The Plague, Pestilence & Apocalypse MEGAPACK™

by Robert Reed

That fable is unjust, which gives the superiority to the sun over

  the wind . Who has not seen the lightsome earth, the balmy atmo-

  sphere, and basking nature become dark, cold and ungenial, when

  the sleeping wind has awoke in the east? Or, when the dun clouds

  thickly veil the sky, while exhaustless stores of rain are poured

  down, until, the dank earth refusing to imbibe the superabundant

  moisture, it lies in pools on the surface; when the torch of day seems

  like a meteor, to be quenched; who has not seen the cloud-stirring

  north arise, the streaked blue appear, and soon an opening made in

  the vapours in the eye of the wind, through which the bright azure

  shines? The clouds become thin; an arch is formed for ever rising

  upwards, till, the universal cope being unveiled, the sun pours forth

  its rays, re-animated and fed by the breeze .

  Then mighty art thou, O wind, to be throned above all other vice-

  gerents of nature’s power; whether thou comest destroying from the

  east, or pregnant with elementary life from the west; thee the clouds

  obey; the sun is subservient to thee; the shoreless ocean is thy slave!

  Thou sweepest over the earth, and oaks, the growth of centuries,

  submit to thy viewless axe; the snow-drift is scattered on the pin-

  nacles of the Alps, the avalanche thunders down their vallies . Thou

  holdest the keys of the frost, and canst first chain and then set free

  the streams; under thy gentle governance the buds and leaves are

  born, they flourish nursed by thee.

  Why dost thou howl thus, O wind? By day and by night for four

  long months thy roarings have not ceased—the shores of the sea are

  6

  Elton’s translation of Hesiod’s Works .

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  strewn with wrecks, its keel-welcoming surface has become impass-

  able, the earth has shed her beauty in obedience to thy command; the

  frail balloon dares no longer sail on the agitated air; thy ministers,

  the clouds, deluge the land with rain; rivers forsake their banks; the

  wild torrent tears up the mountain path; plain and wood, and verdant

  dell are despoiled of their loveliness; our very cities are wasted by

  thee . Alas, what will become of us? It seems as if the giant waves

  of ocean, and vast arms of the sea, were about to wrench the deep-

  rooted island from its centre; and cast it, a ruin and a wreck, upon

  the fields of the Atlantic.

  What are we, the inhabitants of this globe, least among the many

  that people infinite space? Our minds embrace infinity; the visible

  mechanism of our being is subject to merest accident . Day by day

  we are forced to believe this . He whom a scratch has disorganized,

  he who disappears from apparent life under the influence of the hos-

  tile agency at work around us, had the same powers as I—I also am

  subject to the same laws . In the face of all this we call ourselves

  lords of the creation, wielders of the elements, masters of life and

  death, and we allege in excuse of this arrogance, that though the

  individual is destroyed, man continues for ever .

  Thus, losing our identity, that of which we are chiefly conscious,

  we glory in the continuity of our species, and learn to regard death

  without terror . But when any whole nation becomes the victim of the

  destructive powers of exterior agents, then indeed man shrinks into

  insignificance, he feels his tenure of life insecure, his inheritance on

  earth cut off .

  I remember, after having witnessed the destructive effects of a

  fire, I could not even behold a small one in a stove, without a sensa-

  tion of fear. The mounting flames had curled round the building, as

  it fell, and was destroyed . They insinuated themselves into the sub-

  stances about them, and the impediments to their progress yielded

  at their touch . Could we take integral parts of this power, and not

  be subject to its operation? Could we domesticate a cub of this wild

  beast, and not fear its growth and maturity?

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  Thus we began to feel, with regard to many-visaged death let

  loose on the chosen districts of our fair habitation, and above all,

  with regard to the plague . We feared the coming summer . Nations,

  bordering on the already infected countries, began to enter upon seri-

  ous plans for the better keeping out of the enemy . We, a commercial

  people, were obliged to bring such schemes under consideration;

  and the question of contagion became matter of earnest disquisition .

  That the plague was not what is commonly called contagious,

  like the scarlet fever, or extinct small-pox, was proved . It was called

  an epidemic . But the grand question was still unsettled of how this

  epidemic was generated and increased . If infection depended upon

  the air, the air was subject to infection . As for instance, a typhus

  fever has been brought by ships to one sea-port town; yet the very

  people who brought it there, were incapable of communicating it

  in a town more fortunately situated . But how are we to judge of

  airs, and pronounce—in such a city plague will die unproductive;

  in such another, nature has provided for it a plentiful harvest? In the

  same way, individuals may escape ninety-nine times, and receive

  the death-blow at the hundredth; because bodies are sometimes in a

  state to reject the infection of malady, and at others, thirsty to imbibe

  it. These reflections made our legislators pause, before they could

  decide on the laws to be put in force . The evil was so wide-spread-

  ing, so violent and immedicable, that no care, no prevention could

  be judged superfluous, which even added a chance to our escape.

  These were questions of prudence; there was no immediate ne-

  cessity for an earnest caution . England was still secure . France, Ger-

  many, Italy and Spain, were interposed, walls yet without a breach,

  between us and the plague . Our vessels truly were the sport of winds

  and waves, even as Gulliver was the toy of the Brobdignagians; but

  we on our stable abode could not be hurt in life or limb by these

  eruptions of nature . We could not fear—we did not . Yet a feeling of

  awe, a breathless sentiment of wonder, a painful sense of the deg-

  radation of humanity, was introduced into every heart . Nature, our

  mother, and our friend, had turned on us a brow of menace . She

  shewed us plainly, that, though she permitted us to assign her laws

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  and subdue her apparent powers, yet, if she put forth but a finger,

  we must quake . She could take our globe, fringed with mountains,

  girded by the atmosphere, containing the condition of our being, and

  all that man’s mind could invent or his force achieve; she could take

  the ball in her hand, and cast it into space, where life would be drunk

  up, and man and all his efforts for ever annihilated .

  These speculations were rife among us; yet not the less we pro-

  ceeded in our daily occupations, and our plans, whose accomplish-

  ment demanded the lapse of many years . No voice was heard telling

  us to hold! Wh
en foreign distresses came to be felt by us through

  the channels of commerce, we set ourselves to apply remedies . Sub-

  scriptions were made for the emigrants, and merchants bankrupt by

  the failure of trade . The English spirit awoke to its full activity, and,

  as it had ever done, set itself to resist the evil, and to stand in the

  breach which diseased nature had suffered chaos and death to make

  in the bounds and banks which had hitherto kept them out .

  At the commencement of summer, we began to feel, that the mis-

  chief which had taken place in distant countries was greater than

  we had at first suspected. Quito was destroyed by an earthquake.

  Mexico laid waste by the united effects of storm, pestilence and

  famine . Crowds of emigrants inundated the west of Europe; and our

  island had become the refuge of thousands . In the mean time Ryland

  had been chosen Protector. He had sought this office with eagerness,

  under the idea of turning his whole forces to the suppression of the

  privileged orders of our community . His measures were thwarted,

  and his schemes interrupted by this new state of things . Many of

  the foreigners were utterly destitute; and their increasing numbers

  at length forbade a recourse to the usual modes of relief . Trade was

  stopped by the failure of the interchange of cargoes usual between

  us, and America, India, Egypt and Greece . A sudden break was made

  in the routine of our lives . In vain our Protector and his partizans

  sought to conceal this truth; in vain, day after day, he appointed a

  period for the discussion of the new laws concerning hereditary rank

  and privilege; in vain he endeavoured to represent the evil as partial

  and temporary . These disasters came home to so many bosoms, and,

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  through the various channels of commerce, were carried so entirely

  into every class and division of the community, that of necessity they

  became the first question in the state, the chief subjects to which we

  must turn our attention .

  Can it be true, each asked the other with wonder and dismay, that

  whole countries are laid waste, whole nations annihilated, by these

  disorders in nature? The vast cities of America, the fertile plains of

  Hindostan, the crowded abodes of the Chinese, are menaced with

  utter ruin . Where late the busy multitudes assembled for pleasure or

  profit, now only the sound of wailing and misery is heard. The air

  is empoisoned, and each human being inhales death, even while in

  youth and health, their hopes are in the flower. We called to mind

  the plague of 1348, when it was calculated that a third of mankind

  had been destroyed . As yet western Europe was uninfected; would

  it always be so?

  O, yes, it would—Countrymen, fear not! In the still uncultivated

  wilds of America, what wonder that among its other giant destroyers,

  Plague should be numbered! It is of old a native of the East, sister of

  the tornado, the earthquake, and the simoon . Child of the sun, and

  nursling of the tropics, it would expire in these climes . It drinks the

  dark blood of the inhabitant of the south, but it never feasts on the

  pale-faced Celt . If perchance some stricken Asiatic come among us,

  plague dies with him, uncommunicated and innoxious . Let us weep

  for our brethren, though we can never experience their reverse . Let

  us lament over and assist the children of the garden of the earth . Late

  we envied their abodes, their spicy groves, fertile plains, and abun-

  dant loveliness . But in this mortal life extremes are always matched;

  the thorn grows with the rose, the poison tree and the cinnamon

  mingle their boughs . Persia, with its cloth of gold, marble halls, and

  infinite wealth, is now a tomb. The tent of the Arab is fallen in the

  sands, and his horse spurns the ground unbridled and unsaddled .

  The voice of lamentation fills the valley of Cashmere; its dells and

  woods, its cool fountains, and gardens of roses, are polluted by the

  dead; in Circassia and Georgia the spirit of beauty weeps over the

  ruin of its favourite temple—the form of woman .

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  Our own distresses, though they were occasioned by the fictitious

  reciprocity of commerce, encreased in due proportion . Bankers,

  merchants, and manufacturers, whose trade depended on exports

  and interchange of wealth, became bankrupt . Such things, when they

  happen singly, affect only the immediate parties; but the prosper-

  ity of the nation was now shaken by frequent and extensive losses .

  Families, bred in opulence and luxury, were reduced to beggary . The

  very state of peace in which we gloried was injurious; there were no

  means of employing the idle, or of sending any overplus of popula-

  tion out of the country . Even the source of colonies was dried up, for

  in New Holland, Van Diemen’s Land, and the Cape of Good Hope,

  plague raged . O, for some medicinal vial to purge unwholesome

  nature, and bring back the earth to its accustomed health!

  Ryland was a man of strong intellects and quick and sound deci-

  sion in the usual course of things, but he stood aghast at the multi-

  tude of evils that gathered round us . Must he tax the landed interest

  to assist our commercial population? To do this, he must gain the fa-

  vour of the chief land-holders, the nobility of the country; and these

  were his vowed enemies—he must conciliate them by abandoning

  his favourite scheme of equalization; he must confirm them in their

  manorial rights; he must sell his cherished plans for the permanent

  good of his country, for temporary relief . He must aim no more at

  the dear object of his ambition; throwing his arms aside, he must

  for present ends give up the ultimate object of his endeavours . He

  came to Windsor to consult with us. Every day added to his difficul-

  ties; the arrival of fresh vessels with emigrants, the total cessation of

  commerce, the starving multitude that thronged around the palace of

  the Protectorate, were circumstances not to be tampered with . The

  blow was struck; the aristocracy obtained all they wished, and they

  subscribed to a twelvemonths’ bill, which levied twenty percent on

  all the rent-rolls of the country . Calm was now restored to the me-

  tropolis, and to the populous cities, before driven to desperation;

  and we returned to the consideration of distant calamities, wonder-

  ing if the future would bring any alleviation to their excess . It was

  August; so there could be small hope of relief during the heats . On

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  the contrary, the disease gained virulence, while starvation did its

  accustomed work . Thousands died unlamented; for beside the yet

  warm corpse the mourner was stretched, made mute by death .

  On the eighteenth of this month news arrived in London that the

  plague was in France and Italy. These tidings were at first whispered

  about town; but no one dared express aloud the soul-quailing intel-

  ligence . When any one met a friend in the street, he only cried as

  he hurried on, “You know!
”— while the other, with an ejaculation

  of fear and horror, would answer,— “What will become of us?” At

  length it was mentioned in the newspapers . The paragraph was in-

  serted in an obscure part: “We regret to state that there can be no

  longer a doubt of the plague having been introduced at Leghorn,

  Genoa, and Marseilles .” No word of comment followed; each reader

  made his own fearful one . We were as a man who hears that his

  house is burning, and yet hurries through the streets, borne along

  by a lurking hope of a mistake, till he turns the corner, and sees his

  sheltering roof enveloped in a flame. Before it had been a rumour;

  but now in words uneraseable, in definite and undeniable print, the

  knowledge went forth . Its obscurity of situation rendered it the more

  conspicuous: the diminutive letters grew gigantic to the bewildered

  eye of fear: they seemed graven with a pen of iron, impressed by

  fire, woven in the clouds, stamped on the very front of the universe.

  The English, whether travellers or residents, came pouring in one

  great revulsive stream, back on their own country; and with them

  crowds of Italians and Spaniards. Our little island was filled even

  to bursting. At first an unusual quantity of specie made its appear-

  ance with the emigrants; but these people had no means of receiving

  back into their hands what they spent among us . With the advance

  of summer, and the increase of the distemper, rents were unpaid,

  and their remittances failed them . It was impossible to see these

  crowds of wretched, perishing creatures, late nurslings of luxury,

  and not stretch out a hand to save them . As at the conclusion of

  the eighteenth century, the English unlocked their hospitable store,

  for the relief of those driven from their homes by political revolu-

  tion; so now they were not backward in affording aid to the victims

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  of a more wide-spreading calamity . We had many foreign friends

  whom we eagerly sought out, and relieved from dreadful penury .

  Our Castle became an asylum for the unhappy . A little population

  occupied its halls . The revenue of its possessor, which had always

  found a mode of expenditure congenial to his generous nature, was

  now attended to more parsimoniously, that it might embrace a wider

  portion of utility . It was not however money, except partially, but