THE FUNERAL.
The next morning I went in search of Mrs. Flaxman. I found her busy
superintending, along with the housekeeper, some extensive pickling and
preserving operations. I hesitated at first in making my request; I
wanted her to accompany me to the funeral.
"I promised Mrs. Blake to go to her daughter's funeral to-day, and I
should so much like to have you go with me," I said.
"If you would like my company, your liking shall be gratified, my dear."
"But you looked tired, and it is such a hot day."
"I shall want folk to come and get me safely planted away some day, and
we can take the carriage. Thomas will be glad to go; at least he always
wants to attend funerals. Such persons usually are fond of the mild
excitement attendant on such gatherings."
I went in search of Thomas, who was with coachman and gardener, having a
lad to assist him in both occupations. He assured me that work was very
pressing, and it would be at considerable personal sacrifice if he went.
The stable boy, a red-haired, keen-faced youth standing by, gave a
quizzical look, which I interpreted as meaning that Thomas wished to
conceal the fact that he was very glad indeed to go to Mrs. Daniel
Blake's funeral. At the appointed hour I found myself in a carriage drawn
by a pair of horses fully as handsome, but much more sedate than Faery.
"Why, this is positively luxurious," I exclaimed, leaning back in the
very comfortable carriage. Mrs. Flaxman smiled serenely.
"My dear, it is a luxury you may every day enjoy. I am not inclined for
carriage exercise--a walk has greater charm for me save when I am tired."
"If you had walked all your life--only enjoying a carriage at brief
intervals during the holidays, you would enjoy this drive, I am sure."
"Your life is not a very long affair, my child. At your age, no doubt, I
thought as you now do. I believe God intended that youth and age should
see this world through different eyes."
Mrs. Flaxman, I was finding, had a way of setting me thinking about
serious things, and yet the thoughts were mainly pleasant ones. She was
different from any one I ever knew. I found her presence so restful. I
had the impression that some time in her life she had encountered storms,
but the mastery had been gained; and now she had drifted into a peaceful
harbor. Looking back now over longer stretches of years and experiences
than I then had, I can recall a few other persons who impressed me in a
similar fashion. But they were rare and beautiful exceptions to the
scores, and even hundreds of average human folk whom I have known.
After we had driven some distance, Thomas turned to inquire if we were
going to the grave.
"It is a shady drive good part of the way; trees on one side and the
water's edge bordering the other. Perhaps we might as well go."
"They'd take it very kind of you, ma'am, I am sure," Thomas responded,
although her remarks were addressed to me. Evidently he was very
willing to exercise the horses, notwithstanding his press of work.
We sat in the carriage at the door of Daniel's cottage. The house seemed
full, and quite a crowd were standing outside.
"They have shown the poor thing a good deal of respect," Mrs. Flaxman
whispered to me as she glanced at the numerous assemblage.
Suddenly, on the hush that seemed to enfold everything, there broke
weird, discordant singing--women's voices sounding high and piercing, the
men's deeper and more melodious. The hymn they sang was long, and the air
very plaintive, bringing tears to my eyes, and causing the strange,
oppressed feeling of the preceding day to return. When the singing ceased
I noticed the men removing their hats, and a moment after a stentorian
voice speaking loudly. I glanced around amazed, but Mrs. Flaxman noticing
my surprise, whispered, "It is prayer."
If the singing made me nervous the prayer intensified the feeling. In the
hot, midsummer air, so still the leaves scarce rippled on the trees, I
could, after a few seconds, distinguish every word the man uttered.
Accustomed to the decorous prayer of the German pastors our teachers
had taken us to hear, this impetuous prayer to the Deity awed me. He
talked with the invisible Jehovah as if they two were long tried friends,
between whom there was such perfect trust; whatever the man asked the God
would bestow. First there was intercession, pleading for forgiveness for
past offences, and for restraining grace for future needs. Afterward he
spoke of Death, the common inheritance of each of us, and the pain his
entrance had caused in this home, and then followed thanksgiving that
through Christ we could conquer even Death himself. I shall never forget
the triumphant ring in that man's voice as he passed on to the joy of
those who, trampling on Death, have passed safely within the light of
God.
"If one of the old masters had heard that man's prayer to-day, he would
have set it to some grand music. It reminds me of a _Te Deum_ or
oratoria," I said to Mrs. Flaxman, when the benediction was pronounced.
The tears were in her eyes, but her face was shining as if some inner
light were irradiating it.
"Did you ever hear so impetuous a prayer?" I asked.
She answered my question by asking another:
"Did you not like it?"
"I think it frightened me. The clergyman seemed to be talking to some one
right beside him."
"Is not all prayer that--talking, pleading with a God nigh at hand?"
I did not reply. My eyes were fastened on the crowd now issuing from the
cottage door; the coffin, carried by men, came first, the people pressing
hurriedly after--among them one whom I instinctively felt to be the
clergyman--a thick-set man with hair turning white, and a most noble,
benignant face. As the procession formed he took his place at the head;
Daniel and his mother climbing into a wagon directly behind the hearse;
the former looked utterly broken down, as if the light of his eyes had
verily been quenched.
The procession then moved slowly along, and in a short time we turned out
of the Mill Road, and into a beautiful shady street along the water's
edge. I watched the sunlight on the shimmering waters, and far across,
where one of the wooded headlands looked down into the sea, the green
trees made such a picture on the water that, in watching this perfect bit
of landscape, I found myself forgetting the solemn occasion, and the
sorrowing heart of the solitary mourner, while I planned to come there
the very next day with my sketch book, and secure this gem to send to my
favorite teacher as a specimen of my new surroundings. And then fancy got
painting her own pictures as to what my work in this new life with its
greatly altered meaning should be, and before we had reached the grave's
edge I had mapped out my ongoings for a long stretch of the future, and
that in such eager, worldly fashion that I almost forgot that at the end
of all this bright-hued future there lay for me, as well as for Daniel
Blake's wife, an open grave. My busy thoughts were recalled by hearing
the penetrating voice of the preacher saying "dust to dust, ashes to
ashes," with the remainder of the beautiful formula used by many of the
churches in planting the human germ. A glance around revealed Daniel
Blake leaning in the very abandonment of grief on a tombstone at the
grave's side, and looking down into the coffin that was rapidly
disappearing under the shovelfuls of clay. A keen sense of my own
heartlessness in feeling so happy within touch of such woe came over me,
while a vague wonder seized me, if some other careless-hearted creatures
might not be planning their joys some day in presence of my breaking
heart.