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‘CORNERS.’
The modern ‘Corner’ is unlike that into which the historical John
Horner, Esq., retired, in this respect, that those who venture into
one seldom succeed in bringing out a plum or anything else but
discomfiture. They may plunge not only their thumbs but their whole
hands and arms into the ‘pie’ they essay to monopolise; but as a rule,
with almost no exceptions, they have to draw back empty-handed.
The word ‘Corner’ in its commercial application is of American origin,
and along with that other mysterious word ‘Syndicate,’ is doubtless
sufficiently perplexing to non-commercial readers. The prominence
and the frequency of the appearance of both words in the newspapers
indicate a strange commercial tendency of the day. That tendency is to
amalgamate the hazardous element of speculation with the legitimate
fabric of steady industry. Once upon a time, speculators formed a
distinct class, apart from sober merchants and plodding manufacturers.
They had their uses; for none but shallow thinkers will dismiss
speculation in one general sweep as immoral and evil; but they were a
distinctly marked class by themselves; not distinctly marked, perhaps,
to the outer world, but clearly enough defined for those engaged in
commercial pursuits. But now there exists no such definite line of
demarcation. The speculative element enters into every branch of trade
industry; and by the speculative element we do not mean the perfectly
legitimate exercise of foresight or experience which enables a business
man to anticipate events which raise or depress the market values of
the commodities in which he is interested, but the desire and attempt
to be the motor, or one of the motors, in such movements. It is one
thing to buy heavily of a commodity because your instinct or your
information or your experience teaches you that a comparative scarcity,
and consequent dearness, of the commodity will shortly occur. It is
quite another thing to buy up a commodity for the purpose of creating
a scarcity for your own benefit. It is one thing, again, to sell out
as quickly as you can such stocks as you hold of a commodity which you
see reason to think will be depressed in value later on. It is another
thing to sell in advance a commodity which you do not possess, in the
hope of buying it cheaper; or to sell out heavily what you do possess,
in order to frighten others to sell also, that you may buy back again
at a still lower price than you sold.
There must always be some amount of speculation in every department
of commerce and industry. The shipbuilder, for instance, must to some
extent speculate on a continuance or otherwise of the level of wages,
or of the prices of iron, at the time he makes a contract for a vessel.
The manufacturer who buys a quantity of raw cotton must speculate on
the chances of the market enabling him to sell the products of the
cotton when manufactured. The merchant must speculate on the solvency
of his buyers, and his sellers even, when he concurrently buys and
sells a cargo of goods. And so on all through the gamut of commerce.
But these are the ordinary daily risks of trade, which it is the
business of a trader to estimate and provide for. Quite other is the
form of a speculation of modern development. We do not say it is of
modern origin, for men have not varied very much either in character or
in practice since commerce began; but its development is modern, and
its application is modern.
This modern phase has made current two curious words—‘Corner’ and
‘Syndicate.’ The latter is of Latin origin, and was not unknown in
old-world commerce. Then it meant the combination of a number of
merchants for the consummation of a venture beyond the means or the
inclinations of any one of them. The Dutch merchants were fond of
forming syndicates for large trading purposes; and the East India
Company, Hudson’s Bay Company, and many other concerns of our own
time which have now attained the dimensions and the dignity of public
corporations, had a similar origin. The syndicate system had in it
the germ of the joint-stock Company system; but although each member
subscribed a certain amount, which he would advance, or for which he
would be liable, his liability could not always be restricted thereto.
The uncertainty in this respect evolved the limited liability principle
now so common. But the syndicates of to-day are of somewhat different
character; they are usually combinations of capitalists to bring
about changes in the markets for commodities or stocks for a specific
purpose. In this manner they are the parents of ‘Corners.’
The word Corner is probably also of Latin origin. It suggests _cornu_,
a horn—a thing which terminates in an angle, where is a secret and
retired place. The phrase ‘To make a Corner,’ however, is one of
purely American origin, and it is suggestive enough. It implies the
concentrating of some object into a limited area, from which there
shall be but one egress, of which the Cornerers hold the key. It
suggests something like the gathering of a Highland sheep-farm, where
the animals are irresistibly driven in from widely distributed spots
to one small ‘fank.’ It suggests the bag or drawer of the thrifty
housewife, into which is gathered all actually or potentially useful
articles. It suggests the commonplace book of the wide-reading and
much-writing journalist. It suggests also the old teapot, the lucky
stocking, and the Savings-bank. But it is different from all these.
For there are two kinds of Corners, in the commercial sense. There
is the Corner into which you may drive others, and the Corner into
which you may retire yourself. Of the former, the best illustration
we can recall is that of the operation in the Stock of the Hannibal
and St Joseph Railroad, which took place in New York a year or so
ago. Certain astute and light-principled men in Wall Street became
aware that another habitué of the same circle was selling this Stock
rather heavily, in the belief that it was too high, and would soon
be lower. In short, he was doing what in the lingo of the mart is
called ‘bearing.’ The railroad is a small one, and the amount of Stock
comparatively small. It was easy enough, therefore, for a few of his
competitors to form a ‘syndicate’ to buy up all the stock in existence,
so that when the period came for the seller to implement his sales, the
wherewithal was unobtainable except from them. We need scarcely say
that the operators in the Stock markets daily buy and sell securities
which they intend neither to take nor to give; they merely propose to
take or to pay the difference in price which may exist at a certain
future day of settlement. But it is always in the option of a buyer to
insist on the delivery of the actual stock, if he really wants it; and
then the seller must provide it, at whatever cost. The cunning buyers
of the Hannibal stock did not want it, and indeed they paid for much of
it far beyond its real value, because every purchase they made raised
its price in the market. What they wanted was to place the original
seller, or ‘bear,’ in a Corner; and this they effectually did. They
forced up the price to, let us say, three hundred dollars—we forget the
exact figures, but they are immaterial—of what the seller had sold at,
say, ninety dollars. And worse than that, when the day of settlement
came, the seller could not obtain stock at any price whatever. He was
completely ‘cornered,’ and had eventually to pay the difference which
the keen ‘bulls’ chose to exact. But with the sequel comes the moral.
Having exacted all they could out of the unfortunate seller, they found
_themselves_ in a Corner. They were possessed of a quantity of Stock
which they did not want, and which nobody else wanted at anything like
the prices they had paid for it. They had to sell, and with every sale
the price came tumbling down, so that ultimately, we believe, their
loss upon their own purchases exceeded considerably what they had
extracted from the poor man they put in ‘a Corner.’
Then there is the Corner into which you go yourself. Messrs John
Horner and Company of Chicago form the impression that, let us say,
pigs’ bristles might, could, would, or should advance in price. They
determine that bristles shall; and set to work to buy all they can
lay their hands on, and to contract for future delivery of as much
as they can get any one to sell. Of course, the price advances, and
this the more rapidly in proportion as their purchases extend; but the
unfortunate thing—for them—is, that they are themselves the principal,
if not the sole, purchasers at the enhanced rates. By-and-by they
become the masters of all, or nearly all, the available supply of pigs’
bristles; they have ‘made a Corner,’ and in the American phraseology,
they ‘control’ the market. But markets are rather unmanageable affairs,
after all, as Messrs John Horner and Company find when they have to
realise in order to pay for their later purchases; or when, if they
have been rich enough to pay and lie out of the money, they want to
realise their profit.
The effect is still more pronounced when the Corner is attempted
in one of the staples of commerce, such as wheat or cotton, the
supplies of which are not confined to one spot, and are practically
illimitable. For such huge Corners as these, combinations of several
firms are needed in order to provide the money; and the reverse, when
it comes, is therefore more widespread and disastrous. The Wheat
Corner in Chicago, at the beginning of 1882, was a remarkable instance
of audacity and also of recklessness in this species of speculation;
and the effects of the tremendous collapse have not yet worn off.
A still more recent example was the Lard Corner in the same city,
which collapsed in June of last year, and the sweeping out of which
brought down several firms in other parts of the States. But we must
not conclude that operations of this kind are confined to America;
we have them in this country also; and not very long ago, a bold and
very nearly successful Corner was made in Liverpool in cotton, which
produced a good deal of moralising and very heavy losses.
It is often a delicate matter to define what is legitimate and what is
illegitimate speculation; but of the moral aspect of Corners there can
be little doubt. They are bold and entirely selfish attempts to produce
artificial scarcity, to the prejudice of the many, and for the benefit
of the few. They essay to overset the operation of the inevitable and
just law of supply and demand. They are therefore wrong in morals,
and false in economics. They are not examples of trading, in the
proper meaning of the term; they are merely specimens of inordinate
gambling. They disorganise commerce, because they divert streams of
commodities from ordinary channels, which it has taken the labour
of years to create; and they disorganise finance, by deranging the
exchanges between countries, through the concentration of commodities
and money which should be circulating. Their immediate effect is to
inflict a large loss upon the commercial centres, not only directly
of the countries in which they occur, but also indirectly upon other
countries. This is readily capable of demonstration, but is too
technical a question to enter upon here.
In the old days of British commerce, the practice called ‘forestalling’
was a penal offence. Forestalling is defined by M’Culloch as ‘the
buying or contracting for any cattle, provision, or merchandise on
its way to the market, or dissuading persons from sending their goods
there, or persuading them to raise the price, or spreading any false
rumour with intent to enhance the value of any article.’ The penalties
enacted by various statutes were very severe; but they were repealed
in 1772. There was also a practice described in the old statutes as
‘engrossing,’ which meant simply the buying up of corn and other
provisions in order to raise the prices thereof. Although the Acts
referring to this practice were repealed, we believe that ‘engrossing’
is still an indictable offence at common law. As a matter of fact,
however, no indictment is ever made, and if made, no conviction would
ever follow. In his exhaustive article on the Corn-laws, Mr M’Culloch
showed very ably how the speculations of merchants who buy up corn in
times of abundance react to the benefit of the community in times of
scarcity; and how in times of scarcity similar speculations operate to
prevent waste and to induce economy. But there is some considerable
difference between the operations referred to by M’Culloch and those
which we have under review just now.
The unwholesome effects of Corners, and the dangerous features they
lend to commerce, are so powerfully felt in the United States, that
the legislative bodies of the States of Illinois and New York—States
where the evil is most prevalent—have been seriously considering how
to counteract them. Each assembly had before it a Bill for rendering
these operations illegal, and punishable by heavy penalties. It is
exceedingly doubtful, however, if either of the Bills will ever
become law; and it is not by any means manifest that legislation on
the subject is desirable. The hand of the law is rarely interposed
to stay the stream of commerce without producing more evils than it
seeks to prevent. That stream often gets into muddy and unhealthy,
even dangerous channels; but it has a recuperative power within
itself greater than any which can be applied extraneously. The moral
effects of Corners are bad upon all engaged in them, and they inflict
hardship and loss upon many innocent people, as a consequence of the
solidarity of all social affairs. The commercial effects also are bad,
as we have shown; and herein lies the chief hope of reform. We cannot
recall a single instance of a Corner—and we have been acquainted with
the inner history of a good many of the species—which did not result
in overthrow and disaster, sooner or later, to those in it. Either
the operation attempted is too gigantic for the means at command; or
success in the first steps feeds the appetite for gain, and blinds
the operators to the attendant risks, so that they go too far; or
they become timid, and do not go far enough. In the glow of extensive
buying, the effects of the ultimate sales are always under-estimated.
The object of a Corner is to buy in order to sell at some future time;
and when the selling begins, the downfall of prices is always more
rapid than the advance, and then the Corner is swept clean not only
of the commodities, but also of those who put them in. And as there
is about almost every evil some germ of good, we must not forget that
the effect of a Corner is often to stimulate supplies of the commodity
‘cornered,’ in other regions, and the world is benefited by the
increase of productive wealth. This, however, is an accident, and in
no way justifies the creation of Corners, which are dark, malodorous,
unhealthy, and altogether detestable features in the commercial
structure. Public opinion, and the conviction that not only will he
not bring out a plum, but that also he may possibly have to leave his
skin behind him, will ultimately, we hope, have more effect in keeping
the modern John Horner out of a Corner, than legislative enactment is
likely to do.
BY MEAD AND STREAM.
CHAPTER XXVII.—WHY IS SHE SO?
There never was a man who felt more buoyant on learning that his name
had been set down in a will for a handsome legacy than Philip felt
on learning that he had been cut out of one. First, it was the right
thing to do: he was sure of that, the circumstances considered; next,
it had helped to render this interview, which he had expected to be so
painful, a pleasant one. Thus he was enabled to speed with a gay heart
to Madge, carrying the happy tidings, that in spite of the awkward
position he occupied between his uncle and father, he seemed to be more
in accord with the latter, and certainly much more in his confidence,
than he had been at any previous time.
He took a short-cut through the Forest—the way was too well known to
him for him to lose it; and besides, the evening was not dark to his
young eyes, although some black flying clouds helped the skeleton trees
to make curious silhouettes across his path. Then swiftly down by the
river-side, catching glimpses of stars flickering in the rippling
water, and his steps keeping time to its patter, as it broke upon the
stones or bulging sedges.
As he was crossing the stile at the foot of the meadow, he caught the
sound of whispering voices from the direction of the ‘dancing beeches.’
A lovers’ tryst, no doubt, and the voices were very earnest. He smiled,
and quickened his pace without looking back. He, too, was a lover.
At the house he found Aunt Hessy alone in the oak parlour, where
the customary substantial tea was laid, instead of in the ordinary
living-room. That was suggestive of company. Aunt Hessy had on her
Sunday cap and gown. That also was suggestive of company.
‘Going to have some friends with you to-night?’ he said gaily.
‘Thou art a friend, and here,’ she answered, with her quiet welcoming
smile; ‘but I do expect another—that is, Mr Beecham.’
‘What! you have persuaded the shy gentleman to become your guest at
last? Do you know how I account for his shyness?—he saw you at church,
and fell in love with you. That’s how it is, and he won’t come here
because he was afraid of you. Lovers are always shy—at first.’
‘Thou art a foolish lad, Philip, and yet no shining example of the
shyness of lovers. Were they all like thee, no maiden would lose a
sweetheart for lack of boldness on his part. Art not ashamed?’
‘I am, Aunt Hessy,’ he answered with his boyish laugh, ‘ashamed that
you cannot understand how we are all your lovers—and ought to be.’
‘That will do.’ But although she spoke with much decision in her tone,
there was no displeasure in her comely face. She understood him.
‘I won’t say another word, except to ask you how you have conquered Mr
Beecham?’
‘Ah, but we are not sure that we have conquered him yet. He was with
Dick this morning, and gave him some help with the cattle. Dick is in
the barn with them now, for he is afraid there’s trouble coming to
them.’
‘And I suppose he is angrier than ever about the live-stock brought
into the market from abroad?’
‘It is making him anxious, and with reason. Well, he wanted his friend
to come and take dinner; but Mr Beecham said he would rather come in
some evening soon and take tea with us. So, in the afternoon I sent
Madge off to the village, and bade her _make_ him come this evening. I
don’t know what’s come of her. She’s been away more than three hours,
and she is not one to loiter on the road.’
‘Which way do you think they’ll come?’ asked Philip, rising quickly
from his seat.
‘By the meadows, of course. She never comes round by the road except
when driving.’
‘I’ll go and meet them.’
But before he could move, they heard the front-door open.
‘That’s her,’ said the dame, gladly expectant.
Madge entered the parlour alone; and Philip was surprised to note that
she seemed to be a little startled by something—his presence perhaps.
Next, he was surprised to note that she looked pale and excited.
‘Thou hast not persuaded our friend to come to us, then,’ said the
dame, disappointed, and not observing Madge so closely as Philip.
‘Has anything happened Madge?—What has frightened you?’ he said
quickly, taking her hands and gazing into her eyes.
‘Nothing has frightened me, Philip,’ she answered hurriedly, and with a
remote sign of irritability at her present condition being noticed. ‘I
have been running up the meadows, and I daresay I am flushed a little.’
‘Flushed!—Why, you are as white as if you had seen a ghost.’
‘Well, perhaps I have seen a ghost. Would you like to go and look for
it?’
She withdrew her hands and went to her aunt.
Philip stood still, surprised and puzzled, and a little distressed.
It was such a new experience to see Madge nervous and irritable—she
who was always so calm and clear-sighted when other people lost their
heads—that he did not know what to make of it. And then there was such
impatience in the way she had snapped up what he considered a very
natural remark for any one who looked at her steadily for a moment. Her
eyes had not met his in the usual clear, trustful way: they seemed to
avoid his gaze, and she had turned from him as if he annoyed her! Why
was she so?
‘I had to wait some time for Mr Beecham, aunt,’ Madge said. Her voice
was husky, and unlike any sound Philip had heard her produce before.
‘Then we were talking a long time together, and that is what has made
me so late. He says he cannot come this evening. I told him how much
you wished him to come, and he said he would have liked very much to
do so, but could not.... I am afraid I have caught a cold.... I did my
best to get him to come, but he would not.... My head is aching, aunt;
I think I shall go up-stairs.’
The dame was now as much surprised as Philip by the curious manner of
her niece; but she did not show it. She lifted off the girl’s hat,
passed her hand gently over the hot brow, and said soothingly: ‘Yes,
child, you had better go up-stairs; and I will come to you in a few
minutes. I don’t believe you have changed your boots since the morning.
Go up-stairs at once.’
‘I will try and come down again, Philip,’ she said, tenderly touching
his arm as she passed, to console him for that little irritability.
‘All right, Madge; I’ll wait,’ he answered cheerfully.
She passed out, and there was a yelping of dogs heard at the same time.
In rushed Dash and Rover and Tip, followed by their master.
‘I am as hungry as a hawk, mother, and so are the dogs,’ exclaimed
Uncle Dick, after saluting Philip. ‘I can’t wait for anybody.—Sit down,
lad, and eat.’
The dame served them, and then quietly left the room.
Philip ate, and heard Uncle Dick speaking as if from a far distance;
but all the time he was perpetually asking himself—‘Why is she so?’
SUICIDE.
The term ‘suicide’ is almost universally applied to all acts of
self-destruction, and equally indiscriminately to all perpetrators
thereof, no distinction being made as to their state of mind at the
time of killing themselves. It is in this popularly understood sense
that we have used the word throughout this article. From a legal point
of view, however, the term can only be correctly employed to denote
the self-murder (_felonia de se_) of a sane and legally responsible
person. A lunatic cannot in a legal sense commit suicide, though he may
destroy himself. A suicide, or _felo de se_, is in the eye of the law
a criminal, and was formerly ‘punished’ by being buried at midnight at
the meeting of four cross-roads, a stake being driven through the body.
Since 1823, this _post mortem_ punishment has been limited to simple
interment at night in unconsecrated ground without any of the rites of
Christian burial; and even this has but seldom to be carried out, owing
to the charity, and perhaps also to the want of knowledge, of coroners’
juries, who generally find that the act has been committed during a fit
of temporary insanity.
Among the ancients, suicide was very frequently resorted to, sometimes
for the most trivial reasons, and was considered part of their code of
religion and honour. By the Romans especially, it was regarded quite in
the light of a national custom, and by their laws a man was justified
in killing himself when worn out by lasting pain or lingering disease,
or burdened with a load of debt, or even from sheer weariness of life
(_tædium vitæ_). His will was valid; and if intestate, his heirs
succeeded him. Among the illustrious individuals of former times who
quitted this world voluntarily and prematurely, we find the names of
Demosthenes, Antony and Cleopatra, Cato, Hannibal, Cassius and Brutus,
and many others. Suicide was looked upon as a cardinal virtue by the
Stoics, whose founder, Zeno, hanged himself at the ripe old age of
ninety-eight. The custom was also highly commended by Lucretius and
the Epicureans. The philosophers of old spoke of it as ‘a justifiable
escape from the miseries of life;’ and as ‘the greatest indulgence
given to man;’ Diogenes even going so far as to declare that ‘the
nearer to suicide the nearest to virtue.’
The ideas of the ancients concerning this practice underwent a great
change after the time of Constantine the Great, with the advancement
of the Christian religion, which has always discouraged suicide, and
regarded it as one of the degrees of murder. During the middle ages,
when religious sentiment was predominant, instances of self-destruction
were few and far between, these few being mostly caused by the monotony
of monastic life; but with the Renaissance was revived a modified
form of Stoicism, with, of course, a return of suicide. In More’s
_Utopia_, the inhabitants of the happy republic, when, from sickness
or old age, they are become a burden to themselves and to all about
them, are exhorted—but in nowise compelled—by their priests to deliver
themselves voluntarily from their ‘prison and torture,’ or to allow
others to effect their deliverance. To the somewhat melancholy tendency
of the Elizabethan period and the psychological studies of Shakspeare,
succeeded a long period of calm; but towards the end of the eighteenth
century began, with _Werther_—who has been called ‘Hamlet’s posthumous
child’—the era of modern suicidal melancholy. This differs essentially
from the suicidal era of the ancients, being psychical rather than
physical. Whereas theirs was born of sheer exhaustion and satiety, with
want of belief in a future state of existence, that of the present
day is the melancholy of a restless and unceasingly analysing soul,
eternally brooding over the insoluble problems ‘Whence?’ and ‘Whither?’
which disordered state not unfrequently leads to incapacity for action,
and finally to inability to live.
It is a very prevalent but erroneous belief that suicide is invariably
preceded by insanity. Self-destruction is always an _unnatural_
act, and a violation of the laws of nature, but is not, therefore,
necessarily an _insane_ act. On the contrary, a large minority—some
authorities say the majority—of suicidal acts are perpetrated by
persons who cannot be called other than sane, though their mental
state is indisputably more or less abnormal at the time, and the
organic action of the brain and nervous system sometimes in a state
of excitement bordering on real pathological irritation. Dr Wynter
affirms the suicidal impulse to be ‘an inexplicable phenomenon on the
borderlands of insanity;’ the power of the will to conquer any impulse
is the sole difference between a healthy and an unsound mind. But
self-destruction is not, as a rule, the outcome of a mere impulse,
but an act of longer or shorter deliberation, and brought about by
some cause, which may be either real or imaginary; and here we have
the simple test for distinguishing between sane and insane suicides,
namely, the absence or presence of delusions. Outside of insanity,
the passions and emotions are generally at the root of self-murder;
remorse, dread of exposure and punishment, long wearing sorrow or
disease, or hopeless poverty, are the usual causes for an act which
is generally regarded with far too great equanimity, and occasionally
even with commiseration, being looked upon as ‘a catastrophe rather
than a crime,’ although condemned by the religion and laws of the land.
With lunatics, the causes inciting to the act are mainly if not wholly
imaginary, or delusional; they often fancy they hear voices perpetually
urging them to destroy themselves, and these supposed supernatural
commands they generally obey sooner or later. Men in prosperous
circumstances have frequently been known to make away with themselves
from _fear_ of poverty and want; others have perhaps committed some
trifling act of delinquency, which they magnify into an unpardonable
offence, only to be expiated by death. Some insane persons will kill
those dear to them, especially their own children, before destroying
themselves, probably with the view of preserving them from so wretched
a lot as they conceive their own to be. There is usually previous ill
health and depression, with great desire for solitude, in these cases
of suicide by the insane, many of which could be prevented by the
timely exercise of proper care and supervision, as is clearly shown by
their mostly occurring among those lunatics who are not under proper
restraint.
_Melancholia_ is the name given to that form of delusional insanity,
or partial moral mania, which chiefly manifests itself in a desire for
self-destruction. Hypochondriacs may be said to be in the first stage
of this, and in the first stage very fortunately most of them remain.
They feel death would be a blessing, and are constantly talking about
killing themselves; but they are very irresolute, and if they do summon
up courage enough to make the attempt, it is generally abortive, and is
not repeated.
Equally devoid of foundation is the assertion so persistently made
by foreigners, and at last almost believed in by ourselves, that
England is the land of suicide. Frenchmen especially seem seriously to
entertain the idea that we are always ready to blow out our brains in
a fit of the spleen, caused by our much-maligned climate, and general
dullness and lack of amusement! In point of fact, Paris itself is the
headquarters of self-destruction, and its Morgue one of the principal
and most frequented show-places of the city. The cases there are much
more numerous in proportion to the number of the population than in
this country, and have been variously estimated at from three to five
times as many; but there is not the publicity afforded them in the
Parisian press that is given them by our own widely circulated daily
and weekly papers. As a proof that climate has but little connection
with the tendency to commit suicide, it may be pointed out that the
inhabitants of damp and foggy Holland, a ‘country that draws fifty foot
of water,’ are by no means addicted to self-slaughter. The buoyant,
light-hearted Irish are, with the exception perhaps of the Neapolitans,
the least suicidal people in Europe.
In what may be designated, as compared with European countries,
the topsy-turvy nations of China and Japan, suicide is quite an
institution, and is apparently looked upon as a fine art; so much so,
that in the latter country the sons of people of quality exercise
themselves in their youth for five or six years, in order that they
may kill themselves, in case of need, with grace and elegance. If a
functionary of the Japanese government has incurred disgrace, he is
allowed to put an end to his own life, which spares him the ignominy
of punishment at the hands of others, and secures the reversion of his
place to his son. All government officials are provided with a habit
of ceremony, made of hempen cloth, necessary for such an occasion;
the sight of this garment must serve, we should think, as a perpetual
_memento mori_, and as a warning not to stray from the right path.
As soon as the order commanding suicide has been communicated to a
culprit, he invites his friends to a feast, and takes formal leave of
them; then, the order of the court having been read over to him, he
makes his ‘last dying speech and confession,’ draws his sabre, and
cuts himself across the body or rips himself up, when a confidential
servant at once strikes off his head. In China also, the regulations
for self-destruction are rigorously defined and carried out; a mandarin
who can boast of the peacock’s feather is graciously allowed to choke
himself by swallowing gold-leaf; while one of less lofty rank, who
is only able to sport a red button on his cap, is obliged to rest
content with the permission to strangle himself with a silken cord.
In India, the voluntary self-immolation of widows on their deceased
husbands’ funeral pyres was, until recently, a universal practice,
and still takes place occasionally in secret, though very properly
discouraged by the government. In some parts of the East Indies the
natives vow suicide in return for boons solicited from their idols;
and in fulfilment of this vow, fling themselves from lofty precipices,
and are dashed to pieces. Or they will destroy themselves after having
had a quarrel with any one, in order that their blood may lie at their
adversary’s door.
Contrary to the generally received opinion, the spring and summer
are the seasons when suicides most abound. The months of March,
June, and July are those chiefly affected by males for this purpose;
while females seem to prefer September, the much-abused November,
and January. The time of day chosen for the deed is usually either
early morning or early evening. The tendency to suicide varies with
the occupation, and is said to be twice as great among artisans as
it is among labourers; it is certainly much greater in cities than
in rural districts, and increases with the increase of civilisation
and education. The fact that married people are much less prone to
self-destruction than the unmarried may be accounted for by the theory
of natural selection, as it is usually, and especially with women,
only the more healthy both in mind and body who enter the married
state; while the fact of suicides among males being always so much
more numerous than among females is perhaps to a certain extent to
be explained by the former having a wider choice of means at their
disposal, and ready at hand. Women, as a rule, prefer to put an end to
their lives by drowning; and as they may have to travel a long distance
before being able to accomplish their design, it is not unlikely
that they may sometimes repent and alter their minds before their
journey’s end. Again, people who throw themselves into the water are
not unfrequently rescued before life is extinct, and restored. Unless
insane, they are probably cured by the attempt, and will not renew it,
the mind having regained its self-control. Suicide is but rarely met
with in old people, and is also very uncommon in children, although
instances are recorded of quite young children hanging or drowning
themselves on being reproved or punished for some venial fault.
An ill-directed education and certain objectionable descriptions of
literature favour the disposition to self-destruction. The propensity
is most strongly marked in those persons who are of a bilious or of a
nervous temperament.
Some would-be suicides resolve to kill themselves in a particular way,
and may have to wait years for an opportunity; others will make use of
the first mode of destruction that presents itself. Taylor says: ‘The
sight of a weapon or of a particular spot where a previous suicide
has been committed, will often induce a person, who may hitherto have
been unsuspected of any such disposition, at once to destroy himself.’
Individuals conscious of their liability to commit self-murder would do
well, therefore, to avoid that ‘sight of means to do ill deeds’ which
might lead to the ‘ill deed’ being ‘done’ in a sudden fit of depression
or frenzy.
The publicity afforded by newspapers to any remarkable case of suicide,
with full description of details, has unquestionably a pernicious
effect, not only by suggesting a means to those already predisposed
to the act, but also by its tending to lessen the natural horror of
self-murder inherent in the human mind. Example has avowedly a great
influence in exciting the propensity to suicide; and a man who cannot
justify the rash act to his own conscience, will find excuses for it
in the examples of others. This imitative propensity may even amount
to an epidemic, as at Versailles in 1793, when no fewer than thirteen
hundred persons destroyed themselves. Some years ago, the Hôtel des
Invalides, Paris, was the scene of one of these outbreaks; one of the
invalids hanged himself on a crossbar of the institution; and in the
ensuing fortnight, six or seven others followed his example on the same
bar, the epidemic being only stopped by the governor having the passage
closed.
Insane people will sometimes display great ingenuity and perseverance
in the means by which they choose to put an end to themselves. They are
very determined; and if frustrated in one attempt, will make others,
perhaps all in different ways; and unless very strictly guarded, will
generally succeed at last in effecting their purpose. An instance of
almost incredible determination to die is that of a French gentleman
who dug a trench in a wood and lay in it sixteen days, writing down
in a journal each day the state of his feelings. From this journal it
appeared that he suffered greatly, at first from hunger, and afterwards
from thirst and cold. He left his trench, and got a little water from
the pump of an inn near the wood on the sixth night; and this he
continued to do until the tenth day, when he was too weak to stir.
He ceased to write on the fifteenth day; and on the sixteenth he was
discovered by a countryman, who tried—but in vain—to restore him. He
died on the eighteenth day.
The heredity of suicide, though not universally conceded, is
admitted by most authorities, and according to some, the tendency to
self-destruction is more disposed to be hereditary than any other
form of insanity. Certainly a great number of those who put an end to
their own lives are members of families in which instances of suicide
or insanity have previously occurred, and the propensity is usually
most strong at some particular age. Dr Gall mentions the case of a
Frenchman of property who killed himself, leaving a large sum of money
to be divided among his seven children. None of these met with any real
misfortunes in life, but all succumbed, before attaining their fortieth
year, to the mania for suicide.
Intemperance, the root of half the idiocy and a considerable percentage
of the insanity of the country, is also largely contributory to the
rapidly increasing number of cases of self-murder. In the French
classification, which is ‘generally admitted to be pretty true of all
countries,’ fifteen per cent. are put down to drink; while thirty-four
per cent. are attributed to insanity, twenty-three per cent. to grief,
and twenty-eight per cent. to various other causes.
Suicide, whether regarded as a crime or a disease, is in all cases a
rash, ill-advised act of impatience. Napoleon—who, when his misfortunes
reached a climax, declared he had not ‘enough of the Roman in him’ for
suicide—described it as an act of cowardice, a running away from the
enemy before being defeated. Perhaps the best safeguards against it
are domestic ties and the sense of responsibility and accountability.
Very few instances of self-destruction occur among prudent hard-working
heads of families who have insured their lives.
CHEWTON-ABBOT.
IN THREE CHAPTERS.—CHAPTER II.
Mrs Abbot drove home in her stately carriage thinking deeply. Her mind
was tolerably easy. She knew there was little chance of a young man’s
love living through years of absence and silence. Frank would go into
the great world, and gaze on many a fair face during that time; till
the beautiful face of Millicent Keene—for even Mrs Abbot could not
gainsay the girl’s beauty—would gradually fade from his thoughts. He
would taste the cup of ambition; he would see what power and station
meant in the world, and would soon laugh to scorn his boyish dream. He
would very quickly realise the difference between Abbot of Chewton Hall
and plain Frank Abbot, who had to earn the bread to keep a wife, be she
ever so charming. In fact, the thoughts of Mrs Abbot in her carriage
and Miss Keene on her sofa were almost identical, although the words
which expressed them differed.
Save for one thing, Mrs Abbot’s reflections were very comforting. The
drawback was that she felt lowered in her own eyes. She had made a
mistake, and had been treated with contumely. The victory was hers, but
she had not won it herself. It was not her cleverness, but the girl’s
right-mindedness which would bring about the separation. She blamed
herself for having misread the girl’s character, and found her honest
indignation at the imputation that her love for Frank was influenced by
his possessions, mortifying to think of. Still, matters had turned out
well. She would have the satisfaction of telling her husband that all
was, or would be, at an end—that the hope of the Abbots would not marry
nobody’s daughter. So busy was she with these thoughts, that she did
not notice, when some three miles outside the smoky town of Bristol,
a horseman approaching. Upon seeing him, her coachman gathered up the
reins preparatory to stopping his horses; but, as the rider made a
negative gesture, he simply touched his hat and drove on; whilst Frank
Abbot and his mother passed, neither apparently noticing the other.
He was a handsome young fellow, and without a cent to his name might
have given many a wealthy competitor long odds in the race for a girl’s
heart. Tall and broad-shouldered—clever face, with deep-set eyes, large
chin, and firm lips. He sat his horse gracefully, looking every inch
a gentleman and an Englishman. Not, one would say, the man to win a
woman’s love, and throw it aside at the bidding of father or mother.
Not the man to do a thing hastily and repent the deed at his leisure.
Rather, a man who, when once engaged in a pursuit, would follow it
steadfastly to the end, whatever that end might be. It was scarcely
right that Millicent Keene should allow fear to mingle with her grief
at the approaching long separation from her lover. She should have
looked into that handsome powerful face and understood that years
would only mould the boy’s intention into the man’s determination.
Naturally, he was at the present moment rather down-hearted. His
mother, having learned his secret, had refused him sympathy or aid. Too
well he knew she was to be swayed neither by entreaty nor argument. He
was now riding over to Clifton to reiterate his love to Millicent, and
to consult as to future steps. As he passed the carriage, he wondered
what had brought his mother in that direction. She had not mentioned
her intention of going to the town, nor had she asked for his escort
as usual. Could it be possible that she had driven over to visit
Millicent? If so, he knew it boded ill; so, pricking on as fast as he
could, he reached Clifton just as the girl had grown more calm and had
washed away the traces of her recent tears.
Frank was terribly upset by her recital of the events of the morning.
Although she did not repeat the whole conversation, he knew his
mother well enough to be able to supply what Millicent passed lightly
over. The proposed separation was a thunderstroke to him. In vain he
entreated the girl to reconsider her determination. The promise was
made, and her pride alone would insure her keeping it. Of course Frank
vowed, after the usual manner of lovers, that love would grow stronger
in absence; and as he thoroughly believed what he vowed, his vows were
very consoling to the girl. He declared he also would go to Australia;
marry Millicent, and take to sheep-farming, leaving the paternal acres
to shift for themselves. All this and many other wild things the
young fellow said; but the end was a sorrowful acquiescence in the
separation, tempered by the firm resolve of claiming her in four years’
time in spite of any home opposition. Having settled this, the heir of
the Abbots rode home in a state of open rebellion against his parents.
This they were quite prepared for, and had, like sensible people, made
up their minds to endure his onslaught passively. His mother made no
reply to his reproaches; his father took no notice of his implied
threats; but both longed for the time to come when Miss Keene would
sail to distant shores and the work of supplanting her might begin.
About one thing Frank was firm, and Millicent, perhaps, did not try
to dissuade him from it. Until they were bound to part, he would see
her every day. Mr and Mrs Abbot knew why his horse was ordered every
morning, and whence that horse bore him at eve; but they said nothing.
The fatal day came soon enough. Frank went down to Plymouth to see the
very last of his love; and the mighty steamship _Chimborazo_ bore away
across the deep seas one of the sweetest and truest girls that ever
won a man’s heart. A week after she sailed, Frank Abbot started on his
continental tour.
‘I don’t care much about it,’ he said to himself, dolefully enough;
‘but it may help to make some of the time pass quicker. Four years, my
darling! How long it seems!’
‘He will see the world,’ said Mrs Abbot, ‘and learn that a pretty face
is not everything.’
‘He will fall in and out of love with a dozen girls before he
returns,’ said Mr Abbot cynically.
It has been before stated that for many years there had been little
change in either the possessions or the position of the Abbots of
Chewton-Abbot; but, like other people, they had occasional windfalls.
Some years after Mr Abbot succeeded to the estate, a new branch of
a large railway passed through an outlying part of his land, and he
who made it a boast of never selling or mortgaging a single acre, was
compelled, by the demands of public convenience and commerce, to part
with what the railway wanted. Of course he obtained a good round sum as
compensation. This lay for a long time at his banker’s, waiting for any
contiguous land which might come into the market. After a while, as no
fields which he wished to add to his own were open to buyers, at his
wife’s suggestion he sought for another and more profitable investment,
and in an evil hour became the proprietor of fifty shares in a bank,
whose failure has now become historical. He bought these shares at a
premium; whilst he held them, they went to a much higher premium, but
no doubt the same tenacity which led him to cling to his acres made him
keep to the same investment. The high rate of interest also was very
useful, and kept another horse or two in the stables.
We can all remember the astonishment we felt that black day when the
news of the stoppage of that particular bank was flashed from end to
end of the kingdom, and how, afterwards, the exposure of the reckless
conduct of its directors, and of the rotten state in which the concern
had been for years, sent a cold shudder down the back of every holder
of bank stock.
Mr Abbot was not a man of business. He did not at once realise what
being the registered owner of these fifty shares meant. He denounced
the roguery of the directors, and vowed that if ever again he had money
to spare, into land it should go, nowhere else. He had an idea that
no more than the money which he had invested would be lost; but when,
after a few days, he gathered from the newspapers the true meaning of
unlimited liability, his heart grew sick within him. The rental of his
estate was about six thousand a year; so, when call after call was made
on the shareholders, William Abbot knew that he was a ruined man, and
lamented his folly for not having entailed the estates. Lands, house,
furniture, plate, all came to the hammer; and so far as county people
and landed gentry, the Abbots were extinct. Mrs Abbot had a jointure
of some five hundred a year, on which the unfortunate couple were fain
to live as best they could. They took a house at Weymouth, and in that
retired watering-place mourned their woes in genteel obscurity.