Complete Works of Thomas Love Peacock

by Thomas Love Peacock

  And I shall smile, though underground.

  And when the song ceases, the host’s ghost enters. They ask him why he appears. He answers, to wait once more on Cleander, and to entreat a courtesy —

  — to see my body buried

  In holy ground: for now I lie unhallowed,

  By the clerk’s fault: let my new grave be made

  Amongst good fellows, that have died before me,

  And merry hosts of my kind.

  Cleander promises that it shall be done; and Dorilaus, who is a merry old gentleman throughout the play, adds —

  And forty stoops of wine drank at thy funeral.

  Cleander asks him —

  Is’t in your power, some hours before my death, To give me warning?

  The host replies —

  I cannot tell you truly:

  But if I can, so much on earth I loved you,

  I will appear again.

  In a subsequent scene the ghost forewarns him, and he is soon after assassinated: not premeditatedly, but as an accident, in the working out, by subordinate characters, of a plot to bring into question the purity of Calista’s love for Lisander.

  Miss Ilex. In my young days ghosts were so popular that the first question asked about any new play was, Is there a ghost in it? The Castle Spectre had set this fashion. It was one of the first plays I saw, when I was a very little girl. The opening of the folding-doors disclosing the illuminated oratory; the extreme beauty of the actress who personated the ghost; the solemn music to which she moved slowly forward to give a silent blessing to her kneeling daughter; and the chorus of female voices chanting Jubilate; made an impression on me which no other scene of the kind has ever made. That is my ghost, but I have no ghost story worth telling.

  Mr. Falconer. There are many stories in which the supernatural is only apparent, and is finally explained. But some of these, especially the novels of Brockden Brown, carry the principle of terror to its utmost limits. What can be more appalling than his Wielandt It is one of the few tales in which the final explanation of the apparently supernatural does not destroy or diminish the original effect.

  Miss Gryll. Generally, I do not like that explaining away. I can accord a ready faith to the supernatural in all its forms, as I do to the adventures of Ulysses and Orlando. I should be sorry to see the enchantments of Circe expounded into sleights of hand.

  The Rev. Dr. Opimian. I agree with you, Miss Gryll. I do not like to find a ghost, which has frightened me through two volumes, turned into a Cock Lane ghost in the third.

  Miss Gryll. We are talking about ghosts, but we have not a ghost story. I want a ghost story.

  Miss Niphet.. I will try to tell you one, which I remember imperfectly. It relates, as many such stories do, to a buried treasure. An old miser had an only daughter; he denied himself everything, but he educated her well, and treated her becomingly. He had accumulated a treasure, which he designed for her, but could not bear the thought of parting with it, and died without disclosing the place of its concealment. The daughter had a lover, not absolutely poor, nor much removed from it. He farmed a little land of his own, When her father died, and she was left destitute and friendless, he married her, and they endeavoured by economy and industry to make up for the deficiencies of fortune. The young husband had an aunt, with whom they sometimes passed a day of festival, and Christmas Day especially. They were returning home late at night on one of these occasions; snow was on the ground the moon was in the first quarter, and nearly setting. Crossing a field, they paused a moment to look on the beauty of the starry sky; and when they again turned their eyes to the ground, they saw a shadow on the snow; it was too long to have any distinct outline; but no substantial form was there to throw it. The young wife clung trembling to the arm of her husband. The moon set, and the shadow disappeared. New Year’s Day came, and they passed it at the aunt’s. On their return the moon was full, and high in heaven. They crossed the same field, not without hesitation and fear. In the same spot as before they again saw the shadow; it was that of a man in a large loose wrapper, and a high-peaked hat. They recognised the outline of the old miser. The husband sustained his nearly fainting wife; as their eyes were irresistibly fixed on it, it began to move, but a cloud came over the moon, and they lost sight of it. The next night was bright, and the wife had summoned all her courage to follow out the mystery; they returned to the spot at the same hour; the shadow again fell on the snow, and again it began to move, and glided away slowly over the surface of the snow. They followed it fearfully. At length it stopped on a small mound in another field of their own farm. They walked round and round it, but it moved no more. The husband entreated his wife to remain, while he sought a stick to mark the place. When she was alone, the shadow spread out its arms as in the act of benediction, and vanished. The husband found her extended on the snow; he raised her in his arms; she recovered, and they walked home. He returned in the morning with a pickaxe and spade, cleared away the snow, broke into the ground, and found a pot of gold, which was unquestionably their own. And then, with the usual end of a nurse’s tale, ‘they lived happily all the rest of their lives.’

  Miss Ilex. Your story, though differing in all other respects, reminds me of a ballad in which there is a shadow on the snow,

  Around it, and round, he had ventured to go,

  But no form that had life threw that stamp on the snow.

  Mr. Gryll. In these instances the shadow has an outline, without a visible form to throw it. I remember a striking instance of shadows without distinguishable forms. A young chevalier was riding through a forest of pines, in which he had before met with fearful adventures, when a strange voice called on him to stop. He did not stop, and the stranger jumped up behind him. He tried to look back, but could not turn his head. They emerged into a glade, where he hoped to see in the moonlight the outline of the unwelcome form. But ‘unaccountable shadows fell around, unstamped with delineations of themselves.’

  1 Miss Bannerman’s Tales of Superstition and Chivalry.

  2 The Three Brothers, vol. iv. .

  Miss Gryll. Well, Mr. MacBorrowdale, have you no ghost story for us?

  Mr. MacBorrowdale. In faith, Miss Gryll, ghosts are not much in my line: the main business of my life has been among the driest matters of fact; but I will tell you a tale of a bogle, which I remember from my boyish days.

  There was a party of witches and warlocks assembled in the refectory of a ruined abbey, intending to have a merry supper, if they could get the materials. They had no money, and they had for servant a poor bogle, who had been lent to them by his Satanic majesty, on condition that he should provide their supper if he could; but without buying or stealing. They had a roaring fire, with nothing to roast, and a large stone table, with nothing on it but broken dishes and empty mugs. So the firelight shone on an uncouth set of long hungry faces. Whether there was among them ‘ae winsome wench and wawlie,’ is more than I can say; but most probably there was, or the bogle would scarcely have been so zealous in the cause. Still he was late on his quest. The friars of a still flourishing abbey were making preparations for a festal day, and had despatched a man with a cart to the nearest town, to bring them a supply of good things. He was driving back his cart well loaded with beef, and poultry, and ham; and a supply of choice rolls, for which a goodwife in the town was famous; and a new arrival of rare old wine, a special present to the Abbot from some great lord. The bogle having smelt out the prize, presented himself before the carter in the form of a sailor with a wooden leg, imploring charity, The carter said he had nothing for him, and the sailor seemed to go on his way. He reappeared in various forms, always soliciting charity, more and more importunately every time, and always receiving the same denial. At last he appeared as an old woman, leaning on a stick, who was more pertinacious in her entreaties than the preceding semblances; and the carter, after asseverating with an oath that a whole shipload of beggars must have been wrecked that night on the coast, reiterated that he had nothing
for her. ‘Only the smallest coin, master,’ said the old woman. ‘I have no coin,’ said the carter. ‘Just a wee bite and sup of something,’ said the old woman; ‘you are scarcely going about without something to eat and drink; something comfortable for yourself. Just look in the cart: I am sure you will find something good.’ ‘Something, something, something,’ said the carter; ‘if there is anything fit to eat or drink in the cart, I wish a bogle may fly away with it.’ ‘Thank you,’ said the bogle, and changed himself into a shape which laid the carter on his back, with his heels in the air. The bogle made lawful prize of the contents of the cart. The refectory was soon fragrant with the odour of roast, and the old wine flowed briskly, to the great joy of the assembly, who passed the night in feasting, singing, and dancing, and toasting Old Nick.

  But Tarn kend what was whni fu’ brawlie:

  There was ae winsome wend and wawlie,

  Thai night enlisted in the core,

  Lang after kend on Carrick shore.

  — Tam o’ Shanter.

  Miss Gryll. And now, Mr. Falconer, you who live in an old tower, among old books, and are deep in the legends of saints, surely you must have a ghost story to tell us.

  Mr. Falconer. Not exactly a ghost story. Miss Gryll but there is a legend which took my fancy, and which I taured into a ballad. If you permit me, I will repeat it.

  The permission being willingly granted, Mr. Falconer closed the series of fireside marvels by reciting

  THE LEGEND OF SAINT LAURA

  Saint Larua, in her sleep of death,

  Preserves beneath the tomb

  — ’Tis willed where what is willed must be —

  In incorruptability

  Her beauty and her bloom.

  So pure her maiden life had been,

  So free from earthly stain,

  ’Twas fixed in fate by Heaven’s own Queen,

  That till the earth’s last closing scene

  She should unchanged remain.

  1 Vuolsi cosi cola dove si puote

  Ciô che si vuole, e piii non domandare.

  — Dante.

  Within a deep sarcophagus

  Of alabaster sheen,

  With sculptured lid of roses white,

  She slumbered in unbroken night,

  By mortal eyes unseen.

  Above her marble couch was reared

  A monumental shrine,

  Where cloistered sisters, gathering round,

  Made night and morn the aisle resound

  With choristry divine

  The abbess died: and in her pride

  Her parting mandate said,

  They should her final rest provide

  The alabaster couch beside,

  Where slept the sainted dead.

  The abbess came of princely race:

  The nuns might not gainsay:

  And sadly passed the timid band,

  To execute the high command

  They dared not disobey.

  The monument was opened then:

  It gave to general sight

  The alabaster couch alone:

  But all its lucid substance shone

  With preternatural tight.

  They laid the corpse within the shrine!

  They closed its doors again:

  But nameless terror seemed to fall,

  Throughout the livelong night, on all

  Who formed the funeral train.

  Lo! on the morrow morn, still closed

  The monument was found;

  But in its robes funereal drest,

  The corpse they had consigned to rest

  Lay on the stony ground.

  Fear and amazement seized on all:

  They called on Mary’s aid:

  And in the tomb, unclosed again,

  With choral hymn and funeral train,

  The corpse again was laid.

  But with the incorruptible

  Corruption might not rest:

  The lonely chapel’s stone-paved floor

  Received the ejected corpse once more,

  In robes funereal drest.

  So was it found when morning beamed:

  In solemn suppliant strain

  The nuns implored all saints in heaven,

  That rest might to the corpse be given,

  Which they entombed again.

  On the third night a watch was kept

  By many a friar and nun:

  Trembling, all knelt in fervent prayer,

  ‘Till on the dreary midnight air

  Rolled the deep bell-toll, ‘One’!

  The saint within the opening tomb

  Like marble statue stood:

  All fell to earth in deep dismay:

  And through their ranks she passed away,

  In calm unchanging mood.

  No answering sound her footsteps raised

  Along the stony floor:

  Silent as death, severe as fate,

  She glided through the chapel gate,

  And none beheld her more.

  The alabaster couch was gone:

  The tomb was void and bare:

  For the last time, with hasty rite,

  Even ‘mid the terror of the night,

  They laid the abbess there.

  ’Tis said the abbess rests not well

  In that sepulchral pile:

  But yearly, when the night comes round

  As dies of ‘One’ the bell’s deep sound

  She flits along the aisle.

  But whither passed the virgin saint,

  To slumber far away,

  Destined by Mary to endure,

  Unaltered in her semblance pure,

  Until the judgment-day?

  None knew, and none may ever know:

  Angels the secret keep:

  Impenetrable ramparts bound,

  Eternal silence dwells around

  The chamber of her sleep.

  CHAPTER XXXV

  REJECTED SUITORS — CONCLUSION

  May the Gods grant what your best hopes pursue,

  A husband, and a home, with concord true;

  No greater boon from Jove’s ethereal dome

  Descends, than concord in the nuptial home

  — Ulysses to Nausicaa, in the sixth book of the Odyssey.

  What passed between Algernon and Morgana, when the twenty-eighth morning brought his probation to a close, it is unnecessary to relate. The gentleman being predetermined to propose, and the lady to accept, there was little to be said, but that little was conclusive.

  Mr. Gryll was delighted. His niece could not have made a choice more thoroughly to his mind.

  ‘My dear Morgana,’ he said, ‘all’s well that ends well. Your fastidiousness in choice has arrived at a happy termination. And now you will perhaps tell me why you rejected so many suitors, to whom you had in turn accorded a hearing. In the first place, what was your objection to the Honourable Escor A’Cass? He was a fine, handsome, dashing fellow. He was the first in the field, and you seemed to like him.’

  1 To-the-Crows: the Athenian equivalent for our o’-the-

  Devil: a gambler’s journey: not often a long one.

  Miss Gryll. He was too dashing, uncle: he gambled. I did like him, till I discovered his evil propensity.

  Mr. Gryll. To Sir Alley Capel? ‘My dear Marcotta, all’s well that mix well.

  Miss Gryll. He speculated; which is only another name for gambling. He never knew from day to day whether he was a rich man or a beggar. He lived in a perpetual fever, and I wish to live in tranquillity.

  Mr. Gryll. To Mr. Ballot?

  Miss Gryll. He thought of nothing but politics: he had no feeling of poetry. There was never a more complete negation of sympathy, than between him and me.

  Mr. Gryll. To Sir John Pachyderm?

  Miss Gryll. He was a mere man of the world, with no feeling of any kind: tolerable in company, but tiresome beyond description in a tête-à-tête. I did not choose that he should bestow all his tediousness on me.


  Mr. Gryll. To Mr. Enavant?

  Miss Gryll. He was what is called a fast man, and was always talking of slow coaches. I had no fancy for living in an express train. I like to go quietly through life, and to see all that lies in my way.

  Mr. Gryll. To Mr. Geront?

  Miss Gryll. He had only one fault, but that one was unpardonable. He was too old. To do him justice, he did not begin as a lover. Seeing that I took pleasure in his society, he was led by degrees into fancying that I might accept him as a husband. I liked his temper, his acquirements, his conversation, his love of music and poetry, his devotion to domestic life. But age and youth cannot harmonise in marriage.

  Mr. Gryll. To Mr. Long Owen?

  Miss Gryll. He was in debt, and kept it secret from me. I thought he only wanted my fortune: but be that as it might, the concealment destroyed my esteem.

  Mr. Gryll. To Mr. Larvel?

  Miss Gryll. He was too ugly. Expression may make plain features agreeable, and I tried if daily intercourse would reconcile me to his. But no. His ugliness was unredeemed.

  Mr. Gryll. None of these objections applied to Lord Curryfin?

  Miss Gryll. No, uncle; but he came too late. And besides, he soon found what suited him better.

  Mr. Gryll. There were others. Did any of the same objections apply to them all?

  Miss Gryll. Indeed, uncle, the most of them were nothing; or at best, mere suits of good clothes; men made, as it were, to pattern by the dozen; selfish, frivolous, without any earnest pursuit, or desire to have one; ornamental drawing-room furniture, no more distinguishable in memory than a set of chairs.

  Mr. Gryll. Well, my dear Morgana, for mere negations there is no remedy; but for positive errors, even for gambling, it strikes me they are curable.

  Miss Gryll. No, uncle. Even my limited observation has shown me that men are easily cured of unfashionable virtues, but never of fashionable vices.

  Miss Gryll and Miss Niphet arranged that their respective marriages and those of the seven sisters should be celebrated at the same time and place. In the course of their castle-building before marriage, Miss Niphet said to her intended: