DRAWING NIGH TO THE LAST SCENE IN JACKSON’S CAREER
The closing allusion to Jackson in the chapter preceding, reminds me of
a circumstance—which, perhaps, should have been mentioned before—that
after we had been at sea about ten days, he pronounced himself too
unwell to do duty, and accordingly went below to his bunk. And here,
with the exception of a few brief intervals of sunning himself in fine
weather, he remained on his back, or seated cross-legged, during the
remainder of the homeward-bound passage.
Brooding there, in his infernal gloom, though nothing but a castaway
sailor in canvas trowsers, this man was still a picture, worthy to be
painted by the dark, moody hand of Salvator. In any of that master’s
lowering sea-pieces, representing the desolate crags of Calabria, with
a midnight shipwreck in the distance, this Jackson’s would have been
the face to paint for the doomed vessel’s figurehead, seamed and
blasted by lightning.
Though the more sneaking and cowardly of my shipmates whispered among
themselves, that Jackson, sure of his wages, whether on duty or off,
was only feigning indisposition, nevertheless it was plain that, from
his excesses in Liverpool, the malady which had long fastened its fangs
in his flesh, was now gnawing into his vitals.
His cheek became thinner and yellower, and the bones projected like
those of a skull. His snaky eyes rolled in red sockets; nor could he
lift his hand without a violent tremor; while his racking cough many a
time startled us from sleep. Yet still in his tremulous grasp he swayed
his scepter, and ruled us all like a tyrant to the last.
The weaker and weaker he grew, the more outrageous became his treatment
of the crew. The prospect of the speedy and unshunable death now before
him, seemed to exasperate his misanthropic soul into madness; and as if
he had indeed sold it to Satan, he seemed determined to die with a
curse between his teeth.
I can never think of him, even now, reclining in his bunk, and with
short breaths panting out his maledictions, but I am reminded of that
misanthrope upon the throne of the world—the diabolical Tiberius at
Caprese; who even in his self-exile, imbittered by bodily pangs, and
unspeakable mental terrors only known to the damned on earth, yet did
not give over his blasphemies but endeavored to drag down with him to
his own perdition, all who came within the evil spell of his power. And
though Tiberius came in the succession of the Caesars, and though
unmatchable Tacitus has embalmed his carrion, yet do I account this
Yankee Jackson full as dignified a personage as he, and as well
meriting his lofty gallows in history; even though he was a nameless
vagabond without an epitaph, and none, but I, narrate what he was. For
there is no dignity in wickedness, whether in purple or rags; and hell
is a democracy of devils, where all are equals. There, Nero howls side
by side with his own malefactors. If Napoleon were truly but a martial
murderer, I pay him no more homage than I would a felon. Though
Milton’s Satan dilutes our abhorrence with admiration, it is only
because he is not a genuine being, but something altered from a genuine
original. We gather not from the four gospels alone, any high-raised
fancies concerning this Satan; we only know him from thence as the
personification of the essence of evil, which, who but pickpockets and
burglars will admire? But this takes not from the merit of our
high-priest of poetry; it only enhances it, that with such unmitigated
evil for his material, he should build up his most goodly structure.
But in historically canonizing on earth the condemned below, and
lifting up and lauding the illustrious damned, we do but make examples
of wickedness; and call upon ambition to do some great iniquity, and be
sure of fame.