THE SYREN AND THE MOB.
And after all the raskal many ran,
Heaped together in rude rabblement.
SPENSER.
What intricate impeach is this?—
I think you all have drunk of Circe’s cup!
SHAKSPEARE.
The woman continued, with calm, regular breathings, to sleep for
several hours. The dusk of evening had now closed in, and yet her
patient guardian sat silently watching her motionless figure. A long
and serene self-communion had gradually restored the excellent doctor
to his ordinary equanimity, and he now, with untiring vigilance,
awaited the changes that might supervene in the condition of the
patient.
After all his thinking on the subject, he found himself now no
nearer comprehending the cause of the late unwonted disturbance of
his habitual serenity than at the beginning. He had dealt harshly
with himself, in endeavoring to account for it, and never dreamed of
reproaching the feeble and wretched being before him, as in any degree
the conscious agent of what he considered a weakness unpardonable in
himself.
With the natural proclivity of generous souls towards the extremes,
he had, in the plenitude of his self-reproach, proceeded to exalt the
sleeping woman into an earth-visiting angel with wounded wings, the
spotless purity of which the breath of his darkened thought had soiled.
The poor, good-hearted doctor!
The silence of the room was now broken by a low exclamation of fright,
accompanied by a slight movement of the patient. The doctor sprang
forward softly to the bedside.
“Who?—what?—where am I? What has been happening?” asked the woman,
with an expression of bewilderment and alarm.
“Nothing! nothing, my dear madam! I am here—you are safe—but you must
not talk.”
“Where is he? is he gone?” she persisted in a wild, terrified manner.
“Yes, he is gone. He shall not come back to disturb you again. You must
be quiet now, and get well. Please be calm, and trust in me.”
“Trust in thee?” said the patient, in a voice which had instantly lost
its vague tone. “Trust in thee, thou minister of light, who hast come
to my darkened pillow, to my bloody death-bed, to console me!” and here
she clutched his hand. “Trust thee—I would trust thee as I trust God!”
and she pressed his hand to her heart.
“You must be silent, madam,” urged the physician, endeavoring to
extricate his imprisoned hand, for he felt strange tinglings along his
veins, which alarmed his now penitent and vigilant spirit. She only
shook her head, and clung with yet greater tenacity to his hand, and
then, first raising it to her lips with a reverential kiss, she placed
it upon the top of her head, with the palm outstretched, and signified
her desire that he should keep it there, with a smile of entire
beatitude. The doctor barely knew enough of mesmeric manipulations,
to understand that this laying-on of hands was commonly resorted to
among the believers in the science, as a remedy for nervous headache.
He could see no harm in the innocent formula, if it assisted the
imagination in throwing off pain, and he very willingly humored his
poor patient, in permitting his hand to remain there.
In a moment or two a singular change came over the face and general
physical expression of the woman, and the doctor, who had witnessed
something of mesmeric phenomena, instantly recognised this as clearly
presenting all the symptoms of such a case. He had mesmerised her by a
touch, and it was not without a thrill of vague wonder that he awaited
further developments.
There was a perfect silence of ten minutes’ duration, when the
mesmerised patient began moving her lips as if in the effort to
articulate. The curiosity of the doctor was now fully aroused—his
_will_ became concentrated—he desired to hear her speak; in his
unconscious eagerness, he _willed_ that she should do so with all the
energy of his firm nature; and speak she did.
“Happy! happy! Ah, I am content in this pure sphere! My soul can rest
here!” a long pause, then suddenly a shudder vibrated through her
frame, and she shrank back as one appalled by some spectral horror.
“Ha! it is all dark now! I see! I see! his hand is red! red! red! red!
There is murder on this soul!”
The doctor sprang up and back as if he had been shot. His face grew
livid pale, and he trembled in every joint, while with chattering teeth
he stammered—
“Woman! Woman, how know you this?”
“I see it there—that huge red hand! Now all is red! There! there!
I felt it must be so! The pale and golden light breaks through! It
spreads! It fills and covers everything! His heart did no murder—it was
his hand! He can be redeemed! This soul is pure!”
The poor doctor sank upon his chair and groaned heavily, while he
covered his face with his hands. He spoke, in a few moments, in an
almost inaudible tone, to himself, while the woman, who had suddenly
opened her eyes, turned her head slightly, and watched him with a sharp
attention.
“Alas! alas! how came this strange being in possession of the fatal
secret of my life? I believed it buried in the oblivion of thirty
years. My life of dedication to humanity, since, I thought might have
atoned for that quick sad deed! Yes! I struck him! O, my God—I struck
him! but the provocation was most fearful! Woman, who and what are
you, that you should know this thing?” and with a vehement gesture
he jerked his hands from before his eyes, and turning swiftly upon
her, he met the keen, still glance of those watchful eyes, which shone
through the subdued light of the room, steadily upon him. The doctor
was astounded! He sprang to his feet again, exclaiming angrily—
“What shallow trick is this? You seemed but now in the mesmeric sleep,
and mouthed to me concerning my past life, and here you are, wide
awake! How came you with the secrets of my life?”
The woman answered feebly, and with a sob that at once touched the
gentle-hearted doctor, and turned aside his wrath—
“You took your hand away—you would not let me speak. Place your hand
upon my head again, and I will tell you all.”
The troubled doctor re-seated himself with a shuddering reluctance, and
renewed the manipulation.
In a few moments she appeared again to have sank into the sleep, and
commenced in that slow, fragmentary manner supposed to be peculiar to
such conditions:
“I see! The dark shadow is on this soul again! It is of anger and
suspicion—they are both evil spirits! They strive to make it wrong the
innocent! It is too holy and pure to yield! I see the golden light
fill all again! The bloody hand is gone. No stain of crime remains
upon this soul. It will be pardoned of God. This soul needs only human
love. Through love it can be made free before God! All the past will
be forgiven then—the red stains will fade! A sudden anger made it sin.
Love can only intercede for this sin. Love will intercede! It will be
saved!”
Here her voice became subdued into indistinct mutterings, and the
doctor drew a long breath as he withdrew his hand—
“Singular woman! How could all this have been revealed to her? She
must commune with spirits in this state. My story is not known to any
here. I never saw or heard of her, until sent for as a physician, to
visit her in this house. Strange that this fearfully passionate and
repented deed should thus rise up in my path, thousands of miles away,
amidst strangers, who can know nothing of me! Oh, my God! my God!
Thou art indeed vengeful and just!” and the miserable man clasped his
hands before his eyes and moaned. “It was my first draught of love and
life. He dashed it! I was delirious in my joy, while the beams rained
from her eyes into my hungry soul—hungry of beauty and of bliss. He
dashed it all, and in the hot blood of my darkened madness I slew him!
Oh, I slew him! His shadow, that can never be appeased, though I have
given body, and soul, and substance, to relieving the sufferings of
my race since that unhappy hour—it rises here again! It haunts me!
Yes! yes! I feel that love alone can make me strong once more, to bear
such tortures! But have I not denied myself such dreams? Have I not
with dedicated heart walked humbly since in self-denying ways? Have I
not clothed the orphan, fed the poor and nursed the sick? Have I not
ministered amidst pestilence, and held my life as of none account that
I might bring good to others? Can I be forgiven? No! no! The Pharisee
recounts his holy deeds and thanks God that his life is not sinful as
another man! I am not to be forgiven! I shall never know those dreams
of love!”
The strong man bowed his frame and shook with agony. Could he but have
looked up, a keen, quick gleam from the eyes which had been so steadily
fixed upon him during this painful soliloquy, would have struck him as
conveying the ecstacy of a sainted spirit over a soul repentant—or of
some other feeling quite as exultant.
This curious scene was, however, most unexpectedly interrupted at this
moment, by a loud yelling from the street below. The clamor was so
sudden, and yet so angrily harsh, that both parties sprang forward in
the alarm it caused—the woman, springing up into a sitting posture on
the bed, and the doctor to go to the window.
“What is it?” she exclaimed wildly, as she tossed back her hair. “What
do these cruel people want to do to me now?”
The doctor, who saw at a glance the meaning of what was going on below,
and the necessity of keeping his patient cool, turned to her, with a
very quiet expression—
“Do not be alarmed, madam. It is merely some disorderly gathering of
rowdies, in the street below. There is no danger to you—only do not get
excited, or you will bleed again. I am here to protect you.”
“Then I am safe!” was the fervid response, which, however, was followed
by a roar so sullen and portentous, from the infuriated mob underneath,
as to leave some doubt of its truth even upon the mind of the doctor.
“Down with the amalgamation den!”
“Down with the saw-dust palace!”
“Tear it down!”
“Let’s lynch the wretches!”
The response to speeches of this sort, from single voices, would be a
simultaneous burst of approbation from the great crowd, and a trampling
and rush to get nearer the building. It seemed a formidable sight,
indeed, to the doctor, as he looked down upon this living mass of men,
surging like huge waves tossed against some cliff, while the torches,
that many of them bore, glared fitfully upon the upturned, angry faces.
A powerful voice, which rose above all the tumult, exclaimed with a
hoarse oath, as the speaker turned for an instant towards the crowd,
from the top of the front steps—
“Let us burst open the door and lynch every white person found with a
negro. Here goes for the door!” and he threw himself furiously against
it, while a perfect thunder-crash of roars attested the approbation of
the dangerous mob. The door resisted for a moment, when there was a
sudden yell from the outside of the mob, nearly a square distant—
“Here! here’s what’ll do it! pass ’em on!” and the alarmed doctor saw
immediately the portentous gleam of fire-axes, which were being passed
over the heads of the crowd towards the door, and in another instant
the crash of the cutting would commence. The doctor, as we have seen,
was a very prompt man. He thrust his head out of the window, and in a
loud, commanding voice, shouted—
“Stop!”
The man at the door, who had just received the axe, and was in the act
of wielding it, paused for an instant, to look up, while the whole sea
of faces was raised toward the window, amidst a moment’s silence, of
which the doctor instantly availed himself—
“Gentlemen, do you war upon women? I have a female patient here, in
this room, at the point of death! If you proceed, you will kill her!”
“Who is she?” shouted some one, while another voice, in a derisive
tone, yelled out amidst screams of laughter—
“Is she Rose? Rose? de coal-brack Rose? I wish I may be shot if I don’t
lub Rose!”
Amidst the thunders which followed, some one shouted from a distant
part of the mob, to the man with the axe—
“Go on, Jim! It’s all pretence with their sick women!”
“Down with the door—they don’t escape us that way! Look out for your
bones, old covey, when we catch you!”
The axe was again swung back, but the doughty doctor still persisted—
“Stop!” he shouted again, in a tone so startling for energy of command,
that the axe was again lowered.
“Are you Americans? Have you mothers and sisters?”
“Yes, but they ain’t black gals!” gibed one of the mob, and set the
rest into a roar once again.
“I appeal to you as men—as brothers and fathers, do not murder my poor
patient!”
“Who is that noisy fellow?” bellowed a brutal voice below.
“I am a physician! I have nothing to do with this house or its
principles; I only beg to be permitted to save my patient!”
“What is your name, I say?” bellowed the hoarse man again. “Out with
it! We’ll know you—some of us!”
The name was mentioned. There was a momentary pause, and a low murmur
ran through the crowd; then shout after shout of applauding huzzas.
“We know you!”
“Just like him!”
“Noble fellow!”
“The good doctor! Huzza! huzza!”
And so the cry went up on all sides, for the doctor’s reputation for
benevolence was as wide as that of John Jacob Astor for the opposite
trait.
There seemed to be a vehement consultation among what appeared the
leaders of the mob, which lasted but for a moment or two, when one who
stood upon the top step looked up, and in a firm, respectful voice,
said to the doctor—
“It’s all right, sir, about you! We shall let the women pass out! But
you must clear the house of them!”
“But it is dangerous to move my patient.”
“We cannot help that, doctor; we do this for your sake, not theirs, for
they ought every one of them to be burned, and we are determined to
abate the nuisance of this house. So hurry them along here quick, for
the boys will not keep quiet long.”
“Yes, hurry them women along; we’ll let them go this time.”
“All but that lecturing _lady_ (?), who says that she would as soon
marry a negro as a white man!”
“Yes, all but her; we want to be rid of such creatures; let’s duck her
in the Hudson.”
“No, boys, we will make no distinction. We have promised—let the woman
go.”
“Down with the lecturing women and their black lovers!”
“Duck the hag! we’ll wash off the scent for her!”
Cries such as these convinced the doctor that indeed no time was to be
lost, particularly as the sound of the axe was now heard below in good
earnest. Approaching the bed hastily, he took the shivering form of
the panic-stricken woman, who had heard distinctly these last ominous
cries, into his arms. She clutched him with a desperate grip, while he
hurried down the stairs.
On the way, he met the Spiritual Professor in the passage, surrounded
by the women of the house, who were clustered about him, in the
seemingly vain hope of obtaining from him something of that ethereal
consolation and strength, of which he was the so much vaunted
Professor. Indeed, he himself now seemed the most woful, of all the
whimpering, terrified group, in want of any kind of strength, whether
spiritual or otherwise; and his teeth literally chattered, as he
clutched at the doctor’s passing arm.
“Wh—wh—what shall we do? They mean to burn the house, don’t they?”
“Do?” said the doctor, sternly, shaking off his grasp. “Try and be a
man, if you’ve got it in you! Get these women out of the house, and
take yourself off on your spiritual legs as fast as you can, or you may
make some ugly acquaintances.”
The Professor still clung to his skirts.
“Oh Lord! the doctrine of correspondences does not sanction—”
“Go to the devil, with your correspondence, or I shall kick you out of
my path!” roared the angry doctor, while the snivelling Professor, more
alarmed than ever, slunk aside to let him pass. The crash and clatter
from below now announced that the mob had effected an entrance from the
street, and leaving the women, all screaming at the top of their lungs,
around their doughty spiritual guide, he rushed on with his burden
towards the front entrance, which had thus been taken by storm, and was
now rapidly filling with excited men. Some were seizing the furniture,
which they began to demolish, while others hurried forward to intercept
him.
“It is the sick woman. Remember your promise; let me pass.”
“Yes, that’s the good doctor; let him pass, boys.”
“No, not yet!” roared a burly-looking ruffian, pressing through the
throng. “We must see who it is he has got there. Who is she?” and he
roughly dragged aside the shawl that partially covered her face.
“Monster!” shouted the excited doctor, “the woman is dying! Make way!
Let me pass!”
“Not so fast!” said the ruffian, resisting his forward rush. “I
shall see! I shall see! Boys, here she is! By G—d, this is she, that
lecture-woman; she wants to marry a nigger, hah! We won’t let her go.”
“But you will!” said the doctor, releasing one arm, with which he
struck the ruffian directly in the mouth, and with a force that sent
him reeling backwards.
“Good! good!” shouted twenty voices; “served him right, doctor.”
The fellow had rallied instantly, and was rushing, like a wild bull,
headlong upon the doctor, when several powerful men threw themselves
between the two, seizing the ruffian at the same time.
“No, Jim, you stand back!” said one of them, brandishing a heavy axe
before his eyes. “You touch that gentleman again, and I’ll brain you!”
“It’s a shame!” interposed others. “It’s the good doctor who nurses the
poor for nothing. Doubt if he gets a cent for that creature.”
“Yes, if she was the devil’s dam herself, we promised the good man to
let her go. Stand back, boys, and let the doctor pass.”
An opening was accordingly formed, through which the doctor hastened to
make his way. When he made his appearance at the door, he was greeted
with three wild, hearty cheers for himself, and as many groans and
hisses for the character of the woman whom he bore, the news of the
identification of whom had instantly found its way to the outside.
Regardless of all this, and only congratulating himself upon the
prospect of getting his patient off alive, he pressed rapidly through
the crowd, with the purpose of bearing her to the shelter of his own
bachelor home.
The mob now instantly occupied the building, which was gutted by them,
and the shattered contents, along with its occupants, men and women,
roughly hurled into the street. Some of the former were very severely
handled, and among the rest, the Spiritual Professor had his share of
_material_ chastening. The mob found him under a cot-bed, with three
or four feminine disciples of his spiritual correspondences piled over
him, or clinging distractedly to his nerveless limbs.
They dragged him out by the heels, with his squalling cortege trailing
after him, and finding that the occult professor of spiritualities had
gone into a state of obliviousness, or rather fainted, they proceeded,
in their solicitude for his recovery, to deluge his person with sundry
convenient slops, which shall be nameless, and afterwards kicked him
headlong into the street below, where the screaming boys pelted him
with gutter-mud and rotten eggs, until, finding his _spiritual_ legs,
as he had been advised—it is to be supposed—of a sudden, he made
himself scarce, down Barclay Street, in an inappreciable twinkle.
In a word, the people, in this instance, as in many others, when they
have found it necessary to take the laws of decency and common sense
into their own sovereign hands, did the work of ridding themselves
of this most detestable nuisance effectually. The Graham House was
broken up, and although the pestilent nest of knaves and fools who most
delighted there to congregate, have endeavored, in subsequent years,
to reassemble, and renew the ancient character of the place as their
head-quarters, yet the attempt has only been attended with partial
success.
The blow was too decisive on this night; for, although the walls were
left standing, the proprietor was given clearly to understand, that the
unnatural orgies of amalgamation would not be tolerated again by the
community, under the decisive penalty of no one stone left standing
upon the other, of the building.
He took the hint, and it was about time! It has been fairly conjectured
by this time, from the glimpses we have taken of the interior, that the
house was the scene of other vices than those implied in amalgamation
merely. It will be seen in yet other words and years how much there was
of real danger to the well-being of society, in the doctrines taught
and practised within its unhallowed walls. No one lesson could ever
prove sufficient for these people; they enjoy a fatal impunity even
now, and we shall endeavor that men shall know them as they are!