THE DRUNKARD'S DREAM.
Being a Fourth Extract from the Legacy of the late F. Purcell, P. P. ofDrumcoolagh.
'All this HE told with some confusion and Dismay, the usual consequence of dreams Of the unpleasant kind, with none at hand To expound their vain and visionary gleams, I've known some odd ones which seemed really planned Prophetically, as that which one deems "A strange coincidence," to use a phrase By which such things are settled nowadays.' BYRON.
Dreams! What age, or what country of the world, has not and acknowledgedthe mystery of their origin and end? I have thought not a little uponthe subject, seeing it is one which has been often forced upon myattention, and sometimes strangely enough; and yet I have never arrivedat anything which at all appeared a satisfactory conclusion. It doesappear that a mental phenomenon so extraordinary cannot be whollywithout its use. We know, indeed, that in the olden times it has beenmade the organ of communication between the Deity and His creatures; andwhen, as I have seen, a dream produces upon a mind, to all appearancehopelessly reprobate and depraved, an effect so powerful and so lastingas to break down the inveterate habits, and to reform the life of anabandoned sinner, we see in the result, in the reformation of moralswhich appeared incorrigible, in the reclamation of a human soul whichseemed to be irretrievably lost, something more than could be producedby a mere chimera of the slumbering fancy, something more than couldarise from the capricious images of a terrified imagination; but oncepresented, we behold in all these things, and in their tremendous andmysterious results, the operation of the hand of God. And while Reasonrejects as absurd the superstition which will read a prophecy in everydream, she may, without violence to herself, recognise, even inthe wildest and most incongruous of the wanderings of a slumberingintellect, the evidences and the fragments of a language which may bespoken, which HAS been spoken, to terrify, to warn, and to command. Wehave reason to believe too, by the promptness of action which in theage of the prophets followed all intimations of this kind, and by thestrength of conviction and strange permanence of the effects resultingfrom certain dreams in latter times, which effects we ourselves may havewitnessed, that when this medium of communication has been employedby the Deity, the evidences of His presence have been unequivocal. Mythoughts were directed to this subject, in a manner to leave a lastingimpression upon my mind, by the events which I shall now relate, thestatement of which, however extraordinary, is nevertheless ACCURATELYCORRECT.
About the year 17--, having been appointed to the living of C---h, Irented a small house in the town, which bears the same name: one morningin the month of November, I was awakened before my usual time by myservant, who bustled into my bedroom for the purpose of announcing asick call. As the Catholic Church holds her last rites to be totallyindispensable to the safety of the departing sinner, no conscientiousclergyman can afford a moment's unnecessary delay, and in little morethan five minutes I stood ready cloaked and booted for the road, in thesmall front parlour, in which the messenger, who was to act as my guide,awaited my coming. I found a poor little girl crying piteously near thedoor, and after some slight difficulty I ascertained that her father waseither dead or just dying.
'And what may be your father's name, my poor child?' said I. She helddown her head, as if ashamed. I repeated the question, and the wretchedlittle creature burst into floods of tears still more bitter than shehad shed before. At length, almost provoked by conduct which appeared tome so unreasonable, I began to lose patience, spite of the pity which Icould not help feeling towards her, and I said rather harshly:
'If you will not tell me the name of the person to whom you would leadme, your silence can arise from no good motive, and I might be justifiedin refusing to go with you at all.'
'Oh, don't say that--don't say that!' cried she. 'Oh, sir, it was thatI was afeard of when I would not tell you--I was afeard, when youheard his name, you would not come with me; but it is no use hidin' itnow--it's Pat Connell, the carpenter, your honour.'
She looked in my face with the most earnest anxiety, as if her veryexistence depended upon what she should read there; but I relieved herat once. The name, indeed, was most unpleasantly familiar to me; but,however fruitless my visits and advice might have been at another time,the present was too fearful an occasion to suffer my doubts of theirutility or my reluctance to re-attempting what appeared a hopeless taskto weigh even against the lightest chance that a consciousness ofhis imminent danger might produce in him a more docile and tractabledisposition. Accordingly I told the child to lead the way, and followedher in silence. She hurried rapidly through the long narrow street whichforms the great thoroughfare of the town. The darkness of the hour,rendered still deeper by the close approach of the old-fashioned houses,which lowered in tall obscurity on either side of the way; the damp,dreary chill which renders the advance of morning peculiarly cheerless,combined with the object of my walk, to visit the death-bed of apresumptuous sinner, to endeavour, almost against my own conviction, toinfuse a hope into the heart of a dying reprobate--a drunkard buttoo probably perishing under the consequences of some mad fit ofintoxication; all these circumstances united served to enhance the gloomand solemnity of my feelings, as I silently followed my little guide,who with quick steps traversed the uneven pavement of the main street.After a walk of about five minutes she turned off into a narrow lane,of that obscure and comfortless class which is to be found in almost allsmall oldfashioned towns, chill, without ventilation, reeking with allmanner of offensive effluviae, and lined by dingy, smoky, sickly andpent-up buildings, frequently not only in a wretched but in a dangerouscondition.
'Your father has changed his abode since I last visited him, and, I amafraid, much for the worse,' said I.
'Indeed he has, sir; but we must not complain,' replied she. 'We have tothank God that we have lodging and food, though it's poor enough, it is,your honour.'
Poor child! thought I, how many an older head might learn wisdom fromthee--how many a luxurious philosopher, who is skilled to preach but notto suffer, might not thy patient words put to the blush! The mannerand language of this child were alike above her years and station;and, indeed, in all cases in which the cares and sorrows of life haveanticipated their usual date, and have fallen, as they sometimes do,with melancholy prematurity to the lot of childhood, I have observed theresult to have proved uniformly the same. A young mind, to which joy andindulgence have been strangers, and to which suffering and self-denialhave been familiarised from the first, acquires a solidity and anelevation which no other discipline could have bestowed, and which, inthe present case, communicated a striking but mournful peculiarity tothe manners, even to the voice, of the child. We paused before a narrow,crazy door, which she opened by means of a latch, and we forthwith beganto ascend the steep and broken stairs which led upwards to the sickman's room.
As we mounted flight after flight towards the garret-floor, I heard moreand more distinctly the hurried talking of many voices. I could alsodistinguish the low sobbing of a female. On arriving upon the uppermostlobby these sounds became fully audible.
'This way, your honour,' said my little conductress; at the same time,pushing open a door of patched and half-rotten plank, she admitted meinto the squalid chamber of death and misery. But one candle, held inthe fingers of a scared and haggard-looking child, was burning in theroom, and that so dim that all was twilight or darkness except withinits immediate influence. The general obscurity, however, served to throwinto prominent and startling relief the death-bed and its occupant. Thelight was nearly approximated to, and fell with horrible clearnessupon, the blue and swollen features of the drunkard. I did not think itpossible that a human countenance could look so terrific. The lips wereblack and drawn apart; the teeth were firmly set; the eyes a littleunclosed, and nothing but the whites appearing. Every feature was fixedand livid, and the whole face wore a ghastly and rigid expression ofdespairing terror such as I never saw equalled. His hands were cro
ssedupon his breast, and firmly clenched; while, as if to add to thecorpse-like effect of the whole, some white cloths, dipped in water,were wound about the forehead and temples.
As soon as I could remove my eyes from this horrible spectacle, Iobserved my friend Dr. D----, one of the most humane of a humaneprofession, standing by the bedside. He had been attempting, butunsuccessfully, to bleed the patient, and had now applied his finger tothe pulse.
'Is there any hope?' I inquired in a whisper.
A shake of the head was the reply. There was a pause while he continuedto hold the wrist; but he waited in vain for the throb of life--it wasnot there: and when he let go the hand, it fell stiffly back into itsformer position upon the other.
'The man is dead,' said the physician, as he turned from the bed wherethe terrible figure lay.
Dead! thought I, scarcely venturing to look upon the tremendous andrevolting spectacle. Dead! without an hour for repentance, even a momentfor reflection; dead I without the rites which even the best shouldhave. Is there a hope for him? The glaring eyeball, the grinning mouth,the distorted brow--that unutterable look in which a painter would havesought to embody the fixed despair of the nethermost hell. These were myanswer.
The poor wife sat at a little distance, crying as if her heart wouldbreak--the younger children clustered round the bed, looking withwondering curiosity upon the form of death never seen before.
When the first tumult of uncontrollable sorrow had passed away, availingmyself of the solemnity and impressiveness of the scene, I desired theheart-stricken family to accompany me in prayer, and all knelt downwhile I solemnly and fervently repeated some of those prayers whichappeared most applicable to the occasion. I employed myself thus in amanner which, I trusted, was not unprofitable, at least to the living,for about ten minutes; and having accomplished my task, I was the firstto arise.
I looked upon the poor, sobbing, helpless creatures who knelt so humblyaround me, and my heart bled for them. With a natural transition Iturned my eyes from them to the bed in which the body lay; and, greatGod! what was the revulsion, the horror which I experienced on seeingthe corpse-like terrific thing seated half upright before me; the whitecloths which had been wound about the head had now partly slipped fromtheir position, and were hanging in grotesque festoons about the faceand shoulders, while the distorted eyes leered from amid them--
'A sight to dream of, not to tell.'
I stood actually riveted to the spot. The figure nodded its head andlifted its arm, I thought, with a menacing gesture. A thousand confusedand horrible thoughts at once rushed upon my mind. I had often readthat the body of a presumptuous sinner, who, during life, had been thewilling creature of every satanic impulse, after the human tenant haddeserted it, had been known to become the horrible sport of demoniacpossession.
I was roused from the stupefaction of terror in which I stood, by thepiercing scream of the mother, who now, for the first time, perceivedthe change which had taken place. She rushed towards the bed, butstunned by the shock, and overcome by the conflict of violent emotions,before she reached it she fell prostrate upon the floor.
I am perfectly convinced that had I not been startled from the torpidityof horror in which I was bound by some powerful and arousing stimulant,I should have gazed upon this unearthly apparition until I had fairlylost my senses. As it was, however, the spell was broken--superstitiongave way to reason: the man whom all believed to have been actually deadwas living!
Dr. D---- was instantly standing by the bedside, and upon examination hefound that a sudden and copious flow of blood had taken place from thewound which the lancet had left; and this, no doubt, had effected hissudden and almost preternatural restoration to an existence from whichall thought he had been for ever removed. The man was still speechless,but he seemed to understand the physician when he forbid his repeatingthe painful and fruitless attempts which he made to articulate, and heat once resigned himself quietly into his hands.
I left the patient with leeches upon his temples, and bleeding freely,apparently with little of the drowsiness which accompanies apoplexy;indeed, Dr. D---- told me that he had never before witnessed a seizurewhich seemed to combine the symptoms of so many kinds, and yet whichbelonged to none of the recognised classes; it certainly was notapoplexy, catalepsy, nor delirium tremens, and yet it seemed, insome degree, to partake of the properties of all. It was strange, butstranger things are coming.
During two or three days Dr. D---- would not allow his patient toconverse in a manner which could excite or exhaust him, with anyone;he suffered him merely as briefly as possible to express his immediatewants. And it was not until the fourth day after my early visit, theparticulars of which I have just detailed, that it was thought expedientthat I should see him, and then only because it appeared that hisextreme importunity and impatience to meet me were likely to retardhis recovery more than the mere exhaustion attendant upon a shortconversation could possibly do; perhaps, too, my friend entertained somehope that if by holy confession his patient's bosom were eased of theperilous stuff which no doubt oppressed it, his recovery would be moreassured and rapid. It was then, as I have said, upon the fourth dayafter my first professional call, that I found myself once more in thedreary chamber of want and sickness.
The man was in bed, and appeared low and restless. On my entering theroom he raised himself in the bed, and muttered, twice or thrice:
'Thank God! thank God!'
I signed to those of his family who stood by to leave the room, andtook a chair beside the bed. So soon as we were alone, he said, ratherdoggedly:
'There's no use in telling me of the sinfulness of bad ways--I know itall. I know where they lead to--I seen everything about it with my owneyesight, as plain as I see you.' He rolled himself in the bed, as ifto hide his face in the clothes; and then suddenly raising himself,he exclaimed with startling vehemence: 'Look, sir! there is no use inmincing the matter: I'm blasted with the fires of hell; I have been inhell. What do you think of that? In hell--I'm lost for ever--I have nota chance. I am damned already--damned--damned!'
The end of this sentence he actually shouted. His vehemence wasperfectly terrific; he threw himself back, and laughed, and sobbedhysterically. I poured some water into a tea-cup, and gave it to him.After he had swallowed it, I told him if he had anything to communicate,to do so as briefly as he could, and in a manner as little agitatingto himself as possible; threatening at the same time, though I had nointention of doing so, to leave him at once, in case he again gave wayto such passionate excitement.
'It's only foolishness,' he continued, 'for me to try to thank you forcoming to such a villain as myself at all. It's no use for me to wishgood to you, or to bless you; for such as me has no blessings to give.'
I told him that I had but done my duty, and urged him to proceed to thematter which weighed upon his mind. He then spoke nearly as follows:
'I came in drunk on Friday night last, and got to my bed here; I don'tremember how. Sometime in the night it seemed to me I wakened, andfeeling unasy in myself, I got up out of the bed. I wanted the freshair; but I would not make a noise to open the window, for fear I'd wakenthe crathurs. It was very dark and throublesome to find the door; butat last I did get it, and I groped my way out, and went down as asy as Icould. I felt quite sober, and I counted the steps one after another, asI was going down, that I might not stumble at the bottom.
'When I came to the first landing-place--God be about us always!--thefloor of it sunk under me, and I went down--down--down, till the sensesalmost left me. I do not know how long I was falling, but it seemed tome a great while. When I came rightly to myself at last, I was sittingnear the top of a great table; and I could not see the end of it, if ithad any, it was so far off. And there was men beyond reckoning, sittingdown all along by it, at each side, as far as I could see at all. Idid not know at first was it in the open air; but there was a closesmothering feel in it that was not natural. And there was a kind oflight that my eyesight never saw be
fore, red and unsteady; and I did notsee for a long time where it was coming from, until I looked straightup, and then I seen that it came from great balls of blood-colouredfire that were rolling high over head with a sort of rushing, tremblingsound, and I perceived that they shone on the ribs of a great roof ofrock that was arched overhead instead of the sky. When I seen this,scarce knowing what I did, I got up, and I said, "I have no right tobe here; I must go." And the man that was sitting at my left hand onlysmiled, and said, "Sit down again; you can NEVER leave this place." Andhis voice was weaker than any child's voice I ever heerd; and when hewas done speaking he smiled again.
'Then I spoke out very loud and bold, and I said, "In the name of God,let me out of this bad place." And there was a great man that I did notsee before, sitting at the end of the table that I was near; and he wastaller than twelve men, and his face was very proud and terrible to lookat. And he stood up and stretched out his hand before him; and when hestood up, all that was there, great and small, bowed down with a sighingsound, and a dread came on my heart, and he looked at me, and I couldnot speak. I felt I was his own, to do what he liked with, for I knew atonce who he was; and he said, "If you promise to return, you may departfor a season;" and the voice he spoke with was terrible and mournful,and the echoes of it went rolling and swelling down the endless cave,and mixing with the trembling of the fire overhead; so that when hesat down there was a sound after him, all through the place, likethe roaring of a furnace, and I said, with all the strength I had, "Ipromise to come back--in God's name let me go!"
'And with that I lost the sight and the hearing of all that was there,and when my senses came to me again, I was sitting in the bed with theblood all over me, and you and the rest praying around the room.'
Here he paused and wiped away the chill drops of horror which hung uponhis forehead.
I remained silent for some moments. The vision which he had justdescribed struck my imagination not a little, for this was longbefore Vathek and the 'Hall of Eblis' had delighted the world; and thedescription which he gave had, as I received it, all the attractions ofnovelty beside the impressiveness which always belongs to the narrationof an EYE-WITNESS, whether in the body or in the spirit, of the sceneswhich he describes. There was something, too, in the stern horrorwith which the man related these things, and in the incongruity of hisdescription, with the vulgarly received notions of the great place ofpunishment, and of its presiding spirit, which struck my mind with awe,almost with fear. At length he said, with an expression of horrible,imploring earnestness, which I shall never forget--'Well, sir, isthere any hope; is there any chance at all? or, is my soul pledged andpromised away for ever? is it gone out of my power? must I go back tothe place?'
In answering him, I had no easy task to perform; for however clearmight be my internal conviction of the groundlessness of his tears,and however strong my scepticism respecting the reality of what he haddescribed, I nevertheless felt that his impression to the contrary, andhis humility and terror resulting from it, might be made available asno mean engines in the work of his conversion from prodigacy, and of hisrestoration to decent habits, and to religious feeling.
I therefore told him that he was to regard his dream rather in the lightof a warning than in that of a prophecy; that our salvation depended notupon the word or deed of a moment, but upon the habits of a life; that,in fine, if he at once discarded his idle companions and evil habits,and firmly adhered to a sober, industrious, and religious course oflife, the powers of darkness might claim his soul in vain, for thatthere were higher and firmer pledges than human tongue could utter,which promised salvation to him who should repent and lead a new life.
I left him much comforted, and with a promise to return upon the nextday. I did so, and found him much more cheerful and without any remainsof the dogged sullenness which I suppose had arisen from his despair.His promises of amendment were given in that tone of deliberateearnestness, which belongs to deep and solemn determination; and it waswith no small delight that I observed, after repeated visits, that hisgood resolutions, so far from failing, did but gather strength by time;and when I saw that man shake off the idle and debauched companions,whose society had for years formed alike his amusement and his ruin, andrevive his long discarded habits of industry and sobriety, I said withinmyself, there is something more in all this than the operation of anidle dream.
One day, sometime after his perfect restoration to health, I wassurprised on ascending the stairs, for the purpose of visiting thisman, to find him busily employed in nailing down some planks upon thelanding-place, through which, at the commencement of his mysteriousvision, it seemed to him that he had sunk. I perceived at once that hewas strengthening the floor with a view to securing himself against sucha catastrophe, and could scarcely forbear a smile as I bid 'God blesshis work.'
He perceived my thoughts, I suppose, for he immediately said:
'I can never pass over that floor without trembling. I'd leave thishouse if I could, but I can't find another lodging in the town so cheap,and I'll not take a better till I've paid off all my debts, please God;but I could not be asy in my mind till I made it as safe as I could.You'll hardly believe me, your honour, that while I'm working, maybe amile away, my heart is in a flutter the whole way back, with the barethoughts of the two little steps I have to walk upon this bit of afloor. So it's no wonder, sir, I'd thry to make it sound and firm withany idle timber I have.'
I applauded his resolution to pay off his debts, and the steadiness withwhich he perused his plans of conscientious economy, and passed on.
Many months elapsed, and still there appeared no alteration in hisresolutions of amendment. He was a good workman, and with his betterhabits he recovered his former extensive and profitable employment.Everything seemed to promise comfort and respectability. I have littlemore to add, and that shall be told quickly. I had one evening met PatConnell, as he returned from his work, and as usual, after a mutual, andon his side respectful salutation, I spoke a few words of encouragementand approval. I left him industrious, active, healthy--when next I sawhim, not three days after, he was a corpse.
The circumstances which marked the event of his death were somewhatstrange--I might say fearful. The unfortunate man had accidentally metan early friend just returned, after a long absence, and in a moment ofexcitement, forgetting everything in the warmth of his joy, he yieldedto his urgent invitation to accompany him into a public-house, which layclose by the spot where the encounter had taken place. Connell, however,previously to entering the room, had announced his determination to takenothing more than the strictest temperance would warrant.
But oh! who can describe the inveterate tenacity with which a drunkard'shabits cling to him through life? He may repent--he may reform--he maylook with actual abhorrence upon his past profligacy; but amid all thisreformation and compunction, who can tell the moment in which thebase and ruinous propensity may not recur, triumphing over resolution,remorse, shame, everything, and prostrating its victim once more in allthat is destructive and revolting in that fatal vice?
The wretched man left the place in a state of utter intoxication. He wasbrought home nearly insensible, and placed in his bed, where he lay inthe deep calm lethargy of drunkenness. The younger part of the familyretired to rest much after their usual hour; but the poor wife remainedup sitting by the fire, too much grieved and shocked at the occurrenceof what she had so little expected, to settle to rest; fatigue, however,at length overcame her, and she sank gradually into an uneasy slumber.She could not tell how long she had remained in this state, when sheawakened, and immediately on opening her eyes, she perceived by thefaint red light of the smouldering turf embers, two persons, one of whomshe recognised as her husband, noiselessly gliding out of the room.
'Pat, darling, where are you going?' said she. There was no answer--thedoor closed after them; but in a moment she was startled and terrifiedby a loud and heavy crash, as if some ponderous body had been hurleddown the stair. Much alarmed, she started up,
and going to the head ofthe staircase, she called repeatedly upon her husband, but in vain. Shereturned to the room, and with the assistance of her daughter, whom Ihad occasion to mention before, she succeeded in finding and lighting acandle, with which she hurried again to the head of the staircase.
At the bottom lay what seemed to be a bundle of clothes, heapedtogether, motionless, lifeless--it was her husband. In going down thestair, for what purpose can never now be known, he had fallen helplesslyand violently to the bottom, and coming head foremost, the spine atthe neck had been dislocated by the shock, and instant death must haveensued. The body lay upon that landing-place to which his dream hadreferred. It is scarcely worth endeavouring to clear up a single pointin a narrative where all is mystery; yet I could not help suspectingthat the second figure which had been seen in the room by Connell's wifeon the night of his death, might have been no other than his own shadow.I suggested this solution of the difficulty; but she told me that theunknown person had been considerably in advance of the other, and onreaching the door, had turned back as if to communicate something to hiscompanion. It was then a mystery.
Was the dream verified?--whither had the disembodied spirit sped?--whocan say? We know not. But I left the house of death that day in a stateof horror which I could not describe. It seemed to me that I was scarceawake. I heard and saw everything as if under the spell of a night-mare.The coincidence was terrible.
The Purcell Papers — Volume 1 Page 5
