In the morning Will awoke with a strange sense of something. This
feeling of something is not uncommon with young gentlemen who go to bed
about three. He got up and dressed. A cup of tea made him remember but
imperfectly what had happened. "I must have had too much whisky," he
murmured. "I saw myself--actually myself--hard at work." Here his eyes
fell upon the table. There were the books--books on Political
Economy--with a note-book and every indication of work. More; he knew,
he remembered, the contents of these books. He sat down bewildered. Then
it seemed as if there was a struggle within him as of two who strove for
mastery. "Work!" cried one. "I won't," said the other. "You shall." "I
won't." A most ignoble quarrel, yet it pulled him this way and that
towards the table or back in the long easy chair. Finally the struggle
ended: he fell back; he closed his eyes. When he opened them again, the
room was cleared of the breakfast things, and he saw himself sitting at
the table hard at work.
"Good gracious!" he cried, springing to his feet. "Is what I remember of
last night real? Not a dream!"
"Not a dream at all. I will no longer have my career blasted at the
outset by your confounded laziness. I think you understand me perfectly.
I am clear of you whenever I please. I join you when I please."
"Oh! And have I the same power?"
"You? Certainly not. You are only the Half that won't work. You have got
no power at all."
"Oh! Well--I shall not stand that."
"You can't help yourself. I am the Intellectual Principle; mine is the
Will: mine is the clear head and the authority."
"What am I, then?"
"You? I don't know. You are me--yourself--without the Intellectual
Principle. That is what you are. I must define you by negatives. You
cannot argue, or reason, or create, or invent: you remember like an
animal from assistance: you behave nicely because you have been trained:
you are--in short--you are the Animal Part."
"Oh!" He was angry: he did not know what to reply: he was humiliated.
"Don't fall into a rage. Go away and amuse yourself. You can do anything
you please. Come back, however, in time for Hall."
The Animal Part obeyed. He went out leaving the other Part over his
books. He spent the morning with other men as industriously disposed as
himself. He found a strange lightness of spirits. There was no
remonstrating voice within him reproaching him for his laziness, urging
him to get up and go to work. Not at all; that voice was silent; he was
left quite undisturbed. He talked with these men over tobacco; he played
billiards with them; he lay in a chair and looked at a novel. He had
luncheon and beer, and more tobacco. He went down the river in the
college boat; he had an hour or two of whist before Hall. Then he
returned to his room.
His other Half looked up, surprised.
"Already? The day has flown."
"One moment," said Will, "before we go in. You're a serious sort, you
know, and I'm one of the--the lighter ornaments of the College, and I
sit among them. It would be awkward breaking off all at once.
Besides----"
"I understand. Continue to sit with them for awhile, and talk as much
idiotic stuff as you please. Presently you will find that a change of
companions and of conversation has become necessary."
Nobody noticed any change; the two in one sat at table and ate like one;
they talked like one; they talked frivolously, telling stories like one.
After Hall they went back to their chambers.
"You can leave me," said the student. "I shall rest for an hour or so.
Then I shall go on again."
This very remarkable arrangement went on undisturbed for some time. No
one suspected it. No one discovered it. It became quite natural for
Challice to go out of his room in the morning and to leave himself at
work; it became natural to go down to Hall at seven with a mingled
recollection of work and amusements. The reproaching voice was silent,
the Animal Part was left at peace, and the Intellectual Part went on
reading at peace.
[Illustration: "WILL MET THE TUTOR."]
One evening, however, going across the court at midnight, Will met the
tutor.
"Challice," he said, "is it wise to burn the candle at both ends?
Come--you told me this morning that you were working hard. What do you
call this? You cannot serve two masters."
"It is quite true," said the Reading Half on being questioned. "I have
foreseen this difficulty for some time. I called on the tutor this
morning, and I told him of my intention to work. He laughed aloud. I
insisted. Then he pointed out the absurdity of pretending to work while
one was idling about all day. This is awkward."
"What do you propose then?"
"I propose that you stay indoors all the morning until two o'clock,
locked in."
"What? And look on while you are mugging?"
"Exactly. You may read French novels: you may go to sleep. You must be
quiet. Only, you must be here--all the morning. In the afternoon you may
do what you please. I may quite trust you to avoid any effort of the
brain. Oh! And you will avoid anything stronger than tea before Hall. No
more beer for lunch. It makes me heavy."
"No more beer? But this is tyranny."
"No. It is ambition. In the evening you may go out and play cards. I
shall stay here."
They went to bed. It seemed to Will as if the other Part of him--the
Intellectual Part--ordered him to go to sleep without further thought.
This curious life of separation and of partial union continued, in fact,
for the whole of the undergraduate time. Gradually, however, a great
change came over the lazy Half--the Animal Half. It--he--perceived that
the whole of his reasoning powers had become absorbed by the
Intellectual Half. He became really incapable of reasoning. He could not
follow out a thought; he had no thoughts. This made him seem dull,
because even the most indolent person likes to think that he has some
powers of argument. This moiety of Challice had none. He became quite
dull; his old wit deserted him; he was heavy; he drifted gradually out
of the society which he had formerly frequented; he perceived that his
old friends not only found him dull, but regarded him as a traitor. He
had become, they believed, that contemptible person, the man who reads.
He was no longer a dweller in the Castle of Indolence; he had gone over
to the other side.
Life became very dull indeed to this Half. He got into the habit of
lying on a sofa, watching the other Half who sat at the table tearing
the heart out of books. He admired the energy of that Half; for himself,
he could do nothing; if he read at all it was a novel of the lowest
kind; he even bought the penny novelette and read that with interest; if
he came to a passage which contained a thought or a reflection he passed
it over. He had ceased to think; he no longer even troubled himself
about losing the power of thought.
Another thing came upon him; not suddenly, but gradually, so that he was
not alarmed at it. He began to care no longer about the games of which
he had formerly been so fond. Billiards, racquets, cards, all require,
you see, a certain amount of reasoning, of quick intelligence and rapid
action. This unfortunate young man had no rapidity of intelligence left.
He was too stupid to play games. He became too stupid even to row.
He ceased to be a dreamer; all his dreams were gone; he ceased to make
music at the piano; he ceased to sing; he could neither play nor sing:
these things gave him no pleasure. He ceased, in short, to take interest
in anything, cared for nothing, and hoped for nothing.
In Hall the two in one sat now with the reading set. Their talk was all
of books and "subjects," and so forth. The Intellectual Half held his
own with the rest: nay, he became a person to be considered. It was
remarked, however, that any who met Challice out walking found him
stupid and dull beyond belief. This was put down to preoccupation. The
man was full of his work; he was meditating, they said, his brain was
working all the while; he was making up for lost time.
In the evening the lazy Half sat in an easy chair and took tobacco,
while the other Half worked. At eleven the Industrious Half disappeared.
Then the Whole went to bed.
They seldom spoke except when Industry had some more orders to give. It
was no longer advice, or suggestion, or a wish, or a prayer: it was an
order. Indolence was a servant. "You took more wine than is good for me
at dinner to-day," said Industry. "Restrict yourself to a pint of
claret, and that of the lightest, for the future." Or, "You are not
taking exercise enough. If you have no longer brain power enough even
for the sliding seat, walk--walk fast--go out to the top of the Gogs and
back again. I want all my energies." Once Indolence caught a cold: it
was a month before the May examinations. The wrath and reproaches of
Industry, compelled to give up a whole day to nursing that cold, were
very hard to bear. Yet Indolence could not resist; he could not even
remonstrate; he was now a mere slave.
When the examinations came it was necessary to observe precautions of a
severer kind. To begin with, Indolence had to get up at six and go for
an hour's run, for the better bracing of the nerves; he had to stay
hidden indoors all day, while his ambitious twin sat in the Hall,
flooring papers. He had to give up tobacco in order to keep the other
Half's head clear. "Courage," said Intellect, "a day or two more and you
shall plunge again into the sensuality of your pipe and your beer.
Heavens! When I look at you, and think of what I was becoming!"
Industry got a scholarship; Intellect got a University medal; Ambition
received the congratulations of the tutor.
"How long," asked the Animal, "is this kind of thing going to continue?"
"How long? Do you suppose," replied the other Half, "that I have given
up my ambition? Remember what you said two years ago. You were younger
then. You would sweep the board; you would row in the University boat;
you would play in the Eleven; you would be a Leader--in all, all! You
would then take up with something--you knew not what--and you would step
to the front. You remember?"
"A dream--a dream. I was younger then."
"No longer a dream. It is a settled purpose. Hear me. I am going to be
a statesman. I shall play the highest game of all. I shall go into the
House. I shall rise--slowly at first, but steadily."
"And I?"
"You are a log tied to my heel, but you shall be an obedient log. If you
were not--"
Indolence shivered and crouched. "Am I then--all my life--to be your
servant?"
[Illustration: "INDOLENCE SHIVERED."]
"Your life? No--my life." The two glared at each other. "Silence, Log.
Let me work."
"I shall not be silent," cried Indolence, roused to momentary
self-assertion. "I have no enjoyment left in life. You have taken
all--all--"
"You have left what you loved best of all--your sloth. Lie down--and
take your rest. Why, you do nothing all day. A stalled ox is not more
lazy. You eat and drink and take exercise and sleep. What more, for such
as you, has life to give? You are now an animal. My half has absorbed
all the intellectual part of you. Lie down, I say--lie down, and let me
work."
The Animal could not lie down. He was restless. He walked about the
room. He was discontented. He was jealous. The other Half, he saw
plainly, was getting the better share of things. That Half was admired
and envied. By accident, as he paced the room, he looked in the glass;
and he started, for his face had grown heavy: there was a bovine look
about the cheeks: the eyes were dull: the mouth full. Then the other
Half rose and stood beside him. Together they looked at their own faces.
"Ha!" cried Ambition, well satisfied at the contrast. "It works already.
Mine is the face intended for me: yours is the face into which this
degenerate mould might sink. Mine contains the soul; yours--the animal.
You have got what you wanted, Sloth. Your dreams are gone from you. I
have got them, though, and I am turning them into action. As time goes
on, your face will become more bovine, your eyes duller. What will be
the end?" His brow darkened. "I don't know. We are like the Siamese
twins."
"One of them took to drink," murmured the inferior Half. "What if I were
to follow his example?"
"You will not. You do not dare?" But his blanched face showed his terror
at the very thought.