Great Negative! how vainly would the wise
Inquire, define, distinguish, teach, devise,
Didst thou not stand to point their dull philosophies.
ROCHESTER'S ODE TO NOTHING.
Should you feel half as tired with reading as I am with writing, I
forgive you, with all my heart, if you throw down the book, and read no
more. I have written too fast--I have quite _sprained_ my imagination--
for you must know that this is all _fiction_, every word of it. Yet I
do not doubt but there are many who will find out who the characters are
meant for, notwithstanding my assertion to the contrary. Well, be it
so. It's a very awkward position to have to write a chapter of sixteen
pages, without materials for more than two; at least, I find it so.
Some people have the power of spinning out a trifle of matter, covering
a large surface with a grain of ore--like the goldbeater, who, out of a
single guinea, will compose a score of books. I wish I could.
Is there nothing to give me an idea? I've racked my sensorium
internally to no purpose. Let me look round the cabin for some external
object to act as a fillip to an exhausted imagination. A little thing
will do.--Well, here's an _ant_. That's quite enough. _Commencons_.
"Home-keeping youths have ever homely wits," they say; but much as
travel by land may enlarge the mind, it never can be expanded to the
utmost of its capabilities, until it has also peregrinated by water. I
believe that not only the human intellect, but the instinct of brutes,
is enlarged by going to sea.
The ant which attracted my attention is one of a nest in my cabin, whose
labours I often superintend: and I defy any ant, in any part of the four
continents, or wherever land may be, to show an equal knowledge of
mechanical power. I do not mean to assert that there is originally a
disproportion of intellect between one animal and another of the same
species; but I consider that the instinct of animals is capable of
expansion, as well as the reason of man. The ants on shore would, if it
were required, be equally assisted by their instinct, I believe; but not
being required, it is not brought into play; and, therefore, as I before
observed, they have not the resources of which my little colony at
present are in possession.
Now I will kill a cockroach for them; there is no difficulty in finding
one, unfortunately for me, for they know everything that I have. There
never was a class of animals so indifferent to their fare, whether it be
paper, or snuff, or soap, or cloth. Like Time, they devour everything.
The scoundrels have nearly demolished two dozen antibilious pills. I
hope they will remember Dr Vance as long as they live.
Well, here's one--a fine one. I throw his crushed carcase on the deck,
and observe the ants have made their nest in the beams over my head,
from which I infer, that the said beams are not quite so sound as they
should be. An ant has passed by the carcase, and is off on a gallop to
give notice. He meets two or three--stops a second--and passes on. Now
the tide flows; it's not above a minute since I threw the cockroach
down, and now it is surrounded by hundreds. What a bustle!--what
running to and fro! They must be giving orders. See, there are fifty
at least, who lay hold of each separate leg of the monster, who in bulk
is equal to eight thousand of them. The body moves along with rapidity,
and they have gained the side of the cabin. Now for the ascent. See
how those who hold the lower legs have quitted them, and pass over to
assist the others at the upper. As there is not room for all to lay
hold of the creature's legs, those who cannot, fix their forceps round
the bodies of the others, _double-banking_ them, as we call it. Away
they go, up the side of the ship--a pull, and all together. But now the
work becomes more perilous, for they have to convey the body to their
nest over my head, which is three feet from the side of the ship. How
can they possibly carry that immense weight, walking with their heads
downwards, and clinging with their feet to the beams? Observe how
carefully they turn the corner--what bustle and confusion in making
their arrangements! Now they start. They have brought the body
head-and-stern with the ship, so that all the legs are exactly opposed
to each other in the direction in which they wish to proceed. One of
the legs on the fore side is advanced to its full stretch, while all the
others remain stationary. That leg stops, and the ants attached to it
hold on with the rest, while another of the foremost legs is advanced.
Thus they continue, until all the foremost are out, and the body of the
animal is suspended by its legs at its full stretch. Now one of the
hindmost legs closes in to the body, while all the others hold on--now
another, and another, each in their turn; and by this skilful manoeuvre
they have contrived to advance the body nearly an inch along the
ceiling. One of the foremost legs advances again, and they proceed as
before. Could your shore-going ants have managed this? I have often
watched them, when a boy, because my grandmother used to make me do so;
in later days, because I delighted in their industry and perseverance;
but, alas! in neither case did I profit by their example.
"Now, Freddy," the old lady would say, giving her spectacles a
preparatory wipe, as she basked in a summer evening's sun, after a five
o'clock tea, "fetch a piece of bread and butter, and we will see the
ants work. Lord bless the boy, if he hasn't thrown down a whole slice.
Why do you waste good victuals in that way? Who do you think's to eat
it, after it has been on the gravel? There, pinch a bit off and throw
it down. Put the rest back upon the plate--it will do for the cat."
But these ants were no more to be compared to mine, than a common
labourer is to the engineer who directs the mechanical powers which
raise mountains from their foundation. My old grandmother would never
let me escape until the bread and butter was in the hole, and, what was
worse, I had then to listen to the moral inference which was drawn, and
which took up more time than the ants did to draw the bread and butter--
all about industry, and what not; a long story, partly her own, partly
borrowed from Solomon; but it was labour in vain. I could not
understand why, because ants like bread and butter, I must like my book.
She was an excellent old woman; but nevertheless, many a time did I
have a fellow-feeling with the boy in the caricature print, who is
sitting with his old grandmother and the cat, and says, "I wish one of
us three were dead. It an't I--and it an't you, pussy."
Well, she died at last, full of years and honour; and I was summoned
from school to attend her funeral. My uncle was much affected, for she
had been an excellent mother. She might have been so; but I, graceless
boy, could not perceive her merits as a _grandmother_, and showed a
great deal of fortitude upon the occasion. I recollect a circumstance
attendant upon her funeral which, connected as it was with a subsequent
one, has since been the occasion of serious reflection upon the trifling
causes which will affect the human mind, when prostrate under
affliction. My grandmother's remains were consigned to an old family
vault, not far from the river. When the last ceremonies had been paid,
and the coffin was being lowered into the deep receptacle of generations
which had passed away, I looked down, and it was full of water, nearly
up to the arch of the vault. Observing my surprise, and perceiving the
cause, my uncle was much annoyed at the circumstance; but it was too
late the cords had been removed, and my grandmother had sunk to the
bottom. My uncle interrogated the sexton after the funeral service was
over.
"Why, sir, it's because it's high-water now in the river; she will be
all dry before the evening."
This made the matter worse. If she was all a-dry in the evening, she
would be all afloat again in the morning. It was no longer a place of
rest, and my uncle's grief was much increased by the idea. For a long
while afterwards he appeared uncommonly thoughtful at spring tides.
But although his grief yielded to time, the impression was not to be
effaced. Many years afterwards a fair cousin was summoned from the
world, before she had time to enter upon the duties imposed upon the
sex, or be convinced, from painful experience, that to die is gain. It
was then I perceived that my uncle had contracted a sort of
_post-mortem_ hydrophobia. He fixed upon a church, on the top of a
hill, and ordered a vault to be dug, at a great expense, out of the
solid chalk, under the chancel of the church. There it would not only
be dry below, but even defended from the rain above. It was finished--
and (the last moisture to which she was ever to be subjected) the tears
of affection were shed over her remains, by those who lost and loved
her. When the ceremony was over, my uncle appeared to look down into
the vault with a degree of satisfaction. "There," said he, "she will
lie as dry as possible, till the end of time." And I really believe
that this conviction on his part went further to console him than even
the aid of religion, or the ministering of affection. He often
commented upon it, and as often as he did so, I thought of my old
grandmother and the spring tides.
I had an odd dream the other night, about my own burial and subsequent
state which was so diametrically opposite to my uncle's ideas of
comfort, that I will relate it here.
I was dead; but, either from politeness or affection, I knew not which,
the spirit still lingered with the body, and had not yet taken its
flight, although the tie between them had been dissolved. I had been
killed in action; and the first-lieutenant of the ship, with mingled
feelings of sorrow and delight--sorrow at my death, which was a tribute
that I did not expect from him, and delight at his assumed promotion,
for the combat had been brought to a successful issue--read the funeral
service which consigned me and some twenty others, sewed up in hammocks,
to the deep, into which we descended with one simultaneous rush.
I thought that we soon parted company from each other, and, all alone, I
continued to sink, sink, sink, until, at last, I could sink no deeper.
I was suspended, as it were: I had taken my exact position in the scale
of gravity, and I lay floating upon the condensed and buoyant fluid,
many hundred fathoms below the surface. I thought to myself, "Here,
then, am I to lie in pickle, until I am awakened." It was quite dark,
but by the spirit I saw as plain as if it were noon-day; and I perceived
objects in the water, which gradually increased in size. They were
sharks, in search of prey. They attacked me furiously; and as they
endeavoured to drag me out of my canvas cerements, I whirled round and
round as their flat noses struck against my sides. At last they
succeeded. In a moment, I was dismembered without the least pain, for
pain had been left behind me in the world from which I had been
released. One separated a leg, with his sharp teeth, and darted away
north; another an arm, and steered south; each took his portion, and
appeared to steer away in a different direction, as if he did not wish
to be interrupted in his digestion.
"Help yourselves, gentlemen, help yourselves," mentally exclaimed I;
"but if Mr Young is correct in his `Night Thoughts,' where am I to
fumble for my bones, when they are to be forthcoming?" Nothing was left
but my head, and that, from superior gravity, continued to sink,
gyrating in its descent, so as to make me feel quite giddy: but it had
not gone far, before one, who had not received his portion, darted down
upon it perpendicularly, and as the last fragment of me rolled down his
enormous gullet, the spirit fled, and all was darkness and oblivion.
But I have digressed sadly from the concatenation of ideas. The ant
made me think of my grandmother,--my grandmother of my uncle,--my uncle
of my cousin,--and her death of my dream, for "We are such stuff as
dreams are made of, and our little lives are rounded with a sleep." But
I had not finished all I had to say relative to the inferior animals.
When on board of a man-of-war, not only is their instinct expanded, but
they almost change their nature from their immediate contact with human
beings, and become tame in an incredibly short space of time. Man had
dominion given unto him over the beasts of the field; the fiercest of
the feline race will not attack, but avoid him, unless goaded on by the
most imperious demands of hunger; and it is a well-known fact, that
there is a power in the eye of man, to which all other animals quail.
What, then, must it be to an animal who is brought on board, and is in
immediate collision with hundreds, whose fearless eyes meet his in every
direction in which he turns, and whose behaviour towards him corresponds
with their undaunted looks? The animal is subdued at once. I remember
a leopard which was permitted to run loose after he had been three days
on board, although it was thought necessary to bring him in an iron
cage. He had not been in the ship more than a fortnight, when I
observed the captain of the after-guard rubbing the nose of the animal
against the deck, for some offence which he had committed.
"Why, you have pretty well brought that gentleman to his bearings,"
observed I: "he's as tame as a puppy."
"Tame! why, sir, he knows better than to be otherwise. I wish the
_Hemp'rer of Maroccy_ would send us on board a _cock rhinoceros_--we'd
tame him in a week."
And I believe the man was correct in his assertion.
The most remarkable change of habit that I ever witnessed was in a
wether sheep, on board of a frigate, during the war. He was one of a
stock which the captain had taken on board for a long cruise, and being
the only survivor, during the time that the ship was refitting he had
been allowed to run about the decks, and had become such a favourite
with the ship's company, that the idea of his being killed, even when
short of fresh provisions, never even entered into the head of the
captain. Jack, for such was his cognomen, lived entirely with the men,
being fed with biscuit from the different messes. He knew the meaning
of the different pipes of the boatswain's mates, and always went below
when they piped to breakfast, dinner, or supper. But amongst other
peculiarities, he would chew tobacco, and drink grog. Is it to be
wondered, therefore, that he was a favourite with the sailors? That he
at first did this from obedience is possible; but, eventually, he was as
fond of grog as any of the men; and when the pipe gave notice of serving
it out, he would run aft to the tub, and wait his turn--for an extra
half-pint of water was, by general consent, thrown into the tub when the
grog was mixed, that Jack might have his regular allowance. From habit,
the animal knew exactly when his turn came. There were eighteen messes
in the ship; and as they were called, by the purser's steward, or
sergeant of marines, in rotation--first mess, second mess, etcetera.--
after the last mess was called, Jack presented himself at the tub, and
received his allowance.
Now, it sometimes occurred that a mess, when called, would miss its
turn, by the man deputed to receive the liquor not being present: upon
which occasion the other messes were served in rotation, and the one who
had not appeared to the call was obliged to wait till after all the
rest; but a circumstance of this kind always created a great deal of
mirth; for the sheep, who knew that it was his turn after the
eighteenth, or last mess, would butt away any one who attempted to
interfere; and if the party persevered in being served before Jack, he
would become quite outrageous, flying at the offender, and butting him
forward into the galley, and sometimes down the hatchway, before his
anger could be appeased--from which it would appear that the animal was
passionately fond of spirits. This I consider as great a change in the
nature of a ruminating animal as can well be imagined.
I could mention many instances of this kind, but I shall reserve them
till I have grown older; then I will be as garrulous as Montaigne. As
it is, I think I hear the reader say--"All this may be very true, but
what has it to do with the novel?" Nothing, I grant; but it has a great
deal to do with _making a book_--for I have completed a whole chapter
out of nothing.