CHAPTER II.
The thirtieth day of May, 1887, fell on a Monday. It was one of theannual holidays of the nation in the latter third of the nineteenthcentury, being set apart under the name of Decoration Day, for doinghonor to the memory of the soldiers of the North who took part in thewar for the preservation of the union of the States. The survivors ofthe war, escorted by military and civic processions and bands ofmusic, were wont on this occasion to visit the cemeteries and laywreaths of flowers upon the graves of their dead comrades, theceremony being a very solemn and touching one. The eldest brother ofEdith Bartlett had fallen in the war, and on Decoration Day the familywas in the habit of making a visit to Mount Auburn, where he lay.
I had asked permission to make one of the party, and, on our return tothe city at nightfall, remained to dine with the family of mybetrothed. In the drawing-room, after dinner, I picked up an eveningpaper and read of a fresh strike in the building trades, which wouldprobably still further delay the completion of my unlucky house. Iremember distinctly how exasperated I was at this, and theobjurgations, as forcible as the presence of the ladies permitted,which I lavished upon workmen in general, and these strikers inparticular. I had abundant sympathy from those about me, and theremarks made in the desultory conversation which followed, upon theunprincipled conduct of the labor agitators, were calculated to makethose gentlemen's ears tingle. It was agreed that affairs were goingfrom bad to worse very fast, and that there was no telling what weshould come to soon. "The worst of it," I remember Mrs. Bartlett'ssaying, "is that the working classes all over the world seem to begoing crazy at once. In Europe it is far worse even than here. I'msure I should not dare to live there at all. I asked Mr. Bartlett theother day where we should emigrate to if all the terrible things tookplace which those socialists threaten. He said he did not know anyplace now where society could be called stable except Greenland,Patagonia, and the Chinese Empire." "Those Chinamen knew what theywere about," somebody added, "when they refused to let in our westerncivilization. They knew what it would lead to better than we did. Theysaw it was nothing but dynamite in disguise."
After this, I remember drawing Edith apart and trying to persuade herthat it would be better to be married at once without waiting for thecompletion of the house, spending the time in travel till our homewas ready for us. She was remarkably handsome that evening, themourning costume that she wore in recognition of the day setting offto great advantage the purity of her complexion. I can see her evennow with my mind's eye just as she looked that night. When I took myleave she followed me into the hall and I kissed her good-by as usual.There was no circumstance out of the common to distinguish thisparting from previous occasions when we had bade each other good-byfor a night or a day. There was absolutely no premonition in my mind,or I am sure in hers, that this was more than an ordinary separation.
Ah, well!
The hour at which I had left my betrothed was a rather early one for alover, but the fact was no reflection on my devotion. I was aconfirmed sufferer from insomnia, and although otherwise perfectlywell had been completely fagged out that day, from having sleptscarcely at all the two previous nights. Edith knew this and hadinsisted on sending me home by nine o'clock, with strict orders to goto bed at once.
The house in which I lived had been occupied by three generations ofthe family of which I was the only living representative in the directline. It was a large, ancient wooden mansion, very elegant in anold-fashioned way within, but situated in a quarter that had longsince become undesirable for residence, from its invasion by tenementhouses and manufactories. It was not a house to which I could think ofbringing a bride, much less so dainty a one as Edith Bartlett. I hadadvertised it for sale, and meanwhile merely used it for sleepingpurposes, dining at my club. One servant, a faithful colored man bythe name of Sawyer, lived with me and attended to my few wants. Onefeature of the house I expected to miss greatly when I should leaveit, and this was the sleeping chamber which I had built under thefoundations. I could not have slept in the city at all, with its neverceasing nightly noises, if I had been obliged to use an upstairschamber. But to this subterranean room no murmur from the upper worldever penetrated. When I had entered it and closed the door, I wassurrounded by the silence of the tomb. In order to prevent thedampness of the subsoil from penetrating the chamber, the walls hadbeen laid in hydraulic cement and were very thick, and the floor waslikewise protected. In order that the room might serve also as a vaultequally proof against violence and flames, for the storage ofvaluables, I had roofed it with stone slabs hermetically sealed, andthe outer door was of iron with a thick coating of asbestos. A smallpipe, communicating with a wind-mill on the top of the house, insuredthe renewal of air.
It might seem that the tenant of such a chamber ought to be able tocommand slumber, but it was rare that I slept well, even there, twonights in succession. So accustomed was I to wakefulness that I mindedlittle the loss of one night's rest. A second night, however, spent inmy reading chair instead of my bed, tired me out, and I never allowedmyself to go longer than that without slumber, from fear of nervousdisorder. From this statement it will be inferred that I had at mycommand some artificial means for inducing sleep in the last resort,and so in fact I had. If after two sleepless nights I found myself onthe approach of the third without sensations of drowsiness, I calledin Dr. Pillsbury.
He was a doctor by courtesy only, what was called in those days an"irregular" or "quack" doctor. He called himself a "Professor ofAnimal Magnetism." I had come across him in the course of some amateurinvestigations into the phenomena of animal magnetism. I don't thinkhe knew anything about medicine, but he was certainly a remarkablemesmerist. It was for the purpose of being put to sleep by hismanipulations that I used to send for him when I found a third nightof sleeplessness impending. Let my nervous excitement or mentalpreoccupation be however great, Dr. Pillsbury never failed, after ashort time, to leave me in a deep slumber, which continued till I wasaroused by a reversal of the mesmerizing process. The process forawaking the sleeper was much simpler than that for putting him tosleep, and for convenience I had made Dr. Pillsbury teach Sawyer howto do it.
My faithful servant alone knew for what purpose Dr. Pillsbury visitedme, or that he did so at all. Of course, when Edith became my wife Ishould have to tell her my secrets. I had not hitherto told her this,because there was unquestionably a slight risk in the mesmeric sleep,and I knew she would set her face against my practice. The risk, ofcourse, was that it might become too profound and pass into a trancebeyond the mesmerizer's power to break, ending in death. Repeatedexperiments had fully convinced me that the risk was next to nothingif reasonable precautions were exercised, and of this I hoped, thoughdoubtingly, to convince Edith. I went directly home after leaving her,and at once sent Sawyer to fetch Dr. Pillsbury. Meanwhile I sought mysubterranean sleeping chamber, and exchanging my costume for acomfortable dressing-gown, sat down to read the letters by the eveningmail which Sawyer had laid on my reading table.
One of them was from the builder of my new house, and confirmed what Ihad inferred from the newspaper item. The new strikes, he said, hadpostponed indefinitely the completion of the contract, as neithermasters nor workmen would concede the point at issue without a longstruggle. Caligula wished that the Roman people had but one neck thathe might cut it off, and as I read this letter I am afraid that for amoment I was capable of wishing the same thing concerning the laboringclasses of America. The return of Sawyer with the doctor interruptedmy gloomy meditations.
It appeared that he had with difficulty been able to secure hisservices, as he was preparing to leave the city that very night. Thedoctor explained that since he had seen me last he had learned of afine professional opening in a distant city, and decided to takeprompt advantage of it. On my asking, in some panic, what I was to dofor some one to put me to sleep, he gave me the names of severalmesmerizers in Boston who, he averred, had quite as great powers ashe.
Somewhat relieved on this point, I instructed
Sawyer to rouse me atnine o'clock next morning, and, lying down on the bed in mydressing-gown, assumed a comfortable attitude, and surrendered myselfto the manipulations of the mesmerizer. Owing, perhaps, to myunusually nervous state, I was slower than common in losingconsciousness, but at length a delicious drowsiness stole over me.
Looking Backward: 2000-1887 Page 5
