was told me, and I put especial faith in the admonitions and advice
of those who were set to instruct me in manners and morals. One of
the first lessons I learned was that merit is always rewarded; and
another, that industry is the certain road to success and advancement.
These things I firmly believed to be true. Sundays, when other boys
of my acquaintance stole away to go fishing or swimming, I went to
Sunday-school, firm in the conviction that my virtue and self-denial
would be amply rewarded, though I was a bit hazy as to the manner
in which this would come about. It was often a severe temptation to
hear the truants boasting of the pleasures they had enjoyed at the
swimming-pool or at the fork of the creek where they went to angle.
At the end of my first summer of Sunday-school, I was given a crude
picture card showing two cows of peculiar construction who appeared to
be enjoying themselves immensely in the very river I had shunned so
religiously. Upon this card there was printed a conspicuous legend:
“The Reward of Merit.”
While this result of my season of piety was not what I had expected, I
continued to hope on until I had acquired quite a collection of similar
cards, some of them varied a little as to subject, but all of the same
order of art, and all bearing the familiar legend. Being of a naturally
optimistic and sanguine disposition, I soon convinced myself that my
mistake lay in looking for material rewards in return for spiritual
industry.
When I entered the profession of medicine, I still clung to my theory
of the reward of merit, and no sooner did I get a patient than I set
to work to cure him as quickly as possible. If a patient really had
nothing the matter with him, I sent him about his business. I was not a
nerve specialist and I did not care to be bothered with hypochondriacs.
Though I started with an unusually good practise for a young physician,
the result of this course of conduct was that I found myself in two
years’ time sitting idle in my office with my waiting-room absolutely
empty. I had cured all my patients who were really ill and I had
offended all who only thought they were ill. It seems that one can not
offend a man more than by telling him he is well when he prefers to
think that he is unwell. My patients who had been cured had no further
need of me, and those whom I had refused to treat had no further use
for me, so that the tongue of malice completed the work which my own
energy had begun. And thus, for the second time, my theory of the
reward of merit had failed to work out. Having made one failure as
a doctor, I could never again establish myself in the practise of
medicine. Wherever I went, the story of my failure had preceded me,
so that presently I found myself dropping down and down in the social
scale until finally I awoke one morning to find myself a scavenger.
“Now,” said I to myself, “I have touched bottom and I must presently
go up again like a man who sinks in the water.” But my hopes were not
realized. I remained a collector and remover of garbage. My study of
hygiene had taught me the evils of filth and I could not, therefore,
neglect my work as a less intelligent scavenger might have done. I knew
that my clients were depending upon me, in a great degree, to protect
them from typhoid and kindred evils, and even though I realized that
this dependence was more or less unconscious upon their part, I could
no more have shirked my responsibility than I could have gone into
their houses and killed them in cold blood. So I went to work earnestly
and I flatter myself that there is no more thoroughgoing workman in the
whole body of scavengers than myself.
Since I have been engaged in this work I have made another discovery.
I have discovered that industry is by no means a sure road to
advancement. When my work is well done I am paid, but I am not
complimented. The thoroughness of my methods does not attract the
attention of my clients. Nobody seeks me out with a proffer of more
congenial employment. Everybody appears to take it for granted that
I like to collect garbage. I do not. I have never been a collector
of anything from choice. I used to think that any man who collected
stamps must be lacking in intelligence, but I see now that one may be
engaged in collecting worse things than stamps. Nobody says anything at
all about my work unless something goes wrong. And this, I believe, is
usually the case.
I recently read a copy of the _Memoirs of Lieutenant-Colonel Paul von
Pulitz_, which I retrieved from the ash-can of one of my clients who
is of a literary turn, and it was through his receptacle for discarded
matter, by the way, that I first made the acquaintance of your
excellent publication.
In these _Memoirs_, which are unusually interesting in many respects,
I came upon an anecdote which seems to have a direct bearing upon the
question which we are now considering. It appears that Colonel von
Pulitz was discussing with a number of other officers the chances
and mischances of a military career. Several of the officers had
volunteered the causes to which they attributed their success.
Colonel von Pulitz then related this anecdote, the truth of which he
indorses elsewhere, and in this he is borne out by the editor of the
autobiography, Professor Rudolph Ubermann, of Berlin University.
“When a young man,” writes Colonel von Pulitz, “I fell into disgrace
with my family because of a certain youthful escapade--no matter
what--and so forfeited my opportunity for entering the Prussian Army as
an officer. I therefore determined to gain by my wits what I had lost
by my folly. I was, as you who know me can testify, an unusually tall
and fine-looking young man. Now it occurred to me that if I could once
attract the attention of the king (he is here referring to Frederick
the Great) he would undoubtedly desire me as a recruit for his ‘tall’
regiment, and if I had an opportunity to explain to him my situation, I
might, after all, secure my coveted commission. I therefore secured a
situation as a servant in the king’s own household, under a fictitious
name, of course; and I was highly delighted when I found that I had
been delegated as one of the waiters at table, for, thought I, now
is my great opportunity certainly at hand. But alas for my hopes! The
king bestowed upon me no notice whatever, and for all the attention my
height secured from his majesty, I might have been a dwarf.
“So it went on for weeks, and I had nearly despaired of my commission
when I hit upon the audacious scheme which solved the problem. I
determined to attract the king’s notice at any cost, and when next
I waited upon him, I deliberately pretended to stumble, and with an
air of awkwardness I emptied down the neck of his majesty a plate
of exceedingly hot soup. In a moment there was an uproar. The king
was in a fury of temper and the majordomo was in a fair way to die
of fright and chagrin, but my purpose was accomplished. The king had
looked at me. He observed my height and my aristocratic bearing. He
questioned me, and I told him my whole story frankly, omitting nothing
but the ruse whereby I had brought myself to his notice. I secured my
commission in his regiment, and from that time on I advanced steadily.
The king never forgot me, but kept a friendly eye upon me. He once said
in my presence: ‘Gentlemen, I never see a plate of hot soup that I do
not think of my good friend the Lieutenant-Colonel Paul von Pulitz.’”
Now, Mr. _Idler_, I have no opportunity for spilling hot soup down the
necks of my clients and my conscience will not permit me to attract
their notice by gross neglect of duty. My effective work has failed to
bring upon me their favorable regard. Finding myself so situated, and
being, even yet, hopeful of some opportunity for bettering myself, I
have written you this letter. I have done so in the hope that it may
meet the eye of some one of my clients, perhaps that of the literary
gentleman through whose barrel I first made your acquaintance and the
acquaintance of the ingenious Lieutenant-Colonel Paul von Pulitz.
I, am, Sir,
Your humble servant,
CHARLES CLINKER.
THE BLESSINGS OF THE BLIND
_To the Editor of The Idler._
DEAR SIR: Those who are blessed, as the saying is, with two eyes
and the gift of sight, are much given to expressing sympathy with,
and sorrow for, the blind. It would be churlish to quarrel with so
unselfish a sentiment, for it is, indeed, very good-natured of those
who are busily engaged in seeing the sights of the world to spare the
time and the thought which they give to the sightless. Yet I often
wonder if the blind do not sometimes question, as I do, if a great deal
of this sympathy is not wasted?
I, Sir, am blind. Totally and irretrievably blind. I have been blind
all my life, having been, as the Irish say, “dark” from my birth. Born
blind, in fact. My “affliction,” as it is called, being natural, I was
born with no blemish to betray my infirmity, and it has so happened
upon several occasions that, being thrown into the company of those
who had not previously been warned of my condition, I have been
compelled to make them acquainted with it myself. This information has
invariably been the signal for apology and sympathetic pity. From which
I infer that men generally feel that the blind are to be pitied and
consoled. Also I have read a great deal of the hardship of being blind,
though I have never, I confess, been quite able to see wherein that
hardship lay. You are surprised, perhaps, to hear me say that I have
“read” of this, but I assure you there is no reason to be surprised. If
you are at all acquainted with the progress of science, as I suppose
you are, you must have heard of raised type. Oh, yes, I read quite as
naturally as you, yourself, though I accomplish with my fingers what
you do with your eyes.
The result of my reading has been that I have come seriously to
question the theory that sight is necessary to human happiness and
efficiency. It has been borne in upon me that men possessed of two good
eyes are often apparently unable to make use of them. I read that men
often fall in love with women who seem, to all others, extremely ugly;
and that women as often do the same by men. And not only that, but
that they are quite frequently completely deceived in the characters
of the persons whom they marry, women discovering their husbands to be
bullies, and men finding their wives to be viragoes and shrews; and
all this when the nuptial knot is tied hard and fast and the damage is
beyond repair.
If eyes are really of as much use as those who see seem to think them,
how is it possible that people should make such mistakes? Blind as I
am, such a thing could never happen to me, nor do I think it could
befall any sightless person; certainly not one who has been, as I have,
blind from birth. I know the voice of a shrew the moment she opens her
mouth, no matter how pleasantly she may speak at the moment. I can
point out to you the drunkard, the hypocrite and the boor the moment I
have heard them speak. In the tone of his voice every man carries his
true certificate of character, be it good or bad. An ill-tempered man
may conceal his vice from you, who look only at his face and judge his
speech by his words, but he can not deceive me, for I know him by his
voice. I have been engaged in business for the last thirty years and
I have never once been taken in by a swindler. I have never yet been
mistaken in the character of a man with whom I dealt. How many _seeing_
men can say as much?
Excepting the human being, we know of no such active or intelligent
creature as the ant--the ant who lives in total darkness. Yet does he
not build his cities and fight his battles as wisely as we do our own?
I sometimes wonder if the possession of the power of sight is not a
hindrance, rather than a help, in labor? The ant, who can not see at
all, goes straight to his object. He is never distracted by the sight
of things along the way. The fly, on the contrary, is possessed of a
great many eyes; his head, in fact, is practically _all eyes_. Yet what
is the fly but a parasite, a nuisance, a very vagabond of insects?
Attracted hither and thither by everything that meets his gaze, he
lights first upon one object and then upon another, without rhyme or
reason save his overweening curiosity, until he finally falls into a
trap and dies an ignoble death in a spider’s web, or caught fast upon
a sticky paper. The fly has no social organization, no family life,
no mating in any proper sense of the word. He pollutes all that he
touches. His entire life is a life of destruction, as opposed to the
ant’s, which is a life of construction.
According to the Grecian mythology, the largest race of men the world
has ever known, the _Cyclops_, had but a single eye, and that in the
middle of the forehead. The stupidest of all characters of the Grecian
myths was _Argus_, who, though he had more eyes than all the gods and
heroes together, yet allowed _Hermes_ to pipe him to sleep and so cut
off his head. In the tail of _Hera’s_ peacock, his eyes were of as much
use to him as in his own head. _Eros_, the god of love, was blind; yet
he was of all the gods the most joyful. And in this, our own day, is
not _Justice_ blind?
Is there, in all this, no significance? Is there no hint of an
understanding of the secret that, as he who would save his soul must
first lose it, so he who would see must first be blind?
Men see, as we say, with the mind as well as with the eye. Men also
see with the spirit. Saul never could see the truth and beauty of
Christianity until he was stricken blind upon the road to Damascus. But
_while_ he was blind, he _saw_, and so became Paul. Would Homer have
been the giant of poets had he had his sight? I doubt it. Would Milton
have attained his heights of inspiration, had he retained his vision? I
can not believe it. For the man who has physical sight looks upon the
earth and the works of men; but he who has only the spiritual sight,
lifts up his eyes to God and His angels.
The shepherd lad who has never traveled beyond his native valley dreams
a beautiful dream of the world that lies beyond the hills that hem him
in. But the tourist lives a life of constant disillusion, for he finds
in distant lands, where he had thought to find the abiding-place of
Romance, the same humdrum life of the commonplace that he left at home.
We who are blind, Mr. _Idler_, are the shepherd boys of this life.
Enclosed in our valley of darkness by the everlasting shadow of our
endless night, we dream of the world that lies beyond as a place of
beauty and happiness. For us there is no sad disillusion. For us
there is no rude awakening from the delights of fancy. For us the
sky is always fair and the earth is always sweet. For us the woods
are thronged with nymphs and the grasses with the little people of
fairyland. We do not know the gloom of age or the horror of decay. We
do not know the sight of death.
Do not imagine, Sir, that because we can not see, we can not create
images. We can, we do. We dream of the earth as fair as other men may
dream of heaven. Because we have never seen beauty, to us all things
are beautiful. When I walk in the garden, the scent of the rose rises
to my nostrils with a sweetness which is but intensified because I can
not see the blossom whence it springs. I finger its fragile petals,
and I rejoice in its beauty of form, for you must know that one can
_feel_ beauty as well as see it. I lean my head against the friendly
and sturdy oak and I hear the beating of his heart. For to me all these
things _live_. What does it signify that they can not see, or hear,
or speak? _I_ can not see; am I the less a man for that? I learn that
nowadays it is possible to communicate with people who are born not
only blind, but deaf and dumb as well. That it is possible to teach
them to read and to speak, even as I was taught to read and speak. Is
it not possible, then, that some day, if we will only try, we may be
able to break through the long silence that has separated us from our
brothers and sisters of the woods and fields? Already, we who are blind
can almost understand the whispered syllables of the rustling leaves
and the waving grass. May not some other, one perhaps more closely shut
in with God than we, reach downward as well as upward, and bring about
the _universal_ understanding? I hope it may be so.
My wife, who had the sweetest voice of any girl I ever knew, is as
fair to me to-day as upon the day when I first fell in love. Her
voice, if anything, has grown more pleasant as she has grown older.
She, too, is blind, and together we enjoy a state of happiness which
comes as near to being perpetual youth as it is possible for mortals to
attain. How infinitely better this seems to me, than to be compelled,
day after day, to watch the fading of that flower of my early love! To
observe anxiously the lines of care creeping into that dearly beloved
countenance; to see the snow of many winters slowly whiten her soft
smooth hair! What a kindness of the good God is this, that she remains
forever young to me, as I do to her, and that our passion knows nothing
of the insidious poison of departing comeliness!
Curiously enough, our only child, the dearly beloved son who was the
fruit of our attachment, has a perfect vision. And this, Mr. _Idler_,
odd as it may seem to you who are accustomed to look upon this matter
from a different point of view, is the one worry of my life. Many a
night have I lain awake, listening to the gentle breathing of my wife
at my side, and turned over and over in my mind the dangers which he
must face because of his condition. Often have I prayed God that He
might watch over him and turn aside his eyes from the ugliness, the sin
and the temptation, which his mother and I have mercifully been spared!
It is hard, in any case, to have the child grow up and go out into the
world. But it is infinitely more hard to know that he is almost as
though he were of another race of beings, and that he must endure the
sight of pain, of misery, of squalor, of poverty and of age! That he
must be subject to temptations for which I can not prepare him, having
never met with them myself.
I once read a story of a man who became mysteriously possessed of the
power to read the thoughts of all those with whom he came in contact.
At first he was transported into the seventh heaven of delight,
reveling in the sense of his new-found power. But soon he came to
realize what a curse had fallen upon him. Turn where he would, he
found the minds of men filled with envy, malice and evil. The fairest
faces served to hide from others, but not from him, the most ignoble
minds. Beneath the frankest and most friendly manner he often read the
secret hatred and jealousy. Confronted upon all sides with the evidence
of the wickedness and baseness of his fellows, he was at last driven to
despair, and by one desperate act destroyed both his power and his life.
Mr. _Idler_, were I suddenly to be granted the gift of sight, I think
that I should feel like that. It is hard enough to read of some things.
I should not care to look upon them.
There have been those who, hearing me speak so of sight, have answered,
“That is because you have never been able to see. You do not know what
a blessing sight is, because you have never enjoyed it!” Sometimes I
comfort myself with the thought that it is like that with our son.
He can see, but he was born that way and he will never know the
difference. Gradually he will grow used to looking upon things which
I could not endure to behold. God has chosen to give him the harder
part; may He grant him the strength to bear it!
I am, Sir, your sincere friend,
NOEL NIGHTSHADE.
A TALE OF A MAD POET’S WIFE
_To the Editor of The Idler._
DEAR SIR: I have long been an interested reader of your interesting
periodical, though I have not hitherto presumed to address you, either
personally or in your character as editor. I have ever had an aversion
for that type of person who is constantly rushing into print to air
personal troubles and casting upon the shoulders of the public the
burdens which should rightly be borne upon his own. I have observed,
however, that a great many of your readers do not scruple to address
you in this respect and are quite in the habit of writing you for
advice upon their personal affairs, and, since you do not appear to
find this burdensome, I have determined to make known to you my own
pitiable plight, in the hope that you, or some of your readers, may
be able to suggest some method of relief; for, indeed, I am deep in
trouble, from which I seem utterly unable to extricate myself by my
own devices. Lest I weary you, I shall tell my sad story in the fewest
possible words.
While yet a very young woman I fell in love with a poet. In this there
was nothing especially noteworthy, since, I suppose, all women go
through this experience at some time of life. The unfortunate feature
of my own affair was that it ended quite as I wished it to end--in my
marriage. I soon learned that the qualities which make the poet so
satisfactory a suitor do not always appear in so favorable a light when
he has become a husband. I found it very sweet and charming during our
courtship that my lover should be concerned with my spiritual welfare
and that his thoughts should never descend to the common affairs of
life. It would have seemed almost like sacrilege to ask him to consider
with me the sordid problems which are commonly inflicted upon young
men of grosser clay when they have proposed marriage to a young woman.
So certain was I that any mention of such trivialities would mortally
offend my fiancé that I would permit neither my father nor my brothers
to question him upon the subject of his financial condition. For this
sentimental whim I very nearly paid with my happiness, for I found
soon after we had been wed that these questions must inevitably be
considered sooner or later, and whereas it had formerly been only a
question of the expediency of my marriage, it was now become a matter
of vital importance.
Fortunately, I have always been of an excellent _wheedling_
disposition, so much so that my father used to say I could coax a
Scotchman into extravagance or a politician into honesty by merely
smiling upon him. I turned this natural gift to account in the case of
my husband by inducing him to constitute me his business agent. I then
went about among the editors selling his verse, and in this I was so
successful that he was soon supplying _no less than a third_ of the
current verse which was printed in the six or seven leading monthly
magazines published in this city. No doubt you have often heard poets
express surprise at the amount of rather mediocre poetry which finds
its way into the columns of standard publications. You may understand
this more readily when I tell you that several other writers of
magazine poetry, learning of our own arrangement, immediately set about
acquiring handsome and attractive wives, to whom they turned over their
output, never appearing at the offices of the editors in person but
always sending their wives as their representatives.
In this way we managed very well for several years, though latterly I
have encountered one or two editors who were apparently either very
near-sighted or peculiarly unsusceptible. We were doing very well,
however, and my husband had acquired a wide reputation, so that he was
often invited to lecture before associations of one sort or another and
to give readings at entertainments in private dwellings. This added to
our income, but both of us by now being under the necessity of always
appearing dressed in the very neatest and most attractive fashion, we
soon found that whatever sum we had left over from current living
expenses went for keeping up appearances; so that we were able to live
very well but were by no means enabled to lay by a competence for the
future.