St. George and St. Michael

by George MacDonald

  CHAPTER XLVII.

  THE POET-PHYSICIAN.

  Time passed, but with little change in the condition of the patient.Winter began to draw on, and both doctors feared a more rapid decline.

  Early in the month of November, Dorothy received a letter from Mr.Herbert, informing her that her cousin, Henry Vaughan, one of his latetwin pupils, would, on his way from Oxford, be passing near Raglan, andthat he had desired him to call upon her. Willing enough to see herrelative, she thought little more of the matter, until at length the daywas at hand, when she found herself looking for his arrival with somecuriosity as to what sort of person he might prove of whom she had heardso often from his master.

  When at length he was ushered into lady Glamorgan's parlour, where hermistress had desired her to receive him, both her ladyship and Dorothywere at once prejudiced in his favour. They saw a rather tall young manof five or six and twenty, with a small head, a clear grey eye, and asober yet changeful countenance. His carriage was dignified yetgraceful--self-restraint and no other was evident therein; a certainsadness brooded like a thin mist above his eyes, but his smile now andthen broke out like the sun through a grey cloud. Dorothy did not knowthat he was just getting over the end of a love-story, or that he had abook of verses just printed, and had already begun to repent it.

  After the usual greetings, and when Dorothy had heard the last news ofMr. Herbert,--for Mr. Vaughan had made several journeys of late betweenBrecknock and Oxford, taking Llangattock Rectory in his way, and couldtell her much she did not know concerning her friend,--lady Glamorgan,who was not sorry to see her interested in a young man whose royalistpredilections were plain and strong, proposed that Dorothy should takehim over the castle.

  She led him first to the top of the tower to show him the reservoir andthe prospect; but there they fell into such a talk as revealed toDorothy that here was a man who was her master in everything towardswhich, especially since her mother's death and her following troubles,she had most aspired, and a great hope arose in her heart for her cousinScudamore. For in this talk it had come out that Mr. Vaughan had studiedmedicine, and was now on his way to settle for practice at Brecknock. Assoon as Dorothy learned this, she entreated her cousin Vaughan to go andvisit her cousin Scudamore. He consented, and Dorothy, scarcely allowinghim to pause even under the admirable roof of the great hall as theypassed through, led him straight to the turret-chamber, where the sickman was.

  They found him sitting by the fire, folded in blankets, listless andsad.

  When Dorothy had told him whom she had brought to see him, she wouldhave left them, but Rowland turned on her such beseeching eyes, that sheremained, by no means unwillingly, and seated herself to hear what thiswonderful young physician would say.

  'It is very irksome to be thus prisoned in your chamber, sir Rowland,'he said.

  'No,' answered Scudamore, 'or yes: I care not.'

  'Have you no books about you?' asked Mr. Vaughan, glancing round theroom.

  'Books!' repeated Scudamore, with a wan contemptuous smile.

  'You do not then love books?'

  'Wherefore should I love books? What can books do for me? I lovenothing. I long only to die.'

  'And go----?' suggested, rather than asked, Mr. Vaughan.

  'I care not whither--anywhere away from here--if indeed I go anywhere.But I care not.'

  'That is hardly what you mean, sir Rowland, I think. Will you allow meto interpret you? Have you not the notion that if you were hence youwould leave behind you a certain troublesome attendant who is scarceworth his wages?'

  Scudamore looked at him but did not reply; and Mr. Vaughan went on.

  'I know well what aileth you, for I am myself but now recovering from asimilar sickness, brought upon me by the haunting of the same evil onewho torments you.'

  'You think, then, that I am possessed?' said Rowland, with a faint smileand a glance at Dorothy.

  'That verily thou art, and grievously tormented. Shall I tell thee whohath possessed thee?--for the demon hath a name that is known amongstmen, though it frighteneth few, and draweth many, alas! His name isSelf, and he is the shadow of thy own self. First he made thee love him,which was evil, and now he hath made thee hate him, which is evil also.But if he be cast out and never more enter into thy heart, but remain asa servant in thy hall, then wilt thou recover from this sickness, and bewhole and sound, and shall find the varlet serviceable.'

  'Art thou not an exorciser, then, Mr. Vaughan, as well as a discerner ofspirits? I would thou couldst drive the said demon out of me, for trulyI love him not.'

  'Through all thy hate thou lovest him more than thou knowest. Thou seesthim vile, but instead of casting him out, thou mournest over him withfoolish tears. And yet thou dreamest that by dying thou wouldst be ridof him. No, it is back to thy childhood thou must go to be free.'

  'That were a strange way to go, sir. I know it not. There seems to be apurpose in what you say, Mr. Vaughan, but you take me not with you. Howcan I rid me of myself, so long as I am Rowland Scudamore?'

  'There is a way, sir Rowland--and but one way. Human words at least,however it may be with some high heavenly language, can never say thebest things but by a kind of stumbling, wherein one contradictionkeepeth another from falling. No man, as thou sayest, truly, can rid himof himself and live, for that involveth an impossibility. But he can ridhimself of that haunting shadow of his own self, which he hath pamperedand fed upon shadowy lies, until it is bloated and black with pride andfolly. When that demon king of shades is once cast out, and the man'shouse is possessed of God instead, then first he findeth his truesubstantial self, which is the servant, nay, the child of God. To ridthee of thyself thou must offer it again to him that made it. Be thouempty that he may fill thee. I never understood this until these latterdays. Let me impart to thee certain verses I found but yesterday, forthey will tell thee better what I mean. Thou knowest the sacred volumeof the blessed George Herbert?'

  'I never heard of him or it,' said Scudamore.

  'It is no matter as now: these verses are not of his. Prithee, hearken:

  'I carry with, me, Lord, a foolish fool, That still his cap upon my head would place. I dare not slay him, he will not to school, And still he shakes his bauble in my face.

  'I seize him, Lord, and bring him to thy door; Bound on thine altar-threshold him I lay. He weepeth; did I heed, he would implore; And still he cries ALACK and WELL-A-DAY!

  'If thou wouldst take him in and make him wise, I think he might be taught to serve thee well; If not, slay him, nor heed his foolish cries, He's but a fool that mocks and rings a bell.'

  Something in the lines appeared to strike Scudamore.

  'I thank you, sir,' he said. 'Might I put you to the trouble, I wouldrequest that you would write out the verses for me, that I may studytheir meaning at my leisure.'

  Mr. Vaughan promised, and, after a little more conversation, took hisleave.

  Now, whether it was from anything he had said in particular, or thatScudamore had felt the general influence of the man, Dorothy could nottell, but from that visit she believed Rowland began to think more andto brood less. By and by he began to start questions of right and wrong,suppose cases, and ask Dorothy what she would do in such and suchcircumstances. With many cloudy relapses there was a suspicion of dawn,although a rainy one most likely, on his far horizon.

  'Dost thou really believe, Dorothy,' he asked one day, 'that a man everdid love his enemy? Didst thou ever know one who did?'

  'I cannot say I ever did,' returned Dorothy. 'I have however seen fewthat were enemies. But I am sure that had it not been possible, weshould never have been commanded thereto.'

  'The last time Dr. Bayly came to see me he read those words, and Ithought within myself all the time of the only enemy I had, and tried toforgive him, but could not.'

  'Had he then wronged thee so deeply?'

  'I know not, indeed, what women call wronged--least of all what thou
,who art not like other women, wouldst judge; but this thing seems to mestrange--that when I look on thee, Dorothy, one moment it seems as iffor thy sake I could forgive him anything--except that he slew me notoutright, and the next that never can I forgive him even that wherein henever did me any wrong.'

  'What! hatest thou then him that struck thee down in fair fight? Surethou art of meaner soul than I judged thee. What man in battle-fieldhates his enemy, or thinks it less than enough to do his endeavour toslay him?'

  'Know'st thou whom thou wouldst have me forgive? He who struck me downwas thy friend, Richard Heywood.'

  'Then he hath his mare again?' cried Dorothy, eagerly.

  Rowland's face fell, and she knew that she had spoken heartlessly--knewalso that, for all his protestations, Rowland yet cherished the love shehad so plainly refused. But the same moment she knew something more.

  For, by the side of Rowland, in her mind's eye, stood Henry Vaughan, aswise as Rowland was foolish, as accomplished and learned as Rowland wasnarrow and ignorant; but between them stood Richard, and she knew asomething in her which was neither tenderness nor reverence, and yetincluded both. She rose in some confusion, and left the chamber.

  This good came of it, that from that moment Scudamore was satisfied sheloved Heywood, and, with much mortification, tried to accept hisposition. Slowly his health began to return, and slowly the deeper lifethat was at length to become his began to inform him.

  Heartless and poverty-stricken as he had hitherto shown himself, thegood in him was not so deeply buried under refuse as in many abetter-seeming man. Sickness had awakened in him a sense ofrequirement--of need also, and loneliness, and dissatisfaction. He grewashamed of himself and conscious of defilement. Something new began torise above and condemn the old. There are who would say that the changewas merely the mental condition resulting from and corresponding tophysical weakness; that repentance, and the vision of the better whichmaketh shame, is but a mood, sickly as are the brain and nerves whichgenerate it; but he who undergoes the experience believes he knowsbetter, and denies neither the wild beasts nor the stars, because theyroar and shine through the dark.

  Mr. Vaughan came to see him again and again, and with the concurrence ofDr. Spott, prescribed for him. As the spring approached he grew able toleave his room. The ladies of the family had him to their parlours topet and feed, but he was not now so easily to be injured by kindness aswhen he believed in his own merits.