Oranges and Lemons, or the Bells of St. Clement’s.
What a beautiful thing is Memory! It is like the softened sounds of receding music; it is like the long track of silvery spray which a ship leaves on the divided waters. Twilight is the air’s remembrance of the sun. In the olden time, there were some who thought that in childhood we had recollections of Heaven; and, probably, this little world of ours will be a memory to us when we have left it for ever. It is a happy thing that we can drink again some of the sweetness of a by-gone joy; and very useful, though not so pleasant, that we can recall our past errors and follies, and, by steeping them in regret and shame, turn them into lessons of duty.
Pietro Limoncelo was a poor foreigner from the sunny shores of the Mediteranean. While yet a youth, the political troubles of his country had obliged him to leave his home among the fruits and sunbeams, and to find a refuge in London, where he earned a poor living as a journeyman-tailor. He lodged in a garret, in a court branching off from the Strand, near the church of St. Clement Danes. What a change for him! He who had lived near an orange grove, who had basked in the sunshine of the South, or under the shade of purple vines, or beneath the trees where “orange lamps in a green light,” glimmered with a golden beauty—he to become the tenant of a poor room in a dingy thoroughfare, amidst gloom and discomfort, and the hard life of English poverty—it was a sad change, indeed. If such changes happen to any of us, we must keep up our hearts, by remembering that no gloom or darkness can obscure the vision of the Supreme, and that the beams of his blessedness may penetrate even into the dreariest places.
Pietro had not been regularly apprenticed to a tailor: it could not be said of him that he had learned the trade; but he had picked up a little knowledge of it from time to time, and practice improved him. What he did was done pretty well, but he was not ranked as a first-class workman; consequently, the only department in which he could get employment was that in which is called the “Slop”—a department in which goods are got up, common in quality and low in price, for the accommodation of humble customers. There was not much opportunity here of earning handsome wages; it was a bare living, and nothing more.
One evening he was sitting cross-legged on his board, bending wearily over some work that had just come in from his employers, the great Tailoring firm of Push, Puff, Poetry, Placard, and Company. He had lately felt very unwell, and unable to work with his usual energy; he had been obliged more than once to cut off three or four from his wonted number of labour hours. Less work brought, as a consequence, less pay; and so the cupboard got bare, and matters became very desperate indeed with the poor Tailor. He had just put the last stitch to a couple of waistcoats which were lying on the board beside him, when a mixed feeling of hunger, pain and weakness, brought this sad thought into his mind:—“Might I not, without crime, raise a little money on one of these waistcoats, to give my sinking body its needful nourishment? I would make restitution as soon as my health returned.” Conscience grew very uneasy at this thought, and interrupted it several times with “No! no! no!” but want and pain were so loud in their clamours that these “noes” were overwhelmed. Pietro determined to go out and see if half-a-crown could not be borrowed, for a day or two, on one of the waistcoats; he was rising from his board for the purpose, when a giddy faintness came over him, and he was obliged to sit down again. “Ah! I see how it is,” said he; “I am too weak to move to night; I must lie down and rest; I must put it off till to-morrow. Meanwhile, I’ll sleep upon it.”
At the counter of that Pawnbroker’s shop, where three gilt balls hang over the door, and where brushed-up clothes of all kinds for men, women, and children dangle, from pegs in back rooms and gloomy passages, there stands a wretched man, with sallow cheeks, wild-looking eyes, and long streaming hair. He has just pledged a waistcoat, and with the money in his hand is leaving the shop, when he hears a rustling sound from above. Looking up, he sees a pale, serious face looking down upon him. It has an airy, spiritual look, and seems to be floating in the air on misty wings; and then, with a low, solemn, whispering voice it sings these words:—
“Toll! Toll!
When a wandering soul
Forsaketh the truthful and fair:
Its days are unblest,
Its nights are unrest,
In the bud of its hope is a worm of Despair.
Toll! Toll!”
Immediately a strong wind stirred through the belfry of St. Clement’s, and the Bell gave out one long, funereal tone.
The bewildered man leaves the shop and wanders into the street, not knowing whither. He had intended to buy some bread, and tea and sugar; but, in the remorse of his mind, and with those words ringing in his ears, hunger, and thirst, and faintness were all forgotten. He tramps backwards and forwards in the streets, like a sleep-walker in a wild dream.
“Hollo!” says a voice, “what’s the matter with you? you don’t look over cheerful this evening. Why, if you was to go into a dairy, you’d turn the milk sour! Step in here, man, and take a thimble-full to cheer your spirits! It will do you good. Come! I’ll stand treat to-night, and you shall do the same for me to-morrow.”
A door that swung upon its hinges admitted the two men into a glittering-looking temple, where many lights were shining with great brilliancy. Sparkling glasses and polished vessels of pewter increased by reflection the brightness of the light, and made the place look gay. There was the hum of many voices. In one corner the ringing of loud, coarse laughter—in another, the mutterings of rising quarrel; here a song, there an oath, and everywhere that sad mingling of misery and merriment which are to be found in those scenes of sensuality.
“Now, young lady with the pretty curls, a couple of glasses here for me and my friend! Here’s a furrener, you see. I aint got no prejudice against a furrener. I says to him, ‘Aint you a man and a brother?’ Fine sentiment that, Miss! When I was at school, at the Parochial College of St. Calves and Leather Breeches, I put that ‘ere sentiment into my Christmas piece, and it were very much admired. Come, mate! your glass is standing! Drink up! Here’s towards you! Hollo! music above stairs, eh? ‘Sons of Harmony! Grand Meeting Night! Glorious Apollo! Bacchus, God of Wine! Marble Halls! Alice Grey! Never mention Her! Nix my Dolly! Buffalo Gals!’ Well, if that aint a mixtur! Two more glasses, Miss! Drink up, mate!”
The wretched “mate,” thus appealed to drinks up his glass and feels inspirited—his cheek glows—his blood flows merrily through his veins—and he is just beginning to forget that pale face in the air and the solemn singing. He goes to the doorway for a moment, and looks up into the misty night. Just then the Bells of St. Clement’s chime—a fluttering, like wings is heard, and then a solemn whispering.
“The phantom voice! The phantom voice, again!” cries the wretched man; and he runs from the place with the quickness of desperate fear. But the voice follows, and it sings:—
“Hark! the spirit of the Bells
Upon St. Clement’s Tower,
Groans at every deed that tells
Of Evil’s guilty power.
Struggle, strife!
And feverish life—
Struggle, strife, and din;
Night bells chiming,
Souls declining
Into deeps of sin.”
“Why, where are you running to? What the deuce is the matter with you?” said the man left behind in the gin-temple, who had followed and overtaken the frightened runaway. “You’re not going to get rid of me in this fashion to-night, I can tell you. I have got a little job for you to lend a hand in. Follow me!” and he takes him by the arm.
They go on down a street towards the river, and in a dark bye-place, under a gateway, they meet two other men, with crape-masks on their faces and iron instruments in their hands.
“Jim!” said one of the disguised men, “is that you?”
“All right!”
“Who have you got there?”
“A new friend of yours and mine. It’s all right with him, too. He has been to ‘my Uncle’s,’ and another shop since then. He’s regularly in for it, now.”
“Let him come with us to-night, then; we want a hand outside to watch, and help to carry. There’s good booty to-night at that house yonder, in the left-hand corner. They have been borrowing plate to-day, against a grand wedding there to-morrow morning.”
The men skulked forward to the house named, and one with his iron instrument broke a shutter, then opened a window, and crept in. Others followed, and the wretched new accomplice is left outside to take what they shall hand out to him. The night is calm and still, with a few cold, glimmering stars above, and darkness all around. The wretched man paces up and down the dark gateway at the side of the house, trembling at the remembrance of those songs in the air. It is now twelve o’clock, and from all the belfries in the Strand, iron tongues proclaim it in solemn tones. The man’s quick ear plainly distinquishes St. Clement’s among them; and, as he listens with fear, the pale face hovers over him once more, resting on its misty wings—
“Tis midnight, and St. Clement’s chime
Counts the wicked hours of crime.”
He will hear no more. With hands raised to his head, and pressed tight against his ears, he runs with all the strength and fleetness of fevered madness and despair. Away! away!—from street to street! Away from his guilty confederates—from the sound of St. Clement’s bells—from the ghostly look and the fearful singing. Away! if it were possible, from himself—away from the world!
He had reached a street in the neighbourhood of the Park, when he came to a house where a juvenile party was just breaking up. Some little boys and girls, rather sleepy and weary, and well wrapped up against the night air, were being lifted into coaches; while others, a little older, were jumping in of their own accord, in a manner so fresh and vigorous, that one would have supposed they were going to a party instead of coming from one. In particular, there was one very fine boy, with a beautiful eye sparkling beneath a bold, open brow. He came dancing down the steps of the doorway, his pockets full of fruit, and a bright orange in his hand. He appeared to be thinking of one of the games he had played that evening, for he was singing to himself—
“Oranges and Lemons!
Say the bells of St. Clement’s;”
and turning round to a playmate, he said, “Ah, Charley, my side pulled the strongest, you know.” Into the coach he jumped almost at one bound. As he did so, the orange in his hand fell from him and rolled far away down the street with a swift motion: and as the beautiful fruit went round and round on the smooth pavement, the light of the lamps above gleamed on its golden rind. It catches the eye of the poor fevered man. The mere words, “Oranges and Lemons;” the sight of the beautiful fruit of his native land—the merry voice, the innocent brow, the happy smile of the child that had dropped it, came upon him like a spell,—he sinks down, and a vision floats upon his brain.
The scene is in southern Europe, where the blue Mediterranean rolls from the straits of Gibraltar to the Syrian shores. There was the murmuring of tranquil, silvery waves—the soft breathing of the winds—the gushes of sweet music and joy from many a grove on the shore, and many a green cleft in the hills; and one voice above the rest, in a tone of earnest and tender entreaty, rose in the warm skies as if a spirit were singing there. And this was its song:—
“Remember thine early days—
The orange grove, the vine-clad hill;
The river where the sunbeams play—
The evening calm and still.
“Remember thine early days—
Thy mother’s smile, thy sister’s song;
Thy childhood’s little hymns of praise,
Which kept the heart from wrong.”
Then did the air and the ocean break out into a tender joy; and the spirit of the man rode on the waves of sweet sound along the whole course of the Mediterranean into the sunny Adriatic, and among the rocks of the Ægean. And voices came from the Capes of Sicily, whispering that God the Beautiful expected his children to be Beautiful too—beautiful in spirit, in thoughts, affections, and desires. And a like strain floated over the Grecian Isles, and told the enraptured listener, what a spirit of love it was which had poured out the beauty of Heaven on the hills and plains and valleys of the world; and it bid him believe that He who had cherished the grass and the flower through the dews of night and the chill of winter, did also intend a kindness to the soul, in pouring on it the dews of sorrow.
And the man wept, and mingled his feeble voice with nature’s, and they worshipped together, and said—“Our Father! Hallowed be thy name!”
“Decidedly better! the skin is moist; the eye is clearer; the fever is subsiding; he will do very well now.”
This was spoken by the house-surgeon of one of the London hospitals, as he stood by the bed-side of a patient in the fever ward—feeling the pulse, and watching the countenance. The patient raised himself slightly on the pillows, and looked round with a wondering air.
“Why! who—who am I?”
“Who are you?” said the Doctor, “that is a pretty question for a man to ask about himself. You are described in the hospital books as Pietro Limoncello—Journeyman Tailor. You’ll remember it all presently.”
“How came I here?”
“You were brought here by those who took pity on you; you were found lying on your own shop-board in a state of delirium, and you were instantly removed to this hospital. You have been for some days insensible.”
“Oh, Doctor! I have had such dreams.”
“Very likely—men in health have strange dreams, sometimes; men in fever have still stranger ones. You have had time enough for a good deal of dreaming. But come! you are going to get well now; the fever has gone down, and your senses have come back to you. This is visitors’ day: would you like to see a friend for a moment? I think you may.”
“I have got no friends in this country,” said Pietro.
“Haven’t you? If I remember rightly, I heard some one asking to see you only a minute ago. It is a little girl that I have seen carrying milk about somewhere in the Strand.”
“Oh! To be sure, I remember her well. How curious that she should think of me! It is very kind. But she is a good girl; she looks as if she had a gentle heart. I should like her to come up, Doctor.”
“Well, if you will not keep her too long, and not talk too much, she shall come.”
The Doctor turned away, and in a few minutes the little milk-girl was at the patient’s bed-side.
“Well, Mr. Moncello, I’ve come to see you. I would have come before, only they told me you were too bad to know any one. Aunty sends a kind message, and says, If you will make haste and get better, I am to bring you a glass of new milk every day for a fortnight—real milk, sweet and new—that isn’t to be got every day in London, I can tell you.”
The patient lifted the hand of the little girl to his lips, and thanked her with his eyes.
“My little maid,” he said after a pause, “I must not keep you long, nor talk much; but just a few words I should like to say. You came from the country, did you not?”
“Yes!”
“And was it very beautiful there?”
“Oh very! My dear mother’s cottage was in the middle of a garden, and honeysuckle grew over the porch, and birds built under the eaves. I have heard the cuckoo sing there in the spring, and the nightingale, too, in the evening.”
“Remember thine early days!” said the patient with trembling fervour. “My child! you are a good girl; I think you must have had a good mother.”
“My mother!” said the child, bursting into tears. “Oh she was good indeed! Oh! how she prayed for me the night that she died! I shall never forget it, never!”
Again the patient broke out, “Remember thine early days! But go now my dear. Thank you, thank you kindly for coming. Heaven bless you!”
Pietro Limoncello recovered in due time, and returned to his poor trade. The visions of his illness strengthened his integrity; heavenly hopes grew out of the roots of heavenly memories. Thoughts of the loveliness in other lands upraised his heart to Him whose voice is gone out unto all lands; and he felt that God would be ever present to such as trusted, and waited patiently for him. Wherever the mind and heart are devoted to duty and to Heaven, there hovers the Guardian of Souls, with outstretched wings. Yes! even in the din of the Strand, in a wretched garret, at a tailor’s board, God the all-beautiful is there.
