. 
 
 I breakfasted and retired. The elasticity of 
 my spirits was nearly over, and they began to 
 settle into a staid, regular, deep dejection. I 
 sought a small apartment or parlour, seldom 
 used except as a dressing-room for my mother. 
 That, for the future, with her consent was to be 
 my smoking-room, an arrangement made the 
 night before at my initiation : they wished to 
 conceal my practice of smoking from my father, 
 or, if not altogether, the extent to which I in- 
 dulged it. It was but a closet with a small 
 window looking into the fields, and afterwards, 
 when I had made myself a master in the pro- 
 fession, I filled it with smoke as completely 
 almost as a steam-boiler is charged with the
 
 1 64 ANTIPODES. 
 
 aqueous gas. The window served as the safety- 
 valve, or the density of the vapour must have 
 choked up the issues of life. 
 
 Thither I now repaired to chew the cud of 
 reflection. It was morning, but I took a pipe. 
 It was to be my companion, a terror to all care. 
 Behold me then at it again, but more gently. 
 I threw out a whiff only now and then, and laid 
 down the pipe at the most distant approach of 
 nausea. Thus in the course of a week did I 
 complete my apprenticeship, and become as 
 clever as the most accomplished master. This 
 remark, however, I could not but make, that 
 continually during my practice for improvement, 
 when a few whiffs had satiated if not sickened, 
 I laid down the instrument with a most deter- 
 mined resolution never to take it up again ; and 
 yet, when the effect of the smoke had worn 
 away, which was generally in the course of 
 twenty minutes, I found the pipe in my hand 
 again, frequently without being able to recollect 
 having taken it up. There, however, it vvsa, 
 recharged, the match applied, and I was firing 
 away as hard as ever, just as if an eternal peace
 
 ANTIPODES. 165 
 
 had not been twenty minutes before agreed upon 
 between us, ratified and established. 
 
 Such is the sorcery of this habit. What 
 hundreds of resolutions hav^e I not made, and 
 broken at the expiration of a few minutes, often 
 deliberately, often unwittingly. I abhorred the 
 practice and yet loved it ; and thus all the years 
 I have been a smoker, have love and hatred 
 been succeeding each other. Blessed, however, 
 had I been, blessed as the just made perfect 
 should I think myself, had that been my only 
 failing, solitary, without any associate vice.
 
 166 ANTIPODES. 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 I FOUND smoking in the course of a month 
 had produced a wonderful alteration for the 
 worse in my whole appearance. No doubt 
 its power is not so tremendous with those w^ho 
 live better, but with me it operated like some 
 secret, invisible disease preying upon the vitals, 
 drying up the springs of life, carrying on the 
 work of physical destruction with the despatch 
 of a rapid consumption. No one, at the expira- 
 tion of a month, would have thought that 
 nature had ever painted a delicate vermilHon 
 hue upon my cheeks. They were made of 
 parchment. 1 might have been for 'years im-
 
 ANTIPODES. 167 
 
 mured night and day in a solicitor's office, 
 until my complexion had become that of the 
 skin they write upon. I never saw a mummy, 
 unless it was at that time my own face. And I 
 was so attenuated, so meagre, so worn away, 
 that my skin was the covering of bones, not of 
 flesh. How old was I ? Who would have 
 thought me a young man ? 
 
 Verily, thought I, as I one day viewed the 
 wreck of my visage in a looking-glass, I need 
 not say one syllable of De Witt's age or 
 cadaverous face. I am as old myself and 
 almost as hideous. My eyes had lost their fire, 
 not a single scintillation did they emit. Formerly 
 the white was perfect, clear as the Indian's, and 
 the pupil lustrous and brilliant, a twinkling, 
 glittering star; now the whole was glazed, 
 sickly, the dull, leaden planet Saturn. What 
 should have been white was yellow, and the 
 apple, languishing, dead. One part of my con- 
 templated revenge on the Seymours, the whole, 
 father, rnother, sons and daughters — was, as 
 often as opportunity should present me with the 
 power, to exhibit my handsome, blooming com-
 
 168 ANTIPODES. 
 
 plexion, my flashing, vivid, sparkling eye, my 
 youthful elasticity of gait, as thorough a contrast 
 to Witt's in my estimation as Hyperion to a 
 satyr. How disappointed and chagrined there- 
 fore was I, when I found my face the reflection 
 of Don Quixote's, the renowned knight de la 
 Mancha. 
 
 I was lantern-jawed, and my gait was as 
 feeble, tottering, infirm, unsteady, as if I had 
 been completing the latter part of the Sphinx's 
 enigma, walking or having need to walk on 
 three legs instead of two. It is surprising what 
 an imbecility smoking has inflicted upon my 
 legs, knees, and whole frame. Youth was 
 passed and gone, I was no longer a young 
 man, but in the middle of life, if not rather 
 beyond that. How could set myself off 
 to the objects of my malice as a foil 
 to their newly acquired relative. Malice I 
 say, for by what other passion could I be 
 actuated, whether I chose to think so or not ? 
 I was not as ugly, that was impossible, and I 
 thought for ever must remain so, for I had not
 
 ANTIPODES. 169 
 
 the prodigious disproportion of limb and linea- 
 ment to constitute a most transcendently 
 grotesque figure, a De Witt. 
 
 I was now, tlierefore, obliged to hide myself 
 in the house, because I thought myself really a 
 shame to be seen. So far was I from seeking 
 opportunities of presenting myself to their notice, 
 that the very sight of any of them at a distance 
 operated as a scarecrow. " Heavens," said I, 
 " T would not be seen by any of them in the 
 present state of my exterior for a fortune or a 
 bishopric." But what was T to do ? So long 
 as T smoked, this must be my condition. Worse 
 it could not be, for even already the worms 
 would have despised me for a single meal. But 
 it was not likely to improve. I had already 
 passed the Rubicon : what could I do ? I had 
 proclaimed and was in the act of waging eternal 
 war against my constitution, health, and much 
 more therefore personal beauty. This companion 
 I could not forsake ! I had hugged the pipe as 
 an everlasting associate, which nothing earthly, 
 neither rain nor sunshine, neither adversity nor 
 prosperity, neither good report nor evil report, 
 
 VOL I. ' I
 
 170 ANTIPODES. 
 
 should induce me to disown or forsake, and I 
 found now to my soitow, that he was an ever- 
 lasting leech which could never be gorged, 
 and that whether I would forsake him or not, 
 he was determined, as long as I had one single 
 drop of blood circulating in my veins, he never 
 would leave or forsake me. 
 
 " My greatest misfortune," said I, " the 
 origin indeed of all my disasters, has been evil 
 communications, which Menander says and St. 
 Paul after him, ' corrupt good manners.' And 
 here have I selected one, who to all appearance 
 promises to be as morally corrupting as the 
 greatest and most determined profligate. I 
 thought Hartley in Oxford the greatest evil that 
 heaven ever poured out of its vial of wrath, and 
 I think so still, and shall as long as I am capable 
 of thinking at all, but next to him I believe my 
 present one is the worst. What ! I shall be 
 dead in a twelvemonth." After much delibera- 
 tion I concluded that I must shake off the habit. 
 But how must that be accompHshed ? " Oh," 
 said I, " man is a free agent, or not answerable 
 for sin nor consequently a sinner. It can be
 
 ANTIPODES. 171 
 
 done and it shall be done. I will be as hand- 
 some as ever, and, with the aid of an elegant 
 tailor, I will be the very bird of Venus. Every 
 eye shall turn in admiration ; even envy shall 
 not be able to turn away its head as if it saw me 
 not." As one bad habit begets another, so 
 sometimes one will banish another, and I be- 
 thought me, that thus I could get quit of my 
 acquaintance with, and delight in, the society of 
 the pipe. 
 
 I replenished my snuff-box with the finest 
 flavoured, the most exquisitely pungent, the 
 most attractive food for the olfactory member, 
 that ever adorned the box, the hand, the finger 
 and thumb, of a motley fool. I recommenced 
 with renewed and increased fervour the polite, 
 the gentlemanly, the most accomplished practice 
 of a fop. I determined also to be as little as 
 possible in the house. The sight of the room 
 was an incomparably stronger attraction for the 
 pipe, than the snuff was a repulsion. If I 
 continued much in the house, it was clearly im- 
 possible to wean myself from the abhorred habit. 
 Into the fields then I plunged, glorying in my 
 
 I 2
 
 172 ANTIPODES. 
 
 resolution. I could not but admire my self- 
 command, a virtue than which not any one is 
 more useful, not any one more rare. 
 
 I will never smoke again. I am surprised 
 that any event/any misfortune, however grievous 
 to be borne, should have induced me to harbour 
 for a moment the thought of betaking myself to 
 such a disgusting habit for relief. I came to 
 the haunts of my boyhood, of my youthful 
 reveries, when love smiled upon me and lighted 
 in my breast the bewitching lamp of hope, and 
 I thought of her whom I had certainly lost for 
 ever, and I grieved as one forlorn, disconsolate, 
 desolate, whose heart was torn and never could 
 be healed, and I felt myself a lost man and 
 cared not what became of me — and I turned as 
 suddenly as the report of a pistol and hied to 
 the small, confined apartment, the smoking- 
 room, as fast as if I had forgotten something of 
 very great importance, which it required the 
 utmost precipitation to correct or perform, de- 
 termined to smoke as long as my lungs could 
 perform the necessary function of respiration. 
 
 Again the smoke curled beautifully, and the
 
 ANTIPODES. 173 
 
 snuff-box was laid on the shelf, a useless piece 
 of furniture, once valued and now forgotten. 
 The narcotic vapour again soothed the evil spirit 
 within me, and I began to be as happy as ever. 
 If any man wishes to build castles in the air, I 
 mean to do it to perfection, castles of celestial 
 magnificence, or even infernal such as Pande- 
 monium, let him smoke. Only smoke and you 
 may fancy yourself anything, a monarch, an 
 archangel riding on the whirlwind and directing 
 the storm, or an angel bestriding the ocean and 
 the land, or what is infinitely more than any one 
 of these things or all of them put together, you 
 may fancy yourself a successful suitor, the ever 
 blessed bridegroom of her you love. I never 
 was an opium-eater, and therefore can offer no 
 opinion of his comparative bliss, but if you seek 
 the most perfect felicity prior to, or out of, or in- 
 dependently of heaven, smoke, provided you do 
 not want that felicity to be eternal. Yes, I will 
 smoke, and never, never, never think of giving 
 it over again. If I lose thereby my health and 
 beauty, be it so : God's will be done. I smoked 
 and was again translated into Paradise. But
 
 174 ANTIPODES. 
 
 again in the course of half-an-hour I had fallen 
 like Satan in the realms of chaos and old night, 
 ten thousand fathoms deep : the pipe was my 
 abhorrence, my execration. 
 
 And I gazed with absent, lack-lustre eye on 
 the shivered fragments, and thought really 
 nothing now can give me an hour's satisfaction, 
 and I know not in what to seek it purer and 
 more perfect. As I ruminated on I knew not 
 what, the satiating and nauseating eifects of the 
 smoke had passed away, and a desire for another 
 pipe as imperceptibly returned, and I quite as 
 naturally turned my eyes in all directions round 
 in search of a substitute for the fragments at my 
 feet. I now determined to be more moderate 
 in the indulgence, by which I meant, that I 
 would never give over the pleasure, but that I 
 would not make the volumes of incense, the 
 delicious perfume, ascend in such dense and 
 rapid clouds. 1 would take more time : a single 
 pipe should last me an hour. Pleasure, at least 
 earthly, cannot be perfect in both its intensity 
 and duration. In this world, pleasure of every 
 kind is like a pipe of tobacco. You may make
 
 ANTIPODES. 175 
 
 it last an hour or only twenty minutes. In the 
 latter case it is more sweet but evanescent, a 
 vapour which appears for a very little time and 
 then vanishes away : in the former, it is more 
 permanent, but tougher and grosser, a lamp 
 which casts only a glimmering light, imperfect, 
 unsatisfactory, but lasts a whole evening of a 
 dull, dark, winter's night. 
 
 1 commenced then in a deliberate, solemn, 
 stately, statesmanhke manner. I sent a volume 
 up to the ceiling, like a school-boy's soap and 
 water bubble, and then withdrew the tube from 
 my mouth, waited a few seconds as nearly as I 
 could calculate without a watch, then repeated 
 the operation and a similar pause, and thus I 
 continued for some time, I know not how long, 
 but not very long. Certainly I was not sick, 
 nor disgusted. I did not throw the pipe down in 
 abhorrence, nor did I resolve and re-resolve to 
 smoke no more. But there was no reverie, no 
 celestial visions, no trance, no rapture, no sailing 
 in the clouds, no bliss, no terrestrial heaven. I 
 was acting as if I came into the world merely 
 to be a sort of smoking automaton, alternately
 
 1 76 ANTIPODES. 
 
 to smoke and look at my pipe, calculating the 
 intervals to a second. Thus to smoke was 
 torture. I therefore abandoned this plan also, 
 and commenced a fumigation like a Dutch 
 steam-vessel, to which a Dutch smoker has not 
 inaptly been assimilated. 
 
 Ideas of glory, aerial edifices of the most 
 enchanting construction and workmanship, rose 
 up fromthe previously stagnant pool of my 
 mind, fast as, far faster than the smoke issued 
 from my mouth into the thin air and the saliva 
 into an appropriate depository. Again for about 
 twenty minutes this mental scene of fairy realms 
 endured, and then all was shivered together with 
 my pipe in an instant on the floor. It was bliss 
 divine while it lasted, but bliss too blissful in 
 this combined state of happiness and misery to 
 last long. Again I sought the open air for 
 relief from ennui. I deplored the misfortune of 
 my new thraldom. I had been a slave to love, 
 I was now a slave to tobacco. I had changed 
 one master for another, a great tyrant though 
 not greater, still there was this advantage at- 
 tending his service, that I had not thereby, that
 
 ANTIPODES. 177 
 
 I was aware of, spread unhappiness through the 
 house Hke a plague. My friends were conside- 
 rably recovered from their fears and griefs on 
 my account, and this aiforded me a very agree- 
 able reflection. After therefore having wandered 
 some distance, I returned home with my accus- 
 tomed load of wretchedness, and had not been 
 in the house five minutes, before I found that 
 the unhappiness of my mother and brother on 
 my account had by no means ceased, but had 
 taken a different turn. 
 
 " Jonadab, we are so uneasy about you that 
 we really don't know what to do or where to go. 
 I am sure that, if you do not take great care 
 you will not survive many weeks, perhaps not 
 many days. We have held our tongues for two or 
 three days, in hopes that you would get the better 
 of your disappointment and grief, but we are now 
 convinced that, unless you take the greatest care, 
 your days are numbered. You used to be the 
 admiration of the whole town and now you look 
 twenty years older and all your beauty is gone." 
 
 " But my health is good. Judging from my 
 
 I 3
 
 178 ANTIPODES. 
 
 feelings, I was never in better health in my 
 life." 
 
 "But it is impossible for you to be in good 
 health and be so thin and ill. Upon my word, 
 you are not like yourself at all." 
 
 " How is it possible," said my brother, " for 
 him to be in good health or to look well ? He 
 eats nothing. He has never eaten anything 
 worth mentioning since that — that marriage." 
 
 This was the first time since it took place, 
 that the mention of that marriage had sounded 
 in my ears. It is surprising how curious the 
 sound was to me ; and [ could not credit 
 the reality of the event. It sounded like some- 
 thing which had been talked of, not like an 
 event which either had taken place or ever would. 
 My brother had anticipated the curious, indes- 
 cribable sensation in my mind, and therefore 
 started back at the approach of the word in the 
 above sentence, as if it had been something he 
 was either afraid or ashamed to mention. I 
 myself turned from him as if ashamed to meet 
 his eye. 
 
 " As for dinner, he has shunned it with the
 
 ANTIPODES. 179 
 
 exception of once, and then he might almost as 
 well have been absent. Nothing solid above 
 the size of a marble entered his mouth ; I am 
 sure of it, for I took particular notice. And 
 at breakfast and tea he eats no bread, he seems 
 as if he could swallow nothing but what is 
 liquid." 
 
 All this was true. Smoking completely 
 destroyed my appetite, but they were not aware 
 that it was that. They laid the blame on my 
 disappointment, which was only indirectly the 
 cause. I thought I could have lived upon the 
 noxious plant. So little solid, substantial food 
 entered my stomach, that it was not to be 
 wondered at if my whole outward man exhibited 
 a lamentable deficiency in the requisite support 
 Love, however, thwarted, crossed, for ever 
 denied its object, love bore the whole undivided 
 blame. 
 
 " If I were you," continued my brother, " I 
 would be too proud to let anyone see, that 
 they had mortified me so much. You should 
 bear it with the utmost indifference, the coolness 
 of a Cato, show yourself to them looking as
 
 180 ANTIPODES. 
 
 well as ever and as unconcerned, and let them 
 see that you do not care a sou for them, or an 
 alliance with them- If they see you so WTctched 
 they will secretly laugh at you, profess to pity 
 you and to wish that your love had been less 
 aspiring. I should be more mortified at that 
 than at the loss of my first love." 
 
 " Laugh at me, didst thou say, pity me ! The 
 thought is winged with the withering power of 
 the thunder. The bare idea is capital punish- 
 ment : the fact w^ould be, not death, but positive 
 translation to the tortures of the lost. Never say 
 so again. Yet — yet — as thou sayest, pride, pride 
 is a useful thing. What makes some cool- 
 blooded philosophers bear the rubs, and thumps, 
 and buffets of outrageous fortune, and treat 
 them with contempt ? 
 
 'Tis pride, rank pride, and haughtiness of soul, 
 I think the Romans call it stoicism. 
 
 " Stoicism ! blessed, most honourable philo- 
 sophy. This pride bears misfortunes with all 
 the omnipotence of Almighty grace. I am a 
 stoic, a disciple of Zeno. I will laugh at the
 
 ANTIPODES. 181 
 
 frowns and malice of the world. No, I will not 
 laugh, that is not stoical enough : I will neither 
 laugh nor weep. My face, my mouth, my very 
 muscles shall be immoveable. Laugh, despise 
 me fur my lack of beauty, my pale face ! I'll to 
 my toilet, I'll make myself as sleek and pretty 
 as a dancing master, a general cicisbeo. I will 
 make myself a most marvellous proper 
 man." 
 
 Thus I ran on for I know not what space 
 longer. He had struck on a key which vibrated 
 every nerve in my whole system, electrified my 
 whole body and soul. It was the chord of in- 
 dignation. He had restored the dead to life. 
 Before, I was dejected, lifeless, now the quick- 
 silver of my blood rose to boiling heat. He 
 saw and heard the visible raving effects of his 
 appeal to my pride, and was determined to 
 follow it up and turn my craven dejection of 
 soul into the most resolute self-possession, by 
 an additional argument, though by no means so 
 gigantic in its powers of persuasion. 
 
 " Besides, consider how you are ruining your 
 fine understanding. You used to be at the head
 
 182 ANTIPODES. 
 
 of the school. None had any chance to compete 
 with you. It was thought presumption in the 
 cleverest hoy to set himself up as your rival. 
 What a strong memory you had, what a quick- 
 ness of apprehension, what a depth of penetra- 
 tion, what refinement of taste. You are now 
 the reverse of all this. Your memory is quite 
 gone. They will think you never were a 
 scholar. They wiU despise you for supposed 
 ignorance, and perhaps call you a poor im- 
 becile." 
 
 All this was very true, and certainly pro- 
 duced some effect, but nothing like the impres- 
 sion, which, judging from my former ambition, 
 he had anticipated. I was once ambitious, Oh ! 
 how ambitious ! But the eagle had descended 
 from his flight, was maimed, winged, and so 
 accustomed of late to a humble flight near the 
 dust which erst he spurned, that the very desire 
 to take a noble range had quitted for ever his 
 now grovelling soul. 
 
 " Ah," said I, " I once possessed, I believe, 
 an understanding, a faculty, a taste. Is it 
 peculiarly, more eminently, the destiny of such,
 
 ANTIPODES. ]83 
 
 that misfortunes, vice, and habits shall degrade, 
 debase their noble souls, and make them more 
 contemptible than others of far inferior mind ? 
 It has been thought so. Wit and wine have 
 been called very near relations, a sort of brothers 
 or sisters, for we will not quarrel about their sex. 
 ' I could make seven noblemen,' said Harry 
 the Eighth, ' out of seven ploughmen, but 1 
 could not make one Holbein out of seven peers.' 
 Yet Hans was so fond of a jorum and low com- 
 pany, the very lees of society, that the great 
 Erasmus undertook the ungracious task of at- 
 tempting his reformation." 
 
 I was sorry to see them so unhappy, and 
 fully determined to abandon forthwith the 
 offensive, unhealthy habit I had commenced, 
 but to which, I flattered myself, I had not yet 
 fairly enslaved myself. It destroyed constitution, 
 health, and conferred ugliness, and whatever 
 else I could recollect objectionable I treasured 
 up in my mind and pondered over, in order to 
 strengthen the good resolution which I had 
 formed. Such was my serious, deliberate wish
 
 184 ANTIPODES. 
 
 to smoke no more, that this time at any rate I 
 really believed my effort would be successful. I 
 determined also to take a little time for con- 
 sideration, and to commence the battle in good 
 earnest to-morrow.
 
 ANTIPODES. 1 85 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 " JoNADAB, your brother and I have just been 
 considering that it is necessary for you to live 
 better, to take more support. Great smokers 
 always take something to drink better than 
 water. You must drink some good ale to your 
 pipe and then you will not lose flesh. I am 
 shocked to see you looking so ill, and fear lest 
 you should go into a consumption." 
 
 This she said in the simplicity of her heart, 
 and no more dreamed of the tremendous 
 mischief she was persuading me, nor did I then, 
 than of tempting me to commit the sin un- 
 pardonable. She, however, it is true, the most
 
 186 ANTIPODES. 
 
 affectionate of mothers, made the proposal, and 
 I accepted it. The flood-gates were opened. 
 I took the beverage, as I thought, for my 
 necessary support ; but who can calculate how 
 imperceptibly vice steals upon a man, until it 
 completely overpowers him and spoils him of all 
 his goods, the virtues, the excellencies of his 
 mind. I commenced, however, now the com- 
 bination of a pipe and a glass, and certainly 
 thought the one a wonderful improvement to 
 the other. The ale supplied ten times the 
 strength for smoking, and only enabled me to 
 smoke so much the longer, the more furiously, 
 and with so much the greater pleasure ; conse- 
 quently the evil either way was as broad as it 
 was long. 
 
 You may think that it was exceedingly im- 
 prudent in my mother to propose it, inasmuch 
 as she must have heard of smoking and drink- 
 ing being for the most part inseparable, and of 
 the former leading if not driving to the grossest 
 excesses in the latter. Whether it was im- 
 prudent or not, I will not undertake to determine, 
 but of this I am certain, as I wish I were of
 
 ANTIPODES. 187 
 
 heaven, that leading me to drunkenness was, I 
 will not say the farthest thought in her mind, 
 for that implies that it was there though at a 
 great distance, but that it was what never found 
 an entrance there, much more a comfortable 
 harbour. Yet it is lamentable to think, that 
 she the most affectionate of mothers, first pro- 
 posed the pipe, she first proposed the glass. 
 Love prompted the overture. She was sorry 
 to see me unhappy, and afraid of my health and 
 life, and therefore proposed as a remedy what 
 ultimately proved most destructive to both, and 
 above all in addition fatal to the health of my 
 soul. How often has love been a physician, which 
 kiUed when it meant to cure ! Yet I was the 
 primary cause, or shall I lay the blame on for- 
 tune ? This, of course, would be to blame Pro- 
 vidence. Certain it was, I was unfortunate, 
 unhappy, and I communicated the plague of my 
 own heart, my own wretchedness, to my un- 
 happy relations. 
 
 Why did I not fight against adversity ? Why 
 did I not wage war against my own passions, 
 and bring them into subjection to reason and
 
 188 ANTIPODES. 
 
 my knowledge of duty ? Thousands would 
 ask this question and answer it too, that I ought 
 to have done so — thousands of unimpassioned 
 mortals made of clay, without a spark of the 
 Promethean fire. And I too should have said 
 the same, if there had not been one passion 
 which, so far as I could learn from my own 
 experience and the universal consent of mankind 
 of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and 
 nation, I believed to be invincible. The proof 
 appeared to me to be the same as for the ex- 
 istence of a God, and I was very well satisfied 
 with it. I thought that 1 could have been 
 happy if I had not had love to contend with, 
 but that my enemy was too powerful. 
 
 What degree and what sort of blame was due 
 to my mother I could not determine. I smoked 
 and drank ale this day for the first time; would that 
 1 could truly say it was the last. I did not begin 
 without the evil even in its prospective mischief 
 awakening my fears. My heart was not still 
 — it smote me for the imprudence, and certainly 
 afforded strong presentiment of what would be 
 the consequence. It gave me good advice,
 
 ANTIPODES. 189 
 
 most unmistakable warning ; it croaked to my 
 understanding most portentously. 
 
 It spoke not so loud, but let me not add to 
 my other sins the disingenuousness of denying 
 that it spoke at all. I had my fears. I knew 
 that I was playing with a most dangerous and 
 deadly weapon, on the brink of a bottomless 
 gulph ; but like thousands of deluded victims, 
 I promised to rue in time, and confided too im- 
 plicitly in the strength of my own self-control. 
 I did not consider that this strength of the soul 
 would waste away as fast as the physical powers 
 of my body ; that every draught to assuage, not 
 a natural, but an acquired thirst, was a con- 
 sumption to my self-denial. 
 
 I began, it is true, with very great caution, 
 and determined merely to moisten my throat, 
 not to deluge it — to gargle with a tea-spoonful, 
 or at the most two, but most religiously to 
 abstain from copious potations. And then it 
 was very easy. The evil was in its bud, and 
 could easily be nipped. I had not to gird my 
 loins, as I had some years after, and to summon 
 my whole strength to hack and hew down some
 
 190 ANTIPODES. 
 
 aged, evergreen, tough invincible yew tree. No, 
 nothing more at present was required than bare 
 volition. I could as easily abstain from excess 
 as I could move my right arm, because I felt no 
 inclination to drink but what was excited by the 
 dryness in the throat. But considering how 
 constantly in a great smoker the throat is 
 smoke-dried and calls for some moisture, who 
 can deny that learning to smoke is far more 
 than the ABC towards the art of drinking ? 
 I was conscious therefore that a new dang-er 
 was thrown in my way, and this gave ad- 
 ditional strength to the resolution I had made 
 of renouncing the pipe. As I said before, to- 
 morrow was to be the day of trial. 
 
 I rose, washed, and prepared myself in every 
 way for an exhibition of myself in public. 
 This I did because I had discovered that the 
 open air was the most powerful antidote to the 
 offensive vapour of the pipe ; in other words, 
 that a thorough abandonment of smoking could 
 not be eflfected without much exercise in the 
 open air, and indeed walking out as much as 
 possible for several days after it has been dis-
 
 ANTIPODES. 191 
 
 continued. This I observed then, and have 
 proved by my own sad experience many a time 
 since. I never could control and absolutely 
 suppress the proprensity if I stayed much in 
 the house ; and I believe every smoker who 
 wishes to return to his quondam respectability 
 in the rank of the creation, wiU find upon ob- 
 servation and experience the same truth. Shun 
 the house, if you wish to shun the pipe. And 
 as I am now speaking of the ways and means 
 to be adopted, I may as well observe another 
 circumstance I have noticed, viz : that solilo- 
 quising or talking to oneself constitutes a very 
 great, I may rather say, an insurmountable 
 obstacle in the way of success. Great smokers 
 are often great soliloquisers, for smoking en- 
 courages mental abstraction and absurd reveries ; 
 and therefore, if you wish and are resolved to 
 smoke no more, set a double watch on the doors 
 of your lips, respire through the nostrils, and let 
 your lips never open whenever you can avoid 
 speaking. 
 
 Many who have for years never taken a pipe 
 in hand, much more applied it to the mouth.
 
 192 ANTIPODES. 
 
 have returned to it in consequence of some 
 sudden excitement putting the lips in motion, 
 when there has been but the speaker to speak 
 to. But there is not a smoker in the world or 
 man wha has been one, who knows not that 
 the great difficulty of all, is grief or mental 
 dejection. If your spirits are low, you will 
 smoke. This was the mighty mountain, the 
 Ben-Lomond, which at present crossed my path. 
 I was unhappy, nor could anything I could 
 think of, unless intoxication, infuse vivacity 
 into my heart. Every pore of my soul was 
 sealed to joy. I did not think I should ever 
 know anything like permanent joy again. With 
 this most formidable enemy had I to cope, in 
 my present resolution and efforts to smoke no 
 more, and great as it was, so firmly fixed was 
 my mind, I did not despair. 
 
 After coming down stairs, I breakfasted 
 without a moment's delay, and with as little, 
 was pacing the verdant carpet of the meadows. 
 I determined to accost no man, but, above all, 
 myself, to shun indeed as much as possible, 
 communion with my fellow-men that day,
 
 ANTIPODES. 193 
 
 devoting it entirely to the battle against my 
 evil habit. And so deeply rooted was my reso- 
 lution, that I soon began to think that it could 
 not be eradicated by the impulse I was ever 
 and anon liable to feel, and that it would pro- 
 duce the desired fruit. I was not mistaken. 
 Man in general resolves and re-resolves, then 
 dies the same. Thus Young quaintly sings, 
 but truth is not always his. Man can do all 
 tilings ; triumph over himself, which Is the most 
 glorious ovation, as well as over the enemies of 
 his country. 
 
 During one part of the day, I felt inclined 
 to promenade in the streets, instead of my more 
 sequestered haunts. I thought the bustle and 
 animation of the inhabitants would be more 
 cheering, and would prevent that dejection which 
 was now growing habitual. How did everything 
 I saw, in despite of my utmost endeavours to 
 prevent it, discourse to me of my irreparable 
 loss. Once at a distance I saw her brothers 
 — my brothers-in-law they were to have been, 
 so hope once flattered, and her cousins the 
 Misses Jackson. They all seemed to be un- 
 
 VOL. I. K
 
 194 ANTIPODES. 
 
 conscious that my peace of mind had been for 
 ever blasted. Yes, they tripped away as if no 
 such marriage had been heard of, or as if it 
 were only one of the millions of occurrences 
 in the course of time, past and forgotten, a 
 dream, a watch in the night. 
 
 Yet to me was it the want of all wants since 
 Time began his march, that swallowed up in the 
 vortex of its importance aU others as minor 
 and subordinate. What a weight, what an Etna 
 upon my spirits were these mementos of my 
 iU-fate, and how mightily did they drag me to 
 the smoking apartment and its appliances ! but 
 this day I conquered. Habit, like a strong 
 man armed, knocked at the door of my heart 
 for admittance very loudly ; but my dogged 
 resolution, an inexorable porter, an incorruptible 
 Cerberus, stoutly resisted, and 1 prevailed.
 
 ANTIPODES. 195 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 The next day of course I enjoyed an ovation. 
 I rejoiced sincerely, and was congratulated by 
 my friends on my so triumphant a victory over 
 the pipe, and having now obtained the upper 
 hand of the vice, I was determined to keep it. 
 
 We assembled at the breakfast-table, I, my 
 father, mother and brother ; and now, when 1 
 appeared not so outrageously unhappy, our 
 minds naturally and very properly reverted to 
 the difficulty I found in meeting with a situa- 
 tion. We were a small family and isolated : 
 though my father was respected for his piety 
 and exemplary walk through life more than any 
 
 K 2
 
 I 9 6 ANTIPODES. 
 
 other man in the town, yet we stood very much 
 alone in the world ; we had no friends to look 
 
 to. 
 
 Said my father : " Have you any idea, Jonadab, 
 
 where you can obtain a situation ?" 
 
 " None, if I speak the truth, and nothing but 
 the truth should be spoken about it. I really 
 do not know which way to turn." 
 
 " Well, my dear, I would have you by no 
 means despair, much less to fret and vex your- 
 self, for that is wicked. But you want to take 
 orders. To be sure you have not waited long 
 yet, for you have been only a few days at home, 
 but ] wish you to consider whether first of all it 
 be God's will that you should be a clergyman. 
 You have no right to run, unless he call, and 
 therefore I think you ought first to endeavour to 
 obtain some situation in a school, and afterwards 
 a title, if Providence should be pleased to throw 
 one in your way." 
 
 " This I should be very glad to do, but I can 
 no more obtain a school than I can a curacy." 
 
 " It will be necessary to inquire no doubt of 
 any one likely to hear of such things. I think
 
 ANTIPODES. 1 9 7 
 
 it strange though that the tutors of your college 
 should not assist you to a situation of this kind, 
 they must hear of such appointments and receive 
 applications. But you say they do not make it 
 a point to assist an independent member. I 
 think, however, it would not be amiss for you to 
 try what importunity will do. I would write to 
 them again, if I were you. You must also 
 repeat your application to Mr. Scrapling, the 
 vicar." 
 
 " I will certainly ask him again, and, may be, 
 again and again, but I really have no opinion of 
 his disposition to help me, and truth only obliges 
 me to say so. You see he gave me several 
 advertisements, to none of which have they ever 
 had the politeness to answer I fear that the 
 vicar was aware my applications would be in 
 vain," 
 
 " I don't think that it at all follows. To 
 advertisements for curates, especially promising 
 a title for orders, you may depend upon it, many, 
 very many applications are made, and that with- 
 out a moment's delay, so that without the 
 greatest promptitude I believe you need not
 
 198 ANTIPODES. 
 
 apply at all : that it is absurd — money and 
 labour thrown away. If he has therefore given 
 you several advertisements, I think he has 
 clearly shown himself your fi-iend, and as such, 
 entitled to your respect. He is under no obliga- 
 tion, you know, to do so. Looking for them in 
 various publications, such as magazines and 
 newspapers, must cost him some trouble." 
 
 " Now I think that, as vicar of the parish 
 .where I reside and have been brought up, and 
 where my relations live and frequent his church, 
 he is bound to assist me, and that it would be 
 disgraceful for him not to do so. But be this 
 as it may, I doubt very much, and I am sorry 
 to say so, for I would not willingly lay anything 
 falsely to his charge, w^hether these advertise- 
 ments, which he has had the apparent kindness 
 to put into my hand, were not old ones, inserted 
 so long since, that he knew it to be ridiculous 
 to expect a reply to any application for them. 
 Not one letter I have written has been honoured 
 wdth an answer." 
 
 " My dear Jonadab, it is very sinful of you 
 to think ill of Mr. Scrapling on what I believe
 
 ANTIPODES. 199 
 
 to be unfounded suspicion. Remember it is a 
 breach of the commandment, ' thou shalt not 
 bear false witness against thy neighbour,' or at 
 any rate very much like it. Beg of God to 
 forgive you and to make you more thankful." 
 
 '* God forbid I should wrong him, but I can- 
 not but feel a strong desire to see the periodicals, 
 from which he professed to have received the 
 advertisements. There can be no wrong in 
 finding out the dates of them. The first, I 
 think he said, was inserted in the ' Christian 
 Remembrancer.' Let me see : where can I get 
 to look at one ? I will go to the booksellers 
 and to the library." 
 
 " Think ill of no man, but rather pay him 
 another visit, ask him to have the goodness to 
 assist you again, and, if he gives you another 
 advertisement, be thankful and pray for God's 
 blessing upon your application. And, O my 
 dear boy, remember you are coveting a most 
 responsible office, and pray devoutly and per- 
 severingly for meekness and abihty for the- dis- 
 charge of its duties." 
 
 " What you say, Sir, is exceedingly proper
 
 •200 ANTIPODES. 
 
 and of the greatest importance ; still, not having 
 great confidence in the vicar's sincerity, I am 
 anxious to find out some other friend. Who 
 is there that I can consult ? I will, however, 
 see the vicar first, and after my return we may 
 he better able to judge what is best to be 
 done." 
 
 " I am quite sure from the friendship he has 
 already shown, that he w'ill if he can, and God 
 be willing, be of service to you. I am sorry 
 you should think so ill of him. Take care, 
 when you call upon him, that you show him all 
 proper respect. Remember how God has lately 
 visited his house." 
 
 The last observation inspired something like 
 a hope, when there was none before. God had 
 certainly given him a most tremendous blow, 
 and 1 could not but think that his own impiety 
 as a church-jobber had thus called down the 
 divine vengeance. True, God smote the child, 
 not the fiither, but we believe that he visits the 
 sins of the father upon the children. The stroke 
 was merciful. The child was fit for a celestial 
 crown, and was taken away only from the evil
 
 ANTIPODES. 201 
 
 to come, and only a short time prior to the 
 period appointed by nature. But how did the 
 father suffer in his child ! Yes, it was the father 
 whom the bolt struck. The child was dead at 
 his feet without an instant's pain, and another 
 moment beheld it in the mansions of the blessed. 
 It was translated to heaven without its gross 
 material part, that was all. 
 
 How different was the condition of the 
 ! struck by the lightning and yet 
 suffered to live. His heart was scorched and 
 yet did not cease its motion, was blasted and 
 yet was alive. My father, however, is right : 
 such a deep domestic w^ound calls for com- 
 miseration, and should be healed, not irritated 
 and inflamed. 
 
 Away then to the parsonage I posted, and 
 again by stealth, ashamed for my fellow-towns- 
 men to see or speak to me — me of whom such 
 large hopes had been entertained and now a 
 well-known needy pauper, for less I cannot call 
 myself, soliciting with all humility and respect 
 the assistance of any one.
 
 202 ANTIPODES. 
 
 " Oh ! Mr. Rechab, I am so glad, so very 
 happy to see you, though the sight of you 
 makes my wound, my dreadful wound bleed 
 afresh. Oh ! my child, my child, my lovely 
 Emma. Would that I had died for thee, my 
 child." 
 
 " Mr. Scrapling, I am, you may be sure, 
 exceedingly sorry for your awful bereavement, 
 for I was an eye-witness of the melancholy 
 catastrophe, and I sincerely wish that I were 
 better quahfied to console you. But your own 
 ffood sense will inform vou, that incessant 
 lamentation is unavailing, and your knowledge 
 of the scriptures, that we should not mourn as 
 men without hope for them that sleep in God. 
 Your beautiful child died it is true, by what 
 appeared to us a most awful visitation ; but its 
 death was instantaneous. It was no sufferer. 
 It was removed by the almighty power of God 
 in an instant from its earthly house to a house 
 not made with hands. Mr. Scrapling, your 
 beautiful child is in heaven, and has more need 
 to mourn for vou than vou for it."
 
 ANTIPODES. 203 
 
 So far I canted by main force, for I never 
 was clever at extempore preaching to the dis- 
 tressed, and in the present instance I was 
 addressing a clergyman of some standing and 
 was myself a youth. But I was obliged to say 
 something, and it turned out better than I 
 expected when I began. My last remark indeed 
 might have been matured by much reflection, 
 so suitable I thought it to his situation, though 
 it was quite an impromptu. It evidently startled 
 him, and convinced me that he thought the 
 sudden and awful death of that little innocent 
 was for his hypocrisy. " Well," thought I, 
 and what is as quick as thought ? "I am glad 
 that this is the impression. It will do no harm 
 to my suit. Surely he dares not repeat the 
 offence, through fear of the thunder striking 
 him and showing him his impiety where the 
 fire is never quenched. If he does, I shall be 
 tempted to run away through fear of sharing 
 the same fate." 
 
 "Yes, Mr. Rechab, it was a beautiful, a 
 most beautiful child. Oh, what a beautiful 
 child it was. And so innocent, Mr. Rechab,
 
 204 ANTIPODES. 
 
 SO very innocent. It thought no wrong, it had 
 not a wicked thought, not a single wicked idea, 
 I do really believe. Oh, what a lovely temper, 
 what a heavenly disposition. It was indeed an 
 angel, a little cherub. Yes, Mr. Rechab, yes, it 
 is, it is in heaven." 
 
 The tears poured down his face in torrents, 
 and his emotion shook and convulsed his whole 
 person, and made it impossible for the human 
 mind to doubt the sincerity of his grief, and 
 that it was very deep indeed. Nor did I ever 
 question it. 
 
 " God grant, Mr. Scrapling, that you and I 
 and all your flock may be as meet for heaven 
 before we die as was that lovely child." 
 
 And here was there a pause, a long pause of 
 profound silence and to me of as deep interest, 
 for I was really melted with pity. It was im- 
 possible for a heart of flesh not to pity him. 
 There was a pause — a pause for reflection — for 
 the use of the guide within, godlike reason. 
 And I began now to consult the monitor, and 
 seriously to consider what next should be 
 done.
 
 ANTIPODES. 205 
 
 Sure he that made us with such large discourse, 
 Looking before and after, gave us not 
 That capabiUty and godUke reason 
 To rust in us unused. 
 
 I felt myself in a rather delicate position. 
 Here was Mr. Scrapling so overwhelmed with 
 grief, that his mind at present seemed as if it 
 v/ould reject every other thought than that of 
 his child, and I thought it would seem exceed- 
 ingly selfish in me, and moreover indecent, ill- 
 bred, gross ignorance of the common forms of 
 polite behaviour, to intrude my own personal 
 concerns upon his more hallowed thoughts. I 
 therefore determined to take my leave as soon as 
 possible without any mention of my own wants. 
 I thought it would be more becoming to post- 
 pone the matter, until a few weeks should have 
 cicatrized the wound on his mind. I began 
 therefore to make a few general observations on 
 subjects of no concern to either of us pre- 
 liminary to my exit, when I heard myself thus 
 accosted by the vicar. 
 
 " Have you heard, Mr. Rechab, of a curacy ?
 
 206 ANTIPODES. 
 
 eh ? yes — of a curacy, or any other situation or 
 employment ?" 
 
 "I have not." 
 
 " Have you then no expectations, no views 
 of any?" 
 
 " None, and I now confess, which you pro- 
 bably suspected, that I came to have a little 
 conversation with you on the subject. I received 
 no answer, Mr. Scrapling, to my applications 
 for the advertisements you gave me." 
 
 " Ah ! yes, yes, the advertisements. I re- 
 member, I gave you an advertisement or two, 
 and you have not obtained the curacies ? You 
 have not been successful, Mr. Rechab, have you ? 
 They were disposed of to some acquaintance, 
 yes, some personal applicant or friend on the 
 spot, were they ?" 
 
 " Upon my word, Mr. Scrapling, you ask 
 for information which I am not able to give 
 you. I know not whether any friend or 
 acquaintance or personal applicant was the 
 successful candidate, or any one else. If 
 there were such curacies advertised, I suspect
 
 ANTIPODES 207 
 
 they were disposed of prior to my applica- 
 tion." 
 
 " Oh, there certainly were such : yes, yes, 
 there were such. T showed vou the advertise- 
 ments which I had copied for you." 
 
 " Yes, no doubt there were such, but I think 
 I must have applied too late. Do you remember 
 where you saw them ?" 
 
 " Saw them ? Let me see," and he applied 
 his hand to his forehead as if in effort to recall 
 a lost idea. " Where did I see them — I think 
 — upon my word, Mr. Rechab, I really can't — 
 let me see — no — I can't, upon my word, Mr. 
 Rechab, remember just now where I saw them, 
 but it is no consequence, you know ; they are 
 past and gone." 
 
 " Yes, but I should like to see them. Were 
 they inserted in the ' Christian Remembrancer ?' 
 I think you said so, when you gave me them." 
 
 "Oh, never mind, Mr. Rechab, never mind, 
 never trouble yourself about them. If I should 
 see them again, I will show you them. Yes, I 
 will take care of them for you." 
 
 I had no doubt whatever that he had been
 
 208 ANTIPODES. 
 
 deceiving me by giving me old advertisements, 
 which he knew could be of no service ; but I 
 determined to sift the matter thoroughly before 
 I gave way to any intemperance of passion or 
 remark. 
 
 God knows, I have never resented the vicai*'s 
 behaviour as I think in my conscience I ought 
 to have done for the good of others, and above 
 all of himself. I know not why I have not in 
 this instance discharged, what I shall ever esteem 
 an imperativ^e duty. But it may be done, yea, 
 it shall be. 
 
 I do not know 
 Why yet I live to say, " this thing 's to do." 
 Sith T have cause, and will, and strength, and 
 
 means 
 To do 't 
 
 But it shall be done. I will some time or 
 other tell him my mind freely. 
 
 " You have not heard, Mr. Scrapling, since I 
 saw you last, of any curacy being vacant ? My 
 father begins to be very much concerned, and I 
 am myself exceedingly unhappy. You see, I 
 have been a considerable time now in want of a
 
 ANTIPODES. 209 
 
 situation and doing all I could to obtain one, but 
 in vain. It is very distressing, Mr. Scrapling. 
 I should be very easily satisfied. I do not 
 want or desire a very valuable appointment ; but 
 to have no employment, nothing to do and no 
 prospect of it, is very distressing and not very 
 creditable. It seems to imply that I have done 
 something for which no one will employ me. I 
 am sure, no such thing has been the case with 
 me." 
 
 " Ah ! Mr. Rechab, you will be an honour to 
 the profession, yes, an honour, a burning and a 
 shining light. I very much commend, yea, I 
 applaud with all my heart, the spirit from which 
 you wish to take orders. Yes, you would, Mr. 
 Rechab, you would be very easily satisfied, I am 
 sure you would. You look at the honour, as I 
 always said, you look at the honour. You dis- 
 regard, you despise, yes, you abhor, my dear 
 Sir, the unrighteous mammon." 
 
 I am not alive this moment if my ears did 
 not listen with an intensity enough to split the 
 drum, for the report of a thunder-clap, and I 
 compelled my mind to believe that it was not
 
 210 ANTIPODES. 
 
 thundering and lightening. My eye mechani- 
 cally looked to the door with the rapidity of 
 thought, and both my eyes winked just as the 
 eyes of those do who are expecting a tremendous 
 blow from behind, and know not the exact 
 moment when it is to come. Anon I expected 
 my eyes opening and my whole man, body and 
 soul, being laid in an instant in the heart of 
 another world. The little beautiful thunder- 
 slain child stood before me, as clearly as 
 when I saw it in the alcove, and anon a 
 black and scorched mass at its father's feet. 1 
 held my breath, at the idea of the vicar adding 
 one word more, and with a suppressed voice 
 like those that are afraid to speak, even when 
 there is no one to hear, I said, 
 
 " So, so, yes, yes, never mind, another time 
 we will talk of it." And in truth I knew not 
 what to say nor what I did say, I only knew 
 that I would have given something very con- 
 siderable to have been out of the house. He 
 saw that I was frightened as if I had seen or ex- 
 pected to see a ghost, my eyes were so agitated, 
 rolling and enlarged, and 1 have no doubt that
 
 ANTIPODES. 211 
 
 he knew what I was afraid of, but not a muscle 
 of his face betrayed the least emotion. All 
 within him and without was a dead calm : not 
 a breath was there to ruffle the mirror-like 
 placidity of his soul. He looked at me with an 
 unimpassioned eye, in which there was not the 
 least particle of fear, though there was a particle 
 or two of astonishment and something like a 
 faint shadow of a disposition to smile. I sat on 
 a bunch of nettles, and knew not what to say 
 to break the abruptness of my departure. 
 
 " Then you will have the goodness to in- 
 form me, Mr. Scrapling, if you should hear of 
 any vacant appointment which you think would 
 suit ? I cannot express to you how great a 
 favour we should esteem it, I especially, but 
 indeed my whole family." 
 
 " Well, Mr. Rechab, I should be happy, very 
 happy indeed, I cannot express the pleasure I 
 should have, to assist you; but as I told you 
 before, some time since, indeed more than once, 
 curacies are difficult, next to an impossibility, to 
 be obtained. But if any one, I care not who, is 
 likely to obtain one, you are the man."
 
 212 ANTIPODES. 
 
 " Indeed I find anything but that to be the 
 case, but you will do your best for me. Good 
 day." 
 
 I rose and he with me towards the door, 
 he evidently with a mind not quite nor indeed 
 in the least disburdened. But I was anxious 
 to be gone, for I saw to what his discourse 
 tended and I really was alarmed. So paramount 
 was avarice in his breast over every other passion 
 or consideration, that for the gratification of it, 
 I verily thought he would brave another thunder 
 storm. It made him stoop to what I thought 
 so dishonourable, that there was not an atom of 
 room in my heart for additional contempt. 
 
 " Search for the advertisements," thought I 
 " pshaw, he is not worth the trouble. His 
 covetousness makes him so despicable, base, 
 sordid, and disgusting, and, I think, of necessity 
 wretched, as to leave no consolation to the 
 most vindictive spirit, but that such an object 
 as he was, would disgrace the dignity of re- 
 venge." But as much as he was beneath my 
 contempt, such was my distress at that period, 
 that I was glad to sohcit assistance from him,
 
 ANTIPODES. 213 
 
 and so deep and so blinding was ray anxiety to 
 meet with a situation, that 1 had not the dis- 
 cernment which an idiot or blind man would 
 have had, to see, that assistance from him, 
 unless I would serve for years for nothing, was 
 as forlorn a hope as that of a culprit, when the 
 noose has been properly adjusted about his neck, 
 and Jack Ketch is in the act of leaving him 
 nothing to stand upon. 
 
 " Then you don't know of a vacancy any- 
 where, Mr. Scrapling ?" 
 
 "Well, let me see, let me see, I believe, at 
 least I have been informed, yes, I have been 
 told that — that — my curate has some thoughts 
 of leaving. Perhaps — perhaps — but you had 
 rather, I believe, Mr. Rechab, you had rather — 
 yes — yes — it would be better for you to com- 
 mence in some strange place — in some place 
 where you are not known- A prophet, Mr. 
 Rechab, is not honoured, you know, in his own 
 country." 
 
 " If I might have my choice, I should cer- 
 tainly prefer some place at a distance ; but a 
 man in my humble situation and possessed of so
 
 214 ANTIPODES. 
 
 few friends, must not be difficult to please. If 
 your curate should leave, I should esteem it a 
 great favour if you would have the goodness to 
 offer me the refusal of the curacy." 
 
 I said this, not because I wished to be his 
 curate or would have been upon any considera- 
 tion, but because I knew the absurdity of 
 soliciting his aid and declining it when offered. 
 Besides, I knew that I could always back out 
 by standing up for stipend. The bare mention 
 of stipend would be sufficient to stop his mouth, 
 if not to choke him. 
 
 " Yes, yes, but when I consider, my dear Mr. 
 Rechab, when I begin to weigh the matter well 
 over in my mind, I think, yes, I am sure, it 
 would be better for you, infinitely better, to 
 commence somewhere else. Let me see, I will 
 try to get you a curacy. Yes, I think I 
 can — let me see — just wait for half a mo- 
 ment." 
 
 He returned truly in half a moment with a 
 small scrip of paper, with an advertisement 
 copied upon it from some newspaper or periodi- 
 cal. It was clear that he had it copied ready.
 
 ANTIPODES. 215 
 
 and could, if he had chosen, have delivered it 
 into my hands long before. 
 
 " I believe, Mr. Rechab, yes, I really believe 
 — somehow or other I feel sure, that you will 
 be — yes — that — that — you will obtain this. 
 You will be successful this time." 
 
 J took the bit of paper into my hand, and 
 concealed as much as possible the indigation 
 and contempt in my countenance by turning my 
 back upon him.
 
 216 ANTIPODES. 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 r IMMEDIATELY applied for the curacy, and 
 took great pains to indite a respectful letter, 
 couched in gentlemanly language, and containing 
 such circumstances recommendatory of myself, 
 as we all, after much and careful consultation, 
 could imagine to be best calculated for the 
 purpose. I had made so many applications 
 without success, that we were become ridi- 
 culously nervous as to the sort of letter I should 
 write, as if my want of success had been owing 
 solely to the diction or expressions I had em- 
 ployed, which no doubt had been anything but 
 the case.
 
 ANTIPODES. 217 
 
 One point of long, tedious and anxious dis- 
 cussion was, whether I should, agreeably to a 
 motion of mine, propose to serve for only a 
 small stipend. My father thought it impious 
 and nothing less than simoniacal, to offer for any 
 stipend less than what should be deemed fair 
 and right in proportion to the value of the 
 living, that is, that if the living were very small, 
 it would be right, certainly not wicked, to accept 
 a very small stipend, but, if it were of great 
 value, the stipend should not be less than what 
 is ordinarily given. But above all things, he 
 shrunk from and reprobated the idea of serving 
 for less, one single shilling less, for the sake of 
 a title. This he thought no better than pur- 
 chasing orders. ■ 
 
 I, my mother and brother had only one 
 opinion, that it was impious to serve for nothing, 
 but right and proper for a small stipend, what- 
 ever might be the value of the living. He 
 thought that it was more impious to serve for 
 nothing than for a stipend too small, but that 
 the impiety of the latter was as great as the 
 stipend was too small ; so that, according to 
 
 VOL. I. L
 
 2 1 8 ANTIPODES. 
 
 his calculation, I ought never to have accepted 
 a curacy or taken orders, if the stipend had 
 been one single shilling less than what he 
 thought fair and just. It is clear that, in many 
 instances, the calculation must have been ex- 
 ceedingly difficult or rather impossible. At 
 last it was agreed that the stipend should not 
 be mentioned, but made a subject of considera- 
 tion afterwards. 
 
 It was immediately folded up, sealed and 
 committed to the post. I should have to go 
 some two hundred miles from home, and, con- 
 sidering the state of my father's health, I should 
 probably see him no more in the flesh. I took 
 up a volume of Demosthenes, which was lying 
 on the table, and the first sentence which 
 caught my eye was the following : " First, then, 
 Athenians, these our affairs must not be thought 
 desperate ; no, though their situation seems 
 entirely deplorable. For the most shocking 
 circumstance of all our past conduct is really 
 the most favourable to our future expectations. 
 And what is this ? That our total indolence 
 hath been the cause of all our present difficulties.
 
 ANTIPODES. 219 
 
 For were we thus distressed, in spite of every 
 vigorous effort which the honour of our state 
 demands, there were then no hope of re- 
 covery." 
 
 Whatever faihng I or my friends had, a 
 superstitious belief in signs or prodigies or 
 any arts of divination was not amongst them, 
 at least I had always thought so ; but all 
 superstitious people perhaps think all others 
 superstitious but themselves, as many in liquor 
 think themselves the only sober people in the 
 company. But whether there was such a 
 particular soft place in my head or not, I 
 certainly could not but think, that the sentence 
 or two so casually turned up and so selecting 
 themselves for exclusive notice, ought to read us 
 a lesson of very great use, to me in particular. 
 
 At the expiration of about a week, I received 
 a double letter, which I doubted not had re- 
 ference to my application. Of course I had 
 double postage to pay, no trifle in those days. 
 The circumstance of its being double set us all 
 on the tiptoe of expectation ; we thought it a 
 proof that the blessing of God had been wich 
 
 L -^
 
 220 ANTIPODES. 
 
 my letter and had given it success. What a 
 pleasurable hope played about our hearts, smiled 
 on our lips and sparkled in our eyes, and made 
 our hearts dance for joy. What a curious, in- 
 describable, but blissful sensation our hope pro- 
 duced ! Hope, I mean deferred, which maketh 
 the heart sick, but when it cometh, is a tree of 
 life. This sensation is the opposite of sickness 
 and what is that ? My heart knocked at my 
 breast as if it would have leaped out of its 
 receptacle, its domicile, its throne, and my hand 
 trembled so that I could not for the life of me 
 hold the letter. I twice let it fall, and when it 
 lay on the floor I thought 1 should never be 
 able to pick it up again. If such were the 
 difficulty I found in retaining the slippery, eel- 
 like thing in my grasp, not that it was at all 
 like an eel except that I could not hold it, what 
 must have been the task of breaking the seal or 
 rather wafer and of unfolding the paper. My 
 hand shook so, that I thought I could never 
 have introduced my thumb under the envelope 
 for the purpose of separating or tearing off the 
 parts attached by the wafer, and v/hen I had
 
 ANTIPODES. 221 
 
 proceeded so far, my agitation seemed to increase 
 in proportion to the gratification of our hopes. 
 
 " Dear me, Jonadab," said my mother, whose 
 patience was never very great, and who now 
 began to be fairly out of breath, " dear me, 
 what a very long time you aj-e. I am sure you 
 must be very much agitated. Let me open it." 
 
 " Give it me," said my brother, " I can open 
 it quick enough." 
 
 Reader, did you ever buy a ticket in the 
 lottery, and, being of an imaginative mind, 
 dream night and day of getting a £30,000 
 prize from Goodluck and Co., and when you 
 received their letter, (supposing you to live in the 
 country,) announcing your fate, do you re- 
 member with what trepidation and what sensa- 
 tion, which you have not words to pourtray, you 
 opened the important epistle which was to 
 enable you to ride in your carosse, and found a 
 — blank. It was singular that we did not per- 
 ceive, before we opened the letter, that it had 
 come from the general post-office ; but our 
 agitation, I suppose, shook the very senses out 
 of us. Its being a double letter caused us to
 
 222 ANTIPODES. 
 
 think, that it contained a nomination to be 
 forwarded to the Bishop, whereas it was 
 neither more nor less than my own letter 
 returned. 
 
 And what was the meaning of this ? Had 
 the villainous vicar been so iron-hearted, that 
 he could invent an advertisement and offer it to 
 me as what he had seen ? How came I not to 
 demand a sight of the pubhcation, in which it 
 was inserted ? But there is no doubt he has 
 been imposing upon us, and making a mockery 
 of our distress. And is this a clergyman, a 
 vicar ? It is impossible to conceive the indig- 
 nation which enraged me. I wished to go im- 
 mediately and tell him my mind freely, and 
 instantly to demand an explanation, to speak on 
 the subject to all the respectable inhabitants, 
 and to write to the postmaster of the place to 
 whom the letters of application were ordered to 
 be addressed. But my father stood in my way. 
 He said passion was madness, that there must 
 be some mistake, and that the vicar was as 
 fallible as any other man. My mother, who 
 was naturally as suspicious as myself, said, " it
 
 ANTIPODES. 223 
 
 is impossible, that the vicar or any other man 
 could have the heart to do such a thing : it puts 
 us to great expense and anxiety and disappoint- 
 ment, without being any benefit to him." 
 
 " He wants," said I, " to weary out my 
 patience, to make me despair of obtaining a curacy 
 and a title, and so glad to accept his title for a 
 three years' gratuitous service. I understand 
 him perfectly well. I have done so from the 
 very first. He cares not what expense and 
 distress he puts us to, so he can get me to be 
 his curate for nothing. I have also a suspicion 
 that he wishes to sell me some one of his per- 
 petual curacies. He thinks my father has got 
 a little money and he would like to finger it. 
 But I will search for these advertisements, and, 
 if I cannot find them, I will insist upon his 
 showing where he met with them. He has 
 behaved as ill as he can, and I will show him 
 no quarter." 
 
 I went to the booksellers one after another 
 with the speed of vengeance, to all without 
 exception that the town could afford to main-
 
 224 ANTIPODES. 
 
 tain. I examined every periodical they had, in 
 which advertisements are wont to be pubhshed, 
 but could find nothing I sought for. They had 
 indeed only recent numbers, and his advertise- 
 ments, if any such had ever been, must have 
 been of much remoter date. To the library, 
 therefore, I posted next. I was not a sub- 
 scriber nor was my father, but I knew the 
 librarian, and he had no hesitation to grant me 
 the favour I requested. I searched until I was 
 tired of turning over leaves, and began to despair 
 of success, when the identical advertisements 
 turned themselves up to my view. Such had 
 certainly been inserted, which was more than 
 I had expected, especially in respect tc the last ; 
 but the heartless chicanery of the vicar was, in 
 my opinion, just the same as if they had not 
 been inserted. The last had been published 
 half a year within about ten days, and the pre- 
 ceding one, when I applied for it, was of about 
 two months standing. 
 
 Now he knew that such advertisements had 
 been disposed of long before I applied, and that
 
 ANTIPODES. 225 
 
 my writing for them was neither more nor less 
 than a waste of paper, time, trouble, money and 
 patience, to say nothing of the depressing effect 
 of disappointment. Every disappointment was 
 followed by despair or a close approximation 
 to it, and every one knows what a painful state 
 of mind that is. He was insulting the distressed, 
 trampling on the fallen, mocking and aggra- 
 vating our sorrows. I would have visited him 
 immediately, but my friends would not permit. 
 They insisted on my waiting, until my passion 
 and excitement should have subsided, urging as 
 one reason that if he would not be a friend, he 
 might be an enemy, which, in our present 
 exigencies it was not prudent for us to make 
 him. I was fully sensible that passion does 
 not do things in the most prudent way, and 
 saw the propriety therefore of waiting until 
 I could do things more coolly. 
 
 I did wait. But such were my grief and 
 vexation, that 1 could not rest without some 
 sedative, and to the pipe therefore I betook 
 myself again, and, I am sorry to add, to the 
 
 L 3
 
 226 ANTIPODES. 
 
 glass also. Such a misfortune is it to have 
 once begun a bad habit. If I had never smoked 
 and never drunk to drive away care, I should 
 not have thought of doing so now ; that sort of 
 relief would not have entered my mind.
 
 ANTIPODES. • 22 
 
 tr 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 I WAS SO ennuye that I knew not how to 
 spend my time, and as there was a Thursday 
 night lecture at the parish church, I thought I 
 would make it a rule, so long as I should be at 
 home, to attend it every week, in order to get 
 quit of a little of that time which hung so heavy 
 on my hands, if not for a more important and 
 praiseworthy purpose. There was also another 
 reason, which had a good deal of concern in 
 inducing me to make this resolution. I had 
 now been a long time at home, wanting and 
 inquiring for a situation and unable to obtain
 
 228 ANTIPODES. 
 
 one. This of course was no secret in the town, 
 and consequently for some time back I had 
 been exceedingly loath from shame to show 
 myself at church on a Sunday, because people 
 took a marked notice of me, and T had become 
 a very popular topic for conversation of no 
 creditable a character. 
 
 Everybody, even numbers whom I did not 
 know personally, knew exactly how long I had 
 been at home. They made it a subject of their 
 frequent calculation, and some even made bets 
 that I should not be off, as they expressed 
 themselves, before the commencement of another 
 year. Some pretended to have heard, that, on 
 account of some misconduct, my college could 
 not conscientiously give me the requisite testi- 
 monials for the Bishop, and that this was kept 
 a profound secret out of compassion and respect 
 for my father. Some said I was a father with- 
 out ever having had a wife, many that I had 
 never taken a degree, and not a few that I bad- 
 been expelled. They concluded therefore that, 
 not being able to procure College testimonials, 
 it was necessary that I should wait at home
 
 ANTIPODES 229 
 
 three years before the clergy in this neighbour- 
 hood could recommend me to the Bishop, 
 testimonials for so long a period being required. 
 Having for these reasons absented myself from 
 church on a Sunday for a considerable time 
 past, I was anxious to make up for it by going 
 regularly to the lecture, when the audience was 
 smaller and less respectable. 
 
 To the lecture I went, and was very much 
 surprised with the prayer, an extempore effusion 
 as usual of Mr. Scrapling's, before the sermon. 
 From first to last, it was nothing but an earnest 
 supplication to God in behalf of those intended 
 and preparing for holy orders. He prayed with 
 far more than ordinary fervour, that if they 
 were waiting for ordination and could not find 
 an opportunity, could not obtain a curacy or 
 title, could not find a place in the vineyard of the 
 Lord, He would enable them by his grace to 
 wait with patience, 
 
 I could not refrain from covering my eyes 
 with my hands, and I did really think, as I 
 pressed them to my forehead, that the lightning 
 penetrated to the sensorium, and again that there
 
 230 ANTIPODES. 
 
 was a thick and awful darkness. He ceased, 
 however, and I was exceedingly glad of it, and 
 ventured again to behold the light of heaven. 
 The brilliant setting sun gleamed magnificently 
 through the painted glass, and it was a most 
 splendid evening. The preacher closed his 
 address at the throne of mercy with a petition, 
 that no hireling or lover of filthy lucre, by which 
 he meant no one who would not serve a curacy 
 for absolute nothing, might be admitted to the 
 sacred office, and then, without being hurled by 
 the red right hand of the Almighty thunderer 
 to the miseries of the lost, as I thought he 
 ought to have been, he quietly proceeded to the 
 sermon. 
 
 That his prayer was personal to me, no man 
 who understood the circumstances and heard it, 
 could entertain a doubt, and there were persons 
 there who, as well as I, applied it to me. I was 
 the only one then in the parish, who had been 
 at the university, wished to take orders 
 and had waited long for the opportunity. 
 Knowing, as I did, what an instrument he 
 wanted to make of me for the gratification of
 
 ANTIPODES. 231 
 
 his own love, of what he called filthy lucre, and 
 how he had behaved to me in reference to the 
 advertisements, I sat and listened to his dis- 
 course with a heart very unsuited, 1 confess, to 
 the place and the occasion. I thought him the 
 most wicked wretch I had ever heard of, and, 
 on my own account, personally was so enraged, 
 that I had the heart to have done him some 
 grievous bodily harm. 
 
 Yet I was obliged to behave towards him 
 apparently with great respect, I durst not 
 resent his deceitful and cruel treatment. He 
 was the vicar of the parish, and, without his 
 signature, it was not probable I should ever be 
 able to offer myself for ordination. My in- 
 dignation then I was forced to repress, my 
 heart to cloak with a countenance of much 
 seeming veneration and esteem. I maintain 
 that I was compelled thus to temporise by the 
 most forcible and painful means. What an 
 Herculean task ! My heart was inflamed, yea, 
 it burst with choler, yet was I compelled to con- 
 ceal it, and more, to seem to be tranquil, cool, 
 unmoved, perfectly satisfied, well pleased. He
 
 232 ANTIPODES. 
 
 saw, when we were in church, indeed observed 
 during his horrible prayer, for I saw him do it, 
 how he screwed up my feelings to the utmost 
 tension of which they were susceptible. Though 
 I knew that I was anything but composed, 
 though I could feel my heart beating like some 
 creature exerting itself to the utmost to extricate 
 itself from a cage or prison, yet I determined to 
 have an interview with him immediately after 
 service, and had the greatest confidence that I 
 could command my blood. It was indeed 
 running mountains high, and yet was I sure 
 that the storm would obey me. 
 
 I was extremely anxious to see him just then, 
 because I had some suspicion that he had 
 observed my look, and could see, if he had eyes 
 to see with, that it was that of a fierce, ex- 
 asperated hyena, and I thought that, if I could 
 only terrify him, without committing myself by 
 any ungentlemanlike behaviour, it might operate 
 to my advantage in his future conduct towards 
 me. My curiosity also was irresistible to know 
 what excuse he would make respecting the 
 advertisements. Patiently, therefore, did I wait
 
 ANTIPODES. 233 
 
 until the semce was finished, and I watched 
 him leave the vestry where he had disrobed, 
 quit the church, and hie to his own house. I 
 watched every look and motion, and fancied 
 that on emerging from the church portal, he 
 hastened home on the wings of fear : he cer- 
 tainly slammed the door after as if to shut out 
 danger or mischief. 
 
 But if his speed was winged with alarm, 
 mine was with vengeance. My hand was upon 
 the knocker the instant he had closed the door. 
 "Whether he had noticed my approach or not, 
 I know not ; perhaps he did not, because, 
 though I pursued with my utmost speed, I did 
 so with the stealthy pace of the cat. Indeed 1 
 had been playing the cat ever since the prayer, 
 and my feelings suffered me not to be aware of 
 it. He could not have got a yard from the 
 door, before I sent an echo through the lobby, 
 which would have startled, I think, any ordinary 
 nerves. I asked if the vicar was within : he 
 could not be denied. I was shown into the 
 drawing-room and there he was alone. 
 
 " Oh, Mr. Rechab, I am very glad, most
 
 234 ANTIPODES. 
 
 happy indeed to see you. I was just thinking 
 of you. I was just wondering if you had got a 
 title." 
 
 " And did you expect that I should have got 
 one by this ?" 
 
 " Expect — why — expect ? I don't know as to 
 expect, but I was wondering if you had." 
 
 " Would you have thought it a wonder, if 1 
 had?" 
 
 " Wonder — why ? wonder — why ? As to that 
 I am not able to say ; but I thought it not im- 
 possible. No, not impossible." 
 
 " You thought it was barely no more than 
 not impossible. You thought there was not 
 the most distant probability ; that there was 
 only a possibility. Is that what I am to under- 
 stand you to say ?" 
 
 " Yes, yes. It was not impossible. Such a 
 thing was not impossible. I could know no 
 more." 
 
 " But you did not think, Mr. Scrapling, that 
 there was the smallest conceivable probability. 
 Did you, or did you not ?" 
 
 " Upon my word, Mr. Rechab, I don't — really
 
 ANTIPODES. 235 
 
 I don't understand you. You seem to ask, yes, 
 you interrogate with very great warmth, with 
 uncommon anxiety and earnestness. I hope, 
 Mr. Rechab, I hope that nothing, that no offence, 
 yes, that no offence is intended." 
 
 " Mr. Scrapling, I only ask a civil question ; 
 and a civil question, you know, deserves a civil 
 answer." 
 
 " But, but — my dear, my dear Mr. Rechab — it 
 is, it is, such, such a very, very odd question — 
 yes, a very, very odd question." 
 
 " Nevertheless, Mr. Scrapling, I beg permis- 
 sion to ask you, with the greatest respect, which 
 I hope will be always due, and always paid by 
 me to you, as the vicar of this parish. Did you 
 think that there was the most distant proba- 
 bility that I had obtained a title ? The question 
 is very simple, intelligible, and not impertinently 
 inquisitive about secrets, which I have no busi- 
 ness to know. I mean no offence, Mr. Scrap- 
 ling, and therefore, beg you will have the good- 
 ness to answer me without hesitation. Did you 
 think there was the smallest probability of my 
 having obtained a title ?"
 
 236 ANTIPODES. 
 
 " Upon my word — really, Mr. Rechab, I don't 
 know. I cannot think why you should ask 
 such a question. What matters it — of what 
 concern is it, what I thought ?" 
 
 " I see plainly, Mr. Scrapling, that you are 
 determined not to answer the question. I there- 
 fore ask you, did you think there was the least 
 probability of success, in my application for the 
 curacy of which you gave me the last advertise- 
 ment ?" 
 
 " Upon my word, Mr. Rechab, you appear to 
 be — I think I had better, I think I had better — 
 yes, it would be better to ring the bell for the 
 servant." 
 
 " Did you think I had the least chance for the 
 curacy in the last advertisement ?" 
 
 " Mr. Rechab, you appear to be — the least 
 chance — upon my word — yes, you appear to 
 be — very, very warm — the least chance ? it 
 was impossible — utterly impossible for me to 
 know." 
 
 " What was the date of the last advertise- 
 ment ? I will say nothing of the others at 
 present."
 
 ANTIPODES. 237 
 
 " I never — the date ? — let me see — the date ? 
 I never thought of — no — it never entered my 
 head — to notice it." 
 
 " Then you mean to say that you never 
 knew the date of it ?" 
 
 " I— I— yes— I do." 
 
 " And what sort of a heart must you have 
 had to put us, a poor family, to the expense 
 and trouble of applying for a curacy, advertised 
 you knew not when, might be, for aught you 
 know, half-a-year before ? When I received 
 the advertisements into my hands from yours, 
 I took it for granted, how could I do otherwise, 
 that you knew they were only just published, 
 and consequently, were prompt application made, 
 that there was some chance of obtaining them? 
 How could I think they were half-a-year old ? 
 Your behaviour has been extremely cruel, unbe- 
 coming that Christian tenderness which should 
 pervade the breast of every disciple of the com- 
 passionate Redeemer. You excited expectations 
 which you were sure would not be realized, and 
 foresaw, you must have done, the unhappiness 
 which would spring from our disappointment.
 
 238 ANTIPODES. 
 
 If you had no feeling or regard for me, you 
 might, you ought to have had some compassion 
 for my aged and unhappy parents." 
 
 " Really, Mr. Rechab — upon my word, Mr. 
 Rechab — I am very sorry — exceedingly sorry — 
 if I have caused you — yes, you or your friends, 
 any uneasiness. But I knew not — it was im- 
 possible for me to know — whether you had any 
 — yes, the least chance." 
 
 " Did you not know, that the last advertise- 
 ment which you put into my hands, had been 
 inserted in the ' Christian Remembrancer' half-a- 
 year within eight or ten days prior to the day 
 on which you gave it me ?" 
 
 " Knew — knew — let me see — yes, yes, yes — 
 I remember — yes^ — I did know that — but — but 
 — you might have — yes — you might have 
 succeeded nevertheless, you know." 
 
 " You did know then ? Why, you have 
 already said that you did not. But I had no 
 doubt of it. I was sure that you knew. And 
 how could you think of giving me such old 
 advertisements? How could you have the 
 heart to practise such a cruel imposition ?"
 
 ANTIPODES. 239 
 
 "Imposition — imposition? how can you say 
 so ? I iiad nothing — nothing whatever — but a 
 good design. I wished — I was anxious — to 
 assist you. What inducement — yes — what 
 motive could 1 have for imposing upon 
 you?" 
 
 I knew that the altercation would come to 
 this. I had foreseen it some time, though not 
 when I pursued him into the house, for then 
 passion, my eyes " in dim suffusion veil'd." I 
 could see nothing at that time : I was stone- 
 blind. He had now asked me a question, which 
 I could have answered, for I knew the proper 
 reply, but I durst not. I could not tell him, 
 " Sir, you have been wanting all this time to 
 engage me as your own curate to serve several 
 years for a title, and you thought I would not 
 consent to such an unreasonable and wicked 
 bargain, until I had been humbled by long 
 expectations, many fruitless trials, many dis- 
 appointments, even to the very threshold of 
 despair." For if I had done so, he would have 
 denied it flatly and with every plausibility of 
 truth on his side.
 
 240 ANTIPODES. 
 
 He had never offered me his title, which 
 hundreds would have esteemed a great favour, 
 who would have rejected with abhorrence all 
 offer of purchase, nor had he ever been thought 
 by the mass of his parishioners to give his 
 curates less than £100 per annum. That was 
 what he had always unblushingly affirmed, and 
 even asserted when he might have evaded the 
 falsehood. Only a few individuals knew that 
 he gave nothing. He might have said to me, 
 nor could I have disproved his assertion, that 
 he would not have given me his title, had I 
 requested him, so far was he from desiring me 
 to accept it or compelling me by dishonourable 
 manoeuvres. I was struck dumb. I had antici- 
 pated this result and dreaded it during our 
 dispute. 
 
 " Well, Mr. Scrapling, it is strange to me, if 
 you were not sure that those advertisements 
 were too old to be of any service to me, and 
 that my application for them could only be un- 
 necessary trouble and expense. Besides, you 
 ought to have told me, that the curacies had 
 been advertised half-a-vear since, and that
 
 ANTIPODES. 24 1 
 
 consequently the probability of their having 
 been filled up was very great, but that there 
 was some very small chance, and thus have 
 left it to my own discretion whether or not I 
 would write about them. This I cannot for the 
 life of me refrain from saying that I think you 
 would have done, had your intentions towards 
 me been sincere and honourable. But of course 
 you will have the goodness to offer me no more 
 of such advertisements." 
 
 " Oh ! Mr. Rechab, you know — you cannot 
 but know — that— that — it cannot be any benefit 
 to me, to offer you — yes, to put myself to any 
 trouble. I thought — it was natural I should 
 think — that I was doing you — a — kindness. 
 Others — many — very many — in this very 
 parish — would think so." 
 
 I was obliged to pull in my horns. He had 
 me in his mesh, and I found it to my sorrow 
 afterwards. I could only expose myself to 
 ridicule and worse, contempt, the indignation 
 of the whole parish. He afterwards made me 
 thus despised and indeed abhorred for my in- 
 gratitude, as he called it, though, if the truth 
 
 VOL. I. M
 
 242 ANTIPODES. 
 
 had been spoken, the name should have been 
 cruelty, his own cruelty and imposture. Though 
 I knew therefore that he had been playing me 
 the foulest trick, the recollection of which has 
 ever set my blood boiling, yet was I obliged at 
 present to appear grateful to him, which I did 
 while the tears of vexation scalded and blistered 
 my averted face. 
 
 I was now as anxious to leave Mr. Scrapling's 
 house, as I had been to pursue him into it, 
 indeed to leave him and it for ever and a day 
 longer. But when he saw me succumb, as one 
 fairly worsted and who has need to have his face 
 suffused with a blush, he affected considerable 
 dissatisfaction, as if he had been by me not 
 very honourably treated. He turned the tables 
 upon me. 
 
 " I am sure, Mr. Rechab — yes, quite sure — 
 that — I have been a very great friend — yea — 
 none would have befriended you — as — as J have 
 done. I am sorry — with — with all my heart — 
 that you are not — not — not — better pleased. 
 You appeared — really — really — were you 
 offended?"
 
 ANTIPODES. 243 
 
 I had submitted, and kept a very tight rein 
 over my rising choler for some mitmtes, knowing 
 the worse than folly, the unfair advantage he 
 would take, of my giving way to passion. But 
 now, when he affected the aggrieved person, as 
 if I had done him an injury, or offered him an 
 insult, I found my passion pull at my heart- 
 strings, beyond the power of all the reins in the 
 world to hold it in. Snaffle and bridle, and 
 curb, and all other expedients for restraining the 
 most powerful full-blood, would have been 
 smoking flax, burnt thread. But then my 
 passion roared in full cry. 
 
 " You don't approve of a hireling, Mr. Scrap- 
 ling ? No, not you." 
 
 " Oh ! Mr. Rechab, you covet — you — you — 
 long for — the honour." 
 
 " The labourer is not worthy of his hire, Mr. 
 Scrapling ? not he." 
 
 " I think— I think—" 
 
 " That a curate should serve for nothing ; 
 that he should be quite disinterested, and work 
 for the honour." 
 
 " Exactly— ex— " 
 
 M 2
 
 244 ANTIPODES. 
 
 " You said so in your prayer in the church, 
 this evening, did you not ?" 
 
 " I did— I did— Mr. Re—" 
 
 " Did you ever hear it thunder ?" 
 
 "Sir?" 
 
 " Did you ever hear it thunder, and see it 
 hghten ?" 
 
 " My dear Mr. Rechab — you know — " 
 
 " Did you ever see the heavens as black at 
 noon as ever you saw the blackest midnight, and 
 the lightning flash and hear the thunder roar, as 
 if the world had been dashed in pieces ?" 
 
 " For God's sake, for God's sake, Mr. 
 Rechab—" 
 
 " Did you pray, said you ? Did you not ex- 
 ecrate even in the house of God the poor 
 curate who labours for his daily bread ? Oh ! 
 how could the thunders sleep after having 
 blasted that beautiful, innocent child ? Where 
 is your child, Mr. Scrapling ? Where is your 
 child, Sir ?" 
 
 And I was instantly out of his house, and 
 had banged to the door, the noise of which 
 seemed to be the finale to my own vociferation,
 
 ANTIPODES, 245 
 
 which still rung in his ears. I was in the street. 
 I was under the canopy of heaven, the blue 
 etherial of the blessed. I breathed more freely, 
 but still with the inflation of vindictive lungs, 
 and I strode towards my father's house with the 
 strength of a giant. I strode away with a 
 mind anything but dejected, for passion gave it 
 the elasticity, the spring of the tiger, and I 
 heard as I hurried along : 
 
 " Is that a parson ?" 
 
 *' No," replied another voice, " not yet — only 
 wants to be. Nobody will employ him ; he is 
 too bad to be a parson ; they may make him a 
 soldier." 
 
 This was the whole of the above dialogue 
 that I heard, for of course I was too proud to 
 stop and listen ; but it was evidently spoken in 
 an elevation of voice intended distinctly to reach 
 my ears. It was between two hard labouring 
 men, plebeians as a pompous aristocrat would 
 call them, profanum vulgus, operatives in the 
 neologism of Lord Brougham and Vaux, the 
 canaille in the dialect across the water. They 
 threw the insult after me, and I do assure you.
 
 246 ANTIPODES. 
 
 it hit me. My ears were too acute, sore, and 
 sensitive to be made of mere flesh and blood ; 
 they must have been formed of some spiritual 
 material, for angels' ears could not have drunk 
 the above words with greater thirst, and with- 
 out losing a single drop, or tithe of a drop, if by 
 drops I may be allowed to represent words. 
 Yes, I heard. They need not have stretched 
 their lungs as they did : a whisper would have 
 overtaken me. Yes, I heard, and the words 
 sunk into my soul deeper and deeper as my 
 mind dwelt upon them, until they were written 
 there as indelibly as the sins of sinners in the 
 book of life.
 
 ANTIPODES. 24 7 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 As soon as I reached home, I bolted myself 
 into the small apartment like a debtor pursued 
 by the harpies of the law. What cared I for 
 the world, or propriety, or happiness, or reputa- 
 tion, or life, or death. Had I considered for a 
 moment, it would have flashed on my mind 
 with the brilliance of a sunbeam, and the terrors 
 of eternal wrath, that " every cup is unblessed, 
 and the ingredient is a devil." I should have 
 called out, or my fears would, " reputation, 
 reputation, reputation ;" but could I consider '? 
 Could I weigh in the casuist's nicely adjusted
 
 248 ANTIPODES. 
 
 and accurately poised scales, the obliquity or 
 rectitude to a grain of what I was doing ? 
 Could I even think, barely cogitate for an instant 
 on the subject ? Such at that tinae was my 
 state of mind, that I thought then, and have 
 often since, that I could as soon have squared 
 the circle, or told the longitude to a second 
 without calculation. My mind was not my 
 own. It was seized, clutched, stolen, murdered 
 by the felonious idea of my treatment. It 
 lay within my bosom, skin with a thousand 
 gashes ; it was the target of a thousand daggers. 
 Who, said I, can be surprised if I pour upon it 
 anything, no matter what, which falls in my 
 way, so I think it sanative ? 
 
 In plain prose, I never thought an instant of 
 the impropriety or danger, but mixed and quaffed 
 and should have done, had it been prussic 
 acid. 
 
 In short, reader, I was tippling, and you see 
 by what degrees, by what stealthy, imperceptible 
 pace, I was making myself a solitary sot. 
 
 I have before repeated a remark, not my own, 
 for it is probably as old as the world, viz., that
 
 ANTIPODES. 249 
 
 man is in a great nneasure the creature of cir- 
 cumstances. You have seen how my mind was 
 worked up into a fever by the vilest hypocrisy 
 and cruelty, and that too by a reverend pastor, 
 who ought to have had more respect for his 
 flock or any part of it, I w ill not say who ought 
 to have known b ; ter, for better he did know. 
 You have seen also the disappointment, with 
 which my juvenile soul was assailed, a disappoint- 
 ment which has ever been thought by competent 
 judges the severest wit^ which the mind of man 
 can be tried. 
 
 I commenced toping gently, cautiously at first, 
 as one afraid of treading upon a man-trap or 
 spring-gun, but the rubicon was passed. Having 
 a second time this evening comforted my heart, 
 1 took the alarm, serious, terrible alarm relin- 
 quished the pipe and glass both, and hastened into 
 theopen air. Again, said I for the thousandth time, 
 if I mean to hve, I must breathe the unconfined 
 winds of heaven, and I rushed into the valley, the 
 noble, majestic, magnificent e panse between the 
 hills, v/hich vied in breadth with the vault of 
 heaven. I walked quick, as one in haste, in reality 
 
 M 3
 
 250 ANTIPODES. 
 
 to leave my thoughts behind me, as if by change 
 of locality and scenery, I should doff my old 
 thoughts which were the vulture at my liver, and, 
 though it must be confessed that man can outrun 
 anything but himself, yet will a removal to 
 a fresh place beget a change in the current of 
 your thoughts. 
 
 I knew it, I felt it, thousands of times, for 
 my grief had been a terrible annoyance but also 
 very fertile in expedients for relief. The mind 
 seems to make the same effort to throw off and 
 get quit of its peculiar complaints, its griefs, its 
 vexations, its torturing passions, that nature 
 makes to throw off any disease from the body 
 by the discharge of offending humours, and as 
 medicine is an assistance to the body, so change 
 of situation is a powerful alterative and relief to 
 the sick of soul. 
 
 I walked as if I had been in excellent spirits, 
 and indeed endeavoured to be so, and the very 
 apery of vivacity, the very affectation of cheerful- 
 ness, had a mercurial effect on the mind. I walked, 
 not down the valley, but to the apex of the hill 
 which, being continued for miles, formed an
 
 ANTIPODES. 251 
 
 inclosure of the valley, and T went in an oblique 
 direction, not through the pathless sward, but 
 on a footpath which for centuries had conducted 
 from Swallowbeck to Cowley, and when I had 
 mounted the brow of the cliff, I felt the volatility 
 which at the outset I had affected, had gradually 
 grown into real, heart-felt, unsophisticated joy. 
 I was happy, satisfied, well pleased, why, where- 
 fore, at what, I knew no more than the antipodes. 
 I knew that the cheefulness would be very 
 evanescent, but I was really surprised at its 
 existence. I am sure I had every reason to 
 be unhappy, and yet was I high, elevated in 
 soul as the mountain on which I stood. 
 
 The sun was just receding behind a hamlet 
 of considerable magnitude on the opposite side 
 of the valley, of which I had as complete a view 
 where I stood, as sailors in the Mediterranean 
 have of Algiers. The houses ran up to the 
 summit, and the sun was among the chimnies, 
 fast sinking in the most sublime flood of glorious 
 light. The heavens around him were clothed 
 in crimson, which no artist but He who hung 
 out the heavens like a curtain could ever pourtray.
 
 252 ANTIPODES. 
 
 I stood gazing as in days gone by on the lumi- 
 nary and his curtain of crimson and every other 
 colour combined and interwoven, and my tem- 
 porary, unaccountable joy mellowed into a sober 
 sadness, I was not unhappy, but joy and sorrow 
 in my soul seemed to kiss each other, and for 
 once to draw up articles of peace. I was not 
 happy, I was not miserable. 
 
 How often have I feasted my eyes and soul 
 with the sublimity of yon setting orb from this 
 very spot ! What idea of heaven, of its visible 
 magnificence at least, after this life is over, can 
 I conceive better than what the spectacle before 
 me presents ? and if it be so beautiful, so grand, 
 so awful, and far more doubtless it is, what 
 signify the misfortunes man is heir to here? 
 He will soon not even be able to recollect them. 
 The dream will have left no trace behind. 
 Would that I could fix my heart upon that rock 
 of ages, to which no cares, no griefs, or insults 
 can reach. " He builds too low who builds beneath 
 the skies." But here for a time we must live, 
 here the body must be, but at the same time 
 cannot the soul be in heaven ? Though chained
 
 ANTIPODES. 253 
 
 to this perishable tabernacle for a few years, yet 
 can she make, it seems, heaven the depository of 
 his wealth, and the poorest in earth may be rich 
 in heaven. 
 
 I began to be gravely resolved that I would 
 not in future let my peace of soul be so vul- 
 nerable to the annoyances of the world, but 
 endeavour to oppose religion as her shield for 
 protection, and I did really think that nothing 
 merely earthly would be able to plunge me again 
 into such an abyss of wretchedness as that in 
 which I had recently been. I was calm and 
 not only resolved to continue so, but was firmly 
 of opinion that I should. Thank God, said I, 
 there is such a thing as religion to medicine the 
 afflicted soul, and to protect it from the tempests 
 of passion to which it is naturally exposed. And 
 I heard a conversation passing between a gen- 
 tleman and a lady on the other side of the 
 hedge, high and thick, which separated me from 
 them ; and as the voices drew nearer, they 
 arrested my attention as having been familiar to 
 my ears. They were those of Jane and De
 
 254 ANTIPODES. 
 
 Witt, my only love and my happy, ever-blessed 
 rival. 
 
 Yes, I knew that voice — that sweet, subdued 
 voice. How I supported myself I know not, 
 but the blood fled from my face, my eyes were 
 expanded and dim, and my lips apart as if some- 
 thing unearthly and most terrific had stood 
 before me. I saw them, but they saw not me, 
 and I heard them — heard them ? Every whisper 
 of Jane's was trumpet-tongued. The very spot 
 they trod on was to me hallowed ground, for it 
 was there she first solemnly plighted her troth 
 to me, and sealed the promise with the impress 
 of her lips. That spot had been heaven to me 
 once, and was witness now to my irreparable 
 wretchedness. I was rivetted to the place, an 
 immovable, living, and only just living monu- 
 ment, as if the hand of death had been upon 
 me. The winds had carried away the vow 
 which she had made to me. They were walking 
 very slowly, a pace requisite perhaps for her then 
 state ; but having arrived at the very spot, she 
 proposed, in a faint and scarcely articulate voice, 
 that they should stop and look about them.
 
 ANTIPODES. 255 
 
 Stop they did, but her eyes seemed to look 
 inward, not on the magnificent sky before them. 
 She looked upon empty space, while he spoke 
 to ears hermetically sealed to his idle garrulity. 
 She heard him not, his words died in the 
 mountain breeze, as had done her own far more 
 solemn words addressed to me long before. 
 Her face had the sickly hue of a corroded heart. 
 Yes, there was a secret, which preyed upon that 
 heart, and undermined, and sapped, and des- 
 troyed its happiness. The sun, as I have said, 
 was just sinking behind the hamlet, and it was 
 just so, when she, on the very spot where she 
 now stood, made me the promise which I 
 thought as sacred as if made at the altar. My 
 father's house was visible from where we 
 stood, and, after the engagement ratified by the 
 seal of love, we had descended into the valley 
 towards my home. I now heard her husband 
 accost her in the following words, as they gazed 
 on the quickly disappearing god of light. 
 
 " How often, after the labours of the day, 
 have I walked up to this knoll on which we
 
 256 ANTIPODES. 
 
 now stand, and watched yonder magnificent 
 luminary set as he is now doing. Were you 
 ever here before ?" 
 
 Her eyes were fixed on the brilHant orb now 
 nearly out of sight, in an abstracted gaze, and 
 her lips moved not in reply, yet his words took 
 hold of her understanding. Yes, she heard 
 him, that the increasing paleness of her lips 
 sufficiently assured me, but she spoke not. 
 
 " I have often hence cast my eyes around, as 
 the sun descended, and observed the beautiful 
 evening sky gilded by the vermillion beams of 
 the sun, and then looked down in the valley, 
 yonder where stands Mr. Rechab's house, and 
 remarked how much farther advanced were the 
 shades of evening. Look, Jane, at yon house, 
 how dark and gloomy it looks compared to the 
 brightness and splendour, and cheerfulness of 
 the hamlet on the brow of the opposite hill." 
 
 And having thus expressed himself, he printed 
 a kiss on her Hps, those lips which had sworn 
 fidelity to me for ever, and then once more I 
 beheld her eyes and drank deeper of affliction, but
 
 ANTIPODES. 257 
 
 she spoke not, nor moved. Her face, her lips, 
 were the sicklv hue of sorrow, of a withered 
 heart, but she turned not. 
 
 " Look, Jane, at the contrast ; look at Mr. 
 Rechab's house in the valley. But you seem 
 very pale, my dear, are you unwell ?" 
 
 At these words she was roused to something 
 like attention, and she turned towards the object 
 pointed out to her, but seemed afraid to catch 
 it with her eye, and to avoid it she turned 
 rather further, towards where I stood, and 
 through the dense foliage my form, my features, 
 my countenance, marred as they were in com- 
 parison of what they were when she knew them, 
 arrested her notice. She knew me, and I fled 
 down the valley with the strides of a maniac in 
 haste, and I really thought that my heart was 
 broken. I heard a faint shriek, the shriek of 
 one heart-broken like myself, little above a 
 whisper, but it was a shriek of agonizing 
 sorrow. I turned not to look, for I could not 
 give the medicine for a sick mind, which I 
 required for my own. Soon, very soon was I
 
 258 ANTIPODES. 
 
 in my father's house, and in the confined little 
 cabin which I had so recently quitted. 
 
 It was growing late, indeed I cannot conceive 
 what could induce them to walk out so far from 
 her father's, where thev were on a visit, at so 
 late an hour ; unless, as I have always suspected, 
 it was in compliance w^th a proposal of Jane's. 
 How soon was my sober sadness dispersed, and 
 my mind agitated again, like the troubled ocean, 
 by a sudden and most violent gust. Man makes 
 resolutions, and is not sure that he shall keep 
 them for an hour. 
 
 " It is impossible," said I, " for me to abstain 
 from the habits which I abhor, until I shall have 
 been removed, by a merciful Providence, to some 
 other part of the world, and until time shall 
 have obscured the recollection of my misfortunes, 
 and I will make no more resolutions of amend- 
 ment. God himself must see, that, at present, 
 my reformation is impracticable, and He is too 
 benevolent and righteous to demand of me im- 
 possibilities. In my present position, virtue is 
 an idle name."
 
 ANTIPODES. 259 
 
 Again the wreaths of smoke ascended in rapid 
 succession, and the glass contained another devil. 
 I had now no objection, not the least perceptible 
 spark of an objection, to the pipe and the glass. 
 I did not think that God himself would or could 
 object, knowing the constitution of my soul, that 
 it could only stand a certain brunt, and then 
 must necessarily yield. Again did the burning 
 liquid warm my heart, but to no more than a 
 reasonable warmth, as I thought, would I submit. 
 Again did I exercise my faculties of ratiocination 
 on the point, and, after carefully syllogizing, 
 concluded that, though not lawful in all cases, in 
 my present a recourse to these means of solace 
 was allowable, if not commendable. I am per- 
 mitted to cheer my heart with the gift of Provi- 
 dence, and if once, more than once, and if at all, 
 I soon proceeded to infer that I might, to a 
 considerable extent, though not excessive. No, 
 I did not think that I had a right to get drunk, 
 to swallow until my head and eyes should be no 
 longer capable of discharging their respective 
 functions ; but I did think that I had more than 
 a right, that it was indeed imperative on me to
 
 260 ANTIPODES. 
 
 make myself cheerful, for the dispersion of that 
 ennui, and often far worse, that discontent, that 
 spirit of repining, which, in the least degree I 
 knew to be excessively sinful. 
 
 In my conversation with my friends, I re- 
 counted the whole history of my attendance at 
 the lecture, of the vicar's undoubted personalities 
 in his prayer, of the general notice of it taken by 
 the congregation, and of the surprise expressed 
 in their countenances, and I observed that I had 
 no doubt it would spread all over the parish, for 
 that it was clearly understood by every one 
 present. More particularly did I lay before them 
 my interview with the vicar, " extenuating 
 nothing, nor setting down aught in malice," and 
 it was acknowledged by all, my father not ex- 
 cepted, that he had certainly been enacting the 
 part of a most unfeeling impostor, and that I 
 should never make my shadow darken his door 
 again. After, indeed, the manner in which my 
 rage and indignation had vented themselves, this 
 was thought necessary and unavoidable. Whether 
 he had ever been my friend or enemy — he was 
 now, at all events, not my friend, perhaps a
 
 ANTIPODES. 261 
 
 mortal foe ; but whatever might be his power 
 and ingenuity in the latter capacity, we were 
 sure that he could not stab deeper, or with a 
 more poisoned weapon. 
 
 Never shall I forget the length and depth of 
 the grief he caused us. I knew nothing he 
 could have done, which would have produced 
 equal mortification. It is not always what the 
 world thinks the greatest injury, which inflicts 
 the greatest pain. Well, we that evening com- 
 mended ourselves, our affairs, our souls, our 
 bodies, our estates, our all, to the consideration 
 and care of the Universal Parent, with far more 
 than our usual earnestness, making known to 
 Him what He knew better than we could tell 
 Him, our wants, our sorrows, and begging His 
 protection and providential care, who catereth for 
 the sparrow.
 
 262 ANTIPODES. 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 I SLEPT not that night. Not a minute 
 could I prevail upon my senses to compose 
 themselves to rest, though I endeavoured to 
 calm them with the lullaby of a nurse to her 
 infant, and laboured to my utmost to exclude 
 fi"om the sensorium every image, every idea 
 which might engage their attention, and tickle 
 their fancy : it was all abortive. They were 
 all five broad, staring awake, and more than 
 alive, painfully, agonizingly quick. Can he 
 who is tortured by the rack, until a hair's 
 breath intei-venes between him and death, be
 
 ANTIPODES. 263 
 
 said to be asleep, or more than awake ? So 
 was I. The sun rose with all rlie sublimity 
 with which I had seen him go to rest, and the 
 return of his brilliancy set before my eyes the 
 magnificence of his orb the night before, and 
 my once betrothed and eternally beloved, and I 
 heard her shriek, far more piercing than before, 
 and my limbs were impelled into motion, as 
 when I descended from the cliff, and sleep was 
 as far from my eyes as the east is from the 
 west. 
 
 In my forlorn situation I have no consolation 
 but one ; things could not be worse ; so said 
 I, but the thought rushed into my mind, the 
 instant the words had escaped my lips, that 
 my father might die before I met with employ- 
 ment, or if not, be completely incapacitated, and 
 so need support, instead of being able to afford 
 it. But said I again, " God tempers the wind 
 to the shorn lamb ;" He caters for the sparrow ; 
 every living creature opens its mouth wide, and 
 fie fills it. I have too little faith : I am worth 
 more than many sparrows. And new grief 
 had anti-stimulated so far as to produce a
 
 264 ANTIPODES. 
 
 revulsion in my favour, and to become a sti- 
 mulant, and I felt something like the consola- 
 tion of a culprit sentenced to die, whose 
 moments are just numbered, and whose only 
 solace is that the bitterness of death will soon 
 be past. 
 
 It now came into my mind, perhaps at the 
 suggestion of some tantalizing demon, that I 
 should probably be soon receiving a letter from 
 the tutors of my college. Hope from all other 
 quarters had been cut off, and now in hunting 
 about, my mind naturally turned her eyes to 
 Oxford, from which only there now seemed to 
 be an avenue or vista of expectation. I had 
 written to them more than once, and surely, 
 so strongly as I had depicted my disappoint- 
 ment and griefs, and those of my family, and 
 my utter despair of assistance from elsewhere, 
 they would, I concluded, oifer me the next 
 appointment thrown in their way, if it were 
 only to stop the dogged perseverance of my 
 importunities. I knew they often had it in 
 their power, for they had frequently, during my 
 under-graduateship, been most urgently soli-
 
 ANTIPODES. 265 
 
 cited as a great favour, to recommend a youth 
 of their own college, and had been more than 
 once unable to find a man who would accept 
 the post they offered. 
 
 " No doubt," thought I, " they will be offer- 
 ing me soon, what no other man will deem 
 worth his acceptance, though it will be worth 
 mine, if it be worth anything." And this 
 single possibility, for probability, in truth it was 
 not, administered laudanum to my brain, and 
 my eyelids closed when they should have finally 
 opened for the day. Sleep came, but not that 
 completely oblivious sleep, which is the most 
 perfect representative of death, and during 
 which the soul slumbers as well as the body. 
 The various scenes and events of the preceding 
 day and evening, with many alterations and 
 additions, passed in review before me like the 
 images of a phantasmagoria. 
 
 There was an immense ball of red, glaring 
 light before me, and I gazed on it intensely, 
 and mourned and lamented for the reminiscences 
 associated with it, though weep I could not. 
 Again I was with my beloved and we vowed 
 
 VOL. I. N
 
 266 ANTIPODES. 
 
 eternal love and fidelity, that nothing but death 
 should divide us, and again our lips sealed the 
 engagement, and I was happy. I should marry 
 my Jane, and know no disappointment. And 
 methought she was happy, and smiled upon me 
 with her once beautiful, celestial countenance. 
 
 Further, she held in her hand a letter. I 
 could see it as plainly as I ever saw anything 
 in my life with mortal eyes. I examined it in 
 my own hand, I felt it as well as saw it. The 
 crest of the impression on the sealing-wax was 
 a certain bird. I read, too, the postmark in 
 printed characters : it was " Oxford." And I 
 said, " this is from Oxford, and I know the 
 handwriting of the address : it is Mr. Hireton's. 
 He was tutor when I was there, and he fraudu- 
 lently deprived me of a fellowship. By way of 
 compensation, and to ease his conscience, he now 
 offers me a curacy or some other situation. 
 I shall be taken away from you for a time." 
 She observed that that was its purport, that 
 she had been desired to put it into my hand, 
 and that the letter-carrier waited for the postage. 
 
 I broke open the seal with great exultation,
 
 ANTIPODES. 26 
 
 >^ 
 
 as if it had been a prize of £30,000 from 
 Goodluck and Co., and I smiled and was in 
 high glee, but no sooner did the writing within 
 meet my eye, than the characters faded as it 
 were into a mist, and became invisible. My 
 eyes were now opened, and I was really awake, 
 and lo 1 not Jane, but my beloved mother, and 
 father, and brother, whose griefs had always 
 been mine, and mine theirs, stood before me, 
 with pleasure very unusual beaming in their 
 faces, and my mother held out a letter for my 
 acceptance, which had that moment arrived 
 from the post. It was from Oxford. 
 
 " My dear Jonadab," said my mother, " this 
 is from college. I believe comfort has come at 
 last. What a sin it is to despair, as if there 
 were not a God who careth for us, and can 
 and will, if we trust in him, supply all our 
 reasonable wants. My dear, let us never despair, 
 and murmur again." 
 
 Thus was sjie moralising, and preaching right 
 
 vangelically, when my countenance, at the first 
 
 sight of the contents, struck her dumb. My 
 
 look had ten thousand times the eloquence of my 
 
 N 2
 
 268 ANTIPODES. 
 
 tongue. It was from one of ray creditors, to 
 whom I owed about £ 1 6, which I had omitted 
 to pay, not because I possessed not then the 
 means, but from sheer neghgence, or foi'getful- 
 ness. I knew not what to do with the letter, 
 much less how to arrange my tongue for an 
 explanation, as delicate, and as httle offensive as 
 possible. My tongue, however, could not wear 
 more daggers than my face. The worst of it 
 was, they knew not that I was one shilling in 
 debt, and then they might think this only the 
 beginning of many similar sorrows. If I was 
 indebted to one man, I might be to a 
 hundred. 
 
 I plucked up my courage, however, from 
 desperation, and read the letter to them aloud, 
 with the fierceness of one who cares for no 
 man, and can say to fortune, " do thy worst.". 
 The fear of more epistles of this disagreeable 
 character, steeped their disappointment in gall, 
 and embittered bitterness. Their affection inter- 
 dicted all reprobation ; and they merely asked, 
 as blandly as they were able, if that were all I 
 owed? My answer was, it is. Not a syllable
 
 ANTIPODES. 269 
 
 more did I utter then. I defied the utmost 
 malice of fortune. How can that man fear, who 
 has nothing to lose ? So cool and imperturhahle 
 was my mind at that moment, that I was like 
 a wild beast, which has been hunted and 
 wounded, and during the chase, has done all in 
 its power, and felt great anxiety to escape ; 
 but which, being driven into the cave, whence 
 escape is impossible, turns round, and keeps its 
 enemies at bay, possessing a feeling, and exhibit- 
 ing greater courage now, when, indeed, there is 
 the strongest reason to fear. 
 
 I thought really that my misfortunes, treading 
 thus upon the heels of one another, must break 
 the hearts of my friends, even were they made 
 of materials tougher than I knew them to l)e 
 of; but I had now become accustomed to bear 
 this rupture of their hearts. * Every fresh 
 mishap, had brought along with it this fear 
 in particular ; and my heart having been galled, 
 and gaUed beyond endurance, at last turned 
 round, and threw down the gauntlet, to the 
 utmost vengeance of fortune. 
 
 I rose, however, after they had retired ; and
 
 270 ANTIPODES. 
 
 during the discharge of my office at the dressing- 
 table, when I quarrelled with the looking-glass, 
 nny mind had leisure for consideration, and in 
 consideration deep, serious, and most anxious, 
 it employed it. Now, every man who has been 
 in battle knows, and is ready to admit, that 
 nothing has such a power to craven the heart, 
 as consideration. I have been told, but I do 
 not vouch for the truth of it, that officers, 
 more than one, came withm sight of the field of 
 Waterloo, and then absented themselves from 
 the whole battle, and that military men have 
 said, " that had they once entered into the 
 battle, their blood would have defied the thickest 
 shower of balls." Reflection, as well as con- 
 science, makes cowards «of us all. 
 
 After the event of this morning had been 
 fairly shaken and sifted in my mind, I felt some 
 confusion of face, at the idea of making my 
 appearance, which I was just about to do, in 
 the parlour, for breakfast. I had owed this 
 sum of money, w4iich to us was no trifle, and 
 had professed to them that all my debts had 
 been fully discharged, but when I said so, I had.
 
 ANTIPODES. 271 
 
 be it observed, really forgotten the above. It 
 was for the gown and hood, and a few clothes, 
 but the two first items were the principal ; and 
 I had positively come away with these things, 
 procured on the occasion of my taking the degree 
 of B.A., as completely shpt out of my mind, as 
 if they had never been there before ; indeed, I 
 could not remember that I had ever been con- 
 scious, or aware that they had to be paid for. 
 The letter, had not recalled an idea of debt, but 
 created one. For the first time, on the sight 
 of that " request to be paid at your earliest con- 
 venience," did I know that I owed the money. 
 So that, though I had told them a falsehood, it 
 was not a wilful one. Nevertheless, I had no 
 doubt that they would think it, and among 
 themselves, call it the latter, a story, which is 
 the less fierce, and more lady-hke word. 
 
 Into the breakfast-room I bounced, with that 
 audacity, and eifected nonchalance, which a 
 guilty person exhibits in his whole deportment 
 and mien, when he is enacting an innocent cha- 
 racter. Any person, in the least acquainted with 
 human character and countenance, would see at
 
 272 ANTIPODES. 
 
 the first glance, that I was endeavouring to 
 seem what I was not ; and the very apery only 
 confirmed their opinion, that in the matter of 
 the debt aforesaid, I had been guilty of a 
 wilful untruth. I was conscious that they 
 thought so, and this only made me perform my 
 post, as a stage-player on the great theatre of 
 the world, so much the worse. In any common 
 barn of histrionic celebrity, I should have been 
 hissed. I saw that I was a poor player, and, 
 therefore, without anything more to do, took the 
 bull by the horns, and commenced my apologetic 
 explanation. I assured them, in the most 
 solemn manner, that I had never thought of 
 the debt, though I ought to have done so ; and 
 that if the bill had been presented prior to my 
 departure, as it should have been, I should have 
 discharged it, my resources being at that time 
 sufficient for the purpose. I also assured them 
 that I had been endeavouring to recollect, but 
 could not, a single creditor more. 
 
 They were fully satisfied ; but there was a 
 disappointment, which hung a heavy, and a 
 dead weight on their minds. They thought.
 
 ANTIPODES. 273 
 
 poor things, on the arrival of that letter, that ;i 
 reference, or rather final discharge, had come 
 to their sorrows, and they found only the sick- 
 ening of despair, and solace in resignation, to 
 the worst. We began now to think, in good 
 earnest, that a situation of my sort, friendless 
 as I was, was out of my reach, and my father 
 very seriously advised me to think no more of 
 the church, to which it evidently appeared that 
 I had no call, or of any other post for which 
 a literary education is a qualification ; but to go 
 somewhere where I was unknown, and learn a 
 business. 
 
 He mentioned several, at which my 
 classical stomach heaved with disgust, and one 
 in particular which, had I acceded to the pro- 
 posal, would have coffined me, not at three score, 
 but under thirty : it was that I should become 
 spirit-merchant, for which purpose he would 
 advance me a sufficient sum of money. Could I 
 have unlearned what I learned at school and at 
 Oxford, could my mind have been thoroughly 
 washed from all classical lore, as if there had 
 
 N 3
 
 274 ANTIPODES. 
 
 never been the impression of a single Latin 
 word, or Greek character upon it, I should have 
 embraced the overture and have avoided a 
 multitude of sins. I should have been com- 
 paratively at peace with my conscience. 
 
 But there was an if in all that : much virtue in 
 an if, says Shakespeare. I could not unlearn Latin 
 and Greek, nor forget that I had been at Oxford, 
 and was B.A. Having aspired to a profession, 
 my mind would not, could not, descend to a 
 trade. Having learned to soar aloft, it is difficult 
 to learn to creep on the ground. We came at 
 last to the conclusion, that, after a few more 
 attempts at a professional situation, I should 
 open a private school somewhere in the south. 
 We were afraid of the expense of such an un- 
 dertaking requiring more money than we 
 possessed ; but on a small scale, proper for the 
 commencement, we thought it not unfeasable. 
 We also thought that, after I had established a 
 respectable school, should my moral and religious 
 character be irreproachable in the neighbourhood 
 where I resided, I might probably obtain a title
 
 ANTIPODES. 275 
 
 to some neighbouring curacy. This conclusion 
 terminated our breakfast, and my father rose, he 
 was obliged to do so, to his sedentary employment 
 of the pen. 
 
 I too retired to one as sedentary, not less 
 destructive to the health, though more agreeable 
 to the imagination — smoking. It was morning, 
 but I longed for a pipe. I smoked until I was 
 sick, but drank only water. I most religiously 
 abstained from intoxicating liquor, conformably 
 to a very good resolution I had made, and having 
 sufficiently intoxicated myself by the smoke, I 
 betook myself to the public news-room, a very 
 respectable one in the town. 
 
 My object was, to examine all the papers 1 
 could get hold of for advertisements. I saw 
 that I was particularly noticed by all the members 
 present, but nevertheless I continued the chase 
 through every column of every paper, I hunted, 
 I believe, three hours, when something broke 
 cover, which I thought not unworthy my pur- 
 suit. Let me observe, en paasant, that for people 
 like myself, the old Times is, to use a sportsman's
 
 276 ANTIPODES. 
 
 phrase, the best covert. The situation was 
 worth my acceptance, could I obtain it, and 
 and not too valuable to bring many competitors 
 into the field.
 
 ANTIPODES. 27 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 The advertisement was for a master to a free 
 grammar school in the south of England, of 
 which the endowed salary was £80 per annum. 
 It was said to be not incompatible with a 
 curacy, that one in the neighbourhood might at 
 no distant period be vacant, and that, when it 
 was vacant, the successful candidate for the school 
 would have the preference and, if not in orders, 
 would be ordained to it. It was, in every respect, 
 a most eligible appointment for me, just the 
 thing I wanted, and, could I obtain it, my opinion 
 at the moment was, that my utmost ambition
 
 578 ANTIPODES. 
 
 and the first wish of my heart would be amply 
 gratified. So suitable did imagination represent 
 it, that I did not think I should ever wish for a 
 more comfortable berth. "My wishes," said I, 
 " will never soar beyond it. A school and 
 curacy both together cannot fail to please and fix 
 me in respectability and comfort. This stipend 
 too is not too much, I shall not have many 
 antagonists." 
 
 And now for testimonials. There was to be 
 no examination ; even personal appearance before 
 the tiTistees was not required. The greatest 
 number of testimonials, or the strongest, or 
 both, would decide the fortune of the day- My 
 college testimonials would not of course be dis- 
 pensed with, and I thought that they would tell 
 the most, I applied therefore for the usual 
 college testimonial, which I received by the first 
 post, and the following is a copy. 
 
 " To all to whom these Presents shall come', 
 Greeting : 
 
 "Whereas, Jonadab Rechab, B.A., of 
 
 College, in the University of Oxford, hath re-
 
 ANTIPODES. 279 
 
 quested of us our Letters, testimonial of his good 
 
 life and conversation, We, the Fellows of 
 
 College, do testify, that he, the said Jonadab 
 Rechab, resided among us four years ; during 
 which time he lived piously, soberly, and honestly, 
 that he diligently applied himself to his studies, 
 and behaved himself as a faithful subject of the 
 King's Majesty, and a dutiful son of the Church 
 of England, and that he hath not, so far as we 
 know or believe, embraced or maintained any 
 principles or doctrines contrary to the same, and, 
 moreover, we do, in our conscience believe him 
 to be duly qualified for the management of a 
 public school. 
 
 " In witness whereof we have to these pre- 
 sents affixed the seal we make use of on these 
 occasions, and have subscribed our names, this 
 — day of , in the year of our Lord, 18 — ." 
 
 To the tail of this precious document, and 
 admirable specimen of calligraphy, were appended 
 the names of four Fellows, in as illegible a scrawl 
 as ever was seen, probably, since the invention 
 of pothooks. It is a well-known fact, that the
 
 280 ANTIPODES. 
 
 above letters testimonial, as they are called, were 
 copied from a form always used, without the 
 variation of a syllable, except on very rare oc- 
 casions, by the common-room servant ; none of 
 the fellows ever attempted the transcription. 
 
 As a testimonial for the school, for which I 
 was a candidate, and told them so in my letter, 
 what is there in it that can be called a recom- 
 mendation ? All it says about qualifications is 
 contained in these words : " we do, in our con- 
 sciences believe him to be duly qualified for the 
 management of a public school." Not a syllable 
 more is there about my scholarship, and yet that 
 was the principal, I may almost say the only 
 thing the trustees wanted to know respecting 
 me. They had the conscience to say that they 
 thought me duly qualified; those are all the 
 two words, in the compass of which their con- 
 scientious recommendation was enclosed. Was 
 there something latently significant in these two 
 words ; more meant than what met the ear ? I 
 have heard of the Iliad being inclosed in a nut- 
 shell : did they intend to shut up something as 
 valuable in the expression " duly qualified ?"
 
 ANTIPODES. 281 
 
 If they did, I fear the trustees saw only the shell, 
 and never penetrated to the kernel. If they had 
 searched the whole of Johnson's Dictionary, with 
 Todd's additions, and all others ever published 
 besides, they could not have found a more sus- 
 picious-looking word than the dissyllable " duly," 
 and it is to be hoped, for their character's sake, 
 as gentlemen, to say nothing of them as scholars, 
 that they will in future discard it from their 
 vocabulary. 
 
 From this testimonial, which should have been 
 a nucleus, round which the rest were to gather, 
 as merely confirmatory proofs, I entertained, as 
 might be expected, very feeble expectations of 
 success. Such, however, whether I applied for 
 this or any other similar post, was to be 
 my college recommendation. I would have 
 thrown the matter up in despair and disgust, 
 had not my friends, as usual, urged me on to 
 proceed. I therefore wrote to the junior tutor, 
 who had left college, and was residing upon a 
 college living : and a very flattering testimonial 
 he gave me ; not more so than what, he said, 
 truth obliged him to write. I was of his opinion,
 
 282 ANTIPODES. 
 
 which may be imputed to vanity. To the senior 
 I neither wrote nor could, succeed or fail, live or 
 die, after he had deprived me of a fellowship, ] 
 could not ask him to recommend me to a 
 school ; a school too, the endowment of which 
 was only £80 for the master. 
 
 From Mr. De Witt, I received a most grati- 
 f3dng testimony, though I am sure, not more so 
 than I deserved, to my unwearied assiduity, and 
 astonishing progress, to use his words, whilst I 
 was under his instruction. He wrote as if I had 
 not failed at Oxford, or as if that failure had 
 been merely a misfortune, such as may happen 
 to the cleverest and the best. His opinion of me 
 was unchanged ; he still regarded me as what 
 he had always believed me to be : a youth of no 
 ordinary talent. As he had been my successful 
 rival in a matter, which more than anything else, 
 or than all other things together, decides a man's 
 destiny through life, for weal or woe, I felt, I 
 confess, an indescribable sensation, when I wrote 
 his address in my letter of application to him, but 
 I have no occasion to regret that I requested of 
 him a testimonial. My best thanks are also due
 
 ANTIPODES. 283 
 
 to the present master of the Grammar School, 
 who had never taug-ht me a svllahle, but had 
 heard of me much and enough from my 
 contemporary school-fellows, and many most 
 respectable gentlemen and families in the town. 
 His testimonial, if looked upon as anything more 
 than a mere testimony of friendship, must have 
 told, with most overwhelming effect in my favour. 
 Several of the first gentlemen in the town also 
 attested to my conduct, character, and abilities, 
 and such testimonials I might have multiplied 
 almost in infinitum. 
 
 I inclosed the whole forthwith to the gentle- 
 man to whom the advertisement directed testi- 
 monials to be transmitted. A specific day for 
 the election had not yet been fixed ; but w^ould 
 most probably be in the course of six weeks. 
 So long then had I to wait before I could know 
 the result ; and so long, and somewhat longer, 
 I did wait — but, from the first, without the least 
 hope of success. I knew, full well, that the 
 testimonials of friends are considered as only 
 testimonies of friendship ; and all but universally 
 so they are — nothing more, and very often not
 
 284 ANTIPODES. 
 
 SO much. Many a man will write you a strong 
 testimonial, who does not cordially wish you 
 success. 
 
 Again then, and still despondency or despair 
 was the vulture within. Milton puts much 
 truth into the mouth of Satan : 
 
 " The mind is its own place, and in itself. 
 Can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven." 
 
 A man's unhappiness is generally of his own 
 making ; the result of a foolish imagination 
 and of the want of proper mental discipline and 
 control. Nothing had happened to me hut 
 what was common to man, what had happened 
 ever since man was made and will to the con- 
 summation of all things. I was miserable, for 
 I would be so ; I was obliged to confess to 
 myself that apparently 1 was determined to be 
 so. Immediately, therefore, on returning from 
 the post, I plumped into my small apartment, 
 not to be initiated, for my noviciate was long 
 since over, but to revel as an established smoker 
 and sot, in what is as brutal to man as to eat 
 grass like the ox, and infinitely more disgusting.
 
 ANTIPODES. 285 
 
 By physical disease and deprecated habit, I had 
 now become an inebriate and smoker, but never 
 for a moment did I solace and cheer myself with 
 the expectation of being appointed to the mas- 
 tership ; indeed, my application seldom recurred 
 to my recollection. I had almost forgotten it, 
 and when I did think of it, I instantly cast the 
 thought away as of some idle experiment, never 
 likely to succeed. 
 
 At or towards the expiration of that period, 
 I one day read in a periodical I accidentally 
 picked up, of some distinguished author having, 
 during his moments of embarrassment, made 
 much money by writing for magazines or 
 reviews. It instantly occurred to me that I 
 might do the same, and to the pipe I betook 
 myself, in order more decisively to think about 
 it and concoct and mature my plan. Having 
 fully decided on the way to proceed, I addressed 
 three or four letters to so many editors, who 
 drink their wine out of the skulls of authors. I 
 knew that I must live, and I thought that I 
 might thus. Having put them into the post, 
 prepaid, 1 returned to my pipe to indulge in the
 
 286 ANTIPODES. 
 
 reveries of hope, and glorious reveries they 
 were : I had in my eye and within my clutch 
 several hundreds a year. They gave so much 
 for every sixteen pages of letter-press, and I 
 could write so many pages daily. Had my 
 calculations been correct, certainly I might have 
 provided not for myself only, but amply also for 
 those who heretofore had provided for me, 
 besides realizing a large literary reputation. 
 Having thus, by the aid of Virginia and gin, 
 worked myself up into paradise, and far higher, 
 indeed, than any created intelligence ever 
 mounted before, or maybe ever will, I was 
 accosted by my mother in breathless haste ; a 
 person desired to speak to me. I was half 
 angry with the best of mothers for maiming 
 the wing of my airy imagination, but descended 
 to the drawing-room. 
 
 One of the most respectable gentlemen in 
 the town, a solicitor, waited for me. He was 
 one who had favoured me with a testimonial, 
 but the school and my mind were as far 
 asunder, as the east is from the west. 
 
 " Weil, Mr. Rechab, I have just received a
 
 ANTIPODES. 2S7 
 
 letter from one of the trustees, who is of my 
 own profession, and an old acquaintance, though 
 I was not aware of it when I wrote you a tes- 
 timonial. He has inclosed a copy of all the 
 testimonials which you have sent, and requests 
 me, on my honour as a gentleman, to say if, 
 so far as I know, they speak the truth, and to 
 give him any further information respecting 
 you, which I may possess. The trustees, he 
 says, are pleased with your testimonials, and 
 therefore, think proper to make this inquiry of 
 me." 
 
 " Then it rests with you whether I get the 
 appointment or not ?" 
 
 " I will do my best for you." 
 
 " I hope you will : pray do : I believe you 
 will." 
 
 " I rejoice at the opportunity." 
 
 " Not for my sake, that is nothing ; but for 
 my father's." 
 
 " For yours as vvell. Any letters which I 
 may write, I will send to you, and you shall 
 seal them up and post them for me. 1 leave 
 you this seal for the purpose."
 
 288 ANTIPODES. 
 
 " Oh, there is no occasion for that ; I doubt 
 not your sincerity ; 1 only want to awaken your 
 zeal" 
 
 " I have no doubt that you are sure of the 
 appointment ; and if anything I can do, can 
 get it you, it shall be done." 
 
 He was a man of business, and left without 
 further parley, glad as I was myself. 
 
 Oh ! what happiness can hope deferred, 
 when it cometh, diffuse through a house ! It 
 is the rising sun in the midst of tangible dark- 
 ness and horror indescribable. Y\"hat tongue 
 can describe, or heart conceive, the joy he left 
 behind him ? We were now more closely, if 
 possible, united than ever. Our joy was that, 
 not of four hearts, but of one whole and in- 
 divisible ; our union, not mere mechanical 
 diffusion, but chemical combination. 
 
 " Jonadab," said my mother, " your father is 
 very poorly." 
 
 " I know, and am very sorry for it." 
 
 " He is bowed down with years too, and his 
 grey hairs are l)rought down almost to the grave
 
 ANTIPODES. 289 
 
 with sickness and sorrow ; if in good health he 
 is now too old to work." 
 
 " My heart's desire and prayer to God is, that 
 I may relieve him from further labour, I should 
 say, slavery." 
 
 " You have it now in your power : there is a 
 house for the master to live in." 
 
 " The instant I receive the appointment, we 
 will remove in it ; there is no fear of the master- 
 ship being taken from me, for the stipend is 
 from an endowment, and therefore a life annuity, 
 at least so long as I conduct myself properly." 
 
 O ! the satisfaction, the contentment, the bliss 
 this arrangement spread in the hearts of us all ! 
 I had the pleasure before me, a pleasure I had 
 always coveted, of providing for my father, when 
 he could no longer provide for me. It was a 
 righteous, a holy pleasure, the fulfilment in the 
 spirit as well as to the letter of the first com- 
 mandment with promise ; surely it deserved to 
 be gratified. 
 
 Our time was now spent in not only planning, 
 but partly executing, preparations for our re* 
 moval to a distant part of the country, some 
 
 VOL. I. O
 
 290 ANTIPODES. 
 
 things which we did not possess, were purchased, 
 and the purchase of others was postponed until 
 our arrival at the place. In the course of a 
 week or two all things were arranged, even the 
 the mode of transit as well for the furniture as 
 for ourselves. 
 
 I did not renounce drinking, but, being more 
 composed, drank less : as for smoking, I had for 
 some time despaired of ever being able either to 
 discontinue it or to smoke less. To relieve my- 
 self, occasionally, from it, I as usual sauntered 
 into the fields, or perambulated the town ; but, 
 now that 1 was fortunate, I preferred the latter. 
 I was neither ashamed nor afraid to meet any 
 thing in the shape of man. 
 
 One rainy and greasy morning as I was 
 walklns; in the street with attitude erect and 
 dauntless forehead, I encountered an old school- 
 fellow, who, I knew, never had me in any part 
 of his heart, except that which is the especial 
 abode of malevolence. He was one too of the 
 very few, who knew of my attachment and 
 disappointment. 
 
 " I congratulate you, Rechab, on your
 
 ANTIPODES. 291 
 
 appointment to the mastership of the Royal Free 
 Grammar-school of T — ." 
 
 " I am not appointed yet, Dampier, and you 
 know it." 
 
 " But you are sure of it, and that is much the 
 same thing." 
 
 " It remains to see whether I shall get it." 
 
 " After that, I suppose you will fall in love ; I 
 hope you will not be disappointed." 
 
 " That is what you can never be, for you are 
 incapable of the passion." 
 
 " Oh ! I can love as well as any man : how 
 is your father ?" 
 
 " You know that he is very unwell : I cannot 
 say that he is better to day." 
 
 " Really, Rechab, if you marry soon after you 
 go to T — , you may say, I think, with Hamlet. 
 
 " * The funeral-baked meats, 
 Did coldly furnish forth the marriage table.' " 
 
 " Is your wish father to that thought ?" 
 " Oh, no, I hope you are sure of your £80 
 per annum." 
 
 o 2
 
 292 ANTIPODES. 
 
 Having thus discharged a little of his 
 superfluous gall, he left me with a contemptuous 
 sneer, which instead of depressing my mind, did 
 the reverse, I was so supremely happy in the 
 awakened power of giving joy. 
 
 But liis jeers could only shew their teeth, they 
 could not hite. The mortification which I saw he 
 felt at the smiling prospect before me, rendered me, 
 if possible, still more happy, and, having now 
 taken a longer w'alk than usual, I returned home 
 in high spirits. 
 
 On entering the house, I found my father and 
 mother and brother very pale, and the two latter 
 in tears. I was " listening, fear and dumb amaze- 
 ment, all." What could be the matter now ? my 
 eye which fell upon the table answered the 
 question. There lay my testimonials, returned, 
 with a note to say, that another candidate had 
 been appointed, whose college testimonials were 
 much more satisfactory. 
 
 I afterwards requested the gentleman, who 
 had so interested himself for me to wTite to his 
 friend and ask, if the successful candidate had 
 taken a high university honour.
 
 ANTIPODES. - 293 
 
 The reply, come in two or three days, that he 
 had taken none. 
 
 He had the good fortune not to have been an 
 independent member of the same college. 
 
 " May this be washed in Lethe and forgotten ?'
 
 294 ANTIPODES. 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 I RAMBLED up and down the town with my 
 hands on my back from morning till night, 
 having no object or place of destination : people 
 passed me but I saw them not ; some spoke to 
 me, I heard them not or did not understand 
 them. Thus did I ramble day after day round 
 the town and round again, perfectly unconscious 
 why or wherefore, where I was or whither tend- 
 ing. It was on one of these days that I went 
 with many others into a large room, of which 
 the door in the street was wide open ; it was 
 the news-room. I had been there before, but
 
 ANTIPODES. 295 
 
 now did not know it. If it was full of gentle- 
 men ; I never saw them ; if they noticed me, it 
 is known only to themselves. I took up a 
 York paper and ran my eye down one column 
 and up another, column after column, but I 
 could hardly be said to see them ; certainly not 
 a word did I read. What first awoke me in 
 some degree from my stupor was the word 
 curacy ; a little lower down the same column 
 there was another. Pen, ink and paper were 
 before me, and, without forming a wish or re- 
 solution, but mechanically and as if in a dream, 
 I copied one of them, to which I subscribed the 
 initials of my name, directing application to be 
 addressed to the editor. This I took to the 
 post, paid a sovereign for a post-office order to 
 that amount, and inclosed it in a letter, which I 
 pre-paid and posted. 
 
 One beautiful, brilliant Sunday morning, we 
 were thus assembled at the breakfast-table, all 
 silent, but I not sorrowful. We were break- 
 fasting in silence, I too for anything I knew, 
 and we had half done, when the postman 
 brought a letter prepaid and addressed to me.
 
 296 ANTIPODES. 
 
 They were as startled as if some one had opened 
 the door and fired a pistol into the room ; I 
 was not cognisant of anything having occurred. 
 My father opened and read it and then found a 
 tongue. 
 
 " My dear Jonadab, a curacy is offered to 
 you." 
 
 Again the word roused me from my torpor : 
 I awoke as out of a trance, and took the letter 
 and read it for myself. It was a reply to the 
 advertisement, forwarded to me by the editor of 
 the York paper. 
 
 " There must be some mistake ; I have not 
 advertised ; it cannot be for me." 
 
 " It is certainly addressed to Jonadab Rechab, 
 and I know no one of that name but your- 
 self." 
 
 "I advertised a long time since: a year 
 since — no one would reply after so . long a 
 time." 
 
 " Be that as it may, it is meant for you, and 
 you must answer it." 
 
 I read the letter over and over again, and
 
 ANTIPODES. 297 
 
 each time became more distinctly my own 
 identical self, and no sooner was I wholly my- 
 self again than I felt a desire, and that was for 
 a pipe. 
 
 " Well," said I, " whoever has advertised, 
 this is certainly for me." 
 
 " It is, it is, it can be for nobody else," said 
 my mother and brother in the same breath. 
 " Jonadab, it is far better than a school ; away 
 with schools, I think nothing of them. You 
 will now be what we always wanted you to be, 
 and you are fit for nothing else." 
 
 " His name is Courtley, but he says nothing 
 about stipend." 
 
 " I warrant you there will be a stipend ; every 
 man is not a Mr. Scrapling." 
 
 Thus were they running on in high glee, 
 while I ascended to my small room to consult 
 my pipe on the subject. I had no recollection 
 of having recently advertised, and concluded 
 either that it was a reply to my former adver- 
 tisement a twelvemonth since, or that some one 
 from compassion and to save us expense had 
 
 o 3
 
 298 ANTIPODES. 
 
 advertised for me. Mr. Courtley, who called 
 
 himself the Rector of Benwell in N , of 
 
 which he offered me the curacy, appointed the 
 Black Swan, Coney Street, in York as the place 
 where he would wish to have an interview with 
 me the day after to-morrow.
 
 ANTIPODES 229 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 Again am I mounted on a stage-coach, the 
 first time since I left Oxford, inhaling the breeze 
 that rudely saluted my face, but not as then 
 revelling in a fool's paradise. I built no unreal 
 castles, mv mind was down at zero. What a 
 creature is man ! We call this a fickle climate, 
 but its changeableness is nothing to that of the 
 human mind. I was about to see Eboracum, 
 which I had never seen before, an innocent, 
 Roman station, but about that I cared nothing. 
 A Roman emperor had been born there ; it no 
 more occurred to me, than that a man had
 
 300 ANTIPODES. 
 
 been born there. All my thoughts were occupied 
 about other things. Formerly York had been 
 called, and with reason, Altera Roma, a second 
 Rome. " York," says the author of the Poli- 
 chronicon, " before it was burnt by William the 
 Conqueror, seemed, from the beauty and magni- 
 ficence of its buildings, as fair as the city of 
 Rome." Once the seat of empire for the sove- 
 reigns of the world, it had seen its grandeur 
 diminish by the mouldering hand of time, or 
 fall before the convulsive effects of political 
 storms. In the reign of Stephen, 1137, 
 another fire in the city of York, occasioned by 
 accident, spread so extensively, as to burn down 
 the Cathedral, St. Mary's Abbey, St. Leonard's 
 Hospital, thirty-nine parish churches in the 
 city, and Trinity Church, in the suburbs. These, 
 and other historical facts were known to me, 
 and might have engaged my serious meditations ; 
 but they lay still, and uninvoked in the dark re- 
 cesses of my memory, while far different ideas 
 and passions found employment for my head 
 and heart. I neither considered nor cared what 
 York had been, or was.
 
 ANTIPODES. 301 
 
 At a large town, about a dozen miles from 
 York, the coach waited for a half an hour. 
 When I used to travel to and from Oxford, 
 my wont was, on such an occasion as this, 
 to traverse the streets, and see what was to 
 be seen of the town. But now, I lament to 
 record my wont was woefully changed. I 
 wanted a pipe, and no doubt my anticipations 
 of evil, and dissatisfaction with my fancied 
 prospects, fancied I say, for in reality, I knew 
 nothing about them, helped, as well as the 
 habit, to create this want. I felt no desire for 
 a glass, but of course, I could not go into an inn 
 to smoke, without at the same time, spending 
 something upon drink. I therefore entered the 
 paltry fetid beer-shop, where the coach had 
 stopped. 
 
 It was then about eleven o'clock, and the 
 smell of tobacco and ale, smoked and drunk 
 the night before, I thought infinitely more 
 offensive than that of a charnel-house. I was 
 shown into a small parlour, in the back part of 
 the house, filled all round with chairs, con- 
 tiguous to one another, as if it were accustomed
 
 302 ANTIPODES. 
 
 to accommodate a large company, though it was 
 only a small apartment ; the floor was thickly 
 sanded, and each chair had its appropriate spitoon. 
 Who says that smoking and drinking do not go 
 together ? Almost every ale-house attests the 
 fact. 
 
 There was only one person in the room, 
 whom I had never seen before ; if I had, I should 
 have instantly gone out, for 1 had not yet lost 
 all sense of shame. He had the commanding 
 aspect and bearing of a gentleman, and no 
 doubt was one in ruins, that is, who had ac- 
 quired the most fatal habits. His face was 
 covered with large red blotches, and what 
 should have been the white part of his eye bore 
 the hue of port wine. Verily he had done some 
 service to Bacchus, or he would not have had a 
 face so rubicund and marred from what it had 
 once been, for it had evidently been not long 
 since very handsome. He had a thick, shock 
 head of hair, black, but sprinkled with grey, 
 the effect of the intemperate life he had led, 
 not of age, for he must have been considerably 
 under thirty. I was ashamed to look at him,
 
 ANTIPODES. 303 
 
 and by his averted eye there was clearly no 
 shame lost between us. He was smoking, and 
 had a glass of ale on a small table before him. 
 A large shaggy dog lay crouching at his feet, 
 which, on my entering the room, eyed me 
 obliquely through the long hair spread over his 
 eyes like a veil, and shghtly wagged the tip of 
 his tail. I felt an unaccountable interest in 
 both, and thought I should know them again 
 at any distance of time. We smoked and 
 drank together in unbroken silence from first 
 to last, he looking out of the window, and I 
 I know not where, until the coachman came to 
 tell me that the coach was starting again. 
 
 We reached York about two, and after looking 
 about for some time for a private but respectable 
 inn, where I could indulge unseen, 1 came to one 
 such as I wanted, and walked several times 
 backwards and forwards before the window to 
 see if any one were within. Seeing no one I 
 entered hastily : and what was the first object 
 which met my eyes but the unknown gentleman 
 in a corner of the room with his dog at his
 
 304 ANTIPODES. 
 
 feet as before. The surprise was mutual. I 
 stood for a moment with prominent eyes and 
 open mouth, and he fairly burst out into a 
 laugh. He saw that he had found a brother 
 slave, and thought that we might as well hug 
 our chains together. The dog eyed me as 
 before, through the shaggy veil over his eyes, 
 only with this difference, that instead of wagging 
 the tip end of his tail, he wagged the whole of it. 
 
 " Heaven help you !" said he, " you want a 
 pipe. 
 
 "I do. Sir. What a terrible thing it is to 
 be a slave to such a vile habit ! But for that 
 I should not have come hither." 
 
 " 'Sdeath and the devil, Sir ! if that be all, 
 you may rise in your profession. Many a bishop 
 to my certain knowledge loves a pipe as well as 
 I do." 
 
 Had I not been a clergyman intended, I 
 should not have been ashamed of a pipe ; I did 
 not therefore like his taking me for a parson ; 
 but I suppose my costume, or rather its colour, 
 betrayed me.
 
 ANTIPODES. 305 
 
 " But no bishop would like, I think, to 
 promote a smoking curate." 
 
 " Od's my little life, Sir, how do you know 
 that ? If it be bad to smoke, we all like to be 
 in the same mess. No man likes his neighbour 
 to be better than himself." 
 
 " But I think, Sir, it is not thought very 
 becoming in either priest or deacon, much more 
 bishop." 
 
 " S'life, Sir, it is becoming in any man and 
 in every man. I would give a living to a 
 smoker, but I would sooner give my dog, 
 Pollux, which the whole world could not pur- 
 chase, than a living to a milksop, who refuses 
 the comforts that God offers him." 
 
 " But is not smoking considered an evidence 
 of something worse?" 
 
 " Marry, come up, I suppose you mean a 
 glass." 
 
 " I do ; is not a smoker generally thought to 
 be a drinker as well ?" 
 
 " Hoot awa, Sir, what is a drinker, but a man 
 who enjoys what God gives him and returns 
 Him thanks? Sir, a teetotaller is the most
 
 306 ANTIPODES, 
 
 ungrateful fellow upon earth. How can a man 
 be thankful or give thanks, for there is some 
 difference if he will not accept God's gifts. If 
 a teetotaller goes to heaven, may my sins lack 
 mercy, Sir, they give thanks in heaven." 
 
 " Certainly they do, and men ought to do it 
 on earth, or they are unfit for heaven ; but I 
 cannot think that a curate, for instance, who 
 bears the character of being fond of a pipe and 
 a glass, will stand a good chance or any, indeed, 
 to rise in the church." 
 
 " Troth, Sir, I do not mean to say that a 
 notorious drunkard, visiting in pot-houses with 
 tinkers and climbing boys, has much chance or 
 any, God forbid he should ; but there is nothing 
 wrong or rather much to be commended, in a 
 person or any other man smoking a pipe and 
 drinking a glass of good double brown stout ; 
 that is what I mean to say." 
 
 " If I understood you, you would not advise 
 me to discontinue smoking and a moderate 
 glass." 
 
 " By my fi\ith as a gentleman and, let me 
 add, a friend, that is what I mean. You are
 
 ANTIPODES. 307 
 
 unmarried and will live in lodgings ; how 
 ennuye you must be without a pipe, and a 
 glass in addition, and in reason, cannot hurt you." 
 
 " Upon my word, Sir, you seem to know me 
 as well as if we had been acquainted for years. 
 I do not remember ever seeing you before to-day, 
 when I was travelling." 
 
 " Oh ! heavens name, who is there that 
 knows not the life a young curate has to lead in 
 this country? Do as I tell you, and you will 
 please your flock, and how know you what your 
 flock may do for you ?" 
 
 " Never make me a bishop, I am sure." 
 
 " Hum ; is your aspiration so high ? no, but 
 they'll make you a Rector." 
 
 " Ha, ha, ha ! what, a few farmers and farm- 
 labourers ?" 
 
 " Good again ! yes, a few farmers and farm- 
 labourers." 
 
 " Then w^e live and learn indeed ; I never 
 heard of an instance." 
 
 " Beshrew my hand, Sir, but I have ; more 
 than one." 
 
 " Where in the wide world ?"
 
 308 ANTIPODES. 
 
 " Lord, Sir, in a part of the wide world which 
 men call Norfolk. Good day, Sir !" 
 
 If my eyes were ever likely to start from 
 their sockets, they were now. My mouth was 
 open, but I could hardly be said to breathe, and 
 my hands rose involuntarily in an attitude of 
 fear. Surely, thought 1, this must be Mr. 
 Courtley or some one who, in his correspondence 
 with me, had called himself by that name. 
 He was not dressed like a clergyman, nor, from 
 his general appearance, could he be taken for 
 one, but he might have been playing a heartless 
 hoax upon me ; yet, what on earth could induce 
 a perfect stranger to do such a thing? He 
 held his hand out for me to shake, and I shook 
 it, or at least, I think so, but I was so bewildered 
 that T hardly knew what I did. 
 
 " Before we part, allow me to ask. Sir, what 
 is your name ?" 
 
 *' By the white hand of Rosahnd, Sir, my 
 name is Philpots. Remember my advice, use 
 and do not abuse, and your flock shall promote 
 you." 
 
 Without another word on either side, he and
 
 ANTIPODES. 309 
 
 Pollux left the room. In the course of two or 
 three minutes I also left the house, sauntered 
 in the streets for half an hour, bought some 
 lozenges to clear my breath from the smell of 
 tobacco, and though an hour too soon wended 
 my way to the " Black Swan." I no sooner 
 entered the traveller's room, than the waiter 
 came to tell me that a gentleman in another 
 room wished to speak to me. I expected that 
 this gentleman and Mr. Philpots would prove 
 to be alter et idem, one and the same person, 
 and had great pleasure in being mistaken. 
 
 Mr. Courtley was a diminutive gentleman, 
 apparently about seventy years of age, very 
 erect, gentlemanly, and peculiarly plausible in 
 his manner. He had a smooth forehead not- 
 withstanding his age, what is called an open 
 countenance, and that cast of happiness which 
 must arise from his peace of mind not having 
 been much, if at all, disturbed by the rubs of 
 fortune. I should say, without hesitation, that 
 he had experienced few disappointments. His 
 hair was not in the least diminished in quantity,
 
 310 ANTIPODES. 
 
 but was almost perfectly white, and he had a 
 perfect and handsome set of white teeth, so 
 that he had been no smoker. He was evidently 
 prepossessed in my favour from the first ; a 
 smile played upon his countenance, and he 
 made, and strove to make himself very agree- 
 able ; I was consequently quite delighted with 
 his company. Though he had a cheerful 
 countenance, it bore the appearance of much 
 religious resignation and contentment. I should 
 say that he was a religiously disposed man, but 
 neither enthusiast, nor cursed with superstition. 
 
 " I am glad to see you, Mr. Rechab ; have 
 you fully made up your mind to accept the 
 cm'acy of Benwell ?" 
 
 " If your mind is fully made up, Sir, so is 
 mine." 
 
 " What ? before you know anything about 
 the curacy ?" 
 
 " I presume it is much the same as any 
 other ?" 
 
 " As many, but not as any." 
 
 " Well, what is there peculiar about it ?"
 
 ANTIPODES. 3 1 1 
 
 " It is very retired, six miles from a larffe 
 town : will you like such a state of monachism 
 for a time ?" 
 
 " Many curacies are similar, but they have 
 their advantages. I shall have little inteiTup- 
 tion to my studies, [ think I shall like it, 
 how long 1 know not." 
 
 " The population is three hundred." 
 
 " That again, is in favour of a studious 
 life." 
 
 " And wholly agricultural." 
 
 " A curate may be very comfortable among 
 farmers, at least, such as I have seen." 
 
 " I would advise you to endeavour to please 
 them ; be familiar with them ; make them and 
 yourself as one family." 
 
 " Certainly, I shall be glad to be sociable ; 
 I shall think it my duty as a man ; but is it, 
 in your opinion, my duty as a clergyman ?" 
 
 " They may be of great service to you." 
 
 " In what way ?" 
 
 " I am now seventy-two years of age." 
 
 " What has that to do with it ?" 
 
 " Moreover, I have powerful patrons, and
 
 312 ANTIPODES. 
 
 may probably soon obtain more valuable pre- 
 ferment." 
 
 " But how do you connect all this with the 
 parishioners being of service to me ?" 
 
 " Their recommendation is sure to procure 
 Benwell for you." 
 
 " How do you know that ?" 
 
 "I obtained it thus, and I know from the 
 patron that it will be so again." 
 
 " Wlio is the patron ?" 
 
 " Lord Rolle, who is the sole proprietor of 
 that, and several adjoining parishes." 
 
 " Oh ! I see ; it is a small benefice, not 
 worth tiie acceptance of any of his lordship's 
 friends." 
 
 " That is good fishing ; it is worth £400 
 per annum, arising almost entirely from glebe : 
 there is also a good rectory." 
 
 "Where does Lord Rolle reside ?" 
 
 " I do not know ; he is very eccentric, but a 
 man of excellent disposition, a really benevolent 
 character. You see, then, the connection ; the 
 parishioners are not the patrons in law, but 
 they are virtually, and if I should die or be
 
 ANTIPODES. 3 1 3 
 
 promoted, you may obtain the rectory of Benwell 
 through their recommendation." 
 
 This was to me in the highest degree flat- 
 tering. No curacy could be more inviting than 
 one so hkely to lead to the incumbency, and 
 such an incumbency. It was the very thing 
 I wanted, but somehow I began to suspect that 
 all this brilliant recommendation of the curacy 
 was meant as a set off against the smallness or 
 want of stipend. I now wished to know what' 
 it was, but was afraid to ascertain by direct 
 inquiry ; yet it was something which he would 
 be obliged to mention ; without one, no bishop 
 would ordain or license a curate. 
 " Where, Sir, shall I have to live ?" 
 " In the rectory, with the glebe tenant." 
 " In the rectory ! where do you live then ?" 
 " At another living in Yorkshire." 
 " Then my curacy will be a sole charge ?" 
 "With a stipend of £100 per annum. And 
 now, Mr. Rechab, I regret that on this occasion 
 I cannot spend more time with you. I will 
 forward your nomination to the bishop by the 
 
 VOL. I. P
 
 314 ANTIPODES. 
 
 first post, and you must lose no time in trans- 
 mitting to him the requisite testimonials. I 
 suppose you know what they are ?" 
 
 " I do, and will send them without delay." 
 " You will be in time for the next ordination. 
 I shall always be glad to hear from you, and 
 to see you when you come this way. But 
 before I leave you, allow an old man whom 
 God has eminently blessed, and he will bless 
 you in the same way, if you walk in my steps, 
 to give you a bit of advice." 
 
 " Oh, Sir, I shall be glad to hear it." 
 " You have one of the best prospects before 
 you that a curate can desire, but remember 
 that your success depends upon yourself. If 
 you fail for want of proper conduct, a con- 
 sistent walk, your present prospect wiU be a 
 source of the bitterest remorse during your 
 whole life ; and blessed had it been for you, if 
 you had never had it. Take care of yourself, 
 as you value your own happiness for life, and 
 that of your family." 
 
 *' I am fully sensible of the importance of
 
 ANTIPODES. 315 
 
 your advice, which I highly appreciate. It is, 
 and long has been my determination, to be 
 exceedingly circumspect." 
 
 " Above all, beware of a fondness for liquor, 
 that certain, and too general ruin of the young 
 and ardent. And now, good bye. I hope you 
 will have a pleasant journey, and above all, 
 God's blessing." 
 
 I thought this the most eventful day of my 
 life, hitherto, and the happiest ; but many a 
 bright morning terminates in a long, dark, 
 and dismal night. 
 
 END OF VOL. I. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 Printed by Schulze and Co., 13, Poland Street.
 
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 UNIVERSITY OF ILLIN0I9-URBANA 
 
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