Like many thoughtful and deliberate natures, I am persuaded that in early life “Bones” must have been a snuff-taker. He affects a trick of holding his fleshless finger and thumb pressed together and suspended in air, before he delivers himself of an opinion, that can only have originated in a practice he has since been compelled, for obvious reasons, to forego. Pausing during several seconds in this favourite attitude, he sank gravely back in his chair, and replied—
“False logic, my good friend. False premises, and a false conclusion. I deny them all; but the weather, even in my light attire, feels somewhat too close for wordy warfare. Besides, I hold with you, that an ounce of illustration is worth a pound of argument. I will ask you, therefore, as I know you have been in Cheshire, High Leicestershire, and other cattle-feeding countries, whether you ever watched a dairymaid making a cheese? If so, you must have observed how strong and pitiless a pressure is required to wring the moisture out of its very core. My friend, the human heart is like a cheese! To be good for anything, the black drop must be wrung out of it, however tight the squeeze required, however exquisite the pain. Therefore it is, that we so often see the parable of the poor man’s ewe lamb enacted in daily life. One, having everything the world can bestow, is nevertheless further endowed with that which his needy brother would give all the rest of the world to possess. For the first, the pressure has not yet been put on, though his time, too, may come by-and-by. For the second, that one darling hope, it may be, represents the little black drop left, and so it must be wrung out, though the heart be crushed into agony in the process. You talk of suffering being pure waste; I tell you it is all pure gain. You talk of self as the motive to exertion; I tell you it is the abnegation of self which has wrought out all that is noble, all that is good, all that is useful, nearly all that is ornamental in the world. Shut the house-door on him, and the man must needs go forth to work in the fields. It is not the dreamer wrapped in his fancied bliss, from whom you are to expect heroic efforts, either of mind or body. You must dig your goad into the ox to make him use his latent strength; you must drive your spurs into the horse to get out of him his utmost speed. Wake the dreamer roughly—drive spurs and goad into his heart. He will wince and writhe, and roll and gnash his teeth, but I defy him to lie still. He must up and be doing, from sheer torture, flying to one remedy after another till he gets to work, and so finds distraction, solace, presently comfort, and, after a while, looking yet higher, hope, happiness, and reward.
“Self, indeed! He is fain to forget self, because that therewith is bound up so much, it would drive him mad to remember; and thus sorrow-taught, he merges his own identity in the community of which he is but an atom, taking his first step, though at a humble and immeasurable distance, in the sacred track of self-sacrifice, on which, after more than eighteen hundred years, the footprints are still fresh, still ineffaceable. Waste, forsooth! Let him weep his heart out if he will! I tell you that the deeper the furrows are scored, the heavier shall be the harvest, the richer the garnered grain. I tell you, not a tear falls but it fertilises some barren spot, from which hereafter shall come up the fresh verdure of an eternal spring in that region
‘Where there’s fruit in the gardens of heaven, from the hope that on earth was betrayed;
Where there’s rest for the soul, life-wearied, that hath striven, and suffered, and prayed.’
“I’m rather tired. I won’t discuss the question any further. I’ll go back into my cupboard, if you please. Good-night!”
CHAPTER II
THROUGH THE MILL
Most people are ashamed of their skeletons, hiding them up in their respective cupboards as though the very ownership were a degradation—alluding to them, perhaps, occasionally in the domestic circle, but ignoring them utterly before the world—a world that knows all about them the while,—that has weighed their skulls, counted their ribs, and can tell the very recesses in which they are kept. Now, in my opinion, to take your skeleton out and air him on occasion, is very good for both of you. It brings him to his proper dimensions, which are apt to become gigantic if he is hidden too scrupulously in the dark, and it affords opportunities for comparison with other specimens of the same nature entertained by rival proprietors in the line. If I kept mine, as some do, in close confinement, I should be in a continual fidget about his safety; above all, I should dread his breaking out at untoward seasons, when he was least expected, and least desired. But “Bones and I” have no cause to be ashamed of each other. There is no disgrace nor discomfort attached to either of us in our cheerful companionship. He is good enough to express satisfaction with his present lodging, and even affirms that he finds it airy and commodious, as compared with his last; while it is a real pleasure to me, living as I do so much alone, to have a quiet, intelligent companion, with whom I can discuss the different phases of existence, speculative and real,—the sower who never reaps—the fools who are full of bread, roses for one, thorns for another; here over-ripe fruit, there grapes sour, though by no means out of reach; successful bows drawn at a venture, well-aimed shafts that never attain the mark, impossible hopes, unavailing regrets—the baseless mirage of the Future, and the barren reality of the Past.
It was colder last night. The wind was getting up in those fitful howls which denote the commencement of a two-days’ gale; veering besides from east by north to east northeast. So we made fast the shutters, stirred the fire, and drew our chairs in for a comfortable chat. Something in the sound of that waking blusterer out of doors recalled to me, I know not why, the image of a good ship, many long years ago, beating on the wide Atlantic against a head-wind, that seemed to baffle her the more for every plunge she made. No steam had she to help her struggle against the elements; tough hemp, patched canvas, and spars as yet unsprung, were all her reliance; and these strained, flapped, and creaked to some purpose while she battled foot by foot to lie her course. Again I seemed to watch the dark wave race by our quarter, with its leaping crest of foam, the trickling deck, the battened hold, the diving bowsprit, the dripping spars, the soaking canvas, with its row of reef-points like the notes on a music-score. And the grey, sullen curtain of mist and rain, walking on the waters, nearer, nearer, till it dashed its needle-pointed drops into my face. Again I looked admiringly on the men at the wheel, with their pea-jackets, glazed hats, sea-going mits, keen, wary glances, and minute wrinkles about the eyes. Again I heard the pleasant voice of the bravest, cheeriest skipper that ever stood five feet two, and weighed fifteen stone, while he accosted me with his “Dirty weather, sir, and looks sulky to windward still. Makes her drive piles, as we say, and speak Spanish about the bows; but she behaves beautifully! Bless you, she likes it! Yes, I expect we shall have it hotter and heavier too, after sundown. A head-wind, no doubt. I’ve just been jotting off the reckoning; you’ll find the chart below, in my cabin. We’ve made a longer leg than common on the starboard tack. I’ve left a pencil-mark at the exact spot where we went about. Steady, men” (this to the glazed hats). “Luff, and be d——d to you! Can’t ye see it coming?”
So I went below and conned the captain’s chart thoughtfully enough, comparing our great expenditure of energy with the small results attained, and wondering how we were ever to make our port at last.