Chapter 6

and this crude epigram expressed the feelings of numbers of enraged and scandalized individuals. The wretched book gave us an ugly picture of a hollow society where kindness seemed non-existent, and where every man walked with his head in a cloud of poisonous flies. As more memoirs appeared, it was most funny to observe that, while Wilberforce was occupied in scarifying his dear friends, some of his dear friends were occupied in scarifying him. Thus we find Abraham Hayward, a polished leader of society, writing in the following way of Wilberforce, with whom ostensibly his relations were of the most affectionate description--"Wilberforce is really a low fellow. Again and again the committee of the Athenaeum Club have been obliged to reprove him for his vulgar selfishness." This is dreadful! No wonder that petty cynics snarl and rejoice; they say, "Look at your great men, and see what mean backbiters they are!" Alas!

Thomas Carlyle's memoirs are a kind of graveyard of reputations; and we can well understand the rage and horror with which many individuals protested against the fierce Scotchman's strictures. In the hearts of thousands of noble young people Carlyle's memory was cherished like that of some dear saint; and it was terrible to find that the strong prophet had been penetrated by such a virus of malice. Carlyle met all the best men and women in England; but the only ones whom he did not disparage were Tennyson, the Duke of Wellington, Mr. Froude, and Emerson. He could not talk even of Charles Darwin without calling him an imbecile; and his all-round hitting at his closest intimates is simply merciless. The same perversity which made him talk of Keats's "maudlin weak-eyed sensibility" caused him to describe his loyal, generous, high-bred friend Lord Houghton as a "nice little robin-redbreast of a man;" while Mrs. Basil Montagu, who cheered him and spared no pains to aid him in the darkest times, is now immortalized by one masterly venomous paragraph. Carlyle was great--very great--but really the cultivation of loyal friendships seems hardly to have been in his line. Men who know his works by heart, and who derived their noblest inspiration from him, cannot bear to read his memoirs twice over, for it sadly appears as though the Titan had defiled the very altar of friendship.

What shall we say of the cunning cat-like Charles Greville, who crept on tiptoe through the world, observing and recording the littleness of men? His stealthy eye missed nothing; and the men whom he flattered and used little thought that the wizened dandy who pleased them with his old-world courtesy was chronicling their weakness and baseness for all time. A nobly patriotic Ministry came before the world with a flourish of trumpets, and declared that England must fight Russia in defence of public law, freedom, and other holy things. But the wicked diarist had watched the secret proceedings of his dear friends; and he informs us that those beloved intimates were all sound asleep when a single Minister decided on the movement which cost us forty thousand men and one hundred millions of treasure. That close sly being used--to worm out the secrets of men's innermost hearts; and his impassive mask never showed a sign of emotion. To illustrate his mode of extracting the information of which he made such terrible use, I may tell one trivial anecdote which has never before been made public. When Greville was very old, he went to see a spiritualistic "medium" who was attracting fashionable London. The charlatan looked at the gray worn old man and thought himself safe; four other visitors attended the _séance_, but the "medium" bestowed all his attention on Greville. With much emotion he cried, "There is an aged lady behind your chair!" Greville remarked sweetly, "How interesting!" "She is very, very like you!" "Who can it be?" murmured Greville. "She lifts her hands to bless you. Her hands are now resting over your head!" shouted the medium; and the pallid emotionless man said, with a slight tremor in his voice, "Pray tell me who this mysterious visitant may be!" "It is your mother." "Oh," said Greville, "I am delighted to hear that!" "She says she is perfectly happy, and she watches you constantly." "Dear soul!" muttered the imperturbable one. "She tells me you will join her soon, and be happy with her." Then Greville said gravely, in dulcet tones, "That is extremely likely, for I am going to take tea with her at five o'clock!" He had led on the poor swindler in his usual fashion; and he never hinted at the fact that his mother was nearly a century old. His friends were "pumped" in the same subtle manner; and the immortally notorious memoirs are strewn with assassinated characters.

As we study the phenomena indicated by these memoirs, we begin to wonder whether friendship is or is not extinct. Men are gregarious, and flocks of them meet together at all hours of the day and night. They exchange conventional words of greeting, they wear happy smiles, they are apparently cordial and charming' one with another; and yet a rigidly accurate observer may look mournfully for signs of real friendship. How can it exist? The men and women who pass through the whirl of a London season cannot help regarding their fellow-creatures rather as lay figures than as human beings. They go to crowded balls and seething "receptions," not to hold any wise human converse, but only to be able to say that they were in such and such a room on a certain night. The glittering crowds fleet by like shadows, and no man has much chance of knowing his neighbour's heart.

How fast the flitting figures come-- The mild, the fierce, the stony face; Some bright with thoughtless smiles, and some Where secret tears have left their trace!

Ah, it is only the faces that the tired pleasure-seeker sees and knows; the real comrade, the human soul, is hidden away behind the mask!

Genuine heroic friendship cannot flourish in an artificial society; and that perhaps accounts for the fact that the curled darlings of our modern community spend much of their leisure in reading papers devoted to tattle and scandal. It seems as though the search after pleasure poisoned the very sources of nobleness in the nature of men. In our monstrous city a man may live without a quarrel for forty years; he may be popular, he may be received with genial greetings wherever he goes--and yet he has no friend. He lingers through his little day; and, when he passes away, the change is less heeded than would be the removal of a chair from a club smoking-room. When I see the callous indifference with which illness, misfortune, and death are regarded by the dainty classes, I can scarcely wonder when irate philosophers denounce polite society as a pestilent and demoralizing nuisance. Among the people airily and impudently called "the lower orders" noble friendships are by no means uncommon. "I can't bear that look on your face, Bill. I'm coming to save you or go with you!" said a rough sailor as he sprang into a raging sea to help his shipmate. "I'm coming, old fellow!" shouted the mate of a merchant-vessel; and he dived overboard among the mountainous seas that were rolling south of Cape Horn one January. For an hour this hero fought with the blinding water, and he saved his comrade at last. Strange to say, the lounging impassive dandies who regard the universe with a yawn, and who sneer at the very notion of friendship, develop the kindly and manly virtues when they are removed from the enervating atmosphere of Society and forced to lead a hard life. A man to whom emotion, passion, self-sacrifice, are things to be mentioned with a curl of the lip, departs on a campaign, and amid squalor, peril, and grim horrors he becomes totally unselfish. Men who have watched our splendid military officers in the field are apt to think that a society which converts such generous souls into self-seeking fribbles must be merely poisonous. The more we study the subject the more clearly we can see that where luxury flourishes friendship withers. In the vast suffering Russian nation friendships are at this very moment cherished to the heroic pitch. A mighty people are awakening, as it were, from sleep; the wicked and corrupt still sit in high places, but among the weltering masses of the populace purity and nobleness are spreading, and such friendships are fostered as never have been shadowed forth in story or song. Sophie Peroffsky mounts the scaffold with four other doomed mortals; she never thinks of her own approaching agony--she only longs to comfort her friends and she kisses them and greets them with cheering words until the last dread moment arrives. Poor little Marie Soubotine--sweetest of perverted children, noblest of rebels--refuses to purchase her own safety by uttering a word to betray her sworn friend. For three years she lingers on in an underground dungeon, and then she is sent on the wild road to Siberia; she dies amid gloom and deep suffering, but no torture can unseal her lips; she gladly gives her life to save another's. Antonoff endures the torture, but no agony can make him prove false to his friends. When his captors give him a respite from the thumbscrews and the red-hot wires that are thrust under his nails, he forgets his own torment, and scratches on his plate his cipher signals to his comrades. Those men and women in that awful country are lawless and dangerous, but they are heroic, and they are true friends one to another.

How far we proud islanders must have forsaken for a time the road to nobleness when we are able to exalt the saying "A full purse is the only true friend" into a representative English proverb! We do not rage and foam as Timon did--that would be ill-bred and ludicrous; we simply smile and utter delicate mockeries. In the plays that best please our golden youth nothing is so certain to win applause and laughter as a sentence about the treachery or greed of friends. Do those grinning, superlatively insolent cynics really represent the mighty Mother of Nations? Ah, no! If even the worst of them were thrust away into some region where life was hard for him, he would show something like nobility and manliness; it is the mephitic airs of ease and luxury that breed selfishness and scorn in his soul. At any rate, those effeminate people are not typical specimens of our steadfast friendly race. When the folk in the colliery village hear that deadly thud and feel the shudder of the earth which tell of disaster, Jack the hewer rushes to the pit's mouth and joins the search-party. He knows that the gas may grip him by the throat, and that the heavy current of dissolution may creep through his veins; but his mate is down there in the workings, and he must needs save him or die in the attempt. Greater love hath no man than this. Ah, yes--the poor collier is indeed ready to lay down his life for his friend! The fiery soldier, William Beresford, sees a comrade in peril; a horde of infuriated savages are rushing up, and there is only one pony to carry the two Englishmen. Beresford calls, "Jump up behind me!" but the friend answers, "No; save yourself! I can die, and I won't risk your life." Then the undignified but decidedly gallant Beresford observes, "If you don't come, I'll punch your head!" The pony canters heavily off; one stumble would mean death, but the dauntless fighting man brings in his friend safely, though only by the skin of his teeth. It is absolutely necessary for the saving of our moral health that we should turn away from the dreary flippancy of an effete society to such scenes as those. If we regarded only the pampered classes, then we might well think that true human fellowship had perished, and a starless darkness--worse almost than Atheism--would fall on the soul. But we are not all corrupt, and the strong brave heart of our people still beats true. Young men cherish manly affection for friends, and are not ashamed to show it; sweet girls form friendships that hold until the maidens become matrons and till the shining locks have turned to silver white. Wherever men are massed together the struggle for existence grows keen, and selfishness and cynicism thrust up their rank growths. "Pleasure" blunts the moral sense and converts the natural man into a noxious being; but happily our people are sound at the core, and it will be long ere cynicism and corruption are universal. The great healthy middle-class is made up of folk who would regard a writer of spiteful memoirs as a mere bravo; they have not perhaps the sweetness and light which Mr. Arnold wished to bestow on them, but at any rate they have a certain rough generosity, and they have also a share of that self-forgetfulness which alone forms the basis of friendship. Having that, they can do without Carlyle's learning and Wilberforce's polish, and they can certainly do without the sour malice of the historian and the prelate.

_July, 1887._

_DISASTERS AT SEA_.

During last year the register of slaughter on the ocean was worse than any ever before seen since the _Royal Charter_ took her crew to destruction; and it seems as though matters were growing worse and worse. One dismal old story is being repeated week in, week out. In thick weather or clear weather--it does not seem to matter which--two vessels approach each other, and the presiding officers on board of each are quite satisfied and calm; then, on a sudden, one vessel shifts her course, there are a few hurried and maddened ejaculations, and then comes a crash. After that, the ugly tale may be continued in the same terms over and over again; the boats cannot be cleared away, the vessels drift apart, and both founder, or one is left crippled. I shall have something to say about the actual effects of a collision presently, but I may first go on to name some other kinds of disaster. A heavy sea is rolling, and occasionally breaking, and a vessel is lumbering along from crest to hollow of the rushing seas; a big wall of water looms over her for a second, and then comes crashing down; the deck gives way--there are no water-tight compartments--and the ship becomes suddenly as unmanageable as a mere cask in a seaway. Again, a plate is wrenched, and some villainously-made rivets jump out of their places like buttons from an over-tight bodice; in ten minutes the vessel is wallowing, ready for her last plunge; and very likely the crew have not even the forlorn chance of taking to the boats. Once more--on a clear night in the tropics an emigrant ship is stealing softly through the water; the merry crowd on deck has broken up, the women, poor creatures, are all locked up in their quarters, and only a few men remain to lounge and gossip. The great stars hang like lamps from the solemn dome of the sky, and the ripples are painted with exquisite serpentine streaks; the wind hums softly from the courses of the sails, and some of the men like to let the cool breeze blow over them. Everything seems so delightfully placid and clear that the thought of danger vanishes; no one would imagine that even a sea-bird could come up unobserved over that starlit expanse of water. But the ocean is treacherous in light and shade. The loungers tell their little stories and laugh merrily; the officer of the watch carelessly stumps forward from abreast of the wheel, looks knowingly aloft, twirls round like a teetotum, and stumps back again; and the sweet night passes in splendour, until all save one or two home-sick lingerers are happy. It never occurs to any of these passengers to glance forward and see whether a streak of green fire seems to strike out from the starboard--the right-hand side of the vessel--or whether a shaft of red shoots from the other side. As a matter of fact, the vessel is going on like a dark cloud over the flying furrows of the sea; but there is very little of the cloud about her great hull, for she would knock a house down if she hit it when travelling at her present rate. The captain is a thrifty man, and the owners are thrifty persons; they consider the cost of oil; and thus, as it is a nice clear night, the side-lights are not lit, and the judgment of the tramping look-out man on the forecastle-head is trusted. Parenthetically I may say that, without being in any way disposed to harbour exaggerated sentiment, I feel almost inclined to advocate death for any sailor who runs in mid-ocean without carrying his proper lights out. I once saw a big iron barque go grinding right from the bulge of the bow to the stern of an ocean steamer--and that wretched barque had no lights. Half a yard's difference, and both vessels would have sunk. Three hundred and fifty people were sleeping peacefully on board the steamer, and the majority of them must have gone down, while those who were saved would have had a hard time in the boats. Strange to say, that very same steamer was crossed by another vessel which carried no lights: but this time the result was bad, for the steamer went clean through the other ship and sank her instantly.

To return to the emigrant vessel. The officer continues his tramp like one of the caged animals of a menagerie; the spare man of the watch leans against the rail and hums--

We'll go no more by the light of the moon; The song is done, and we've lost the tune, So I'll go no more a-roving with you, fair maid-- A-roving, A-roving, &c.

--the pipes glow in the clear air, and the flying water bubbles and moans. Oh, yes, all is well--beautifully well--and we need no lights whatever! Then the look-out man whistles "Hist!"--which is quite an unusual mode of signalling; the officer ceases his monotonous tramp and runs forward. "Luff a little!" "He's still bearing up. Why doesn't he keep away?" "Luff a little more! Stand by your lee-braces. Oh, he'll go clear!" So the low clear talk goes, till at last with a savage yell of rage a voice comes from the other vessel--"Where you coming to?" "Hard down with it!" "He's into us!" "Clear away your boats!" Then there is a sound like "smack." Then comes a long scraunch, and a thunderous rattle of blocks; a sail goes with a report like a gun; the vessels bump a few times, and then one draws away, leaving the other with bows staved in. A wild clamour surges up from below, but there is no time to heed that; the men toil like Titans, and the hideous music of prayers and curses disturbs the night. Then the vessel that was hit amidships rolls a little, and there is a gurgle like that of an enormous, weir: a mast goes with a sharp report; a man's figure appears on the taffrail and bounds far into the sea--it is an experienced hand who wants to escape the down-draught; the hull shudders, grows steady, and then with one lurch the ship swashes down and the bellowing vortex throws up huge spirts of boiling spray. A few stray swimmers are picked up, but the rest of the company will be seen nevermore. Fancy those women in that darkened steerage! Think of it, and then say what should be done to an owner who stints his officers in the matter of lamp-oil; or to a captain who does not use what the owner provides! The huddled victims wake from confused slumbers; some scream--some become insane on the instant; the children add their shrill clamour to the mad rout; and the water roars in. Then the darkness grows thick, and the agonized crowd tear and throttle each other in fierce terror; and then approaches the slowly-coming end. Oh, how often--how wearily often--have such scenes been enacted on the face of this fair world! And all to save a little lamp-oil!

Yet again--a great vessel plunges away to sea bearing a precious freight of some one thousand souls. Perhaps the owners reckon the cargo in the hold as being worth more than the human burden; but of course opinions differ. The wild rush from one border of the ocean to the other goes on for a few days and nights, and the tremendous structure of steel cleaves the hugest waves as though they were but clouds. Down below the luxurious passengers live in their fine hotel, and the luckier ones are quite happy and ineffably comfortable. If a sunny day breaks, then the pallid battalions in the steerage come up to the air, and the ship's deck is like a long animated street. A thousand souls, we said? True! Now let some quiet observant man of the sailorly sort go round at night and count the boats. Twelve, and the gig aft makes thirteen! Allowing a tremendously large average, this set of boats might actually carry six hundred persons; but the six hundred would need to sit very carefully even in smooth water, and a rush might capsize any one boat.

The vast floating hotel spins on at twenty miles an hour--a speed that might possibly shame some of the railways that run from London suburbs--and the officers want to save every yard. No care is omitted; three men are on the bridge at night, there is a starboard look-out, a port look-out, and the quartermaster patrols amidships and sees that the masthead light is all right The officer and the look-out men pass the word every half-hour, and nothing escapes notice. If some unlucky steerage passenger happens to strike a light forward, he stands a very good chance of being put in irons; and, if there is a patient in the deck-house, the windows must be darkened with thick cloths. Each officer, on hazy nights, improvises a sort of hood for himself; and he peers forward as if life depended on his eyesight--as indeed it does. But there comes a bright evening, and the monster liner's journey is all but over; three hours more of steaming and she will be safe. A little schooner comes skimming up on the port side--and the schooner is to the liner as a chip is to a tree-trunk. The schooner holds on her course, for she is not bound to give way at all; but the officer on the bridge of the steamer thinks, "I shall lose a quarter of an hour if I edge away to starboard and let him fall astern of us. I shall keep right on and shave his bows." The liner is going at nineteen knots, the schooner is romping along at eight--yet the liner cannot clear the little vessel. There comes a fresh gust of wind; the sailing vessel lies over to it, and just touches the floating hotel amidships--but the touch is enough to open a breach big enough for a coach and four to go through. The steamer's head is laid for the land and every ounce of steam is put on, but she settles and settles more and more. And now what about the thirteen boats for a thousand people? There is a wild scuffling, wild outcry. Women bite their lips and-try, with divine patience, to crush down all appearance of fear, and to keep their limbs from trembling; some unruly fellows are kept in check only by terror of the revolver; and the officers remember that their fair name and their hope of earthly redemption are at stake. In one case of this sort it took three mortal hours to ferry the passengers and crew over smooth water to the rescuing vessel; and those rescued folk may think themselves the most fortunate of all created souls, for, if the liner had been hit with an impetus of a few more tons, very few on board of her would have lived to tell the tale. Unless passengers, at the risk of being snubbed and threatened, criticise the boat accommodation of great steamers, there will be such a disaster one day as will make the world shudder.