The Plague, Pestilence & Apocalypse MEGAPACK™

by Robert Reed

  troops of horses, herds of cattle, flocks of sheep, wandering at will;

  here throwing down a hay-rick, and nestling from cold in its heart,

  which afforded them shelter and food—there having taken posses-

  sion of a vacant cottage . Once on a frosty day, pushed on by restless

  unsatisfying reflections, I sought a favourite haunt, a little wood not

  far distant from Salt Hill . A bubbling spring prattles over stones on

  one side, and a plantation of a few elms and beeches, hardly deserve,

  and yet continue the name of wood . This spot had for me peculiar

  charms . It had been a favourite resort of Adrian; it was secluded;

  and he often said that in boyhood, his happiest hours were spent

  here; having escaped the stately bondage of his mother, he sat on

  the rough hewn steps that led to the spring, now reading a favourite

  book, now musing, with speculation beyond his years, on the still

  unravelled skein of morals or metaphysics . A melancholy forebod-

  ing assured me that I should never see this place more; so with care-

  ful thought, I noted each tree, every winding of the streamlet and

  irregularity of the soil, that I might better call up its idea in absence .

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  A robin red-breast dropt from the frosty branches of the trees, upon

  the congealed rivulet; its panting breast and half-closed eyes shewed

  that it was dying: a hawk appeared in the air; sudden fear seized the

  little creature; it exerted its last strength, throwing itself on its back,

  raising its talons in impotent defence against its powerful enemy . I

  took it up and placed it in my breast . I fed it with a few crumbs from

  a biscuit; by degrees it revived; its warm fluttering heart beat against

  me; I cannot tell why I detail this trifling incident—but the scene

  is still before me; the snow-clad fields seen through the silvered

  trunks of the beeches,—the brook, in days of happiness alive with

  sparkling waters, now choked by ice—the leafless trees fantastically

  dressed in hoar frost—the shapes of summer leaves imaged by win-

  ter’s frozen hand on the hard ground—the dusky sky, drear cold, and

  unbroken silence—while close in my bosom, my feathered nursling

  lay warm, and safe, speaking its content with a light chirp— painful

  reflections thronged, stirring my brain with wild commotion—cold

  and death-like as the snowy fields was all earth—misery-stricken

  the life-tide of the inhabitants—why should I oppose the cataract of

  destruction that swept us away?—why string my nerves and renew

  my wearied efforts—ah, why? But that my firm courage and cheer-

  ful exertions might shelter the dear mate, whom I chose in the spring

  of my life; though the throbbings of my heart be replete with pain,

  though my hopes for the future are chill, still while your dear head,

  my gentlest love, can repose in peace on that heart, and while you

  derive from its fostering care, comfort, and hope, my struggles shall

  not cease,—I will not call myself altogether vanquished .

  One fine February day, when the sun had reassumed some of its

  genial power, I walked in the forest with my family . It was one of

  those lovely winter-days which assert the capacity of nature to be-

  stow beauty on barrenness. The leafless trees spread their fibrous

  branches against the pure sky; their intricate and pervious tracery

  resembled delicate seaweed; the deer were turning up the snow in

  search of the hidden grass; the white was made intensely dazzling by

  the sun, and trunks of the trees, rendered more conspicuous by the

  loss of preponderating foliage, gathered around like the labyrinthine

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  columns of a vast temple; it was impossible not to receive pleasure

  from the sight of these things . Our children, freed from the bond-

  age of winter, bounded before us; pursuing the deer, or rousing the

  pheasants and partridges from their coverts . Idris leant on my arm;

  her sadness yielded to the present sense of pleasure . We met other

  families on the Long Walk, enjoying like ourselves the return of the

  genial season . At once, I seemed to awake; I cast off the clinging

  sloth of the past months; earth assumed a new appearance, and my

  view of the future was suddenly made clear . I exclaimed, “I have

  now found out the secret!”

  “What secret?”

  In answer to this question, I described our gloomy winter-life,

  our sordid cares, our menial labours:—“This northern country,” I

  said, “is no place for our diminished race . When mankind were few,

  it was not here that they battled with the powerful agents of nature,

  and were enabled to cover the globe with offspring . We must seek

  some natural Paradise, some garden of the earth, where our simple

  wants may be easily supplied, and the enjoyment of a delicious cli-

  mate compensate for the social pleasures we have lost . If we survive

  this coming summer, I will not spend the ensuing winter in England;

  neither I nor any of us .”

  I spoke without much heed, and the very conclusion of what I

  said brought with it other thoughts . Should we, any of us, survive

  the coming summer? I saw the brow of Idris clouded; I again felt,

  that we were enchained to the car of fate, over whose coursers we

  had no control . We could no longer say, This we will do, and this we

  will leave undone . A mightier power than the human was at hand to

  destroy our plans or to achieve the work we avoided . It were mad-

  ness to calculate upon another winter . This was our last . The coming

  summer was the extreme end of our vista; and, when we arrived

  there, instead of a continuation of the long road, a gulph yawned,

  into which we must of force be precipitated . The last blessing of

  humanity was wrested from us; we might no longer hope . Can the

  madman, as he clanks his chains, hope? Can the wretch, led to the

  scaffold, who when he lays his head on the block, marks the double

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  shadow of himself and the executioner, whose uplifted arm bears

  the axe, hope? Can the ship-wrecked mariner, who spent with swim-

  ming, hears close behind the splashing waters divided by a shark

  which pursues him through the Atlantic, hope? Such hope as theirs,

  we also may entertain!

  Old fable tells us, that this gentle spirit sprung from the box of

  Pandora, else crammed with evils; but these were unseen and null,

  while all admired the inspiriting loveliness of young Hope; each

  man’s heart became her home; she was enthroned sovereign of our

  lives, here and here-after; she was deified and worshipped, declared

  incorruptible and everlasting . But like all other gifts of the Creator

  to Man, she is mortal; her life has attained its last hour . We have

  watched over her; nursed her flickering existence; now she has fall-

  en at once from youth to decrepitude, from health to immedicinable

  disease; even as we spend ourselves in struggles for her recovery,

  she dies; to all nations the voice goes forth, Hope is dead! We are

  but mourners in the funeral tr
ain, and what immortal essence or per-

  ishable creation will refuse to make one in the sad procession that

  attends to its grave the dead comforter of humanity?

  Does not the sun call in his light? and day

  Like a thin exhalation melt away—

  Both wrapping up their beams in clouds to be

  Themselves close mourners at this obsequie.18

  VOL. III.

  CHAPTER I.

  Hear you not the rushing sound of the coming tempest? Do you

  not behold the clouds open, and destruction lurid and dire pour

  down on the blasted earth? See you not the thunderbolt fall, and are

  deafened by the shout of heaven that follows its descent? Feel you

  not the earth quake and open with agonizing groans, while the air is

  pregnant with shrieks and wailings,— all announcing the last days

  18

  Cleveland’s Poems .

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  of man? No! none of these things accompanied our fall! The balmy

  air of spring, breathed from nature’s ambrosial home, invested the

  lovely earth, which wakened as a young mother about to lead forth

  in pride her beauteous offspring to meet their sire who had been long

  absent. The buds decked the trees, the flowers adorned the land:

  the dark branches, swollen with seasonable juices, expanded into

  leaves, and the variegated foliage of spring, bending and singing in

  the breeze, rejoiced in the genial warmth of the unclouded empy-

  rean: the brooks flowed murmuring, the sea was waveless, and the

  promontories that over-hung it were reflected in the placid waters;

  birds awoke in the woods, while abundant food for man and beast

  sprung up from the dark ground . Where was pain and evil? Not in

  the calm air or weltering ocean; not in the woods or fertile fields,

  nor among the birds that made the woods resonant with song, nor

  the animals that in the midst of plenty basked in the sunshine . Our

  enemy, like the Calamity of Homer, trod our hearts, and no sound

  was echoed from her steps—

  With ills the land is rife, with ills the sea,

  Diseases haunt our frail humanity,

  Through noon, through night, on casual wing they glide,

  Silent,—a voice the power all-wise denied.19

  Once man was a favourite of the Creator, as the royal psalmist

  sang, “God had made him a little lower than the angels, and had

  crowned him with glory and honour . God made him to have domin-

  ion over the works of his hands, and put all things under his feet .”

  Once it was so; now is man lord of the creation? Look at him—ha!

  I see plague! She has invested his form, is incarnate in his flesh,

  has entwined herself with his being, and blinds his heaven-seeking

  eyes. Lie down, O man, on the flower-strown earth; give up all claim

  to your inheritance, all you can ever possess of it is the small cell

  which the dead require . Plague is the companion of spring, of sun-

  shine, and plenty . We no longer struggle with her . We have forgotten

  19

  Elton’s translation of Hesiod .

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  what we did when she was not . Of old navies used to stem the giant

  ocean-waves betwixt Indus and the Pole for slight articles of luxury .

  Men made perilous journies to possess themselves of earth’s splen-

  did trifles, gems and gold. Human labour was wasted—human life

  set at nought . Now life is all that we covet; that this automaton of

  flesh should, with joints and springs in order, perform its functions,

  that this dwelling of the soul should be capable of containing its

  dweller . Our minds, late spread abroad through countless spheres

  and endless combinations of thought, now retrenched themselves

  behind this wall of flesh, eager to preserve its well-being only. We

  were surely sufficiently degraded.

  At first the increase of sickness in spring brought increase of

  toil to such of us, who, as yet spared to life, bestowed our time

  and thoughts on our fellow creatures . We nerved ourselves to the

  task: “in the midst of despair we performed the tasks of hope .” We

  went out with the resolution of disputing with our foe . We aided the

  sick, and comforted the sorrowing; turning from the multitudinous

  dead to the rare survivors, with an energy of desire that bore the

  resemblance of power, we bade them—live . Plague sat paramount

  the while, and laughed us to scorn .

  Have any of you, my readers, observed the ruins of an anthill

  immediately after its destruction? At first it appears entirely deserted

  of its former inhabitants; in a little time you see an ant struggling

  through the upturned mould; they reappear by twos and threes, run-

  ning hither and thither in search of their lost companions . Such were

  we upon earth, wondering aghast at the effects of pestilence . Our

  empty habitations remained, but the dwellers were gathered to the

  shades of the tomb .

  As the rules of order and pressure of laws were lost, some began

  with hesitation and wonder to transgress the accustomed uses of so-

  ciety . Palaces were deserted, and the poor man dared at length, un-

  reproved, intrude into the splendid apartments, whose very furniture

  and decorations were an unknown world to him . It was found, that,

  though at first the stop put to all circulation of property, had reduced

  those before supported by the factitious wants of society to sudden

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  and hideous poverty, yet when the boundaries of private possession

  were thrown down, the products of human labour at present exist-

  ing were more, far more, than the thinned generation could possibly

  consume . To some among the poor this was matter of exultation . We

  were all equal now; magnificent dwellings, luxurious carpets, and

  beds of down, were afforded to all . Carriages and horses, gardens,

  pictures, statues, and princely libraries, there were enough of these

  even to superfluity; and there was nothing to prevent each from as-

  suming possession of his share . We were all equal now; but near at

  hand was an equality still more levelling, a state where beauty and

  strength, and wisdom, would be as vain as riches and birth . The

  grave yawned beneath us all, and its prospect prevented any of us

  from enjoying the ease and plenty which in so awful a manner was

  presented to us .

  Still the bloom did not fade on the cheeks of my babes; and Clara

  sprung up in years and growth, unsullied by disease . We had no rea-

  son to think the site of Windsor Castle peculiarly healthy, for many

  other families had expired beneath its roof; we lived therefore with-

  out any particular precaution; but we lived, it seemed, in safety . If

  Idris became thin and pale, it was anxiety that occasioned the change;

  an anxiety I could in no way alleviate . She never complained, but

  sleep and appetite fled from her, a slow fever preyed on her veins,

  her colour was hectic, and she often wept in secret; gloomy prog-

  nostications, care, and agonizing dread, ate up the principle of life

  within her . I could not fail to perceive this change . I often wish
ed

  that I had permitted her to take her own course, and engage herself

  in such labours for the welfare of others as might have distracted

  her thoughts . But it was too late now . Besides that, with the nearly

  extinct race of man, all our toils grew near a conclusion, she was

  too weak; consumption, if so it might be called, or rather the over

  active life within her, which, as with Adrian, spent the vital oil in the

  early morning hours, deprived her limbs of strength . At night, when

  she could leave me unperceived, she wandered through the house,

  or hung over the couches of her children; and in the day time would

  sink into a perturbed sleep, while her murmurs and starts betrayed

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  the unquiet dreams that vexed her . As this state of wretchedness be-

  came more confirmed, and, in spite of her endeavours at concealment

  more apparent, I strove, though vainly, to awaken in her courage and

  hope . I could not wonder at the vehemence of her care; her very soul

  was tenderness; she trusted indeed that she should not outlive me if

  I became the prey of the vast calamity, and this thought sometimes

  relieved her . We had for many years trod the highway of life hand

  in hand, and still thus linked, we might step within the shades of

  death; but her children, her lovely, playful, animated children—be-

  ings sprung from her own dear side—portions of her own being—

  depositories of our loves—even if we died, it would be comfort to

  know that they ran man’s accustomed course . But it would not be

  so; young and blooming as they were, they would die, and from the

  hopes of maturity, from the proud name of attained manhood, they

  were cut off for ever. Often with maternal affection she had figured

  their merits and talents exerted on life’s wide stage . Alas for these

  latter days! The world had grown old, and all its inmates partook of

  the decrepitude . Why talk of infancy, manhood, and old age? We all

  stood equal sharers of the last throes of time-worn nature . Arrived

  at the same point of the world’s age—there was no difference in us;

  the name of parent and child had lost their meaning; young boys and

  girls were level now with men . This was all true; but it was not less

  agonizing to take the admonition home .

  Where could we turn, and not find a desolation pregnant with the