MONSIEUR DU MIROIR

Than the gentleman above named, there is nobody, in the whole circle of

my acquaintance, whom I have more attentively studied, yet of whom I

have less real knowledge, beneath the surface which it pleases him to

present. Being anxious to discover who and what he really is, and how

connected with me, and what are to be the results to him and to myself

of the joint interest which, without any choice on my part, seems to be

permanently established between us, and incited, furthermore, by the

propensities of a student of human nature, though doubtful whether

Monsieur du Miroir have aught of humanity but the figure,—I have

determined to place a few of his remarkable points before the public,

hoping to be favored with some clew to the explanation of his

character. Nor let the reader condemn any part of the narrative as

frivolous, since a subject of such grave reflection diffuses its

importance through the minutest particulars; and there is no judging

beforehand what odd little circumstance may do the office of a blind

man’s dog among the perplexities of this dark investigation; and

however extraordinary, marvellous, preternatural, and utterly

incredible some of the meditated disclosures may appear, I pledge my

honor to maintain as sacred a regard to fact as if my testimony were

given on oath and involved the dearest interests of the personage in

question. Not that there is matter for a criminal accusation against

Monsieur du Miroir, nor am I the man to bring it forward if there were.

The chief that I complain of is his impenetrable mystery, which is no

better than nonsense if it conceal anything good, and much worse in the

contrary case.

But, if undue partialities could be supposed to influence me, Monsieur

du Miroir might hope to profit rather than to suffer by them, for in

the whole of our long intercourse we have seldom had the slightest

disagreement; and, moreover, there are reasons for supposing him a near

relative of mine, and consequently entitled to the best word that I can

give him. He bears indisputably a strong personal resemblance to

myself, and generally puts on mourning at the funerals of the family.

On the other hand, his name would indicate a French descent; in which

case, infinitely preferring that my blood should flow from a bold

British and pure Puritan source, I beg leave to disclaim all kindred

with Monsieur du Miroir. Some genealogists trace his origin to Spain,

and dub him a knight of the order of the CABALLEROS DE LOS ESPEJOZ, one

of whom was overthrown by Don Quixote. But what says Monsieur du Miroir

himself of his paternity and his fatherland? Not a word did he ever say

about the matter; and herein, perhaps, lies one of his most especial

reasons for maintaining such a vexatious mystery, that he lacks the

faculty of speech to expound it. His lips are sometimes seen to move;

his eyes and countenance are alive with shifting expression, as if

corresponding by visible hieroglyphics to his modulated breath; and

anon he will seem to pause with as satisfied an air as if he had been

talking excellent sense. Good sense or bad, Monsieur du Miroir is the

sole judge of his own conversational powers, never having whispered so

much as a syllable that reached the ears of any other auditor. Is he

really dumb? or is all the world deaf? or is it merely a piece of my

friend’s waggery, meant for nothing but to make fools of us? If so, he

has the joke all to himself.

This dumb devil which possesses Monsieur do Miroir is, I am persuaded,

the sole reason that he does not make me the most flattering

protestations of friendship. In many particulars—indeed, as to all his

cognizable and not preternatural points, except that, once in a great

while, I speak a word or two—there exists the greatest apparent

sympathy between us. Such is his confidence in my taste that he goes

astray from the general fashion and copies all his dresses after mine.

I never try on a new garment without expecting to meet, Monsieur du

Miroir in one of the same pattern. He has duplicates of all my

waistcoats and cravats, shirt-bosoms of precisely a similar plait, and

an old coat for private wear, manufactured, I suspect, by a Chinese

tailor, in exact imitation of a beloved old coat of mine, with a

facsimile, stitch by stitch, of a patch upon the elbow. In truth, the

singular and minute coincidences that occur, both in the accidents of

the passing day and the serious events of our lives, remind me of those

doubtful legends of lovers, or twin children, twins of fate, who have

lived, enjoyed, suffered, and died in unison, each faithfully repeating

the last tremor of the other’s breath, though separated by vast tracts

of sea and land. Strange to say, my incommodities belong equally to my

companion, though the burden is nowise alleviated by his participation.

The other morning, after a night of torment from the toothache, I met

Monsieur du Miroir with such a swollen anguish in his cheek that my own

pangs were redoubled, as were also his, if I might judge by a fresh

contortion of his visage. All the inequalities of my spirits are

communicated to him, causing the unfortunate Monsieur du Miroir to mope

and scowl through a whole summer’s day, or to laugh as long, for no

better reason than the gay or gloomy crotchets of my brain. Once we

were joint sufferers of a three months’ sickness, and met like mutual

ghosts in the first days of convalescence. Whenever I have been in

love, Monsieur du Miroir has looked passionate and tender; and never

did my mistress discard me, but this too susceptible gentleman grew

lackadaisical. His temper, also, rises to blood heat, fever heat, or

boiling-water beat, according to the measure of any wrong which might

seem to have fallen entirely on myself. I have sometimes been calmed

down by the sight of my own inordinate wrath depicted on his frowning

brow. Yet, however prompt in taking up my quarrels, I cannot call to

mind that he ever struck a downright blow in my behalf; nor, in fact,

do I perceive that any real and tangible good has resulted from his

constant interference in my affairs; so that, in my distrustful moods,

I am apt to suspect Monsieur du Miroir’s sympathy to be mere outward

show, not a whit better nor worse than other people’s sympathy.

Nevertheless, as mortal man must have something in the guise of

sympathy,—and whether the true metal, or merely copper-washed, is of

less moment,—I choose rather to content myself with Monsieur du

Miroir’s, such as it is, than to seek the sterling coin, and perhaps

miss even the counterfeit.

In my age of vanities I have often seen him in the ballroom, and might

again were I to seek him there. We have encountered each other at the

Tremont Theatre, where, however, he took his seat neither in the

dress-circle, pit, nor upper regions, nor threw a single glance at the

stage, though the brightest star, even Fanny Kemble herself, might be

culminating there. No; this whimsical friend of mine chose to linger in

the saloon, near one of the large looking-glasses which throw back

their pictures of the illuminated room. He is so full of these

unaccountable eccentricities that I never like to notice Monsieur du

Miroir, nor to acknowledge the slightest connection with him, in places

of public resort. He, however, has no scruple about claiming my

acquaintance, even when his common-sense, if he had any, might teach

him that I would as willingly exchange a nod with the Old Nick. It was

but the other day that he got into a large brass kettle at the entrance

of a hardware-store, and thrust his head, the moment afterwards, into a

bright, new warming-pan, whence he gave me a most merciless look of

recognition. He smiled, and so did I; but these childish tricks make

decent people rather shy of Monsieur du Miroir, and subject him to more

dead cuts than any other gentleman in town.

One of this singular person’s most remarkable peculiarities is his

fondness for water, wherein he excels any temperance man whatever. His

pleasure, it must be owned, is not so much to drink it (in which

respect a very moderate quantity will answer his occasions) as to souse

himself over head and ears wherever he may meet with it. Perhaps he is

a merman, or born of a mermaid’s marriage with a mortal, and thus

amphibious by hereditary right, like the children which the old river

deities, or nymphs of fountains, gave to earthly love. When no cleaner

bathing-place happened to be at hand, I have seen the foolish fellow in

a horse-pond. Some times he refreshes himself in the trough of a

town-pump, without caring what the people think about him. Often, while

carefully picking my way along the street after a heavy shower, I have

been scandalized to see Monsieur du Miroir, in full dress, paddling

from one mud-puddle to another, and plunging into the filthy depths of

each. Seldom have I peeped into a well without discerning this

ridiculous gentleman at the bottom, whence he gazes up, as through a

long telescopic tube, and probably makes discoveries among the stars by

daylight. Wandering along lonesome paths or in pathless forests, when I

have come to virgin fountains of which it would have been pleasant to

deem myself the first discoverer, I have started to find Monsieur du

Miroir there before me. The solitude seemed lonelier for his presence.

I have leaned from a precipice that frowns over Lake George, which the

French call nature’s font of sacramental water, and used it in their

log-churches here and their cathedrals beyond the sea, and seen him far

below in that pure element. At Niagara, too, where I would gladly have

forgotten both myself and him, I could not help observing my companion

in the smooth water on the very verge of the cataract just above the

Table Rock. Were I to reach the sources of the Nile, I should expect to

meet him there. Unless he be another Ladurlad, whose garments the depth

of ocean could not moisten, it is difficult to conceive how he keeps

himself in any decent pickle; though I am bound to confess that his

clothes seem always as dry and comfortable as my own. But, as a friend,

I could wish that he would not so often expose himself in liquor.

All that I have hitherto related may be classed among those little

personal oddities which agreeably diversify the surface of society,

and, though they may sometimes annoy us, yet keep our daily intercourse

fresher and livelier than if they were done away. By an occasional

hint, however, I have endeavored to pave the way for stranger things to

come, which, had they been disclosed at once, Monsieur du Miroir might

have been deemed a shadow, and myself a person of no veracity, and this

truthful history a fabulous legend. But, now that the reader knows me

worthy of his confidence, I will begin to make him stare.

To speak frankly, then, I could bring the most astounding proofs that

Monsieur du Miroir is at least a conjurer, if not one of that unearthly

tribe with whom conjurers deal. He has inscrutable methods of conveying

himself from place to place with the rapidity of the swiftest steamboat

or rail-car. Brick walls and oaken doors and iron bolts are no

impediment to his passage. Here in my chamber, for instance, as the

evening deepens into night, I sit alone,—the key turned and withdrawn

from the lock, the keyhole stuffed with paper to keep out a peevish

little blast of wind. Yet, lonely as I seem, were I to lift one of the

lamps and step five paces eastward, Monsieur du Miroir would be sure to

meet me with a lamp also in his hand; and were I to take the

stage-coach to-morrow, without giving him the least hint of my design,

and post onward till the week’s end, at whatever hotel I might find

myself I should expect to share my private apartment with this

inevitable Monsieur du Miroir. Or, out of a mere wayward fantasy, were

I to go, by moonlight, and stand beside the stone Pout of the Shaker

Spring at Canterbury, Monsieur du Miroir would set forth on the same

fool’s errand, and would not fail to meet me there. Shall I heighten

the reader’s wonder? While writing these latter sentences, I happened

to glance towards the large, round globe of one off the brass andirons,

and lo! a miniature apparition of Monsieur du Miroir, with his face

widened and grotesquely contorted, as if he were making fun of my

amazement! But he has played so many of these jokes that they begin to

lose their effect. Once, presumptuous that he was, he stole into the

heaven of a young lady’s eyes; so that, while I gazed and was dreaming

only of herself, I found him also in my dream. Years have so changed

him since that he need never hope to enter those heavenly orbs again.

From these veritable statements it will be readily concluded that, had

Monsieur du Miroir played such pranks in old witch times, matters might

have gone hard with him; at least if the constable and posse comitatus

could have executed a warrant, or the jailer had been cunning enough to

keep him. But it has often occurred to me as a very singular

circumstance, and as betokening either a temperament morbidly

suspicious or some weighty cause of apprehension, that he never trusts

himself within the grasp even of his most intimate friend. If you step

forward to meet him, he readily advances; if you offer him your hand,

he extends his own with an air of the utmost frankness; but, though you

calculate upon a hearty shake, you do not get hold of his little

finger. Ah, this Monsieur du Miroir is a slippery fellow!

These truly are matters of special admiration. After vainly

endeavoring, by the strenuous exertion of my own wits, to gain a

satisfactory insight into the character of Monsieur du Miroir, I had

recourse to certain wise men, and also to books of abstruse philosophy,

seeking who it was that haunted me, and why. I heard long lectures and

read huge volumes with little profit beyond the knowledge that many

former instances are recorded, in successive ages, of similar

connections between ordinary mortals and beings possessing the

attributes of Monsieur du Miroir. Some now alive, perhaps, besides

myself, have such attendants. Would that Monsieur du Miroir could be

persuaded to transfer his attachment to one of those, and allow some

other of his race to assume the situation that he now holds in regard

to me! If I must needs have so intrusive an intimate, who stares me in

the face in my closest privacy, and follows me even to my bedchamber, I

should prefer—scandal apart—the laughing bloom of a young girl to the

dark and bearded gravity of my present companion. But such desires are

never to be gratified. Though the members of Monsieur du Miroir’s

family have been accused, perhaps justly, of visiting their friends

often in splendid halls, and seldom in darksome dungeons, yet they

exhibit a rare constancy to the objects of their first attachment,

however unlovely in person or unamiable in disposition,—however

unfortunate, or even infamous, and deserted by all the world besides.

So will it be with my associate. Our fates appear inseparably blended.

It is my belief, as I find him mingling with my earliest recollections,

that we came into existence together, as my shadow follows me into the

sunshine, and that hereafter, as heretofore, the brightness or gloom of

my fortunes will shine upon, or darken, the face of Monsieur du Miroir.

As we have been young together, and as it is now near the summer noon

with both of us, so, if long life be granted, shall each count his own

wrinkles on the other’s brow and his white hairs on the other’s head.

And when the coffin-lid shall have closed over me and that face and

form, which, more truly than the lover swears it to his beloved, are

the sole light of his existence,—when they shall be laid in that dark

chamber, whither his swift and secret footsteps cannot bring him,—then

what is to become of poor Monsieur du Miroir? Will he have the

fortitude, with my other friends, to take a last look at my pale

countenance? Will he walk foremost in the funeral train? Will he come

often and haunt around my grave, and weed away the nettles, and plant

flowers amid the verdure, and scrape the moss out of the letters of my

burial-stone? Will he linger where I have lived, to remind the

neglectful world of one who staked much to win a name, but will not

then care whether he lost or won?

Not thus will he prove his deep fidelity. O, what terror, if this

friend of mine, after our last farewell, should step into the crowded

street, or roam along our old frequented path by the still waters, or

sit down in the domestic circle where our faces are most familiar and

beloved! No; but when the rays of heaven shall bless me no more, nor

the thoughtful lamplight gleam upon my studies, nor the cheerful

fireside gladden the meditative man, then, his task fulfilled, shall

this mysterious being vanish from the earth forever. He will pass to

the dark realm of nothingness, but will not find me there.

There is something fearful in bearing such a relation to a creature so

imperfectly known, and in the idea that, to a certain extent, all which

concerns myself will be reflected in its consequences upon him. When we

feel that another is to share the self-same fortune with ourselves we

judge more severely of our prospects, and withhold our confidence from

that delusive magic which appears to shed an infallibility of happiness

over our own pathway. Of late years, indeed, there has been much to

sadden my intercourse with Monsieur de Miroir. Had not our union been a

necessary condition of our life, we must have been estranged ere now.

In early youth, when my affections were warm and free, I loved him

well, and could always spend a pleasant hour in his society, chiefly

because it gave me an excellent opinion of myself. Speechless as he

was, Monsieur du Miroir had then a most agreeable way of calling me a

handsome fellow; and I, of course, returned the compliment; so that,

the more we kept each other’s company, the greater coxcombs we mutually

grew. But neither of us need apprehend any such misfortune now. When we

chance to meet,—for it is chance oftener than design,—each glances

sadly at the other’s forehead, dreading wrinkles there; and at our

temples, whence the hair is thinning away too early; and at the sunken

eyes, which no longer shed a gladsome light over the whole face. I

involuntarily peruse him as a record of my heavy youth, which has been

wasted in sluggishness for lack of hope and impulse, or equally thrown

away in toil that had no wise motive and has accomplished no good end.

I perceive that the tranquil gloom of a disappointed soul has darkened

through his countenance, where the blackness of the future seems to

mingle with the shadows of the past, giving him the aspect of a fated

man. Is it too wild a thought that my fate may have assumed this image

of myself, and therefore haunts me with such inevitable pertinacity,

originating every act which it appears to imitate, while it deludes me

by pretending to share the events of which it is merely the emblem and

the prophecy? I must banish this idea, or it will throw too deep an awe

round my companion. At our next meeting, especially if it be at

midnight or in solitude, I fear that I shall glance aside and shudder;

in which case, as Monsieur du Miroir is extremely sensitive to

ill-treatment, he also will avert his eyes and express horror or

disgust.

But no; this is unworthy of me. As of old I sought his society for the

bewitching dreams of woman’s love which he inspired, and because I

fancied a bright fortune in his aspect, so now will I hold daily and

long communion with hint for the sake of the stern lessons that he will

teach my manhood. With folded arms we will sit face to face, and

lengthen out our silent converse till a wiser cheerfulness shall have

been wrought from the very texture of despondency. He will say, perhaps

indignantly, that it befits only him to mourn for the decay of outward

grace, which, while he possessed it, was his all. But have not you, he

will ask, a treasure in reserve, to which every year may add far more

value than age or death itself can snatch from that miserable clay? He

will tell me that though the bloom of life has been nipped with a

frost, yet the soul must not sit shivering in its cell, but bestir

itself manfully, and kindle a genial warmth from its own exercise

against; the autumnal and the wintry atmosphere. And I, in return, will

bid him be of good cheer, nor take it amiss that I must blanch his

locks and wrinkle him up like a wilted apple, since it shall be my

endeavor so to beautify his face with intellect and mild benevolence

that he shall profit immensely by the change. But here a smile will

glimmer somewhat sadly over Monsieur du Miroir’s visage.

When this subject shall have been sufficiently discussed we may take up

others as important. Reflecting upon his power of following me to the

remotest regions and into the deepest privacy, I will compare the

attempt to escape him to the hopeless race that men sometimes run with

memory, or their own hearts, or their moral selves, which, though

burdened with cares enough to crush an elephant, will never be one step

behind. I will be self-contemplative, as nature bids me, and make him

the picture or visible type of what I muse upon, that my mind may not

wander so vaguely as heretofore, chasing its own shadow through a chaos

and catching only the monsters that abide there. Then will we turn our

thoughts to the spiritual world, of the reality of which my companions

shall furnish me an illustration, if not an argument; for, as we have

only the testimony of the eye to Monsieur du Miroir’s existence, while

all the other senses would fail to inform us that such a figure stands

within arm’s-length, wherefore should there not be beings innumerable

close beside us, and filling heaven and earth with their multitude, yet

of whom no corporeal perception can take cognizance? A blind man might

as reasonably deny that Monsieur du Miroir exists, as we, because the

Creator has hitherto withheld the spiritual perception, can therefore

contend that there are no spirits. O, there are! And, at this moment,

when the subject of which I write has grown strong within me and

surrounded itself with those solemn and awful associations which might

have seemed most alien to it, I could fancy that Monsieur du Miroir

himself is a wanderer from the spiritual world, with nothing human

except his delusive garment of visibility. Methinks I should tremble

now were his wizard power of gliding through all impediments in search

of me to place him suddenly before my eyes.

Ha! What is yonder? Shape of mystery, did the tremor of my heartstrings

vibrate to thine own, and call thee from thy home among the dancers of

the northern lights, and shadows flung from departed sunshine, and

giant spectres that appear on clouds at daybreak and affright the

climber of the Alps? In truth it startled me, as I threw a wary glance

eastward across the chamber, to discern an unbidden guest with his eyes

bent on mine. The identical MONSIEUR DU MIROIR! Still there he sits and

returns my gaze with as much of awe and curiosity as if he, too, had

spent a solitary evening in fantastic musings and made me his theme. So

inimitably does he counterfeit that I could almost doubt which of us is

the visionary form, or whether each be not the other’s mystery, and

both twin brethren of one fate, in mutually reflected spheres. O

friend, canst thou not hear and answer me? Break down the barrier

between us! Grasp my hand! Speak! Listen! A few words, perhaps, might

satisfy the feverish yearning of my soul for some master-thought that

should guide me through this labyrinth of life, teaching wherefore I

was born, and how to do my task on earth, and what is death. Alas! Even

that unreal image should forget to ape me and smile at these vain

questions. Thus do mortals deify, as it were, a mere shadow of

themselves, a spectre of human reason, and ask of that to unveil the

mysteries which Divine Intelligence has revealed so far as needful to

our guidance, and hid the rest.

Farewell, Monsieur du Miroir. Of you, perhaps, as of many men, it may

be doubted whether you are the wiser, though your whole business is

REFLECTION.