Poe, Edgar Allen - The Complete Works of Edgar Allen Poe

by Volume 01-05 (lit)

"Are my friends and keepers," interupted Monsieur Maillard, drawing

  himself up with hauteur, -- "my very good friends and assistants."

  "What! all of them?" I asked, -- "the women and all?"

  "Assuredly," he said, -- "we could not do at all without the women;

  they are the best lunatic nurses in the world; they have a way of

  their own, you know; their bright eyes have a marvellous effect; --

  something like the fascination of the snake, you know."

  "To be sure," said I, -- "to be sure! They behave a little odd, eh?

  -- they are a little queer, eh? -- don't you think so?"

  "Odd! -- queer! -- why, do you really think so? We are not very

  prudish, to be sure, here in the South -- do pretty much as we please

  -- enjoy life, and all that sort of thing, you know-"

  "To be sure," said I, -- "to be sure."

  And then, perhaps, this Clos de Vougeot is a little heady, you know

  -- a little strong -- you understand, eh?"

  "To be sure," said I, -- "to be sure. By the bye, Monsieur, did I

  understand you to say that the system you have adopted, in place of

  the celebrated soothing system, was one of very rigorous severity?"

  "By no means. Our confinement is necessarily close; but the treatment

  -- the medical treatment, I mean -- is rather agreeable to the

  patients than otherwise."

  "And the new system is one of your own invention?"

  "Not altogether. Some portions of it are referable to Professor Tarr,

  of whom you have, necessarily, heard; and, again, there are

  modifications in my plan which I am happy to acknowledge as belonging

  of right to the celebrated Fether, with whom, if I mistake not, you

  have the honor of an intimate acquaintance."

  "I am quite ashamed to confess," I replied, "that I have never even

  heard the names of either gentleman before."

  "Good heavens!" ejaculated my host, drawing back his chair abruptly,

  and uplifting his hands. "I surely do not hear you aright! You did

  not intend to say, eh? that you had never heard either of the learned

  Doctor Tarr, or of the celebrated Professor Fether?"

  "I am forced to acknowledge my ignorance," I replied; "but the truth

  should be held inviolate above all things. Nevertheless, I feel

  humbled to the dust, not to be acquainted with the works of these, no

  doubt, extraordinary men. I will seek out their writings forthwith,

  and peruse them with deliberate care. Monsieur Maillard, you have

  really -- I must confess it -- you have really -- made me ashamed of

  myself!"

  And this was the fact.

  "Say no more, my good young friend," he said kindly, pressing my

  hand, -- "join me now in a glass of Sauterne."

  We drank. The company followed our example without stint. They

  chatted -- they jested -- they laughed -- they perpetrated a thousand

  absurdities -- the fiddles shrieked -- the drum row-de-dowed -- the

  trombones bellowed like so many brazen bulls of Phalaris -- and the

  whole scene, growing gradually worse and worse, as the wines gained

  the ascendancy, became at length a sort of pandemonium in petto. In

  the meantime, Monsieur Maillard and myself, with some bottles of

  Sauterne and Vougeot between us, continued our conversation at the

  top of the voice. A word spoken in an ordinary key stood no more

  chance of being heard than the voice of a fish from the bottom of

  Niagra Falls.

  "And, sir," said I, screaming in his ear, "you mentioned something

  before dinner about the danger incurred in the old system of

  soothing. How is that?"

  "Yes," he replied, "there was, occasionally, very great danger

  indeed. There is no accounting for the caprices of madmen; and, in my

  opinion as well as in that of Dr. Tarr and Professor Fether, it is

  never safe to permit them to run at large unattended. A lunatic may

  be 'soothed,' as it is called, for a time, but, in the end, he is

  very apt to become obstreperous. His cunning, too, is proverbial and

  great. If he has a project in view, he conceals his design with a

  marvellous wisdom; and the dexterity with which he counterfeits

  sanity, presents, to the metaphysician, one of the most singular

  problems in the study of mind. When a madman appears thoroughly sane,

  indeed, it is high time to put him in a straitjacket."

  "But the danger, my dear sir, of which you were speaking, in your own

  experience -- during your control of this house -- have you had

  practical reason to think liberty hazardous in the case of a

  lunatic?"

  "Here? -- in my own experience? -- why, I may say, yes. For example:

  -- no very long while ago, a singular circumstance occurred in this

  very house. The 'soothing system,' you know, was then in operation,

  and the patients were at large. They behaved remarkably

  well-especially so, any one of sense might have known that some

  devilish scheme was brewing from that particular fact, that the

  fellows behaved so remarkably well. And, sure enough, one fine

  morning the keepers found themselves pinioned hand and foot, and

  thrown into the cells, where they were attended, as if they were the

  lunatics, by the lunatics themselves, who had usurped the offices of

  the keepers."

  "You don't tell me so! I never heard of any thing so absurd in my

  life!"

  "Fact -- it all came to pass by means of a stupid fellow -- a lunatic

  -- who, by some means, had taken it into his head that he had

  invented a better system of government than any ever heard of before

  -- of lunatic government, I mean. He wished to give his invention a

  trial, I suppose, and so he persuaded the rest of the patients to

  join him in a conspiracy for the overthrow of the reigning powers."

  "And he really succeeded?"

  "No doubt of it. The keepers and kept were soon made to exchange

  places. Not that exactly either -- for the madmen had been free, but

  the keepers were shut up in cells forthwith, and treated, I am sorry

  to say, in a very cavalier manner."

  "But I presume a counter-revolution was soon effected. This condition

  of things could not have long existed. The country people in the

  neighborhood-visitors coming to see the establishment -- would have

  given the alarm."

  "There you are out. The head rebel was too cunning for that. He

  admitted no visitors at all -- with the exception, one day, of a very

  stupid-looking young gentleman of whom he had no reason to be afraid.

  He let him in to see the place -- just by way of variety, -- to have

  a little fun with him. As soon as he had gammoned him sufficiently,

  he let him out, and sent him about his business."

  "And how long, then, did the madmen reign?"

  "Oh, a very long time, indeed -- a month certainly -- how much longer

  I can't precisely say. In the meantime, the lunatics had a jolly

  season of it -- that you may swear. They doffed their own shabby

  clothes, and made free with the family wardrobe and jewels. The

  cellars of the chateau were well stocked with wine; and these madmen

  are just the devils that know how to drink it. They lived well, I can

  tell you."

  "And the treatment -- what was the
particular species of treatment

  which the leader of the rebels put into operation?"

  "Why, as for that, a madman is not necessarily a fool, as I have

  already observed; and it is my honest opinion that his treatment was

  a much better treatment than that which it superseded. It was a very

  capital system indeed -- simple -- neat -- no trouble at all -- in

  fact it was delicious it was

  Here my host's observations were cut short by another series of

  yells, of the same character as those which had previously

  disconcerted us. This time, however, they seemed to proceed from

  persons rapidly approaching.

  "Gracious heavens!" I ejaculated -- "the lunatics have most

  undoubtedly broken loose."

  "I very much fear it is so," replied Monsieur Maillard, now becoming

  excessively pale. He had scarcely finished the sentence, before loud

  shouts and imprecations were heard beneath the windows; and,

  immediately afterward, it became evident that some persons outside

  were endeavoring to gain entrance into the room. The door was beaten

  with what appeared to be a sledge-hammer, and the shutters were

  wrenched and shaken with prodigious violence.

  A scene of the most terrible confusion ensued. Monsieur Maillard, to

  my excessive astonishment threw himself under the side-board. I had

  expected more resolution at his hands. The members of the orchestra,

  who, for the last fifteen minutes, had been seemingly too much

  intoxicated to do duty, now sprang all at once to their feet and to

  their instruments, and, scrambling upon their table, broke out, with

  one accord, into, "Yankee Doodle," which they performed, if not

  exactly in tune, at least with an energy superhuman, during the whole

  of the uproar.

  Meantime, upon the main dining-table, among the bottles and glasses,

  leaped the gentleman who, with such difficulty, had been restrained

  from leaping there before. As soon as he fairly settled himself, he

  commenced an oration, which, no doubt, was a very capital one, if it

  could only have been heard. At the same moment, the man with the

  teetotum predilection, set himself to spinning around the apartment,

  with immense energy, and with arms outstretched at right angles with

  his body; so that he had all the air of a tee-totum in fact, and

  knocked everybody down that happened to get in his way. And now, too,

  hearing an incredible popping and fizzing of champagne, I discovered

  at length, that it proceeded from the person who performed the bottle

  of that delicate drink during dinner. And then, again, the frog-man

  croaked away as if the salvation of his soul depended upon every note

  that he uttered. And, in the midst of all this, the continuous

  braying of a donkey arose over all. As for my old friend, Madame

  Joyeuse, I really could have wept for the poor lady, she appeared so

  terribly perplexed. All she did, however, was to stand up in a

  corner, by the fireplace, and sing out incessantly at the top of her

  voice, "Cock-a-doodle-de-dooooooh!"

  And now came the climax -- the catastrophe of the drama. As no

  resistance, beyond whooping and yelling and cock-a-doodling, was

  offered to the encroachments of the party without, the ten windows

  were very speedily, and almost simultaneously, broken in. But I shall

  never forget the emotions of wonder and horror with which I gazed,

  when, leaping through these windows, and down among us pele-mele,

  fighting, stamping, scratching, and howling, there rushed a perfect

  army of what I took to be Chimpanzees, Ourang-Outangs, or big black

  baboons of the Cape of Good Hope.

  I received a terrible beating -- after which I rolled under a sofa

  and lay still. After lying there some fifteen minutes, during which

  time I listened with all my ears to what was going on in the room, I

  came to same satisfactory denouement of this tragedy. Monsieur

  Maillard, it appeared, in giving me the account of the lunatic who

  had excited his fellows to rebellion, had been merely relating his

  own exploits. This gentleman had, indeed, some two or three years

  before, been the superintendent of the establishment, but grew crazy

  himself, and so became a patient. This fact was unknown to the

  travelling companion who introduced me. The keepers, ten in number,

  having been suddenly overpowered, were first well tarred, then --

  carefully feathered, and then shut up in underground cells. They had

  been so imprisoned for more than a month, during which period

  Monsieur Maillard had generously allowed them not only the tar and

  feathers (which constituted his "system"), but some bread and

  abundance of water. The latter was pumped on them daily. At length,

  one escaping through a sewer, gave freedom to all the rest.

  The "soothing system," with important modifications, has been resumed

  at the chateau; yet I cannot help agreeing with Monsieur Maillard,

  that his own "treatment" was a very capital one of its kind. As he

  justly observed, it was "simple -- neat -- and gave no trouble at all

  -- not the least."

  I have only to add that, although I have searched every library in

  Europe for the works of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether, I have, up

  to the present day, utterly failed in my endeavors at procuring an

  edition.

  ~~~ End of Text ~~~

  ======

  HOW TO WRITE A BLACKWOOD ARTICLE.

  "In the name of the Prophet -- figs !!"

  _ Cry of the Turkish fig-peddler_.

  I PRESUME everybody has heard of me. My name is the Signora Psyche

  Zenobia. This I know to be a fact. Nobody but my enemies ever calls

  me Suky Snobbs. I have been assured that Suky is but a vulgar

  corruption of Psyche, which is good Greek, and means "the soul"

  (that's me, I'm all soul) and sometimes "a butterfly," which latter

  meaning undoubtedly alludes to my appearance in my new crimson satin

  dress, with the sky-blue Arabian mantelet, and the trimmings of green

  agraffas, and the seven flounces of orange-colored auriculas. As for

  Snobbs -- any person who should look at me would be instantly aware

  that my name wasn't Snobbs. Miss Tabitha Turnip propagated that