wrote to Fanny's father, whose address he had learned from her while
attending her, and detailed all he knew--and this was nearly all that
was to be known--regarding Raeburn's conduct to his daughter; for,
although the latter had never accused Raeburn to him of ill-treatment,
the doctor had, by connecting the broken hints which she had dropped
from time to time, and especially by marking certain expressions which
escaped her during her temporary fits of delirium, arrived at a
knowledge of the whole truth. Having executed this part of his threat,
Dr Henderson set diligently about the remaining portion, which was to
give all the publicity he could to the story of Raeburn's infamy; and so
successful was he in his efforts in this way, that he had the
satisfaction in a very short time of seeing him shunned by all his
acquaintances, and completely debarred from respectable society.
After Fanny's death, Raeburn had evinced a disposition to take an active
part in her obsequies; and even expressed a willingness to defray the
whole of the funeral charges. But this Dr Henderson would on no account
permit. Neither would he suffer him to interfere in any way whatever
with the funeral rites; the whole expense of which he insisted on paying
out of his own pocket; and Raeburn knew too well the advantage the
doctor possessed over him, to offer any resistance to these peremptory
objections.
Thus stood matters, then, with Raeburn, and thus they remained for about
eighteen months afterwards. He still, during all this time, continued in
possession of his situation; but his superiors, who were well acquainted
with the story of his villany to Miss Rutherford, were eagerly and
anxiously watching for an opportunity to dismiss him. They did not feel
that they would have been warranted in discharging him for his infamous
conduct on the occasion alluded to, as it was a matter of which they had
no right, officially, to take cognisance; but they had determined that
the slightest dereliction of duty on his part should cost him his
situation. Of this Raeburn was perfectly aware; and it required all his
diligence, care, and attention, to avoid the visitation with which he
was threatened. Such, we say, then, was the state of matters with
Raeburn for about eighteen months after Fanny Rutherford's death. At the
expiry of this period, however, that event occurred which winds up this
tragic tale.
One evening, about nine o'clock, Raeburn was sitting solitary in his
room, musing on the miseries to which his villany had subjected him, and
no doubt indulging, as all villains do, in imaginary schemes of
vengeance against his enemies, when a waiter from one of the hotels in
town called, and said that a gentleman there desired to see him
immediately on a matter of importance.
Raeburn, conceiving that it might be on some official business that he
was wanted, instantly repaired to the hotel, and was ushered into the
room where the person was who wished to see him.
That person kept his back towards Raeburn till he had fairly entered the
apartment, and until the waiter who had shown him in had retired. This
done, he suddenly rushed towards the door, snatching up at the same time
one of a pair of pistols which lay on a table in the middle of the room,
and having locked the door in the inside, he fiercely confronted
Raeburn, who, horror-struck at the sight, instantly recognised, in the
person before him, Edward Rutherford, the brother of the unfortunate
Fanny.
"Do you know me, villain? Do you know me?" shouted out Edward, first
seizing him by the breast, and then dashing him from him with a violence
that sent him reeling to the farther end of the apartment. "Do you know
the brother of Fanny Rutherford, murderer? Did you think, ruffian, that
you were safe from my vengeance, because the half of the globe lay
between us? If you did, you mistook Edward Rutherford. But I will waste
no more words on you, villain! The shade of my murdered sister--murdered
by the cruellest of all deaths--is calling aloud for retribution, and,
in her name, I am here to demand it! Here, dastard!" he said, taking up
the other pistol, and presenting it to Raeburn--"here, take this, and
stand to me like a man; for I would not imbrue my hands in your filthy
blood but upon equal terms. Although you but little deserve it, I will
give you a chance for your life! Come, sir," he went on, Raeburn
declining to take the pistol, "take it--take it; for, by the heaven
above us, one or other of us, or both, must die; and your only chance
is in opposing me; for, if you do not fire, I will! By all that's
sacred, I will!" At this moment, Raeburn rushed to the window, with the
view of calling for assistance; and one supplicatory cry, which,
however, was unattended to, he did emit. But, ere he could fully effect
his object, Edward had him by the throat, and, holding his pistol within
a few inches of his head, threatened, if he stirred or repeated his
outcry, that that moment should be his last.
Seeing the desperate situation in which he was placed, the trembling
wretch now took the pistol from Rutherford's hand, being aware, as he
had been told, that it was indeed his only chance for life.
The parties now took their stations, one at each end of the room, and
confronted each other.
"Raise your weapon, Raeburn; raise your weapon!" exclaimed Rutherford,
on observing that his antagonist was not proceeding to assume a hostile
attitude. "Your not firing will not save you from mine. I give you fair
warning!"
Raeburn elevated, and levelled his pistol.
"Are you ready?" said his terrible opponent.
"Yes," replied Raeburn, faintly.
"Then fire, villain!" exclaimed Rutherford; and both pistols went off at
the same instant, but with very different effect. A retributive power
had directed the fatal engines of destruction. Raeburn's bullet struck
the wall wide of its mark, while Rutherford's passed through the heart
of him at whom it was aimed, and he fell lifeless on the floor.
Rutherford threw himself on his knees, and holding aloft the still
reeking weapon of death, thanked Heaven that he had been permitted to be
the avenger of his sister's wrongs.
The house in which this dreadful scene took place was a large one, and
the apartment, especially selected on that account by Rutherford, was a
remote one; so that the firing was not heard by any of the inmates--at
least not so distinctly as to inform them that it was the noise of
firearms. No one, therefore, appeared to interrupt the escape which
Rutherford now meditated, and lost no time in effecting. He left the
apartment, and, unheeded by any one, descended the great staircase which
led to it and to others, and fled from the house.
Although, however, Rutherford effected his escape in safety, the
transaction which rendered his flight necessary did not long remain
unknown. It came to the ears of justice, and she uncoupled her
bloodhounds after the offender; but, as the whole circumstances of the
case gradually transpired, it is supposed that the pursuit was neither a
very eager nor a very willing one. Certain it is, at any rate, that
Rutherford could nowhere be found, although it is equally certain that
several persons knew very well where he was for nearly two months after
the death of Raeburn.
To these it was known that, immediately after the fatal occurrence in
the hotel, a person closely wrapped up in a travelling-cloak called at
Dr Henderson's, and desired to have a private interview with the doctor.
When that gentleman entered the apartment into which the stranger had
been shown, the latter announced himself to be Edward Rutherford, the
brother of Fanny Rutherford, with whose melancholy story he said the
doctor was so well acquainted.
"The brother of poor Fanny!" said the doctor, in amazement, and at the
same time taking his visiter kindly by the hand. "I am happy to see you,
sir, on your poor unfortunate sister's account. Did you come with the
ship that arrived from England to-day, sir?"
"I did, sir," replied Edward.
"And pray, my dear sir," said the doctor, "if it be not an impertinent
question--I assure you it is put with the most friendly intentions--what
may be your purpose and views in coming out to India?"
"Vengeance, doctor! vengeance!" replied Rutherford, fiercely, "was my
sole object--and I have already had it."
"Raeburn!" exclaimed the doctor, eagerly.
"Yes, sir, Raeburn is no more--his villanous career is ended. I have
killed the ruffian; but, thank God! I killed him in fair fight. Villain
as he was, I took no advantage of him, farther than compelling him to
fight me." Edward then went on to detail the whole proceedings connected
with the duel in the hotel.
When he had concluded--
"On my word, sir," said Dr Henderson, smiling--he could not help
it--"you have made quick work of it indeed; and I assure you, I for one
am not sorry that the villain has met with his deserts. But we must now
care for your safety, Mr Rutherford, from the vengeance of the laws,"
added the doctor; "although I do not see how they can be very severe in
such a case as this. Yet it will be as well for you to keep out of
harm's way for a little. You must remain for some time in concealment;
and a fitter or more secure place than I shall provide for you in my
house here, you could not readily find anywhere; and I must insist on
your availing yourself of it."
Edward did not know how to express the gratitude he felt for the
singular and most disinterested kindness of his worthy host. He was, in
truth, too strongly impressed with it to be able to acknowledge it
otherwise than by a few broken sentences; but there was in these, and
still more in the manner in which they were spoken, enough to show Dr
Henderson that his friendly conduct was properly appreciated.
"Nothing at all, my dear sir!--nothing at all!" said the doctor, in
reply to Edward's attempts at acknowledgment of the generous part he was
acting towards him. "I'm very sure you would do the same for me, were I
placed in your situation. You have, besides, Mr Rutherford--although,
perhaps, a strict morality might question your right to the step you
have taken--you have, I say, notwithstanding this, a claim on the
friendly services of every man who can feel for the wrongs of another,
especially--most especially--such grievous wrongs as yours. It was a
just, and, on the part of him who has suffered, a well-merited
retribution."
Edward was shortly afterwards introduced into the place of
concealment--a comfortable little apartment, which had been prepared for
him by the kindness of the worthy doctor; and here he remained for about
seven weeks, experiencing every kindness and attention from his
benevolent host, when he was secretly conveyed on board of a ship about
to sail for London, where he arrived in safety, at the expiry of
somewhere about the usual period occupied in such a voyage.
On his return home, Edward found his father at the point of death. The
fate of his unfortunate daughter was hurrying him to the grave. Edward
had not told him what was his object in going out to India; but the old
man had guessed it, and had made several ineffectual attempts to
dissuade him from his purpose. On the former now approaching his
bedside, therefore, "Thank God!'" he said, stretching out his hand to
Edward, "that I see you safe again, my son;" and added--afraid to be
more particular in his inquiries--"have you seen Raeburn?"
"I have, father," was the only reply of his son; but it was said in a
manner, and accompanied by a look, which assured him of what had taken
place.
"I cannot approve, Edward, of what you have done," said his father; "but
God will forgive you!"
They were the last words he spoke; and Raeburn's villany boasted yet
another victim.
THE PROFESSOR'S TALES.
THE ENTHUSIAST.
There is a splendid book written, called "The Enthusiast;" but, though
it discovers the author's talents, to my apprehension and feelings, it
fails, after a few pages, to keep alive the attention--and why? Just
because the author, portraying the general character of enthusiasm,
steps beyond himself and his own personal observations, and talks about
the workings of the principle in a new and untried combination of
circumstances. From the law which regulates projectiles in _aere_, he
reasons to what should regulate them _in vacuo_; he reasons from things
seen to things unseen; and then leaves both himself and his reader in
the mud and the mist of mere supposition. But, in what I mean to say of
enthusiasm, I pledge myself to state nothing but what I have felt or
seen; and I shall separate this principle from all others, only marking
its influence when it is in a state of intensity, as one marks the
electric spark, not in the cloud or the machine, but as it passes from
one locality to another. Enthusiasm is, in fact, the electrical element
of life. It is more or less everywhere, and often where it is least
suspected. It bursts forth, occasionally, in the character of the
warrior, the scholar, the poet, the speculator; but it remains as
substantially, perhaps, though not so ostensibly, in the bosom of the
parent, the husband, the wife, the child, the friend, the kinsman. The
tradesman is an enthusiast, if he hopes to succeed; the merchant, the
labourer, the mechanic. I have seen a shoemaker as enthusiastic in
making his shoes fit neatly without pinching, as the scholar would be in
divining the meaning of a difficult passage. Without enthusiasm man had
never been what he is. It found him in the world naked, and it clothed
him; houseless, and it covered him; defenceless, and it armed him. It
run him up through the pastoral, the agricultural, to the commercial
state. It composed the "Idylls" of Theocritus, the "Georgics" of Virgil,
and the "Fleece" of Dyer. Without this there had been no shepherds to
sing, and no poets to sing of their singing; no husbandmen to labour,
and no Virgils and Hesiods to speak of their labour and argonautic
expeditions; and no sacred bard to celebrate their pursuit of the golden
fleece, commerce. But, though all this is true, in the enlarged and
diluted sense of the word, it is not so in that sense in which the term
is commonly understood. He is quite an enthusiast in the pursuit of
knowledge--of a fox--or of hoped-for discovery--or of fame or of
fortune--anybody knows to be terms applied to an unusually spirited
pursuit of any or all of these. But the enthusiasm of which I speak is
more limited still. It is a glow which originates and cools in the same
bosom; which has no view beyond itself. It is not a mean to an end, but
mean and end in one. Look at that boy: he is never to be found at a
leisure hour without a fishing-rod in his hand; at that other youth--his
book is his constant companion by the fountain and the hill; at that
religious devotee--prayer and Bible-reading are his heaven; at that
butcher's boy, who is now killing a lamb--his father has put the knife
into his hand to please him--he is an enthusiast in butchery--his
passion feeds on itself: it is, like virtue, its own reward--he cares
not for cutlets or brown roasts.
Having thus narrowed the field to a class, I shall now select an
individual, and that individual shall be one with whom I have had many
opportunities of becoming well acquainted. Curious reader, it is not
you, nor your brother Robert, nor your uncle Andrew, nor any, so far as
I know, of your kindred--it is "myself." And how has enthusiasm wrought
in me? That I am just going to tell you. It has made me, in the first
place, miserable--most miserable; and I'll tell you how. I took it into
my head, when a boy of about eight or nine years of age, that my
mother--my only living parent--was mortal; nay, that she was so old and
infirm--though she was not more than fifty, and in perfect health--that
she would drop down dead, even before my eyes. I followed her wherever
she went; held on by her apron-string, roaring aloud most mournfully,
and shedding, besides, a world of tears. In vain did my kind mother
endeavour to rally me, to reason me, to scold me, and even to chastise
me, out of my dream: it had taken such hold of my imagination, that,
sleeping or waking, it was there. When my mother travelled anywhere
abroad, I was sure to be after her, like a domestic cur. When she went
to offer up her private oblations to a throne of mercy, I crept in under
her plaid, and heard every audible aspiration. In my sleep she was still
before me as I had seen my grandmother--the lips parted, the eyes open,
and set in night. It was horrible. I started into real life, and wept
aloud. I rushed into my mother's apartment, felt her face all over, and
cried bitterly. Reader, have you always been made of pot-mettle? Have
you never experienced any such nervous enthusiasm as this? Have you been
at all times a child of realities--a very steady, thinking, prudent
person; slept like a top, ate like a raven, and talked to the amazement
even of the minister himself? You may be a steady, good person now. You
may even be married, with a family of thirteen children. You may have
succeeded in the world, and feathered your nest. You may have presided
well at various public dinners, and
"Never wrote
One line which, dying, you would wish to blot;"
and for this simple and best of all reasons, that you have never
written, as far as the public is concerned, any lines at all. You may
be a sound-headed lawyer, a calculating merchant, an honest shopkeeper,
or, what is still more commendable, because more rare, an honest judge.
You may sole shoes or make greatcoats to a nicety--fabricate chairs, or
nails, or pins, or periwigs, to a thought; but you are no enthusiast. Do
you see that poor maniac, who is just receiving a visit from his mother
in his cell, whose eyes are turned up in wild uproar to the roof of his
dungeon, and who, in the damp icicles, is apostrophising sun, moon, and
stars, Venus, Jupiter, and Aldubaran? That emaciated form of scarcely
twenty years of age, which a weeping mother clasps, and whom a frenzied
son convulsively strains to his bare and fleshless breast--that is
Ferguson, the poet, the prince of enthusiasts--he at whose genius Burns
lighted that torch which has filled the world with light. Do you mark
that form sitting amongst the sands of Syracuse? The city is taken by
the Roman armies. The enemy are within the walls; pillage and murder are
the order of the hour. But what is that to him?--he is only an
enthusiast. The soldier has challenged him to surrender; his sword is
uplifted, and the challenge is repeated. He heeds it not; the sword
descends--and the greatest mathematician, the most complete enthusiast,
which the world has ever seen, lies before you, a gashed and mangled
corpse. The world--its wonders, its atoms, its various formations!--the
laws--the eternal laws of its construction and form!--there is one who
sung sweetly--oh, how divinely! There is one who sung sublimely--yes, as
one overpowered with the spirit of Him who said, "Let there be light,
and there was light;" but the cord which was overstrained is snapped,
and the bow is unstrung; the pressure upon the delicate fibres of the
brain has been too much, and the building of God has given way. Poor
Lucretius! the disease of which thou didst expire was "enthusiasm."
But it is time to shift the scene--to resort to that exquisite
happiness, and extensive benefit to society, which enthusiasm is
calculated to produce. Poetry is the language of nature. All languages
originated in poetry; the ballad is the mother of all living and dead
books. Whether it be repeated in the shape of Fescenine catches on the
banks of the Tiber, of glorious epic on those of the Scamander, of
chivalrous narrative by the rapid Rhone or sweet Liger--whether it
employ the time and the enthusiastic efforts of the bard, the
troubadour, the harper, or the minstrel--whether it resound through the
recesses of Pindus, of Arcady, or of Yarrow--still, still the ballad
presents the first germ of literature. What are the earlier pages of
Livy's "History" but popular ballads, connected and narratived? What the
history of our own Scotland--of her Bruces, and Wallaces, and all her
many and valorous achievements--but ballads? And
"How canst thou resist the boundless store
Of charms which Nature to her votaries yields--
The warbling woodland--the resounding shore--
The pomp of groves--and garniture of fields--
Oh, how canst thou resist, and hope to be forgiven!"
But who can or does resist? Not even the robber Moor, who soliloquises
so poetically the setting sun. Not
"The swain who, journeying homeward from
A day's long labour, feels
The form of beauty smiling on his soul."
Poetry is spread as widely through the human heart as is electricity
through all the works of nature. Man can no more help being poetical,
than he can new-model his frame. But what is the love--the passion of
poetry--but enthusiasm--enthusiasm which converts everything it looks
upon into beauty and sublimity? The man is born desert and lonely: and
is there no beauty in solitude--no grandeur in expansion? The mountains
are highland, wild, heathy, and tempest-beaten: and is there no
sublimity in their cliffs, their scarred fronts, and scarred sides? The
landscape is covered with wood, or there is at least a pleasing
alternation of forest and glade, of peopled levels and wooded hills: and
does not the soul nestle softly and lovingly amidst these pleasing
varieties? But you are making faces, and there is something like an
incipient yawn beginning to travel over your beauteous lips, my dearest
madam. Well, I'll have done with advising you to wed the "spirit of
poetry," if you wish to be completely happy. You need not write poems,
ma'am--that is not necessary; Livy never wrote poetry, and yet he is
every inch a poet. Robertson never wrote verse, and yet he is
essentially poetical. Witness Mexico and Montezuma. "Am I lying on a bed
of roses?"--There, for example, is me _now_--ay, just me--I am every
inch a poet! and yet, with the exception of a few things which need not
be excepted, I never wrote any poetry:--yet I see you want a story, and
you say, am I not reading "The Tales of the Borders, and of
Scotland?"--I cry you mercy, and shall give you the results of my
enthusiasm.