had just come over from France into the province of Piedmont, in northern
Italy. I was then in fairly easy circumstances, and was engaged in making
some botanical researches for a little book which I had planned to write
on a medical subject. I will explain to you later how I came to do a great
deal of that sort of thing.
"Late upon a warm afternoon I was entering the town of Ivrea, and passing
a large stone building, I stopped to examine some leaves on a bush which
grew by the roadside. While I was doing this, and comparing the shape and
size of the leaves with some drawings I had in a book which I took from my
pocket, I heard a voice behind me and apparently above me. Some one was
speaking to me, and speaking in Latin. I looked around and up, but could
see no one; but above me, about ten or twelve feet from the ground, there
was a long, narrow slit of a window such as is seen in prisons. Again
I heard the voice, and it said to me distinctly in Latin, 'Are you free to
go where you choose?' It was the voice of a woman.
"As I wished to understand the situation better before I answered, I went
over to the other side of the road, where I could get a better view of the
window. There I saw behind this narrow opening a part of the face of a
woman. This stone edifice was evidently a prison. I approached the window,
and standing under it, first looking from side to side to see that no one
was coming along the road, I said in Latin, 'I am free to go where
I choose.'
"Then the voice above said, 'Wait!' but it spoke in Italian this time. You
may be sure I waited, and in a few minutes a little package dropped from
the window and fell almost at my feet. I stooped and picked it up. It was
a piece of paper, in which was wrapped a bit of mortar to give it weight.
"I opened the paper and read, written in a clear and scholarly hand, these
words: 'I am a most unfortunate prisoner. I believe you are an honest and
true man, because I saw you studying plants and reading from a book which
you carry. If you wish to do more good than you ever did before, come to
this prison again after dark.'
"I looked up and said quickly, in Italian, 'I shall be here.' I was about
to speak again and ask for some more definite directions, but I heard the
sound of voices around a turn in the road, and I thought it better to
continue my walk into the town.
"That night, as soon as it was really dark, I was again at the prison.
I easily found the window, for I had noted that it was so many paces from
a corner of the building; but there was no light in the narrow slit, and
although I waited some time, I heard no voice. I did not dare to call, for
the prisoner might not be alone, and I might do great mischief.
"My eyes were accustomed to the darkness, and it was starlight. I walked
along the side of the building, examining it carefully, and I soon found a
little door in the wall. As I stood for a few moments before this door, it
suddenly opened, and in front of me stood a big soldier. He wore a wide hat
and a little sword, and evidently was not surprised to see me. I thought it
well, however, to speak, and I said: 'Could you give a mouthful of supper
to a--'
"He did not allow me to finish my sentence, but putting his hand upon my
shoulder, said gruffly: 'Come in. Don't you waste your breath talking
about supper.' I entered, and the door was closed behind me. I followed
this man through a stone passageway, and he took me to a little stone room.
''Wait here!' he said, and he shut me in. I was in pitch-darkness, and had
no idea what was going to happen next. After a little time I saw a streak
of light coming through a keyhole; then an inner door opened, and a young
woman with a lamp came into the room."
"Now does the love-story begin?" asked his wife.
"Not yet," said Mr. Crowder. "The young woman looked at me, and I looked
at her. She was a pretty girl with black eyes. I did not express my
opinion of her, but she was not so reticent. 'You look like a good old
man,' she said. 'I think you may be trusted. Come!' Her speech was
provincial, and she was plainly a servant. I followed her. 'Now for the
mistress,' said I to myself."
"Thee may have looked like an old man," remarked Mrs. Crowder, "but thee
did not think like one."
Her husband laughed. "I mounted some stone steps, and was soon shown into
a room where stood a lady waiting for me. As the light of the lamp carried
by the maid fell upon her face, I thought I had never seen a more
beautiful woman. Her dress, her carriage, and her speech showed her to be
a lady of rank. She was very young, scarcely twenty, I thought.
"This lady immediately began to ask me questions. She had perceived that
I was a stranger, and she wanted to know where I came from, what was my
business, and as much as I could tell her of myself. 'I knew you were a
scholar,' she said, 'because of your book, and I believe in scholars.'
Then briefly she told me her story and what she wanted of me.
"She was the young Queen Adelheid, the widow of King Lothar, who had
recently died, and she was then suffering a series of harsh persecutions
from the present king, Berengar II, who in this way was endeavoring to
force her to marry his son Adalbert. She hated this young man, and
positively refused to have anything to do with him.
"This charming and royal young widow was bright, intelligent, and had a
mind of her own; it was easy to see that. She had formed a scheme for her
deliverance, and she had been waiting to find some one to help her carry
it out. Now, she thought I was the man she had been looking for. I was
elderly, apparently respectable, and she had to trust somebody.
"This was her scheme. She was well aware that unless some powerful friend
interfered in her behalf she would be obliged to marry Adalbert, or remain
in prison for the rest of her life, which would probably be unduly
shortened. Therefore she had made up her mind to appeal to the court of
the Emperor Otto I of Germany, and she wanted me to carry a letter to him.
"I stood silent, earnestly considering this proposition, and as I did so
she gazed at me as if her whole happiness in this world depended upon my
decision. I was not long in making up my mind on the subject. I told her
that I was willing to help her, and would undertake to carry a letter to
the emperor, and I did not doubt, from what I had heard of this noble
prince, that he would come to her deliverance. But I furthermore assured
her that the moment it became known that the emperor was about to
interfere in her behalf, she would be in a position of great danger, and
would probably disappear from human sight before relief could reach her.
In that prison she was utterly helpless, and to appeal for help would be
to bring down vengeance upon herself. The first thing to do, therefore,
was to escape from this prison, and get to some place where, for a time at
least, she could defend herself against Berengar, while waiting for Otto
to take her under his protection.
"She saw the force of my remarks, and we discussed the matter for half an
hour, and when I left--being warned by the soldier on guard, who was in
love with the queen's black-eyed maid, that it was time for me to
depart--it was arranged that I should return the next night and confer
with the fair Adelheid.
"There were several conferences, and the unfaithful sentinel grumbled a
good deal. I cannot speak of all the plans and projects which we
discussed, but at last one of them was carried out. One dark, rainy night
Adelheid changed clothes with her maid, actually deceived the guard--not
the fellow who had admitted me--with a story that she had been sent in
great haste to get some medicine for her royal mistress, and joined me
outside the prison.
"There we mounted horses I had in readiness, and rode away from Ivrea. We
were bound for the castle of Canossa, a strong-hold of considerable
importance, where my royal companion believed she could find refuge, at
least for a time. I cannot tell you of all the adventures we had upon that
difficult journey. We were pursued; we were almost captured; we met with
obstacles of various kinds, which sometimes seemed insurmountable; but at
last we saw the walls of Canossa rising before us, and we were safe.
"Adelheid was very grateful for what I had done, and as she had now
learned to place full reliance upon me, she insisted that I should be
the bearer of a letter from her to the Emperor Otto. I should not travel
alone, but be accompanied by a sufficient retinue of soldiers and
attendants, and should go as her ambassador.
"The journey was a long and a slow one, but I was rather glad of it, for
it gave me an opportunity to ponder over the most ambitious scheme I have
ever formed in the whole course of my life."
"Greater than to be autocrat of all the Russias?" exclaimed Mrs. Crowder.
"Yes," he replied. "That opportunity came to me suddenly, and I accepted
it; I did not plan it out and work for it. Besides, it could be only a
transitory thing. But what now occupied me was a grand idea, the good
effects of which, if it should be carried out, might endure for centuries.
It was simply this:
"I had become greatly attached to the young queen widow whose cause I had
espoused. I had spent more than a month with her in the castle at Canossa,
and there I learned to know her well and to love her. She was, indeed, a
most admirable woman and charming in every way. She appeared to place the
most implicit trust in me; told me of all her affairs, and asked my
opinion about almost everything she proposed to do. In a word, I was in
love with her and wanted to marry her."
"Thee certainly had lofty notions; but don't think I object," said Mrs.
Crowder. "It is Chinese and Tartars I don't like."
"It might seem at first sight," he continued, "that I was aiming above me,
but the more I reflected the more firmly I believed that it would be very
good for the lady, as well as for me. In the first place, she had no
reason to expect a matrimonial union worthy of her. Adalbert she had every
reason to despise, and there was no one else belonging to the riotous
aristocratic factions of Italy who could make her happy or give her a
suitable position. In all her native land there was not a prince to whom
she would not have to stoop in order to marry him.
"But to me she need not stoop. No man on earth possessed a more noble
lineage. I was of the house of Shem, a royal priest after the order of
Melchizedek, and King of Salem! No line of imperial ancestry could claim
precedence of that."
Mrs. Crowder looked with almost reverent awe into the face of her husband.
"And that is the blood," she said, "which flows in the veins of our
child?"
"Yes," said he; "that is the blood."
After a slight pause Mr. Crowder continued: "I will now go on with my tale
of ambition. A grand career would open before me. I would lay all my plans
and hopes before the Emperor Otto, who would naturally be inclined to
assist the unfortunate widow; but he would be still more willing
to do so when I told him of the future which might await her if my plans
should be carried out. As he was then engaged in working with a noble
ambition for the benefit of his own dominions, he would doubtless be
willing to do something for the good of lands beyond his boundaries. It
ought not to be difficult to convince him that there could be no wiser, no
nobler way of championing the cause of Adelheid than by enabling me to
perform the work I had planned.
"All that would be necessary for him to do would be to furnish me with a
moderate military force. With this I would march to Canossa; there I would
espouse Adelheid; then I would proceed to Ivrea, would dethrone the wicked
Berengar, would proclaim Adelheid queen in his place, with myself as king
consort; then, with the assistance and backing of the imperial German,
I would no doubt soon be able to maintain my royal pretensions. Once
self-supporting, and relying upon our Italian subjects for our army and
finances, I would boldly re-establish the great kingdom of Lombardy, to
which Charlemagne had put an end nearly two hundred years before. Then
would begin a grand system of reforms and national progress.
"Pavia should be my capital, but the beneficent influence of my rule
should move southward. I would make an alliance with the Pope; I would
crush and destroy the factions which were shaking the foundations of
church and state; I would still further extend my power--I would become
the imperial ruler of Italy, with Adelheid as my queen!
"Over and over again I worked out and arranged this grand scheme, and when
I reached the court of the Emperor Otto it was all as plain in my mind as
if it had been copied on parchment.
"I was very well received by the emperor, and he read with great interest
and concern the letter I had brought him. He gave me several private
audiences, and asked me many questions about the fair young widow who had
met with so many persecutions and misfortunes. This interest greatly
pleased me, but I did not immediately submit to him my plan for the relief
of Adelheid and the great good of the Italian nation. I would wait a
little; I must make him better acquainted with myself. But the imperial
Otto did not wait. On the third day after my arrival I was called into his
cabinet and informed that he intended to set out himself at the head of an
army; that he should relieve the unfortunate lady from her persecutions
and establish her in her rights, whatever they might prove to be. His
enthusiastic manner in speaking of his intentions assured me that I need
not trouble myself to say one word about my plans.
"Now,--would you believe it?--that intermeddling monarch took out of my
hands the whole grand, ambitious scheme I had so carefully devised. He
went to Canossa; he married Adelheid; he marched upon Berengar; he
subjugated him and made him his vassal; he formed an alliance with Pope
John XII; he was proclaimed King of the Lombards; he was crowned with his
queen in St. Peter's; he eventually acquired the southern portion of
Italy. All this was exactly what I had intended to do."
Mrs. Crowder laughed. "In one way thee was served quite right, for thee
made all thy plans without ever asking the beautiful young ex-queen
whether she would have thee or not."
In the tones of this fair lady's voice there were evident indications of
mental relief. "And what did thee do then?" she asked. "I hope thee got
some reward for all thy faithful exertions."
"I received nothing at the time," Mr. Crowder replied; "and as I did not
care to accompany the emperor into Italy, for probably I would be
recognized as the man who had assisted Adelheid to escape from the prison
at Ivrea, and as I was not at all sure that the emperor would remember
that I needed protection, I thought it well to protect myself, and so
I journeyed back into France as well as I could.
"This was not very well; for in purchasing the necessary fine clothes
which I deemed it proper to wear in the presence of the royal lady whose
interests I had in charge, in buying horses, and in many incidental
expenses, I had spent my money. I was too proud to ask Otto to reimburse
me, for that would have been nothing but charity on his part; and of
course I could not expect the fair Adelheid to think of my possible
financial needs. So, away I went, a poor wanderer on foot, and the
imperial Otto rode forward to love, honor, and success."
"A dreadful shame!" exclaimed Mrs. Crowder. "It seems as if thee always
carried a horn about with thee so that thee might creep out of the little
end of it."
"But my adventures with Adelheid did not end here," he said. "About fifty
years after this she was queen regent in Italy, during the infancy of her
grandchild Otto III. Being in Rome, and very poor, I determined to go to
her, not to seek for charity, but to recall myself to her notice, and to
boldly ask to be reimbursed for my expenses when assisting her to escape
from Ivrea, and in afterward going as her ambassador to Otto I. In other
words, I wanted to present my bill for enabling her to take her seat upon
the throne of the 'Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation.'
"As a proof that I was the man I assumed to be, I took with me a ring of
no great value, but set with her royal seal, which she had given me when
she sent me to Otto.
"Well, I will not spend much time on this part of the story. By means of
the ring I was accorded an interview with the regent. She was then an old
woman over seventy years of age. When I introduced myself to her and told
her my errand, she became very angry. 'I remember very well,' she said,
'the person you speak of, and he is long since dead. He was an old man
when I took him into my service. You may be his son or some one else who
has heard how he was employed by me. At any rate, you are an impostor.
How did you come into possession of this ring? The man to whom I gave it
had no right to keep it. He should have returned it to me when he had
performed his duties.'
"I tried to convince her that there was no reason to suppose that the man
who had assisted her could not be living at this day. He need only be
about one hundred years old, and that age was not uncommon. I affirmed
most earnestly that the ring had never been out of my possession, and that
I should not have come to her if I had not believed that she would
remember my services, and be at least willing to make good the
considerable sums I had expended in her behalf.
"Now she arose in royal wrath. 'How dare you speak to me in that way!' she
said. 'You are a younger man at this moment than that old stranger you
represent yourself to be.' Then she called her guards and had me sent to
prison as a cheat and an impostor. I remained in prison for some time, but
as no definite charge was made against me, I was not brought to trial, and
after a time was released to make room for somebody else. I got away as
soon as I could, and thus ended my most ambitious dream."
VII
"Now, my dear," said Mr. Crowder, regarding his wife with a tender kindness
which I had frequently noticed in him, "just for a change, I know you
would like to hear of a career of prosperity, wouldn't you?"
"Indeed, I would!" said Mrs. Crowder. "You will have noticed," said her
husband, "that there has been a great deal of variety in my vocations; in
fact, I have not mentioned a quarter of the different trades and callings
in which I have been engaged. It was sometimes desirable and often
absolutely necessary for me to change my method of making a living, but
during one epoch of my life I steadily devoted myself to a single
profession. For nearly four hundred years I was engaged almost
continuously in the practice of medicine. I found it easier for me, as a
doctor, to change my place of residence and to appear in a new country
with as much property as I could carry about with me, than if I had done
so in any other way. A prosperous and elderly man coming as a stranger
from a far country would, under ordinary circumstances, be regarded with
suspicion unless he were able to give some account of his previous career.
But a doctor from a far country was always welcome; if he could cure
people of their ailments they did not ask anything about the former
circumstances of his life. It was perfectly natural for a learned man to
travel."
"Did thee regularly study and go to college?" asked Mrs. Crowder, "or was
thee a quack?"
"Oh, I studied," said her husband, smiling, "and under the best masters.
I had always a fancy for that sort of thing, and in the days of the
patriarchs, when there were no regular doctors, I was often called upon,
as I told you."
"Oh, yes," said his wife; "thee rubbed Joshua with gravel and pepper."
"And cured him," said he, "You ought not to have omitted that. But it was
not until about the fifth century before Christ that I thought of really
studying medicine. I was in the island of Cos, where I had gone for a very
queer reason. The great painter Apelles lived there, and I went for the
purpose of studying art under him. I was tired of most of the things I had
been doing, and I thought it would be a good idea to become a painter.
Apelles gave me no encouragement when I applied to him; he told me I was
entirely too old to become a pupil. 'By the time you would really know how
to paint,' said he, 'supposing you have any talent for it, you ought to be
beginning to arrange your affairs to get ready to die.' Of course this
admonition had no effect upon me, and I kept on with my drawing lessons.
If I could not become a painter of eminence, I thought that at least
I might be able, if I understood drawing, to become a better
schoolmaster--if I should take up that profession again.
"One day Apelles said to me, after glancing at the drawing on which I was
engaged: 'If you were ten years younger you might do something in the
field of art, for you would make an excellent model for the picture I am
about to begin. But at your present age you would not be able to sustain
the fatigue of remaining in a constrained position for any length of
time.' 'What is the subject?' I asked. 'A centurion in battle,' said he.
"The next day I appeared before Apelles with my hair cropped short and my
face without a vestige of a beard. 'Do I look young enough now to be your
model?' said I. The painter looked at me in surprise. 'Yes,' said he, 'you
look young enough; but of course you are the same age as you were
yesterday. However, if you would like to try the model business, I will
make some sketches of you.'
"For more than a month, nearly every day, I stood as a model to Apelles
for his great picture of a centurion whose sword had been stricken from
his hand, and who, in desperation, was preparing to defend himself against
his enemy with the arms which nature had given him."
"Is that picture extant?" I asked.
Mr. Crowder smiled. "None of Apelles's paintings are in existence now," he
answered. "While I was acting as model to Apelles--and I may remark that
I never grew tired of standing in the position he desired--I listened with
great satisfaction to the conversations between him and the friends who
called upon him while he was at work. The chief of these was Hippocrates,
the celebrated physician, between whom and Apelles a strong friendship
existed.
"Hippocrates was a man of great common sense. He did not believe that
diseases were caused by spirits and demons and all that sort of thing, and
in many ways he made himself very interesting to me. So, in course of
time, after having visited him a good deal, I made up my mind to quit the
study of art and go into that of medicine.
"I got on very well, and after a time I practiced with him in many cases,
and he must have had a good deal of confidence in me, for when the King of
Persia sent for him to come to his court, offering him all sorts of
munificent rewards, Hippocrates declined, but he suggested to me that
I should go.
"'You look like a doctor,' said he. 'The king would have confidence in you
simply on account of your presence; and, besides, you do know a great deal
about medicine.' But I did not go to Persia, and shortly after that I left
the island of Cos and gave up the practice of medicine. Later, in the
second century before Christ, I made the acquaintance of a methodist
doctor--"
"A what?" Mrs. Crowder and I exclaimed at the same moment.
He laughed. "I thought that would surprise you, but it is true."
"Of course it is true," said his wife, coloring a little. "Does thee think
I would doubt anything thee told me? If thee had said that Abraham had a
Quaker cook, I would have believed it."
"And if I had told you that," said Mr. Crowder, "it would have been so.
But to explain about this methodist doctor. In those days the physicians
were divided into three schools: empirics, dogmatists, and methodists.
This man I speak of--Asclepiades--was the leading methodist physician,
depending, as the name suggests, upon regular methods of treatment instead
of experiments and theories adapted to the particular case in hand.
"He also was a man of great good sense, and was very witty besides. He made
a good deal of fun of other physicians, and used to call the system of
Hippocrates 'meditation on death.' I studied with him for some time, but it
was not until the first century of the present era that I really began the
practice of my profession. Then I made the acquaintance of the great
Galen. He was a man who was not only a physician, but an accomplished
surgeon, and this could be said of very few people in that age of the
world. I studied anatomy and surgery under him, and afterward practiced
with him as I had done with Hippocrates.