We Two [206]
it would excite a breach of the peace, which was excited quite as much and probably more by my not lecturing. But I'm not going to be beaten! I shall go down there again in a few weeks."
"Was there any rioting?"
"Well, there was a roughish mob, who prevented my eating my dinner in peace, and pursued me even into my bedroom; and some of the Ashborough lambs were kind enough to overturn my cab as I was going to the station. But, having escaped with nothing worse than a shaking, I'll forgive them for that. The fact is they had burned me in effigy on the 5th and had so much enjoyed the ceremony that, when the original turned up, they really couldn't be civil to him, it would have been so very tame. I'm told the effigy was such a fearful-looking monster that it frightened the bairnies out of their wits, specially as it was first carried all round the place on a parish coffin!"
"What a hateful plan that effigy-burning is!" said Erica. "Were you not really hurt at all when they upset your cab?"
"Perhaps a little bruised," said Raeburn, "and somewhat angry with my charitable opponents. I didn't so much mind being overturned, but I hate being balked. They shall have the lecture, however, before long; I'm not going to be beaten. On the whole, they couldn't have chosen a worse night for their little game. I seriously thought we should never grope our way home through that fog. It has quite taken me back to my young days when this sort of thing met one on every hand; and there was no little daughter to cheer me up then, and very often no supper either!"
"That was when you were living in Blank Street?"
"Yes, in a room about the size of a sentry box. It was bearable all except the black beetles! I've never seen such beetles before or since twice the size of the ordinary ones. I couldn't convince the landlady that they even existed; she always maintained that they never rose to the attics; but one night I armed myself with Cruden's Concordance and, thanks to its weight and my good aim, killed six at a time, and produced the corpses as evidence. I shall never forget the good lady's face! 'You see, sir,' she said, 'they never come by day; they 'ates the light because their deeds is evil.'"
"Were the beetles banished after that?" asked Erica, laughing.
"No, they went on to the bitter end," said Raeburn with one of his bright, humorous looks. "And I believe the landlady put it all down to my atheistical views a just retribution for harboring such a notorious fellow in her house! But there, my child, we mustn't sit up any longer gossiping; run off to bed. I'll see that the lights are all out."
CHAPTER XXXVII. Dreeing Out the Inch
Skepticism for that century we must consider as the decay of old ways of believing, the preparation afar off for new, better, and wider ways an inevitable thing. We will not blame men for it; we will lament their hard fate. We will understand that destruction of old forms is not destruction of everlasting substances; that skepticism, as sorrowful and hateful as we see it, is not an end but a beginning. Carlyle
One June evening, an elderly man with closely cropped iron-gray hair, might have been seen in a certain railway carriage as the Folkestone train reached its destination. The Cannon Street platform was, as usual, the scene of bustle and confusion, most of the passengers were met by friends or relatives, others formed a complete party in themselves, and, with the exception of the elderly man, there was scarcely a unit among them. The fact of his loneliness would not, of course, have been specially remarkable had it not been that he was evidently in the last stage of some painful illness; he was also a foreigner and, not being accustomed to the English luggage system, he had failed to secure a porter as the train drew up and so, while the others were fighting their way to the van, he, who needed assistance more than any of them, was left to shift for himself. He moved with great difficulty, dragging down from the carriage a worn black bag, and occasionally
"Was there any rioting?"
"Well, there was a roughish mob, who prevented my eating my dinner in peace, and pursued me even into my bedroom; and some of the Ashborough lambs were kind enough to overturn my cab as I was going to the station. But, having escaped with nothing worse than a shaking, I'll forgive them for that. The fact is they had burned me in effigy on the 5th and had so much enjoyed the ceremony that, when the original turned up, they really couldn't be civil to him, it would have been so very tame. I'm told the effigy was such a fearful-looking monster that it frightened the bairnies out of their wits, specially as it was first carried all round the place on a parish coffin!"
"What a hateful plan that effigy-burning is!" said Erica. "Were you not really hurt at all when they upset your cab?"
"Perhaps a little bruised," said Raeburn, "and somewhat angry with my charitable opponents. I didn't so much mind being overturned, but I hate being balked. They shall have the lecture, however, before long; I'm not going to be beaten. On the whole, they couldn't have chosen a worse night for their little game. I seriously thought we should never grope our way home through that fog. It has quite taken me back to my young days when this sort of thing met one on every hand; and there was no little daughter to cheer me up then, and very often no supper either!"
"That was when you were living in Blank Street?"
"Yes, in a room about the size of a sentry box. It was bearable all except the black beetles! I've never seen such beetles before or since twice the size of the ordinary ones. I couldn't convince the landlady that they even existed; she always maintained that they never rose to the attics; but one night I armed myself with Cruden's Concordance and, thanks to its weight and my good aim, killed six at a time, and produced the corpses as evidence. I shall never forget the good lady's face! 'You see, sir,' she said, 'they never come by day; they 'ates the light because their deeds is evil.'"
"Were the beetles banished after that?" asked Erica, laughing.
"No, they went on to the bitter end," said Raeburn with one of his bright, humorous looks. "And I believe the landlady put it all down to my atheistical views a just retribution for harboring such a notorious fellow in her house! But there, my child, we mustn't sit up any longer gossiping; run off to bed. I'll see that the lights are all out."
CHAPTER XXXVII. Dreeing Out the Inch
Skepticism for that century we must consider as the decay of old ways of believing, the preparation afar off for new, better, and wider ways an inevitable thing. We will not blame men for it; we will lament their hard fate. We will understand that destruction of old forms is not destruction of everlasting substances; that skepticism, as sorrowful and hateful as we see it, is not an end but a beginning. Carlyle
One June evening, an elderly man with closely cropped iron-gray hair, might have been seen in a certain railway carriage as the Folkestone train reached its destination. The Cannon Street platform was, as usual, the scene of bustle and confusion, most of the passengers were met by friends or relatives, others formed a complete party in themselves, and, with the exception of the elderly man, there was scarcely a unit among them. The fact of his loneliness would not, of course, have been specially remarkable had it not been that he was evidently in the last stage of some painful illness; he was also a foreigner and, not being accustomed to the English luggage system, he had failed to secure a porter as the train drew up and so, while the others were fighting their way to the van, he, who needed assistance more than any of them, was left to shift for himself. He moved with great difficulty, dragging down from the carriage a worn black bag, and occasionally