XIV
In the summer of 1793, the city of Penn numbered forty-five thousandsouls, and lay in the form of an irregularly bounded triangle, the apexbeing about seven squares, as we say, west of the Delaware. From this itspread eastward, widening until the base, thinly builded with shops,homes, and warehouses, extended along the Delaware River a distance ofabout two miles from Callowhill Street to Cedar. It was on the partsnearest to the river that the death-cloud lay.
De Courval had walked from the Falls of Schuylkill late in the morning,and, after having been ferried across the Schuylkill, passed by forestand farm roads over a familiar, rolling country, and arrived at Merion,in the Welsh barony, where he parted from his mother. To this distancehe was now to add the seven miles which would bring him to the city.
He soon reached the Lancaster road, and after securing a bowl of breadand milk, for which he paid the exorbitant price of two shillings at afarm-house, he lay down in the woods and, lighting his meerschaum pipe,rested during the early afternoon, glad of shelter from the moist heatof the September day.
He had much to think about. His mother he dismissed, smiling. If, afterwhat he had said, he had not obeyed the call of duty and gratitude, heknew full well that she would have been surprised, despite her protestsand the terror with which his errand filled her. He, too, felt it, forit is the form which peril takes rather than equality of risk whichmakes disease appal many a man for whom war has the charm which awakensthe lust of contest, and not such alarm as the presence of the unseenfoe which gives no quarter. He dismissed his fears with a silent appealfor strength and support.
He thought then of his enemy. Where was he? This pestilence, theinexplicable act of an all-powerful God, had for a time been set as abarrier between him and his foe. If either he or Carteaux died of it,there was an end of all the indecisions that affection had put in hisway. He had a moral shock at the idea that he was unwilling to believeit well that the will of God should lose him the fierce joy of apersonal vengeance. How remote seemed such a feeling from the religiouscalm of the Quaker home! And then a rosy face, a slight, gray-cladfigure, came before him with the clearness of visual perception whichwas one of his mental peculiarities. The sense of difference of rankwhich his mother had never lost, and would never lose, he had long sinceput aside. Margaret's refinement, her young beauty, her gay sweetness,her variety of charm, he recalled as he lay; nor against these was therefor him any available guard of common sense, that foe of imprudent love,to sum up the other side with the arithmetic of worldly wisdom. He rose,disturbed a little at the consciousness of a power beginning to getbeyond his control, and went on his way down the long, dusty road,refreshed by the fair angel company of Love and Longing.
Very soon he was recalled from his dreams. As he came within a mile ofthe city, he saw tents as for an army, camp-fires, people cooking, men,women, and children lying about by the roadside and in the orchards orthe woods. Two hungry-looking mechanics begged help of him. He gave themeach a shilling and went on. The nearer shore of the quiet Schuylkillwas lined with tents. Over the middle-ferry floating bridge cameendlessly all manner of vehicles packed with scared people, thecontinuous drift from town of all who could afford to fly, a pitifulsight in the closing day. Beyond the river were more tents andhalf-starved families.
At dusk, as he went eastward on Market Street, there were fewer people,and beyond Sixth Street almost none. The taverns were closed. Commercewas at an end. Turning south, he crossed the bridge over Dock Creek atSecond Street and was soon in a part of the city where death and horrorhad left only those whom disease, want of means, or some stringent need,forbade to leave their homes. Twenty-four thousand then or later fledthe town. A gallant few who could have gone, stayed from a sense ofduty.
Exposure at night was said to be fatal, so that all who could were shutup indoors, or came out in fear only to feed with pitch and fencepalings the fires kindled in the streets which were supposed to giveprotection, but were forbidden later. A canopy of rank tar-smoke hungover the town and a dull, ruddy glow from these many fires. Grass grewin the roadway of the once busy street, and strange silence reignedwhere men were used to move amid the noises of trade. As he walked ondeep in thought, a woman ran out of a house, crying: "They are dead! Allare dead!" She stopped him. "Is my baby dead, too?"
"I--I do not know," he said, looking at the wasted, yellow face of thechild in her arms. She left it on the pavement, and ran away screaming.He had never in his life touched the dead; but now, though withrepugnance, he picked up the little body and laid it on a door-step. Wasit really dead? he asked himself. He stood a minute looking at thecorpse; then he touched it. It was unnaturally hot, as are the dead ofthis fever. Not seeing well in the dusk, and feeling a strangeresponsibility, he laid a hand on the child's heart. It was still. Hemoved away swiftly through the gathering gloom of deserted streets. OnFront Street, near Lombard, a man, seeing him approach, ran from himacross the way. A little farther, the sense of solitude and lonelinessgrew complete as the night closed dark about him. He had been long onhis way.
A half-naked man ran out of an alley and, standing before him, cried:"The plague is come upon us because they have numbered the people.Death! death! you will die for this sin." The young man, thus halted,stood appalled and then turned to look after the wild prophet ofdisaster, who ran up Lombard Street, his sinister cries lost as hedisappeared in the gloom. Rene recalled that somewhere in the Bible hehad read of how a plague had come on the Israelites for having numberedthe people. Long afterward he learned that a census of Philadelphia hadbeen taken in 1792. He stood still a moment in the gloom, amid thesilence of the deserted city and then of a sudden moved rapidly onward.
He had reached the far edge of the town, his mind upon Schmidt, when hesaw to his surprise by the glow of a dying fire a familiar form. "Mr.Girard!" he cried, in pleased surprise; for in the country little was asyet known of the disregard of death with which this man and many morewere quietly nursing the sick and keeping order in a town where, exceptthe comparatively immune negroes, few aided, and where the empty homeswere being plundered. The quick thought passed through Rene's mind thathe had heard this man called an atheist by Daniel Offley.
He said to Girard: "Ah, Monsieur, have you seen Monsieur Schmidt?"
"Not for three days. He has been busy as the best. There is one man whoknows not fear. Where is he, Vicomte?"
"We do not know. We have heard nothing since he left us two weeks ago.But he meant to live in Mrs. Swanwick's house."
"Let us go and see," said Girard; and with the man who already countedhis wealth in millions Rene hurried on. At the house they enteredeasily, for the door was open, and went up-stairs.
In Schmidt's room, guided by his delirious cries, they found him.Girard struck a light from his steel and flint, and presently they hadcandles lighted, and saw the yellow face, and the horrors of the_vomito_, in the disordered room.
"_Mon Dieu!_ but this is sad!" said Girard. "Ah, the brave gentleman!You will stay? I shall send you milk and food at once. Give him waterfreely, and the milk. Bathe him. Are you afraid?"
"I--yes; but I came for this, and I am here to stay."
"I shall send you a doctor; but they are of little use."
"Is there any precaution to take?"
"Yes. Live simply. Smoke your pipe--I believe in that. You can getcooler water by hanging out in the air demijohns and bottles wrapped inwet linen--a West-Indian way, and the well water is cold. I shall comeback to-morrow." And so advising, he left him.
De Courval set the room in order, and lighted his pipe, after obeyingGirard's suggestions. At intervals he sponged the hot body of the manwho was retching in agony of pain, babbling and crying out about courtsand princes and a woman--ever of a woman dead and of some prison life.De Courval heard his delirious revelations with wonder and a painedsense of learning the secrets of a friend.
In an hour came Dr. Rush, with his quiet manner and thin, intellectualface. Like most of those of his profession, the deat
h of some of whom inthis battle with disease a tablet in the College of Physicians recordsto-day, he failed of no duty to rich or poor. But for those whodisputed his views of practice he had only the most virulent abuse. Afirm friend, an unpardoning hater, and in some ways far ahead of histime, was the man who now sat down as he said: "I must bleed him atonce. Calomel and blood-letting are the only safety, sir. I bled Dr.Griffith seventy-five ounces to-day. He will get well." The doctor bledeverybody, and over and over.
His voice seemed to rouse Schmidt. He cried out: "Take away that horseleech. He will kill me." He fought them both and tore the bandage fromhis arm. The doctor at last gave up, unused to resistance. "Give him thecalomel powders."
"Out with your drugs!" cried the sick man, striking at him in fury, andthen falling back in delirium again, yellow and flushed. The doctor leftin disgust, with his neat wrist ruffles torn. On the stair he said: "Hewill die, but I shall call to-morrow. He will be dead, I fear."
"Is he gone?" gasped Schmidt, when, returning, Rene sat down by hisbedside.
"Yes, sir; but he will come again."
"I do not want him. I want air--air." As he spoke, he rose on his elbowand looked about him. "I knew you would come. I should never have sentfor you. _Mein Gott!_" he cried hoarsely, looking at the room and thebedclothes. "Horrible!" His natural refinement was shocked at what hesaw. "_Ach!_ to die like a wallowing pig is a torture of disgust! Aninsult, this disease and torment." Then wandering again: "I pray you,sir, to hold me excused."
The distracted young man never forgot that night. The German at dawn,crying, "Air, air!" got up, and despite all De Courval could dostaggered out to the upper porch and lay uncovered on a mattress uponwhich De Courval dragged him. The milk and food came, and at six o'clockStephen Girard.
"I have been up all night," he said; "but here is a black to help you."
To De Courval's delight, it was old Cicero, who, lured by high wagesgiven to the negro, whom even the pest passed by, had left the widow'sservice.
"Now," said Girard, "here is help. Pay him well. Our friend will die, Ifear; and, sir, you are a brave man, but do not sit here all day."
De Courval, in despair at his verdict, thanked him. But the friend wasnot to die. Cicero proved faithful, and cooked and nursed and Rene, asthe hours of misery went on, began to hope. The fever lessened in a dayor two, but Schmidt still lay on the porch, speechless, yellow andwasted, swearing furiously at any effort to get him back to bed. As thedays ran on he grew quiet and rejoiced to feel the cool breeze from theriver and had a smile for Rene and a brief word of cheer for Girard, whocame hither daily, heroically uncomplaining, spending his strengthlavishly and his money with less indifference. Schmidt, back again inthe world of human interests, listened to his talk with Rene, himselffor the most part silent.
Twice a day, when thus in a measure relieved, as the flood served, DeCourval rowed out on the river, and came back refreshed by his swim. Hesent comforting notes by Cicero to his mother and to Mrs. Swanwick, anda message of remembrance to Margaret, and was careful to add that he had"fumed" the letters with sulphur, that things were better with Schmidt,and he himself was well. Cicero came back with glad replies and fruitand milk and lettuce and fresh eggs and what not, while day after daythree women prayed at morning and night for those whom in theirdifferent ways they loved.
One afternoon Dr. Rush came again and said it was amazing, but it wouldhave been still better if he had been let to bleed him, telling how hehad bled Dr. Mease six times in five days, and now he was safe. But herehe considered that he would be no further needed. Schmidt had listenedcivilly to the doctor with the mild, tired, blue eyes and delicatefeatures; feeling, with the inflowing tide of vigor, a return of hisnormal satisfaction in the study of man, he began, to De Courval's joy,to amuse himself.
"Do you bleed the Quakers, too?" he asked.
"Why not?" said the doctor, puzzled.
"Have they as much blood as other people? You look to be worn out. Praydo not go. Sit down. Cicero shall give you some chocolate."
The doctor liked few things better than a chance to talk. He sat downagain as desired, saying: "Yes, I am tired; but though I had only threehours' sleep last night, I am still, through the divine Goodness, inperfect health. Yesterday was a triumph for mercury, jalap, andbleeding. They saved at least a hundred lives."
"Are the doctors all of your way of thinking?"
"No, sir. I have to combat prejudice and falsehood. Sir, they aremurderers."
"Sad, very sad!" remarked Schmidt.
"I have one satisfaction. I grieve for the blindness of men, but Inourish a belief that my labor is acceptable to Heaven. Malice andslander are my portion on earth; but my opponents will have their rewardhereafter."
"Most comforting!" murmured Schmidt. "But what a satisfaction to be sureyou are right!"
"Yes, to know, sir, that I am right and these my enemies wrong, doesconsole me; and, too, to feel that I am humbly following in thefootsteps of my Master. But I must go. The chocolate is good. My thanks.If you relapse, let me know, and the lancet will save you. Good-by."
When Rene returned, having attended the doctor to the door, Schmidt wassmiling.
"Ah, my son," he said, "only in the Old Testament will you find a manlike that--malice and piety, with a belief in himself no man, no reason,can disturb."
"Yes, I heard him with wonder."
"He has done me good, but now I am tired. He has gone--he said so--tovisit Miss Gainor, at the Hill. I should like to hear her talk to him."
An attack of gout had not improved that lady's temper, and she cruellymocked at the great doctor's complaints of his colleagues. When sheheard of De Courval, and how at last he would not agree to have Schmidtheld for the doctor to bleed him she said he was a fine fellow; and tothe doctor's statement that he was a fool, she retorted: "You havechanged your religion twice, I do hear. When you are born again, try tobe born a fool."
The doctor, enraged, would have gone at once, but the gout was in solidpossession, and the threat to send for Dr. Chovet held him. He laughed,outwardly at least, and did not go. The next day he, too, was in thegrip of the fever, and was bled to his satisfaction, recovering later toresume his gallant work.
And now that, after another week, Schmidt, a ghastly frame of a man,began to eat, but still would not talk, De Courval, who had never lefthim except for his swim or to walk in the garden, leaving Cicero incharge, went out into the streets to find a shop and that rare article,tobacco.
It was now well on into this fatal September. The deaths were threehundred a week. The sick no man counted, but probably half of thoseattacked died. At night in his vigils, De Courval heard negroes, withpush-carts or dragging chaises, cry: "Bring out your dead! Bring outyour dead!" The bodies were let down from upper windows by ropes or leftoutside of the doorways until the death-cart came and took them away.
It was about noon when Rene left the house. As he neared the center ofthe city, there were more people in the streets than he expected to see;but all wore a look of anxiety and avoided one another, walking in themiddle of the roadway. No one shook hands with friend or kinsman. Manysmoked; most of them wore collars of tarred rope, or chewed garlic, orheld to their faces vials of "vinegar of the four thieves" once popularin the plague. He twice saw men, stricken as they walked, creep awaylike animals, beseeching help from those who fled in dismay. Every hourhad its sickening tragedy.
As he stood on Second Street looking at a man chalking the doors ofinfected houses, a lightly clad young woman ran forth screaming. Hestopped her. "What is it? Can I help you?" A great impulse of desire toaid came over him, a feeling of pitiful self-appeal to the manhood ofhis courage.
"Let me go! My husband has it. I won't stay! I am too young to die."
A deadly fear fell upon the young Huguenot. "I, too, am young, and maydie," he murmured; but he went in and up-stairs. He saw an old man,yellow and convulsed; but being powerless to help him, he went out tofind some one.
On the bridge ov
er Dock Creek he met Daniel Offley. He did not esteemhim greatly, but he said, "I want to know how I can help a man I havejust left."
The two men who disliked each other had then and there their lesson. "Iwill go with thee." They found the old man dead. As they came out,Offley said, "Come with me, if thee is minded to aid thy fellows," andthey went on, talking of the agony of the doomed city.
Hearses and push-carts went by in rows, heavy with naked corpses in thetainted air. Very few well-dressed people were seen. Fashion and wealthhad gone, panic-stricken, and good grass crops could have been cut inthe desolate streets near the Delaware.
Now and then some scared man, walking in the roadway, for few, as Isaid, used the sidewalk, would turn, shocked at hearing the Quaker'sloud voice; for, as was noticed, persons who met, spoke softly and low,as if feeling the nearness of the unseen dead in the houses. While DeCourval waited, Offley went into several alleys on their way, and cameout more quiet.
"I have business here," said Offley, as he led the way over the southside of the Potter's Field we now call Washington Square. He paused topay two black men who were digging wide pits for the fast-coming deadcast down from the death-carts. A Catholic priest and a Lutheranclergyman were busy, wearily saying brief prayers over the dead.
Offley looked on, for a minute silent. "The priest is of Rome," he said,"one Keating--a good man; the other a Lutheran."
"Strange fellowship!" thought De Courval.
They left them to this endless task, and went on, Daniel talking in hisoppressively loud voice of the number of the deaths. The imminence ofperil affected the spirits of most men, but not Offley. De Courval,failing to answer a question, he said: "What troubles thee, young man?Is thee afeared?"
"A man should be--and at first I was; but now I am thinking of thePapist and Lutheran--working together. That gives one to think, as wesay in French."
"I see not why," said Offley. "But we must hasten, or the healthcommittee will be gone."
In a few minutes they were at the State House. Daniel led him throughthe hall and up-stairs. In the council-room of Penn was seated a groupof notable men.
"Here," said Offley in his great voice, "is a young man of a will tohelp us."
Girard rose. "This, gentlemen, is my countryman, the Vicomte deCourval."
Matthew Clarkson, the mayor, made him welcome.
"Sit down," he said. "We shall presently be free to direct you."
De Courval took the offered seat and looked with interest at the menbefore him.
There were Carey, the future historian of the plague; Samuel Wetherill,the Free Quaker; Henry de Forrest, whom he had met; Thomas Savory;Thomas Wistar; Thomas Scattergood; Jonathan Seargeant; and others. Mostof them, being Friends, sat wearing their white beaver hats. Tranquiland fearless, they were quietly disposing of a task from which some ofthe overseers of the poor had fled. Six of those present were very soonto join the four thousand who died before November. When the meeting wasover Girard said to De Courval: "Peter Helm and I are to take charge ofthe hospital on Bush Hill. Are you willing to help us? It is perilous; Iought to tell you that."
"Yes, I will go," said Rene; "I have now time, and I want to be of someuse."
"We thank you," said Matthew Clarkson. "Help is sorely needed."
"Come with me," said Girard. "My chaise is here. Help is scarce. Toomany who should be of us have fled." As they went out, he added: "I owethis city much, as some day it will know. You are going to a scene ofungoverned riot, of drunken negro nurses; but it is to be changed, andsoon, too."
James Hamilton's former country seat on Bush Hill was crowded with thedying and the dead; but there were two devoted doctors, and soon therewas better order and discipline.
De Courval went daily across the doomed city to his loathsome task,walking thither after his breakfast. He helped to feed and nurse thesick, aided in keeping the beds decent, and in handling the many whodied, until at nightfall, faint and despairing, he wandered back to hishome. Only once Schmidt asked a question, and hearing his sad story, wassilent, except to say: "I thought as much. God guard you, my son!"
One day, returning, he saw at evening on Front Street a man seated on adoor-step. He stopped, and the man looked up. It was the blacksmithOffley.
"I am stricken," he said. "Will thee help me?"
"Surely I will." De Courval assisted him into the house and to bed. Hehad sent his family away. "I have shod my last horse, I fear. Fetch meDr. Hutchinson."
"He died to-day."
"Then another--Dr. Hodge; but my wife must not know. She would come.Ask Friend Pennington to visit me. I did not approve of thee, young man.I ask thee pardon; I was mistaken. Go, and be quick."
"I shall find some one." He did not tell him that both Pennington andthe physician were dead.
De Courval was able to secure the needed help, but the next afternoonwhen he returned, the blacksmith was in a hearse at the door. De Courvalwalked away thoughtful. Even those he knew avoided him, and he observed,what many noticed, that every one looked sallow and their eyes yellow. Astrange thing it seemed.
And so, with letters well guarded, that none he loved might guess hiswork, September passed, and the German was at last able to be in thegarden, but strangely feeble, still silent, and now asking for books. Agreat longing was on the young man to see those he loved; but October,which saw two thousand perish, came and went, and it was well on intothe cooler November before the pest-house was closed and De Courval setfree, happy in a vast and helpful experience, but utterly worn out andfinding his last week's walks to the hospital far too great an exertion.What his body had lost for a time, his character had gained in anexercised charity for the sick, for the poor, and for the opinions ofmen on whom he had previously looked with small respect.
A better and wiser man on the 20th of November drove out with Schmidt tothe home of the Wynnes at Merion, where Schmidt left him to the tendercare of two women, who took despotic possession.
"At last!" cried the mother, and with tears most rare to her she heldthe worn and wasted figure in her arms. "_Mon Dieu!_" she cried, as forthe first time she heard of what he had done. For only to her wasconfession of heroic conduct possible. "And I--I would have kept youfrom God's service. I am proud of you as never before." All the longafternoon they talked, and Mr. Wynne, just come back, and Darthea wouldhave him to stay for a few days.
At bedtime, as they sat alone, Hugh said to his wife, "I was sure ofthat young man."
"Is he not a little like you?" asked Darthea.
"Nonsense!" he cried. "Do you think every good man like me? I grievethat I was absent."
"And I do not."
The Red City: A Novel of the Second Administration of President Washington Page 16
