After this Meredith’s malady made gradual but rapid progress. When Colin
and his friend returned from Rome in the evenings, after their
expeditions there, they thought they could see a difference in his looks
even from the morning. He ceased to move about; he ceased to go out;
finally he ceased to get up from his bed. All these changes were
accomplished very gradually, with a heart-breaking regularity of
succession. Alice, who was constantly engaged about him, doing every
kind of office for him, was fortunately too much occupied to take full
cognizance of that remorseless progress of decay; but the two friends,
who watched it with eyes less urgent than those of love, yet almost more
painfully pitiful, could trace all the little advances of the malady.
Then there came the time, the last stage of all, when it was necessary
to sit up with him all night--an office which Colin and Lauderdale
shared between them, to let the poor little sister have a little
reluctant rest.
The season had warmed into May, of all seasons the sweetest in Italy. To
see the sun shine, it seemed impossible to think that he would not shine
for ever; and, when the window of the sick room was opened in the early
morning, such a breath of life and happiness came in--such a sweet gust
of air, wild from the great breadth of the Campagna, breathing of dews
and blossoms--as felt to Colin’s lips like an elixir of life. But that
breathing balm imparted no refreshment to the dying man. He was not
suffering much; he was only weary to the bottom of his soul--languid and
yet restless, eager to be moved, yet unable to bear any motion. While
Alice withdrew behind them by times to shed the tears that kept always
gathering, and say a prayer in her heart for her dying brother--a prayer
in which, with a child’s simplicity, she still left room for his
restoration, and called it possible--the two others watched with the
profoundest interest that which was not only the dying of a friend, but
the waning of a life. To see him so individual and characteristic, with
all the notable features and even faults of his mind as distinct and
apparent as if he had been in the strongest health, and yet so near the
end, was the strangest spectacle. What was it the end of? He directed
them all from his deathbed, and, indeed, controlled them all, with a
will stronger than ever before, securing his own way in face of all
their remonstrances, and, indeed, seemed to grow more and more strong,
absolute, and important, as he approached the final stage of
weakness--which is a sight always wonderful to see. He kept on writing
his book, propped up upon pillows, as long as he had strength enough to
hold the pen; but, when that power too failed him, the unyielding soul
coerced itself into accepting the pen of another, and dictated the last
chapter, at which Alice laboured during the day, and which occasionally,
to beguile the tedium of the long night-watches, his other attendants
were permitted to carry on.
The nights grew shorter and shorter as the season advanced, and
sometimes it was by the lovely light of the dawning morning, instead of
the glimmer of the lamp, that these solemn sentences were written. At
other moments, when the patient could not sleep, but was content to
rest, wonderful scraps of conversation went on in that chamber of death.
Meredith lay gaunt and wasted among his pillows--his great eyes filling
the room, as the spectators sometimes thought; and by his bedside rose,
sometimes the gigantic figure of Lauderdale, dimly visible by means of
the faint night-light--sometimes Colin’s young softened face and air of
tender compassion. It did not occur to any of the three to ask by what
right they came together in relations so near and sacred. The sick man’s
brothers, had he possessed them, could not have watched him with more
care, or with less doubt about his claim upon all their ministrations:
but they talked with him as perhaps no brother could have
talked--recognising the reality of his position, and even discussing it
as a matter in which they too had the profoundest interest. The room was
bare enough, and contained little comfort to English eyes--uncarpeted,
with bare tiles underneath the feet, and scantily furnished with an old
sofa, a chair or two, and a table. There were two windows, which looked
out upon the Campagna which the dying man was to see no more, nor cared
to see. But that great living picture, of no benefit to him, was the
only one there; for poor Meredith had himself caused to be taken down
from the wall a print of the Madonna, and the little cross with its
basin for holy water underneath, which had hung at the head of his bed.
He had even sent away a picture of the Crucifixion--a bad, yet not
unimpressive copy. “I want no outward symbols,” said the sick man;
“there will be none where I am going,” and this was the beginning of one
of those strange talks by night.
“It’s awfu’ difficult to ken,” said Lauderdale. “For my part it’s a
great wonder to me that there has never been any revelation worthy of
credit out of that darkness. That poor fellow Dives, in the parable, is
the only man I mind of that takes a Christian view of the subject. He
would have sent one to tell. The miracle is, that nae man was ever
permitted to come.”
“Don’t say so,” said Meredith. “Oh, my dear friend! if you could but
know the joy it would give me to bring you to Christ before I die--to
see you accept and receive Him. Has not He come to seek and to save?”
“Callant,” said the watcher, with a long drawn breath, “I’ve longer
acquaintance with Him than you can have; and if I dinna believe in Him I
would hang myself, and get to an explanation of all things. If it was
not for Him, wherefore should I, that have nobody dependent on me,
endure the mystery? But that’s no answer to my question. He came to put
a meaning in the world that has little enough signification without Him,
but no to answer a’ the questions that a human spirit can put to heaven
and earth. I’ve heard of bargains made between them that were to die and
them that had to live--”
“You put it in a strange way, Lauderdale,” said the dying man; “most
people would say, those who had to die. But what can any one want beyond
what is revealed--Jerusalem the golden? How strange it is to think that
a worm like me shall so soon be treading those shining streets, while
you--you whom the world thinks so much better off--”
“Whisht,” said Lauderdale, with a husky voice. “Do you no think it would
be an awfu’ satisfaction to us that stay behind if we could have but a
glint of the shining streets you speak of? Many a long day we’ll strain
our eyes and try hard to see you there, but a’ to little purpose. I’m no
saying I would not take it on trust for myself, and be content with what
God pleased; but it’s hard to part with them that belong to us, and ken
nothing about them--where they are, or how they are--”
“They are in Heaven! If they were children of God they are with Him,”
said the sick man, anxiously. “Lauderdale, I cannot bear to think that
you do not believe--that perhaps I may not meet you there.”
“Maybe no,” said the philosopher; “there’s the awfu’ question. A man
might go ranging about the shining streets (as you say) for ever, and
never find them that belonged to him; or, if there’s no geographical
limits, there may be others harder to pass. It’s awfu’ little comfort I
can get for my own mind out of shining streets. How am I to picture you
to myself, callant, when I take thoughts of you? I have the fancy in my
mind to give you messages to friends I have away yonder; but how can I
tell if you’ll ever see them? It’s no a question of believing or not
believing; I put little faith in Milton, and none in the good books,
from which two sources we draw a great part of our talk about Heaven.
It’s no even to ken if they’re happy or no happy that troubles me. I’ve
nae hesitation to speak of in leaving _that_ in God’s hand. It’s but to
have an inkling ever so slight where ye are, and how you are,” said
Lauderdale, unconsciously changing his pronouns, “and that ye keep
thought of us that spend so many thoughts on you.”
After this there was a little pause, which fell into the perfect
stillness of the night outside, and held the little dim-lighted chamber
in the midst of all the darkness, like the picture of a shadowy
“interior,” with two motionless figures, the living and the dying,
painted upon the great gloom of night. Meredith, who, notwithstanding
the superior intensity of his own thoughts, had been moved by
Lauderdale’s--and who, used as he was to think himself dying, yet
perhaps heard himself thus unconsciously reckoned among the dead with a
momentary thrill--was the first to speak.
“In all this I find you too vague,” said the patient. “You speak about
Heaven as if you were uncertain only of its aspect; you have no anxiety
about the way to get there. My friend, you are very good to me--you are
excellent, so far as this world goes; I know you are. But, oh,
Lauderdale, think! Our righteousnesses are as filthy rags. Before you
speculate about Heaven, ask yourself are you sure to get there?”
“Ay,” said Lauderdale, vaguely, “it’s maybe a wee like the question of
the Sadducees--I’m no saying; and it’s awfu’, the dead blank of wisdom
and knowledge that’s put forth for a response--no any information to
you; nothing but a quenching of your flippant questions and impudent
pretensions. No marrying nor giving in marriage there, and the curious
fools baffled, but nae light thrown upon the darkness! I’ll have to wait
like other folk for my answer; but, if it’s according to your new nature
and faculties--which surely it must be--you’ll not forget to give us a
thought at times? If you feel a wee lonely at the first--I’m no profane,
callant; you’re but a man when a’s done, or rather a laddie, and you’ll
surely miss your friends--dinna forget how long and how often we’ll
think of you.”
“Shall you?” said the dying man. “I have given you nothing but trouble
ever since I knew you, and it is more than I deserve. But there is One
who is worthy of all your thoughts. When you think of me, O love Him, my
dear friend, and so there will be a bond between us still.”
“Ay,” said Lauderdale once more. It was a word he used when his voice
could not be trusted, and his heart was full. “Ay,” he repeated, after a
long pause, “I’ll no neglect that grand bond. It’s a bargain between you
and me no to be broken. If ye were free for such an act, it would be
awfu’ friendly to bring me word how things are”--he continued, in a low
tone, “though it’s folly to ask, for if it had been possible it would
have been done before now.”
“It is God who must teach and not me,” said the dying man. “He has other
instruments--and you must seek Him for yourself, and let Him reveal His
will to you. If you are faithful to God’s service, He will relieve you
of your doubts,” said Arthur, who did not understand his friend’s mind,
but even at that solemn moment looked at him with a perplexed mixture of
disapproval and compassion. And thus the silence fell again like a
curtain over the room, and once more it became a picture faintly painted
on the darkness, faintly relieved and lighted up by touches of growing
light, till at length the morning came in full and fair, finding out as
with a sudden surprise the ghostly face on the pillow, with its great
eyes closed in disturbed sleep, and by the bedside another face scarcely
less motionless, the face of the man who was no unbeliever, but whose
heart longed to know and see what others were content, in vague
generalities to tell of, and say they believed.
This was one of the conversations held in the dead of night in
Meredith’s room. Next evening it was Colin, reluctantly permitted by his
faithful guardian to share this labour, who took the watcher’s place;
and then the two young men, who were so near of an age, but whose
prospects were so strangely different, talked to each other after a
different fashion. Both at the beginning of their career, and with
incalculable futures before them, it was natural they should discuss the
objects and purposes of life, upon which Meredith, who thought himself
matured by the approach of death, had, as he imagined, so much advantage
over his friend, who was not going to die.
“I remember once thinking as you do,” said the dying man. “The world
looked so beautiful! No man ever loved its vanities and its pomp more
than I. I shudder sometimes to think what would have become of me if God
had left me to myself--but He was more merciful. I see things in their
true light now.”
“You will have a great advantage over us,” said Colin, trying to smile;
“for you will always know the nature of our occupations, while yours
will be a mystery to us. But we can be friends all the same. As for me,
I shall not have many pomps and vanities to distract me; a poor man’s
son, and a Scotch minister does not fall in the way of such
temptations.”
“There are temptations to worldliness in every sphere,” said Meredith.
“You once spoke eagerly about going to Oxford, and taking honours. My
dear friend, trust a dying man. There are no honours worth thinking of
but the crown and the palm, which Christ bestows on them that love Him.”
“Yes,” said Colin; “but we are not all chosen for these. If I have to
live, I must qualify myself the best I can for my work. I should like to
be of a little use to Scotland, if that was possible. When I hear the
poor people here singing their vespers----”
“Ah, Campbell! one word--let me speak,” said his friend. “Alice showed
me the poem you gave her. You don’t mean it, I know; but let me beg you
not to utter such sentiments. You seem to consent to the doctrine of
purgatory, one of the worst delusions of the Church of Rome. There are
no spirits in prison, my dear, dear friend. When I leave you, I shall be
with my Saviour. Don’t give your countenance to such inventions of the
devil.”
“That was not what I intended to say,” said Colin, who had no heart for
argument. “I meant that to see the habit of devotion of all these
people, whom we call so ignorant, and to remember how little we have of
that among our own people, whom we think enlightened, goes to my heart.
I should like to do a priest’s duty----”
“Again!” said Meredith. “Dear Campbell, you will be a minister; there is
but one great High Priest.”
“Yes,” said Colin, “most true, and the greatest of all consolations. But
yet I believe in priests inferior--priests who need be nothing more than
men. I am not so much for teaching as you are, you know; I have so
little to teach any man. With you who are going to the Fount of all
knowledge it will be different. I can conceive, I can imagine how
magnificent may be _your_ work,” the young man said, with a faltering
voice, as he laid his warm young hand upon the fingers which were almost
dead.
Meredith closed his hand upon that of his friend, and looked at him with
his eyes so clear and awful, enlarged and lighted up with the prescience
of what was to come. “If you do your work faithfully it will be the same
work,” he said. “Our Master alone knows the particulars. If I might have
perhaps to supplement and complete what you do on earth!--Ah, but I must
not be tempted into vain speculations! Enough that I shall know His will
and see Him as He is. I desire no more.”
“Amen,” said Colin; “and, when you are in your new career, think of me
sometimes, worried and vexed as I know I shall be. We shall not be able
to communicate then, but I know now beforehand what I shall have to go
through. You don’t know Scotland, Meredith. A man who tries for any new
reformation in the Church will have to fight for trifles of detail which
are not worth fighting for, and perhaps get both himself and his work
degraded in consequence. You can know no such cares. Think of me
sometimes when you are doing your work ‘with thunders of acclaim.’ I
wonder--but you would think it a profanity if I said what I was going to
say.”
“What was it?” said Meredith, who, indeed, would not have been sorry had
his friend uttered a profanity which might give him occasion to speak,
for perhaps the last time, “faithfully” to his soul.
“I wonder,” said Colin, whose voice was low, “whether our Master, who
sees us both, though we cannot see each other, might tell you sometimes
what your friend was doing. He, too, is a man. I mean no irreverence,
Meredith. There were men for whom, above His tenderness for all, He had
a special love. I should like to think it. I can know nothing of you;
but then I am less likely to forget you, staying behind in this familiar
world.”
And the two youths again clasped hands, tears filling the eyes of the
living one, but no moisture in the clear orbs of him who was about to
die.
“Let us be content to leave it all in His hands,” said Meredith. “God
bless you, Colin, for your love; but think nothing of me; think of Him
who is our first and greatest Friend.”
And then again came silence and sleep, and the night throbbed silently
round the lighted chamber and the human creatures full of thought; and
again there took place the perennial transformation, the gradual rising
of the morning light, the noiseless entrance of the day, finding out,
with surprised and awful looks, the face of the dying. This is how the
last nights were spent. Down below in the convent there was a good
friar, who watched the light in the window, and pondered much in his
mind whether he should not go thither with his crucifix, and save the
poor young heretic in spite of himself; but the Frate was well aware
that the English resented such interruptions, and did better for Arthur;
for he carried the thought of him through all his devotions, and
muttered under his breath the absolution, with his eyes fixed upon the
lighted window, and prayed, if he had any credit in heaven, through the
compassionate saints, the Blessed Virgin, and by the aid of Him whose
image he held up towards the unseen sufferer, that the sins which God’s
servant had thus remitted on earth might be, even without the knowledge
of the penitent, remitted in heaven. Thus Colin’s belief in priests was
justified without his knowing it; and perhaps God judged the
intercession of Father Francisco more tenderly than poor Arthur would
have done. And with these private proceedings, which the world was
unaware of, night after night passed on until the night came which was
to have no day.
They had all assembled in the room, in which it seemed before morning so
great an event was to happen--all worn and tired out with watching; the
evidences of which appeared upon Colin and Alice, though Lauderdale,
more used to exertion, wore his usual aspect. As usual, Meredith lay
very solemnly in a kind of pathetic youthful state in his bed;
struggling for every breath, yet never forgetting that he lay there
before heaven and earth, a monument as he said of God’s grace, and an
example of how a Christian could die. He called Alice, and the others
would have withdrawn; but this he would not permit. “We have no secrets
to discuss,” he said. “I am not able to say much now. Let my last words
be for Christ. Alice, you are the last. We have all died of it. It is
not very hard; but you cannot die in peace, as I do, unless you give
yourself to Christ. These are my last words to my sister. You may not
live long--you have not a moment to spare. Give yourself to Christ, my
little Alice, and then your death-bed will be as peaceful as mine.”
“Yes,” said the docile sister, through her sobs, “I will never, never
forget what you have said to me. Oh, Arthur, you are going to them all!”
“I am going to God,” said the dying man; “I am going to my Lord and
Saviour--that is all I desire to think of now.”
And there was a momentary breathless pause. She had his hand in both of
hers, and was crying with an utter despair and abandonment to which she
had never given herself up before. “Oh, Arthur--papa!” the poor girl
said, under her breath. If they had been less interested, or if the
stillness had been a degree less intense, the voice was so low that the
two other watchers could not have heard her. But the answer was spoken
aloud.
“Tell him I forgive him, Alice. I can say so now. Tell him to repent
while there is time. If you wish it, you can tell Colin and
Lauderdale--they have been brothers to us. Come here, all of you,” said
Meredith. “Hear my last words. Nothing is of any importance but the love
of Christ. I have tried everything in the world--its pleasures and its
ambitions--and--But everything except Christ is vanity. Come to Him
while it is called to-day. And now come and kiss me, Alice, for I am
going to die.”
“Oh, no, Arthur. Oh, Arthur, do not leave me yet!” cried the poor girl.
Lauderdale drew her gently away, and signed to Colin to take the place
by the bed. He drew her hand through his arm and led her softly into the
great empty _salone_, where there was no light except that of the moon,
which came in in broad white bars at the side windows. “Whisht! it’ll no
be yet,” said the kind guardian who had taken possession of Alice. No
mother or lover could have been tenderer with the little forlorn
creature in this hour which was the most terrible of all. He made her
walk softly about with him, beguiling her awful suspense a little with
that movement. “A little more strength, for his sake,” said Lauderdale;
“another trial--and then nobody shall stop your tears. It’s for his
sake; the last thing you can do for him.”
And then the poor little sister gave utterance to a bitter cry, “If he
would say something kind for papa, I could bear it,” she said,
smothering her painful sobs; and Lauderdale drew her closer on his arm,
supporting and soothing her, and led her about, slowly and noiselessly,
in the great empty room, lighted with those broad bars of moonlight,
waiting till she had regained a little composure to return to the
chamber of death.
Meredith lay silent for some time, with his great eyes gazing into the
vacancy before him, and the last thrill of fever in his frame. He
thought he was thus coming with all his faculties alert and vivid to a
direct conscious encounter with the unknown might of death. “Get the
book, Colin,” he said, with a voice which yet possessed a certain
nervous strength; “it is now time to write the conclusion”--and
he dictated with a steady voice the date of his last
postscript:--“Frascati, midnight, May 16th.--The last hour of my
life----”