Rest! Ah, what a delicious word to the sick and wearied man. Rest in
mind and body! How unsatisfactory appear the gaudy pictures of the
dreamer of Patmos compared with the simple words of the Master, "I
will give you rest." I can hardly say why I selected Hampton for rest.
I knew nobody here, and had never been here. But somehow I had taken
up the impression that it was one of those old East Virginia towns
that had been blown ashore by the tempest of civil war and lay stranded
on the beach of the briny ocean of life. And that was the sort of place
that quiet was to be found in. My first night was a happy confirmation
of my choice. Standing on the wharf at which lay a little steamer, the
scene was beautiful. The new moon hung in the west and cast its
glittering line over the water for miles and miles away. Thick in the
little harbor lay the slender masts of vessels with steady lights
glowing in their rigging. Across the narrow bay stood the Normal School
with its three stories brightly lighted, and further away was the
gigantic Soldiers' Home with a thousand lights burning. To the east
was the long bridge across Hampton creek, with every few minutes a
lighted omnibus or a pair of carnage lamps going leisurely across.
Further yet was a railroad train lighted and flying across the trestle
bridge. At the opening of the little bay were fisher boats, coming in
with all sail spread, the loud laughter and chaffing of the men easily
heard at this distance. Turning inland, you see a broad street, with
shade trees on each side casting dark shadows. The lights twinkle its
whole length and at one point there is a bright spot--a pretty, white
hotel with a treble deck of verandahs. That is my home for many days
to come and there I am to be at rest. The call of the bugle sounds on
the night air; it is the "taps" at the Soldiers' Home; the salt water
is beating with lazy monotone against the shore; the fisherman have
tied up their boats; the last omnibus has crossed the bridge; the young
moon is getting to her bed and I turn my face toward the long street
and the bright hotel. A man of high-toned and poetic mind would here
insert something about his thoughts turning to his mountain home. Alas!
mine are turned with eager curiosity to what my breakfast tomorrow
would be, reflecting as I do that I am now in the land, or rather
water, of oysters, soft crabs and fish. After all, of what common clay
we are made!
* * * * *
The redeeming feature of ill-health, to me, has been that for the last
few months I have been thrown with many invalids and enjoyed their
confidence to the fullest, (and sometimes the most, to some extent).
There seems to be a sort of free-masonry among sick people by which
they at once become friendly and familiar. There is, also, if you only
knew it, an aristocracy of ill-health; that is, a man with two
complaints stands much higher with his fellow invalids than a man with
one; and a man who has been sick for five years stands immeasurably
higher than a mere cadet who has not been sick six months. Having only
a two years' standing, I was forced to bear the contempt which I
received from chronic cases, but I repaid it with interest on some
evidently shoddy invalids, who were trying to work their way into
society on an attack of only a few weeks duration. I remember one case,
however, in which our whole aristocratic circle was swept into
insignificance by a little lady, whom I saw after I left Hampton, and
who didn't weigh ninety pounds. She had been an invalid, she said, for
fifteen years, and while I do not recollect precisely her afflictions,
it appears to me that she had had chronic trichnia spiralis for that
length of time, with intermittent cerebro spinal meningitis tending
towards hydrophobia. This imposing patient cowed the whole invalid
circle. But one man showed the slightest resistance, and that was old
man Smith, who had been very proud of his chronic liver complaint. He
told me in confidence the next day that he believed "the whole story
was a ---- ----." It is due to the company, however, to say that the
narration was received with polite expressions of sympathy and wonder,
while there was at the same time a silent conviction that it was of
this complication of diseases that Ananias died. If a lady could rout
us, however, it was not permitted to a man. When another of these
aristocratic invalids, one of those "four giant shows under one canvas,"
came along, varying in sex from the first mentioned, he was speedily
brought to grief. At supper, the first evening of his arrival, one of
our circle having asked him with incautious politeness "how he was?"
the new arrival opened on us with a sonorous discourse filled with
chronic afflictions mixed up with pious reflections. I think he would
have established his claims to high rank had not a consumptive-looking
boarder with a haggard face taken advantage of a pause in the speech,
and without looking up from his plate, remarked in a squeaky voice,
"The remainder of the service will be concluded at the grave." The
interruption was a bombshell. I have said that there is a free-masonry
among invalids; I might add that it almost amounts to the old
co-operation plan. I have been offered advice without limit and even
medicine from my fellow sufferers. I have also been furnished with a
list of their own attending physicians, all of whom have performed
remarkable cures. It is a full and complete list of fifty-eight
physicians in good professional standing, and I will dispose of it at
a moderate compensation to any apothecary or undertaker who desires
to purchase.
Where was I? Oh, speaking of invalids! Sickness is to be dreaded with
many because of death, but from the high moral plane from which I
regard it, it is chiefly objectionable on account of the lying it gives
rise to. Directly a man gets well on the way down hill, the good natured
world gets this lie photographed, and each man presents him a
copy--"Why, I never saw you looking better in my life!" For the first
few copies that are presented him the poor devil is grateful; of the
next few he is suspicious, and thereafter he is worried, vexed and
profane. If you remonstrate against the truth of the assurance and
call attention to the prominent skeleton which you are presenting to
the public eye, the good natured liar looks you unflinchingly in the
eye while he presents you with another lithograph bearing this
inscription: "Oh, I didn't mean that you were fatter, I meant that
your skin is clearer and your eyes are brighter." Not having a sample
of your former skin, nor another pair of eyes handy to confute him
with, this well-meaning liar walks off triumphantly. I, myself, however,
am no better than the rest of them, though my presenting the lithograph
cost me dearly one day. In one of the towns where I stopped, a young
girl came to the hotel the shadow of what she had been. I suppose one
evening I must have felt unusually chipper and kindly myself, for,
coming up on the porch where she was sitting, I dashed off the old
lithograph, "Why you are looking so much better." Her eyes--I never
saw eyes that had so much of the other world and so little of this in
them--turned on me with a half kind, half reproachful look, and at
once filled with tears. She merely said gently, "Thank you," and got
up and walked away. God forgive me, that I should have interrupted a
soul so near to setting sail, to pay a lithographed and lying
compliment. Three weeks later, in another town, I was told that she
had gone on the last long voyage. I have burned my lithographs.