Complete Works of Lewis Carroll

by Lewis Carroll

  Lady Muriel looked at him enquiringly, but she seemed to have learned by intuition, what years of experience had taught me, that the way to elicit Arthur's deepest thoughts was neither to assent nor dissent, but simply to listen.

  "At that time," he went on, "a great tidal wave of selfishness was sweeping over human thought. Right and Wrong had somehow been transformed into Gain and Loss, and Religion had become a sort of commercial transaction. We may be thankful that our preachers are beginning to take a nobler view of life."

  "But is it not taught again and again in the Bible?" I ventured to ask.

  "Not in the Bible as a whole," said Arthur. "In the Old Testament, no doubt, rewards and punishments are constantly appealed to as motives for action. That teaching is best for children, and the Israelites seem to have been, mentally, utter children. We guide our children thus, at first: but we appeal, as soon as possible, to their innate sense of Right and Wrong: and, when that stage is safely past, we appeal to the highest motive of all, the desire for likeness to, and union with, the Supreme Good. I think you will find that to be the teaching of the Bible, as a whole, beginning with 'that thy days may be long in the land,' and ending with 'be ye perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.'"

  We were silent for awhile, and then Arthur went off on another tack. "Look at the literature of Hymns, now. How cankered it is, through and through, with selfishness! There are few human compositions more utterly degraded than some modern Hymns!"

  I quoted the stanza

  "Whatever, Lord, we tend to Thee,

  Repaid a thousandfold shall be,

  Then gladly will we give to Thee,

  Giver of all!'

  "Yes," he said grimly: "that is the typical stanza. And the very last charity-sermon I heard was infected with it. After giving many good reasons for charity, the preacher wound up with 'and, for all you give, you will be repaid a thousandfold!' Oh the utter meanness of such a motive, to be put before men who do know what self-sacrifice is, who can appreciate generosity and heroism! Talk of Original Sin!" he went on with increasing bitterness. "Can you have a stronger proof of the Original Goodness there must be in this nation, than the fact that Religion has been preached to us, as a commercial speculation, for a century, and that we still believe in a God?"

  "It couldn't have gone on so long," Lady Muriel musingly remarked, "if the Opposition hadn't been practically silenced—put under what the French call la cloture. Surely in any lecture-hall, or in private society, such teaching would soon have been hooted down?"

  "I trust so," said Arthur: "and, though I don't want to see 'brawling in church' legalised, I must say that our preachers enjoy an enormous privilege—which they ill deserve, and which they misuse terribly. We put our man into a pulpit, and we virtually tell him 'Now, you may stand there and talk to us for half-an-hour. We won't interrupt you by so much as a word! You shall have it all your own way!' And what does he give us in return? Shallow twaddle, that, if it were addressed to you over a dinner-table, you would think 'Does the man take me for a fool?'"

  The return of Eric from his walk checked the tide of Arthur's eloquence, and, after a few minutes' talk on more conventional topics, we took our leave. Lady Muriel walked with us to the gate. "You have given me much to think about," she said earnestly, as she gave Arthur her hand. "I'm so glad you came in!" And her words brought a real glow of pleasure into that pale worn face of his.

  On the Tuesday, as Arthur did not seem equal to more walking, I took a long stroll by myself, having stipulated that he was not to give the whole day to his books, but was to meet me at the Hall at about tea-time. On my way back, I passed the Station just as the afternoon-train came in sight, and sauntered down the stairs to see it come in. But there was little to gratify my idle curiosity: and, when the train was empty, and the platform clear, I found it was about time to be moving on, if I meant to reach the Hall by five.

  As I approached the end of the platform, from which a steep irregular wooden staircase conducted to the upper world, I noticed two passengers, who had evidently arrived by the train, but who, oddly enough, had entirely escaped my notice, though the arrivals had been so few. They were a young woman and a little girl: the former, so far as one could judge by appearances, was a nursemaid, or possibly a nursery-governess, in attendance on the child, whose refined face, even more than her dress, distinguished her as of a higher class than her companion.

  The child's face was refined, but it was also a worn and sad one, and told a tale (or so I seemed to read it) of much illness and suffering, sweetly and patiently borne. She had a little crutch to help herself along with: and she was now standing, looking wistfully up the long staircase, and apparently waiting till she could muster courage to begin the toilsome ascent.

  There are some things one says in life—as well as things one does—which come automatically, by reflex action, as the physiologists say (meaning, no doubt, action without reflection, just as lucus is said to be derived 'a non lucendo'). Closing one's eyelids, when something seems to be flying into the eye, is one of those actions, and saying "May I carry the little girl up the stairs?" was another. It wasn't that any thought of offering help occurred to me, and that then I spoke: the first intimation I had, of being likely to make that offer, was the sound of my own voice, and the discovery that the offer had been made. The servant paused, doubtfully glancing from her charge to me, and then back again to the child. "Would you like it, dear?" she asked her. But no such doubt appeared to cross the child's mind: she lifted her arms eagerly to be taken up. "Please!" was all she said, while a faint smile flickered on the weary little face. I took her up with scrupulous care, and her little arm was at once clasped trustfully round my neck.

  She was a very light weight—so light, in fact, that the ridiculous idea crossed my mind that it was rather easier going up, with her in my arms, than it would have been without her: and, when we reached the road above, with its cart-ruts and loose stones—all formidable obstacles for a lame child—I found that I had said "I'd better carry her over this rough place," before I had formed any mental connection between its roughness and my gentle little burden. "Indeed it's troubling you too much, Sir!" the maid exclaimed. "She can walk very well on the flat." But the arm, that was twined about my neck, clung just an atom more closely at the suggestion, and decided me to say "She's no weight, really. I'll carry her a little further. I'm going your way."

  The nurse raised no further objection: and the next speaker was a ragged little boy, with bare feet, and a broom over his shoulder, who ran across the road, and pretended to sweep the perfectly dry road in front of us. "Give us a 'ap'ny!" the little urchin pleaded, with a broad grin on his dirty face.

  "Don't give him a 'ap'ny!" said the little lady in my arms. The words sounded harsh: but the tone was gentleness itself. "He's an idle little boy!" And she laughed a laugh of such silvery sweetness as I had never yet heard from any lips but Sylvie's. To my astonishment, the boy actually joined in the laugh, as if there were some subtle sympathy between them, as he ran away down the road and vanished through a gap in the hedge.

  But he was back in a few moments, having discarded his broom and provided himself, from some mysterious source, with an exquisite bouquet of flowers. "Buy a posy, buy a posy! Only a 'ap'ny!" he chanted, with the melancholy drawl of a professional beggar.

  "Don't buy it!" was Her Majesty's edict as she looked down, with a lofty scorn that seemed curiously mixed with tender interest, on the ragged creature at her feet.

  But this time I turned rebel, and ignored the royal commands. Such lovely flowers, and of forms so entirely new to me, were not to be abandoned at the bidding of any little maid, however imperious. I bought the bouquet: and the little boy, after popping the halfpenny into his mouth, turned head-over-heels, as if to ascertain whether the human mouth is really adapted to serve as a money-box.

  With wonder, that increased every moment, I turned over the flowers, and examined them one by one: there was no
t a single one among them that I could remember having ever seen before. At last I turned to the nursemaid. "Do these flowers grow wild about here? I never saw—" but the speech died away on my lips. The nursemaid had vanished!

  "You can put me down, now, if you like," Sylvie quietly remarked.

  I obeyed in silence, and could only ask myself "Is this a dream?", on finding Sylvie and Bruno walking one on either side of me, and clinging to my hands with the ready confidence of childhood.

  "You're larger than when I saw you last!" I began. "Really I think we ought to be introduced again! There's so much of you that I never met before, you know."

  "Very well!" Sylvie merrily replied. "This is Bruno. It doesn't take long. He's only got one name!"

  "There's another name to me!" Bruno protested, with a reproachful look at the Mistress of the Ceremonies. "And it's—' Esquire'!"

  "Oh, of course. I forgot," said Sylvie. "Bruno—Esquire!"

  "And did you come here to meet me, my children?" I enquired.

  "You know I said we'd come on Tuesday, Sylvie explained. "Are we the proper size for common children?"

  "Quite the right size for children," I replied, (adding mentally "though not common children, by any means!") "But what became of the nursemaid?"

  "It are gone!" Bruno solemnly replied.

  "Then it wasn't solid, like Sylvie and you?"

  "No. Oo couldn't touch it, oo know. If oo walked at it, oo'd go right froo!"

  "I quite expected you'd find it out, once," said Sylvie. "Bruno ran it against a telegraph post, by accident. And it went in two halves. But you were looking the other way."

  I felt that I had indeed missed an opportunity: to witness such an event as a nursemaid going 'in two halves' does not occur twice in a life-time!

  "When did oo guess it were Sylvie?" Bruno enquired.

  "I didn't guess it, till it was Sylvie," I said. "But how did

  You manage the nursemaid? "

  "Bruno managed it," said Sylvie. "It's called a Phlizz."

  "And how do you make a Phlizz, Bruno?"

  "The Professor teached me how," said Bruno.

  "First oo takes a lot of air—"

  "Oh, Bruno!" Sylvie interposed. "The Professor said you weren't to tell!"

  But who did her voice?" I asked.

  "Indeed it's troubling you too much, Sir! She can walk very well on the flat."

  Bruno laughed merrily as I turned hastily from side to side, looking in all directions for the speaker. "That were me!" he gleefully proclaimed, in his own voice.

  "She can indeed walk very well on the flat," I said. "And I think I was the Flat."

  By this time we were near the Hall. "This is where my friends live,"

  I said. "Will you come in and have some tea with them?"

  Bruno gave a little jump of joy: and Sylvie said "Yes, please. You'd like some tea, Bruno, wouldn't you? He hasn't tasted tea," she explained to me, "since we left Outland."

  "And that weren't good tea!" said Bruno. "It were so welly weak!"

  CHAPTER 20.

  LIGHT COME, LIGHT GO.

  Lady Muriel's smile of welcome could not quite conceal the look of surprise with which she regarded my new companions.

  I presented them in due form. "This is Sylvie, Lady Muriel. And this is Bruno."

  "Any surname?" she enquired, her eyes twinkling with fun.

  "No," I said gravely. "No surname."

  She laughed, evidently thinking I said it in fun; and stooped to kiss the children a salute to which Bruno submitted with reluctance: Sylvie returned it with interest.

  While she and Arthur (who had arrived before me) supplied the children with tea and cake, I tried to engage the Earl in conversation: but he was restless and distrait, and we made little progress. At last, by a sudden question, he betrayed the cause of his disquiet.

  "Would you let me look at those flowers you have in your hand?"

  "Willingly!" I said, handing him the bouquet. Botany was, I knew, a favourite study of his: and these flowers were to me so entirely new and mysterious, that I was really curious to see what a botanist would say of them.

  They did not diminish his disquiet. On the contrary, he became every moment more excited as he turned them over. "These are all from Central India!" he said, laying aside part of the bouquet. "They are rare, even there: and I have never seen them in any other part of the world. These two are Mexican—This one—" (He rose hastily, and carried it to the window, to examine it in a better light, the flush of excitement mounting to his very forehead) "—-is. I am nearly sure —but I have a book of Indian Botany here—" He took a volume from the book-shelves, and turned the leaves with trembling fingers. "Yes! Compare it with this picture! It is the exact duplicate! This is the flower of the Upas-tree, which usually grows only in the depths of forests; and the flower fades so quickly after being plucked, that it is scarcely possible to keep its form or colour even so far as the outskirts of the forest! Yet this is in full bloom! Where did you get these flowers?" he added with breathless eagerness.

  I glanced at Sylvie, who, gravely and silently, laid her finger on her lips, then beckoned to Bruno to follow her, and ran out into the garden; and I found myself in the position of a defendant whose two most important witnesses have been suddenly taken away. "Let me give you the flowers!" I stammered out at last, quite 'at my wit's end' as to how to get out of the difficulty. "You know much more about them than I do!"

  "I accept them most gratefully! But you have not yet told me—" the Earl was beginning, when we were interrupted, to my great relief, by the arrival of Eric Lindon.

  To Arthur, however, the new-comer was, I saw clearly, anything but welcome. His face clouded over: he drew a little back from the circle, and took no further part in the conversation, which was wholly maintained, for some minutes, by Lady Muriel and her lively cousin, who were discussing some new music that had just arrived from London.

  "Do just try this one!" he pleaded. "The music looks easy to sing at sight, and the song's quite appropriate to the occasion."

  "Then I suppose it's

  'Five o'clock tea!

  Ever to thee

  Faithful I'll be,

  Five o'clock tea!"'

  laughed Lady Muriel, as she sat down to the piano, and lightly struck a few random chords.

  "Not quite: and yet it is a kind of 'ever to thee faithful I'll be!' It's a pair of hapless lovers: he crosses the briny deep: and she is left lamenting."

  "That is indeed appropriate!" she replied mockingly, as he placed the song before her.

  "And am I to do the lamenting? And who for, if you please?"

  She played the air once or twice through, first in quick, and finally in slow, time; and then gave us the whole song with as much graceful ease as if she had been familiar with it all her life:—

  "He stept so lightly to the land,

  All in his manly pride:

  He kissed her cheek, he pressed her hand,

  Yet still she glanced aside.

  'Too gay he seems,' she darkly dreams,

  'Too gallant and too gay

  To think of me—poor simple me—-

  When he is far away!'

  'I bring my Love this goodly pearl

  Across the seas,' he said:

  'A gem to deck the dearest girl

  That ever sailor wed!'

  She clasps it tight' her eyes are bright:

  Her throbbing heart would say

  'He thought of me—he thought of me—-

  When he was far away!'

  The ship has sailed into the West:

  Her ocean-bird is flown:

  A dull dead pain is in her breast,

  And she is weak and lone:

  Yet there's a smile upon her face,

  A smile that seems to say

  'He'll think of me he'll think of me—-

  When he is far away!

  'Though waters wide between us glide,

  Our lives are warm and near:

/>   No distance parts two faithful hearts

  Two hearts that love so dear:

  And I will trust my sailor-lad,

  For ever and a day,

  To think of me—to think of me—-

  When he is far away!'"

  The look of displeasure, which had begun to come over Arthur's face when the young Captain spoke of Love so lightly, faded away as the song proceeded, and he listened with evident delight. But his face darkened again when Eric demurely remarked "Don't you think 'my soldier-lad' would have fitted the tune just as well!"

  "Why, so it would!" Lady Muriel gaily retorted.

  "Soldiers, sailors, tinkers, tailors, what a lot of words would fit in!

  I think 'my tinker-lad sounds best. Don't you?"

  To spare my friend further pain, I rose to go, just as the Earl was beginning to repeat his particularly embarrassing question about the flowers.

  "You have not yet—'

  "Yes, I've had some tea, thank you!" I hastily interrupted him.

  "And now we really must be going. Good evening, Lady Muriel!"

  And we made our adieux, and escaped, while the Earl was still absorbed

  in examining the mysterious bouquet.

  Lady Muriel accompanied us to the door. "You couldn't have given my father a more acceptable present!" she said, warmly. "He is so passionately fond of Botany. I'm afraid I know nothing of the theory of it, but I keep his Hortus Siccus in order. I must get some sheets of blotting-paper, and dry these new treasures for him before they fade.

  "That won't be no good at all!" said Bruno, who was waiting for us in the garden.

  "Why won't it?" said I. "You know I had to give the flowers, to stop questions?

  "Yes, it ca'n't be helped," said Sylvie: "but they will be sorry when they find them gone!"

  "But how will they go?"

  "Well, I don't know how. But they will go. The nosegay was only a Phlizz, you know. Bruno made it up."

  These last words were in a whisper, as she evidently did not wish Arthur to hear. But of this there seemed to be little risk: he hardly seemed to notice the children, but paced on, silent and abstracted; and when, at the entrance to the wood, they bid us a hasty farewell and ran off, he seemed to wake out of a day-dream.